Friday Night Lights - Kieran plays at halftime

Kieran's playing tackle football this fall, practices are Tuesday and Thursday nights from 6:00 - 7:30. The highlight of the fall was last night when the 3rd and 4th graders played at halftime of the Central Raider game.  Kieran has really been looking forward to it (last week when the Raiders were in Watertown, their little ones played at halftime and Kieran said "that will be me next week dad!").

We go to all the games and Kieran really does enjoy watching his favorite players (#4 and #5).  Last night he just had to wear his football pants...

Friday nights at Central are always great to watch the sunset (if there aren't any clouds like last night)...

Can you find Kieran?  He's the fullback in the backfield, getting down into position ready for the snap of the ball...he got a carry, went for almost two yards and got creamed...

He plays defense too...here he is as the left cornerback...you can almost make out the 0 on his jersey (his number is 10)...

Everyone came out to watch him play...although Luke and Lex were too busy running around to notice that he was on the field.

The Raiders beat Sibley East 35-6, it was a good night for Kieran.  The team is now 4-1 on the season, though they have two really tough games coming up yet.

The team picture....look to the front right...

Duluth-Goosberry Falls-Split Rock Lighthouse

A few weekends ago, we were up on the North Shore.  Maddy was scheduled to do the Inline 1/2 marathon and Sarah was going to do the Wheels Off Half Marathon run.  We decided to camp at Gooseberry because I had two nights reserved at the campground in July that we couldn't keep because of Luke going to school.  We were able to change the reservation, though we couldn't keep our favorite site - #27.

The races were on Saturday morning, we woke up to temperatures around 38 degrees and the skies were sunny.  We've been to a lot of races, but we're not familiar with times for inline skates -- we missed Maddy coming through, but caught Sarah on the run.

What do you do on the North Shore?  The kids throw rocks....lots of rocks.  Though Luke always looks for something bigger....

After the mornings races, Sarah wanted to go to Split Rock Lighthouse since Maddy had never been there....so off we went.  Of course you have to climb to the top.

Of course you have to walk all the way down to the Lake...though not everybody goes at the same speed...

Since it's so many steps down to the lake, most people require a short rest before walking back up, these four were no different...

It is a nice view from below the lighthouse...

It was certainly cool when the sun went behind the clouds, the wind didn't help either.

Sunday morning, we had to go check out the falls near the visitor center...

Kieran and I took a quick 1.7 mile hike up to the fifth falls, we had never seen them before...

They're in a gorge, but with the low sun angle and just the phone, it was tough to get a decent picture.  That means we'll have to go back...

Site #25 wasn't too bad...it certainly isn't as good as #27, but not too bad.  I've actually made reservations for the same site next summer during the weekend of Grandma's Marathon for the same site.

The Conservation Corps has been busy at Gooseberry's campground, they've completely re-landscaped the area around the bathroom and shower...nobody thought that was very cool, but I certainly noticed!  (actually, they thought it was pretty dumb that I was taking a picture of a bathroom....).

Steamboat Days Parade

Carver Steamboat Days were the weekend after Labor Day.  We went to the fireworks on Saturday night and the parade on Sunday.  All the kids except for Lex helped papa and Robb's Electric hand out popcorn/cotton candy.

Some of them rode....

Some of them walked...

Luke wondered if he had to give his sister some popcorn...

In the end, he did...

All in all, it was an exhausting day...

Lex's First Day of Preschool

We've finally sent our last one off to school!  Lex went to preschool for the first time today.  She was very excited for the last few weeks, then suddenly there were a few tears this morning, but she got over them fairly quickly.

This is what it looks like when you send 3 feet 4 inches and 27 pounds (I'm not quite sure of the actual stats, but she's tiny) off to school...

She had everything picked out early --- she accessorized with the hat, shoes and even a neckless.

Sarah came back to Cologne to see her off to school and take the pictures.  Lex rides a smaller, preschool bus to school, but rides the regular elementary bus back to daycare (Kieran and Luke also ride that bus, but it sounds as though they pretty much ignored her until they all got off the bus).

So where is this bus anyway?  I'm ready!

See you later mom!

State Fair

Four of us went to the Minnesota State Fair the Sunday before Labor Day.  What do we do when we go to the state fair?

Our first stop was to the DNR building, Kieran wanted to see the fish.  We couldn't pass up a picture opportunity supporting the Conservation Corps...

Last year we didn't climb the first tower because the heat index the day we went to the fair was about 105-110 degrees.  We climbed the tower this year.

And scouted where we would head next.  "Mom....where's that big slide?"

"It's right over there Kieran"

Some of us had other plans...."Maddy, how do we ditch these loser parents?"

It was a busy day at the fair, the fair set an all-time attendance record this year.

We made it to the dairy building, the lines for shakes was so long we settled for watching a dairy princesses likeness getting carved into butter.

Had to check out the Miracle of Birth building, some of the little piglets were just minutes old (check out Kieran's face for a record of some of the food we ate)...

When we went to the KARE11 barn, news anchor, Rena Sarigianopoulos was there taking pictures.  So of course, we had the kids get one...

We took a ride on the Space Tower this year...see here we all are somewhere on the way up or down.

Here's our picture after the ride...it's a lot taller than the fire tower!

The only thing Kieran wanted to do that day was play a 3 inning whiffle ball game.  He got his chance, though we had to go there twice until it was open.

It was a fun day!

Luke's Birthday

The day finally came...it's Luke's 6th birthday.  A few days ago, Luke said that on his birthday, he was going to be in charge of everyone....um, sorry buddy, mom and dad are still in charge --- but Luke does get to decide some things today.

Luke woke up and found his cake --- covered in Dinosaurs.  A huge hit, even though we haven't had any cake yet.  Luke decided that he wanted donuts for breakfast...so Sarah and he went to Holiday to get them (at 5:20 am).

After eating his donut, he decided he would like to open a present or two before leaving for daycare and school.  Sarah placed two in a bags and we were ready.  What do you get Luke?  A dinosaur that is also a vehicle....

 He's totally content and happy!

 Now, Luke was totally awake and ready for presents.  Not everyone was as enthused about waking up at 6:00 for presents....Maddy wasn't the only one who was still pretty tired --- Kieran would've rather slept and Lex was pretty much having a meltdown.

Sarah was going to school today to eat lunch with him today.  Luke also decided he wants to eat at Unhinged Pizza and watch Dolphin Tale tonight.  So that sounds like our plan.

First Day of School

First day of school was today.  Maddy (Grade 10), Kieran (Grade 3), Luke (Kindergarten) and Lex (almost preschool...next week).  All of these were taken by Sarah.

A deal was made by Sarah with Luke.  She'll watch him get on the bus Thursday, his birthday, and take pictures then (you'll probably see updates then).  Apparently, they got a little rushed and plans changed this morning --- Maddy was going to be dropped off first in Chaska and then Sarah was going to watch the boys get on the bus.  But, it'll all work out in the end.

Lex will ride the bus to and from school for the first time next week when preschool starts.  She is not going to have a problem getting on the bus (if you remember Luke's first time....).  I'm sure you'll see some pictures next week too....

Kieran's got homework tonight...so.....

Running

I rarely write a post that directly involves me, but here we go.  During the summer of 2013, when I was camping/hiking with the boys for a week on the Gunflint Trial I realized that I was badly out of shape.  I was winded and sweating from hikes that shouldn't have been much of a problem.  The boys were easily out pacing me.  So when we got back I started running and going to Safari Island to lift/workout.

After watching Sarah do the Boston Marathon this spring, I got inspired to do something more, so I signed up for the Twin Cities Marathon on October 5th this fall (Sarah signed up for the marathon too shortly after her Ironman).  I track everything....so here's my last three months of running.

June:
Days in red are the days that I ran, blue were days taken off.  A total of 118.49 miles that month, I was supposed to do a 1/2 marathon on June 1, but it was called off due to thunderstorms.

July:

A total of 184.41 miles that month, its where the long runs really began.

August:
Just finished yesterday.  A total of 185.53 miles.  My legs are tiring some, you may be able to see that my average pace has decreased every month, it's almost over....

It's a total of 488.43 miles for June-August.  And here's my totals for the year and since I began running again last summer.

I also won a complimentary registration to the 2015 Grandmas Marathon next June 20, so there'll be one more marathon.  I've got two 1/2 marathons this fall yet, one before Twin Cities and one after Twin Cities.  But overall, am doing much better physically than before July 2013.