Monday, November 30, 2009

My First Race!

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On Thanksgiving morning I ran the Oregon Mid-Valley Road Race, my first race ever.  I have never been a runner; it takes too much effort, but I’m actually starting to like it.  Just after the one mile mark a photographer was taking pictures and here I am

I signed up for the 5.2 mile scenic challenge.  Interpret “scenic” to mean “hills.”  There was one stretch of “significant elevation gain” about 2 miles in.  Most of the runners around me turned left and ran back for the second half of the flat 3.75 mile run, and I turned right up the switchback road.  I managed to keep my jogging cadence up rather than relaxing into a walk, but near the end of the killer hill a guy who was walking caught up to me and we were going the same speed.  Oh, brother!  I’m a sloooow hill runner.  He motivated me to keep going.

Near the 4 mile marker I was tired and wet. (It rained the whole time.)  A few ladies passed me and I tried to keep up with them since one of my goals was to not be last.  Another goal was to finish in less than an hour.  As I rounded the final corner and crossed the finish line I saw my time: 59 minutes.  Alright!  I also heard the announcer call out another runner after me who finished in just over an hour.  Whoohoo! 

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I checked my stats online later in the day and saw that I met two of my goals by one: I was 178 out of 179 runners and my time was an even 59 minutes.  It’s hard for me to do something I know I can’t win or even be anywhere near the best.  I keep reminding myself that about a year ago I couldn’t even run a flat half mile so I’ve improved a lot.  I should be even better next year.  Now I just need to heal my shin splints.  They’ve been bothering me for awhile so I was resting a lot before the race rather than training like I wanted to, but now they’re hurting again.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

How Many Words?

I was recently reading an article about the common gender differences in early childhood development.  By 18 months the article says boys typically have around 50 words and girls have 90.  I knew IMG_5517Desmond had more than 50 since a couple months ago Davin and I counted about 30.  So out of curiosity I made a list of all the words Desmond can say on his own.  Here’s what I came up with and I’m realizing all the time that there are more words I haven’t remembered or didn’t know he could say.

  • 1. 1-2-3
  • 2. a-b-c
  • 3. Addi
  • 4. Airplane
  • 5. Apple
  • 6. Apple sauce
  • 7. Baa
  • 8. Baby
  • 9. Bagel
  • 10. Ball
  • 11. Balloon
  • 12. Banana
  • 13. Bath
  • 14. Beans
  • 15. Bear
  • 16. Beep
  • 17. Belly button
  • 18. Bike
  • 19. Bird
  • 20. Bite
  • 21. Blanket
  • 22. Blue
  • 23. Boat
  • 24. Boo
  • 25. Book
  • 26. Boots
  • 27. Bowl
  • 28. Bread
  • 29. Broccoli
  • 30. Brush
  • 31. Bunny
  • 32. Burr
  • 33. Bus
  • 34. Button
  • 35. Buzz
  • 36. Bye-bye
  • 37. Camel
  • 38. Camera
  • 39. Car
  • 40. Cat
  • 41. CD
  • 42. Cheese
  • 43. Chicken
  • 44. Choo-choo
  • 45. Circle
  • 46. Clock
  • 47. Cock-a-doodle-doo
  • 48. Comb
  • 49. Cow
  • 50. Cracker
  • 51. Crayon
  • 52. Cup
  • 53. Daddy
  • 54. Dark
  • 55. Desmond
  • 56. Diaper
  • 57. Ding-Dong
  • 58. Dirt
  • 59. Dirty
  • 60. Dog/Doggie
  • 61. Done
  • 62. Donkey
  • 63. Down
  • 64. Drink
  • 65. Duck
  • 66. Ear
  • 67. Eat
  • 68. Elbow
  • 69. Elmo
  • 70. Eye
  • 71. Feet
  • 72. Fire truck
  • 73. Fish
  • 74. Fork
  • 75. Gina
  • 76. Gorilla
  • 77. Grapes
  • 78. Green
  • 79. Green beans
  • 80. Hair
  • 81. Heart
  • 82. Hexagon
  • 83. Hi
  • 84. Hippo
  • 85. Home
  • 86. Hot
  • 87. Hush
  • 88. Jesus
  • 89. Juice
  • 90. Key
  • 91. Knee
  • 92. Knock-knock
  • 93. Koala
  • 94. Leaf
  • 95. Light
  • 96. Lollipop
  • 97. Macaroni
  • 98. Meow
  • 99. Mickey Mouse
  • 100. Milk
  • 101. Mommy
  • 102. Moo
  • 103. Moon
  • 104. More
  • 105. Mouse
  • 106. Music
  • 107. Nana
  • 108. Nemo
  • 109. Night-night
  • 110. No
  • 111. Nose
  • 112. Oatmeal
  • 113. Off
  • 114. Oh-no
  • 115. On
  • 116. Oops
  • 117. Orange
  • 118. Out
  • 119. Outside
  • 120. Oval
  • 121. Owl
  • 122. Papa
  • 123. Paper
  • 124. Peanut butter
  • 125. Peas
  • 126. Pillow
  • 127. Pizza
  • 128. Please
  • 129. Poop
  • 130. Pop
  • 131. Potty
  • 132. Puppy
  • 133. Quack
  • 134. Radio
  • 135. Rain
  • 136. Rainbow
  • 137. Raisin
  • 138. Remote
  • 139. Robot
  • 140. Rock
  • 141. Seal
  • 142. Shoes
  • 143. Sit down
  • 144. Snack
  • 145. Sneeze
  • 146. Socks
  • 147. Spoon
  • 148. Star
  • 149. Sun
  • 150. Teeth
  • 151. Tick-tock
  • 152. Toes
  • 153. Train
  • 154. Truck
  • 155. TV
  • 156. Twinkle
  • 157. Uh-oh
  • 158. Up
  • 159. Vacuum
  • 160. Vroom
  • 161. Walk
  • 162. Water
  • 163. Whoa
  • 164. Word World
  • 165. Wow
  • 166. Yellow
  • 167. Yummy
  • 168. Zebra

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Permission to Get Wet

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Today Desmond and I went to the Children’s Museum for the first time.  Wow!  I thought he might be too young to really enjoy it, but he had a blast!  They do a great job making many of the exhibits cater to a variety of ages.  We played for two hours straight, and Desmond could have gone longer.  His favorite area was definitely the water.  We started and finished there.  We may need a membership to this place…

Desmond playing in the water

As we left the museum