MOVIE STARS

They picked out black sunglasses "like mama and daddy" (even though Cora tried on every pair of glittery or rhinestone-studded pair they had in pink and white and purple...) while out hunting for running shorts for James, and when we later walked into the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory (to reward them for not running around like insane little monsters at the clothing store), James looked up at me and said "Tell that man that we're movie stars mama", serious as can be. What's a mama to do but tell the man behind the counter that we're movie stars?...

 

Thank you kind sir for humoring us and not giggling.

 

Those would be chocolate dipped marshmallows on a stick - treats fit for the famous (or infamous...)

 

The shades stayed on indoors because that's how movie stars roll. OBVIOUSLY.

QUIET END TO A BUSY WEEKEND

We spent our weekend hosting a yard sale (which was highly unproductive - mostly because we sold all the big ticket items online earlier in the week, so I guess that's ok), running (I ran 8 with Christina on Saturday night - due to the yard sale in the morning - followed by a lovely dinner for two, complete with cocktails and a severe thunderstorm that allowed us an excuse to stay out extra late, and Jay ran 5.5 this afternoon in the same heat and humidity - it sucks folks, it really does), swimming (in the little blow-up pool in the carport and the big outdoor pool at the Y), cleaning house (oh my gosh the cat room/tool room is the most clean I've ever seen it!), and playing with the kids. We're exhausted, but at the same time well rested because we finally broke down and got James a clock for his room, then asked him very nicely to stay there quietly until it said at least 7:00am, 7:30am preferred on weekends. And since Jay postponed his run to this afternoon, we ALL got to sleep in until 7:31am when James left his room and woke Cora, which then resulted in an entire hour of family snuggle time in our bed, which was just heavenly! It may have been another busy weekend, but it was a good one, that's for sure!

CASTLE CLUB BEACH PARTY

So, there's no sand and no water, but it's a beach party? Yes. Because you wear leis. The kids did not comprehend, but the promise of bouncy houses sealed the deal (or maybe it was just that they love coming "to work" with mommy and daddy) and they agreed to attend. They have such busy schedules you know.

The dunk tank was a HUGE hit with them. Cora, our previous heavy hitter, struck out. But James, the kiddo who never used to come close to scoring direct hits in these types of hand-eye coordination games, knocked that castle multiple times. The only problem was that he wasn't quite strong enough to hit it hard enough to dump the guy into the water. No worries though, the assistant gave it a good push and sent him tumbling each time! The look on James' face was priceless - such joy!

Learning the rules of dunk tank

Watching the adults hog the ball ;-)

Enjoying the giant fan (the hangar where the beach party took place - since we got rained out by the threat of thunderstorms - was like a sauna)

 Bouncy house fun (lots of buddies were there - kids of our friends and coworkers - but our dynamic duo stuck together like glue most of the night, as usual)

 Attempting to cool the kids off (and calm them down) with snow cones in front of the fan (shortly after this they literally melted down and we called it an early night)

Snuggling with her "Judy Cutie"

POOL BOY

Another lovely Tuesday afternoon at the pool with my little loves.

 

Cora spent a lot of time making new friends and was too busy to ride the waterslides or play much with mama, but James stuck to me like glue and we had a good time diving for superheroes.

 

He's getting to be a good swimmer too! Just don't take him where he can't touch or he freaks out just a little bit... We're working on that.

"BUT I SAW HIS FEATHERS MOVE!"

After our puzzle completion glory, we headed outside for popsicles and sprinkler fun. Yes, Cora is in undies (and was in the puzzle picture too). James' undies. Since I proudly posted about her being accident free on her All About Cora: 4 Years edition, karma decided to slip her back into a "baby phase" (talking like a baby, having random small accidents, fake crying and throwing more tantrums than usual, etc.) -- She had 2 accidents at school, the second on the playground right as I picked her up, and all we had with us for the drive home was a pair of James' undies (because we ALWAYS have a pair of boy undies around, since he never needs them...) So much for going to the library... Oh well, I needed to price items for our upcoming yard sale anyway... and we need to find the library cards... can't remember the last time we used them...

After dinner (and baths) we took Buster out to do his homework (yes, he has homework from dog obedience school - he's doing great by the way - perhaps he's not as "special" as we thought, and he just needed some guidance from people who actually know how to train dogs...) and check out the rooftop rooster that the kids and I spotted on the way home earlier... I couldn't tell if it was real or metal. Cora couldn't see from her carseat and James was convinced it was real because he "saw his feathers move!" Um, no. The house on the corner does in fact have a metal rooster standing in a random spot on their roof. Then again, they also have random concrete statues of dogs and frogs in their yard, so I should have expected it, right? The kids are pointing at the rooster in the below photo, Buster is just happy to be outside adventuring, and Jay is either wiping sweat or hiding from my camera (or perhaps both...)

 

There's not much cuter than your kids holding hands of their own volition and helping daddy walk the dog. The princess nightgown just adds to it, right?

FINISHED!

The kids woke up ready to work on the puzzle this morning and were very upset that they had to go to school before "getting lots of pieces in", so the first thing we did when we got home was get to work. Within an hour we had it finished up - yay us!

BUSY GIRL

Cora is always on the move around the house, always helping mama or daddy or James, always getting into something, always wanting to do a project or craft, always reading book after book, always doing. She was all over the place today (when she wasn't working on the puzzle off and on), but I found it particularly amusing that she washed dishes for almost 30 minutes while I made dinner and also that I was able to distract her from a tantrum by quietly sneaking away and setting up a toy that she hadn't played with in a while (old is new when you haven't seen it in a couple months).

PUZZLERS

After four events and complete exhaustion by bedtime yesterday (and a lot of post-race soreness this morning), we declared today a just-stay-home day. Among the cleaning and garage sale prep, we worked on our first family puzzle (large pieces on the outer edge, getting smaller as you move inward). If it hadn't been for Buster's first obedience class (he learned to sit when we tell him to - hooray!), dinner, and DVR'd World Cup, we'd have finished it tonight. These kids are great little puzzlers, and they fit almost as many pieces (even the small ones) as we did. James did the eagle face solo and Cora did the clouds solo while I made dinner. I'm really impressed that they can say things like "I need one with a wiggly thing here and wiggly thing there", scan the pile, and somehow grab the perfect piece over and over... I swear I try a few dozen for every one I finally get right! We're so proud of them!

 

Thanks again for the family puzzle Hollingsworths! We hope you're enjoying vacation and settling into your new California home nicely - don't forget to check in with us now and then :-)

UGH. AW! WHEE!!! MMMM...

UGH.

 

My day started at 5:00am with an easy 1.5-mile warm-up run around the neighborhood, a quick shower (so I didn't offend my carpooling buddies for an hour-long drive), and grabbing my coffee and breakfast to go. I met Michelle and Ashley at SuperJunior and we headed to Jackson to  participate in Governor Phil Bryant's Run For Health 5K. When we arrived, we went by the Coliseum to get our race bibs and t-shirts, then met up with Dawn and Ron, and Dara and her husband, and the rest of Team Funk to take a group photo.

Team Funk was put together to support baby Pierce Funk, who was diagnosed with Bilateral Neuroblastoma at 2-months-old. His older sisters used to attend Agape with our kids, but they moved to Brandon following Pierce's diagnosis so they'd be closer to the hospital where he receives his treatments.

This race was originally slated for mid-April, which would have been perfect temperature-wise. I had been doing speedwork regularly leading up to the race as well, so I was anticipating a significant PR. But then they bumped the race to June at the last minute and I knew a PR attempt was out the window due to the Deep South's summer heat and humidity. I didn't want to drop the race though, so I decided that whatever pace I ended up running would be a "hard effort" for me and thus good training, regardless of my finish time. I figured I'd just get out there and see how I felt during the first mile, then decide whether I was truly "racing" or just running the rest of the miles. My first mile went pretty well (8:18), but wasn't as fast as I would have hoped for back in April (the week before the original race date I did a lunch break speedwork session of 3x1 miles at 8:27, 8:17, 8:01 and felt great), and it left me feeling hot and like I'd gone out too fast, which was discouraging. It wasn't until the halfway point that I kinda threw in the towel though. I'd been waiting for a water station (I didn't bring my water bottle on the course with me because there are usually multiple water stops at races, even short 5K's, ESPECIALLY IN THE SUMMER in Mississippi), but there were none... At 1.5 miles there was a guy in a golf cart at the bottom of the first (of two) significant hills passing out bottles of Gatorade. I needed a drink, so I took a bottle and walked up the hill drinking some of it. There were no trash cans, and I still had 3/4 of the bottle left, so I carried it the rest of the way. Which allowed me to walk (hike?) up the second hill while drinking Gatorade as well. At that point though I just wanted to finish the race and go find my friends, so I didn't care in the least that I was walking during a 5K...

 

Course map and elevation profile (not BIG hills, but big enough in this heat...)

These two sprinted past me at the finish, and I still didn't care, if that tells you anything (I'll usually battle it out at the end just because it's fun). I was losing my Team Funk sticker at this point from all the sweat... Official finish time was 27:23 and my Garmin time (which is what I'm going with, since they did not use chip timers for this event) was 27:04 (8:43 pace). Either way, I was slower than the 5K I ran last year around this time (an evening race at the end of May), and slower than my speedwork training run (by 15 seconds/mile!), so no PR for me. I need to find a good fall 5K to test my speed (that won't interfere with my November marathon or my favorite Vicksburg race, the Over the River 5-miler in October)... I'm still so glad I went today though!

 

AW!

After getting back to the 'Burg, another quick shower, and some house cleaning, we loaded up enough gear for 3 parties and headed out the door. Stop #1 was Isaac's 2nd birthday party at Home Depot, where the kids did a flower pot painting craft.

The adorable birthday boy checking out his Thomas the Train cake

Coltin and Cora, going green

Mr. Cheese was only sorta into this craft... he didn't even care which colors I gave him. What he really wanted to do was get back to hitting balloons all over the room and running in circles.

This girl, on the other hand, loves a good craft project. Especially if it involves paint. She was the last one working at the table and we had to wait on her so we could do presents and cake!

Isaac somehow ended up with his painting bib as a doo-rag...

Michelle (the birthday boy's mama) and Dawn got into the craft as well!

James and Cora were a bit jealous of the books we got for Isaac...

Cora decided she had to read them both before eating cake...

Happy Birthday sweet little Isaac!

WHEE!!!

 

Next up was Hazel's 5th birthday party, with a mermaid theme! Poor Ashley (the birthday girl's mama, and one of my best running buddies) was set back with a chlorine problem in her pool, followed by a thunderstorm, but that didn't stop them from eating cake and letting the kids splash around outside! I was highly disappointed in my kids for not playing on the waterslide (I was half tempted to go put my own swimsuit on so that I could force them down it... but I would have been the only mama sliding, since we got there late due to Isaac's party, and Ashley had already taken enough turns down herself!) Cora went down once, then decided the hose water was too cold and it was too scary (that is completely James' fault for telling her that - as you all know, she isn't afraid of anything, let alone a little bouncy waterslide). So our kids spent the next hour taking turns riding on the GIANT tire swing (daddy Eric was a good sport to push all those kids throughout the entire party!)

No way mama, it's too scary. I'll just stand here and convince Cora that she should not go again and should instead go play with me on the "much safer" giant tire swing...

"I'm so COLD!" (Seriously? It was about 90 degrees out with 100% humidity...)

I thought for sure they'd follow the birthday girl's brother Adler up the slide, but no.

James was nervous at first, but quickly decided that this swing was the best thing ever

I'm pretty sure the swing was attached to a branch 30ft up... Some of the older kids really got swinging high (and Cora joined them later when she concinved a pair of girls to let her ride with them - oh the squealing of girls!)

Mermaid Hazel opening presents (while James gazes longingly at the pool).

I had to tell them so many times to stop asking about going in the pool...

MMMM...

Our final (and longest!) event of the day was the Delta Brews "Pair with a Pig" beer pairing and pig roast. A few of the guys (John, Nate, and Martin, with Jay's help before and after Isaac's birthday party) tended the pig all afternoon, and when I showed up with the kids at 5:30pm it was just about ready to come off the grill. James just wanted to "touch it's claws" and Cora said "Ew yuck, I am NOT eating that", but they both ate a few chunks of meat and seemed to really like it. Jay and I (and the rest of the responsible adults) ate MANY chunks, dipped in Heather's amazing homemade BBQ sauce, and accompanied by various delicious casseroles and potato salads and pasta salads and homemade breads. And then there was dessert... trifle, pineapple upside down cake, smores bars, and maple bourbon bacon cheesecake - yes, it was incredible! We stayed until well past the kids' bedtime (even though they were the only kids at the party, other than "baby" Houston) because they were surprisingly well behaved given their supposed exhaustion level and I had a great time chasing them around the yard once they tired of their LeapPads and Transformers cartoons.

John heats things up in preparation of "the flip"

John, Martin, and Nate sweating over the pit

Jay, post-flip

Nate, John, and Martin, cleaned up a bit and ready to party with the pig!

Starting the party with their LeapPads. Cora was not in the mood for a photo, but I wanted to show Christina that she chose her birthday present Elsa shirt as attire for this 3rd party :-)

The crowd takes turns surrounding the piggy...

Don't mind Jay... just snagging a few ribs

There was so much meat that we were able to take a large tupperware container home at the end of the party

Cora had no fear of Lisa and John's beautiful Scottie dog Trix. Lisa and John are the couple that own Martin's at Midtown, our favorite restaurant. They are also members of Delta Brews, and Lisa hosts the Barley's Angels meetings that I attend most months.



The back corner of their yard housed the homebrew tap, retrofitted from a used soda tap acquired from another local restaurant. The two giant cans beneath held the various kegs on ice (there were 5 of them, including Jay's newest brew: Key Lime Hefeweisen) and the table to the left is where folks poured samples from various homebrew bottles (that were stored in the large ice chests). I was lucky to not be the designated driver this time, since Jay had a 10-miler planned for Sunday morning :-)

Since she was tired, Cora kept wanting me to hold her. At one point I told her mama was exhausted and she should go find someone really strong to hold her. She ran right up to Barrett and demanded "Pick me up!" He loved that she was finally being friendly with him, until he realized that even 35 lbs feels like a lot after a while... He and Sandy set the date, so we are very much looking forward to celebrating their marriage at the end of October!

Winding down with Transformers... or so we thought...

Showing me how they can transform into other things. Here they are submarines.

After that there was some "monster chase" where the kids repeatedly attempted to lock me out of the house and told anyone and everyone who came inside that they were allowed, but not to let "the lady in the pink shirt" come in... When I was sufficiently done (i.e. too tired to chase them anymore, too full to eat anymore, etc.), I threw them into their jammies and daddy drove us home. It was a great day from start to finish, and even though it was a far busier Saturday than usual for us, we feel very lucky to have such oppotunities to spend with the community of friends we've made here - thanks you guys!