A Balancing Act

When the weekend rolls around, my family expects to get in some type of family exercise. But sometimes, a perfectly good day gets away from us. Take this past Saturday. The weather was gorgeous, the sun was out, the sap was flowing, and we were mattress shopping. A morning excursion turned into a full-day affair. We traveled around central Vermont going in and out of one furniture store after another. And when we (the parents) finally found the perfect mattress that put us into immediate nap mode, we began eyeing bed frames. 

The girls were fairly well behaved and were mesmerized by the large show rooms. But when Julia decided to bounce on one bed and caterpulted into the air, we knew it was time to call it quits. So we hit a newly built playground and let the girls go crazy on the twirly slides, climbing walls, and swings. I was pretty much a spectator but the fresh air pulled me out of my mattress slumber. As for Tom, he got a quick walk in to the nearby grocery store. 

And the next day, we took the girls out on their bikes even though we woke up to snow. We had made a promise, after all. And so it is in family life, balancing everyone's wants and needs. But, because of that long bed-shopping adventure, the girls think they need bunk beds!

New Season, New Sports

 In one week I've gone from watching a confident five-year-old snow plow down the ski trails to seeing that same kid wobble on her two-wheel bike and tip over into a mud patch. 'Tis the change of seasons here in Vermont. I'm not naive enough to think that winter is actually over, but I'm anxious to get my running legs back and to get my girls ready to bike without giving me a heart attack watching them swerve all over the road. 

Bring on 50 degree weather and dry roads and we're back to biking. Well, the girls are. Me, I'm just aching from bending over giving them a "starting push." The stress of watching the bike and rider careen along ahead of me is bad for the back and exacerbates the tightness. The sidewalks with all the slopes and cracks aren't exactly conducive to a new bike rider either.

We're probably going to need a few more parking lot training sessions like this one before I let Ava bike alongside me on a run.

2nd Annual Cabin Trek

In case the snow disappears this week, we squeezed in our second annual cabin trek on Saturday. The 5K uphill trek to the cabin takes a while with the family. The trip back down (5K again) takes no time if you can stay on your feet.

The weather was perfect for being outdoors with kids -- 4o degrees and sunny. But we did hit a challenge early on. Our pulk broke. The duct tape fix would last no longer. Luckily we hadn't hit the hills yet. Tom did the problem solving and headed back to the Nordic center to borrow a pulk available for rental. Ava and I forged on. Up and up and up. 

Ava did get a reprieve on one particularly steep section of trail thanks to a rope tow harness that Tom devised last year. Last year Ava used the tow quite a bit for the cabin trek, but this year, just for one section.

Aside from the cabin treats (banana bread for Ava, a brownie for Julia and supposedly me, and a sandwich for mom and dad), the best part was the descent. Ava has just learned to snowplow so my heart rate was much more tame seeing her controlled downhill technique. Julia got to ski between Daddy's legs and was happy for the attention. I was so warm that I could take pictures with my gloves off.

And now that we've wrapped up that notorious ski trek, I'm ready for spring!

Just The Two of Us

When you have more than one child, taking just one of them somewhere is a luxury. There's no opportunity for sibling squabbles and you get to experience  one-on-one parent/child interaction.

So it was that I went skiing yesterday with just Ava during Julia's nap time. We skied side by side in the tracks and talked about Pooh Bear, about friends and relatives, and how it would be a good idea if we went into the lodge after to warm up with hot cocoa by the fire. 

Ava showed off her snow plow on occasion, a skill that she is fortunately acquiring rather than screaming "track" on the downhills as she has in the past. And we did a nice loop without having to drag little sister along protesting in the pulk.

We topped the outing off by playing checkers in the lodge according to our own rules. Sometimes, I wish that I could be five again.

Exercising with Grown-ups

It's school vacation week and I've had the luxury of running and skiing with friends while someone else has watched my kids. The sitters have included my sister, my dad, and my husband, who doesn't have to teach this week.

The bonus of having an exercise companion means that we get to talk about, well, all the good and bad things about our kids is a given, but we also talk about work, about the economy, about issues in the community, and whether or not the new hairdresser in town is worth going to. When you try to have these discussions with kids around, they get started but come to a quick halt when a child falls on the pavement and needs a Band Aid or when your child says "Excuse me" so many times that you've forgotten what you were talking about anyways.

It's true that exercising with a friend or two requires more planning to match schedules and to arrange for child care, but I'm up for that challenge.

 

 

The Stud

My husband is in demand by a small group of ladies in town for his "stud service" or that is what he likes to call it. The ladies are my running friends and my husband is winterizing their sneakers. 

Somehow, there has been a buzz this winter about screw shoes, which use small sheet rock screws inserted into sneaker soles to provide traction on hard packed snow and ice. All you need is a screw driver and some screws and a pair of sneakers that you will dedicate to winter running.

I usually take the winter off from running and instead cross country ski, but this season I have been running once or twice a week as I am able to sneak in a quick run while a friend watches my kiddo. My new stud shoes have a subtle grab on the roads. My running buddy says that she prefers these homemade jobs to YakTrax for running in town on a little hard pack snow. 

Here is a photo of my converted sneakers as well as instructions by runner Matt Carpenter, which were featured recently on the Runner's World web site.

Scavenger-Hunt Ski

Julia had the best ski of her almost-three-year-old life today. She had some incentive to ski thanks to a clever little scavenger-hunt course. Each fun find was spaced far enough to get your curiousity going and just out of sight, too, to keep the momentum going.  

I started by holding onto Julia's hand, but she quickly told me that she could ski on her own. She was smiling and chatty and moved along steadily in the tracks until she saw a prize bucket and crossed over to collect her ware. Among the things that she tucked in her pockets: a wooden bunny to decorate; a rubber ducky; a clementine; sheep's skin (for cleaning skis); and a Kit Kat bar, purposely saved for last. The grand prize, which was passed out to the little participants, was a coupon for a free maple creemie (Vermont's version of soft serve ice cream). We're used to eating them in the summer so it was a treat today to almost eliminate the roll of drips down the kids' chins.

Ava got an ice cream on-the-house, too, after completing her lollipop race, which was about .8K. She fell down at a bottleneck on the first turn but recovered and had a strong finish. Most importantly, she enjoyed skiing with a bunch of other kids her age.

Now Tom wasn't happy with his race performance and I never got in the ski that I anticipated, but this was the kids day to shine and they sure did.