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The girls and a big pig picture.
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Sunday may be quickly becoming my favorite day if we continue in this manner here in the Orelove household. The sun was rising when I enjoyed a cup of coffee before heading out for a 15-mile run. My gear is holding-up, and I am looking forward to New York. My plane ticket and lodging have all been taken care of, so now all that remains is getting the miles in and staying hydrated! But I digress....
So after a nice long run, we hang out as the kiddos wake up and play for a while. Then it is off to the swimming pool for over an hour and now we are watching some football while my feet are up on the couch. An afternoon of football and some work organization await, but that is just fine with me.
The girls have been happily playing with their dolls and Playmobile world. Tonight we had a nice dinner and now showers and a little Sunday Night Football are in order. I sit, feeling content. I only wish my family were closer and able to visit or us to visit them. More and more as of late, I have been thinking of my family in Alaska, Arizona, and Washington, DC.
I read this interview with Dick Van Dyke, and he said that he always took every opportunity to sing, and dance because we were all just "swirling around the drain". That term really hit me and made me stop and think about my life and look around at what I am trying to do. Now that I have children, there is something driving at me to ensure they have a support system in place in case anything happens to me...if I go "down the drain". It is quite a thing to consider how life changes so quickly. I am looking at pictures of my cousins and mom and dad and childhood...it is a trip to consider that I am closing-in on my fourth decade of life!
(one week later)
Talk about time swirling....
Now it is a week later, and here we are on another Sunday. It is Kim's birthday today, and we have been having a nice relaxed day at home. The weekend has been a fairly active one, though. Yesterday we met Ann and Dixie at Fair Oaks Farm in Indiana. It is an amazing place in terms of the systems in place to generate living animals and profit. The girls enjoyed seeing the animals, but I was fascinated at the organization and massiveness of it all. It is always nice to spend time showing the girls new things, letting them experience things brings me joy and it is nice to see the world through their lenses and perspectives. What is interesting to Violet is something that I would not necessarily think of. Also, the fresh ice cream and cheese available at the "Cowfe'" is outstanding.
Today (September 25th), was an early-riser for me. I was up and on the road by 3am to get to the Museum of Science and Industry so I could secure a parking spot for the Chicago Half Marathon. I got the spot and enjoyed an extra hour and a half of napping before I needed to get out and walk to the start line. The run itself was an easy one, although there are still some butterflies before things get going. It was a beautiful morning for a run, and the sun rising as the start horn blared was a sight to see. The beginning of the race is mostly spent trying to zig and zag around a lot of runners in front of you until you find your pace and place. I like seeing all of the different people around me, realizing that each of them has a story and a journey to this point. Some people wear shirts with names on them of loved ones, some have organizations for charity. Some are running this distance for the first time in their lived and they are almost scared to be there in that moment challenging themselves to do something they haven't done before. I see some parents running with their kids....maybe someday for me. People line the course with signs...some funny, some serious...some encouraging....everyone is there for someone running, though. The course brings us out along Lake Michigan, and the cool breeze is a nice thing. The sounds of the waves lazily lapping on the shore is relaxing and reminds me to remain steady in my own run. That was the goal today: consistency. I kept a 10 minute pace the entire race. While I have been faster in the past, I am still just training for New York. It is strange at the beginning of a race to start slower to ensure a consistent pace because so many people go out too fast and "crash" later along the course.
I savored the turn-around point where I went from running North towards the city to South back to the finish. There are a few areas with DJs and loud speakers playing energy music, and even a couple live bands playing. My personal favorite was a duo playing blues guitar and classic tunes. Water and sports drinks are every mile or two. I make sure to drink at almost every stop to ensure my legs and muscles are getting hydration and enough salts and sugars. In the last few miles, I pas more and more. I see the strain on many of the faces, and the talking and chatting between runners that was present before has died away and now all are focused on simply finishing. I take inventory of my body and am happy to realize that I could keep running for a bit...which is good since this is all training for the New York Marathon. The finish is sweet, and the medal is closer to a manhole cover than a traditional finisher medal. I get back to my car as quick as I can, and am on the road and back home to spend the day with my family and celebrate Kim's birthday.
So here we are...another Sunday night. We are all trying our best to enjoy the time together and have fun. The day is still light outside, but the evening is really upon us and thoughts of dinner and laundry and showers are nearing the front of our minds. But the girls are outside swinging in the back yard...the football game is fun to watch, and we are all just comfortable.
Like I said at the beginning of this post, Sundays are quickly becoming my favorite day.
-a
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| Violet and Cow |
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| The girls having a swine time. |
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| Pigging out at Fair Oaks Farm |
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| The girls love these things for some reason. |
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| Audrey had to be bacon. |
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| Violet the pig farmer |
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| Audrey the pig farmer |
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| All of us on the tour of the cows and pigs farms. |
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| Soooo many pigs |
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| Violet and another pig. |
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| Looking down at the swinery. |
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| Meeting a 4 minute old piglet. |
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| Violet and the piglet. |
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| Violet liked the Cowch. |
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| This is the giant milking wheel where 72 cows are milked at a time. It goes around like a merry-go-round. |
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| Violet on the ropes course. |
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| Swinging on the ropes course. |
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| And the girls got their Halloween costumes for this year. Violet is Iron Man and Audrey is Harry Potter. There is something cool about both of my girls selecting "boy" characters. I love them so much. |
