One teenager, nine bunnies and some flair

This has been the weirdest week in a very long time. I started my final term of Grad School for the year as well as coaching track. Grad school sucks. Shocker I know. Track coaching on the other hand is far more fun than I could have possibly imagined. Who would have guessed that I was born to teach middle school. Well, at least born to coach middle school track. This is seriously by far the most fun I've had remotely related to my job in about 5 years. I kid you not. It was also officially announced that I'm teaching 5th grade next year. Now I wish it was 6th or 7th. Who knew those crazy middle school kids would be the perfect fit for me.

The other bizarre thing about the first week of April is the stream of birthdays our family has. Three days in a row of birthday celebrations. Zach is first, then my mom then Sean's mom. Tricky when I'm already on the tightest timeline of my life. Wednesday was Zach's birthday. He's a teenager now. How the hell did that happen? Of course we celebrated by going to the Mongolian Grill. All you can eat is key to a 13 year old who has grown about 9 inches in the past year alone. That was fun and bizarre when some guy mistook me for someone else and came to the table and gave me a huge hug. Can you say awkward? For dessert Zach had Sarah order him this tasty little treat he had seen before when we went out to breakfast last Sunday.



Yes, that is a S'more pie. Could I possibly love this boy any more? I think not. Sean refused to partake in the sugary goodness, but being the excellent aunt I am I joined the birthday boy in a piece.

Yesterday I noted that Easter is only three short days away and I have yet to eat any Peeps. Now anyone who knows me knows my love for sugar covered marshmallow treats and would find this tidbit of information shocking. Usually by now I'm getting sick of them and stockpiling them for the rest of the year. My love of Peeps is so well known that my dear friend Melinda actually gave me some she had frozen for Christmas. Now that's a friend you know has your back when they pull out the cellar reserve stock.

That's why when another friend showed up with a special delivery for me at work today I nearly kissed her right on the spot!




Is this not the cutest thing you have ever seen? Seriously creative. It was so cool I almost didn't want to disturb it by eating any of it. Of course that lasted about 5 minutes and then I quickly decapitated one of those little pink bunnies! Thanks Staci!

Which brings me to final best thing of this week!



New Shoes! My knees and my shins were telling me it was time to retire my purple running shoes to just walk around shoes. So I looked up some new kicks on Zappos, ordered them and just two short days later they were sitting on my porch just begging to be used. Which is a good thing considering the previous two pictures!

Don't they look fast? I'm going to burn some serious calories in these babies! I better go eat another bunny.

Check, Check and Check

Download Grad Class Course Syllabus...Check
Surf web for advice, download kindle version of coaching book...Check
Stuffy Nose and plugged ears indicating you too have Sean's crud..Check,Check

Bring on Spring Term!

Shaken Faith

I don't consider myself to be a deeply religious person. I was raised in the Episcopal Church and I occasionally enjoy returning for a service or two, but I don't affiliate with any one religion. That is not to say that I'm not spiritual though and it offends me when people think I'm not. However, my beliefs are things that I normally tend to keep to myself. It's how I am.

Sometimes though things happen that shake the faith that I do have. Like today when I logged on to Facebook only to discover that yet again, the worst had happened. I knew yesterday a dear friend was taking her dog into the vet. The news unfortunately was the worst and yet again, loving owners were forced to make the excruciatingly humane decision to spare their beloved dog from the pain any longer. Through pictures she shared his last day, a run in the rain and a drive through McDonald's. Thank goodness for fast food for the last supper. Marley too enjoyed a hamburger on his way to the rainbow bridge.

Less than a month ago another dear friend had to say goodbye to her boy. Rogue hasn't even been gone two months yet.

Three dogs in less than two months. Three families heartbroken. It shakes my faith sometimes and so I turn to the sky and I ask "why?" I know I will receive no answer that is acceptable, that it is not my information to know. I know there are more homeless pets down here and puppies yet to be born to fill in the family gaps. I know that there could never be enough homes for them all. I understand all that. But right now, running in the rain, I just feel cold and empty. I am not ready to offer my home, my heart to one of those in need. Selfish, yes, but so is the call to take the dogs back home again before we are ready to see them go. Time will heal us all, I know it will. It's just too fresh and with every loss of another beloved pet, the painful reminder resurfaces the wound and shakes the faith yet again.

Run free dear friends. Run free.

Spring Break!

It's finally here! Spring Break 2012. We have packed a bunch of fun stuff into it already starting off bright and early Saturday morning with a 10k. It was a benefit run for a friend's wife suffering from Cancer. We woke up to sunshine and it was a pretty amazing day. Sarah, Sean, Madeleine, Gram and I all headed over with everyone participating. The kids ran while Gram played photographer. Madeleine started out with a 1K kids run which she rocked at! It started out with an uphill trail route where she started picking off the competition passing them up the hill. ROCK STAR! Next came the 10K! That's 6.2 miles for those of you who like me struggled with the HS competencies! The turn out was fantastic. Melinda and I ran (Go Team Tortoise) the whole time together and Sarah ran almost the first half with us before she gave up our pokey pace and headed on her own. My friend Erin kicked my ass pushing her one year old in a stroller. Damn, I have got to start doing some speed work. Or get myself a one year old to push around, which is less likely. It was a really cool event, even if I was exhausted the rest of the day, and a great way to kick off the break.

Yesterday Sean's Dad and Crystal came to town and we spent the entire pouring down rain day tootling around, shopping at all their favorite places. We checked out Happy Trails, The Book Bin and then introduced them to both TJ's (Maxx and Trader Joe's) and then took them to Market of Choice. We went out to dinner and then headed back to our respective sleeping spots. I'm currently awaiting everyone waking (cause I don't sleep), so we can go for a hike and hit the OSU bookstore before they take off at lunchtime.

Which is when the best part of the scheduled events happen. We are getting outta dodge ourselves. Sarah found us a great (well according to the pictures, it could be like Summer Rental with John Candy from the 80s for all I know), house on the beach. Two days out of this Popsicle stand.

I'm gonna watch whales, walk on the beach, read a book for FUN, watch movies, play with the kids and not think about my life in the valley for at lease 48 hours.

I can hardly wait!

Snow Day!

On March 21! I know. What the heck? It's been snowing all day.

At least it's pretty!

Luck of the O'Ross

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Don't let the Christmas wreath on the house fool you. This really was taken this morning. Funny how I didn't even know it was still there. I wonder what else is on our porch.

This is Sean and I after completing the "Run to Get Lucky" this afternoon. Don't we look fantastic? You want my socks don't you? Well you can't have them, they are my lucky charm. Clearly we both got lucky cause we each finished 2nd in our age group. Sean was actually really fast! My luck was that no fast runners in my age group showed up today. Regardless, it was a blast and I'm sure we will run it again next year.

Now to sample the delicious offerings of downtown Corvallis at the spring wine walk. What better way to procrastinate my final paper due on Monday!

Cheers everyone!

The Bus Whisperer

Oh yeah you're jealous aren't you? Who gets a sweet ass nickname like that? Me! The girl who can locate not one bus but two! What's the big deal you say? Well, it is nearly impossible to get a bus scheduled in the spring because of field trips and spring sports. Which is why I need them. We now have two additional track meets scheduled for two dates in May.

Did I forget to mention the fact that I'm the middle school track coach this year? Um, yeah, more on that later. Anyway, I called the bus garage the day we got our notice and the guy that answered the phone laughed when I gave him my dates. He actually laughed. I asked if there was anyone else I could talk to and he said that he was the boss and therefore he knew the score and "it doesn't look good, there are no buses available!" He then said that I could try e-mailing the secretary but again repeated "it didn't look good." So I did. I talked really, really nice to her and I thanked her for her time before she even had looked at anything for me. Guess what? It turns out what they say about the secretaries and janitors having all the power is exactly right! I've always made it my policy to be friends with them anyway, but this just reinforces it for me! I have two buses scheduled for my middle school track team.

I am, the bus whisperer!