Visit with Grandma, Rara, and Grandpa Dean

 
 
 
Bailey has four grandparents by blood: Grandma and Grandpa Driscoll and Grandma and Grandpa (he's in Heaven) Jones. Here's a cute shot of Grandma Karen (Jones) with Bailey on a recent visit. She calls Bailey "Sweet Cheeks" and recently found out that she is "Sweet Cheeks #2" (Hannah is #1 and Alexis is #3). Grandma Karen came for a surprise visit last week and even volunteered to watch Bailey during the day while Jeff and I were at work. I am sure that they had a lot of fun together.

The same night that Grandma Karen came, Rara (Donna) and Grandpa Dean came to visit. They are great friends of ours from the Oregon coast and came to visit and take me on a rafting trip. Donna was there when Bailey was born and has been a mentor to me over the past three years.

So, here is the kiddo with these great "grandparents", eating a chocolate ice cream cone and pretending to be sad. I don't know what the deal was with the lip in Grandpa Dean's picture...I think she was sad to see them leave.

New dresses and such

 
 
Grandma Sally sent another box of new clothes this past week. I love how my mom shops...she hits Sidewalk Sales and gets the best bargains. She always says, "Now, remember, these clothes were 70% off the tag price...I didn't pay what it says it costs!" I am So my mother's daughter when it comes to shopping. So, here are a few shots of Bailey in hew darling blue sun dress. I love the one of her Jeff. And, again, I had to set her on a rock in the garden, just to keep her still enough to get the shot.

Thanks, Mom, for clothing our child. You always find fun and cute (and cheap!) stuff and it helps me out so much! Can you keep it up until she gets her first job, please?

The "Gard-nen"

This "gard-nen" is what Bailey calls our raised bed vegetable garden. She likes to go outside with us and water the garden, the dirt, the weeds, whatever. She also loves eating the ONE strawberry we get a day from our strawberry plants. If I let her pull more, even the ones that are still white, she would be a happy camper. Here's a few pictures that celebrate the harvest (even if it's not from our garden):

Bailey has taken a liking to corn on the cob. I suppose we could say that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, as I am a huge corn on the cob fan. Just give me two ears of corn and some butter and salt, and dinner is just fine for me. This, unfortunately, didn't come from our garden. We are hoping to plant corn next year though, and then we can eat all the corn we want come August.
And below is a picture of Bailey and a beautiful, big zucchini. This will taste great in bread this winter. Yummy!

I love the fact that she likes to garden with us. She has even started "making dinner" by playing in the dirt. In fact, here's a recent conversation I had with her about her dinner making escapade:

Me: Bailey, whatcha doing? (She is taking small handfuls of dry dirt from a pile and placing them on the cottage brick in our front yard)
B: Making dinner.
Me: Wow! What are you making?
B: Pause..."Strawberries."
Me: Really? Nice! What else are you making?
B: Peanuts.
Me: "Interesting." A while later, I ask, "What else are you making?"
Bailey says matter of factly, "Meat." I couldn't contain myself. I was giggling after each new dinner ingredient, but after the "meat" statement, I burst out laughing hysterically.

So Bailey's making a dinner of strawberries, peanuts and meat. Not the delicious homemade bread I used to make every Saturday in the spring. Not cookies, toast, cereal, anything that can be "made". She is making things that grow in the ground or on the ribs of an animal. I don't quite understand my child, but she sure does make me laugh.

Tonight, we are having friends and family over for dinner and we are planning on eating fresh green beans and a green salad from the garden (plus more corn on the cob and barbecued chicken). Should be a great night.

A Little Garden Goodness

 
This is our first year with a vegetable garden. We didn't have any idea what to expect, and for the most part, tried to do what other people did. For example, our friends, Dean and Donna, from the coast, have these amazing raised beds for their vegetable garden. I asked, "Why are they so high?" And Donna answered matter of factly, "So we don't have to bend over." What a concept. So we built ourselves a 4x8 raised bed of our own, 3 feet high, out of some old fencing wood. And then we planted. How exciting it was to see the beginnings of little onions and carrots. The lettuce facinated me. I was so excited to have just one little piece of lettuce to eat.

Now, (how I wish I had a photo to post) our garden is insane. The little 4x8 bed is hardly big enough to contain what we have growing in there. We have at least 10 zucchinis ready to be picked. Our cukes are flowering, our green beans are sprouting, and we have been cutting head of lettuce after head of lettuce for fresh green salads for most of our dinners. Scallions are full grown and carrots are nearly dissolved in the mouth of our little toddler. She eats them like candy, and why wouldn't you? They are sweet and much softer than the store bought ones. Tomatoes are starting to grown, strawberry plants are 4 times their original size (but are still only yielding about one red strawberry a day, which again, goes directly into the mouth of our babe).

So, here's a picture of some of the fruits of our labor (mostly watering, very little feeding, and lots of Miracle Grow)...some green leaf lettuce and sweet carrots ready for salad making. Yum!

Super Special Pig Tails

 
So there really isn't anything super special about them, but it was the only way that I could convince Bailey that she should wear pigtails today. Regularly, she won't even LET me touch her hair, but with the heat, I wanted to get her hair off her face. So at breakfast, i brought out her clips and bows and said she could pick out anything for her super special pig tails. And somehow, I was able to get them in. Well, I had to semi-bribe her to put in the 2nd one, but that's besides the point, right? So here's my little "piggy" with her curly pig tails in. And no, this is not a smile. It's a "I want to see the camera! whine that I tried to cleverly disguise as a smile. Who am I kidding?

Doesn't matter. Even if she's whining, she's still pretty cute.

Baby and Me

 
Grandma Sally got this cute little duo outfit for Bailey and her Baby for Bailey's birthday. That's right, folks, matching dresses. Quite cute actually. She wore it to church on Sunday, and of course, being the OCD mom that I am, I made sure she had her dressed by baby doll as well.

Lately, Bailey has been packing up her baby doll in her baby stroller and saying, "Go church." Interesting. Sometimes, I think that she only knows three places in the world: our house, her babysitter's house, and church. I suppose any of these three destination is just fine, but it's kind of sweet to know that Bailey likes going to church. Who wouldn't? She gets to play for 2 hours with a bunch of other kids her age, gets animal crackers, and then, after church is over, runs around the long, twisty hallway trying to see as many of her friends as possible. We like to "Go church" too, so I am glad we don't have to fight her on it.

Corner

Okay, so this is my second post that is related to pictures of Bailey in the corner. And while you may think, "Wow, that kid gets into a lot of trouble!" (which, depending on the day, may be quite true), Bailey actually volunteers to go to the corner sometimes. If she is having a meltdown, I will say, "Do you need to sit in the corner?" and she replies quietly, "Yes." So, off she goes. She sits herself down and takes a time out. Once she has cooled down, she says, "Sowwy", we talk about it, and is back to play. Sometimes, she just goes to sit in the corner for no reason. And what's more, sometimes, she takes her dolly with her and she just plays in the corner with her. Whatever. I am not picky.
 

Happy 4th of July!

 
Now, normally, I wouldn't let my daughter wear such a little thing...but she's two. So, here is my darling Bailey in a 4th of July bikini, enjoying a lovely lime green popcicle on the front porch at our house. It was a hot one, and she spent most of her time in the pool that day.

Interestingly enough, when I first showed the bikini to Jeff, he immediately said, "No way." And when I came home from running the Splash N Dash that morning, there Bailey was, sporting her red, white and blue. Dad's a sucker.

Our babies...

These are our babies. Even though Bailey is two, Sawyer is nearly two, and Leila is 10 months old, they are our BABIES. When does your baby turn into your oldest? I am sure it's when you have another child, but when does the deep down feeling of "my baby" change? I am the youngest in my family, and I remember being called the baby of the family. I don't ever remember my eldest sibling, Jim, being called the baby. I know, I know, I actually get it. It WILL happen, someday Bailey won't be my baby anymore. But I have been loving my BABY since she was born, and for some reason, I can't think of her in any other way. I overhead a friend a few months back call her 6 year old "Baby". I was relieved to know that I could keep calling my kiddo "Baby" for as long as I want to.

 Last week, Megan, Steffy and I had a pool party with our BABIES. Bailey loved splashing around in the pool, and riding her floatie.
  Leila spent most of her time in Megan's arms, but enjoyed the warm water. She even went for a ride in Bailey's floatie too.
 Sawyer, on the other hand, being the "all-boy" that he is, clearly wanted to be UNDERWATER the entire time. He repeatedly would drop to his bottom, and go underwater. When Steffy pulled him out, he had a huge smile on his face, inferring, "Let's do it again!"

All three BABIES different, but all three a total joy. What fun to play around with our kids and talk about parenting. Hopefully, we will be able to do it again sometime soon.

The Sunriver Triathlon

Did you know that the first blog post I ever did was for my first triathlon back in 2006? I was so excited about it that I just had to write about it and share my experience with others. So, here I am again, 3 years later, blogging about my more recent race: The Sunriver Olympic Triathlon.

Wow, what a RACE! It was all I ever expected it to, but with a little surprise waiting for me on my bike ride. In the end, it didn't turn out exactly how I wanted it to, but, really, what in my life does, right?
  We started off with setting up for the race the night before. Joel Setzer, friend from Portland, was racing with me. Well, we decided ahead of time that would wouldn't actually race together, but we were cyber-training together and would be one another's support during the race. We set up, got our bearings and then took a bunch of race-eve pictures. Don't we look relaxed? I was a nervous wreck on the inside.
 On race day, we got all ready to go. My swim hat took off first, a whopping 4 minutes before Joel's. Thanks to friend, Megan Graham, my tooshie was nice and cozy in her NRS wetsuit. I did a pre-race warm up, which took my breath away (it was only 60 degree water!), and then got ready for the countdown. Once my heat started, I swam the entire course, struggling a bit to stay straight and not get kicked by other swimmers. The website said the waters were crystal clear, but there was no lane marker on the bottom of the lake to keep me going in the right direction. Swim, swim, swim, blah, blah, blah. Finished the swim and headed into the transition to get ready for the bike. 3 minutes later, I was off for the bike. I felt GOOD...had my energy shots, a granola bar, and two bottles of gatorade. As I got my speed up, I noticed that I was not able to get into my 6 fastest gears, those gears you use to go really fast downhill. I knew it was an 18 speed bike (again, Megan, thank you for letting me use your bike!), but I was not familiar as to making necessary adjustments to get it to work right. No biggle. I could deal with 12 speeds. At mile 12, there was a 3 mile section with a mostly uphill climb. No prob...I had trained on hills. I get to the top, and at about mile 16, my crank (which is attached to my pedal) falls off out of nowhere. What? And, how do I fix it? I know that mostly anything can be fixed with an Allen wrench and knew that there was one in my saddle bag. So I got pulled over, retrieved my crank from the road and attempted to fix it. I didn't pay attention to the placement of the crank, and when I got back on the bike, the pedals were not in a straight line, causing me to feel like I was riding a clown bike or something (insert circus music here please). I knew that I needed to fix it again, and less than a mile later, it fell off again. What?!?!?!?!?! Pulled over again, fixed it. Got going. fell off again. Seriously? Someone on the side of the road that was cheering people on helped me out. Thought I was golden. Yeah, right. Within 10 miles, my pedal fell off 8 times. EIGHT TIMES! At one point on the ride, I knew the pedal was about to fall off, so I stopped pedalling with my left foot (the loose side) and just pedalled with my right. I got over 2 miles that way (there was also a downhill to coast), but then had to get back to repairing it. At mile 26, the pedal fell off again, and it appeared that I had lost some sort of piece to put it back together again. So, with 2 miles of the bike portion, I got off and ran with the bike. People are passing me saying, "Are you alright? Do you need anything?" "Nope, just a broken pedal. I will be fine. Thanks!" At this point in time, it just became humorous. Obviously, I wasn't in it to win the race, but this was definitely slowing down my time. After the run (which was tortuous because I didn't have free arms), My bike time was 45 minutes longer than expected. INSERT RACE FACTS HERE: There were 580 bike finishers. I finished about 568th in the bike. Oh well. So, I finally make it to the bike-run transition area, park my bike, take a quick potty break (no toilet paper left in the porta-potty!), and head for the trail for the 6.4 mile run. By now, the trail is mostly covered with walkers. So here I am, running along, passing walker after walker, cheering them on to the finish line. The trails were covered with fans cheering us on, as well as spraying runners with makeshift showers they made specifically for the race and handing out handfulls of ice chips to help with the heat. This was the best part of the race. I love it when a community rallies together and embraces a race. It was awesome.
 As I near mile 5.5, I see a familiar person ahead of me...JOEL???? Yes! Joel! After racing for more than 3 1/2 hours apart, we meet up in the end! It was awesome to run the last mile together, encouraging one another to finish strong. I told him about my bike dilemmas, we laugh, pant, and keep running to the finish line. As we approach, the crowd thickens, and I hear, "Way to go Dana!" Scott and Megan (with Baby Leila) came just to see me finish the race. They waited over 2 hours at the finish line and were awesome support when I (finally) crossed. And of course, at the end were Jeff, Bailey, and Amy, ready with cold water, hugs, and high fives.
 After our family celebration, Joel and I finished up, got our timing chips taken off our ankles, received our medals and sweat towels, and enjoyed a racer's feast of Red Vines, cheesy pasta, watermelon, pretzels, bagels, and strawberry shortcake. I had two plates.

In the end, what mattered most happened: I finished the race. My bike might have wanted me to quit, but there was no way that I could. The feeling of crossing a finish line motivates me every time. I have a feeling that, when I cross the "pearly gates" into heaven, that crown on my head and the robe around my shoulders will be similar...but even better.

I have another race this weekend, a sprint triathlon with an added boating element. I am teaming with Scott Graham on this one, and it should be a fun time. Next race is the MAC Dash, sprint triathlon in Madras in September. Anyone want to join me?