Mid vaca update

So this is me and Aunt Carol trying to keep Gabrielle occupied after getting 11 stitches to close up her knee, which of course means...NO LAKE.  We arrived in NH on the 2nd of July, and she slid off the raft (across a nail) on the 5th of July, so hasn't been in the water since.  She's been a trooper considering they start talking about swimming in the lake in February.

And this is Grampa and Evie going out to the raft to make sure all the nails are pounded flat!!

And Tyler and Evie, feeling bad that Gabrielle can't join them, but not letting it stop them from taking full advantage of the fun!

And my happy place...  Grew up spending my summers here, and every time I go back it's like I never left.  The sound of the loons calling is magic to me.  Picking the wild blueberries on the shore while watching the boats go by and listening to the waves is the most peace I've felt in EONS.  Love it.

With apologies to Jeff Foxworthy...

If you have been driving right next to the same car for more than a mile...
You might be the bottleneck.

If you can see wide open asphalt in front of you, and only windshields behind you...
You might be the bottleneck.

If people are darting to the right, and then back to the left behind you, honking, and "waving" at you...
You just might be the bottleneck.

GET OUT OF THE PASSING LANE!!!

PS:  I was not the one darting, honking and waving.  I was 4 cars behind, too amused to be annoyed, thinking that pre-kids, I probably would have been annoyed and darting, honking, and waving.

Genetics cannot be overcome...

For the past several months (okay, be honest Lori, years) Den has been after me to clean up a few areas of the house.  The loft, that has been laid waste by my boxes, cartons, and bins of scrapbooking and crafting supplies, the area to the left of our bed that has been laid waste by every thing I don't have a spot for downstairs, and the guest room that became a catchall after Christmas when the last of the guests left.

Today, Gabrielle had plans all day, so I had big plans to let Tyler and Evie occupy each other, maybe with extra movies if need be, and to dig in to one of the aforementioned areas.  So in true Krasinski fashion, after I sent Gabrielle off and popped in a movie for the other two, I.......emptied the cabinet under the sink in the master bathroom, and reorganized it, cleaned my closet, and sat down and watched "The Sandlot" with Evie and Tyler.  Sorry Den.  :(

Bandwagon jumper?

You would think that being a physical therapist I would have known this already, but as I prefer not to think about running,  it never occurred to me.  Running barefoot REALLY uses more muscles in the calves than running with running shoes on.  I know those of you who know me well and are reading this are shocked  that I was running, and Pat's Run is 10 months away, but there is a reason!

At our staycation, there was a fitness room.  I knew there would be, and most fitness rooms have Stairmasters.  The Stairmaster is my very favorite piece of fitness equipment EVER.  So while packing, I threw my running shoes (workout shoes) in a bag along with the kids', so that we could go to the fitness center and I could use the Stairmaster.  Saturday morning rolled around and I asked who would like to go work out with me, and Gabrielle and Tyler both said they wanted to.  We got dressed in workout gear, opened the closet and found....no bag of running shoes.  I went to the car to check if they had been left in there, went to lost and found to see if we left them in the front of the hotel while unloading--no luck.  Now the kids are excited about working out, so off we went to the fitness center wearing sandals and carrying athletic socks.

Of course, since the Stairmaster is the best piece of equipment ever, they were all in use when we got there, but there were 3 treadmills right in a row.  So off came the sandals, on went the socks, and I showed the kids how to use the treadmill.  So there were the 3 of us running "barefoot" on the treadmill, not because we are trendy and jumping on that whole barefoot running bandwagon, but because I am a flake and we came home from the staycation to find the bag of shoes at the foot of my bed, right where I had left them.  The whole point of this blog though, is to tell you that I only ran a mile on the treadmill.  When I run the 4.2 miles of Pat's Run, my calves are not screaming like they have been screaming the past 24 hours.  The kids both said the same thing.

 If I go back to working with adults, this just might have changed my whole perspective on how to treat lower extremity weaknes!.

It's the little things, part 2

I wrote a blog back in Nov about the Halloween soap dispenser running out of soap the day after Halloween and how that made me happy.  I'm now writing the opposite blog.

This morning I came downstairs to find that my kids had opened a second gallon of milk before the first one was gone.  We go through a gallon of milk per day, so it's not like one of them will go bad.  It is no big deal.  Really not even a little deal.   But it drives me CRAZY...can't help it.  Had to blog it in order to move on.  How silly is that?

stormy night

So after watching every video on youtube and Yahoo about the tornado in Springfield, MA (10 min from the house I grew up in), and then some "Tornado Chaser" show last night, I -- shockingly-- dreamt about tornadoes!

Add to that tornado Evie, (whip to her right side, clothesline mom with her arm, flip back to left side, rip all the covers off mom) who crept into the bed sometime in the middle of the night and I didn't get much sleep last night...

I HATE braces!

Mom: " I made popcorn, do you want some?"
Tyler:  "What can I have?"
Mom:  "Oh, I forgot.  Sorry buddy."

Mom:  "Do you guys want some gum?"
Tyler:  "What can I have?"
Mom:  "Ahhh.  Sorry Tyler."

Mom:  "I bought corn on the cob for dinner!"
Tyler, looking crestfallen:  "What?"
Mom:  "I'll cut yours off the cob Ty, sorry."

When are we done with these stupid things?!?