independence day Archives

We made it through the Fourth of July weekend, but what I feared most became a reality. The good news is my wife and I kicked the day off with a bang by placing in our Fourth of July 5k!

The night before the race, we brought Avery up the road in our neighborhood to see the local fireworks. It was past her bedtime before they even started and we were getting eaten by bugs, but I’d say she still had a great time.

Okay, maybe “great” is an exaggeration, but it was officially her first time to see fireworks since last year I don’t think she was too aware. Either shame on us for keeping her up so late when we had to wake her up extra early the next day or….no, never mind, just shame on us.

G-Ma met us at Martin House Brewery, where the race was being hosted, to hang out with Avery as Going Mom and I pushed our legs to the limits in the hot and humid weather. The race started at 8am and it was already sticky with most of the participants sweating from just standing around.

Isn’t my Mom beautiful? I can’t believe she’s turning 60 at this end of this month! Oops, was I not supposed to share that with the blogosphere? Sorry, Mom, I love you!

Before the start, we took turns posing together for pictures with Avery. Any picture with these three lovely ladies is one to cherish forever.

Avery wasn’t sure of what to make with Daddy not having a shirt on, but not like it’s anything new.

By the time we took our family picture, Avery had enough of the posing. She was probably pissed we woke her up so early too.

Kelley snapped a shot of my true fashion sense wearing brown and black. But hey, I was excited to race in my Soft Star Shoes Dash RunAmoc since the last race never panned out. Don’t I look proud?

After a quick warm-up jog, singing the National Anthem alongside 200+ already sweaty runners, and anxious to run, we were finally off. Kelley and I gave each other a good luck kiss and I dashed in the grass to pass slower runners and walkers.

Actually, I had to go off road a few times in order to pass people, and the Dash RunAmocs performed better than expected. With the Bullhide Leather Sole, I was worried traction would be an issue in the grass when I jumped to the side, but I never slipped once. The rest of the race was on a gravel trail, and they felt light with just enough protection from the rocks.

G-Ma was too occupied with an energetic toddler to ask her to take action shots of us racing, so I just have snippets from the Movin’ Pictures. As you can see, they are not paid for, just what you can find online, but I think they’re good enough.

What if, one day, it was cool to buy pictures with the word “Proof” across the entire image? I’d be ahead of the game then!

The shoes were great with their minimal weight and maximum performance. As long as it’s not wet (leather soles and water is like walking on ice), these are awesome. I do have other RunAmocs with a rubber trail sole which feel great when running too, but I like using those for lifting in my garage more.

The race itself was quick but the heat was punishing all of us. But that didn’t stop Going Mom from keeping on course and maintaining composure. I even have “proof” of her solid performance.

Both of us have hardly put enough running training in lately, be we have been rocking intense workouts with the barbell and kettlebells which gave us a great foundation to keep us going strong. And, as a result, our strength training paid off; we both came in 3rd place in our age group!

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It may not seem like anything spectacular to some, but I’m proud of the both of us and think it was a great way to kick off the Fourth of July!

Out of 261 runners, we came in 13th (me) and 59th (wife) place overall. I was hoping for a sub-20 minute run, but I’ll take 20:26. Plus, maybe that’s a positive sign that I’m doing better at my ultimate goal of gaining strength/weight.

Our favorite brewery, Martin House, had free beer for all runners. Kelley and I had a few drinks while sharing some much deserved beer with G-Ma while waited for the Awards to get our medals and take a photo. Of course, Avery had to be in there with both of us. Still rockin’ her “no smile” look.

After taking advantage of free craft beer (#winning), and talking with other runners, some who were quite interested in my brown Soft Star running shoes, we took off to G-Ma’s house. This is where we spent the night what I was scared of happening, happened.

Lets just say that sleep was very rare that night. Of course, our sweet angel did take a nap on the way home the next day.

What a stinker. Details of the rest of the day and tiring night are coming soon. Until then, have a great day!

How was your Fourth of July?

Did you run any races or kick back and enjoy the day in relaxation?

Happy Independence Day to my fellow Americans, and Happy Friday to all others! Both great things, and both reasons to celebrate!

We’re heading down to G-Ma’s to celebrate the 4^th of July weekend with Uncle Preston (if he’s around) and G-Ma’s boyfriend, Paul. This will be the first time Avery gets to watch fireworks, and we’re not too sure how she’ll act. Any tips?

Growing up, I remember getting tremendously excited around New Year’s and the 4^th of July because that meant fireworks!! When I was old enough, I would have my own yard sale trying to sell anything from some of my old books to jewelry I thought my mom would never miss.

For some reason, some boy sitting in the front yard with a few things laying on a blanket never got me very far. I earned some money, though, but mainly out of pity from the neighbors. I even tried my shot at a Kool-Aid stand which earned a bit too. Same reason…..pity.

With my earnings, I’d ride my bright neon Huffy bike to the firework stand nearby and spend it all on whatever I could afford. The stand owners were parents to one of my friends, so they’d always toss in a few extras.

I couldn’t afford the big fireworks, my sympathetic mom helped there, so I mainly came back with a lot of Black Cat firecrackers. Probably for the best since trying to ride bike while carrying several artillery shell fireworks would be ill-advised.

Not 30 minutes after arriving back home and I’d be out of my hard earned fire ant disrupters. Man, for such a small thing, those firecrackers are pretty potent!

One day, while Avery was screaming because I set her down for a second, I reflected upon my past obsession with firecrackers and came up with 4 things they have in common with babies. I figured 4 is a good number for the 4^th; see how intuitive I am?

1. Both are small but loud. When compared to an adult, babies are small, cute and (usually) cuddly, right? Likewise, a firecracker pales in comparison to the enormous fireworks you’d see at a major firework display. Despite their small packaging, babies and firecrackers can and do create quite a racket.

The firecrackers are self-explanatory; you light them and they go “boom!” Babies do a great job at creating loud noise with just their vocals, or by grabbing anything nearby and banging it on anything else nearby.

Although, unless you have one of those strands of 50,000 firecrackers set to explode one after the other in sequence, babies tend to make noise for longer periods. And, unfortunately, it’s not on cue by lighting a fuse, it’s all on their terms!

2. Both are good at exploding. While firecrackers themselves explode, babies tend to create explosions by other means. But, after either one “explodes” you have a mess to clean up.

The paper wrapping and any remnants from an unfortunate toy might be scattered across the ground, while babies leave their aftermath inside a diaper, on the floor, up their back, in the tub, in the car, in the…well, you get the idea.

3. Both have a short fuse. You ever try to light a single firecracker? Those things explode before you can turn the other way after lighting, and a lot of people, me included, just light and throw them quickly as they explode before touching the ground. Not safe or smart since you eventually have one go off in your hand which feels far from good.

Babies, on the other hand, can be as happy as a clam at high tide for one moment, but if you so much as take your attention off of them to scratch your head, they can go irate! This happens to Going Mom and me frequently; we’ll have Avery laughing as we coo at her and make funny faces, but we stop to talk to each other and WHAM! she’s crying.

4. Both need to be tightly swaddled/wrapped. We haven’t swaddled Avery in months, but when we did, it had to be a tight wrap. If it wasn’t tight enough, she’d get her arms free and thrash around like a short circuited robot. For a firecracker to work as intended, it needs to be very tightly wrapped around the powder inside.