Jace turns 10

All of a sudden he feels older, acts older, accepts more responsibility more willingly.  I think I like this kid =)

The party was low key;  cake and ice cream just amongst us family folks.  Scott and I were lame though and didn't buy a present for him in time.  We still owe him an IOU.  For the cake he requested a soft as silk cake--white and vanilla ice cream.  He doesn't like chocolate cake.  Here are some pics of the day...

Racing Jace

Saturday we woke to Grey cloudy skies, but luckily no rain.  Jace and I left the house before any one else was awake ready to tackle a 5krace.  His first, and our first together.  Admitedly, we could and should have trained better for it.  We had run several times together out and about our neighborhood to give him the feel of how long that kind of distance feels and what kind of effort it requires.  But the past two weeks have not been kind.  First, a weeklong bout of an aweful stomach flu that knocked the rest of our family flat.  Thankfully, somehow I escaped unscathed.  And by God's grace never felt sleep deprived or too out of sorts to comfort each member in turn as they succombed to 8 -24 hours of vomiting and body weakness.

The week after that was Easter and its hordes of candy and get togethers and good food.  We didn't run at all that week.

Jace was so excited to get checked in and pin on his race number.  The goodies in the bag were a nice bonus too.  He met a friend from school and they raced up and down the bouncy house along with the other kids.

The runners queued up , and we all waited excitedly for the gun.  Then Jace takes off full speed.  Over his shoulder he looks back and says "Mom, why are you going so slow?"  That would be the constant story of the entire race.

Race2Place

Jace got all excited about racing together.  I signed us up for the 5k race2place over at Mirabeau Park.  The route takes us along the Spokane river on the Centennial trail, out and back.  We ran it in 33:07/ 33:08 respectively.  Not too shabby.  AND he could have beat the pants off me.  He had speed left to spare, while I was my usual steady eddy runner.

2014 Pinewood Derby

This year Jace didn't care much to work on his car.  He picked the design early --a low rider, smooth rounded, wide fender car--and got the pieces glued and rough-sanded together, then it just sat.  Meanwhile, Scott began his own car--a short coupled, Shelby Cobra--and it sits unfinished, probably until next years slow winter work schedule.  The week before the race began the finishing process:  multiple sandings, axle polishing, weights installed and balanced, wheels aligned, and the final painting. 

Race day arrived and Jace decided he definitely didn't want to go to districts, but 4th place would be OK.
The boys ran in heats--12 each, for 42 total runs.  It was exciting!  Lots of drama--a wheel fell off, weights dropped off of a few cars and were re-glued or just rubber-banded back on, and one car jumped the track on the downhill.  Jace's car ran smoothly and placed 2nd several times, then it placed 1st several times, with a 3rd in there too.

Scott monitered the results closely and guessed that Jace's car would place either 4th or 5th.  And as it turned out he did place 4th over all and received a trophy for his efforts.  Yeah!

Running with Lyssa

This was the first time I ran a race with my oldest daughter and I was thrilled!  She instigated it and I signed us up for the Rapid Rabbit 5k race.  What a cool thing to do together.  She doesn't love running, but she does love Mama time.  And since I do love running this was a great way to spend time together.  Our cousins' family also ran for fun--all 6 of them.  The two oldest kids and Dad ran for ribbons, and the rest of us with the little ones ran for sunshine and fun.  The older kids placed 2nd and 1st respectively in their age divisions.  So proud of them.  Awesome Day!

Christmas 2013

I thought I had posted our Christmas pictures, but sadly no.  So here they are only 3 months late.

 Indoor hopscotch and painters tape...fun for hours.

 Love our snow.  Powdery snow, easy to shovel on the cold dry days.  And heavy and snowball perfect on other days.  Had a great sledding day over at Mission Hill.  Perfect temps and great sledding.  Ali still doesn't care for it, though.

 Yes, we had to do a gingerbread candy house.  Tradition,.... Tradition!

 and Christmas morning...

 Sooooo excited!!! The kids were up early. 6am I think.  They came in and pounced on us in bed until we were sufficiently woken up and moving upstairs.

 Easy Bake Oven!

 Hi Sweetie

 Got tons of new games.  We'll have to find new shelves just to store all of them.  This one is Pop the Pig.  They love it (although it will probably be broken soon)

A Minion Birthday

Here is Ali with a few friends celebrating her 5th birthday Dispicable Me style.

 Ali and Shayne so excited to help hang the streamers.  They taped little pieces to the wall while I did the nice long streamers around the room.  Lyssa and Jace helped draw minion faces on large yellow balloons with a sharpie.  So cute!

 There's the Birthday girl

 Pin the eyes on the minion...

 Here's our minion fans, all set in yellow and blue duds.  All 3 of the younger kids are missing several teeth each.  I wish you could see it.

 Check out the "banana" flavored minion cupcakes.

 All the kids dressed the part in yellow and blue.  Two kids even did suspenders or overalls.  Two had knit minion hats.

 Our bananas had eyes, as well as the big yellow balloons.  I guess I didn't get any pictures of those=(

The refreshments were simple and fun.  Lemonade, bananas, minion cupcakes and a scoop of rainbow sherbet per Ali's request.