Madeline's 8th birthday Minnesota Weekend

We came. We saw. We froze.

No, not really. I thought we actually handled it pretty well. I realize the difference between 40 here and 13 in MN is not so much, because at 40 here we are freezing because we are trying to run to the mailbox in our bare feet and going out on errands with a coat begrugingly thrown on and hanging open and lamenting how cold it is, whereas, at 13 in MN you assume you will be freezing so you prepare to exit the building with boots, heavy coat fully locked in place with buttons or zipper, gloves, scarf and possibly a hat, slip into your car and shiver until the seat warmer starts heating up your butt, and then dash in to your next indoor adventure.

I had a very special time with Madeline all by herself in MN. Mads is the 2nd born and of the four girls is the "quiet perfectionist". She is a rule follower and is always well behaved and is very conscientious of doing the right thing. She willingly chats and entertains if the floor is unmistakably hers, but she will never fight for the floor, and around here that means she never gets the floor. This lack of floor time produces a quiet moodiness and pouting that is also easy to go unnoticed.

My goal for the weekend was to hyper-focus on Mads and make her feel noticed and special. I hope I succeeded. She is a precious girl and I love her very much!

Grandma picked us up and we met up with Grandpa for dinner at the Rainforest Cafe at the Mall of America, and then went in to Minneapolis to a Children's Theatre performance of The Gruffalo, which was excellent.

The next day we lunched at the American Girl at Mall of America with Grandma and Auntie Nonny and then got her dolls ears pierced and hair done there. She also spent her birthday money on a new American Girl doll and some accessories.

We stayed at the Radisson Hotel next door to the Mall of America. It had an indoor waterpark, and Mady's cousin Raley joined us for the night to partake of the fun in the waterpark.

Saturday we spent a big part of the day with the Wolfe cousins at Nickelodean Universe, an indoor amusement park at the Mall of America. Then we watched High School Musical 3 at the hotel with Auntie and Grandma.

It had snowed 4 inches on Friday while we were there, so our last morning we let Mads spend some time outside playing in the snow and we also went to an outdoor ice skating rink, and she tried her hand at ice skating.

Then we boarded the plane and headed home where daddy and the sisters were waiting for us at the airport. Daddy surprised Mady with a really cool homemade treasure chest cake that he had made with the girls over the weekend.

My girl Madeline is sweet, special, creative, quiet, trustworthy, and fun to be with. I love my girl.

Broken...

My brave baby girl broke her arm yesterday! Sarah (5) came and got me and said, "Mom, Gracie is crying, she was doing a somersault and I heard her arm pop!" Well, that did get me up, but, can I just tell you how many times a day I am told someone is hurt? So although I knew enough to move immediately with the description she gave, I was still skeptical that we had a real injury on our hands.

As I approached her and saw her sitting cross-legged with her arm resting on her lap and kind of a dazed, whimpering expression on her face, I looked at her arm and didn't even get up close to her before I KNEW it was broken. It was so obvious, there was a bend in the forearm!

I just kept telling myself to be calm and not panic. I am so thankful for that brave little girl who did not cry or get hysterical, because that is what kept me from crying and being hysterical. Two wonderful neighbors came over and we taped her arm with packaging tape to a small cutting board, pumped her with tylenol and put a bag of crushed ice right on the bare arm (and kept it there all the way to the hospital, when we got there her arm was so numb we could have cut it off with a butter knife!)

We went right to Children's hospital, which I am so glad we did because the radial bone was broken clear through and at an angle and she needed to be sedated to have it set in place.

Most know Grace's favorite color in the world is orange and she kept saying she wanted an orange cast, but unfortunately that must not be a popular color because it wasn't a choice, so she went with Red. We told her it is a reddish orange. :)

She will have the full arm cast for a month, and then a short cast for another couple weeks after that. Right now her biggest distress is that she sucks her thumb on her right hand. It is her comfort position to have her thumb and snuggle bunny up by her face, and she is very sad that she cannot get her hand to her face with her full arm cast.

Some may think, cool, it will break her of that habit. Maybe if she was my first born I'd be humiliated that my almost 4 year old still sucks her thumb, but she is my baby, and I really don't care if she sucks her thumb until her wedding day! She is uncomfortable and she can't comfort herself in her usual way and it makes me sad! :(

I have been so proud of her. She is the bravest, strongest little girl, and it helped me to not give in to panic. She barely cried and was calm through the whole thing yesterday and, although her equilibrium is off with the big cast, and she cannot dress herself or go to the bathroom by herself like she is used to, she is such a trooper. Kids are so resiliant!

I love my little Goo! She is my hero!

Running...a forced perspective

My sister is strong-arming me into writing a post about my running so she can link her post on her blog about running to mine. I initially told her "no", but here I am, we'll see what I can come up with...

Running. It is a secret dream of mine to be a runner, not unlike my secret desire to be a beautiful singer. However, becoming a runner is something that could actually become a reality...the singing, not so much, at least without a voicebox transplant (I still pretend on Sunday mornings when I belt out worship songs amongst the other 2,000 singing and think myself amazing. :))

I was always a power walker after all my babies were born. I literally power walked my butt off through the neighborhood with first a single stroller, then a double stroller, and even a couple desperate times, a double stroller and a baby bjorn strapped to my body (don't recommend that).

A couple years ago my sis-in-law and sister both took up running and I got inspired. On a visit to MN the summer of '07 my sil diligently came to get me every other morning at 5:30am to run about 4 miles. I begged her to show me mercy, but she was ruthless. I amazingly adjusted to pushing my body past its cardiovascular and physical limits, and could pump out 4 miles by the end of the 2 weeks there. There was that nasty little pain in my left ankle every time, but whatever...

When I got home I continued running and felt like such a champion to be able to run for 40 min without stopping. I bought some new running shoes, thinking it was my inadequate shoes that kept my ankle hurting and kept at it despite the pain. The end of the line was a trip up to the Jersey shore, where, one day into our vacation I pushed myself 3 miles on the hotel treadmill and could barely hobble back to my room when I was done. I spent the rest of the week at the beach and on the boardwalk all taped and wrapped up, iced, and ibuprofen/percocetted (is that a word) while trying to enjoy the beach and the boardwalk.

When I got home the writing was on the wall...a broken ankle. A stress fracture, likely from poor shoes and to quick a build up. I just can't do anything half ass (can I say the "a" word here?) I feel like, what is the point of only running a mile, what good is that going to do me? Anyway, I spent 6 weeks in a boot cast and by then it was late fall and I just couldn't get motivated to start running again.

Lets fast forward, shall we, this is getting a little boring isn't it?

So there has been no exercise to speak of on any consistent basis since the broken ankle incident, and 15 mysterious pounds and quite a bit of jiggle has been left in its wake. I made the cliched new years resolutions on Jan. 1 and started running again and watching what I eat.

Here I am mid Feb and I have managed to lose 6 lbs and work my way back up to running 4 miles in about 40 min without stopping, and I like to powerwalk another 20-30min to finish up a full hour. I am satisfied with getting out every other day. I am also trying to incorporate some strength training and my girlfriend has shown me some exercises to do at home with free weights and an exercise ball. Can't say I am very consistent on that, I am just glad I am running with a little consistency so far.

Food has been a greater issue. When my kids were babies, I just never thought about food or snacking. I was a naturally healthy eater and just ate to live, at the appropriate meal times. I don't know what has happened in recent years, but man, I struggle with wanting to snack all the time! I have to virtually eliminate all my favorite naughty foods from my life because I am not one that can just eat one or two of something dastardly like a lushious block of extra sharp cheddar cheese, or a bag of Cape Cod Potato chips....yummy!!! Pizza is NOT my friend. Nor is anything salty/crunchy or savory like olives. I can avoid most sweets with no problem, but you won't find me baking chocolate chip cookies because I tend to bathe myself in the batter and only end up with 7 actual baked cookies for my efforts. :)

So I have started logging on www.myfooddiary.com in order to realistically see what I shove into my mouth every day and keep myself in check. There are plenty of delicious, healthy things to eat, but man, sometimes I just miss downing half an appetizer order of chips and artichoke dip!

My goal is April 1 to be a consistent runner and down 15 lbs. My reward is a night in a nice hotel all by myself with no children, messy house, husband. Just me, myself, and I, room service, magazines, quiet, sleep, and maybe a massage thrown in.

There, Non, here's your post, are you happy now?

Photo's of a 10th birthday room makover

THE ROOM REVEAL...in video!