Auntie Nikki Comes to Visit

My sister, Nikki, came out for a visit last week. I hadn’t seen her in more than a year, so it was extra nice to spend some time in the same room with her. The kids loved it too, of course. This was Conan’s first time getting to meet his Aunt Nikki.

Her first full day here was also Lincoln’s first day of preschool, so she took the metro into DC in the morning and we met her for lunch after school got out. After lunch we headed to Georgetown Cupcake where Lincoln really dove into his after school treat.

Me and my sister at Del Ray Pizzeria for dinner.

We spent the next day shopping and driving around, so we didn’t take any pictures. Then she spent the weekend with friends (she used to live in the area) and came back to hang out with us for one more day before she went home. Nikki had never been to the Lincoln Memorial, so we had to go there, of course.

We actually hadn’t been to visit the Lincoln Memorial since Lincoln was younger than Conan, so he needed an updated picture.

We tried and tried and tried to go to Dairy Godmother (a custard shop), but it never worked out. When we finally got there, the day before she left, they were mysteriously closed. I guess she’ll just have to come back for another visit (with Paul and the kids)!

Preschool Rocks

Lincoln started preschool yesterday! So far (the whole hour and a half he went . . .  they’re easing the kids into it) he loves it. As a matter of fact, when we went to meet his teacher briefly on Wednesday he told me, in no uncertain terms, that I should just leave. I don’t think he needs to be eased into anything.

We Are Sparta

Have you ever thought to yourself: “Hey, I want to run, but just running sounds boring, so I also want to  climb walls, roll through mud, throw spears, and haul around a variety of awkward and heavy weights; if only there was some way to combine these myriad passions.” Probably not, right? Because that would be, well, crazy. But should you be the rare soul longing for such a challenge, know that yours desires need not go unfulfilled.

Enter the Spartan Race.

Thanks to the magic of smartphones and the inspiration that comes during Priesthood Opening Exercises, Jonathan and several friends decided to sign up for a Spartan Race. After training intensely with a semblance of regularity for several months, the much-anticipated day finally arrived.

We packed up and headed to Leesburg for the Race. We were lucky and the weather cooperated; instead of the stifling August humidity that we expected, we were greeted with an overcast sky, low 70s temperatures, and a few brief sprinklings of rain to help cool the runners down.

After a inspirational speech from Mr. Leonidas and some smoky race theatrics, the runner are off!

As the runners Spartans wandered their way through hill and dale, Hillary and Conan spent plenty of time relaxing and posing in photographs.

Jonathan ended up looking a little less photogenic. (This is probably one of our favorite pictures. Due to an earlier splash, the contact in Jonathan’s right eye was covered in mud and completely opaque. Here’s a nice shot of him reflexively closing his eye while rolling through the mud and under the barbed wire.)

The race itself involved a lot of running (and leaping over a seemingly endless number of hurdles, logs,  and walls)

And, of course, a variety of obstacles. (Sadly, we don’t have pictures of very many of the obstacles, but here’s a small sampling of some of the fun stuff that Jonathan faced throughout the race.)

And if you failed to complete an obstacle, you were forced to do thirty burpees.

The final brief stretch was a run through a sort of gauntlet.

 

And then it was over, and Jonathan could relax a bit.

Here’s the team at the conclusion of the race. Out of the 239 teams that participate, we came in 15th -- not bad for a bunch of weekend warriors. And amazingly, they all want to do it again next year.

Conan at Six Months

Train Brain

Lincoln loves trains. Lincoln loves to build. As a result, we’ve had a lot of homemade trains around these parts recently.

Lincoln will build a train out of whatever material is available at that moment. Here’s one built out of pieces of our marble run with a cup for a smoke stack:

This one is made of the pieces of a bingo game:

And these are, obviously, crayons.

This one, made of Lincoln Logs, has the added feature of a bonnet smoke stack.

More then anything though, of course, Lincoln builds trains out of Legos and Duplos. They must always have a cow catcher (we’ve been calling it a cattle guard, but now we’re worried that may be incorrect) because that is his favorite part of a train.

(This last one has smoke coming out of the smoke stack as an added bonus.)

Lincoln knows now that I take pictures of his trains so he runs and finds me whenever he finishes one.