little baby Jaycee

 

Dan’s big brother Jason became a father while we were in town!  Dan had to fly home to study for the bar (so sad) but the rest of us got to meet her.  Her name is Jaycee and she was 8lb 15oz 20.5 inches born on July 11th.  Look at all that pretty blonde hair!

What a beautiful baby, (doesn’t she look just like her mom?) we are so happy for these guys!  And her cousins were so excited to hold her.  Welcome to the Chapman Powder Puff Team Jaycee!

That is one cute Grandma don’t you think?  Dan’s mom is really good at this granddaughter thing.  I included the picture in the middle below to show how the girls just FLOCKED to the baby, they all wanted to “see her” which means to {poke, squeeze, hug, hold, or otherwise touch} “seeing” the baby has little to do with their eyes!

Earlier that morning the girls got to play together at “Elise’s House.”  Sorry Ann and Brian, it’s not yours, it’s ELISE’S according to Sophie.  And it’s an often talked about/rarely visited wonderland for my girls.

This last picture is cool I think, I am learning to use a slow sync flash in low light situations.  It’s fun because you can still capture the 2 things you usually can’t when using a flash 1)movement and 2)ambient light, plus you still get a relatively sharp image (look at the Barbie).  I still need more practice.  Go try it out! 

Beecher Reunion and Tessa’s 1st trip to the ER

Ok, so now I am back to the travelog.  Don’t grumble!  It’s going great exciting stuff!! :)

Well, to a linner (lunch/dinner) at the Golden Corral for Dan’s Grandma Chapman’s reunion.  I was happy to be at an all-you-can-eat buffet after my race that morning.  And at that linner is where Sophie met her twin!  They were born only one day apart.  And they got along great!  I can’t for the life of me remember her name though, Nina… help me out.  After linner there was an auction at the Chapman’s to raise money for the next reunion.  Sophie was outside playing, Dan was in the basement studying and I was in the house when I heard a blood curdling SCREAM!  I ran out expecting to see Sophie’s arm broken or at least her face bleeding but she was just standing the grass screaming.  Turns out there was a snake.  She likes snakes in the zoo, but not in real life apparently.  What a relief!  We scared the snake into the window well.  The snake story is becoming a close 2nd to the “I’m scared of Dumbo,” routine she tells every person who will listen.  If they like the Dumbo story she’ll say, “I saw a snake, it scared me! I scream, I scream, I scream.”

During the reunion my girls napped and I hurried over to my mom’s for a quick sneak peek of my favorite nephew, baby Dean.  My sister had just arrived from Houston and made a pit stop at my mom’s on their way down to Orem to visit with the Kendalls.  Dean is adorable and really easy going.

Back at the reunion I was playing with Tessa and pulling her up from the ground to my face saying “boo.”  Tessa was chuckling heartily, until suddenly she cried out.  She was doing that really sad painful cry and holding her wrist.  After a few minutes of her not calming down and not using her arm I took her into to see Dan for a 2nd opinion.  We could get her to wiggle her fingers a bit but she didn’t want to.  Nothing looked “wrong” with her arm and we couldn’t feel anything strange.  But the poor girl was just screaming in pain.  I made a quick call to our insurance since we were out of town and found that we couldn’t go to instacare (by this time it was after office hours about 8:00 I think) we had to go to an ER if we wanted it covered by insurance.  I don’t like the ER, in my experience it’s so stressful and inefficient!  But we took her up to the Primary Children’s ER.  The little sweetie fell asleep in her carseat on the way up from pure exhaustion.  We could tell she was still in pain because she would whimper in her sleep from time to time and grimace.  It was so sad!  I felt so terrible because it was MY FAULT, I am the one who did this to her!! 

Anyway, we got there talked to some people including a resident who said she needed xrays to figure out what was wrong.  She watched Up! in the room with Dan while we were waiting.  I have to say we had a very good ER experience, we didn’t have to wait long and being a Children’s hospital it had tons of fun pictures, toys, books, and movies to distract her from her pain.  Before they did any xrays the resident came back with a doctor who said she thought it was nursemaid’s elbow.  The resident came over and touched Tessa’s arm a bit and twisted her wrist quickly.  I couldn’t hear the pop but, Tessa screamed and then suddenly stopped crying all together.  She almost immediately started using her arm again and acted like nothing was wrong.  It was so good to see her smile again!

A note about the cruddy pictures.  I brought my camera in the car to take pictures but was too chicken to bring it in the ER, it just felt so wrong to bring my big camera in to document this occasion of my daughter being hurt.  Maybe I would for like a planned surgery, but not the ER.  So these pictures are from my phone. 

Since she recovered so quickly we knew that’s what it was, her elbow out of place.  The doctor even came back and showed us how to fix it if it pops out again, it’s really easy.  She made me feel better by telling me how common it is and that children’s ligaments are so loose that their bones are easily dis-jointed.  But advised me to lift her under her arms and not with her arms, which I will most definitely do!

almost there!

 

I need to take a break from the chronological for just a moment (I have a bunch of pictures from the Quincy Reunion trip to post) and bring some attention to the NOW.  Dan is studying his brains out, not literally we hope, for the Bar Exam he’s taking next week.  This poor man not only endured 3 years of law school but now an additional (and expensive) 2 month bar prep course that mandated almost all his time.  And it is coming to the end, he is ALMOST THERE!  The test is next Tuesday and Wednesday, so wish him luck!

This week has been awful, he is off to school by 7AM and returns home around 9PM.  And he studies after coming home for another hour or two after that.  Can you imagine studying for that long?  I just want to cry thinking about it.  I know I couldn’t do it.  I think the prospect of having to do it all over again keeps him studying for longer and longer, just in case.  He does need breaks though and a chance to see the kids so we’ve happily brought him a picnic dinner to the law school most nights for some family time. 

Wednesday was his birthday and that didn’t change his study habits one bit, when I sent him a message at 8AM to wish him happy birthday he replied, “Oh yeah, I forgot.”  We decided previously to celebrate his birthday AFTER the bar but it just felt wrong to ignore his birthday completely.  So the girls and I surprised him by bringing birthday treats to school… and then quickly leaving so he could get back to work.  I had planned to get cupcakes but Sophie and Tessa choose little cookies with character rings in the frosting.

 

There is a lot of love in these hugs and smiles for their Daddy.  We are so proud of him and grateful for the sacrifices he is making for our family!  I know it will pay off.  You can do it honey!!!

I passed by this little machine on our way to the restrooms in Macy’s this week.  I don’t know what it is… but it speaks the truth!  This is how I found it, didn’t type that in myself.  I had to take a picture with my phone and send it to Dan right away.

And, randomly… I’d like to add a few pictures I’ve wanted to blog but don’t know where to fit them in, so I figure at the bottom of this blog is as good a place as any.  Before I forget.

{I’m working with Sophie on going potty all on her own these days and since Tessa gets in on the treat afterwards, Sophie decided that Tess should participate in the work!  She drags Tessa in to sit on the princess potty (fully clothed) a few times a day.  I don’t care what it is, it’s cute when they do stuff together!}  {This elaborate contraption Dan put together one night in our old apartment because we couldn’t get the alarm to stop beeping.  You can’t see it but the alarm key pad is on the column in the right of the picture and he’s used couch cushions cinched down with an ace bandage and added pressure from the bug cushions and chair, to muffle the noise.  I laughed so hard in the morning when I saw this.}

Sophie likes to put her face in the leg holes of Tessa’s pool floatee.  My beautiful Sophie, what a funny little goof!

 

Have a good week!!

Half or Full Marathon?

I know you are tired of hearing about my running, I just posted about it.  But I can’t stop thinking about this opportunity and really want some help deciding!  Here’s my dilemma:

I found a race In Colorado on Labor Day (which is in 6 1/2 weeks) that has both a half marathon and a full marathon. Which should I do?

Half Marathon Pros:

• I know I can do the distance without injury
• I can try to break 1:50!

Half Marathon Cons:

• the race is up hill the first half and then down the 2nd… might make it hard to get a PR
• They have pacer runners (which is way cool!) but they don’t have a pacer at my goal of 1:50, just at 2 hours or 1:45

Marathon Pros:

• I am already in shape and could get my mileage high enough to do it in 6 weeks
• It would be really cool to complete a marathon!
• The marathon is all at a slight down hill
• They have a pacer at the time my goal would be, 4 hours, so I could just stick with them
• We want to have more children and I will likely be pregnant sometime next year making it at least 2 and probably more like 3 years until I’d be able to run another marathon, now may be the time!

Marathon Cons:

• Risk of INJURY is high, and could be long lasting
• People usually train for 16 weeks for a marathon, and I would only have 6, BUT I am very close to on track since I just trained for a half marathon

What do you think?  Any advice?  Anyone out there done this before?  I’m putting up a poll. Please help me decide!

South Jordan Half Marathon 7/10/10

I ran my first half marathon (13.1 miles) the morning after we arrived in Utah for a family reunion.  I had planned to run one here in Denver but couldn’t find one on a Saturday this summer while we are in town.  So I just found one in Utah, conveniently while we were there, on a Saturday AND in my home town!

I felt less nervous for this race than others because (1) I had trained well, (2) it’s a longer race so I didn’t feel so much pressure to be so darn fast, and mostly because (3) I had ran the course previous to the race.  I woke up at 4:45 and got to the start line WELL before dawn.  I was the 2nd racer to arrive.  I knew it was a small race (their 1st year) but… c’mon!  More people came but I think there were only 115 runners.

Dan and the girls woke up and found me around mile 10 to cheer me on.  It meant a lot to me, sort of teared up when I saw them, good thing I was wearing sun glasses so no one could see. :)  Check out their cute bed heads and jammies in the picture below.

I met my primary goal of under 2 hours but not my secondary goal of under 1:50.  That’s okay, I feel really good about my race.  I ran hard and at a pretty even pace the whole time.  I had energy left to sprint the last 100 meters and no injuries!  It’s a really hilly race and I think I will try a flatter course and maybe break 1:50 next time.  My biggest excuse for my time is that they didn’t have mile markers on the course!  I did have my nike+ chip that talks to my ipod and tells me distance, time and pace but I forgot my ipod and used Dan’s and it gave me inaccurate readings so I thought I was going faster than I was.  According to his itouch I finished in under 1:50 (it said I was done like half a mile early) I may have been closer to my goal had I not relied on that bad information.  But no biggie!  Like I said, I am happy with my performance.  The nice thing about the first time you do a race, anything is a PR!

In a small race like this my places look so much better than the Boulder Bolder!  I got 5th overall and 2nd in my age division, made me feel pretty darn special.  I am tempted to do a full marathon but am scared of injury so I think I’ll stick to half marathons for now.  I’d really like to do another half this summer but I can’t find one!  What is it with Denver and races on Sundays only?  Geez.  Hello Denver?  Sunday CHURCH, you ever heard of it?!?!?

Cherry Creek Art festival and Jessica’s rant

 

We braved the heat and visited the Cherry Creek Art festival this year.  We got there just after it opened but it was already packed!  They have hundreds of booths for artists of all different types from around the world, photography, painting, pottery, sculptures, there were even kaleidoscopes and chunks of glass.  We didn’t get through a quarter of the booths before my girls were too tired and we had to go.  This dress is the only piece I got a picture of, my girls were too high maintenance.  But we saw some way cool stuff!

 

 

This “orange superman” (as Sophie called him) was just there for you to take pictures with.  Dan said he was actually really funny and put them in the “sexy pose.”  As a joke Dan asked if he could hold him, the guy didn’t even flinch and picked Dan right up and posed for the camera!

We all laughed, except for Sophie.  She was so scared of this superman impersonator and she didn’t like that her dad an uncle were that close to him, look at her frown, she was upset!  Tessa fell asleep only for a moment after lunch and then cried all the way to the car.  Poor baby.  It’s not he fair’s fault my girls were being bums they had stuff for kids, it was just an off day I guess.

 

We went to lunch at a really yummy crepe cafe in Cherry Creek.  It was crowded because of the festival and my girls had HAD IT with this place and were really acting up and LOUD.  I was mortified.  You know how I said the Lakewood fair wasn’t very classy?  Well Cherry Creek is the opposite, it’s a very hoity toity kind of place.  We had the only kids there and boy did I get some nasty glares!  Why is it that rich people don’t have kids?  Dan told me the other day that as income goes down the number of kids goes up.  I wonder what the correlation is.  What comes first?  Are they rich because they don’t have kids?  Or do they not have kids because they are rich (both working)?  I guess they are too self-centered.  Ok, just kidding, that can’t be it… but really, why?  I was just so self-conscious since it felt like no one there understood what I was going through.  And I only have 2 kids!  I can’t imagine what it’ll be like when I have 3 or 4, yikes.  Oh well, not my problem I guess.  They can judge me all they want, I’m still going to the festival! :)  Moms are people too.

Wow, sorry about that tangent!  Keeping my opinion to myself hasn’t ever been a talent of mine.  Anyway, the festival was fun!  I’d like to go again.

* Lakewood on Parade * July 3rd

We brought the cutest kids to the fair, no doubt.

I think it’s worth mentioning that the kitty Sophie is holding I got for $1 at an estate sale that morning.  I want to learn how to refinish furniture so I went out garage sale-ing for my first time since I was a kid looking for some cheap pieces to learn on.  I didn’t get furniture that day.  But I have got a $10 dresser since then I will post pictures of as soon as I get around to painting it.

  

There were a lot of art activities and games for the kids to play but we didn’t want to wait in line.  So we just got our food, and hung out on the bleachers waiting for the fireworks.  We did catch some Doggie Dancing and a bird show while waiting.  Matt and Dan were really disappointed in the dogs, they thought it was going to be trick show… not old ladies dancing with their dogs to music.  But my girls thought it was great!  Tessa is really into babies, she always wants to hold Lily.

Lakewood on parade was fun… not the classiest of events, but it free, had plenty of mullets, good food and fun times for our family.  So that’s a success!  Plus it was on Saturday before the 4th, which we appreciate since our Sunday’s are devoted to church. 

 

Both the girls really enjoyed the fireworks.