I am a Warrior

I survived Warrior Dash and will sign up again next year. I did the 3.1 miles and 11 obstacles in 1 hour 10 minutes. We didn't run much but the obstacles took the wind out of you so running was not really happening.

Before

Here is taste of our obstacle course, I have photos of the last few courtesy of our friend Diane but that is the only place for non-racers to stand and cheer:

• 5 foot walls followed by crawling under barbed wire
• Up and into and over 4 roll off dumpsters (empty) with tires between. This was difficult, I'm about a 1/2 foot taller than the side of the dumpster so on the outside there was a foot hold, on the inside there wasn't. A kind competitor helped me on the last 2 to get my leg swung over the side
• Balance beam like the ones you see on survivor
• 11 foot wall with a rope. This is the one obstacle I couldn't do. Tried really hard but couldn't get started. However, Stacey did awesome and conquered not only the wall but her fear of heights.
• Cargo net
• Crawl through a dark tunnel
  
• Scale a platform and slide down a fire house pole
• Waist deep pond (green algae and all) and up and over logs
• Soaking wet up and over another cargo net
• Scale another platform and over
• Jump over fire
• Crawl in mud under barbed wire
  

After

A taste of the characters at the Dash. We also saw a group of men in superhero boxer briefs.

IT WAS AWESOME!

Preparing to be a Warrior

Tomorrow I am running (walking?) the Warrior Dash with some awesome women. I have no illusions of grandeur that I will be crossing the finish line without collapsing. However, I have been running/spinning/lifting for five days a week the last 10 weeks. Even though I don't expect I can run all 3.2 miles in August Carolina heat and humidity, I feel like I'm headed into the race with the overall fitness of above average.

My race day gear includes:
Clothes and shoes I'm willing to toss after the race
A colored bra so I can change in the parking lot
A towel to put on my friend's car seat for the ride home
A change of clothes and shoes

Our heat is at 10am, and the Dash is a place for us amateur athletes to run through some mud, crawl under some barbed wire and jump over fire. And when its all done, we get to eat turkey legs and drink beer. My kind of race.

I am excited (suppose I should be more scared than I am). My awesome women and I are going to do the course together and finish together. We didn't find awesome costumes to wear but I'll make sure to get some photos of other competitors. Holden and a friend kind enough to watch him are going to cheer us on at the sidelines (Jeremy will be drinking beer at the Nascar Race in Bristol). Stay tuned for a follow-up post with photos of the Warriors!

Weekend fun

We are Bank of America customers and they are running a promotion that on the first weekend of the month they pay the entrance fee to hundreds of museums. We have been wanting to check on the Nascar Hall of Fame here in Charlotte and it was on the list of free museums through BofA. So we took advantage of being BofA customers since there isn't much else in the way of advantages to big banks.

It was a good hall of fame and I would recommend it to race fans and visitors to the city. Its very interactive. Holden loved all of the race cars and I'm pretty sure he is going to follow in his Dad's footsteps when it comes to the love of all things mechanical. And their mutual love of Kyle Busch the driver of the Number 18 M&M car.

Also, we learned this weekend that Holden is over his fear of bubbles. Just like that he wanted bubbles in the bath and has so much fun. He's a strange one sometimes.

Oak Island

The Beach House was a great time, but all great things have to come to an end. However, we have all decided we will be making it an annual occurrence. We spent the week at Oak Island, NC with our close friends, Katie and Jay. Holden had a blast, he sang the Beach Song "going to the beach, going to the beach" every morning running circles around the living room. It was truly a vacation for Holden, he got to watch movies all the time (The Incredibles were watched daily), had a menu of hot dogs, mac & cheese and PB&J pretty much every day and endless bike rides.

Holden loved the beach, its still amazing how much he likes the water compared to last year. He's a bit fearless so we had to go and buy a life jacket after the first day as he wanted go in deeper water with Dad. Jeremy took him into deeper water the first day (before we had the life jacket) and I freaked out. Not that Jeremy wasn't holding onto him tightly, or that I didn't trust him but I could just see a wave take out Jeremy and he lose his grip. Its been a while since I had a moment like that but that is why we now have a life jacket, and surprisingly Holden didn't mind wearing it to go out and swim with Dad. Good thing we are in swim lessons.

Holden would get to our spot on the beach, immediately take off his sandals and run towards the water. Fearless I tell you. I can envision visits to the ER in my future.

Jeremy burying Holden in the sand

We took a road trip one day to Fort Fisher, the NC Aquarium and the USS North Carolina Battleship. Holden took his first ferry ride and loved it. Jeremy obviously loved the battleship (see the photo with him shooting the guns). Katie and I also got to spend a day shopping in Southport and have a nice relaxing lunch.

Southport to Fort Fisher Ferry, being cool like Dad.

NC Aquarium, we currently really like Alligators

USS North Carolina deck

Our childhood friend, Nick, showed up on the last couple of days to join in the fun. It was his first time hanging out at the beach as he has only lived in the Charlotte area for little over a year. Needless to say, he made the classic rookie mistake and got really sun burnt. Although, the rest of us seemed to make the same mistake on the last day also, funny how that happened. I'm just glad the sunburns didn't occur on Day 1.
I had to add this last photo, which classically shows how cooperative Holden is for photos lately. We can't wait to do it all again next year.

Beach Week

This is where I am for the rest of the week. Its awesome. Been wanting to rent a house at the beach for the 6 years we have lived here, don't know why we waited so long. Holden and I went on a bike ride last night and I took a turn a bit too slow and toppled the bike. The end of the bike ride went a little like this
Me: "Holden you have a good time?"
Holden: "Yes, Mommy fall down"
Me: "Lets keep that our little secret and not tell daddy"
We come inside and Holden runs to Jeremy
Jeremy: "Holden, did you have a good time"
Holden: "Yea, Mommy fall down"

Just the beginning I suspect of my son tattling on me.

1/2 way

I was bold enough to post my 2011 goals back in January. Now that its July I thought I'd do a sanity check on my progress. Pretty disappointing if I say so.

Amanda's 2011 Goals

• Will - Yes yell at me know, Jeremy and I have been meaning to do a Will since we got married 4 years ago. Its time we did it. Still haven't done it.
  
• Gardianship - Same story, we need to have something written out for Holden, this is a hard one for us mainly because we can't settle on who to put down. Again not done, but finally decided on who we are going to list, that was my big hurdle.
  
• 500 Miles in 2011 - Laura put me on to this goal as she completed it in 2010. We also got a Wii for Christmas and I think this will help during the winter months. I haven't run since October and my excuse has been the lack of daylight. I have not been keeping track and so this probably needs to be off the list :(
  
• Healthiness - I'm not going to put a number down because I have disappointed myself for 2 years in a row. But I really want to get rid of the baby weight I've been carrying around at a minimum. I also hope the spending freeze helps get me back on track with the lack of eating out. I want to be more diligent with our meatless Mondays and we try to follow a real food diet (no preservatives, no artificial ingredients, etc.) but it has allowed maybe a bit too much butter into the diet and I need to find a balance between healthy/low - fat and real food so I don't fall into buying "diet" food. Weight watchers has been a huge help for my girlfriend Stacey, so I have rejoined as a tracking tool and recipe source. Making progress, we joined the YMCA back at the beginning of the summer and I'm getting pretty consistent in my workouts, and the change of pace from just running is nice.
  
• Family Dinners - This might not happen until the 2nd half of 2011 but we want to push Holden's dinner time back an hour so that we can all eat together the same meal. I'm not sure if he is still too little to do this as he wants to eat at 5:30 now and its impractical to think we will all be home at 5:30 let alone have dinner made. This is going OK, it probably only happens at the most twice a week, mostly due to our new fitness schedule I don't get home until 7 some nights. A small sacrifice for hopefully healthier parents and better examples.
  
• Church - We think its time we start putting some consistency in our church attendance for Holden. This is still off the table. But I've made a big decision for myself and I think we are going to go back to the Catholic Church. I don't think we will be the "church every Sunday" kind of family, not sure yet. But those of you that know me closely know that this is a big internal struggle. However, I do want Holden to have his First Communion.
  
• Date Night - Once a Month (after the spending freeze). We are sporadic on this one but working it in the schedule.
  
• Pay off 2 unsecured loans - This is part of a larger 5 year goal of ours to buy a home in a different school district by the time Holden enrolls in 1st grade. First one paid off in July.
  
• 5K and Warrior Dash - I'm still on the fence with the warrior dash because I don't want to do it alone, but definitely going to run another 5 K once it warms up. Did a 5K in the spring and Warrior Dash is August 27th.

So not sure if the assessment means I had too lofty of goals or I'm just slacking. Guess we'll reevaluate in December.

Family Visit

My mother-in-law came to visit over the last week along with Jeremy's 14 year old nephew. We took them to Myrtle Beach for a long weekend and my MIL got to spend some much needed quality time with Holden. Of course because we were having too much fun, I don't have many photos.

Holden loved the beach, we were really surprised how quickly he took to the ocean this time. Bodes well for the week long beach trip we have planned in July, which I will say I am stoked about. Grandma got him a ring floaty that was in the shape of a tiger and it definitely helped with his courage.

On a side note, we have been in summer heat for over a month now and Holden has taken to any type of water. We started swim lessons this week with Holden's best bud, Cameron. They are going to have a great summer.

Zoo Review

We took Holden to the NC Zoo Saturday and it was all he was expecting but Jeremy and I have high expectations growing up in Omaha with access to Henry Doorly. That being said, the NC Zoo is very well laid out and I did like that the large grazing animals looked like they had plenty of room to roam. Holden got to feed the giraffes which he loved. Also, Holden was so excited about the alligators. The biggest disappointment for me was the lack of big cats, they had one cougar but no lions, tigers etc. Big cats are my favorite at the zoo, so that was a bummer.

It was a beautiful day all be it a little hot and Jeremy had a great time people watching. All in all, we will definitely go back. Holden has been talking all about the animals he got to see for 2 days straight now, so it was obviously a hit.

Holden watching the elephant drinking.

I didn't get a good shot of Holden feeding the giraffe, but they came right up to the deck to eat out of the kid's hands.

All smiles after feeding the giraffes and spotting the zebra.

Easter 2011

Our Easter weekend in photo form

Coloring Eggs

Sunday best

Hunting for Easter Eggs with Miss Cameron

Playing with their cool bubble fans that Stacey got them for Easter

Too Cute for Words

It only took 5 years

We have been accumulating the materials for a deck since we bought our house in 2006. With a bit of help from some friends and a couple of nice weekends we finally have a finished deck. Just in time to enjoy sunny evenings and lazy Sundays. We are very excited but now are in the market for a new grill since Jeremy says our old one is too ugly for the new deck.

A bit of an improvement

46.19 minutes

Ran my second 5K yesterday evening with two awesome girls, Stacey and Katie. And was able to shave a little over 3 minutes off my time from the first race. When Katie and I got back home, our husbands agreed to run with us next time. We think it was the beer that was talking but the next race is May 22 so we'll see if they have amnesia.

Not only am I enjoying the running, especially since Stacey has been my weekly running partner. But its all to gear up for Warrior Dash in August.


On another note, Spring has sprung around here and Holden was being my gardening helper last weekend. We planted our vegetable seeds and he loves using his watering can that he got from Grandma Hassler.

Planting onionsThis was taken during a father/son night but is classic on what is most important to Holden, Mr. Elephant and Buzz Lightyear

The Big Reveal

Holden currently shares a room with the guest bed. Not anymore. He now has his own space. Jeremy made the bed and the ladder. Holden likes playing in his new big boy room, but we haven't tackled the sleep transition yet. He is not climbing out of his crib, but we are prepared if that happens. I'm not trying to make my little man grow up too fast, but we wanted him to have his own space even if he isn't ready to sleep there yet.

Jeremy did an awesome job on the room and Holden loves it. A pretty sweet room for a pretty sweet kid.

Holden helping Dad screwing the bed together

Jeremy build the bed, a toy box is the engine compartment

A ladder on one side

Hoses and dials on the other side

A fire jacket and fire bell in the left corner

Jeremy painted the fire house mural
A low voltage light that Holden can turn on and Name letters made by Grandma Hassler
Lastly, my contribution a growth chart

2!

Happy Birthday to my dear little boy. Turning 2 today! So many changes that you are more little boy than baby now. So much fun and so much work some days. Trying to be independent but still needing mommy and daddy. Language is exploding with sentences and wanting to know what everything is and repeating words after we tell you what an item is. And recognizing that anything with Nebraska or Huskers on it is "football". So proud of you little man.

Love,
Mom and Dad

For the Grandparents, Holden is doing the following:

• Singing his ABCs, about 1/3 of the letters he can say audibly, the rest is all jumbled up
• Counting but saying 2,3,2 instead of 1,2,3.
• Saying over 50 words and forming sentences.
• Running everywhere
• Kicking a ball
• Putting things away and understanding the difference between the garbage and recycle bin. And saying 'recycle' which is pretty funny.
• Getting much better at the spoon
• Recognizes the house and the street leading to our house and the street leading to daycare.
• Gives hugs and kisses and finally said "I love you" but only to daddy.
• Sitting on the potty (not using the potty yet but likes to sit and read stories)
  

I'm sure there is more but those are the highlights. Now for some adorable photos of our 2 year old.