Since it's been getting dark earlier and earlier in the evening, I went running this morning right after dropping Gabriel off after his swim class.
Urgh, I am so not a morning runner. I wheezed my way up the hills, then counted my various ills down the hills (knee, stitches, feeling tired). But afterward, I only remembered it as being very pleasant, mostly because I just love being outdoors, on trails and surrounded by trees, seeing different terrain, hills, canyons, open scrubby areas, scurrying lizards, rewarding views.
After a tough hot run, I really wanted to stretch -- in water. We belong to a community pool in our neighborhood, which costs us $60 a quarter. $240 a year! We've stuck with it over the years to support the neighborhood, but that sure is expensive sentiment. Especially since we hardly ever use the pool.
But I used our community pool today, for the first time this year. For about 15 minutes, I jumped and splashed and flipped and just played in the water, stretching gently with every movement. Boy, did that feel good! Even if it did cost $240.
But I didn't get all this childcare this summer just to indulge myself. My real purpose is to pursue our long-overdue downstairs remodel. And a big step was made there today. Dave came home for lunch, and we met with our new architect to sign a contract and go over the basics of the project. In a few weeks, she'll have a few designs for us to mull over.
I can't believe how different this is already shaping up to be than our upstairs remodel. I'm not wheel-spinning or fretting so much about how to pull all the pieces together, since this time, we have completely competent help and guidance. I'm delighted to let go of my inner control freak, and focus my energy instead on collecting What I Want, and let someone who knows what they're doing Put It All Together.
I went right to Borders after our productive meeting, to gather kitchen & bath magazines. I can't wait to spend some quality time with them and a stack of sticky notes.
Kids. Oh yes, children! That is what my life is about, isn't it? Not running, swimming and remodeling.
Picking up The Three after a nice day of being a grownup is always a bit of a shock, but it takes only an instant to kick back into Mom/Cook/Cleaner/Organizer/Traffic Controller/Servant mode. Nothing like trying to make dinner, feed baby, and keep happily reunited brothers from spinning themselves into a frenzy all at the same time.
Gabriel was fascinated when I told him about the lady who's going to draw us a new house, he wants to know alllll about how it's going to be built. Julian says he doesn't want to go to Tonya's, he wants to go back to daycamp, poor guy. (I think I will sign him up for one more daycamp week before summer's over, but there's no getting around it: Tonya's is where his preschool is, so there he's going.) Katrina...boy, is she a noisy baby! She's getting more and more opinionated, like about holding something, or being somewhere, about trying to do something and not being able to. The toddler years are just around the corner!
And me...always happy to have time off, always a little guilty about how much I enjoy it, and always relieved and glad to have them all with me again.
7/31/07
Today's run, according to Rancho Runner:
7) Parking -> Lower Meadow (SW) -> Farm -> Rogue Valley ->
Wildcat Loop Trail (SW) -> Upper High Meadow (E) ->
Upper Wildcat Canyon (SW -> E) -> Wildcat Loop Trail (NE) ->
Coyote -> Equestrian Parking -> Parking
Results for route: 1EF3MNPR6STUWV21
Route Miles Up Down
1E 0.30 15 0
EF 0.54 40 0
F3 0.17 30 0
3M 0.31 25 0
MN 0.04 10 0
NP 0.96 460 0
PR 0.18 135 0
R6 0.32 60 0
6S 1.37 0 450
ST 0.12 0 20
TU 0.53 0 180
UW 0.25 50 0
WV 0.67 120 0
V2 0.51 0 195
21 0.29 30 0
Total Distance = 6.56 Miles, 975 feet of climbing
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