Rode 19 miles today with my wonderful husband, William. Now that the kids are back in school we have time together in the morning to go on rides together(if I'm not at work). Today he got home(worked the night shift) and we rode to the lake. Sat and watched the water .. it was calm and peacefull. We ate our cliff bars and talked about kayaks...

19miles, 1:39:51trip time, 12mph average speed, 22.08 max speed

I did it!

Since I've been riding, one of my goals has been to ride to Snelling. Today I did it! It wasn't as difficult as I thought. The biggest challenge was staying on the bike for that many hours. But my long rides have been in the 2 hour range(20-25 miles). I had wanted to get up to 30 mile rides before going to Snelling..but Will asked if I wanted to do a long ride and Snelling popped into my head. He was willing so we set off. Of course it was hot. It probably got to 100. I got a little sunburned on my upper arms. We ate oatmeal, bananas and coffee before we left. We packed our camelbacks with ice water and cliff bars. I made a water bottle with Heed(it's a Hammer electrolyte drink). Unfortunately not a mile out I hit a bump and lost my Heed bottle. It was one of my favorite water bottles(the orange one) We turned around for it but the top had cracked when It fell and so it had to be thrown away. Now I know I can go further.


35.59miles, 2:41:32trip time, 1554cal burned, 13.22mph avg, 30.92max speed

Hung out with the Thompson-Blackshear-Gomez families. We swam and had a nice afternoon..got to see the David, he's so big now...and baby Sammy is adorable

First Day of School

Ok...William being on graveyard right now has atleast one advantage. He went(for the first time) with me and the kids to take them to their 1st day of school...
Riley is in Mrs. Deals 1st grade class.
Liam has Ms Hamel (again) he had her for 4th grade and now it's a 4 - 5 combination class for his 5th grade year.

Great America

We took the kids to Great America for the first time...We all had so much fun today!!! We drove super early and got there before the park opened. William paid the extra 2 dollars to park in the closer lot - and since we were sooo early we actually got THE closest spot. It was right near the entry gate and had a grassy spot near by..so we left our lunches in the car and planned on eating there.

As soon as we were paid and went in (used the restroom and put on sunblock)we ran straight to the Demon....After we rode the Demon...we went out the exit and ran back around to the entrance and rode it again....

When I was a kid there was a ride called the Edge...now there's a similar ride called the Drop Zone. It's soo high! We went over to that one and Riley was excited...until we got there and saw that she was too short to ride it. Liam didn't care because he didn't want to(actually he was tall enough but when we put him up to the measuring post he shrunk himself down and declared himself too short). Riley was pissed! She put a sour look on her face that didnt come off for 1/2 hr.
William got in line to ride. I decided to go with him and left Riley and the camera with Liam. It was so freaking ????!!! I don't know what to say: exciting? scary? When you watch it from ground level it looks like a short, fast ride(few seconds). When the ride drops from the top and you feel the fall...it feels like it's forever. It was crazy!

So Miss Riley was still mad about not going on the Drop Zone while we were in line for our next ride. Then we just did ride after ride after ride...

We commented on how it didn't seem crouded. We expected it to be that way for the first hour because it was early...but it was all morning. We got on to the rides fast. We rode the carousel then went out for lunch.. we saw signs hanging that said 'Great Americas Muslim Unity Day' and thought maybe that was why, but when we came back in from lunch there were twice as many people and there were long lines now.






We went to the water part of the park and rode the Log ride and then the water slides and the kids played in the water for a long time. I played with Williams iphone and found an app 'restaurant finder'...and found a BJ's a few miles away. We rode this ride that starts with V it spins around and up and down...This is Riley doing her "roller coaster" face...

So before we left the park the kids wanted to ride the Deamon again. On the way over Liam wanted to "win" a stuffed animal. He did not want to buy one(would have been cheaper if he had). So we played until each kid won a stuffed animal. Unfortunately as we were getting in line for the Demon the stitching was already comming out of Rileys and so I went back while to exchange it and they got in line - that's how I got these photos:








We rode the carousel one last time before leaving and going for dinner...mmm yummy dinner...then drove home.
A happy happy happy day with eachother!