Fun Mom Rents a Kayak

Jeremy had Monday off, and suggested we rent canoes.

I was very surprised. The last time we rented canoes was in 2000 or 2001, before we were married. My mom rented them for Pioneer Day or some other summer holiday, and we went to Payson Lakes with whichever of my siblings were not on missions, my cousins Greg and Ben, and probably a few of my sister Lizzy's friends.

Jeremy, not an avid canoer, was interested to learn that our family thought it was fun to paddle around the lake with no apparent destination. And that the goal was not to get across the lake as quickly as possible for lunch.

Our canoe adventure was not going well. Our canoe just didn't seem to move as sleekly as Greg and Ben's canoe, which shot through the water as if in a Boy Scout training video.

And then Jeremy became out of sorts. It is the only time my mother has ever seen him out of sorts, so she recalls it vividly. (Jeremy is rarely grouchy, grumpy, or out of sorts. He is very, very pleasant, even in the face of severe aggravation.) He said, "I give up! This canoe is broken!" And he laid down in the bottom of the canoe.

Our canoe was not, in fact, broken. It was merely weighed down by three other canoes that Greg had secretly tied to it. It was very funny, but left Jeremy without a taste for family canoeing.

So I was surprised that he wanted to take the boys out on the lake. After I remembered that I am fun and adventuresome, off we went. We rented a canoe for Jer and Zeke and a tandem kayak for me and Victor, and paddled around for about three hours. I had never paddled a kayak before, and enjoyed it. Victor was a surprisingly useful boat-mate. We landed on a little island and looked around, which the boys thought was marvelous. And I wore my knee brace and got an awesome tan line from it.

Zeke Starts Kindergarten

Victor and Zeke started school on Wednesday. Here they are in their uniforms.

Zeke had this to say about his first day:

1. A girl forgot her lunch.

2. His class may only use the drinking fountain, which is in the classroom, at certain times of the day. (I can't remember what those times are, but he did.)

3. He will only tell me more if I go to Target and buy him a Transformer.

Victor said he had a good day. And that they learned some rules, which are about the same as the rules he had last year.

Fast Cars

Whenever Victor sees a fast car in a parking lot, he checks out the speedometer to know how fast it will go.

He has done this for years.

Victor's Talk on Prayer

Towards the end of Sacrament Meeting today, Victor leaned over and whispered, "Mom. I have to give a talk today."

Uh-oh.

I had known that two weeks ago, but I had forgotten. Fortunarely, I had told Victor about the talk and he had been thinking about it.

"Don't worry," he said, "I've been writing it in my mind."

So Victor and I reverently hightailed it out of Sacrament Meeting to transcribe his talk onto paper for easy delivery.

Here is it.

PRAYER

[Victor started with the following ad-lib:]

I want to start by asking you a question. How many of you are afraid of the dark?

[Hands went up, including Jeremy's.]

Okay. How many of you are afraid of roller coasters?

[More hands.]

Okay. Today my talk is about prayer.

[This is the written part.]

If we do not pray we will not get what we need.

If we do nto get what we need in an emergency, who knows what could happen to us.

Here's something wonderful about prayer: If you ask for something that is right you shall receive it.

You can pray anytime or anywhere.

For example, if the lights go out and it's really dark at night, and the power will be out for two days because of a snow storm--if you can't find your flashlight, you can pray to find it in the dark.

If you are nervous about something, like you are afraid of the dark, you can pray to Heavenly Father and He can help you not to be afraid.

Or if it is your first time on a roller coaster and you are really scared, you can pray to Heavenly Father, and he may tell you how it's gong to turn out.

[Now another ad-lib, from his original mind-talk, which I omitted from the transcription and he added back in:]

Now, that is not a promise. He may tell you, but I cannot promise because I have never tried it.

[Back to the written version.]

I know we can pray at any time or anywhere that we are.

In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Utah Vacation

We went on an unexpected journey to Utah two weeks ago!

The purpose was to see our cousins.

This is a picture of some of the cousins: Zoie, Vea, Eliza, Alex, Zeke, Hailey, and Victor. I wish you could see all of their hair in this picture. You can exactly and easily match each child in this picture to his parents just by looking at his hair. Curly goes with curly, blond with blond, etc.

Shortly after this picture was taken, we hiked 1.5 miles (and 1000 ft UP) to Timanogas Cave. Aunt Katie and Grandma were very squeamish with the heights, but everyone made it there and back again.

Maracas

We have a classical radio station that plays a wonderful selection. Unfortunately, the reception is spotty.

While listening to this station the other day, Zeke asked me the other day what that weird sound was. I explained that it was static.

He cheerfully announced that he would pretend it was maracas instead. So now, when I listen to my static-filled Mozart et al., I pretend that someone has simply added maracas.

Swim the Haw River

I hurt my knee running back in April. I was up to 20 miles a week, so the injury was pretty disappointing. Nothing cracked or popped or broke; it's cartilage damage from my kneecap tracking to the outside (tight IT band, weak VMO) (the VMO is a muscle, I've learned). I've been doing PT for a few weeks, and it's getting much better.

But I still can't run on it, and it has been hurt since April.

Fortunately, in April, I had just joined the Y. (Finally--I had wanted to for years.) That meant I could swim instead of run.

It was fun to back in the pool. It had been years since I'd swum laps. I found an old Speedo in a drawer, got a new cap and goggles, and joined the oldsters for some fun lap swimming.

After two months, the pool director told me about their Swim the Haw River challenge. Every time you swim, you can log your laps on a chart on the bulletin board. If you swim the equivalent of the length of the Haw River by December 31, you are in a drawing for three free months of Y membership.

That means 3960 laps by the end of December. I got a late start, but as of today I have 1512 done. That leaves 2448 to go, or an average of 100.4 laps per week until the end of the year. It's very doable. I usually do 120-150 a week, which will leave me some wiggle room.

I break up the pattern I swim in. Sometimes I swim sets of 500 (yards--which is 10 laps), sometimes I do sets of 100 while alternating strokes, and sometimes I swim faster or slower.

The one thing I don't do is kick board, because of my knee.