We are officially on the road! Pretty exciting to actually be taking our camper out.

We stopped and ate lunch along the way but the weather was terrible. It was very nice to be able to eat in the trailer.

The best part was being able to pull over and use the bathroom whenever we wanted!!
Our eight hour travel day became a thirteen hour day (kids + dog) but we made it and settled in ready to explore the Tetons.

short potato while we are on the road. More comprehensive travel blog when we get home.

How was your weekend?

Happy weekend everyone! My day started with getting up a little later with the kids, poor Cory was up all night trying to get a project done for work before we leave for a week.

Cannon had a good day at school and even got an award for being kind to his friends.

While Cannon was at school Emmy enjoyed coloring for a total of three minuets and hanging out with Cory.

I spent the morning running nine miles on the treadmill.

I re-watched Unbreakable about the 2010 Western States (so good).

After lunch Cannon gets “quiet time” while Emmy naps and it’s one of my favorite parts of the day. I get to spend some one-on-one time with him and sometimes snuggle.

We spent the rest of the day shopping, packing and prepping for our trip. Emmy was already picking out her pumpkins.

She even helped us carry the groceries inside.

This evening we heard the news to Ruth Bader Ginsburg passing and are so devastated.

She was an incredible human and a shining light for this country. I can only hope that her legacy will inspire more girls to follow in her footprints. Rest in peace RBG, you were the greatest of all time.

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Posts for the rest of the week will likely be very short since we will be off on the road but I still hope to post and share what we are up to.

Today ended up being an unintended rest day. I won’t say that I couldn’t get a run in today, I just had too many obstacles and didn’t ever make it enough of a priority.

I didn’t get up early because I have been up late working and prepping for our trip (watching the Tour hasn’t helped either) so I have been getting five hours or less every day this week and that just isn’t a good match for me. I am not as good of a partner/mom/teacher/human with too little sleep. Usually I can run the kiddos to school but the air was too bad so I didn’t want them out or to be out myself running in unhealthy air.

After school drop off Emmy and I hit up Target to grab some things I needed (and didn’t need). I can’t resist all the fun themed holiday stuff, sorry Cory!

I picked up this Komucha, so good!

Cannon fell hard at school on the concrete and hit his nose, forehead and hands.

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His mask actually saved the skin on his nose from worse harm. His teachers take such good care of him.

Emmy was very excited to have her partner in crime back.

When we got home my parents and brother needed to go to Denver to pick up the RV they are renting for the trip (have I mentioned they are coming along on our Yellowstone trip? so fun!) We offered to puppy sit so their little ones wouldn’t have to be left home and we got fun puppy time.

Humphry was so excited to have other dogs his size to play with. It makes me think we need another dog to keep him company.

It was really nice to see him so playful when two weeks ago he was so close to death.

My brothers dog is just a couple months old and is a bernedoodle puppy and so sweet. My parents have a five month old goldendoodle named Desi (yes after Des Linden) and a five year old goldendoodle named Tucker.

We had just four dogs total, and Cannon kept saying too many dogs as they crawled all over him.

Kid has no idea! Cory and I used to have three dogs and there were a total of six in my family! We were down to two for awhile so these two little ones are a nice addition (we also have added these two little humans since then as well).

Nap time is also usually an option to get a run in but with our puppy visitors it wasn’t an option. When the puppies went home it was time to get dinner on the table and get ready to teach my evening class.

At 10 PM after class I *could* jump on the treadmill, but I am just not an evening runner. Cory can run almost any time, often training late at night. I am a morning person and that is my favorite time to get my training in. As the day goes on the less likely I am to fit it in.

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What time of day is your ideal to run?

Today the smoke returned to our part of Colorado and while it’s nowhere near as bad as our friends on the west coast, it is still pretty awful. Whith our AQI in the unhealthy range we kept our activities inside.

I got up before the kids to run five mile progression run on the treadmill. I have to give a special shout out to Cory for asking for this treadmill for his birthday years ago. I wasn’t that excited about getting it, I didn’t think we needed one given that we have a nice gym just down the street. But with the addition of kids and now Covid, this treadmill is amazing. I can’t imagine not being able to just roll down to the basement at any hour to get some miles in. So thanks Cory for knowing we needed one long before I did!

I wanted Once is Enough on Amazon Prime while running about an obese man changing his life and running a 100 miler. There were a couple tears.

Our day wasn’t very exciting since we stayed indoors and didn’t leave the house. We played in the basement playroom and even had snack down there. It’s nice on days like this to have different parts of the house to use.

For lunch the kids wanted chicken nuggets and I had left over stir-fry. We are trying to clean out the refrigerator before our trip.

During Emmy’s nap time Cannon had quiet time (he doesn’t nap but he still needs some rest mid-day). Cannon and Humphry snuggled, I love how close these two are.

I spent part of nap time trying to plan out the details of our trip to the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone. I found this blog that had amazing details for a three day Yellowstone trip (we are spending two full days in the Tetons and three full days in Yellowstone, we have a handful of travel days in there that we aren’t counting).

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Any tips for visiting Yellowstone and Grand Tetons?

I got outside to run this morning. Our air is so much better than it was before but there is still enough smoke to create a red sunrise.

These photos will never do it justice, and while I hate why we are getting these red sunrise/sunsets they are gorgeous.

I loved the nice cool temps and empty trails for 3.6 miles before we got the day started.

The kids and I then ran out to a local playground, the temps have gone back up so we don’t want to be out in the sun too late in the day.

Emmy enjoyed the t-shirt and shorts weather

Cannon had “online school” today, I can tell you it’s not the best for this pre-schooler but we are doing our best and not sweating it.

Lately our favorite snack has been apple slices, these Honey Crisps are the best! Fall food is my favorite.

It was a teaching night so we had a quick dinner of stir-fry and pumpkin bread for dessert.

It’s very interesting being on the parent side of online learning. I am currently a math teacher for an online college program (ran by a University in Indiana) and I do really miss the connection that I normally have with in person classes. These are college students so I can’t imagine trying to connect and teach online for k-12 classes. My hat is off to all the educators who are learning new skills and doing their best, you are all amazing. My program is always online so nothing has changed for us.

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Are you affected by all the wildfires?

Do you like online learning?

Today was a rest day from running and I have to say I don’t love it, I really am looking forward to starting that 100 day run streak, just hoping I can stay healthy!

I caught up on some much needed sleep this morning then headed out to the playground to meet some friends. It really brightens my day when we get to see friends and be outside.

Hopefully we will have a fairly mild winter so we can still be outside until we are past this Covid time. Although moisture would be nice here in the west, so bring on the snow then sun the next day!

Cannon also helped me make pumpkin bread for my parents for Grandparents Day, Emmy napped while we baked. Grandparent’s Day was on Sunday but we couldn’t find any canned pumpkin so we needed an extra day to cook a pie pumpkin. We were forgiven for our tardiness when the goods were delivered.

We use THIS recipe but also add dark chocolate chips.

For the afternoon we delivered our bread to my parents house and played with their dogs. Then we went home to work on some preschool activities.

I really don’t know how you homeschool mamas do it!!!

For dinner we had steak salad with left over flank steak we made earlier in the week, I really love this meal!

The kiddos love “olive fingers”

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Did you do olive fingers when you were a kid?

Four weeks down already! Time is flying and I am excited about my milage inching up. I think I feel best and make the most progress when I am running 45-55 mile weeks. Trying to work myself back up to that.

This is how the week went down:

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Monday:  Started off the week strong with a 7.15 mile treadmill run.

Tuesday: Ran outside in the snow for 2.5 miles

Wednesday: 2.25 miles on the treadmill.

Thursday: 6.35 miles on the treadmill (again)

Friday:  rest day

Saturday: 8.5 mile long run

Sunday: Just 2.2 miles to shake out the week.

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Totals: 29ish miles and feeling pretty good about the increases. I do need to work on getting outside more as we go.

Today was mostly a day to get some chores done. We needed to update the tires on our trailer, clean the house and work on the endless amounts of laundry. We did start off with our new pumpkin waffle maker, the kids loved it!

Cannon had soccer for the third time, it was nice to be out and have it be in the 70s instead of the 90s

We also were trying on costumes for Cannon. He wants to be a pumpkin this year, so I bought two because I wan unsure of size. Emmy decided she needed the smaller one.

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How was your training this week? Anyone run virtual Boston Marathon?

Have you started thinking about Halloween? I am not sure what it will look like for this year yet but these kids love it so we will wear costumes around the house if needed.

We planned a day trip to Vail last minute so I knew I needed to get my run in early or it wouldn’t get done. I really wanted to run outside and thought I had prepared well but I didn’t check to see if my headlamp was working. The batteries were dead and we didn’t have any extras. It was hard mentally to switch to the treadmill when I had my heart set on running outside.

I got it done, at least I chose my coffee mug well.

I don’t think there is much better than going to the mountains in the summer. We thought we might start to see the trees changing color for the fall but we were too early for that.

The leaves weren’t changing but the wildflowers were still in full bloom and it was gorgeous. It was also the perfect weather, cool in the morning and warm in the afternoon without being hot.

We parked on the east side of Vail at the Betty Ford Botanic Garden. This place is gorgeous and free to visit!

This weekend should have been Oktoberfest in Vail but it was cancelled because of Covid. We have gone up to vail this time of year almost every year and always love it.

Humphry came with us on our adventure but we didn’t want him to walk too much or get too excited so he road along in the stroller.

People seemed to love seeing him cruising along with us. Cannon and Emmy just took turns who would walk and who would hang out with Humphry.

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We walked down past Vail Village to Lions head and had lunch at the Vail Chophouse.

The Chophouse is right at the base of the gondola, has an amazing patio and was great at keeping diners spread out. They were also very sweet to Humphry.

It is fun to watch all the mountain bikes come off the mountain. After lunch we found another playground, Vail has some of our favorite playgrounds!

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Humphry seemed very happy to hang out while we played.

Lions Head is very cute and nice to visit.

but Vail village is my favorite.

It tries a little hard to be like a European ski town but it is so quaint and lovely to walk around, I find it to be the most walkable mountain town in Colorado.

Emmy and Humphry napped in the stroller while Cannon found yet another playground (it’s one of our favorite things to do while traveling).

After playing we made our way back to the car and had an easy drive home.

Vail is less than two hours from our house and is one of the best ways to spend the day.

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What is one of your favorite places to visit?

It was a fairly boring day in our lives, we had many things to cross off the to-do list. It was also a rest day from running. Even though I think the rest was good for my legs I could tell my day just wasn’t quiet as good without my daily dose of endorphins.

I think life would be easier and it would fit my abilities better if I would just stick to half marathons (which I DO love), but there is something about the ultra that keeps calling to me.

Ultra Running Memes gets me…..

Cannon had school today and Emmy had a playdate with some of her little friends. It was nice to see some friends that I haven’t seen in forever.

The rest of the day was just grocery shopping and attempting to trip plan.

Originally we were supposed to go to Disneyland this fall but with Covid-19 that is obviously not going to happen. We then decided we wanted to still get out and do something so we planned a road trip to Lake Tahoe, the red woods and the California coast. Because it’s 2020 and we can’t have anything nice California is devastated by forest fires. The place we were supposed to stay in Tahoe is likely going to be closed and even getting across the state to the coast seems difficult and possibly dangerous.

I feel terrible for everyone on the west coast dealing with their states being on fire on top of a pandemic. I have been thinking about the firefighters a lot.

So now we are left with just a week to figure out what to do. Scrap the trip all together? Make a trip up to the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone? Tour Utahs national parks? What would you do?

Emmy definitely represents my mood about all of this.

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Do ultras call your name?

Any trips planned for this year?

I was up this morning with my 4am alarm. It’s still taking me way too long from the time I get up until I am actually running. I jumped on the treadmill for 6.4 miles.

Normally I try to get outside much more even in the dark, but this year it has just seemed so much easier to run inside. I don’t know if I am just being soft or if it really is smarter not to run in the dark on my own.

It was another school day for Cannon today and it’s really been throwing me off.

The current schedule for Cannon’s school is that he goes Thursday and Friday mornings. Going two days in a row at the end of the week feels like it’s hard to get into a rhythm. The superintendent announced his recommendations for the rest of the semester yesterday. It includes all k-5 students going back to school full time at the end of them month but preschool continuing with the half time schedule. I don’t understand this choice and I am not sure how I feel about it. I don’t know if I want Cannon to go to school more with a bigger class but I also wonder how hard it is for him with this odd schedule. Whatever it is, we will just roll with it.

After school it was lunch and nap time. I ended up falling asleep on the couch with Cannon for little while during Emmy’s nap. I guess going to bed late most nights and 4 am wake up calls are getting to me.

We spent the afternoon playing in the basement.

As you can see our basement isn’t finished, I would like to finish it when the kids are bigger but for now it is working great. It’s one big open space as it is but functions as many things. We have a large space for our home gym, a bike workshop for Cory, storage and the kids play area. When we built this little area for them for Christmas I had no idea how much they would love it!

Humphry spent the day cuddling as much as possible. He continues to make progress and is eating more and more. We are hopeful he will make a full recovery in the coming weeks.

We had some wonderful salmon for dinner and Humphry enjoyed eating that alot!

I had a class to teach after dinner so Cory took over bedtime duties (gold stars for him) while I set up in the office.

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Do you like running in the dark?

I used to love it but have been avoiding it completely lately, with winter coming I might have to get back into it. Otherwise all I will ever see is our treadmill.