Around Here: Parties, Races, Swimming, and Pattern Testing

Life has been busy around here, as usual.  March - May have been the months where our kitchen "family calendar" is completely full, and it's nice to look up and see that we are almost near the end.  But then again, June and July are pretty busy too.  Anyway, here's 5 things we're up to at the moment...

1.) The big news for this week is that Jayce's birthday party is this weekend, in our flat!!

Jayce has been asking for a birthday party at his home since we first moved here.  Last year we opted for Snakes and Ladders which was a huge hit,  but he still wanted a party at home.  Even though our space is very limited I decided to go for it.  It will be a small party, less than a dozen friends, but manageable is the main thing that I'm going for here.  I have a dozen ideas, which I have whittled down to the few that will work best, and a few days before the party I will inevitably panic slightly and try to throw a few more things into the mix.  But it will be a good time.  Really, any time that friends come over to your house to play, eat lots of goodies, and then leave you with presents is a pretty good gig.  So I'm trying not to stress about the details that no one will care about other than me.

Jayce requested a Lego City party and chose the 6 men and their various accessories for the invitation (which is the first picture in this post).  I took a few different types of pictures because he really wanted them all on a podium (like the picture above), but I wanted them in a line, and of course he and Hannah both kept photo bombing in ways that I could not crop them out.  But it all worked out in the end and he was thrilled with the final product.  He's counting down the days.

2.) As if we wouldn't be tired enough by Saturday evening, Cheslsea and I will be running this awesome 10K the night of the party.  Chels is a bit Nike-obsessed, and when she saw that Nike holds this cool women-only evening race in only 5 cities in the world, and London was one of them, she quickly talked me into running it with her.  I've only been "training" for the past 5 weeks, and I must say that this was one of those situations where I realized that I am not as young as I used to be.  BUT, I think I will do just fine, it starts at 8:00 pm and I think it will be really cool to run through the city at night.  I'm a little more worried about my post-birthday party crash than about the actual race itself.  But we will definitely be sleeping very soundly on Saturday evening.

3.) In keeping with our running theme, Chris and Chelsea ran a Richmond half-marathon this past weekend. 

Chris ran it last year as well while Mom and Chelsea were in town, so it was fun that this year Chelsea was running it too.  They have been training really hard for this race (and a full marathon that's coming in September) and were excited to have each beat their former best race times.

We tried to flag Chelsea down at two different stops along the finish line, but she had her headphones on and her head down to focus.  The kids were excited to cheer for Chelsea and Chris and both put on their running clothes and practiced running back and forth in the living room that morning.

In the picture in the top right you can see Chris running up towards us (the yellow shorts above Jayce's left shoulder), and the people standing next to us are laughing because the kids were going absolutely crazy yelling and jumping to get Chris' attention.

He did see us, and Jayce and Hannah both got to escort him across the finish line this year.  The race team even gave each kids their own medal.  It was a good race and a very good day.  

4.) Jayce's swimming has been going great.  He started his first round of swimming lessons in January, and after a few weeks of hesitation with the whole "face under the water" issue that they all have at first, has been doing amazingly.  

 For the past few months he's been throwing himself forward in the water with wild abandon, and the teachers have been telling us that they'll move him up to Level 2 as soon as the next term started.  Last week was the start of next term, and after this week's lesson the teacher told us that they were moving him up to Level 3.  He's thrilled and obviously very proud of himself.  He keeps telling everyone, "I was only in Level 2 for 2 weeks!"

5.) Last week I was able to test a new pattern for the Lulu Dress and Top and I love it!  It's a perfect little summer dress, Hannah is obsessed with the pockets and I'm just kind of obsessed with it in general.  

I made another as well and I'll blog about them soon, I have already taken the pictures!  It's just that, for the next 5 days it's alllllll about getting ready for that Lego party, cleaning, and trying to finish up two other commitments that I have for the week.  Such a good week to end in an evening race!  Come on Erin, come on...