Tarzan!!



Alex and I were invited by my sister to go see a production of Tarzan at the Hale Center Theater. Alex had never been to anything like that before so I was really excited to see how he liked it. I was so impressed with the production, they did an amazing job.
At one point in time, Alex leaned over to me and said, "Mom..." in a quivering voice. I was wondering why it sounded like he wa about to cry. He said, "I'm about to cry... it's just so cute." (This was during a song that was rather tender.)





After the play, the actors lined up by the exit of the theatre so that you could say hi to them. This is Terk, Tarzan's gorilla friend. He was so sweet, he knelt down and talked to Alex, asking him his name, how old he was and so on.



He also got to get his picture with Tarzan and Jane. When we got home, Alex was telling Steph about his experience seeing Tarzan. He made sure to tell her, "Jane told me she thinks I'm cute. Ahhhhhhh." Alex's first crush, perhaps?

Deseret News 10k 2013

I had such a good experience doing my first 10k last summer for the Deseret News Classic on Pioneer Day, I wanted to do it again this year. I was really hoping to improve upon my time from 2012. I had a really crappy night of sleep and was feeling it the next day, but I tried to push it and I shaved off a minute and a half from the previous year. I was happy with my pace, a 9.2 minute average. (It kinda helps that the first half of the course is on a slight decline!)

As he did last year, Steve dropped me off, then found a place mid-route to cheer me on and take pictures. Again, he almost missed me, even though I was frantically waving my arms in the air as I was approaching him and yelling his name.

I got his attention just in the nick of time.

At this moment, I am saying to Steve, "I'm TIRED!" And he goes into coach mode by telling me, "You're 3 minutes behind, let's go, let's go, LET'S GO!"

I immediately start running faster, then think to myself, "He's full of crap, he's just saying that to 'motivate' me". Well, I guess it did work, for a moment anyhow.

 Hallelujah, I'm done!

I compare running a race to childbirth; in the midst of it, especially towards the end when you are wearing down, you think to yourself, "this sucks, I don't wanna do this again." But then when it's over and you recover, you realize how awesome it was and can't wait for the chance to do it again.

Living the Good Life, Napa Style

After our camping trip, it was such a lovely treat to not have to drive back to Utah, but to drive home to Napa to spend time at my parents house. There is no other place I'd rather be, there is even a certain sweetness in the air that you can smell when you get out of the car when you arrive there. I know that sounds odd, and probably like it's my imagination, but I know some of my other family would back me up on that!

One of the things I was most looking forward to was meeting my brother Brett's new baby, Alexis. Couldn't you just eat her up?

I am so in love with this picture. Between my kids' mocha colored skin, and Alexis' creamy white skin, this pose has been named "The Oreo Cookie".

We spent a day in San Francisco at Pier 39 and Fisherman's Wharf, saw my brother's new home they just built, went swimming at my sister's house, and took lots of walks and a few runs enjoying the beautiful Napa Valley.

Grovers 2013

We had our yearly family camping trip to Grovers Hot Springs in early July. We were missing a lot of people this year due to new babies, new jobs, school and such, but it was still a great time as usual.

 One of my favorite things about camping is hanging out by the creek. It is so relaxing, and I love watching Alex just playing and enjoying nature.

The boys can usually be found playing hacky sack. Now that Alex is older he tries to join in... and his sweet cousins let him.

Lesley gave Lorna and I Grovers Hot Springs shirts for our birthdays, what a great gift!

Steph and I trying to psyche ourselves out before jumping into the cold water!

The nightly campfire.

Alex is in heaven with all the boy cousins there to play with!

The whole crew. I always feel a little sad when it's time to leave. Grovers is such a big part of the Eide family legacy. It's a special time to be together as a family, to put everyday cares out of your mind for a few days, and enjoy the fresh air and beautiful scenery. I'm still hoping one of the grandkids will name one of their future children Grover, but I'm not sure if there will be any takers.

 

Taylorsville Dayzz 5k

I had fun running in the Taylorsville Dayzz 5k this year. Since it's a smaller, local race it makes it really nice because the starting line was 5 minutes away by our local rec center so I didn't have to worry about getting up at the crack of dawn, stress about parking and trying to find Steve after the race, etc. This was my first time doing a 5k by myself, so I wanted to see how much I could push myself. I ended up running a 9.4 minute pace which I was pleased with, especially since there were a few slightly hilly spots. I finished #2 in my age division (which is not as impressive as it sounds since there were only 14 ladies in my division), but hey, I'll take it!

Alex's 6th Birthday

On June 28, my big boy turned six years old, I can't believe it. He brings so much joy to the family, I can't imagine how lonely it would be around here if he hadn't surprised us by making a long awaited debut into the Lilly family back in 2007.

I finally did what I've been putting off for the past few years and threw Alex a friend party. We had the party in our back yard and told the kids to come prepared to get wet. We set up Alex's pool, had a slip and slide and played water games.

We set up a tent with drinks and snacks.

Steph made these adorable little water bottles for the kids.

The party was a big success, I think the kids had a fun time.

 

 

The next day, which was his actual birthday, we had a few cousins over for cake and ice cream. Steph (my little Martha Stewart in the making) made this adorable Minion cake for Alex.

His big gift was a new bike. Don't you love those curls poking out from under his helmet? The girls already like him at age 6, can you imagine what it'll be like at age 16? Arrrrghhh!

Youth Conference

Back in June I had the fun opportunity to go to Youth Conference with our stake at Snow College. It was so much fun! We were there for 3 days and stayed in the dorms. The kids were all divided up into different "Avenger" groups (the theme was Spirit Avengers), so we got to know kids from different wards. A couple of the girls in our group were a tad bit difficult to put it nicely, but the other kids were a lot of fun and a joy to get to know better.

The first day, we went up the canyon to do a ropes course. Now, I'm not usually a daredevil adventurous type, but I find that as I get older I am more likely to try things that push me physically. I'm pretty sure that it's a subconscious force that's driving me to prove that I'm still young. The reason I say all this is because I tried a few things on the ropes course that I was very proud of myself for attempting.

This challenge included pulling yourself up this wooden post using the little medal rungs, hoisting yourself up the tire, then climbing up the rope net to ring a bell at the top. Oh yeah, the wooden post is not cemented to the ground so it's swinging as you are trying to climb it. Pretty challenging, but in retrospect a cakewalk compared to what was to come...

This post was also not cemented into the ground, it was up to your teammates to hold the ropes in such a way that the post stayed as upright as possible as you tried to climb up. This picture does not do justice in showing just how high the top of the pole is.

Next, you have to try to get your body up onto this tiny perch. I probably should mention that I am securely harnassed (I'm not that crazy!)

Then, slowly rotate your body 180 degrees to face the trapeze dangling off in the distance. The hardest part was trying to stand from the seated position on the perch. My legs were violently shaking at this point. Once you are standing, your teammates slowly start to lean the pole towards the trapeze so that you can get yourself close enough to leap off the perch and grab the trapeze.

I missed.... but I was totally okay with that because I was very proud of myself for getting as far as I did. Not to toot my own horn, but I'm pretty sure I was probably one of the only female leaders who even attempted this challenge.

That night we went to the Manti pageant. I had never been before. It was pretty cool, especially having the temple as a backdrop and all lit up in the dark.

The next day the Snow Fun advisors (college students running the youth conference) did different games and activities with us. We rotated through with our groups. One of my favorites was riding on tandem bikes throughout the campus.

Later in the afternoon, we did water games which was a blast.

After the water games we had "bishop time" where our ward came back together for a devotional with our bishop.

That night was a fireside and a dance, then a testimony meeting the next morning before heading home.
Sherry, the other Young Women leader that was there from our ward and I talked about how much fun we had. Of course, you have to do the usual adult responsibilities like making sure everyone is where they're supposed to be, etc. but at the same time the leaders were very involved in all the activities. It was (no offense to our families) kind of fun to be there not as a mom or wife and to just... play. It's not very often as women that we get the chance to do that and it was oh so refreshing. It was one of the funnest youth conferences I've ever been to as an adult or as a youth and definitely one of the highlights of my summer.