Sage advice

Cadel: Mom, you should never pull down your pants in the kitchen.

Cormac:  Tomorrow is always tomorrow.

Maggie:  Mom, don't wear a trash can.

Cormac:  Here's something to remember:  never marry a witch.  (He meant the Halloween kind but I think it applies to life as well)

Maggie:  We don't eat people.  And we don't bite people because they will say "boo-hoo-hoo" and cry.

Field Day

On Friday Gus and Cormac's school held their Field Day.  Cadel, Maggie and I went to watch.  The two school boys had a blast!  I think it was hard for each of them to decide which game they liked the most.

Gus and his class doing the ball bounce.

Cormac trying to score goals with the soccer ball (and Cadel there watching--he found a great job retrieving the balls for them).

Cormac's class doing tug-o'-war.

Gus' class running the relay.

Ironman 70.3 Kraichgau

Pat competed in the Ironman 70.3 Kraichgau last weekend.  It was a lot of fun to watch him.  There wasn't a super early start so we could see him swim.  There was a playground at Hardtsee (where the swim was) so the kids played there while I could watch a bit.  There was also a playground in Bad Schoenborn where the run took place--it was right on the run course--so the kids couldn't complain and I had a chance to cheer Pat on.

Hardtsee.  This is the lake where the swim took place.  We were there the day before the tri for Pat to check in his stuff.  There was an Ironkids competition going on so we stopped to watch for a bit.

Race day support.

Finish line!  This one was a lot of fun to watch and the kids were more than happy to play the whole time so it was a successful weekend.  Pat did a great job and I am so proud of him.

Heidelberg

Last weekend we headed over to Heidelberg for a long weekend.  We lived over in that area ages ago (before kids).  Pat was participating in a triathlon in the area (upcoming post on that) and we wanted to show the kids some of the cool stuff around there.

We took them to Heidelberg Castle which they thought was pretty cool.

"But there is too much walking."

Until he got to the top and saw the great views.

View of the altstadt (old city) from the castle.

Heidelberg castle from the alte bruecke (old bridge).

They love staying in hotels (really vacation apartments for us since a family of six can't fit in a hotel room).  They love them so much that sometimes we can't get them to leave to do fun stuff.  We finally forced them out to get pizza.

While out and about getting Pat's triathlon stuff ready we stumbled upon a little tierpark (animal park) in the country.  It was mainly birds and deer but they loved it.

Brussels 20km

When we were trying to figure out when to reschedule our trip to Brussels Pat stumbled across the Brussels 20 km over Memorial Day weekend and said I should try it.  I had been looking for a race and this sounded good but by the time I booked us and entered I had 7 weeks to prepare (not the best idea but it worked out perfectly).

Pre-race at Parc du Cenquantenaire.  It is a big, beautiful green space in the middle of Brussels with a couple of museums.  The race has been held here every year since it began in 1980.

The kids had a dance-off while waiting for the race.  They took turns judging each other's moves.

While I was running Pat and the kids hung out at the park, ate waffles, got balloons and tons of other free stuff.  I like this picture where they are all getting in the fountain.

Almost there.  This was just a few hundred feet before the finish line.

I made it in 1:55:46.  It was an awesome and huge race (over 40,000 participants).  I had a great time and I have the BEST cheering section.