Over Thanksgiving, we spent a week in St. George visiting family and enjoying the sunshine. We arrived on Thursday night a week before Thanksgiving and made the best of our time there. On Friday, Russell took the kids to climb the red rocks at the Dixie rock with Grandma and Grandpa Farnsworth.
They had a good time exploring the caves and climbing the rocks. Russell tried to have Brooklyn stay with Grandma Farnsworth while they climbed but she was not having it. She wanted to climb and explore with everyone else. Logan was even a tour guide to some people that wanted to know how to get to the top of the Dixie.
While they were hiking I attended the graveside service of my cousin's baby. Sadly, my cousin got a really weird bacterial infection, called Listeria, while she was pregnant. This put her into pre-term labor and affected the baby's heart. The little girl was born at 28 weeks and lived for a few minutes before her little heart gave out because of the infection. It was so sad and the casket was so small. What a sad, hard experience for Amy to have to go through. All we could do was give her a hug at the funeral.
After the funeral, I met up with Russell and the kids at Dixie rock before heading back home. That night we watched Fynlee while Jacee and Stewart were at a work party. Brooklyn and Fynlee had a good time playing together. Well it didn't start out that way though. At first these two were enemies, well "frienemies." They wanted to be friends and their first words to each other was, "Hi Baby!!" Then they started playing with each others toys and that was just not right. They don't really know how to share very well. We finally had to take away the doll because it was causing too much drama. They were crying, stealing toys, and sometimes even hitting. Fynlee loves to pet people's hair so when she would try to feel Brooklyn's hair, Brooklyn though she was hitting her and would squawk. Finally by the end of the night, they were used to each other and were friends. 
They liked giving each other hugs and were even sharing toys! They did like rocking in the rocking chair together and making faces at each other. Any time they saw each other the rest of the time we were there this week, Brooklyn and Fynlee were great friends and got a long well. I guess they just needed to get used to someone their size.
The next morning, Saturday November 19, I ran the Snow Canyon Half Marathon.
This is a fun half marathon and fairly easy because it is all down hill. I have ran this half marathon four times now. This is the first half marathon I have ran in two years though so it was almost like a first time. Training for this race was difficult as always because I can never seem to get my nutrition and gut to cooperate. Every long run I just hoped nothing would go crazy with my stomach. Thankfully, this race there were no gut issues! That in itself is a victory! The race started in between Dameron and Diamond Valley. It was freezing up there in the morning so I was glad they handed out Hot Hands and silver emergency blankets. The Hot Hands were great and the blankets really blocked the wind and held in body heat. Since we had to ride the bus up to the start so early, I found a seat on the ground and waited out the hour before the start time while trying not to freeze. By the time it was start time, my toes were frozen and probably didn't thaw until a few miles down the course.
The course ran passed Diamond Valley and turned down Snow Canyon State Park. This is such a beautiful area and the scenic views alone make this an awesome race. After leaving Snow Canyon, the trail goes through Ivins into St. George on the Snow Canyon Parkway. Then turns into the Ledges gated community to Lava Flow Drive and then turns toward Snow Canyon High School to finish on the track.
The good and bad part about this race is that it is all down hill and I mean steep down hill. You would not think this is problem until you are running it and your legs are taking a beating pounding down the hill. The great thing about it though is that because it is down hill, you can go a lot faster than usual so your times are great. By the time I got through the steep downhill of Snow Canyon, I was actually glad to be on flat ground and didn't even complain about the slight up hill through the gated community.
There were a lot of runners in this race so I was constantly surrounded by people. This meant there was never a dull moment. Whether it was being cheered on by total strangers, or listening in on the funny conversations of the other runners, there was always something going on. Finally I made it to the final mile of the race and picked up the pace a little. I was also really excited to see my family cheering for me at the finish line. I did not get a Personal Record this race but I was happy with my time of 1:52. For training for this race from nothing, I was pretty happy with a sub 2 hour race.
And the giant medal around my neck was pretty awesome too. At the end of the race, I tanked up on race food like string cheese, muffins, bananas, and cookies. One guy just took one whole box of cookies and said he needed to refuel. I couldn't help but laugh as he was about to hand me an empty box to use for the same purpose. I was too embarrassed and proud to actually take the box but I thought it was a great idea.
After heading home after the race and getting a shower, my legs were pretty dead. They were so sore I could hardly walk and don't even think of making me walk downstairs. That downhill really did a number on them. I don't really get it because I can run all I want at home and for training and never be sore but every time I race, I am so sore for days afterward. I must really overexert myself in races.
Well I hobbled around for a few days trying to get the lactic acid out of my legs so I could actually go downstairs. Finally Russell said we should go for a bike ride. I didn't know how riding a bike was going to help me but we had hauled all of the bikes down here so we had to go on a few rides. I told everyone I would probably be in the back of the pack because I didn't know how well my legs would work. We decided to ride Dino Cliffs on Monday because it was close to my parents' house.
This was really the first time I have been mountain biking with Russell and the kids. The trail was so fun even though the first part was sandy and uphill. When I got on my bike, I expected my legs to freak out but they didn't! They didn't even hurt. I could ride forever! You wouldn't think running and biking would use different muscles in your legs but they do. The sore muscles in my legs from running were totally the opposite muscles needed to ride my bike. This was great news. Not only was I able to ride pain free, but I was loosening up the sore muscles in the process. Win-Win!
Anyway, we had a great time riding Dino Cliffs with Tyrel and Jack. I was still the last one in the pack but that was more from inexperience than anything else. Russell and Tyrel are much braver than us and went down some pretty sketchy trails while the rest of us just walked. We made the little 3 mile loop in good time and then headed back home before it got dark.
The next day we headed to a different trail for some more riding. This time we went to Bear Claw Poppy in Bloomington.
This trail was so fun and reminded me of riding bikes as a kid. These types of trails were what we rode all the time. I didn't know it was considered mountain biking, it was just riding your bike back then. Even Charlotte was able to ride her little bike on these trails. She did really well and rode for about a mile with us up and down the trails. Then Emily, Colby and I took off to ride the full trail. I had never been here before so we didn't really know where we were going but eventually we found the trail turnaround spot. At the turnaround, there was a giant hill. I decided to be cool and try and climb it. I did really well until the last little part that had a lip to wheelie over then I jumped off and walked the rest. At the top we took a picture that sadly did not save for some reason so we don't even have proof of our climb. Then I wanted to ride back down but Emily freaked out and said I would die. When I looked down the trail, I realized she was probably right so we walked down to about half way and rode the rest.
Riding down was pretty awesome. We actually rode back up the steep hill just so we could go down again. Then we continued down the trail to head back to the van and Russell, Charlotte, and Brooklyn.
As we were riding, there were two different trails, a beginner trail and an intermediate trail. I didn't realize I was on the intermediate trail at first but then when I did, instead of getting off the trail and onto the beginner, I thought I was cool again and kept going. I saw a few hills that thought I could climb and went for it. Well I would have made it if I knew how to gear right but I don't so I had to jump off my bike. Well I jumped off the wrong size of my bike to the downhill side of the trail. With the help of gravity, I proceeded to roll down the hill with my bike following behind me. Emily knew I had died but I just kept laughing at myself. I guess I am not as cool as I thought I was. With my leg all scraped up, I had to try again, this time in a better gear. This time I made it up and down the other side. As if that wasn't a good learning experience, I continued on the intermediate trail because it was more fun. The next down hill I came to I got going too fast and my feet slipped off the pedals. I stayed on the bike and was able to recover but the knobs on my pedals jabbed into my shins causing perfect peg holes in my legs. I'm so awesome. Finally Emily and Colby told me I wasn't as cool as I thought and we rode back the rest of the way on the boring beginner trail.
Russell was wondering what was taking so long and then I showed him my awesome battle wounds. This was such a fun trail I didn't even care that I wrecked.
While waiting for Russell to ride the trail with the kids, Charlotte and Brooklyn played in the dirt. They didn't care how long it was taking because they were happy to get dirty. Logan and Charlotte were pretending they were throwing bombs when they were throwing dirt clods. Brooklyn yelled "Bombs Away!" each time they threw.
The next day we rode another trail near the Utah Arizona boarder. This trail was called Secret Sauce and is the High School State Mountain Bike course. We wanted to try this out so Emily can be used to it in case she qualifies for State next year.
We met up with Jack and Tyrel as well as Trista and her daughter Jaydee. These kids rode all over these trails without a problem. Trista and I hung out behind them as we climbed all the hills.
I only rode the one trail with them this time because then I took Brooklyn while Trista and I hung out and talked. After riding for a while, the kids were tired and wanted to go. This was a fun trail but a little more technical than Bear Claw Poppy.
The next day was Thanksgiving so we spent the day with family. We had Thanksgiving with the Morwood's this year but since the Farnsworth's were not doing anything, Keith and LeeAnn came over for dinner as well. This was fun for the kids to have both grandparents to be with. The Hughes's also came for dinner. We ate, hung out, and played games. It was a good day.
On Friday we spent one more day in the sun and went to the Ninja park near my parents' house. This park was pretty cool because it had a ton of obstacles to climb on, a Ninja course, sprinting track, and huge slides that went down the hill.
There were even boulders to climb on. Charlotte liked climbing on the boulders and liked standing on top when she was done.
The Ninja course was cool and even has a timer to time your progress through the course. Each of the kids had to take a turn to see who could do it the fastest. The boys were the fastest in our family. The yellow obstacles were the hardest to get through and took up the most time.
We all had to try out the sprinting track too. This area also had an actual timer to test your speed. We all raced and I think our best time was seven seconds. Colby kept challenging me to a sprint but he was pretty surprised when I beat him every time. He is pretty quick so I really had to work for it but I did beat him. Let the record show that I beat my kids in a running match at least once in their lives.
We headed home the next day loaded to the hilt. We had our new VelociRAX that holds 7 bikes, plus the dog, plus a bunch of clothes, and other random stuff my mom always sends us home with. The van was riding pretty low but we made it home. This was a fun eventful trip and a great way to celebrate Thanksgiving.
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