Kidlets burn the midnight oil

We got there at 10:00 pm, they were on the walls at 10:30 after waiting in a line one might expect when a popular band is playing a small club, and they went non stop until 1:00 am when the oldest laid down and went to sleep on the floor. It was late night climbing night at the local climbing gym - 10pm to 2 am. The place was packed, lines 3-4 deep at all he top ropes, bouldering area was shoulder to shoulder - only good place was the one that mattered, the kids wall, so Annie and I just sat and enjoyed watching the rats of the rug work on their bouldering skills.
Kylie is strong, and muscles her way through problems. Her determination pushes her strength hard - watched her cling herself on the wall in some positions that I didn't think she had a chance to hold on to.

Chesney's a little more cerebral, watched her on several occasions stop and think her way through some sequences. Some climbers make it look graceful, Chesney is that type of climber.

Annie working on her ninja feet - soft and quiet. Annie's both exceptionally strong, and graceful.

And then there's Brock - kind of at that age where motor skills and the like start to progress faster than growth in actual size, so when people started gathering to watch the "little boy" who's up past midnight working the wall, with some cheers and gawking, he started to get a little Hollywood on us.

By 1:30 the younger 2 were starting to get dreary eyed, so we packed it up a little early. They've been asking to go again since waking up Saturday morning.

Chicken eggs

The kids have a new daily contest - it's called "see who happens to find the egg(s)". They managed to do a good job raising their chickens, keeping them fed, watered, and even alive. They've been rewarded the last few weeks with a few of the chickens hitting chicken puberty and starting to lay eggs.

It's still enough of a novelty that each time they find one they come running through the house announcing it. They've stuck with it pretty well, we'll see if that lasts now that the cold weather is here. But it's been cool thus far watching them have fun with them and taking ownership of the work, and dad likes the fresh eggs.

UTCX Halloween weekend

Matt and the gang's UTCX double cross Halloween weekend is one of the best race weekends of the year. Between the costumes and the already rowdy vibe of the CX crowd, it makes for a fun couple of days. Here are a few of our favorite costumes Alex Kim and one of his teammates raced as waffles - earning Bruce's race within a race status - not sure which waffle won...
Steve was more William Wallaceesque than Mel Gibson
Even the local contaminated meat doper showed up.

Rick raced as a scout, complete with sash and handkerchief.

This was one of my top three for the weekend - lifeguard with nipple problems and a burley batch of hair that couldn't be contained in the nether regions.

Annie raced as Little Red Riding Hood.

Steve Wasmund and his racing companions costumes were secondary to the coolness of doing a CX race on a tandem, and yes, they cleaned the sandpit and were even smooth on the barriers.

Miles running the barriers as cockroach.

Our kids favorites were the Lozon's, who came as Mr. and Mrs. Incredible, didn't get a good shot of them together, but here they are.

The racing was good, really good. Wheeler is one of the best tracks on the circuit in regards to a good mix of fast speed sections and technical stuff that necessitates some skill and attention beyond pedaling fast. The highlight this year had to be the sand pit, as shown in last post's video - which made for a fun new technical challenge. There were two guys on the day, both in the A flight, that I thought stood out as exceptional in it.

Annie and I both raced both days. Niether of us put together a race that we thought was a particularly solid one. Did some things well, but lot's of important and sometimes silly little mistakes and a few bigger one's that make for good lesson's and prevent our racing for the weekend from being qualified as good. Fun factor was through the roof though.

Annie coming off the bridge, setting up for one of the trickier corners on the course on day 2.

We've got two more converts to CX in the house. Chesney and Brock both did their first CX race. Chesney challenged me to a race down the back stretch. She already had me on the rivet after chasing here around the lap, and the photo above captures the drop, the band snapped and I was off the back.

Us just prior to me getting dropped in the photo above, looking over hoping to see her in trouble, and seeing just the opposite - that's when I cracked.

Brock's takeaway from his race is that he wants pedals - said he can't go as fast as he wants on the push bike. Quick vid of the kids race for the grandparents.


The kidlets were lined up giving five's on the course on day two, made for some smiles and a brief respite from the chase when we came by. Hard to beat CX at Wheeler Farm for a full day of fun for the whole family - great time had by all.

Goblin Valley, Little Wild Horse Canyon, and Calf Creek Falls

With summer break officially ending this week with the kids heading back to school, we hit the road for one more weekend of family adventuring before getting back to the grind.

Stop one was Goblin Valley where the world class scampering among the hoodoos was only outdone by the world class evening and sunset.

Now I'm not sure if there are actual classes of scampering, but if there are, GV has to be world class. Have heard all sorts of great ideas for play down there, from easter egg hunts to capture the flag, and don't know that there's a better place for any of that stuff. Being GV rookies, we kept it simple with hide and seek and some other gimmicks the kids came up with and had a blast. The place set the kids imaginations on fire and made us parents/grown ups feel and act like part of the kidlet tribe.

Watching for inbound pirate ships or something of that nature. At the end of the trip, Goblin Valley stood atop the list as kids favorite place of the weekend - a testament to the theory of whatever inspires their imaginations the most is the best in their eyes.

Day two would be their first slot canyon experience in Little Wildhorse Canyon. It was set up perfectly with the heavy rains a few days prior leaving several good water crossings, the kids got the full slot experience. We had them (sometimes forced them) hike through the water (chilly but not cold) on the way out, then let them do it how they wanted on the way back - the obvious choice was to climb the walls...

Even the 3 yr old figured it out pretty good.

We had to tell Kylie to stay within a reasonable height, think she would have climbed out the top if we let her.

Little Wildhorse was really a great place to give the kids a taste of slot canyons - short hike in and there were some high quality narrows sections that everyone enjoyed a lot.

Around the entrance to the canyon is this little feature that just begs to be jumped. Not posting the rest of the sequence, will let you look at trajectory at the midway point and determine if you think the kids are standing in a safe spot or not.
More shots from the canyon...

Day three was Lower Calf Creek Falls, which also didn't disappoint. ...

The traditional sprint finish that seems to always happen on the waterfall hikes. Once they see it, they're off. The oldest was already stripped down to her swim suit and in the water by the time I got to it. The middle was increasing her gap on the littlest as seen here, he's trying, but just not hangin yet....

It was a little overcast, and the fall itself creates a strong breeze which made it chilly. The water was cold, but my adventure book says you've gotta swim under it for the excursion to count.

The girls wisely stuck to wading and mud pie making on the pretty great beach.

The area even had a place for a workout on the bike. If it looks steep.......

it's because it was... sign at the top of the hill after turning around to head back down.

Fun trip topped off maybe the best summer we've had as a family, the kids are all old enough and plenty capable to do just about any adventure we can drum up. Pretty excited for the next few years while we've got them all in the "sweet spot" where they still think we're cool to hang out with and don't have better things to do with their weekends.

Chickens

So, a few weeks back the kids got some baby chicks to raise and be responsible for. Kind of an odd choice for a kids pet, I know, but we took them out to the ranch last trip to Moab and the highlight for them was gathering eggs from the chicken coop. I remember my brothers and I getting chicks one Easter when we were little, Mom or Dad took us out to show us and the dog had gotten there first during the night - it was a gruesome scene. So what do you do? Head back to the local farm store and get another batch. Don't recall what happened to our chickens, but don't remember collecting eggs, so guessing we didn't do a good job taking care of them and they either died by causes other than dog attacks or the parents gave them away.

So we took the kids down to the local IFA to pick out their chicks, and turned the garage into a barn until the chicks got a few chicken years behind them and were ready to move outside.

In the meantime, coop construction began, not many things better than a little project that the kids can do with me, they helped pick out what kind of coop they wanted for their chicks, and the older two got to use real tools, drill, wire snips, etc.... The little dude made attempts with the real tools and was quickly relegated to the plastic tool belt and tools, and took the too little medicine just fine.

The chickens have been in the backyard for a few weeks now and we haven't seen or heard any predators out there in the middle of the night yet. The kids are doing a great job taking the lead on raising their chickens. They won't lay eggs for another few months so the kids are staying engaged as their anxious for the production stage.

So what's the ROI on a backyard chicken setup, assuming they survive until the egg bearing years of chicken life? Pretty sure there ain't one. What's a dozen eggs cost at the store - a couple bucks? At the rate they lay eggs and the rate we eat them (some, not a lot), your looking at years before they pay for themselves. Nope, there's no economic sense to backyard chickens. The ROI is in the kids learning a little about raising stuff and having a small but tangible return on their work that's fun for them at their age. And while I'm a full bore believer in the free market/capitalist system and enjoy the heck out of the real life monopoly game (even these nasty cycles) that most of us choose to engage in for our living, I don't think it's the only route to being happy, - so, I'm trying to find ways to facilitate them getting some real life understanding that life can be pretty simple if they want to go the route I grew up in, and this gives them a small lesson in self sufficiency and a small return for their time that they don't have to trade in a dollar for. Don't know if it will work, but we've got four chickens named after Toy Story characters that second as the neighborhood petting zoo at the very least.

Iron Horse Classic 2010

Fantastic time in Durango again - if there's a better weekend for both bike racing and family vacation time anywhere else, let me know. Hard to imagine it being better than the Iron Horse in Durango though.

The racing efforts were a small success - went in this year 8-10 pds heavier than last year so wasn't sure how it would go and was a little scared I'd be slower, but went a few minutes faster than previous in both the road race and TT and rode better in the crit. So, either paced a little smarter (less smart on the TT, was late to my start) or am a little stronger. So small positives to take away, despite still going pretty slow. One of our top local pro's, Burke Swindlehurst, won the race - it's a big time event and it's the 2nd time he's won it. Maybe the longest stretch between win #1 and win #2 at the Iron Horse?

Bunch of random photo's from the trip....

Went through here late at night, but, I like these, so seems like it could be a cool town...

Soaking in the hot springs pools in Ouray post race weekend.... soaked for about 4 hours.... still coming unwrinkled.... kids would have stayed another 4 if we let them.

Think I've mentioned before that Durango is a hardcore town when it comes to the outdoor lifestyle. This set up's pretty indicative of the crowd there....

Lunchtime at the Telluride stop on the way home had a place for the kids to do a little scrambling on some climbing features.

The kids dug the free Gondola up the mountain in Telluride on the way to lunch.

They also dug feeding the fish and turtles in the Koi pond next to the hot springs in Ouray.

They also dug the abundance of waterfall hikes in Ouray...

And hiking around the Amphitheater area of Ouray

Here's the crit scene at the Iron Horse... super fast corner and those tires got some action that day. I'm the dude in the middle.

A little earlier shot of the same corner, different lap.

Managed to win the group that got shelled sprint, coming around the muscles in the Jackal kit about 30 yards from the finish.

Brock spent most of his race giving the crowd his thumbs up, which was a nice distraction from him being pissed the only helmet we had that fit him had flowers on it.

Any guesses as to what this is...? And no, I didn't find it in the town of Areola, I mean, Arriola.

Chesney setting up for a corner in her race.

Me and the kids after finishing the race from Durango to Silverton... such a cool race route.

The kids watching the train roll through camp. The Iron Horse Classic got it's start when a couple of dudes decided to race from Durango to Silverton - one driving the train, one driving his bike.

Can't say enough good things about this race and trip - one of our favorite getaways every year, and should be even better next year with a dirt race being added.