HAWAII HERE WE COME...

Well it is getting much closer to our departure day...

We have been busy doing laudry, packing, doing more laudry and more packing in preparing for our big trip to Hawaii. As it gets closer, I really wish I would have spent more time training for this trip. But I didn't so now I just pray that the scenery is so spectacular that it numbs the pain I will be feeling in my legs from riding.

But at least at the end of the trip, thanks to a mistake on my part, we will be spending an extra day and a half in Hawaii to just be able to relax on the beach. Bummer right?!?

Hopefully we are not too sore after 6 days of riding, hiking and kayaking to be able to enjoy ourselves on the extra days. But I'm sure we will manage.

The countdown has begun... 4 days!

Once again (Part 2)

I would have never believed there would be a part two to the ripping apart of my GPS watch, but there was. I was out working in the yard again tonight and no, I didn't let Kip in by himself but I came in and got in the shower. When I got in Kip was eating his food like a good puppy, but when I got out this is what I saw:

Now you might be thinking "What's the big deal? You have to send it back to Garmin to get it fixed anyways?" Exactly what I was thinking so I went to pick it up and this is what I saw:

If you don't see it, take a look at the picture from this post here. The colors on the GPS watches are different! Oh no! Kip somehow while I was in the shower got Alexa's GPS off of the kitchen counter and proceeded to tear into it. Hers, just like mine has fallen into the almighty hands of the Kipster. So this got me to thinking that there are many reasons why Kip may have done this, but I figured I would share the top three.

1. Kip is screaming inside, "Give me more attention!!!" because he sure gets a lot of it after he does these kinds of things.

2. Maybe Kip doesn't like us exercising! I noticed the other day that when I got my watch out and turned it on (it has a distinctive beep to it) Kip beat me to the door to set it outside.

3. Maybe he really loves to go on runs with us and this was his sign of telling us! I really doubt this one, but it could be true.

If you have any ideas on why you think he has done this twice now, let us know in the comments! Oh and by the way, I was the last one to use the watch, so I guess it was my fault once again!!! Looks like these are coming out of my paycheck!!

Breakfast for a King...

Not many of you know, but I am starting to become a big fan of cycling and triathlons. I enjoy reading up on some of the best athletes in these disciplines and the things they have to go through in their training. I don't think I will ever get to the point that they are at (I think I got started a little late) but it's great to learn the little things that may help along the way. One really great blog that I read recently was the story of Matt Lieto, now a professional triathlete. He has an amazing story, one that can get anyone up off the couch and out doing something, you can read about it here.

One of the things that stuck out to me in this article was when he talked about the King, Prince, Pauper diet that he did to lose so much weight. So since my wife studies nutrition every day of her life I asked her if she had ever heard of such a thing. The slogan is Breakfast like a King, Lunch like a Prince and Supper like a Pauper (poor person). After talking about it Alexa realized that this was something that she had been trying to get me to do for a while, so I was begging her to let me try it out.

The next morning it started, just like the title says "Breakfast for a King". I went ahead and scrambled up four eggs with some pieces of ham and some cheese, had two pieces of toast, a glass of milk, and my wonderful wife made me a strawberry smoothie which I am sure there will be a blog about that in the near future. You can see most of my breakfast below.
I have never felt so energized and awake throughout the day. I have been trying to follow this plan pretty close for the past couple weeks and I have to say that though I may not be dropping any pounds (I'm gaining due to the fact that I can't quite figure our the supper like a pauper as I was always use to large suppers.) I have a lot more energy and feel much better after spending a couple hours a day training.

Not long after I started this did Alexa jump on board and has been feeling the same great benefits that I have. So if your in need of an energy boost to start out the day, I don't know if scrambled eggs with ham is what you need (you might ask Alexa to help you with what to eat) I just know that the large portions at breakfast have been the ticket for me!

Once again...

I really hate to bash on our dog two posts in a row, but I promised you in an earlier post last week that I would share the technology that Alexa and I are using to keep track of our stats while running / biking / swimming. Well Alexa and I went for a run yesterday morning and afterwards she went to teach swimming lessons. I was out mowing our lawn and had Kip on his leash on our porch. He was being good for the first half hour, but he started barking at the door. So since I was almost done I let him inside and finished the mowing. I was only outside for another 5 - 10 minutes and here is what I saw when I got inside.
Now many of you don't know what you are looking at so here is a photo of what it is.

You are looking at a Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS watch with heart rate capability. In other words I set this watch outside for a few minutes before I work out and it finds the satellites. I put on my heart rate strap and either place the watch on my arm or bike and it gives me my pace, heart rate, time, elevation, grade, pedaling cadence, bike speed, pretty much everything you need to know.

So back to Kip... I thought "Oh No, I'm going to have to look at this thing for the rest of its life with tooth marks in it." I guess it could be worse! Oh but it was, I turned the watch over and this is what I saw:
Yes you are seeing this correctly, Kip cracked and broke the screen on my very nice 6 month old GPS watch. So now I am waiting on a reply from Garmin to see if there is any way to fix it, or if I am going to have to fork out another couple hundred dollars to get a replacement. The good thing though was that I was able to plug it into my computer and download my previous workout data, so that is saved for good. After I get a replacement I'll fill you in a little more on how I use the watch during and after my workouts to analyze the data.

So I learned my lesson and Alexa wasn't any bit sympathetic to me. Oh well, thats what you get for having a puppy and trusting him to be inside alone. It was definately a lesson learned the hard way!!

He was so good...

Kip is turning out to be a real porch dog, or so I thought. I have been tying him out a lot lately because he really seems to enjoy being outside and watching all of the people out. But the other day when I was eating my breakfast I thought I heard a weird noise, like there were rocks being scraped across our cement. So I went to look and sure enough there were rocks being scraped against our cement as kip was digging them out of our flower bed that is around our house. I don't know what he was digging for or if he just had the urge to dig but by the time I got out there, he had dug quite a hole. And being after it had rained that night you can imagine how muddy his previously white paws were. I did discipline him but being that he is my furry child I had to do what any good parent would do and take a few pictures.

I guess he still is a puppy and puppy's do like to dig. It could have been worse he could have in torn up our grass. Anways, we, well Payton got it all cleaned up and now it's back just the way it was.

Training

So after Alexa's blog the other day about getting ready for a triathlon, what she forgot to mention is that we still have some training for an even better event coming up in the next month. On August 1st we leave from Moline, Illinois and travel our way to the big island of Hawaii (pun intended). With that trip which I talked about here, there is going to be a lot of bike riding. I think we are going to take the leap and go for the long 100 mile day. As Alexa has said to me a couple times "You only get to do this once, so you might as well not miss out on anything" (well put). So to prepare for the week, Alexa and I decided to take a trip over to La Porte to hop on the bike trail and do some riding today.
We never got some pictures of us actually riding, but I have the stats downloaded to prove we did it. I logged in 24.2 miles in 1 hour and 33 minutes with Alexa logging 20.28 miles in 1 hour and 36 minutes. One of these days I will update you on some of the new technology that we are using to monitor our fitness throughout our workouts. Alexa thinks I am a nerd when I talk about those kinds of things, but she married me!

All in all it was a beautiful day of riding and the scenery was great. The only downside was that the bridge over the Cedar River right before you go into Waterloo was broken so we couldn't quite say that we went to Waterloo and back. It made for a great afternoon activity that we washed down with some good ice cream when we got back home! Nothing beats the open trail and the sun beating down on you as you ride along.

The 4th of July

We spent the 4th out at the Sander's house with many of our other relatives. It always turns out to be an entertaining time. With most of them being pyros... it can get a little dangerous at times. Sometimes when you walk outside there are so many bottle rockets and bunker bombs going off one might think there was a war going on.

Anyways, here are a few pictures that capture some of the finer moments of the day.

Payton, Barry (my cousin), and TJ all standing around developing some kind of bomb or homemade firecracker.

They are all very much pyros... if there is any chance of something blowing up, you can be assured that they are there somewhere.

The "supplies" for what looks like a sparkler bomb.

The developing and making of a sparkler bomb.... man North Korea has nothing on these guys.

The launching of one bomb or missle or whatever it is.

The testing or launching of another bomb or missle.

As I recall the end result was just a fire ball. Nothing spectacular or anything but they were excited.

I remember a quote from one of them....

"Man look at all that fire."

I guess they were all pretty impressed.

This is another cousin Gabe riding his bike with a smoke bomb on the back. I'm not really sure whose idea this was and I probably don't want to know for fear that it was Payton's idea.. but it was pretty funny. This picture doesn't do justice to what it actually looked like, but this is the best I got.

And of course you can't end the night without sparklers and a fireworks show that will knock your socks off.. ok not quite but still good.

All in all it was a good day. Everyone left with all of their fingers intact. There were just a few burns but nothing serious.

Hope you all had a Happy 4th of July!

Kip update

Kip our puppy that we adopted from the pound is now about eight months old, we think. We have only had him for about two and half months but he has grown a lot in that short amount of time and he is still growing. You can read more about when first got him here. Well we just wanted to show you a few pictures now that he is turning into a big dog.

He's quite the photogenic dog... look at that smile

Notice the dead spots in the lawn... he must have toxic pee.

He's turned out to be a really good dog, minus the fact that he can't leave us alone. He has separation issues even when your just in the other room. He has a tendency to drag any article of clothing of Payton or mine out of our room or anywhere he can find it and make a pile in the middle of our kitchen floor. I guess dirty laundry is comforting to him, strange I know.
He is also a huge wimp which you probably guessed from his separation issues. But he is scared of almost everything, especially fireworks. It was nearly impossible to get him to go outside during the Party in the Park fireworks display in town. Other than that we haven't had many problems, mostly just good things to say about our little (well semi-little) baby pup.

Triathetes... maybe

So as many of you know Payton has gotten into training and competing in triathlons around the area. Below is a picture of him competing in the Cornman triathlon in 2007.
This year he wasn't sure if he was going to sign up for any because of our crazy schedule and us going on our trip to Hawaii, which is around the time when many of the triathlons occur. Well it turns out he did decide to sign up. So he will officially be competing in the Cy-Man Triathlon on September 13th at Big Creek State Park.
This triathlon consists of a 500 yard swim, 14.3 mile bike ride and a 3.1 mile run all in one day. Challenging right, well he is up for the challenge and apparently he thought that I would be also.
It turns out that Payton signed me up as well. Yes wrote the check, filled out the paper work. He did the whole deal, so now I am apparently competing in the triathlon as well. And frankly I am terrified, not because of the run or the bike ride, I think I can handle those after our trip to Hawaii, but I am terrified of the swim.
Some of you know and others don't know I have a huge fear of drowning. I know, I know it seems silly considering I was on the swim team for 10+ years of my life and I now teach swimming lessons. But the thought of swimming across a lake with hundreds of other people makes me cringe. But I am going to get over that and overcome my fear.
Anyways, I am determined to overcome this fear and who knows maybe I will end up liking it. But I need to get to training, a month after Payton started. Nice he told me now. O well I'm just a little behind, right?
Anyways, if you would like to join us in this great adventure you can sign up here. Well we will keep you informed on how the training is going, or isn't going. And definitely on how we come out that day.