And this is why we ate 6 lbs. of lasagna

Hello! I've started four posts in the last week.

The first was to commemorate our regional/city champs swim meet in which James, Landon, and Claire all competed and enjoyed victories of various sorts. James dominated his events and I must admit, it still thrills me to my toes to watch him race.

It's always fun to watch people who are good at what they do, but as a former swimmer who is married to the current swimmer in question, his form and speed and power and technique and... well, I practically have to fan myself after each race.

And Landon won his 25 yard fly and got second in his 25 yard free, qualifying for state in both events! He is so very good and so very Landon-chill about the whole thing.

Clairebear dropped 3 seconds in her 25 back and won her heat! She added the same amount of time in her free, but we don't need to talk about that. She is as consistent in her confidence as she is erratic in her performance, but she was the youngest swimmer entered in the meet and we're so proud of her for swimming this season.

Following directions and working hard for sustained intervals are not her two favorite things, so her 3x per week practice attendance earns a medal in our book!

Also, in classic Claire fashion, when we were packing to head to the meet at 6:00 in the morning, she told me cheerfully and matter-of-factly "don't worry mom, I packed my mirror so I can see my lipstick."

She does not own lipstick, but she has taught Cora the importance of always having your purse.

Corabunny was a trooper, but man, the two sessions nearly killed us both (boys and girls events were split into a.m./p.m. which was awesome last year when we only had a boy swimming; it was less awesome this year when we had a mix).

The one downside to watching your sexy husband do his sexy swimming in the pool while you're in the bleachers is that it means he's not sitting next to you sexily flexing his arms while holding your heavy baby. Cora duty was all me and we were both pretty freaking over it by the time the meet ended at 3 p.m.

And by "over it" I mean grumpy and tired with a sprained/broken/permanently aching right arm from holding a million pound toddler who does NOT want to get down and does NOT want to read books and does NOT want to be held by anyone who is not mommy even though mommy has useless tiny hips that can't hold anything and is so right-side dominant her left arm is little more than an accessory for balance while walking, so she uses her right arm to hold up all million pounds of toddler for hours and hours and hours. My right bicep still hurts. Don't touch it.

Ooh, other highlight, we acted like total rookies and failed to pack an extra outfit for the only partially domesticated toddler and THEN ordered her spaghetti and meatballs at lunch (ugh why??), so she was covered in tomato sauce and we still had many hours of swim meet to go, so we swung through a Children's Place between lunch and the pool and redressed her in the finest of clearance items.

Honestly the meet was super fun, it really only devolved at the end, and we have enjoyed this year's round of summer league so very much. So much so we're even doing what we vowed we wouldn't and packing up the family and driving to College Station next weekend for the state meet. As luck would have it, both James and Landon's events are in the same session on Saturday morning, so we only have to commit 6 hours to the whole affair and my parents are going to drive over and watch so it won't be me on my own in the stands again. And then we'll go to the lake afterward for the rest of the weekend. This time we'll pack extra clothes for Cora.

After that we'll have 2 weeks until our Jamaica trip which is blowing my mind. I booked that vacation approximately 9 months ago now we're at 25 days until departure. I took the big kids school supply shopping after work yesterday because we get back the Friday before school starts and it was very exciting for me to have two kids picking out spirals and composition notebooks. On the way out Claire expressed some concern that she might not know how to "do Kindergarten," but before I could respond Landon assured her that "that's why you go to Kindergarten, so you can learn how to do it." And that's pretty much exactly right, plus it's an excuse to buy some adorable navy blue jumpers and pink spiral notebooks.

I can't remember if I ever posted this, but I'm back to teaching at my original barre studio, Urban Yoga, and I'm loving it. I don't have a regular class yet (I've been promised one in the fall), so I'm just subbing, but between vacations and summer colds and other conflicts, I've been subbing 3-4 classes a week! I'm adding new moves and new music and am so grateful to share my love for barre with more students. I am also grateful to continue receiving my Lululemon fitness instructor discount. Teaching barre is satisfying on many levels.

Tonight I was out of ideas and ingredients for dinner when I remembered a giant 6 lb. meat lasagna we'd bought from Costco a few weeks ago and stuck in the freezer. Hooray I thought, dinner tonight and leftovers for James and the kids for lunch tomorrow. But no, no, no. We ate ALL SIX POUNDS of lasagna. The teenage years are going to be terribly expensive.

And finally, a funny story from Sunday. Landon's baseball glove has been such a huge hit that James took the big kids to Academy Sunday at lunchtime to buy a mitt for Claire, plus a bat and a few plastic balls for practice. I ran errands later that afternoon and came home to find all 12 balls scattered about the front yard and two sweaty kids running in circles after each other with the bat and two mitts piled in the middle and when Claire saw me she stopped her running and exclaimed, "MOMMY! We're playing BASKETBALL!"

Maybe we'll sign her up for that next.