Ramblings from Texas

Wow, wow, wow! Life has changed and I've neglected this blog. I am going to try to post once a week. Now that summer is here, that should be doable... yeah, sure.

So, we moved - and then we moved again.  We are still in Texas, but rather than being south of Austin, we are now north of Austin in a little bedroom community called Cedar Park.  I got a job, we bought a house, bought a dog, planted a veggie garden, A joined a swim team - or two, C is going to preschool, S stays home and is raising kids, cleaning house, being a taxi for the kids, shopping, taking car of any loose ends that I have left behind, and in short being a fantastic house husband, AND we have been exploring Austin!

C admiring a buffalo statue near Johnson City

There is SO much to do here - Capital tours, Austin sightseeing, pioneer farms, parks, Native American Pow Wows, music festivals, Cinco de Mayo celebrations, dog parks, shopping, movie theaters where they serve food(!), parties, GIANT book stores, kite festivals, etc.  We have yet to scratch the surface, go past the tip of the iceberg, etc. in terms of what there is to do here. We like it, it feels comfortable. I can see how we will have to strive to maintain our island vibe though what with all there is to do, I can see us getting over extended. In fact, most weekends we manage to build in home time where we hang here and do stuff like paint, make flower crowns, ride our bikes, cook, etc.

Crucian peeps and others at the Dirty Girl Mud run

Scarf dancer at Powwow @UT

Do I miss St. Croix? yes. Do my kids and husband miss St. Croix? yes. In fact the other day, C asked Stephen when we were going back and NOT for vacation. When we told him we didn't know, he got very upset and muttered something about going back to his island and selling this house for sixty five nine dollars - sorry kid, we need more money than that for this sucker!

I discovered Crucians here in Texas! We are EVERWHERE!!!! Big Up Crucian massive! I need to have a real Crucian party here this summer, play some Violators, Stanley, Quelbe, and even toss some Daddy Yankee in that mix to really let the new neighbors that "we deh here, meson!" So, if you find yourself in Austin this summer, look us up and "Leh we jam!"

Triathlon madness!

View of the harbor as the athletes will see it on Sunday. 

 It's that time of year again.  The roads are getting paved, the bush is getting wacked from the sides of the road, and there are orange spray painted marking on the asphalt.  It's time for the St. Croix 70.3 Half Ironman!!!

Pre race talk.

This is such a great, fun event for everyone - sporty and not.  We get tons of people visiting the island from all over the world in the hopes of securing a spot in a full ironman, there are people at the restaurants, people running and cycling on the roads, and a festive quality to downtown.

When I was younger - high school aged and before, I would volunteer to help in the transition area. in those days, the transition area was held in the old fort parking lot that took up much of the waterfront. We had to report to "work" the day or two before the triathlon to sweep the parking lot, set up the bike racks, set up the barricades, and gawk at all the hot bodies. It was a teenager's dream come true. Actually, some of the older women were in heaven too.  I haven't been able to volunteer since I graduated from high school because I was in college, or once back and married -preferred to stay snuggled in bed with S, but now that A is old enough, and sleeping in is 6 am, I figured we needed to start giving back and doing our part.  That said, if you need water when leaving the transition area, we are your people :)

Pollito - all the triathletes know him
by name thanks to C!

Yesterday was part 2 of the warm up swim, and A and I swam it while C waited on shore with my Mom and his new found friend Pollito(a slowly dying baby chick that we found on the roadside).  THANKS Mom!

We hoped to not only make it around the 750m course in less than 30 minutes, but to also get to rub goggles with Lance Armstrong. Yes, you heard me - Lance Armstrong.  The man himself is here.  I remember seeing him win the "Beauty and the Beast" triathlon when I was in high school. Now he is back and we are wishing him well.  If he does win, and I hope he does, it will bring a boost to our little island next year as more competitors will come.  Right now we average about 300 athletes, but in the beginning we sometimes had upwards of 800! Can you imagine that?

What I saw most of the swim

Anyway, it was fun and it stopped raining long enough for us to want to jump into that cold harbor water.  Yeah, it's still cold for us. I know, I hear the tiny violins playing in the background.  Anyway, I haven't swum in the harbor for YEARS.  The last time I was there it was pretty barren, but yesterday we saw starfish, 2 juvenile French Angel fish, Sargent Majors, Blue Tang, Sea Urchins the size of my head, and many other fish.  It was cool.  We had to swim through seaweed though - and I HATE that.  A did well on the swim despite wanting to turn back at one point, and I did well despite running her over constantly! Once we got out, A said it fine and she'd do it again! Good girl!

Sadly, we didn't see Lance.  I heard he had done a private swim and was biking the island. Maybe we'll go hunt him down?

Hot body for my friend Anna,
who is missing the race this year.

Altoon Lagoon play date

 The other day another home schooling mom and I were talking about how we wanted our kids to get out and do MORE exercise.  Don’t get me wrong; both of our children are active. A swims 4-5 days a week, plays in the bush, participates in all the kids biking, running, swimming races, etc; but I just don’t feel that she gets out there and is active enough.  Apparently, my friend feels the same so we decided that we would get together once a week and let the kids, bike, run, or whatever as long as they were outside and DOING.  During this time, we get visit and C has a friend over to play.  We decided to meet at Altoona Lagoon because it is between both our homes, it is flat, and where they hold most of the kids’ races.

Altoona Lagoon is another one of our undiscovered St. Croix areas for many reasons.  There is a whole fishing community of old time Crucians who grew up swimming in the inlet to the lagoon, jumping off the bridges, fishing, and generally having a good time there.  It is a great place for walking, running, biking, limin’, and generally just enjoying the views of Christiansted from a different angle. Altoona Lagoon also has a GREAT playground and fun exploring beach for little ones.

Our day started early with us in the car, the trike in the trunk, and the bike(new big 26” bike) racked on the back of the red SUV. Water, and snacks were packed in the reusable shopping bag, and I had had at least 2 cups of tea by 7:30! We were set. Once at Altoona, and unloaded – I really do think we are related to Gypsys since we cannot seem to go anywhere without the entire contents of the house and the kitchen sink ---- Oh wait! It’s because I’m a Mom not related to Gyspsys!!!  ANYWAY…. A got con her bike and as soon as her friend showed up away they went. The two kids did about 10 loops, which I think translates to just about 2 miles! Then they took a break to go explore the beach, whereupon they stuck their heads together and decided that they needed to go fishing! Crazy kids!

The two kids, my wonderful mom friend and her equally wonderful hubby walked down with C to the inlet by the bridge. Once I got there, which was about 15 minutes later – I had to re-rack the bike, put stuff away, etc. I found both kids wading through the inlet, with fishing nets in hand, HUGE self satisfied grins on their faces and COMPLETELY, soaking wet.  During the course of the day, they caught Lizardfish, Coral Banded shrimp, regular shrimp, and Blue Crabs. We saw Blue Herons, a Great Snowy Egret, fishermen coming in with their catch and then it happened… the kids spotted a Lionfish! Turns out there wasn’t 1 Lionfish, but 3.  They were hiding in the Mangroves.  My friend’s hubby shucked down to his shorts and got in the water and caught 2 of the three. At first we though maybe we could eat them, but they were too little. What actually scared us was that the Lionfish were in the Mangroves, which are breeding grounds for other fish, and we all know Lionfish eat EVERYTHING so they were in the worst place possible for our native fish. Not, that having Lionfish anywhere in the Caribbean is good, but in a breeding ground it’s like an A bomb ready to go off at any moment. 

Photo by Jill Updyke.

One of the things I really liked about this day, was that both kids ended up wading around in only their shorts and never even batted an eye. They are the same age, and look exactly the same chest wise and for them it was super natural and not embarrassing to be that way. I love that our island still allows our kids to be kids and doesn’t make them aware of the opposite sex until later.  We are able to keep our children innocent of the societal pressures that other children face elsewhere in the world. 

We decided that the kids had such a good time – even C, that we are going to make this a weekly occurrence. We hope to go kayaking into the Lagoon next week. I’ll keep you updated J Sorry for the lack of personal photos but we were so busy having a good time that I didn’t think of taking pictures until the end.

I’ll leave you with a word from our kids: "Lionfish.. they taste like Chicken."

Sportiness=Happiness

On Sunday, we got up at the crack of dawn. It really felt like that to me, pretty sure C didn’t care, and A was excited, so it didn’t make a difference to either of them.  Ate a good breakfast and took off to Altoona Lagoon to take part in the VI Traithlon Federation and Rotary Mid Isle Kids Duathlon.  I needed TWO cups of tea to make it out of the house, let alone remember gear and kids!

Warming up before the race start - can you tell who are serious?

A started “getting into sports” about a year ago. She is on the swim team, used to do running club when she was in school, LOVES to bike, and generally likes to be outside doing stuff.  I guess this whole triathlon, duathlon, swimming races, was just natural progression, but still, leave the house before 7:30??? On a SUNDAY??? Actually, I couldn’t think of anything I would rather do, and it makes A happy, and a happy kid is one that I want to live with J

So, here we were. Loading up the bike, the tire pump – that we borrow from the Crazy Neighbor Lady (she gave herself that name), the helmet, the water, the second breakfasts, and C starts crying that he wants to take his bike…..S I G H – did I mention it was about 7 at that time? Off came the bike, the rack, out came the tire pump, the helmet…. In went the plastic toddler trike, the tire pump, the helmet, the water, and snacks, on went the rack, and the racing bike! Whew! Are we ready yet?? Better be, it was 7:12 and we needed to vamoose!

 

So, this duathlon, was awesome! There were tons of kids, it was cloudy, yet didn’t rain.  Almost all of A’s sporty friends were there, certain “fast” kids had aged up, and A was raring to go.  The Rotary gave out goody bags with awesome T-shirts, the kids racked their bikes, adjusted helmets, cljmbed trees, and played in the mud – oops, that was C, not the kids who were racing! Actually, C discovered a “real” tricycle, I think we are in trouble, because he promptly turned up his nose at his old plastic one.  Oh, well, it was bound to happen at some point.

Let me tell you about the duathlon for a moment. There are different age groups for the kids, 5-6, 7-8, 9-10, 11-12, and 13+.  Each group has its own distance requirements, but it basically goes like this: run, bike, run.  A had to run a ¼ mile, bike a ½ mile, and run another ¼ mile.  While A is all arms and legs, she HATES to run because she gets cramps. Seeing as I had her same build and always got cramps too, I don’t blame her. I still don’t like to run. I’d love to be able to because it seems like such a beautiful sport when you only really race yourself, but I’d probably get about ¼ of the way into a race and end up tied up in spasmatic knots, flailing helplessly on the side of the road while the slower yet crampless runners passed me by….

Back to the duathlon….

Notice the feet in the air so as not to get her shoes wet!

We had figured out that A needed to pace herself, and run slowly in the first loop, bike like a bat out of hell in the biking portion, and then run as fast as possible without killing herself in the last loop.  All the way to Altoona, she chanted slow, super fast, don’t die. I tried not to laugh, really I did.  

She did just as she planned on, and ended up beating her time from the last duathlon and coming in 3^rd in her age group(in the females division).  A had her best transition of her racing career yet, she got a volunteer to rack her bike and took of running with her bike helmet on.  Before she even cleared the transition area, she had taken it off and, literally, flung it aside for someone(who would that be, hmm?) to pick up and dust off later.  I guess watching the pros race around STX during the ironman in May, has paid off.  She looked good when she finished, and she had so much energy left of that she and all her sporty girlfriends rode around on their bikes for another hour after the race finished.  So proud of her, that words just can't express it.

100 mega watt smile! So proud of her.

I love events like these because it gets kids out and participating in a sport that will last them a lifetime, it celebrates the breaking of their previous records, and it is so low key that they don’t get turned off because of the stress.  If you are here on STX and your child is 5 or older, there is a kid’s triathlon at Cramer’s Park in March. Drop me a line if you want more info, if you think your kids can’t do it because they don’t have a bike, think again, there are rentals for umm, free or $5 – with helmets – so no excuses!

Now, if I could just figure out how to not get cramps when I run, A could be as proud of me, as I am of her for finishing her race with a smile on her face.