Foot Notes*

Posts Tagged ‘grandchildren’

I don't want to run Old Waterford Road!!

After the run on Saturday there was a voice mail from my son that his wife was having some contractions and they were going to go into the hospital to have things checked out.

About noon the word was that they were going to go ahead and induce labor.

By 5 pm he said things were progressing slowly and that there was no hurry.

I got to the hospital around 9 pm and settled in with the other grandparents for the vigil.  It was slow going until around midnight.  By 1 am the urgency in the steps of the nurses back and forth from her room had increased and the doctor was called.

At 1:48 am Sunday morning, Amelia Elizabeth Wiley came screaming into the world with ten little fingers and ten little toes.  She is my fourth grandchild and (of course) she is beautiful.  Everyone involved is doing fine.

It just doesn’t get much better. 

Weekend Runs

Saturday looks perfect for a nice little out and back on The Woods Road.

Are we going up or down?

(No, this is not a picture of Amelia.  My daughter-in-law’s blood pressure has stabilized and the doctor is now letting nature take its course.)

I’ve sat through my share of graduation keynote speeches. The only one I remember was Scott Hamilton, the Olympic Gold Medal figure skater, who spoke at my daughter’s graduation ceremony from Ithaca College in 2004.

He spoke of the tremendous high points in his life, and he told of the incredible challenges he had overcome, including a mysterious childhood illness that caused him to stop growing, testicular cancer and a brain tumor.  He’s not unusual for this, I suppose — few people have lives that are completely struggle-free (and would you want that even if you could?).  What was unusual was his perspective on it. 

He said that he used to think that after every victory in his life, he had been cut down with a hardship.

At some point, however, he realized that the opposite was actually true — for every lowpoint in his life, a victory had followed.

Within a week, Sandra Bullock was celebrated for being the worst actress of the year and also the best actress of the year.  And now, if tabloid reports are true, her real-life circumstances are eerily similar to the plot in another movie she made in 1998 entitled Hope Floats.

At the very end of Hope Floats she narrates:

Beginnings are scary. Endings are usually sad, but it’s what’s in the middle that counts. So, when you find yourself at the beginning, just give hope a chance to float up. And it will..

For every ending there is a beginning of something else and another chance for success. I like that.  A lot.

I’m having these thoughts today because I’m taking a friend of mine out to walk/run the last two miles of the Taylorstown run this afternoon.  It’s really a beautiful couple of miles, and I’m glad I didn’t let my apprehension about the difficulty of the “run” stop me from going out to check it out that first time.

I don’t have to run uphill..  I just have to keep putting one foot in front of the other.  I can do that. 

Peaks and valleys — a lot more interesting than the flat track at the rec center.

Weekend Runs

I haven’t done the Faith Chapel  run yet and it looks like Saturday is going to be a beautiful day for it.  I see a <5 mile option that looks quite suitable.

Good old Greenberry’s on Sunday would be a very nice twofer.

…unless Amelia makes her grand entrance, in which case I’ll be enjoying another peak in my personal life doing the grandma thing.

Can Spring be far behind?

I went for a walk with my little grandson Tuesday afternoon and was excited to be able to point out undeniable evidence that spring is coming. There it was – a tiny little purple and yellow flower amidst the dried up leaves and twigs in the mulch of a neighbor’s landscaping. We bent down and inspected it and he said it looked like a butterfly. I suppose it did.

When we resumed our walk, he looked up at the cloudless blue sky and said, “What a beautiful day!”

No question about it.

My family is anxiously awaiting the arrival of another new life this week — my son’s first child, Amelia Elizabeth.  The doctors have said that if she isn’t here by Monday, they will induce labor.  I look forward to sharing a picture of her next week!

It’s that time again

Daylight Savings Time returns this weekend.  Don’t forget to set your clocks  forward Saturday night before you go to bed, or else you’ll miss the Sunday run — which is the trail cleanup, beginning at the high school  — on the corner of Dry Mill Rd. and Catoctin Circle in Leesburg.

I’ll be there — unless Amelia has made her entrance, or the drops on the weather map turn out to be a deluge (which it looks like could happen on Saturday).

My son -- 1982

My son is 30 years old today, and I don’t know how that happened.

How did he manage to go from being this adorable little boy, peeking into the hospital nursery to get his first look at his baby sister, all the way to being a 6’4″ law enforcement officer who knows how to break down a door and clear a room — when I haven’t changed at all?!

My grandson -- 2010

Last weekend I baked some chocolate chip cookies with my grandson, and now looking at these two pictures, I’m having a serious bout with deja vu.  I have to realize that the next 30 years are going to zip by even faster than the last 30 did.

I want to be around (and able) to teach a great-grandchild or two how to lick a beater properly.

And that’s why I keep running.

Weekend Runs

How nice it was this week to get back outside for a couple of days.  Still a bit nippy, but at least without the wind it’s crossed over into the wimp-acceptable zone.  And by golly, the forecast for Saturday looks down right half-way almost  kinda pleasant (in comparison, of course). 

Sunday?  Not so much.

So I’ll be aiming for Saturday at Hamilton:

– for some kind of out and back modification.

Christmas pillows for Nathan and Sarah

I’m happy to report that the Christmas Pillows for my twin grandchildren are officially finished.  (Whew, glad that’s done!)

I measured twice before I cut the fabric down to “pillow size” and then discovered that if you measure from the wrong place, you’ll cut in the wrong place.  Consequently, Nathan’s horse is about an inch off center.    Oh well…  these things happen.

In running news, unfortunately I’ve been forced (by my own wimpiness) to do most of my running for the last couple of weeks on the track at the rec center.  I’ve found a few more positives to the experience:

1. I’m starting to recognize “the regulars” and the smiling and nodding has begun.  (Perhaps I’ll invite them to join the LRR one of these days.)
2. Every now and then I can sprint for a bit and pass someone.  That’s kind of cool for me.
3. I’ve found another song on my iPod that forces me ever onward — Paul McCartney, Dance Tonight.

I did my thing for about 40 minutes this morning, and then finished up with Dance Tonight and End of the Line, counting the laps so I’d have an accurate report.  It came to 8 1/2.  (A mile on that track is 14 laps and change.)

Weekend Runs

I’m looking at the 7-day and it’s not looking pretty for Saturday again. 

I’m going to aim for Sunday from the high school for an “out and back” on the W & OD:

http://loudounroadrunners.org/lrr/run_maps/Thomas_Mill.pdf

 – unless there is snow or wind or rain or slush from the snow on Saturday –

A Christmas Pillow tradition begins!

When my own children were born, I made a needlepoint “birth announcement”  for each of them and a small needlepoint ornament with their name and the year for their first Christmas.  They were small little things and it wasn’t a big deal to make them. 

When my first grandson was born in February of 2007, I made him a cross-stitch birth announcement and then along in the fall, I got to looking for a pattern for a Christmas tree ornament I could make for him.  I couldn’t find any that I liked, so I wound up expanding the scope of the project and making him a Christmas pillow. 

I found a pattern for a “Christmasy” rocking horse, and I added his name and the year, and then cut some velvet for the back, sewed them together and put a pillow form inside.  VOILA!  A Christmas pillow.  (What the heck…  start a tradition!) 

Now, I admit that I was pretty excited about the arrival of my first grandchild, but I thought I was setting the bar for any future grandchildren low enough that it would still be doable.  Last thing I want is for a grandchild of mine to come to me with quivering lip and ask ”How come you didn’t make ME a Christmas pillow, grandma?”  :::::::sniff:::::::

I was excited again last summer when my daughter announced that my second grandchild was on the way. 

I wasn’t prepared (nor were she and her husband, of course) for the discovery that my second grandchild was in fact going to be my second and THIRD grandchildren.  EEEEEK.

I solved the birth announcement problem by finding a really wonderful cross stitch pattern for a “twins” birth announcement — Two Peas in a Pod.  Cute, cute, cute.  I was a little late getting it finished, but I did get it finished.  

Summer rolled into fall and I realized that I had some work ahead of me.  I probably could have taken the easy route and made one Christmas pillow with both names on it, but I figured that was the coward’s way out, so I vowed to suck it up and make two of them.

I’ve finished one and can see the light at the end of the tunnel for the second one….Just in time for the arrival next March of my fourth grandchild (from my son and his wife, this time). 

I’m getting really tired of the rocking horse pattern.  But I started it, and I can’t get out now.  I’ve got some time.  I won’t have to face it again until next fall.  I’ll have a break while I do a birth announcement.

I don’t know if my grandchildren will cherish these things I am putting so much time into making for them, or if they will wind up tossing them in the Good Will bag at some point.  I can’t worry about that.  I can only try to give them something of myself to take with them as they make their journeys through life.

Who knew I’d wind up with four grandchildren in three years?

Who knew I’d ever be able to run for even 3 miles?

And who knows what’s to come?

I guess there are two lessons from this little tale:

1. Don’t start something you aren’t prepared to finish.
2. Just keep doing the best you can.

We have a “wart-sponsored” run on Saturday this week from Lincoln Elementary, so it would probably be nice to have a reasonable wart contingent for that.   Who knows, Joanne might even decorate us up a cake (with the LRR logo?) to enjoy when we finish! 

Hey..  it could happen.

 http://loudounroadrunners.org/maps/Lincoln.pdf

We can always walk the hills for that one, and then show up again on Sunday to run from Greenberry’s on the trail.