Summer Fun-birthdays, visitors and more

For Father's Day Keith wanted to run up Mission Peak, but because the kids had swim and we all wanted to go out to brunch, we decided to go up Mission Peak the Saturday after Father's day. We were not able to run up the entire trail because it was a bit too steep, but we were able to run down the entire trail. Our legs were pretty destroyed for the next three days with the 2000 feet of sharp downhill running. 

After our run up the hill Keith took the kids to practice and I was able to have brunch with a few ladies from my bible study group. Last year I was unable to attend because of a swim meet, so I was excited to meet some of my group in person after studying with them for the past two years!

Phoenix has been really into doing her nails. She can spend hours coming up with different designs and painting them. It is just another way for her to flex the artistic side of her brain. 

Sunday night, June 22nd we went to the Golden State Valkyries game because Albert is so nice and offered us tickets. The crazy thing was we went to sit in the seats we normally sit in for the Warriors game and we discovered that we were in the wrong seats. Our seats were front row on the court!

Where we were initially sitting in the second row....

Where we actually sat during the game. Front row!!!

No obstruction except the ref!!!

Happy couple!

Happy family (minus Axel). 

I was impressed with how much faster the game is and how good the Valkyries are playing!

Axel made his friend Christine a couple of small birthday cakes. Here is one. I think it looks like a professional wedding cake :)

Another nail design by Miss Phoenix. 

The kids had their last chance swim meet over my birthday weekend. Phoenix had an amazing 400 free style getting a 4:51 and her first AAAA time standard. She is just 11 seconds from sectionals, which is her goal (during her 13th year of life next year). The rest of the swim meet was a little rough for Phoenix, but she had a great attitude and enjoyed spending time with her friends. Rubix, on the other hand, hit it out of the park. He achieved four AAAA times in the 50 fly, 100 fly (which he had in short course), 400 free and 200 IM. The other impressive race was his 50 breast where he achieved the AAA time. Rubix has come a long ways in his breast stroke and free style. He has worked on these strokes with over half a dozen lessons and regularly goes to work with Daddy on his form. The most ironic thing of all is Rubix will likely be the breast stroke leg of the medley relay at Age group Champs and Far Westerns because he has the best breast stroke time on the team now. (Jeffrey, who was the breast stroker aged up to 11). 

I forgot to mention that little Grammy arrived on Wed. June 25th. Rubix is almost as tall as her now at almost 4 feet 9 inches. 

Jose, Hannah and Alex arrived Friday the 27th. Here we are visiting with them on Saturday for the first time. We hadn't seen Alex for 5 years!

Keith bought me flowers for my birthday, along with 2 new pairs of running shoes (that I can also wear to work). 

On Saturday we enjoyed a lovely sushi dinner and game night with the family. We had so much fun and laughter playing Telestrations together. 

Axel could not get over Grammy's guesses. Aunt Josie and Axel definitely had the most laughter, with Hannah, Grammy and I a close second. 

Phoenix's latest creation while Grammy was here. 

The week with Grammy went by fast. The Petersons spent Monday- Wed in Big Sur, but stopped over to pick up Grammy and say goodbye Wed. evening. We loved seeing them!

A family photo!!

On the 4th of July, Phoenix wanted to go to the mall with her friend Emma from summer school. I haven't been inside the mall for almost 20 years. Let's just say it is very, very different. Here is one display at a sunglass store. This was crazy!

We also saw Pulstar and Lucid cars at the mall. 

Can you find the missing ice cream cone?

The mall was incredibly high end. I cannot believe that they are able to make money with the high end stores that are there. It looked like many people go to eat at the restaurants or just walk around. The girls were pretty board, because the three of us are not "shoppers". We did have some laughs at the Squishmallow store. 

The cute frog was only $300!

We spend most of the time eating. First at California Pizza kitchen and then at a place called Somisomi ice cream store. 

They were much happier eating then shopping!

On Sunday July 6th the kids went to the Olympic clinic that they earned during swim-a-thon. This year they had Taylor Ruck (Canadian 3 time Olympian) and Natalia Jaspeado (a collegiate swimmer).

This year they swam first for an hour and a half and worked on Taylor's favorite drills and then they talked. It was a much smaller group of 12, rather than the 36 swimmers that attended last year's with Abbey Weitzel. 

Group photo!

The kids with Taylor and Natalia. 

Today is Keith's 50th an to celebrate we ran up the other side of Mission Peak and were much more successful than last time. 

It was a beautiful morning and hardly anyone on the trail. 

I made him hold up his hands to represent 50! What a milestone!

We had such a great time!

Phoenix and I made a poster that Keith wanted to do earlier this summer. The poster displays all the years of him coaching Rubix's soccer team. We have one spot left on the right lower portion of the poster that will be for fall 2025. Because Rubix will start playing for school, and likely be in a harder swim group, he will likely no longer play rec. soccer after this fall. I am still not convinced, but will wait and see what happens. 

Axel is loving his running group and he was announced one of the captains of the cross country team for the school year. He is done on Friday with his summer AP Bio course and will likely spend the rest of his summer prepping for standardized tests and developing Harker application with the computer science group called Harker Dev. 

Grandma Susan comes this weekend to hang out with Axel as Keith and I take off to Santa Rosa with P and R for Age group champs. 

The other big news is we spent 4th of July weekend buying a new car! I am now driving a Kia Hybrid Sportage- Prestige. I really like it. We decided on hybrid because we feel it will be too complicated to go completely electric with our hectic driving schedule. I have a lot to learn because the car is pretty high tech. Axel is pretty excited about having his own car now. He says it is crazy to think that he can go anywhere at anytime (within curfew limits, of course). 

We are really busy starting Thursday through the first 10 days of August, but I hope to blog on all things swimming and running by mid August. Until then.....God bless!

 

Summer Happenings!

 
It was incredibly nice to be home and with the kids starting from 1 pm on May 29th, the last day of school, until I had to return to work on June 9th. We had two, three day swim meets in a row, which I mentioned previously and the second one was just as successful as the first. It was actually really nice to have our own "Intrasquad meet" with just Santa Clara Swim Club kids in between prelims and finals of the International meet we were hosting. The kids were able to sleep in and we were always done by 3pm.

Phoenix was able to see Audrey because her brother was swimming in the International meet. Here they are actually saying good bye. Audrey was there on the last day for prelims and came with us to In N Out afterwards. 

We decided to stay for Finals because it was starting at 4pm and was projected to get over by 5:30pm. 

Rubix was recruited to time because they needed more volunteers. It was crazy to see how poor attendance was on this last day of finals, but apparently most of the really fast swimmers left for U.S. Summer Nationals which was being held in Indianapolis, IN. Rubix had a lot of fun seeing the older swimmers and timing for them. 

On Friday, Phoenix had a great 400IM, dropping 10 second and getting a 5:36.77, but was .08 shy of the AAAA time. Rubix had a stellar 400 Free achieving a 5:27.23 which was nearly a 12 second drop from last year! Saturday Rubix started off the day crushing his 100 Free, dropping more than 8 seconds and finishing in 1:12.51. Phoenix dropped more than 2 seconds in her 200 free getting a 2:23.34. Both kiddos did the 50 back, Phoenix dropping an entire second and getting 35.32 and Rubix dropping half a second finishing in 38.11 seconds. Phoenix ended her day with the 100 free and only dropped .81 seconds finishing in 1:09.27. She was hoping for a couple of seconds faster, but had trouble with her breathing and ending fast. Rubix dropped more than 2 seconds in his 50 fly finishing in 35.08. On Sunday Phoenix dropped more than 2 seconds in her 100 beast missing the Far Western cut by less than a second at 1:28.88. Rubix dropped more than 5 seconds, just missing the AAA time finishing at 1:36.61. Both kids added in their 100 back and Phoenix had a tough 50 free as well, but Rubix was able to drop another half a second finishing his 50 free in 33.02, .04 off of AAA time. 

Here is a cute picture of Rubix and a few of his teammates. 

On our week off Daddy really wanted to go for a run with Rubix. Rubix easily ran 3.1 miles one afternoon after he had morning swim practice. Rubix declared he really enjoys having double workouts each day. 

My week off was all about decluttering from the year and cleaning up the kids room and the house. I managed two full trunk loads full of items to donate to Goodwill, but after three days of constant work along with swim and cross country practices I burned out. What is wrong with me? When have I ever not finished something I started?! Well, it happened and I think I am feeling my age and just wanted to do other things that clean and declutter, which means I still have to help Rubix put up new artwork, although his bunk bed is officially down and he has a much more grown up room with space for a desk in the next year or two. 

Now, I did forget to mention, we weren't all work. The kids and I went to Hakone Gardens on Tuesday morning to enjoy the garden and Koi fish. Phoenix and Rubix had fun feeding them while Axel and I watched. 

I forgot how big and colorful they are. 

I did manage to get a few good pictures of the kids. 

By the water fall. 

And a selfie of the kids and myself and....

the littles and myself.

Part of the reason for me cracking is that I wasn't able to ride my bike. Instead I was taking Phoenix to the track to run or Axel to the gym to lift or shopping at Costco. I finally decided, I need to get up and ride at 7 am in order to spend the rest of the day with the kids. It was cloudy and overcast on Thursday when I headed out on the bike, but I was welcomed with an inversion layer and I had the sun on me the last mile of my climb. I just had to stop on the way down to take a picture of the blanket of clouds that filled the sky. It always reminds me of my childhood view of what heaven would look like. I managed to get up 4 times early on my week off to ride, which was such a blessing!

Rubix and I also had a couple of nights of game night together, which was a blast. 

On Sunday we had our annual BBQ at Tiffany's house. The first hour it was just Tiffany and the Szolushas, but slowly Charlotte came out and then Avery and finally Cliff. 

Rubix decided to play in the water by himself. 

He found enjoyment, as always. 

Charlotte eventually got into the pool and then the two decided to go into the hot tub. 

Avery made her famous cotton candy, but only Rubix ate it this year. P and A didn't want any.

After dinner the kids finally played together. The older kids played cards while Rubix entertained himself with the pool table. 

He did much better this year now that he is a bit bigger. 

I had a need to make good wholesome food and decided to make home made gnocchi for the first time. It was absolutely pain stacking, because I made a huge batch! Five times the recipe to be exact!!!

I had to cook them in batches as well, which made the 3 hour process more than I signed up for. 

I had two big containers full of gnocchi. I think it was a success. I prepared broccoli and bacon with it and the boys put parmesan cheese on it. I would have made a yummy butter sauce with it, but the kids are too picky, so I left it plain. 

We managed have managed through the first 2 weeks of the summer swim schedule which included 4 mornings where the kids are swimming in the water by 6:30 or 7 am. Phoenix has 7 practices and Rubix has 6 practices. They are both in the water about 3 hours more than they normally are. 

The kids wanted to work on starts and finishes so we went to Los Gatos High school on Father's day. They have start blocks there where the kids can work on their dives. 

Afterwards we went to Stacks for a huge lunch!

Happy Father's Day!

We all managed to clean our plates!

And a selfie of Keith and I!

Another cool thing that happened on Father's day was Keith helping Axel shave for the first time. 

Axel really didn't want me to take any pictures, but I managed a couple. 

After he said NOOOO, he smiled with his clean shaven face! He looks so young and clean without his super long side burns, his little mustache and his long chin hairs :)

Here is Phoenix laughing as we were convincing her for one last photo with Daddy-o for Father's day. 

Happy Father's Day.

We are excited to go to our first Gold State Valkyries game on Sunday. We are also looking forward to little Grammy and Josie, Hannah and Alex coming next week. Next weekend is also the "Last Chance" meet for the kids before summer Age Group Champs, Far Westerns and Western Zones. Both kids are going to Western Zones for the first time in August. This will be the highest level meet they have qualified for yet! We are looking forward to a fun filled summer with family, friends and of course swim! 

Oh, the big news for Axel is that he joined a running club with his new Harker Cross country coach. He is on the igreyhounds menlo team, which he is having a blast with. He is done with the first two weeks. He started AP Bio and is super bored with it because the class is the slowest class he has done in 2 years! Rubix has been in basketball camp and loving it and Phoenix started an Algebra prep 2 week class, which she feels is boring and review as well! ugh! 

And best news of all is that Keith will start his 6 weeks sabbatical next Wed the 25th! It is a little stressful as far as timing because his company just had a huge re-org, but things should work out okay. 

I am hoping to post 4th of July weekend before AGC. Until next time.... :)