November: Sunset, Sickness, Speedy Zac, and Surf

 November's first weekend started with a long-anticipated camping trip to Polihale.  The wind was gusty around the island in the week previous but that's not what almost stopped the excursion.  We had all kinds of anxiety when Kauai went on lockdown chasing down an armed jail escapee the day of the trip.  The man ran through a middle school campus, came down to Koloa to rob a pharmacy, and headed to the mountains before finally getting booked by police at 4pm that day.  The kids sat in silent lockdown for 4 hours.  I was happy with how the school handled the emergency and angry at the armed idiot who required this much attention.  Most of all, I'm glad no one was hurt.  This incident took place exactly two days after Brady told a concerned Zachary that gun violence is rare on Kauai.

 With all that crazy behind us, we made it to the beach and set up in time to enjoy a sunset and make a nice fire for dinner.  We had 5 other families join us that weekend, and it was fun to hear the boys play King-of-the-Hill and the girls run around with glow sticks.  I love that camping requires my kids to be creative and come up with their own fun.

 They played hard, we visited with friends, and then finally put the kids to bed.  Several hours later, we came to the tent to find Zachary sound asleep like this:

It was a rough night with loud waves (too loud, if that's a valid complaint), and we were awake for most of the night, but somehow we still bounced out and sleeping bags the next morning and had a lovely day.  The ocean was too rough for swimming or water sports, so instead I went on a long run while Brady held sleepy Owen.  The kids played on the tall, packed sand dunes--climbing and digging and scraping around for hours.  We did end up getting in the water for a short time before packing up and heading home, strangely refreshed yet again from an exhausting night and satisfying day.  

Kate woke up on Halloween day with a cold, and that cold migrated it's way around the family to hit 5 out of 5 of us.  Owen was next, and I knew I wasn't escaping it after he sneezed multiple times right into my mouth.  It's the achy, congestion-packed, sinus headache, can't-stop-coughing type and it's had us down for weeks.  Day-to-day is the same of course, but our enthusiasm about getting into water has been dampened.  Har har har.  

Here's a picture of my snotty little grump:

Kate looking snazzy in her new pants.  She wore them the first time while Brady was working on Big Island and knew he'd want a picture of her in them.

This is how my workouts end each day if I don't start the second Owen lays down for a nap.

 My favorite scene each day: watching Owen tag along with Kate and Zac at their practice sessions.

 With our yucky colds, we weren't sure about running the annual Koloa Sugar Mills half marathon.  We never miss this race.  Brady also has a knee issue right now, so between hacking coughs and injury, we opted for the 10k.  Zachary woke up the morning of the race at 5am, complaining that he didn't feel well.  He had a fever of 102.  We knew it was over for us, and decided one of us would race and the other would stay home and watch the kids (I volunteered quickly after coughing all night long).  However, at 6:20am (40 min before the race gun), he came down dressed and ready to go, asking why we were still in bed.  We figured he knew his body best and if he wanted to tough it out, we would let him.  We decided against giving him race strategy or encouraging him to run as fast as he could, etc.  5k is a long way for an 8-year-old, especially a sick one.

I ran the kids over to a friend and rushed to the start line.  I made it with time to spare and barely missed the start of the 5k.  Brady and I took off a few minutes later with 125 others for the 10k.  We were both surprised to be leading the pack.  I ran with my friend Leigh, who raced with me years ago in the half.  With three miles to go, it was Brady in first and me in second.  We've both run only one other 10k before, and we certainly weren't conditioned for speed, but it was fun to lead a race.  In the last mile, another guy picked me off, so I finished third overall but first for women.  Brady won the whole thing.  He ran a 43 min with 6:58/mile splits and I ran a 44 something with 7:12/mile splits.  We do realize that on the mainland, there is no chance in heaven we could win a race with those times, but hey, a W is a W and it felt pretty good, even on a sick day.  The best part of the race was watching for Zachary at the turnaround and seeing him running along with his bright red face and huge smile.

He was the hero.  Zachary ran a 28:20 for his 5K--2 full minutes faster than last year and without any running companion.  All his miles from 100 mile club paid off!  After his race, he asked if he could go home and sleep on the couch.  He was so proud of himself all day, wearing his shirt and my medal (his age division was 1-13, and he came in 4th and just out of medals).  I love that we did not push him and this drive came all from himself.

 That afternoon, the kids suddenly decided they needed to put in their Santa requests.  "The elves need to know, Mom!"  They worked away while we shampooed the carpets, watched football, and sneezed.

 Kate takes pride in how much Owen loves her.  She says she can babysit now because she can give Owen his bath.  This was actually the first bath in a month where Owen wasn't freaking out.  He laughed and splashed and played during what has been his least favorite part of the day.  Maybe she is old enough to babysit.  Ha!  (He still can't stand getting his jammies put on--all those buttons!)

This past weekend, we went to Kate and Zachary's piano performance class, and then headed up to Hanalei.  It was a terrible day for weather, raining hard all island-wide.  It was still great surf, although miserable for anyone not in the water.  We made the most of it, loved our rides, watched Zachary and the Hadley boys play for hours, and came home shivering to mugs of cocoa and some tortilla soup.  A sunny day at Hanalei is impossible to beat, but you don't get a lot of sunny days at Hanalei.