Idol Pt. 1

There will be more to come after Erin sings again on Sunday and then Jeff also sings his first solo.  I will have some backstage pictures and eventually some pictures from the shows to share.

But for now, here's the end of Erin's solo of "I Have Confidence" from The Sound of Music.

M-O-M

Car conversation from last night.  Just one of those moments you want to hold on to forever.  Absolutely adorable.  

Jeff has been working more and more on spelling and getting some of the gist of English language rules (but honestly all those rules end up being broken anyway).  

Erin's teacher is the director of her school play from last year.  She's been trying to get him to come see Bye Bye Birdie this weekend and he was able to come out to last night's show.  She couldn't remember the time it started though.  Erin started the conversation in the car by relating one between her and Mr. W. in the morning.

Erin -- "Mr. W. asked me how to spell your name.  He wanted to e-mail you, but I didn't know so he had to look it up.  How do you spell your name?"

Jeff -- "That's so easy Erin.  M-O-M.  You should know that."

Completely straight tone.  I love that in his life right now I'm not Meghan, but just simply mom.

4 Miles Later

Getting Lined Up Pre-Race

Yesterday was the culmination of Erin's and my summer running together.  All summer we've been training for the local Women's 4-Miler race.  It's an amazing event to fund raise for the University Breast Cancer Research center.  Picture 3500 women of all ages, races and walks of life lined up on a country road running 4 miles together.

The View From Our Starting Position Before Walking to the Road

Erin and I have been training all summer.  We started with a half mile back in June and worked all summer to build up to 4 miles.  Erin definitely has the running bug.  She really seems to enjoy it and certainly can get competitive with it.

So, bright and early yesterday morning we all piled into the van and headed to the race.  We watched a beautiful sunrise and were ready for an awesome morning.  The rain started once we got there.  Just a light misting rain though, and certainly better than hot and humid.  It did throw Miss. Boo into a tizzy for a bit though.  Once I convinced her that running in the rain could be fun, she relaxed and once that gun went off and 3500 women started running down the road she was all business.

It's pretty congested for the first mile or so.  Since the girl is so tiny she could make some darts and moves that I couldn't fit through.  Once she got ahead of me I was done for.  I briefly caught up with at the 1.5 mile mark, but she darted off again and I never got back to her.  She finished the race a solid 30 seconds ahead of me.  And I was trying!!!

Look at That Form

 

A Little Sad When She Didn't Place in the Top 8

Erin finished the 4 miles in 41:05, so that's an average pace about 10:15 a mile.  I'm so amazingly proud of her.  She was 22nd in her age group (there were over 100 in all in her group) and somewhere in the 900s of total runners.

No More Sad

While those numbers are super cool they aren't what counts.  What counts is that Erin can't wait to run another race!!