Long time no post...

It's been quite a week... or quite a couple of weeks...

Chris was sick, Jim was sick, Cheryl was sick, and I was sick.
The van broke down again. And we had to juggle cars/schedule to get everyone where they needed to be.
We have Jena... the puppy school menace.
Cross Country invitationals every weekend.
... And I have over 20,000 photos I'm trying to edit/sort for the end of year banquet.

I was sick most of the weekend, and was still feeling queasy enough to rationalize a sick day on Monday. Sick day... sanity day... cross country photo catchup day...

I had a nice relaxing, rainy, day with Jena and Cheryl. It stopped raining in the afternoon, and look who I found resting on the back mat...

Pretty cool, huh? Look at the stuff I miss when I'm at work!

Huntington Beach XCI

The boys have barely had a chance to recover from the meet on Thursday, and they are running in their second meet of the week on Saturday. The top-12 are running the State course in Fresno. That leaves Chris, Phil, and Ricky to carry the Capo team at the Huntington Beach Invitational. This is their first time running this meet, and the bus didn't arrive with enough time for them to checkout the course... so here's the boys consulting with Coach Airy on the map.

Here's the JV team warming up!

This course does a lot of turning back onto itself. It's great for spectators, because we got to see the start, the finish and saw the boys pass by three times. Chris doesn't like this type of course because he said it feels like they do a lot of running but don't go anywhere. This was also a very hilly course, which is another reason why it was so tough.

Times for this course were 40-60 seconds slower than most of the boys' PRs. Chris finished in 17:58 (behind Phil and in front of Ricky). It was 44 seconds slower than his PR, BUT he finished very high in the standings... 35th out of about 300 boys, which earned him (and Phil) a very cool medal.

Great job, boys! GO CAPO!
OC CHAMPS next weekend!

XC League Meet

It's the first SeaView League meet with Capo, Trabuco, Mission Viejo, Tesoro, San Juan Hills, and Laguna Hills. Poor Chris was sick. He still ran JV and got a 17:20; not a PR, but still a good time. He finished 4th for Capo. The Capo JV team finished in 2nd place overall! They have their eye on State Finals this year!

They turn around quickly and have another meet tomorrow in Huntington Beach. The top 12 runners are going to Fresno... that leaves Chris and Phil the top Capo runners running at Huntington Beach! Either one of them could come in 1st for the school! Phil is tricky... He lets Chris lead for the whole race and will try and pass him in the last 400 meters before the finish line. If Chris can hold him off, Chris will win... otherwise Phil will win. We shall see! It will be exciting!

http://www.fvhsxc.com/pdfs/CentralParkMap.pdf

Crafty Share...

Not my crafty share, but Chris's! California State Universities require one year of Fine Arts in High School. Since Graphics Design doesn't count as Fine Arts, Chris took Jewelry Making. This is Chris's first project. He designed the pendent, cut it out with a hand saw and polished it. We met Chris's Jewelry teacher at back to school night and she said he has an eye for detail... a real perfectionist... and I think his project is PERFECT! So did she, since she gave him a 40 out of 40!

Jena really LOVES her Chris! She can't wait for him to get up in the morning. This morning as soon as I opened Chris's bedroom door, Jena went running in and launched herself at the bed... too bad for Chris, he was still in the bed, lol!

Here is a puppy school update. Jim took pity on me and my feeble attempts to get Jena to walk on a leash. Jim is now Jena's puppy school partner! She went crazy again and tried to escape, but Jim was firm with her. After about 10 minutes she settled down and joined the class. They were GREAT even when walking behind the little cairn terrier who was causing so much trouble, barking and snapping at the other dogs. The instructor threatened to put a muzzle on the little guy.

The other problem dog, the golden retriever, was a problem again. He has the exact opposite problem than Jena. He keeps trying to run towards the other dogs to play! lol!

It was a rainy night, but puppy school goes on, rain or shine! Well, since it's night, I guess that would be rain or stars... They practice in a high school parking lot, it was muddy, greasy, oily, YUCK! Jena's legs, bottom and tail were black from the sitting practice. There are two little white dogs in the class: a poodle and a bichon frise. They were a total mess! I just stood on the sidelines last night under my umbrella.

Guess What?

Jena can SWIM!!!
... and guess what else?... Jena doesn't like to swim, lol!

She's saying, "Please, save me!!!"

A Card to Share...

This is the first item that I've crafted all summer! Of course, inspired by our little girl Jena!

I took Jena to her first night of puppy school. What a disaster! LOL! Out of the 18 dogs there, 15 were perfectly behaved. Out of the three who were not perfect:

1) A carin terrier puppy was yappy. The instructor took care of that by spraying his front paws with a water bottle.
2) A big golden retriever would jump every time the high school marching band started to play.
3) Jena!

Jena was trying to twist out of her collar and drag me across the parking lot. We had to line up with our dogs in two lines facing each other. Jena refused to stand between two other dogs. She was so terrified that the instructor put us on the end of the line... way on the end... And even there, she tried to take off again any time another dog moved. Everyone was taking turns walking the dogs up and down between the lines. Of course, Jena refused! And the marching band practice wasn't helping things. She'd jump every time they hit the drums. Jim was disappointed. He had been working so hard with Jena on our heeling homework that he was sure she'd be the STAR of the class... not that she would show anyone what a good walker she was!

The instructor says not to be discouraged. She just needs to get used to being around other dogs... We'll see... Next class on Monday.

Cross Country AGAIN!

It was blazing hot. I put our outdoor temperature sensor in the sun just to see how hot it was... and it was 137F!!! YIKES!!!

The Dana Hills Cross Country Invitational runs, rain, or shine, or HEAT! Thankfully, since they are closer to the ocean, it wasn't quite as hot there.

Chris reminded me... "Mom, you need to update my PR on your blog!" LOL! Yep, Chris has a new 3 mile PR! *** 17.14 *** That 8 seconds off his PR from last weekend!

There were only 4 races this weekend: Freshmen, Sophomore, Juniors, and Seniors. All the varsity runners ran with their own age groups. There are 4 varsity seniors, who all came in under 16.30. The first non-varsity senior came in just under 17.00, followed by Chris at 17.14. So, he got 6th place... non-scoring... but still a GREAT time!

In fact, the entire senior team finish under 17:30! They are going to have a GREAT JV team this year! The boys already have plans to take 1st-6th place overall in the league cluster meet next week!

YAHOO! GO CAPO!

EDIT: *** The Senior team took third place overall at the Dana Hills Invitational! The boys cross country team got a nice BIG trophy for the school trophy case!

High School Cross Country!

It's the night of the Woodbridge Invitational. There are five races this evening: Freshmen, Sophomore, Juniors, Seniors and Sweepstakes (Varsity). Chris's raced with the seniors. The second to the last race of the evening, starting around 8:15pm. He said the boys were so pumped up by then that the first mile of the race was really violent... lots of pushing, shoving, elbowing, hitting and words (not very nice words). The team captain told them to start fast in the first mile, pass other runners in the second mile, and hold their position in the third mile. Chris beat his one mile PR in the first mile, 5.09! AND beat his XC PR by 30 seconds!... FINISHING in 17:22 (2 seconds after the 3rd place runner on his team). He was the 4th senior across the line, so in a scoring position, and earned himself a medal!

In fact, ALL the seniors finished under 18 minutes! Just 30 second pace under the Varsity. We've been looking for how the Senior Team did relative to the other schools, but haven't found it... I bet they placed really well!

Everyone was so happy, and congratulating each other while walking to the bus... And the bus was GONE! It turns out that the girls cross country team took both buses back to Capo, and left the boys stranded. The coach called one of the bus drivers, and he had to come back to pickup the boys. Chris didn't get home last night until 12:15am!

Congrats Chris! Congrats Seniors!
Go Capo!

Meet...... Jena!

Look who's home! As soon as we saw her, we decided that she was a Jenny, but Cheryl didn't like the name Jenny... so Jena it is!

We got a call yesterday afternoon that we could come get her TODAY! I expected a dog who was out of it, and recovering from surgery... instead we have an over abundance of unrestrained puppy enthusiasm!
She's been looking around, being curious, checking things out. The neighbors have been over to say, "Hi" too. We are supposed to keep her quiet and calm for two weeks. FAT CHANCE of that! LOL!

She is so sweet! We can already tell she is going to be a GREAT DOG! Oh, and we can also tell that she's not house broken (oops... don't tell Cheryl).

We all love her dearly, and she's already part of the family!

Oh where, oh where, has my little dog gone?

Sorry about the lousy photo. It was taken with Chris's cell phone. Still no word from the animal shelter, so these are the only photos we have. They said it could take up to 10 days to have her spayed (notice I said spayed and not neutered... girls are spayed, boys are neutered... I have it straight now!)

But, I really didn't think it would take 10 days! Actually, it's only been 4 days so far. We are just so anxious to have her home!
We are ready with the basics! A BIG bag of Puppy Chow and a box of Milk Bones are now in stock at our house! We also got some newspapers from our next door neighbors, just in case she isn't house broken yet. Jim is talking about going out to get a dog bed, chew toys, and treats! LOL! It's like setting up a nursery for a new baby!

We FOUND this little house on the side of the street! WhooHoo! It's just her size! The doghouse we have in the backyard is for a much bigger dog (around 60-70 lbs). We are definitely hoping she doesn't get that big. She'll be nice an cozy in this little house the times that she has to hang out in the backyard.

Since we didn't get a call today, that means the soonest that she'll come home is on Saturday! A whole week of waiting, and waiting, and waiting...

Newest choices on her new name are: Mayzie, Gigi, Jemma, Angie, Tess. We need to wait until she gets home to see which name fits.

Meet our new Family member!!!

After weeks of going to 6 animal shelters (some more than once) and 5 adoption events, we almost came home with a 4 year old golden retriever yesterday. In fact we would have brought her home, if they would have let us! We saw her at the golden retriever rescue in Rancho Cucamonga. Before they will let anyone adopt their dogs, they require us to fill out a 6 page adoption application, go through an interview, and someone would have to visit our home to make sure it was dog friendly. It seemed like a lot of hassle to adopt a dog (and by the time we go through all that, the dog may be adopted by someone else)! Anyway, I took their website address and promised to start the application process.

Before I filled out the application, we decided to give the Orange County Animal Shelter one more try... and look who we found:

She was brought to the shelter by her owner because she was too wild around their new baby. She's just a baby herself, only 7 months old! We didn't plan on a puppy, but she looked at us through the bars of the cage and said, "Please take me home!" The shelter thinks she's a golden retriever/cocker spaniel mix. She has the body style and head of a golden, and the sad droopy eyes of the cocker.

The owner named her Mimi, but we all agreed that she needs a new name. We are still discussing it. The favorite so far is Zoey.

I'm so sad that we couldn't bring her home, but she has to stay and be neutered. The day after her operation, they'll call us and we'll bring her home.

More pictures coming soon!!!