Tour of Utah - Stage 2

You've got to know that I love the Tour of Utah bike race. I spend much of July immersed in the Tour de France and I usually get depressed when it's over, kind of the same feeling I get in January when the holidays are done. I'm so glad when the Tour of Utah rolls around in August so I have something to pay attention to besides the kiddos. This year, I've found that the Olympics filled the Tour de France void, so I haven't been quite as grouchy as usual. Ask Todd. The Tour of Utah is kind of splitting my loyalties this year, but whatever, I can just have two obsessions in August of this year.

Grandma Rainey watched the kids and the Crock-Pot worked on dinner so TB and I headed to Stage 2 at Miller Motorsports Park for the only team time trial for the Pro Circuit this year. These guys are fast! I like to see how many famous racers I can track down and TB just drools over the gorgeous bikes. Here's Christian Vande Velde...

Here I am with Tyler Farrar. He's still all road rashy from his numerous crashes in the Tour de France. He also just raced for the USA in the Olympics.  I waited and waited for him to get dressed before taking a picture with him, but he just didn't so I just posed with a goofy grin. When he did get dressed, he put on the YELLOW JERSEY because he's the leader of the race after the team's win in the TTT today.

 

Here's the back of Dave Zabriskie in his US Time Trial Champion "Captain America" uniform.

 

This is Chris Horner. A great Tour veteran and a totally awesome 41 year old, he also raced in the Olympics for USA.

 

And here's Jens Voigt. He's a legendary bike racer and father of six kids. He must have a nanny.

Todd is Anti-Doping.

More yard work, train show, the ark

I asked Jovie if she wanted to plant some flowers. She was so excited! She said, "I need to go check the tomatoes to see if any need to be eaten."
Todd was working on yet another yard project and was shoveling dirt into the wheel barrow. Jovie said, "Is dad making a snowman out of dirt?"
Ikey concentrated his artistic talents on the garbage can while we filled it up with plants. These are...you guessed it... trains.

You can click on this picture to make it larger so you can see the crazy kids' faces.

We went with Grandma Rainey and Ross to the train show in Evanston. There's a very cool restored round house and turntable which the kids were happy to ride on. Here's a link to a video of the turntable: http://youtu.be/zZD5d5v2Tgs

And a video of the kids riding the little train: http://youtu.be/2QcVGfxfzgk

We went to the theater to see Pirates! Band of Misfits. It was surprisingly violent. Should I be surprised? It's about pirates. The kids were very well-behaved and are now really interested in ships. Ikey took Noah's Ark in the bathtub. I had never noticed a little family photo inside the ark. I asked Ikey, "Who is in that picture?" He said, "Noah and his mom."

Jovie just took off with my camera and when I retrieved it, she'd taken 17 photos like this:

Here's a link to a cute video of the kids playing together. http://youtu.be/CPM_XPAbzbg

Fancy dinner out...

Ikey invented this trick at The Training Table.

He said, "It makes your water taste like milk." He drank a LOT of watered down milk and when we left, he had a tummy ache.

Haircut

I said, "We have to go see if the barber shop is open so we can get Jovie's hair cut."
Ikey said, "I hope so. I don't like to just look at her bangs. I want to see her beautiful eyes."

Todd's working hard

Todd is staining the deck this weekend. Doesn't the hot tub look much better?

Ikey started a story or poem: I fell asleep in the sun and woke up in the shade.

Zoo and party

At the zoo, Jovie said, "That's what I'm talkin' about: American birds!" as she ran toward the bald eagles.

Grandma Rainey hosted a BBQ at her house for her birthday - nice gift to US right? Ross entertained us with hunting stories and showed Ikey how to drink the very last of his ice cream.

All the Burrows cousins - a small and perfect little group. The little ones are so lucky to have such awesome girls in their lives. Both these beautiful and fun ladies got straight A's at school!

 Jovie was committed to eating her entire dessert.

As we walked around the yard inventorying our garden I said, "This snail is crazy." Jovie said, "It's UNBEARABLE!" She picked the one little tomato that was ripe and kept it in her mouth for about a half hour. She's hilarious.

SWIMMING!

Our new camera takes underwater pictures...so expect a lot more of these!
Clancy went to swimming lessons with us and he was brave!

Jovie doesn't open her eyes underwater. Who knew?