Three months GONE, just like that!



I have a hard time even really knowing where I left off...what has happened since we returned from Florida?  Well, for one thing, the Paynes visited from Nigera for six weeks.  A treat to see they all look happy and unchanged...except Jordan, Cypress and Isabel have seemingly grown up overnight! It was so great to see Hannah again, looking well and also more mature than the last time we saw her. There was the family get together at the cabin. Mike spent one adventuous day with the girls, Kim and Gary in Birch Bay in a water park. In Sept. we enjoyed one last visit with the Payne's at Tom and Judy's..always nice to spend time with the family.   

This one makes me laugh...what are we yaking about anyway?

Food, glorious cabin food!

Miss Jordan, all grown up and just as beautiful as ever

The handsome, fit couple...training together for the 3 day, 60 mile cancer walk







Tom and Judy were there, too



Cute baby doll aka McKenna, Lia and everyone's favorite Grand-Pa



When we came back from Florida we had several hectic weeks settling two vacancies in the rentals...a fairly non eventful and expected vacancy in the Bellevue condo and an unexpected troublesome vacancy in Marysville. We have the routine down and got them both cleaned up, repaired and rented within a couple of weeks.  I will not bother to go into details except to say rentals are not for the weak willed or thin skinned.  Of course, just when we thought we had it all under control, a major leak was discovered in the Kirkland house in which we had to replace an entire underlayment in the floor of the laundry room.  Fortunately, we have found an awesome fix-it all construction guy that we trust to do a good job at a reasonable price. Mike spent hours and hours, trips and more trips overseeing these repairs and helping out when he was able.

Mona, Amy, David, 2 lady friends whose names escape me

All right people, heads up.  Just when you think you are "in shape", you meet people like these.  David and Amy RODE their bikes from their home in Bothell to Whistler, BC, stayed a 2 days, then RODE back.  Along the way various biking friends joined them including yours truly.  They rode something like 650 miles in one week.  Yes, in case you were wondering, they have completed 3 full Ironmans!  I rode with them from Birch Bay, pictured here, to Marysville at which time I cried "UNCLE" and had Mike pick me up.  I was toast after riding hard for 80 miles in 90 degrees. 



Joan and Mona on the way to the start of STP

  Following the "ride from H---", excuse my French, riding the STP (Seattle to Portland-200 miles in 2 days) the following weekend was a piece of cake!  This is me and Joan the morning of our ride to Centralia which was 98 miles away.  It turned out to be a beautiful day; we had a great time.

Bikes unloaded, ready to go!

As you can see, she is one large woman. I was trying to stand tall, but I just couldn't quite measure up!  We are both doing the Ironman in Arizona in November.

Tahani and Pj in LA

After all that riding and training I needed a break so on to "Grand-ma week" with Pj and Tahani in LA.  It's a tradition, every summer that I spend some quality time with Pj.  This visit I rented a sweet little one bedroom cottage and we had one on one time for 4 days.  It was "awesome", as Pj would say! 

Universal Studios..check out the mohawk - hey he's a California kid now, what did you expect?

Ahhh....cooling off

So many crowds.  We were at Universal for over 8 hours. I was beat!  Riding my bike for 100 miles is easier than this...





Back up a minute: what is summer without at least one triathlon?  I competed in the all women's triathlon in July.  I was pleased that with all my hard training for the Ironman, I was able to break my PR time for this race. I came in 2nd in my age group. Some mammoth woman beat me..ah, can't win 'em all. 

I'm smiling, but actually I am freezing!!





Transition area



I had a great swim...won my age division by a lot, giving me a good head start out of the water. If you look closely, you can see all the women I beat, yeah baby!  I like to win, in case you haven't figured that out yet.



On to the bike!!

 

Well, that's a rap for now.  God's speed to all.