2023 Mud Girl!

Yesterday Claire and I did our 3rd annual Mud Girl mud run! It is a 3 mile course with 16 obstacles throughout. Some were pretty easy, some were pretty difficult. It had rained a lot the night before so it was extra muddy this year, which was so much fun but made the course harder! It also we very cold outside and windy so we all froze some but toughed through it and had a blast! I am so thankful Claire and I have this to look forward to each year as something special we can do together! First, all of the before pictures....

and then the after pictures!!!

Claire and Abigail had to hit all of the tents on the way out to gather the free giveaways! They were rocking the free blue sunglasses for sure! Now we wait for next year!

 

First long course swim meet of the season

Claire had her first long course swim meet of the season. She dropped time in everything, and exploded in her 200 freestyle! She managed to drop 33 seconds off her last long season time! It was so fun to watch her come in first by a large amount in her heat!

Claire and two of her swim buddies swam the last even of the day. After cooling off, they decided to have a little fun and do a cannonball into the pool! It was a great start to the long course season!

 

Braces and Meet the High School Swim Coach!

On April 13, Claire got her top braces on. Here is the before picture...

and the after placement picture. She very quickly went from "I am excited to get braces"' to " mom and dad, you were right, they are not fun"!

Then the next week we had an athletics meeting at CyFair High School (cannot believe we almost have a high schooler!). We learned all about the athletics program and then Claire got to meet her high school swim coaches. She is very excited to start this next chapter of her life. I wish she would slow down for a while but I guess I have to go with her pace....

 

Snow tubing in Utah

The views were just so amazing and of course the camera doesn't capture it all.

Since Claire wasn't a huge fan of skiing, we decided to go snow tubing the second day. We had lots of fun hitting both the small and long hills! Overall it was a fun family trip. Don't think we will be heading back to Utah for skiing anytime soon, but hopefully for some hiking again! Utah is one of my favorite places!

 

Utah Ski Trip

We went to Utah to try our hand at some downhill skiing...the view from the plane is just too hard to put into words. God's artwork is just stunning!

We got to the place we rented and quickly hopped in to enjoy the private hot tub!

Meanwhile, Claire got tired of the hot tub and decided to play in the snow in her swimsuit! Thankfully it was fairly warm outside. It was so fun watching her have a blast in the snow!

The next morning we headed to Park City to try out some downhill skiing. Claire was excited to get going and learn how to ski!

Thankfully, this park had a wonderful beginner practice hill for us to learn how to ski on. It had a conveyor belt to ride up and then a small slope to ski down.

After spending about an hour on this beginner slope, we were able to hop on the chair lift and try our hand at a much bigger slope.

Claire and I were both very hesitant and went most of the way down in a V-shape to keep from going to fast! 

The views were just amazing...minus Jeff being his crazy self in the back of our picture!

Claire decided that skiing wasn't really her thing and she decided to sit out a bit and make a mini snowman while Jeff and I went down a few more times. 

Back at our rental, Claire worked at making a snowman in the chair....

and the next morning, this is what became of her snowman in the chair! The weather was very warm (which I loved!), running in the 50s and low 60s during the day. No chance her snowman was going to survive that!

 

Last cotillion practice for the year

Jeff and I got to chaperone for the final cotillion practice. We didn't do well with getting pictures however....but the dance instructor put us parent chaperones to work and we had to learn the dance moves too!

Claire, Abigail, Annalee, and Caroline...all looking lovely for their final practice!

 

Superintendent Fun Run 2023!

On April 1, we did the 10th annual Superintendent Fun Run for Cy Fair school district. It is a 5K. Claire and Abigail took off to leave Amy and I in their dust! We all finished and were just a little sore the following day!