Quick summary Distance: 546 mi (including 15 mi ride to start), 1007 mi (including 451 mi ride back to start) Climbing: 8967 ft Time: 2 days, 11 hours, 46 minutes (Mon, 12/7/20 5:24am to Wed, 12/9/20 5:10pm) Speed: Overall average (9.1mph), Moving speed (11.0mph), Total stoppage time (10 hours) Sleep: ZERO – I stopped at […]
It has been quite busy with 16 weeks compressed down to 13 weeks so we can end the semester before Thanksgiving. I’ve still been riding because that takes priority over blogging, but between riding and work, I haven’t had a lot of time for anything else! 15km vertical for Nuevas Esperanzas 15th birthday celebration It […]
Part 1 – There… I love a good ride starting at midnight. Guess what time the Delta Epic starts … midnight! Here’s my not-so-quick-ish recap of the race before getting ready for class this morning… I drove over to the start from Birmingham on Friday after teaching in the morning. Quick, easy drive, and I […]
It may have taken over 25 miles longer than we had planned, but Luke Caldwell and I successfully completed an everesting of what may arguably be the most scenic and iconic climb in the Birmingham area – Smyer Road. Here’s a quick look at the numbers: Distance: 250.0 mi Total elevation gain: 30,102 ft Total […]
We just survived what was being called “snowmageddon” here in Alabama. Unfortunately, the bulk of the snow was just north of Birmingham with some places getting over 6-8 inches of snow. The snowfall dropped sharply below a line about 10 miles north of us with only about an inch of snow and another inch of sleet/freezing rain falling here in our part of Hoover. But it was enough to cancel school for two days (Monday and Tuesday)! The pictures below document the story – hover over each one to see a caption.
It’s been such a good day. Typing on my iPhone, but I just had to capture the sweet simple memories.
I worked Friday/Saturday, leaving Brian and the kids Thursday evening. I came home to happy kiddos and husband, lots of hugs and Josiah saying several times, “I was missing you, Mom!”
The kids joined us in bed this morning, full of sweet snuggles, spontaneous hugs for each other and kisses all around. Ahhhh… loved it. They were both full of love today, playing well together, wrapping their little arms around me with hugs at random
times. They joined me snuggling on the couch as I watched the Packers game (Yay Packers!!!), as we settled in for winter storm. And as the sleet and flakes fell tonight, we curled up in our PJs to fall asleep on the couch watching A Bug’s Life. Perfect.
Today, we had some really interesting weather – 21 degrees and raining! Yes, the freezing rain that started right around dinner time was treacherous. Within 15 minutes, you could barely walk to the car and drive a couple blocks down the street to the sledding hill. So imagine how fast the sledding hill was. On the first run, I started Analise halfway down the little hill and she still went straight into the woods. So I started Josiah a lot lower, and he still went into the trees, too! Fortunately, there was some deeper snow and smaller brush to slow them down before plowing into any of the big trees! We went over to the big hill and only managed one crazy run each starting from near the bottom of the hill. Analise still flew at least two feet into the air on her first run and landed hard enough to knock both of her boots right off her feet. Fortunately the landing also scrubbed most of her momentum. After watching this, I took Josiah down the hill practically to the bottom, let him go, and he still went nearly all the way down to the football field. We decided it was way too dangerous to continue. You could probably hit 30-40mph with the right sled starting from the top if you could steer it down the path to the football field!
Video of Analise and Josiah sledding into the woods (watch on our blog if you are reading this in Facebook):