Saturday race report and trip to the zoo!

Thought you might like to see some photos from last Saturday here... we had such a fun day!  At 7:30 that morning, Tom ran in the Kansas City Marathon.  11,000 runners signed up to participate.  It was  inspiring to see so many athletes~ of all shapes and sizes there.

Can you believe that sea of humanity?  It is difficult to tell in this picture, but runners were lined up for blocks and blocks!  I am sure that it took at least 15-20 minutes for everyone to get across the start line once the race began.  Everyone wore a timing chip on their shoe, so the runners in the back didn't have to worry too much about not being near the front.

With so many runners, I was worried that I would miss Tom.  We found him though... here is was at about mile 3... still going strong!

After he passed us there we had some time to kill while Tom ran the rest of his route.  We were able to do a little sight-seeing.  Kansas City has a great downtown area.  We were able to peek in Union Station,

And then we headed over to the finish line to cheer for Tom!  I almost missed seeing him again~ there were so many runners!

 

Tom did fabulous~ this was his first half-marathon.  He finished in 1 hour 51 minutes!  His goal was to break 2 hours~ he easily did that!  I was so proud of him.  Next up, he plans to run a whole marathon in November.

Once we got home, we decided that one event for the day wasn't enough, so we took the children to the zoo that afternoon.  Going to the zoo is always fun, but this trip was especially delightful as it was the first trip that Timmy could remember taking to the zoo.  He was totally enthralled by each animal and especially by the little train.

The polar bear exhibit is back in Kansas City!  The children all agreed that our great pyreneese Lance looks like he could be this bear's brother.  The pumpkin looks yummy, doesn't it?

 Up tomorrow, Lord willing, part two of the denim quilt tutorial.

I was just reprimanded by the visiting nurse who came to check on me.... too much swelling in my leg~ so she encouraged me to "be good" which means sitting more (sigh...) and using my crutches more (double sigh).  I really don't want to have problems with my hip in the future, so I am going to do my best to be good now.  You heard it here.... I'm going to sit more!  LOL!  (the children are in the background saying "Whatever, Mom!")  ((I really don't do very well sitting....))