Blowing & Drifting

At about 10:30 tonight, as I was sitting at the laptop watching an episode of Game of Thrones, Julia came out of her bedroom. “Daddy, I can’t sleep!” “What’s wrong, honey? You can’t sleep?” “No, I can’t! Everyone keeps moving everything up and down.” “What?” Then, quickly, realizing she was sleepwalking: “Honey, I think you’re [...]

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A great summer song with a hilarious, to-the-moment pair of opening lines: In the back of the taxi you turned off the TV And read me a book on your phone

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Every now and then, Vivi will spontaneously start singing a little song she made up: Dangit dangit dang-IT Dangit dangit dang-IT Dangit is supported by Northfield News. Provided by Genevieve Land Everybody Dance Now Service. And it’s also provided by Iffy Mama. This is clearly modeled on the little promos after PBS shows, but she’s [...]

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Here are nine reasons that I love this nine-year-old kid: 1. She is ridiculously smart, and I can tell she’s going to use her brain to great effect over the next nine years – and beyond. 2. She loves to read. If she has her nose in a book, good luck getting her attention. And [...]

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Finally – video of the girls’ dance at the elementary school talent show! This was shot by my friend Todd, the father of the other two girls here. They’re all good dancers! You can tell they practiced a lot – and that Shannon and Todd’s wife put a *lot* of thought into the choreography. Well [...]

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I realized a longtime dream today when the girls agreed to play Scrabble with me! Nonna is on notice: Genevieve is pretty sharp.

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The 2013 Almanzo 100 was as fantastic a day on the bike as could have been imagined. I’ll recount the race in more detail in another post, but one of the best moments of the event came around mile 45 or so, when we had to ford a shallow but cold little creek. The water [...]

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For my birthday, Julia also drew this amazing picture: She drew it from a photo of taken on the first day of school last fall. Pretty good resemblance, huh?

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Musing about possible April Fool’s pranks, Julia asked me how hard it would be to rig a bucket of water to fall on someone’s head. Thankfully, she and Vivi went in another, tamer, drier direction. (The dress color and the last line in the description are the jokes.)

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Friday morning, I was finishing up some work before heading to Julia’s field trip in the next town when Shannon texted me: Washer just stopped itself with a load of clothes and water in it and there is a burning smell! I had a few minutes of before I needed to be at the field [...]

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When I was racing the other weekend, Shannon set the girls up with a dish-soap painting project. Here are two of the paintings they made, each with a mysterious title. When I asked them about the titles, they said almost in unison that I’d told them that artists sometimes gave their works strange names, so [...]

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Saturday morning, I drove up to Elm Creek park in Champlin, Minnesota, for the second running of the Fatbike Frozen Forty race. I didn’t know what to expect, since I hadn’t trained much for the race and have done all my racing on gravel roads, but I was eager for the chance to ride my [...]

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Though I’m not quite sure what I’m getting myself into, I am doing this race on Saturday morning. I am severely undertrained, but adrenaline should compensate for at least 10% of my fitness shortfall. I hope my beard can make up the rest. If nothing else, I’ll have some painful fun on the Beast!

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Feeling a little unprepared for a fatbike race I’m planning to do on Saturday, I spent quite a bit of time on the Beast this last weekend – trying my winter gear, testing my legs, figuring out riding positions, feeling the wintry mix on my face, learning the best way to fly off my bike [...]

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Genevieve spends a lot of time talking about “Genevieve Land,” where the natives naturally speak “Genevieve Language.” Luckily for those of us who might have to travel to this locale, she’s started a lexicon with important entries like Mama, sweets, vegetables, and birthday:

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