Birth Story

In Ryah's baby book, there is a page titled "Birth Story." It gives you about five lines to write about the experience leading up to baby's big debut. I figure I might have to type her story just to get it to fit into the allotted space.  While Ryah is now only 2.5 weeks old, it seems like she has already had enough "adventures" to fill several pages.

It seems only fitting that the way we found out I was pregnant with Ryah was by me running a 50k- something felt off, and three days later we learned why. The Flagline 50k will now have a special place in our memory. Despite the challenge of the day, I now just look back at that race and think of Ryah's ultra debut- actually it was her second ultra, since the weekend before "we" had run for 14 hours pacing a friend at Pine to Palm 100. Her little life began in a very fitting manor.

Ryah's ultra debut

We didn't exactly cruise through the rest of the pregnancy. At five months we learned her placenta was low lying. I had to stop running, and we monitored it closely with additional ultrasounds. Through these visits we then learned that she was small for her "age." At 36 weeks, her size dropped below the 10th percentile, and there was talk of immediately delivering her. Luckily, the doctors decided to give her a little more chance to grow. They put me on bedrest, and we spent the next three weeks driving to Bend for additional ultrasounds and fetal monitoring.

At 39 weeks I was induced.
Of course, the next stage couldn't be a sprint- ultra training came into play. Apparently, Ryah had not been informed it was her time to come into the world. After 32 hours of labor, her heart rate started to decelerate, and the doctor opted for a C-section to safely deliver her. It started as a regular procedure- music was playing, the nurses were joking around, and then they checked her heart rate again and it had plummeted. Suddenly everything became rushed and Josh barely made it into the room before they had her out. It took her 2.5 minutes to breathe on her own.

Despite the rocky beginning,  Ryah is doing amazing. She weighed 5 lbs. 15 ounces at birth, surprising the doctors and nurses who were prepared for a much smaller little girl. She passed her two week check up with flying colors and she has already grown an inch since her birth.  Our yellow lab has taken it upon herself to be Ryah's protector, and she follows us around the house whenever we carry the baby.

By the time I am allowed to run, she will hopefully be big enough for the baby jogger. Just like her parents, she loves to be moving.

Peter's birthday run

Your father-in-law only turns 60 once so you better do something fun-   We decided to run, what a surprise.

We celebrated THREE BIRTHDAY actually- Dennis turned 40, John 50 and Peter 60

Since it is a birthday party run we needed to have some goals.  Runners always have goals.

Today's goal was to bag as many peaks as possible, or at least 6!

Dimple came first!  We made it!

We lived to challenge McCulloch Peak next.

Survival was questioned, but we made it.  Off to gather the rest of the group and onto Price Peak.  We didn't know what we were in for. 

 Off we went with Peter leading the way.  Last minute instructions were in order.

This is where Peter began to explain there was no trail up to Price Peak!  Then we stopped and explained again that we were not lost and there are multiple ways to the top.  It is good to have options.

It was a bit frigid on top of Price Peak and there is a concrete block.  We took turns standing on it!

With the hardest and coldest challenge over we had 3 more peaks to bag.  Not without proper nutrition, Ashley and Vicki packed in some nutritious snacks.  This included peanut M&M's, licorice, Pepsi, and of course other natural whole foods. 

 

Then to Lookout!

On to Lunch Counter!

Up Forest Peak! Where only the strong survive!

Then over to Indian Hill.

Down we went...

  

and the party began!

Happy Birthday!

Another day in Sisters....

A day of snow today with between 8" to 10" inches last night and more snow right now, it made for a great snow day.

We are thankful Christmas Break has arrived and looking forward to some XC skiing tomorrow.  Hope you enjoy the photos.  We still only take care of one dog, we were dog sitting for our good friends from Corvallis.

A lot of this...

It was a year ago this week when we decided to move away from this....

Our house in Mt. Baldy House

Our backyard in Mt. Baldy

 and we really missed this....

at the end of the day though it was really important to be closer to this....

before we moved we almost bought this....  for a ton of this $$$$$$$$!

so we came to Sisters and moved into this....

Ranch House

all we had to do was feed this...

and take care of this...

when we got here we were worried we wouldn't have any friends, but we of course met folks who like to do this...

and this...

of course we brought Mati and she did a lot of this....

and hung out more with this...

 and felt safer when she wore this... maybe... at least Ashley felt she was safer when she wore this....

now Ashley is pregnant so next year she won't win this...

but she is still thrilled to be sponsored by this...

so we decided to stay in Sisters, so we bought this...

but we didn't know we had to share it with this...

now that we are getting more of this...

I think it is safe to say we are happy with all this...