MONSTER COOKIE METRIC CENTURY

Today was our first big ride of the season...62 miles (actually 60) riding from Salem to Champoeg Park and back to Salem put on by the Salem Bicycle Club. We have done the Peach of a Century (Metric) and now this one and I have to say that they know how to put on a good ride!

The route was almost totally flat and with the tailwind at times on our way to Champoeg, we made pretty good time. Less than two hours to Champoeg. Going back to Salem was slightly more challenging as we were going into the wind the whole way, but because we are a little obsessed, we kept our average speed up because it was the highest we ever had on any ride at 15.2 for most of the ride until we hit town then it was 15.1. We finished at 3:59:09! It was a perfect day for a ride, not too cold and not too warm. However, if you sat around long enough the cold would set in. Since this ride was so easy and quite scenic, I would totally recommend this ride to others!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Compassion Goes to India

Yeah, so Tom and I "adopted" a little girl from India thru Compassion International last year. Every month we send support to her and her family and every few weeks we get a letter addressed to "Aunty" and "Uncle" and she closes each one by sending sweet kisses...she is a sweetie! In each letter she tells us about her family, school, what she is learning, where they go etc. She also ask us to pray for specific things. All of her letters are hand-written and in English, so we know that she is learning that in school.

I was just thinking that it has been a while since we received a letter...but then this week Compassion send out a monthly update with "Follow our India Trip" in the subject line. Well that caught my attention. Right now, as I type, 5 people are on their way to Calcutta and will be blogging their expience as they go along. I know that Miss Suneera is not near Calcutta, but they will be a lot closer than I am at the moment. I plan to follow a couple of these blogs to gain a better understanding of what is happening there. You can follow a couple of them too...on the right I have a couple of mini banners that are actually links to a couple of blogs...check them out and see how God is working in India!

April 29, 2009 update - we received another letter just over the weekend...so excited to hear from our girl again!

I Love Me Some Statistics!

I swear it's an illness...I HAVE to log my mileage and I HAVE to try to ride to or from work faster than the last time and I HAVE to ride more than last year!

So, two out of three isn't too bad. I do log my mileage and have done so since Spring of 2008 on My Cycling Log - this is how bad I am though, I had to transfer all the information that I had from a different log to the web-log to really get an accurate number for 2008. The cool thing is that my mileage is up from last year - YTD is more than double of last year...that's exciting. There have been lots of great days to ride and with having to train for the Duathlon I've been riding just a little more than I normally would. It also helps when a good friend invests in a brand new road bike!

Now if I could only ride FASTER! There is always something! The season is still young and I have lots of time to improve my ride time to and from work....always need a challenge!

Everyone needs a hobby.

PS: if you look closely, I have logged a few more miles since I first posted the monthly mileage log. I'm telling you - it's a sickness!

Remote Blogging...

So fancy! I had no idea…oh my…this could be bad!

Monthly Mileage

So I was pokin' around My Cycling Log today and checking out what I have done so far this year as far as cycling goes...I have done more than double what I rode last year at this time. A lot of that is probably because I got the crazy notion that I should probably train for the Duathlon rather than hope that I can do it.

More miles = more maintenance on my bike. I'm a bad bike owner...haven't cleaned and lubed the chain in almost a month! My bike is starting to make noises that it has not been making before and I am reluctant to bring it in to be looked at because we have a couple of rides coming up that I would rather ride the Fuji than the Trek. I'll have to wait until May to take it in - by then I think I'll have the 1000 miles logged since the last tune up in September.

Sweet Sunshine...where HAVE you been?

This weekend was so nice that everyone I encountered was giddy – I think it’s because we know it will end in a couple of days so we are happy as all get out! My friend Matt said he could go for 30 days of this weather and I told him that’s called August. We’ll see how things go, the showers keep showing up in the forecast, but that tends to change on an hourly basis!

Small Group Service Project & Fellowship

Due to the economy and the number of church members losing their jobs, Felida ended up letting go of the janitorial help (less money coming in time to cut back). Since then, church members have taken over the cleaning duties. I remember many years ago when we had no janitor and were cleaning and now we have come back to it.

As a service project the small group that Tom and I are a part of signed up to do cleaning duty this past Saturday morning. It was a gorgeous day out and even though I wanted to do other things (ride my bike) this opportunity was for our small group to work together and hang out with each other. With all of us (10 total) working together, by taking different areas to clean, we got the church cleaned up in under a couple of hours! I have to say that even though Tom and I were cleaning the bathrooms in the lower building, it really was a pretty good time. We had our moments of silliness, but that is to be expected while we were all together trying to figure out where things were and getting things done.

Probably the funniest thing is that in the men’s bathroom in the lower building you will find the old patio furniture that once was in the entry outside of Worship 2. Tom and I were having a hard time understanding WHY there would be two patio chairs in there – in close proximity to the stall, but there they were! At our group last night after extensive discussion over this we all had a good laugh about those chairs. I wish I had a photo, but in reality WHO would want a picture of the inside of the men’s room? Good times!

Following the church cleaning Dani, Jenni, Kristen (w/ son #1) and I went to Starbucks for coffee and a snack. It was nice hanging out with my buddies and Mr. Brayden, although he may have been getting bored as he kept urging us to watch him and his tricks. He’s a good little man and fun to have around. It’s amazing that he will be 5 this year…time flies! It’s not very often that I want to go and hang with my friends, especially my girlfriends…I really need to be more social! I do best in one on one visits, must be my A.D.D. kicking in, too much to keep track of. These friends mean a lot to me though, they were there during my cancer stuff, but THAT is quite a different post! Even though I might be kicking and screaming (on the inside) I always am glad that I go and hang out with my friends.

Cycling Fever…

Before the thought of going to coffee was discussed Kristen and I tried to pull together a riding plan for that afternoon. Since she is training to do triathlons she was thinking riding and then running afterward. I really need to start doing that, but Tom and I went to the track the previous evening and did speed work and I wasn’t up for riding THEN running just yet. So we planned to meet and ride a quick ride (as quick as possible) and then call it good. Turns out that Matt planned to meet someone at 1:30 to ride, so we had to be back as close to 1:30 as possible so a ride/run was not possible anyway need more time! 18 miles later we went our separate ways and still had the rest of the afternoon to enjoy.

Yesterday in between worship and BX time we made a last minute plan to ride with another friend from church. Tom and I met Adam at the Salmon Creek Trailhead and took off for an awesome 28 mile ride – my hilly route that we wanted to take Mark & Robin on for Mark’s birthday, but ran out of time. Anyway, it’s always fun to take people on a new route that goes by the more quiet parts of Clark County. This particular ride includes riding 199th Street from Delfel Road to 61^st Avenue and overlooks the Columbia River. A very cool sight! Adam enjoyed the ride and the hills and had not ridden that far north until yesterday. Considering that I was the lone female I had to keep up with the men…it was good though, we shaved off 9 minutes from the previous time that Tom and I rode the route...9 MINUTES! I was a little motivated to say the least. I hate feeling like I might be slowing other people down. Tom and Adam visited while I was grinding away, but it was all good as we have a couple of organized rides coming up and I need to really get serious and ride with purpose while still enjoying the scenery.

We have only had a couple of opportunities to ride with Adam and I hope there will be more he’s a good sport and he’ll ride just about anywhere! Also, it’s very easy to spot him and his super bright green Klein and matching jersey. Wowie Super Bright! I am thankful that his wife, Jenn, is very understanding and Adam gets to come play with us now and then. Maybe one day in the future she’ll come with us too!

All of our rides, whether we ride with other people or just with each other, end up at a Starbucks. Saturday mornings at the Salmon Creek Fred Meyer Sbux can be busy with the soccer/baseball fields and the indoor soccer facility are both about a mile away from that particular Starbucks, but we don’t mind waiting and have fun people watching. Plus the Vancouver Bicycle Club meets at the Fred Meyer parking lot on Saturdays so it’s fun to watch the club ride get going. Anyway, after enjoying a refreshing beverage and each other’s company we head out. Sometimes the caffeine just give enough boost to get us home – a big whopping two and a half miles!

Yeah, so if I could have I would have ridden more, but planning is good too and I would not have traded our weekend for anything else. I have missed riding with Kristen so it was good to hang out with her and I love riding with Tom and when we can get others to join us it’s even more fun!

This last weekend feels like a taste of what this summer might be like – a lot of riding and a whole lot of hanging out with good friends, whether it’s an organized event or just getting some people together. I’m afraid to find out how many others are roadies out there…I know of a few at church and a fair amount of people at the fire station…

Seriously, we need a bike club!

Easter at Felida

This is the tail end of the cool intro to our worship service this morning...

He Has Risen...

and Felida had a ROCKIN' good time this morning! I'm tired and a little hungry so just photos from this morning...

Suzy came to worship this morning along with her daughter-in-law and grandkids

The kids helped out with a couple of songs...so fun! Awesome Men's Quartet! Me & My Goodest Friend - SO cheesy Nice looking couple...

Fun with a camera

Monday is our usual night to hang out with Robin & Andrew at Starbucks. This week Tom brought the camera along for fun...here is what we got -

Self-Portrait #9,999...Just leaving the house.

Welcome! (this is a Danielism) Standing in line at the ATM....I want some cash too... Surprise Brittney! Ooh La La

Good Start To...

...cycling season! I am hopeful that the days of bundling up as pictured above will soon be behind us. There is something so liberating about not having to wear the long pants and multiple layers - I feel like I go so much faster when I can just go with shorts and a jersey. Spring and Summer cycling will indeed produce less in the way of cycling clothes going into the wash.

Had a couple of great rides over the weekend and today, once I pack the backpack, I'll be off on my bike to work! Have logged just over 400 miles on my bike already this year, I'm really excited to ride to work now! 400 miles is more than double what I rode last year at this time...this year is going to be a really awesome cycling year! Tom and I will be well on our way to that century later this Summer.

The Rock Star prize goes to Robin for actually making it up Corbin Street/Road Hill yesterday afternoon - I think with only one stop. Even though my bike sports a compact crank the hills are still not easy - and since I didn't want to break the momentum, I kept going and waited at the top and cheered Robin on. She's a trooper for following me...yesterday and on Saturday. Yesterday was fun because the men were with us. It was a good afternoon of fellowship and riding - partly to celebrate Mark's birthday, but also it had been awhile since our last ride together as a grupetto. I have enjoyed the few rides that we have gone on together and now I am I am itchin' for an organized ride, the Worst Day Ride was too long ago now - Monster Cookie Metric Century here we come!

Another week closer to...

...warmer weather? The weekend is looking good for riding!

April Showers...

Haven't been up to a whole lot, as you can see by my blog...not many posts! I'm itchin' to ride and keep watching the weather...rain rain and MORE RAIN! All I want to do is ride to work. The days that are good are not good because I have appointments scheduled and the other days have just been way too wet. Oh well...this is the Pacific Northwest and this is what the weather is supposed to be like. A little less would be good, but that IS too much to ask for! Although the KOIN 7 day forecast shows a good weekend - I like this forecast the best so far!