Bullying or Life Skill?

I understand the bullying policies in today's schools and I like that they are in place. But, as a mom of boys, sometimes I think there is some value in standing up for yourself, even if that means punching someone back.

Today, when Booker got in the car, he told me that Little Brat Boy punched and kicked him in the bathroom. I asked him why, and he said he didn't know, he didn't do anything. Then I asked him what he did back. "Well, I told him 'ouch, that hurt', washed my hands and went to tell my teacher". He handled it perfectly according to 2012 rules. Good for him! I was proud of him and told him he did the right thing. But then I started second guessing my parenting skills. Am I going to encourage my son to be the victim and get picked on? So, I told Booker that if Little Brat Boy continues to pick on him, or punch or kick him, that he has Mom and Dad's permission to punch him back. I told him he will get in trouble at school, but to know that if it was defending himself, he would not be in trouble at home.

Then, the principal called me. She wanted to tell me there was an incident and that Booker handled it exactly how he was supposed to and she was very proud. She told me that Little Brat Boy was being disciplined, and that if Booker would to have hit back, both parties have to be disciplined. I told her I understand, but also think there is a certain life skill boys learn by sticking up for themselves. Of course she couldn't encourage this behavior, which I'm actually glad for, but I just wanted to get it out there.

Anyway, I told Booker that I got a call from his principal and that she was very proud of him for how he handled the situation. He was proud of himself too. For the most part, he's a lover, not a fighter. It's just hard knowing what the right thing is to do. For me and him. And I'm sure he's even more confused now, poor kid.

Overly Emotional Mom, Party of One

Booker lost his first tooth today. While the Superintendent was in their classroom speaking to them, he yanked it out! He is over the moon. I'm so excited for him, but at the same time feel like bursting into tears! Two best things about it are 1) I didn't have to pull it out, 'cause that grosses me out! And 2) he pulled it the day before school pictures so we get to capture this moment forever!

Free Olathe Women's Tri Pics!

The End to Tri Season

Today was my last triathlon of the season.  Jen and I did 4 this year, and hope to do 5 or 6 next year.  I love everything about triathlons.  I love the change in pace from swim to bike to run.

The first tri we did this year was the Kansas City Triathlon on May 20th.  Last year, the water temp was only 59 degrees, but this year we warmed up to 69 degrees, which is a huge difference, but still cold.  Gotta love the first tri of the season!  Our 2011 time was 3:29 and our 2012 time was 3:24.  We were SO please with this improvement.  However, we both had bike envy as we stared down our competition, and also realized how well we do on the swim and the run, but got our butts kicked on the bike.  And we are competitive, and didn't like that, so that was the last triathlon we did on our old road bikes.  By old I mean mine was an early 90s Trek and Jen's was an 80s Schwinn.

Enter the era of "The New Babies."  Jen got a brand new Felt tri bike and I got a used (but still a 2012) Cannondale tri bike.  Let me just say, we love them more than most humans we come in contact with on a daily basis.  And I wish I were exaggerating!  AND, they make a huge difference.  We give the same amount of effort and fly down the road at about 4mph faster, and don't feel like we are trying nearly as hard.  And uphill?  Wow!  Where we used to slow down to about 8-9 mph we are now going about 12mph.  Just love them.

So we tried out our new bikes at the Shawnee Mission Triathlon on July 8th.  We finished in 1:13 and floated on cloud 9 for days.  That is one heck of a hilly bike course!  And this was the first time we finished and saw our names on the first page of the results!

We had high hopes of really getting going on our bikes at the Midwest Meltdown Triathlon on August 26th.  However, it decided to rain for the first time all summer, and mixed with the 8 tons of brand new asphalt they put down on the bike course, we took it easy.  This was a great course.  The swim was 750m instead of 500m, but Jen and I locked in at a 1:50 pace, which was great!  This was the first triathlon I finally got into a swim groove.  I wasn't being "as" clobbered by other people, so that was a major factor.  We also had a great run!  Our 5k time was 25:59.  This will be a redo next year because the bike course was really flat, and hopefully the roads will be dry next year so we can fly!

Today we did the Olathe Medical Center Women's Triathlon.  We found out earlier this week that we were in different swim heats.  This doesn't work for us.  Jen and I do triathlons TOGETHER!  And our heats were 30 minutes apart.  And they said if we miss our heat, we can't participate.  So we had to regroup and plan to go solo.  Not cool.  Jen started at 7:35 and I got to watch her entire swim, which was fun.  I started at 8:05, and she was completely done by the time I got off the bike.  Have I ever mentioned I hate to run by myself?  Well, I do.  And Jen and I have a system.  My watch tracks our entire tri time and our splits.  But it doesn't show my pace.  Jen's watch paces our run.  We both have speedometers on our bikes, and neither one of them were working today, so we had NO idea where we were on the bike.  And without Jen, I had no idea where I was on the run.  On both, I just decided to push til it hurts, and then I knew I was giving it my best effort.  My swim was 10:15 for 500m, my bike was 38 minutes for 10.6 miles and my run was 25:29 for 3 miles.  I placed 7th in my age group and 39th of 307 overall.  Jen did fantastic too, and our times were only a couple minutes apart.  However, it just wasn't the same without her.  I'm bummed we aren't the same age.  We are 7 years apart, so this heat division problem is going to definitely come into play again in the future.

In the off season, we both plan on getting more miles on our bikes.  I can't wait until May 2013 rolls around so we can do it all again!