Awesome Moms and Marmot Races

(upbeat music) Hi again everybody, welcome back to the Miles Palfcast. These legs should podcast of awesome moms. Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there. It's, I'm very lucky to have a lot of awesome moms in my life. Obviously my own mom, and she's still doing stuff for me. She's still being great. And to everybody else, to Chan and Morgan McKenzie, Kimmy, Alexa, Laurie, Karen, Alicia, Serena Sam, there's a ton of people in every little beginning to forget. And last but not least, obviously my wife, it kind of the mom of our kids. And how much she does? There's so many little things that, I feel like I don't think you're enough for. When I get up in the morning, I go to get a shower and in that period of time, both the girls wake up, so Kendall's helping them kind of get out of bed and helping them get breakfast. And in some case, getting dressed and getting ready for school. And she picks them up because I'm still at work. They get done with their school and she picks them up. And there's so much stuff there. There's just so many little things. And all of the helping with their emotions, she's much better at that than I am. And all the times, they just want, all the times the girls just want Kendall and not me. I never take offense. That it's a mother child kind of thing. But that right there comes with a ton of extra work because in those situations, you need something. And it's a little bit more elaborate than just, something simple. And she's always there. I, the fact that she's so intentional and works so hard at it. And all these people, I feel like in my job, I've seen both sides of it. Unfortunately, I see when the moms aren't super invested for a lack of a better way of putting it. And it really makes me appreciate the effort when you see it the other way around. And fortunately, more often than not, I always like, I can't think of anybody who wouldn't do it this way in my life anyways, that they put a lot of effort forward. Their kids are great because of it. And it's just a ton of work. Man, being mom looks super, super hard. From the very beginning up through the entire lifespan, it's a lot of work. And here's all the moms out there for all that they do. It's, it's an excellent holiday 'cause that deserves to be completely recognized. All that work. So that's where the flagship podcast of this week. Taylor Show, got to talk about last weekend. A lot about last weekend. We had the, the Marmot Race, the little Bloomsday thing, actual Bloomsday. Kind of took the girls. Again, here's the thing again. She took the girls away so I could get more stuff done. There's that and then kind of, kind of living in that same vein. We got to talk about what I'm into and it's just, it's about the kids. But first, tell me something good. Marmot Day was Saturday. Marmot Day or the Marmot Race, the Marmot Run, is like, it's not junior Bloomsday 'cause that's a different thing. And I think that's for like, mmm, like kind of a little bit older kids. But there's the Marmot Run for young kids. And this is like, they different groups. They had like four and under and like first grade and second grade, I think it was. It was downtown Spokane, started the clock tower. And you run this like lap where it ends up at the, it's like right into the arena, the Ice Age playground, I think is where it officially ended. And it's like a one mile lap. And it's perfect. It's really pretty down there. I think they really cap off the race like 300 kids, which sounds like a lot, but it's like the perfect amount. And we went down there. It was Emmy's first race. And she's excited about it. She had all her stuff ready. And again, we get down there. And we're kind of the last to go because she's in like the youngest age group. And it worked out well that way. Like Kendall and Gabby could go in the stroller with us and I ran with Emmy. And she loved it. It was a perfect way of like introducing people to this kind of thing, like getting kids interested in doing these races and these road races. And eventually probably to Bloom's Day. They had like little balloons along the path. Like these purple lilac balloons that looked really cool. They had characters along the trail that were, you know, of interest to the kids. The like the Spokane Indian mascots. There's several of them. The Spokane Shee's mascots. Swoop was there, the Eagle mascot. And Emmy's at the edge where she loves it. She's no longer afraid of it. Gabby is. Gabby wanted nothing to do with them. She's interested, but no high fives. But Emmy loved that. And she also had the cheerleaders. There was several like high school cheerleader groups along the course. And she'd go high five all of them. And it was just, it was really cool. It reminded me of like a very, very miniature version of a Disney race where there's just attractions and entertainment and interactive opportunities like throughout the entire race, which just makes it so much more interesting when you're just pounding it out on the pavement for miles and miles. This was that. And again, it was like in kid form. And man, Emmy loved it. I was very proud of her. She ran, pretty, honestly, the almost the entire lap, like the entire mile. I bet she'd probably ran at least 0.8.9 out of the entire mile, which I was very impressed about. Cause I didn't, I didn't, I figured it would be more of like a, let's run really fast. And we're gonna walk. And then we're gonna run and we're gonna walk. Nah, she pretty much jogged and ran the entire way. There was a couple like little hills that we would walk up. But other than that, man, she was running and she crushed it and had so much fun. It was really, really cool to see that. It was a great way to kind of kick off what was a very, very busy weekend. Because after that was Bloom's Day on Sunday and Holy smokes made it, what a hot day. Like I know it was only like mid-up or 70s and 80s. Like when you're on that pavement, it was so, so warm. It started off. I was able to leave a little bit early than planned, which was a problem because I initially planned a park in the park aid because they had like a Bloom's Day deal there. And I was able to leave early. So I'm like, hey, I don't wanna like deal with the traffic, especially when leaving and going into a garage where there's so many, so many other cars there. So I'm like, hey, I'll leave it early. I'm just gonna go park a Kendall yards. It'd be great. I'll be able to kind of walk up to the course, get some stretching in on the way. It's an easy, easy, short, like half mile there. And when I leave, I want to deal with all the traffic of getting back to the park aid and then exiting downtown. It just, it seemed easier. And it worked out perfect. I got there and there's a lot of spots taken. There's a couple left. I'm like, oh, cool. I nailed it. And it's free. I saved a couple bucks doing it. But then right last minute, it kind of crossed my mind and I'm like, wait a minute. I'm assuming the course is the same way it's always been. Sure enough, it was. And if that's the case, I don't think there's a way out of here. I don't think there's a way that I can physically exit this space with a pick up because there's going to be the race going on. And the race lasts until like 3 p.m. and sure enough, I check it and it's like, oh, if I hadn't caught that, I'd have been trapped downtown for a very long time. But because of that, I was then too late to go park the park aid. Didn't want to navigate that old space. So I ended up parking pretty much in the middle of some residential neighborhood in West Central and walking way, way more than I wanted. But I wasn't trapped and it ended up working out. It worked out fine. Bloom's Day, super hot though. It was, I was very fortunate I could start right near the front of the race. So I didn't have to wait very long. I started pretty close to the 9 o'clock start time and was able to get through most of the race before it got even hotter. But even at the end, I felt like it was the hottest I've experienced this year. And I look over and I can kind of, I'm right near the end and I can look up and I can see where people start. And there were just streams of people still coming along. And I talked to somebody later on that I guess they didn't actually end up starting until like after 10, which I was finishing around then. Like it just seemed crazy to have to then start like in that extra additional heat. But again, it was a cool race. It worked out great. I finished the time that I wanted. My goal was to finish within an hour and I beat that by like a minute, two minutes and a half. Didn't think it was going to happen early on because there's so many hills and man, they call it Doomsday Hill for a reason. Doomsday Hill is like going up. I don't know the road like TJ Meenock maybe. It's, it doesn't seem like much. But when you're kind of approaching it and you see this just really kind of elongated and steep hill, it's overwhelming. But I was, I got the top and there were two of my patients, two sisters that were standing there and like they ran over and gave my fives and it's that weird thing. Kind of like when like song comes on that you love, like there's just like this extra, like can a nitro on your belt that drops in the tank and you got extra energy. And all of a sudden I was like refreshed for whatever reason and I was able to pick up a ton of lost time and finish right where I need to be, which is great as well. But it's cool, a great race. I spent 11 years to do it last time and it's probably gonna be a long time before I do it again because races are fun. I don't, it's just so many people and there's so much that kind of goes into it and there's a lot of weighting around at the beginning 'cause you got to get there kind of early and you gotta navigate parking, getting out of there. It's fun, it's a cool event, but it's not something that's really need to do. The Marmot race will definitely do again. That was really, really cool. But Blooms, I who knows, maybe it'll be another 11 years, maybe it won't. But it's great, got it, did it. (upbeat music) ♪ You know who you are ♪ ♪ Yeah, who you are ♪ So man, that was just kicking off a very, very long day. Just kind of going into a long weekend because it was one of those weekends where we're trying to get all the yard work stuff done and I'm in a place right now where I'm taking care of our lawn and the neighbor's lawn and it worked out great that Keno was able to take the girls Saturday after the Marmot race, took them down to her mom's house so I kind of had the weekend or the bad evening and then kind of the next half a day to get stuff done. And I went out to Lake, our Lake cabin and did the yard out there and cleaned up like just some of the stairs in the parking lot and such and then went down and helped out mom, came back, mowed the neighbor's yard up until like eight o'clock, trying to get a lot of that stuff done because they're both deployed and it's the least you can do, right? And then after Blooms Day, taking care of our yard, like going through the mowing and the edging and the weed back in, there's just like all those little things that go into it but then there was the worst part. My now, my least favorite job around the house, I can possibly think of, turn the sprinklers on. No problem, got everything good, like every now and then like there's some, you know, little things left open, valves opened up so things don't freeze. Got out of that, taking care of, turned it on, everything was great, turned on the sprinklers and there's always several, like a dig up, like for whatever reason, like enough sod and stuff gets over the top that you kind of got to dig them out and that's kind of a pain. But I finally decided this was the year and I get, I hope I never have to do this again or at least no time soon. Our sprinklers, I've never set them, Like how they were said. is how they were we bought the house back in 18. And we've always had the problem of the sprinklers, either A, watering the neighbor's yard, or B, like watering kind of the grass and the extra weeds like outside of what we normally kind of take care of, or just blowing straight into a tree. Like it's just, there was so much extra wasted. And then inevitably there's always in parts of our yard that dry up a lot quicker than they should. And they're just not getting enough water. So I finally decided, I've got the time, I just need to go through and like try and reset their all of these sprinkler heads. And you Google it and they make it seem so easy. It's like, oh, the left side, like the left side set. So all you do is turn that and like that automatically sets like the left barrier. And then you turn the little screw counterclockwise and that reduces the arc. But imperfectly so because if you like one whole spins 90 degrees or something, they make it sound so easy, but holy smokes man, trying to do that on top of me. I guess I had a lot of faith in myself because I would set like the little the clock. Like I would set like an auto or a manual run on station five for five minutes. All right, cool. Five minutes to go and knock out these sprinkler heads. I feel like I'd get really close and then would turn off and like, oh, got a run back over to the garage around the house, back into the garage. Turn it back on for five minutes, that should be fine. Standing out there, you know, there's a lot of time where the sprinkler kind of revolves left and then right and you transit the barriers where the boundaries turns off again. Go back and do it over again. I just looking back, I don't know how much I learned from this whole process because I think if I was to go do it to get him to take just as long, but the idea, if I just would have set the station to run for 30 minutes, just more than enough time and then just like use that, I would have saved myself a lot of effort. But even still like, yeah, I feel like I'd get the left lined up and then reduce the arc and then it's not going to the right spot or you're trying to, what I need is a heat map, like a hydration map of the yard. If I get somehow see like, oh, this area's super dark blue, it's getting a lot of water. Why do, what if I like reset this other sprinkler to do more over here where it's not blue at all and it's more dry. It's so imperfect and you can't obviously run them all at the same time, it just doesn't work that way. So you're just kind of guessing and checking. But I feel like I had a memory of where the yard was dry in certain spots. So I kind of use a strategy of like all the middle rows, we're going to water the bottom half of the yard. Top is going to look top half. Time will tell if this is going to work. I eventually just said we're good and we're just going to see all the summer progresses and then something dries out. I'll go back and try it again. But if nothing else, our water in the neighbors yard a lot less, we are watering the extra space like the kind of the golf course area lot less and we're watering less trees. Thank goodness. Hopefully this works not better in a yard doesn't dry up in certain spots and it's, I don't have to run them for so long to just like get those spots to kind of get a water. But done with that, thank goodness. Holy smoke, it was a long, a ton of work. I feel like I worked harder after blooms, they then blooms they itself and I was so sore the next day. Just trying to make it through. But got it all done, tons of work done. We still got to take care of our gardens and get some flowers planted and some hanging baskets going but we're getting closer. The yard's getting good and I feel like we're just in that window where you try and get so much of it done because you got to get things grown before it gets too hot and I don't know, we're in a good spot. It's a good weekend, grateful. And that was way past the IOU. The IOU1 was for Kendall for taking the girls and then obviously every their mom stuff she does. But for taking the girls, it was helpful that we could get a lot of stuff knocked out. All right, last but not least, Shawn's what are you into? - All right, listeners, it's time for hidden passions, wild hobbies and that one thing they didn't know miles was obsessed with. Buckle up, it's time for Shawn's, what are you into? - The other day, this is what me think of this was, the girls were getting ready for bed and I'm just kind of sitting there waiting for Gabby to be done and she's, I took this picture of her standing in the bathroom on her little pink stool and her little pink night gown, just brushing her teeth with of course her little pink toothbrush and she just looks so small and so innocent and so sweet which and all those things she is. But just watching them like, "Oh, this is a phase of my life and of our lives." Of Kendall in mind that I think when we're in our 60s looking back, this is one of the phases I would choose to go back to. We're in this phase where it seems like a long time now. Obviously, we are in the stage where both girls are going to the daycare so we're paying an extra mortgage essentially for child care which I'm perfectly fine with. But it just, it limits other things and other opportunities and it seems like it's just gonna go on and on and in the grand scheme of things, this is gonna be such a short phase. We're gonna look back and it's like, "Member when both girls or maybe we have more, we're just in daycare and they weren't even in school yet." That was such a short period of time and we're in that and I feel like it's kind of like day trading the stock market. If you just based off this super light, I mean super nerdy. If you just like based all of your trading off to like one day, it is so volatile and there's so many ups and downs. Like to compare that, the analogy to the girls, like there's obviously a lot of emotions every day. If God forbid Gabby gets your shoes on before M or if one of them doesn't get the right spoon for their oatmeal or you open the banana and you weren't supposed to, there's all those little things and it makes the days sometimes really exhausting. But man, I've used Zoom out and you see the forest with the trees, this is one of those phases where it's like it's great. The girls, they're happy and it's so sweet to watch. Like I said, Gabby brushing her teeth that were like when we're watching like Emmy on the monitor and when she's playing in a room by herself and she's got a stethoscope around her neck and all of her little stuffed animals lined up on the bed and she's giving them checkups and she's singing to them and it's just, it is so sweet and there's gonna come a time where that's no longer the case where that's not what she's interested in. It's gonna be, you know, much older kid stuff. And her favorite song won't be a Lamy like you anymore. Like it's little things like that or like when, you know, there's gonna come a time where Gabby doesn't point out every single airplane and every single helicopter or say hello to the sudden shine when she sees it or says wants to say goodnight to the geese outside of her house every night. It's just, I've talked about this before but like there's so many phases that you're in and you're like, oh, this is, I don't need to like worry about recording this or remembering it 'cause this is gonna last forever and then all of a sudden you look back and you're like, wait a minute, that, she doesn't do that anymore. And that's actually kind of where we're at, like with the stink night to the geese. Like that's a real thing and up until by two weeks ago I'd take her out every night, she'd always say outside geese night and we'd read her stories and we'd walk outside and we'd see the geese out on the golf course and we would say goodnight to 'em and we'd walk back inside and she doesn't do that anymore. Like it's one of those things, it's already, is already coming on and I think that's what I'm into is like just recognizing that and the sweet phase of life that word with the girls and how great it is and how good they do, watch them eat, like trying to things with swimming and tea ball now and Gabby, she's in the phase where she's just getting so much more words and language and doing more with it stuff. Like she's no longer in that phase, I've just kind of like being a little toddler. Like she's now a fault-fledged, two, not quite two and a half year old, not even close but she's no longer in that baby stage. Like she's remembering things and she's picking up on things and she's learning things and it's awesome. And watching 'em and seeing 'em, it's really cool and I think that deserves to be recognized. 'Cause also maybe the thing to this is, there's always like all the, like every night you gotta kind of refresh the house because there's toys that just somehow grow out of nowhere. Like they're always there and you're always kind of cleaning them up and I cross my mind once. Like, you know, I don't mind this because when it's gone, like when we're no longer cleaning these toys up, like that's gonna be a sad day indeed. I remember the same thing with, with two of the things, with lost, the show lost, I remember like somebody had a tweet or something or it's like, man, I just, I always wanted to know the end. I wanted to know what happened. I wanted to know like the whole story and all the sugars behind it. And I wanted to see the end. But then you get to the end and that's the end. And it was the same thing with Harry Potter. I remember kind of that same sentiment. I don't know where I remember hearing it if I just kind of thought it and recognized it. It's like you really, like you wanted to know what was gonna happen at the end of Harry Potter. All those books, everything you went through, you wanted to see that wrap up. But then you get the wrap up and it's great, but that means it's over. And it's kind of like, I guess it's the same thing with, with all the little things that we're in right now. It's the cleaning up all the little toys every single night and their rooms, like you can't keep them clean. And it's all the little things that make a matter frustrated, but then they're fine. It's all that little stuff and it's great to like, what can't you can't wait until it's all over. It's like, oh, I can't wait to the day where I don't have to worry about this. Or we're gonna have to deal with this. Or they don't care what spoons they get or who gets their shoes on first. But when you get there, that's gonna be a sad day indeed. That's what I meant to do. Just try to be aware of that and recognizing it 'cause it's gonna be gone in the blink of an eye. It's corny as that all sounds. Like that's, it's a real thing. It's great. Thank you all for listening. Thank you for going through all that with me. I appreciate you all hanging out every week, listening to it all. Happy Mother's Day to every mom out there and it's with the sunshine, enjoy it all. Mariners finally hoping to get back on that wind and streak of theirs. Go Pickles, go to the T-ball team. Love watching them. And thank you all. We're gonna have you Mother's Day and we'll talk to y'all next week. Emmy Gabby Soundbite on the way out. Have a good one. Bye. (baby mumbles) - Forces. - Forces, man. Forces, man. Forces. Man, forces. - Say what say bye. - Bye. [BLANK_AUDIO]