Go, Go Power Rangers!!!

I had a little victory this week as a mom. I've found that most of the challenges that come my way with parenting kind of blindside me. One I've been struggling with for a while is Brandt's fine-motor skills. Writing and coloring haven't been one of his strengths, and I have been working with him much more than I ever had to with Eli to get him ready for kindergarten. He would switch between his right and left hand, neither one becoming any better, and keeping him interested in writing and coloring for more than 3 or 4 minutes was next to impossible. I purchased two fun handwriting wipe-off books, and we filled a couple of incentive charts with stickers to get him to practice with me some each day. He didn't write his name on his own until after school began this year--and his handwriting still kind of looks like he is a arthritic old lady. His coloring has been just a step above Ashers. He would color on the picture, but didn't pay attention to lines, and I would sometimes find him gazing around the room while his hand was still moving the crayon around on the page.
Well, on Sunday Brandt woke up with a bad cough so I stayed home from church with him. I wanted to use some of our time to work some more with him on his fine-motor skills. I decided to get a coloring book out for us to color in together. Kate gave the boys some Power Rangers coloring books that they hadn't really done much in, so I got one of those. Then, as we colored, I told Brandt he needed to pay close attention to staying in the lines so we could cut out his guys he colored and make them into toys. This really got him excited. I realized he didn't really lack much skill, he just lacked a good reason. We cut out all the pictures he colored and mounted them on cardboard. When Eli got home, he joined in and colored several for himself. We colored and mounted some more after school one day this week, and I bought some clear contact paper and laminated them. They have LOVED these. And as you can see from the pictures, Brandt's turned out very neatly colored.

Workout log- Monday: After just over a mile warm-up, I ran ten 400 meter intervals with 1 minute of rest between each and a 1 mile cool-down. I tried to keep my pace about 6:30/mi. for the intervals--but my fastest was at a 6:11 pace ( had a significant down-hill), and my slowest I averaged 7:23 (It was mostly a long, steep hill). My mean speed for all the intervals was 6:42.
Tuesday: I biked dowstairs 45 minutes and did whole-body weights.
Wenesday: I ran with Ashley 6.3 miles in 52:44. My legs were tired, but the run seemed to work out some of the lactic acid buildup.
Today: I biked downstairs 48 minutes (and watched High School Musical 2--my BOYS chose that from the library. The dancing is pretty fun to watch, though!) . I ran out of time to get all my weights in, so I just did squats, pushups, and bicep curls. This afternoon the boys had practice. Brandt has been kind of whiny at the last couple of practices, so I asked him if my running with him would help him. He said yes, so I put running clothes on and pushed Asher. Brandt and I ran eight 100's and two 1 50's. He kept saying, "I'm Sonic! No one can catch me !!" before zooming off. Thank goodness for wholesome television icons. Eli ran THIRTEEN 1 50's. I ran the last 5 with him to help him keep his pace. Their coach has them do these intervals at a target pace so they can gradually work up to running further and further. Several kids are now running 300, 400, and 600m intervals.