Hawaii!!!!

Recently Nathalie and I spent an entire week on the big island of Hawaii! Although it was tough to be away from the little guy for that amount of time the break was much needed and we tried to relax as much as possible. Problem is that my parents' genes don't allow for much relaxation and I am sure Nathalie will agree that I am pretty much incapable of just lounging around all day.

We flew out of Houston early Sunday morning on Continental flight C001, and naturally we were the first ones of the group at the airport. A little over 2 hours before departure, she puts up with a lot ;). Actually I think my mother couldn't wait to get us out of the house so she could have Sebastian all to herself, love you mom. The flight over to Honolulu was good, smooth until the landing which was a little rough. We then spent a couple of hours at a bar in the Honolulu airport waiting for our connecting flight to Kona. The view was beautiful from the plane as we began to climb, then suddenly we heard a very loud "BANG" and one of the engines sputtered. Not good. Definitely one of those moments you feel the hair stand up on your arms. The pilot turned us around and we headed back to Honolulu, funny thing was this landing was smoother then the first. After an hour in the airport they pulled up another plane and off we were to the Big Island.

We were up Monday morning and headed north to Hawi (prnounced Havi) for a day of zipline! We had two amazing guides they really made us feel welcome and also made the trip so much fun. As you can see from our helmets our names were Koko (Nathalie) and Sassy (me). Actually in the video you can hear the guide call e Sassy.

Tuesday was a relaxing day, we didn't plan anything other then a nice dinner at the Canoe House at the resort. The view was absolutely gorgeous...and yes we definitely need to upgrade our camera.

Wednesday I had a meeting for the morning so Nathalie spent all morning at the salon getting her hands and feet pampered along with a hair cut. That evening we loaded up into buses and headed down to Kona Village for a luau to taste some local foods.

Thursday we had some wonderful massages. What we thought was a couples' massage didn't end up being one. We then drove down south to Kona to see the town and try out a sushi joint recommended to us by our waitress at the Canoe House. Not only was it great sushi the rolls were HUGE!!! (That's what she said). That night after some driving around in the Kings and Queens markets we enjoyed a bottle of wine and some really good room service.

Friday was another beach day, Nathalie an I went with a couple friends to snorkel. My co-worker Tyler found this amazing place not far from the resort. I felt as though we were swimming in an aquarium. Friday afternoon Nathalie fell asleep on a lounge chair and burned the tops of her legs pretty good. So needless to say we didn't do a lot after dinner, mostly rub aloe vera gel on her legs.

Saturday we enjoyed one last breakfast at the resort dinning area and then up to the room to pack and get ready for a very long trip back home.

It was a wonderful week and both of us were ready to come home and see our little boy.

Warren

P.S.

Not to disappoint I also got to see pretty much all of the Ironman world championship race course, I can only imagine how hard that course must be to complete. Below is a picture of the swim start that I snapped while in Kona.

Think about this...

Here is your warning...I (Nathalie) am going to get on a soap box for a minute so if you don't like what I say, get over it. :) This also means my thoughts will be all over the place.

Jamie Oliver's TED Prize wish: Teach every child about food | Video on TED.com

A lot of people wonder why we take the extra time and effort to cook our meals and eat cleaner when we could be doing more "fun" things. Our long term health and making an investment for my family's bodies is extremely important to us. Yes it costs us more money, but in the end we see the savings not having to go to the doctor as many times and take loads of medication. Since Sebastian was born, 18 month ago, we have only taken him to the doctor TWICE (outside his usual checkups) for being sick. These days that is unheard of. No ear infections either.

The video above is only a snipet of what we should be looking into. This one has recently impacted me the most.

http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S26/91/22K07/index.xml?section=topstories

Read this to about see recent finding on high fructose corn syrup. Yes, in moderation is OK, as the commercials tell us...but have you thought about what it is all in??? EVERYTHING! So there goes the moderation people! Being a huge Food Network fan, I catch episodes of Unwrapped every now and then when washing dishes. It makes me so sick to my stomach when they start listing out the ingredients of the foods they are "unwrapping". Almost 99% of the time, there is some level of high fructose corn syrup. Our bodies just weren't made to digest corn very well, ever think about that? Gross I know, but think about it when you visit the throne next time.

Anyhow, I got to get back to work. I'm sure I will come back to this again.

Halloween!!!!

Yeah, yeah, yeah we know it's a bit late but after so many requests and finally getting the littleman to sleep here are the pictures from our wonderful Halloween ;). So we will start with all the yummy stuff.

Nathalie made an army of little ghost meringues! They came out perfect, of course :).

Werewolf cupcakes, these were a huge hit with the kiddos on the block, and some of the parents.

It's simply amazing what you can do to a cupcake with some marshmallows, fruit roll ups and icing.

Cookies!!! We ended up having so many we had to take them to work but they tasted even better than they looked.

Some Photos of Sebastian in his little ducky costume, mom and dad as well (just not in duck costumes).

Second try at Triathlon

Yeah I know this one's a little late and it's being posted after my third race, but beggars can't be choosers :)

Race report!

The Clear Lake International was this past Saturday (08/22/09), it was my second triathlon and what an improvement over my first. They had two races an Olympic (1.2K swim, 40K bike, 10K run) and a Sprint (750M Swim, 30K bike, 5K run), seeing as I just started this sport I raced in the Sprint. Also since this sprint was much longer then my first I am basing my comparison on average speed in each part of the race. Overall I did very well considering I estimated the race would take me 1hour and 45 minutes but I finished in just 1:34:12, I was totally shocked when I crossed that finish line and looked down at my watch. I finished up in 63^rd place out of approx. 235 racers in the sprint and I was 8^th in my age group (Male 25-29) out of 26. So all in all I really can’t complain about my performance.

My swim wave was the very last swim wave of the day to hit the water. This was my first open water swim so I positioned myself near the back left of the group. I was hoping this position would keep me from getting kicked or punched when the gun went off, boy was I wrong. After the first 100 meters or so things cleared up until I felt my hand smack the top of a rock. I found out after the race I wasn’t the only person to have a close encounter with this rock, and I was one of the more fortunate ones to have only a minor injury (more on that later). Other than that I only ran into the occasional person either swimming across my path or swimming slower then I (I passed quite a few people from the wave before ours), but I excited the water in 00:15:20. This was just as fast as my previous race (approx. 00:02:03 per 100M) except this time I wasn’t gasping for air and my transition from swim to bike went very smooth and I was out on the bike in 00:01:33.

As I hopped onto the bike I was feeling pretty good, I hadn’t forgotten my water bottle this time (the one big mistake of my first race) so I quickly downed a few ounces to wash out some of the nasty salt water I drank on the swim. That’s when I realized my hand felt weird (the one that hit the rock), and I looked down to see a nice gash down the middle of my palm. It wasn’t too deep and it wasn’t bleeding, well not anymore at least, so I just kept on going. Around mile 12 I was able to get a gel down with a few more ounces of water to start the run well hydrated. I slipped my feet out of the shoes as I came to the last 400 meters or so of the bike portion and prepared myself for transition 2.

After slipping on my running shoes I grabbed my race number and hat and took off on the run. Upon exciting the transition area I checked my watch and saw my T2 (transition 2) time of 00:00:52 with a total time of 1hour 8 minutes, all I remember thinking was “that can’t be right!” J My 30K bike time was 00:49:51!!!! I averaged 22.4mph which was a 6mph difference from my first race (I averaged 16.4 in my first tri). Talk about an improvement, I was expecting to keep my speed around 19mph.

So off I go with good ol’ spaghetti legs on the run, the first half mile is the worst. If you have ever seen one of those National Geographic videos where the new born giraffe tries to walk for the first time; well that’s about how I feel for the first half mile. Finally the blood works it’s way back down my legs and I start to pick up the pace, all I can think about at this point is the turn around at 2.5K. Finally just up ahead I can see the turn around and looking down at my watch it’s only been 12 minutes, which means I am also beating my estimated 30 minute run time! As I pass back through the water/Gatorade area I grab one last cup of water drink half and pour the other half over my head, my mind is set on the last mile that lays ahead. The 7^thplace finisher must have passed me during that last mile of the run because he was only about 30 seconds ahead of me, and I was ahead of him when we started the run. Crossing the finish line felt great, especially when I saw a total time of 01:34:12, 11 minutes ahead of my estimated finish. My 5K run time was 00:26:35 which means I was running 00:08:35 miles (I ran 00:09:29 miles during my first race), and it was apparent my training has me headed in the right direction.

Katy Triathlon

This past Sunday (10/25/2009) was my third sprint triathlon and final race of the season. To finish it off with a bang David, my brother-in-law, joined me for what would be his first race.

The morning for us started at 4:45am and it was chilly, around 58F, but by the time the race start was nearing it must have warmed up to around 65-70F. Still the water was a good 71-72F, and for a south Texas boy that means keep you eyes pealed for icebergs. At these water temps a wet suit is just about necessary but it's also one piece of equipment neither of us own. At most races they allow competitors to get in a swim warm up, but for some reason this time they were not permitted. At the time I thought this was odd but didn't realize until after the gun went off just how much this would affect my overall swim.

Swim start:

We had approx. 3 mins between each wave of swimmers to get our body acclimated to the water temp. I found out really quick that 3 minutes was not enough time and after the first 100M or so the cold hit me like a brick wall. It felt as if my lung capacity dropped to about 30%, I couldn't even catch my breath with my head above water doing the breast stroke. Not a good way to start a race, but I made it to the swim exit in 00:11:32 (about 2:18 100M times). Not good, I was expecting a 10 minute swim, but I was just happy to be out of the water and onto the bike.

Transition 1:

I was back out on the bike in 00:02:03 which isn't as good as the last race but after the swim it didn't matter. I wasn't as cold as I thought I would be getting out of the water. David was getting on his socks as I grabbed my bike to exit transition, I was glad to see he made it through the swim in one piece.

Bike start:

Once I got out of the neighbor hood the wind hit me, and I imediately knew this would be a much slower race then that last one. But I pushed through the wind and finished the 15 mile bike in 00:47:58 (ave 18.8MPH). I didn't see David on the bike but he finished not too far behind me with an average of 18.1MPH, way to go David that's awesome!

Transition 2:

I know it sounds odd but this was the highlight of my race, 00:00:45! My fastest transition time ever, and I was off on the run.

Run Start:

This is where the mental part of the race really starts to take affect, your tired, everything seems to hurt and all you can think about is the finish line and that you just got passed by another guy in your age group :(. Not that I am a terrible runner, I just seem to lose the most places on the run. This time around I started to cramp up on the last half mile and it took everything I had left to keep stride and finish the race. I finished the 5K in 00:26:08 (approx. 8:43 per mile), hopefully with more training next year I can get these times down.

In all I finished with a time of 01:28:27 placing 264 out of 590 and David finished up at 349 with a total time of 01:32:48, which is fantastic! I am sure he is now addicted like me ;).

~ Warren

Happy Birthday J-Dad!

Here are a couple of videos for you! Hope you have a wonderful birthday!

XOXOXO,

Warren, Nathalie and Sebastian

The first one is of Sebastian getting a little excited about Go, Diego Go!

The second is of him playing with a ball and Warren chasing him with the camera yesterday.

Day of Rest

One thing we planned on doing while here was rest, and we finally got it! Saturday night was the last night of the EVE Online Fanfest and we arrived back at our hotel around 2am. With nothing to get up for on Sunday we managed to sleep until noon which was "AWESOME" as Nathalie put it. So for the remainder of the day we planned to walk the streets of Reykjavik and see what else this wonderful island has to offer, maybe even try a little Puffin (we had Minke whale just the other night).