savor it

2014 was a big year for us. We dove into our third year of teaching. We finished up grad school. We found out that we are expecting a new little adventure buddy in May of 2015. With all of the amazing things that have been going on, it has been easy to just let the time slip by. 

It would be easy to continue in this manner too. Even though we will no longer have grad school taking up whatever free time we thought we had before, we will always find ways to fill our time - with adventures, with good books, with creating, with long runs - but will we be approaching each of these activities with purpose? Will we be living in the moment, or letting the moments pass us by? 

These past couple of years we have taken advantage of our location and have ended one year and begun the next by doing something that we love - running (or walking, or hobbling, depending on the time of day). We have surrounded ourselves with a community of crazy runners as we ring in the New Year as a part of Aravaipa Running's Across the Years 24-hour event. This is a great opportunity to meet other runners, have thought provoking conversations, and push yourself to the limit. During these past two years I have had the opportunity to engage with some very interesting people, and this year I was left pondering two words: savor it. 

Throughout the first 15 hours of the event I found myself chatting with a fellow runner, Cliff, whenever our paces matched up. Cliff is full of motivational wisdom, and at one point he shared the story of his first 50 mile race and being told to savor the final 1.5 miles (or so). This sounded as odd to me as I am sure it did to him when he first heard the words, but as he explained what happened during those final footfalls of the race, no two words have ever sounded sweeter. He savored those final miles and as a result, the time flew by and he was finished before he knew it, leaving the pain of so many completed miles behind and taking in the experience as opposed to suffering through it. After all, as he later pointed out, there isn't anyone forcing us to do these crazy things that we do (such as signing up for 24-hour events), so why not savor the moment?

speaking of crazy... midnight in the cold... before running my first mile of the new year

 As I continued moving through the event, I found myself returning to these words over and over again. However, I was not thinking of them with regards to the race itself, but with regards to life. How often have I been guilty of pushing through or suffering through, and not savoring the blessings that have been laid before me? As I pondered these words, I thought about the year to come, about living with intention, and about being in the moment. I thought about other wise words that have been shared with me by friends and the conversations that have arisen as the result of my pregnancy. I thought about books that I have read that portray women suffering through their pregnancies and not savoring the miracle that their body is capable of creating. After all, when you're walking around in the middle of the night you have a lot of time to think.

And so, I now find myself approaching this new year with a new outlook - savor it. What a simple mantra to bring me back to the moment. As we meander through life we can never experience the same moment twice, so why not savor each and every one. The good and the bad. The celebrations and the challenges. The ups and the downs. After all, the good wouldn't be quite as good without the bad, and we learn more about ourselves and about life when we encounter struggle. And with these thoughts (if you have managed to suffer through my ramblings up to here), I challenge you to savor it. Savor the moment, the day, the year, your life. After all, we only have one life, why not savor it?

pausing to savor the first sunrise of 2015

love

This afternoon I opened up a National Geographic catalogue that I got in the mail and turned immediately to a page that was selling Kanji birthstone necklace pendants. I spotted April's and thought, that looks familiar. And it was. The symbol for April was love.

Once upon a time I broke up with my high school sweetheart and my amazing friends in college bought me a necklace with the Kanji symbol for love on it. I loved the symbol and the simplicity of the necklace and wore it day in and day out for the next five years (with a brief respite where I wore a turtle necklace that I got on a trip to Hawaii because my sister's favorite animal is a turtle and it made me feel close to her at a time when I moved across the country). Then one day my necklace broke.

My necklace broke on January 3, 2006. I know this because it happened when I took off a hoodie before bed on the day that I began my Team Leader year of AmeriCorps*NCCC. I'm not generally a superstitious person, but I will say that I find it coincidental that the day that my Love necklace broke was the day that I met my mister. Perhaps it was the universe's way of saying that I didn't need a necklace to remind me that I was loved anymore. 

Whatever the case, the mister and I started going on runs together (probably the fastest I have ever run in my life and the slowest he ever ran willingly), going on hikes, and throwing the occasional date night in to get away from our campus. And while we may not run together very often anymore, we do still go on hikes and have an occasional date night to get away from teaching and grad school. 

And here we are, eight years later, and I still don't need a necklace to remind me that I am loved. I am reminded every day by my amazing mister. But sometimes it is nice to be reminded of where you came from and how you got to where you are.

Life is an adventure. It is not about everything always fitting neatly in a box or about following a plan to the T. It is about embracing what you encounter, living in the moment, and being willing to take on whatever comes your way because in the end every moment of every day shapes who you are and how you view life. And I choose to embrace my adventure in love and all of the amazing things that have happened in my life because of it.

for the love of seuss

In preparation for Dr. Seuss's birthday, I led my first ever author study. We began on Monday by looking at the a timeline of Dr. Seuss's life on seussville.com. This fantastic website has everything Seuss that you could possibly want to share with a classroom full of kinders. They loved the animations and we followed it up by reading Dr. Seuss's first children's book, Dr. Seuss's ABC.

Throughout the remainder of the week we continued to learn about the many components of Dr. Seuss's creations. We learned about the characters, about settings, and most importantly, about rhymes and word families. This author study doubled as my introduction to word families. Perhaps this is a little later than some kinder teachers' introduction of word families, but I think the foundations that have been laid led to a quick mastery and a topic that will now be a part of our weekly word work. 

Yesterday we wrapped up the week by reading Bartholomew and the Oobleck. If you haven't read this Seuss classic, you really should. It is a lot of fun and you can extend the reading by making oobleck! Yesterday we had an entertaining reading, full of silly voices and then we did "science" and made our own oobleck. It was amazing how many of my kiddos kept saying, "my mom will get so mad at my mess." I assured them that science was supposed to be messy, and that their moms would not get mad because I was the one cleaning up the mess, not them.

When I look back at the week, I think there was a tie between Bartholomew and the Oobleck  and Wacky Wednesday for the book of choice. The kiddos loved looking through Wacky Wednesday for all of the silly pictures that didn't make sense. Unfortunately, I only had one copy of the book so the kiddos were crawling over one another to see the pages. Next year I'll get a couple of copies from the library and have them work in small groups.

All in all, I think our Dr. Seuss study was a success. Happy Birthday to you (tomorrow) Dr. Seuss! And, thank you for sharing your imagination with so many generations and inspiring young readers. My class was asking all week if they could look at Dr. Seuss books whenever they had free time. Reading success!

Our March bulletin board, a small selection of Dr. Seuss stories, word family hats, and oobleck!

can i read

Earlier this year I was told that when my students are completing a task, they need to walk away with something. I followed the advice that was given to me by a veteran teacher, for a while, and found that this is not always the case.

When I received this advice, it was following an observation of my language arts class. For an hour, during this class, my students rotate through centers, spending fifteen minutes at each center. One center is independent reading. The observing teacher informed me that my students should not be reading just because, that they needed to walk away from the center with a finished product. I tried having them write in journals for a while about what they read; I tried having them do partner reading; in the end, I realized what their finished product truly is.

They love to read. 

My students will come up to me whenever they finish an assignment and ask, "Can I go to the library?" or, "Can I go to books?" or, "Can I read?" They may not be walking away from their fifteen minutes with a paper in hand, but they are walking away with a love of reading. They are gaining confidence in their skills and they get so excited when they can complete a smooth read of a book. 

Our classroom library (rather, a third of it!)

For me, the finished product is that I am helping to develop a new generation of readers. 

breathe

Sometimes, we just need to breathe. I have been noticing lately that I have been getting frustrated with my kinders that just aren't getting it. I think that the reason I am getting so frustrated is because so many of my little learners do get it. Yet, there are three that just baffle me. I keep trying and trying, and still, nothing.

One of my grad classes this semester is on the psychology of learning. I really do try to employ best practices every day, during every lesson that I teach. I keep things moving, I try to keep the kiddos involved, there are hands on activities. I try to create lessons that appeal to different learning styles and abilities. And, for 14 out of my 17 students, they get it. And, they get it fast. And then there are those three that just do not get it. Not through regular instruction, not with modifications, not with additional small group instruction, not with guided practice, not with intervention work. And I get frustrated. I shake my head. And then I ask myself why.

Yesterday I was reflecting on the week. I thought about how my emerging students (those that are just above my struggling learners) and about how we laughed in small group when they were working on figuring out consonant blends. They made silly comments, I laughed at their reasoning and corrected them, and then, when they had their reading assessment on Friday, they were all proficient.

This got me thinking that maybe I just need to breathe. I need to relax. I need to have fun. While they may not be getting the instruction that I am providing, maybe if my kinders have a personal connection to the material through laughter something will click. And, laughter is a much better response in education than frustrated head shakes.

spring

I may be jumping the gun a bit here, but it seems as if spring has come to Gallup. Last week we had afternoons in the fifties, contrasting heavily with the mornings in single digits, but that's spring in the desert. 

Spring has also come to the Hall House. With this spring semester we found ourselves exhausted by the start of a new semester of grad school and we found ourselves sifting through items that we rarely use and making trips to Goodwill to donate that which was still in good condition. (We even managed to drop off our goodies without going in to replace it all, as is our usual modus operandi.)

It has been fortunate that we had a three-day weekend following our first week back to our very busy lives. We have been allowed to mix work with fun, cleaning with relaxing, and all in all, have a pretty balanced weekend. Sure, there are chapters to read and papers to write, but we're taking things at a more relaxed pace which is nice.

For me, this is quite the change. Perhaps a good one. I generally go full force, right out of the gate. But, maybe after so many years of go, go, go, I'm figuring out how to apply my slow and steady running strategy to life. When I have a due date that is several weeks away, I don't need to be working on the assignment now. I can balance my drive to be successful in school with the joy that I find in long, lazy runs and afternoons of crafting.

Spring is here. A time of new growth, of blossoms, of sunny afternoons. For me, it may just mean a time of growth in how I approach life. Spring is good.

end of year adventures

We try our hardest to live life to the fullest in the Hall house. That typically means that we do not allow ourselves much down time, because there is so much out there to see, do, and explore. This year we have crammed as much as possible into our two-week winter vacation.

Following our brief stay with the Nebraska Halls, we embarked on yet another adventure, to make sure that 2013 ended with a bang. We began by stopping off at Fort Union National Monument in northern New Mexico on our drive home. We were both unaware that the Civil War took place this far west and enjoyed the little history lesson that we got there. We spent a lot of time talking about how differently historic structures were made, comparing the longevity of Puebloan sites and these Anglo sites. The Puebloan structures have withstood the tests of time and the elements much better than their Anglo counterparts. It's worth checking out and comparing them yourself if you are ever out west. New Mexico has a good supply of both kinds of historic sites.

Fort Union National Monument

Fort Union National Monument

Our next adventure took place in the outskirts of Flagstaff a couple of days later. We visited Sunset Crate Volcano National Monument and Wupatki National Monument, enjoying a variety of landscapes and nearly every type of ecosystem on the 35 mile loop road between the two sites. At Sunset Crater we were amazed at the towering mounds of cinders. At Wupatki we were once again taken away by the structural integrity of Puebloan buildings. The two locations were breathtaking in different ways and left us wishing that we had had more time to explore, but alas, we had one more adventure to squeeze in before the end of 2013.

Twisty Trees at Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument

Wupatki National Monument

It's a good thing we're not very big people!

Wupatki National Monument

Upon leaving the Flagstaff area we drove south to Glendale, home of Camelback Ranch, the spring training site for the White Sox and the Dodgers, and of course to Across the Years! Our final adventure of the year was to test ourselves in the 24-hour endurance run at this fantastic event. We got into town Monday evening and camped out (another bonus! one more night of camping in 2013!) before the 9AM start on Tuesday morning.

As the name suggests, Across the Years is a run from one year into the next. The event consists of 24-, 48-, 72-hour runs and a 6 day run. We clearly took the easy way out by only doing the 24-hour event! Everything was incredibly well run (no pun intended, but it is there none-the-less) and I was impressed by the thought that the Coury family and Aravaipa Running put into every component of the week-long event. The food was fantastic, warming tents were available, and the first aid support was by far the best I have experienced at a running event.

The start of the 12/31 24-hour event

Motivation from the families/friends of runners 

Inspiring race participants

For me, the beginning of the 24-hours was fantastic. Going from our home elevation of 6500 feet to the nice thick air at 1100 feet was a blessing and a curse. I knocked out some quick for me miles, walked some, and ran some, and walked some more. Until I simply could not run any more. Never having run in an ultra event, I hadn't really come in with a great strategy for doing anything in particular. Mostly I had just wanted to cover 50 miles. I did achieve that goal. I had also decided that I wanted to move for the whole 24-hours. I made it close to that one. My lack of planning early on left me with super tight hip flexors which rendered me nearly motionless as I embarked on my final lap of the event. I had decided to push on, but my inability to move very well meant that I was not staying warm and the shivering that commenced made my hip flexors even more painful. An hour and a half and one mile later I crawled into the warming tent and called it quits at 21.5 hours and just under 57 miles. I learned my lesson and have a better idea of what I can do next year to make things go more smoothly (hopefully). The mister ended up with just over 71 miles and lessons learned as well. 

Ready to toast to the New Year! Sparkling cider and champagne for all!

Happy New Year!

Yes, the New Year did happen to fall on hump day - thanks to the support crew at this table for evoking smiles

We're now home and recovered and preparing ourselves for the second half of the school year as well as a whole new year of adventuring. Time flies when you're having fun!

This is what my recovery looked like shortly after arriving home

Happy New Year to All!

[belated] thanksgiving

Once upon a time I mentioned that I would write about the epic adventure that occurred over Thanksgiving vacation. Since that time life has been quite crazy, a little out of control, and of course, full of adventure. Now that things are slowing down a little bit, here is a glimpse of the adventuring that took place when my parents came to town.

We were fortunate to have the whole week of Thanksgiving off, which meant that we were able to squeeze in quite a bit when my parents visited. Their first full day in town we took it easy, thanks to being snowed in more or less. The mister and I went for a snowy morning run, and then we all went out for a delicious breakfast at the Plaza. If ever you are in Gallup and it is breakfast time, I highly recommend stopping by either location and ordering the french toast, or the huevos rancheros, or an omelette, or a burrito, really, it is all excellent. They are famous for their french toast though, it is out of this world. The rest of the day progressed with movie watching, game playing, and catching up after not seeing each other for a long time.

On Monday morning, we ate some breakfast and then hit the road. We headed west with the Grand Canyon as our destination. Our journey, however, also included a visit to Petrified Forest National Park. An hour outside of Gallup we hit our first stop. Mom and dad were introduced to the painted desert, we met a cool park ranger, we did a little bit of hiking, and hit up old Route 66. 

Painted Desert

Route 66 (in case you couldn't guess)

Dad on Route 66

In front of one of the massive petrified trees at the park

After leaving the "forest," we continued our journey west and took the scenic route from Flagstaff up to the Grand Canyon. Even for being late in the season the park was packed. We got a quick peek into the canyon before the sun went down and then had dinner at the Bright Angel Lodge. The service wasn't great, the food was mediocre, and I guess that was a good predictor for the rest of our stay at the park.

Tuesday morning we were all up dark and early to embark on our most enduring adventure of the week. For mom, dad and I, the destination was the Colorado River. For the mister, the goal was Rim to Rim to Rim. As the sun began to show itself we snapped some quick photos and then began our descent. The mister took off and the rest of us took it all in. The canyon is deep, that is for sure. Beyond that, I cannot honestly say that I think it is so grand. Perhaps after all of the adventures and amazing places that the mister and I have had the honor of experiencing, this was not on the top of the list. Maybe it is because the park is so commercialized and overrun with people. I don't know (though I will say, since our visit we have seen photos from other parts of the park, and maybe we were just in the wrong place?), but we still enjoyed ourselves, so I can't really complain.

Ready to hike! (and run as the case may be)

We were all on the Bright Angel Trail which goes down, and down, and down, as you would expect when dropping into a canyon of immense proportions. We watched the strata in the rock change as the age of the formations changed. We enjoyed watching the colors changes as the sun continued to rise high into the sky. We talked, and laughed, and had a great time being together. Before we knew it we had hit our stride, were passing other groups that had left before us, and the Colorado was in sight. Checking our watches we decided to push for the suspension bridge and have lunch on the river bank before beginning our climb out of the canyon.

Mom and Dad at the Colorado River

On our return hike we kept a slow and steady pace, allowing us to complete the ~18 mile round trip adventure in about 11 hours. We were happy to see the top after what seemed like an endless climb and were excited when we sat down to dinner, though a little concerned for the missing mister. We filled our bellies though and while we were waiting for dessert I went out to investigate some "really awesome lights down in the canyon" that a kid at another table was talking about. Sure enough, I could see the mister's lights making progress up the trail and went back in to enjoy my sundae. As we wrapped up the meal, the mister was at the top and I had his dinner, hot from the oven, ready to take back to our room.

Almost to the top!

Chris finishing his R2R2R adventure

The next morning we grabbed one last meal at the Bright Angel Lodge and then began our return to civilization. Our first stop was at Walnut Canyon National Monument, just outside of Flagstaff. It is a small canyon, but incredibly impressive and historic with the remnants of cliff dwellings all around. We stretched our legs by climbing around in yet another canyon and enjoyed the breathtaking views. Upon completing our visit there, we stopped in Winslow, Arizona for lunch and to check out The Eagles landmark.

Walnut Canyon 

At Standing on a Corner (in Winslow Arizona)

One might think that this is where our adventures ended, but no. They continued once we got back into Gallup. On Thanksgiving we worked up an appetite by running in a Turkey Trot and then climbing Pyramid Rock. Then we had a traditional New Mexican enchilada dinner (it was the easies thing to do and accommodate gluten-free and vegetarian diets). More games followed before digging into our garbanzo bean and black bean brownie sundaes. It was a very relaxing and enjoyable day.

Mom and Dad made it to the top of Pyramid (even with snow, ice, mud, and slippery junk)

Dad's gluten-free vegetarian Thanksgiving (and he was FULL after!)

On Friday, we drove south and visited El Morro National Monument in Ramah. This historic landmark holds the inscriptions of those who passed through the area once upon a time. We were also able to check out some of the Puebloan structures that have been being excavated. We followed our hike up with delicious eats at the Ancient Way Cafe - another place that I highly recommend trying out if you are ever in the area. Everything is phenomenal. On the way home we stopped in Zuni where mom did her Black Friday Shopping (for herself - you can't pass up the amazing deals that she got on some pottery). Then we returned home for some more game time (no, not football, board games).

Checking out El Morro National Monument

On Saturday, mom and dad were scheduled to leave town in the afternoon, which meant that we had time to squeeze in one more hike! We went out to the High Desert and hiked through some amazing freezing fog. Everything was crystalized and beautiful. We enjoyed the quite morning surrounded by nothing but nature. That was heavily contrasted later on when we went to the flea market, but that is what Gallup is. A mix of serenity and crazy. We got both in just a few short hours. One more meal, and then we had to say our good-byes. 

One of the beautiful aspects of hiking in frozen fog

It was a whirlwind of non-stop adventure, and I wouldn't change it for anything. I am so fortunate to have crazy adventuring parents that will go out and squeeze the most out of every day when we only get to see each other about once a year. Granted, after they left I think we all had to take some serious naps, but it was worth it!

cause and effect

The kinders are going crazy. They can taste the looming Thanksgiving vacation. One more day. We can do this.

Today I salvaged our day today by introducing Rube Goldberg machines. We're studying cause and effect this week, so it fit with the curriculum and it enchanted my kinders. They were in heaven. Anyone walking past my classroom at several points during the day would have heard my students oohing and aahing. To make things better, at the end of the day, they could tell me what cause and effect means!

We were without specials this afternoon, so I moved our math interventions to specials time, and then we experimented. My kinders used materials from the classroom to create their own "Rube Goldberg Machines." Now, being kindergarteners, these machines were really more like a mess of materials, but a lot of cause and effect was going on. 

Here's a little snippet of the end of my day. I hope yours was as exciting!

Now that you've seen what my kinders made of Rube Goldberg, if you have never seen one, or didn't realize what you were watching, here is the video that entranced my class.

back at it

Having a three day weekend was such a blessing. I had time to do a little bit of grad school work, to begin making Christmas gifts, and to run a lot. In essence, I had me time. Sometimes as a teacher it is so easy to get wrapped up in the little ones that surround you day in and day out that you put your own needs on the back burner. I was able to rejuvenate and jump right back into the swing of things this morning.

We had a great Tuesday. We talked about the plot in stories, about verbs, about citizenship, and the numbers eighteen and nineteen. The kinders picked up on some of the things, others (such as plot) will take a fair amount of review. Whatever the case, we're back into the swing of things. We have a week and a half to keep on swinging until we're off for a whole week to celebrate Thanksgiving. We'll need to see how quickly we get back into the swing of things after that!

One highlight for today was having one of my little learners write her first name all by herself three times unassisted! We have been working so hard and it seems like this little break was what her brain needed to make things click. Wahoo! Success! This same little learner was also a rock star in small group around the world today. She is finally getting her numbers (1 - 10) down (with the exception of 9). Progress!

around the world

It is recess and I am coming off of an Around the World high. I know that I keep bragging about how awesome my kinders are, but I need to do it again (and I am sure that it is not for the last time).

This morning my kinders were a little full of Friday energy and ended up moving into the "yellow light" as a result. This meant that our class lost five minutes of recess time. To fill that time, and the fifteen minutes before, we did sight word work. First we worked on their word lists for study at home, then we did the high frequency words that we have been working on in class. The students had them down, so we extended our small group Around the World games into a whole group Around the World.

I wasn't too sure how this would work with mixed levels, but all of the students' practice has paid off. We had high levels competing against low levels, and to my surprise and delight, the high levels didn't always win. It was fantastic. The class had tons of energy, sight words were flying, the kinders were having a learning party. It was fantastic. I think that I see more around the world in the future!

inspiring

Today we had parent teacher conferences at my school. It was a busy day, with parents missing appointments then squeezing in later in the day so that I had a line down the hall. In the grand scheme of things though, 15 out of my 18 students' families showed up for the big day (I even completed my final conference in Spanish - always exciting for me). My other three students ended up having to go out of town for family emergencies and so I will check in with them tomorrow afternoon since they are all pick-ups.

When I was talking with my neighboring teacher during a break from the madness, she told me one of the most incredible stories ever. Below is my paraphrasing of this story.

My student's grandmother came in today for her conference and expressed how excited she was that her granddaughter was learning how to read. The grandmother had gone to school and struggled to complete the third grade. When she stopped going to school she also stopped reading.

Now that this woman's granddaughter wants to read, she is needing to learn how to read once again. She pre-reads all of the stories that she will read to her granddaughter and then walks the 1/4 mile down the road to ask her neighbor what the words are. Then she practices so that she can read her granddaughter a bedtime story. The woman expressed that she is beginning to remember the words now and that she is learning how to read again.

How amazing is it that a kindergarten student can inspire an elderly woman to take an interest in reading and re-learn this valuable skill? I feel inspired, to say the least.

writing

Today we wrote and I just could not resist sharing some of my students' creation. This week we are reading a story called Bear Snores On and my kinders are loving it. We decided to take our bear conversations one step further and write about what we would do if we were bears. Some of them got it, some did not. Whatever the case, we wrote happily for 30 minutes.

"I would sleep."

"I would eat fish." (I'm pretty sure no caption was needed here.)

"I'm going to take care of my cub."

"I find berries."

"I went fishing. I got lost because my mom wasn't with me."

Don't you just love it! I know I do!

progress

We have been in school for 10 weeks now and progress is being made. In preparation for parent teacher conferences I have been wrapping up quarterly progress reports on foundational skills. My students are making headway on learning their letter names and sounds. Some have made the jump from zero letters recognized in a minute to fourteen, which is really incredible when they entered school not knowing letters from numbers. Others, that entered school with basic letter knowledge are now approaching sixty letters in a minute. Progress!

While these numbers are fantastic, the thing that has really gotten me excited is seeing actual progress in my students' reading abilities. Today, I had each of my independent readers (13 of 18 in my class) read a new text to me. The story included high frequency words that we have been working on all year along with some new CVC words (words made up of consonant-vowel-consonant combinations) that were composed of letter sounds that we have been working on, such as cap. 

One of my students, one that struggled quite a bit at the beginning of the school year, blew me away today. He nailed his sight words and then successfully sounded out each of his new CVC words. He was a rock star. He read the story from beginning to end and was even able to tell me the main idea of the story. As I said, I was blown away. 

I love that progress is so noticeable in kindergarten. I love my job.

success

On Friday we left town and began our Navajo adventure. We began our journey by stopping in Window Rock, AZ, the capital of the Navajo Nation. We walked through the zoo and enjoyed seeing some of the animals that live in our area - porcupines, owls, elk, mountain lions, black bears, wolves, and bobcats (to name a few). The Navajo Zoo has done a good job of providing the animals with the space and natural environment that thrive in as the park is build into one of the numerous canyons in the area.

Porcupine!

Horned Owl

After leaving the zoo we continued our journey to Chinle, AZ, the home of Canyon de Chelly. The mister checked in for the race and then we set up camp. Thanks to dual management of Canyon de Chelly, we were still able to camp near the mouth of the canyon and the start line of the race. Navajo Nation Parks and Recreation has stepped up in this time of the government shut down and has kept activity in the monument running smoothly. We were able to explore the north side of the canyon after setting up the camp, enjoying that none of the overlooks had been closed as we have heard happening in other areas managed by the National Parks Service.

After our quick tour of the north rim, we returned to the park for the pre-race meeting and an introduction to the Navajo culture by the race director, his father in law, and a resident of the canyon (at other times, a park ranger, but for now, just a resident he pointed out). The Navajo tradition of running was explained to the race participants and their families, a brief history of the canyon and its significance to the Navajo people was described, and a fair number of jokes were shared, and everyone had a great time.

We all retreated to our tents, campers or hotel rooms and prepared for race day. The mister and I ran into town to get some food and then climbed into our tent for a fantastic night of sleep in the cool fall air. When the alarm went off in the morning we were ready to roll. 

The race began with a blessing and prayer ceremony around a bonfire. The racers gathered around to keep warm and to receive a blessing to stay with them throughout their journeys into and out of the canyon. The race course went 17 miles into the canyon, ending at the top of bat trail, and then came back out of the mouth where racers were greeted with mutton stew and fresh fry bread.

Preparing for the blessing and prayer ceremony

At the starting line

The race began at roughly 7:00AM, with the rising of the sun and a great yell by all of the runners. In Navajo tradition, the Gods come out with the sun, and so the people run to greet the Gods. The great yell is a way to clear the lungs after a night of sleep and to present yourself and say, "I am here."

After the runners took off, I drove out to White House Ruins, and hiked down into the canyon where I would be able to see the mister as he came through mile 5.5. He was looking good as he ran through the water and subsequently through his clothes from the cold morning start at me. He continued his journey into the canyon and I stayed at the Ruins for a while talking to the family members of other runners and cheering as more people splashed through the muddy water at the bottom of the canyon.

The mister running at 5.5 miles

White House Ruins

After I while I climbed back out of the canyon, only to hear Shaun, the race director finish up a conversation with two of his cross country athletes - the truck for the next aid station had gotten stuck trying to go up a hill and was only about halfway to where it needed to be. He quickly made a plan with his runners and sent them running back to the truck to execute the plan for providing aid to the runners as they progressed through the canyon.

I climbed out of the canyon and drove further down the south rim and pulled into the Spider Rock overlook. I hiked down to the edge of the rim and stood with a Navajo family for a long time, cheering on the ant sized runners as the passed the base of Spider Rock. I believe that cheering from this location was one of the most enjoyable cheering experiences that I have had at a race. From the top of the canyon you cry out your support and then hear it echoed back about 10 seconds later as it makes its way into the canyon and to the runners. It was fantastic!

Spider Rock

After spotting the mister's bright red cap running back from the turn around I returned to White House Ruins. The hike is so beautiful that it was hard to resist another chance to descend into the canyon. My efforts were blessed with these views:

As I waited at the bottom of the canyon for the mister to come running back through, I kept checking my watch. Based on the times that I had seen him running earlier, his pace had fallen off. At first I had thought that perhaps I had been too slow and missed him coming back through, but I checked with the Navajo family that I had been cheering with earlier and they said that all of the runners that they had seen come through were wearing shirts, so I knew the mister was still out there. He eventually came through, but was hobbling along thanks to an old knee injury that had flared up. However, he pushed on, and eventually made it out of the canyon, rounding out the top third of runners.

The mister coming through the finish line

Receiving his hand beaded turquoise finisher's necklace from Shaun, the RD

After the runners crossed the finish line, they received hand beaded turquoise necklaces. Shaun's (the race director) grandmother made all of the necklaces, with some help from Shaun and other family members. All of the prizes were created by family members and included moccasins, star quilts, necklaces, earrings, bracelets, and photographs of the canyon. After all of the prizes were handed out there was a traditional toss out of other gifts to the runners, including magazine subscriptions, runner's vests, posters, and t-shirts. Not to be forgotten, all of the runners also received their fill of homemade mutton stew (or vegetable stew) and fry bread. Family members could also enjoy these delicious creations by giving a donation to the local cross country programs.

All in all it was a fantastic event, culturally rich and centered on the community. All of the proceeds from the race are going to the local cross country programs, and thanks to some amazing sponsors, I believe that the programs have been really blessed by this event. We cannot wait to go back next year, and I am already thinking that I want one of those finisher's necklaces too. We'll see!

As a follow up to my post prior to our trip, the federal government shutdown has not been able to shut down the Navajo Nation. In this we were truly blessed on this adventure, and look forward to exploring many more cultural landmarks throughout the nation.