These 3 pictures pretty much summarize Kevin’s 3rd birthday party. Two weeks ago, we invited a small group of friends over to celebrate Kevin’s birthday. The big surprise was a clown riding a unicycle up the street. The kids were amazed!!! The video clip below captures the highlights from the party and especially the reaction of the kids to the mystery clown guy riding up our street!  Kevin and his friends had an excellent time.

The month started with Easter weekend.  The family went to church and the boys got to sit on the Easter bunny’s lap. Later we enjoyed family time at Grandma and Grandpa’s house making Easter eggs.

Baby Ryan continues to grow. At almost exactly 6 months he started sitting up. He’s now working on crawling and it won’t be long till he’s got it mastered. He’s very strong. We’ve actually witnessed him ‘planking’ several times, ready to do a pushup! Below he is demonstrating his new sitting skills wearing one of Nanny’s Easter present outfits.

Kevin continues his obsession with power tools. At our last little backyard party he begged me to get his edger out so that he could show everyone how he uses it. Below he’s showing off his edging outfit.

Two days after Daddy’s birthday he celebrated by doing the first triathlon of the season. The entire family came down to watch. 

Of course the most exciting part of the race for Kevin was his very first chance to sit on a real motorcycle. He and Mom talked to a policeman and he let Kevin sit on his motorcycle for more than an hour….he didn’t even remember I was racing he was having so much fun!

The next weekend was our 4th annual Great Race brunch.  We had a great group again this year and everyone enjoyed the race and the great food afterwards. Below are a few pictures from the event.

Before the race.

Heather and Dave at the finish line.

The group running 6 miles back to our house after the race.

Ryan and Kevin have fun at the post race party!

The same weekend as the Great Race party we took some time to do a little “photoshoot” with Ryan. Some of the pictures were used for the comparision photos in the previous post  Here are a few of the other good ones.

To get fueled up for the Sunday race, Heather and I went out to dinner on Friday night to celebrate my birthday. We went to a restaurant we have heard a lot about but have never been to; La Foret. We had a great time in a quiet restaurant while Grandma and Grandpa were nice enough to put the kids to bed. 

Race morning I made the 40 minute drive south to Uvas Reservoir.

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A lot of us were very familiar with the course since this is the same location as another race that takes place later in the year. This particular race is new this year. It’s put on by a new race management company made up of a number of local triathletes and is called  Threshold Racing

I don’t think I was really ready to race an Olympic Distance race this early in the season, but thought it would be “fun” to see where I am fitness wise. 

While I got ready for the race, the rest of the family was driving down together to be spectators.  My swim wave was only 10 minutes away when I spotted them on the bank of the reservoir. Below I am getting some last minute race advise from Kevin and Ryan before I head to the starting line!

There were only 5 start waves in the race and the “old men” were last; 45 and older. I saw a lot of familiar faces in the water as we were getting ready to start. There was a lot of joking going on just 15 seconds before the race. Of course there were also plenty of nervous looks on others faces and all our joking around was probably not helping them concentrate

The swim went well and I headed out for a little 40k bike ride. For the entire hour I was out on the bike, Kevin was sitting on a police motorcycle. He and his mom approached a policeman because Kevin is obsessed with motorcycles. It took a little warming up before he got the nerve to sit on it, but after that there was no getting him off of it. He talked about it for days after the race.

While Kevin sat on the motorcycle, Ryan was happy to just watch the race and enjoy an early morning prune snack.

I felt pretty good the entire way on the bike. I purposely started out a bit reserved since I knew I hadn’t been biking enough to really pound a 40k from start to finish.

The run was tough. I could tell it was just a bit early in the season to have a solid race start to finish. Nevertheless I had a good time and it was fun to see the whole family at the finish line!

After the race, “Team TRIbe” enjoy pizza and strawberries from the post race food tent. It turned out to be a perfect April day for a race, sunny and near 70 degrees.

So now at least I know I have a little work to do before the rest of the season arrives. I have 2 fun races coming up in May…both shorter distance than this one:

1) Angels Camp – My annual trip to Gold Country in CA with Rad and friends to do a low key, fun race.

2) Got the Nerve – This will be the 2nd annual trip to Pennsylvania on Memorial Day weekend to visit the family and do a little race while we are there.

Of course I’m still hosting a local triathlon results website bayareatri.com in my “spare” time. Below is a graph from the website showing where I finished relative to everyone else in the Reservoir Triathlon. I just noticed it also gives away my true age!!

In the midst of the chaos, we managed to “pile” all the grandkids on the couch for a picture.  From left to right:  Ryan LeRoy on Taryn Fortunati’s lap, Mae Steenhausen on Sarah Fortunati’s lap, Kevin LeRoy on Paige Fortunati’s lap, Ryan Chadda on Nathan Chadda’s lap, Lily Steenhausen laying across Jacob Steenhausen’s lap, Alec Fortunati, Ben Chadda. 

A few things to note:

- the Gestures game in the foreground.  We actually played with all these kids – each kid got to pick out their own cards and take a turn. 

- Ben Chadda has one of his Grandma’s shirts on (with a big paperclip holding it together in the back) because he soaked his own shirt with blood from a head-butting accident

- This is the only picture in which Alec Fortunati wasn’t holding his hands over his ears because Lily Steenhausen was screaming so loud

- Ryan LeRoy was mid-diaper change, which explains the nakedness

- Maureen Clark’s house will never be the same!

We have several “outtakes” of this photo.  Funny enough, these are the best ones.    Ryan Chadda (left) never cried through the whole progression, but he did wonder what the heck was wrong with everyone else!  Lily Steenhausen (center) did not enjoy herself; and in the 3 minutes we spent taking pictures she went from screaming (top picture) to asleep (bottom picture).  Ryan ranged from neutral to unhappy.

Now you’d think there would only be a few crazy people out there willing to join you for that kind of “celebration”. Below are 10 people who knew what they were getting into and all seem to be smiling prior to the start.

(left) Eduard, the birthday boy is showing everyone how it’s done. (right) Fred and Staffan make it look easy.

Here is a nice shot from the bleachers of the whole group coming around the track with Fred and Eduard leading the way.  Thanks to Conrad for taking such great pictures. See everyone next year for 43!