Turkey Trot--Thanksgiving Day 2008

This is the chaos I speak of. Note the kids just running loose, the adults lined up yelling and photographing. This is like 1/10 of the chaos that ensued at the end of the race!

Jillian and Ava show off their medals

Ava running her little heart out

Jillian holding on to our friend from church

The so-called "staging area"

Eli on a rare moment when I let him out of the stroller

A family shot before Jon's race

Jon, Ava and Jillian participated in their first ever Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving Day this year. Jon ran his first 10K and the girls ran a short foot race. It was a truly chaotic day. First of all, who knew so many people liked to run? And on a national holiday at that? The place was packed. We got Dad all set up for his run and then the girls and I waited around for their foot race to begin. Now when you become a parent you realize that all non-parents have no clue when it comes to children. Get this: you were supposed to put your race numbers on your child and then leave them in a staging area arranged by age. So Ava went to one area and Jillian to another. They would then run the race by age. The youngest went first. They would start it and the kids were supposed to run in a straight line for the finish which was a huge grassy area full of people, parents and non-parents alike. Then you were supposed to somehow just find your parent before the next set of kids was released. It was insanity and chaos all rolled up in one nice package. I was so stressed primarily because Jon was not back yet, I was holding Eli and I had to be in four places at the same time: Ava's staging area, Jillian's staging area, the finish line and the starting gate for the next race. I was about in tears as I was terrified to leave any of the kids alone with the mobs of people around. Fortunately, at that moment, I saw a family from church and I yelled out to them. They willingly took Jillian from me to the start of her race so I could wait at the end to catch her. Ava, well, you take a chance with the oldest and I left her alone in the staging area and told her to stay put. What else could I do? Just as Jilly was about to run Jon showed up. Thank God because just as I expected, it was pandominium as parents swarmed in to take pictures and shout at the kids and then it was a mob scene as about 50 two and three year olds ran to the finish line where parents were yelling, workers were steering them to grab medals and relatives were greedily grabbing the treat bags for the kids. Words cannot express what a scene this was. Think hundreds of large adults and fifty little children while loud music played and people were grabbing kids left and right and rushing the treat booths for medals while they start the next race to add another 75 kids to the mix. I think the kids had fun, I'm not sure. The coolest part for them was that their paranoid mother wrote her cell phone number in pen all the way up their forearms so that I could be called if we had been separated. They showed everyone all day. Oh, and Jon? He ran his 10K in 57:56 minutes or 9:20/mile.