Our Christmas Letter 2008

Here is our letter (okay, book!) for the year. Enjoy!

Hello and Happy Holidays to you and your family! Another year has come and gone. A lot has happened in the past 12 months, so we’ll try to get you up to speed as much as a relatively short Christmas letter will allow.

January, February and March had one thing in common: cold. Apparently, it’s like that every year in South Dakota. Go figure. Shannon celebrated her 28th birthday at Applebee’s on January 21st. Not much else went on for the next couple of months; just waiting for spring to come.

Caiden had his 4th birthday on April 1st. He had a Spiderman party with a bunch of his friends. On the 6th, Shannon and her sister Lauren ran the Autism 5K in Rapid City. They both finished in less than 30 minutes for their fastest 5Ks so far. On the 19th, Chris and Shannon, Shannon’s sister, Kelly and her best friend, Lacey all ran at the Kevin Whirlwind Horse race, the 5K for the girls and the 10K for Chris. Shannon set another 5K personal record and ran it in 27:31 and got 2nd in her age group. Chris also set a personal record and finished 3rd overall and 1st in his age group.

May was the month Chris had been looking forward to all year as he was hoping to qualify for the Boston Marathon by running the Colorado Marathon in Fort Collins on May 4th in less than 3 hours and 11 minutes. Mother Nature almost put the kaibash on those plans though, as the Black Hills were hit by the biggest blizzard of the year on the 2nd. A couple of feet of snow fell in Belle Fourche and some places had 5-6 feet. But, the temperature rose quickly after the snow stopped falling and after sneaking around a closed section of interstate in South Dakota, we were able to make it to Fort Collins. Shannon ran a 5K on the 3rd and the kids also ran a ½ mile race that day and got really cool medals. We also visited a petting zoo where Caiden and Chloe got to ride some ponies (Chloe’s favorite animal in the whole world). The night before the marathon we ate dinner with a couple of other runners who Chris had met online. As weird as it sounds, they were very nice and we had a lot of fun. One of them, Dan, had a wife back home in Denver who was expecting their second baby any day. Well, the baby came the next morning while Dan was running the marathon and his wife called Chris’ cell phone to try and get a hold of Dan. Shannon answered and when she saw Dan running toward the finish line she broke the news by yelling “DAN, YOUR SON WAS BORN!!!” It was a good weekend right up until Chris ran the marathon. A lingering cold and stomach issues caught up with him and, although he set a new personal record of 3:18:06, he came up a little over 7 minutes short of Boston. The month ended with Chris’ 30th birthday and Shannon flying to Las Vegas to surprise her mom on her 50th birthday. All four of her siblings were there too and she got see her best friend, Mindy, from high school and they ran a 5K together while Shannon was visiting.

The snow finally went away for good in June. It just rained instead…..a lot. So much that the creek across from our house, which is usually a series of stagnant mud puddles, turned into a raging river and flooded the park and a few houses just down the street from ours. Thankfully, we were high enough that the water didn’t reach our house, but it was closer than we’d like. Chloe’s 3rd birthday just so happened to occur not long before the nearby Deadwood-Mickelson Trail Marathon, so we celebrated by having a Disney Princess carbo-loading party at our house the night before the race. Nothing gets you ready to run a marathon like pink princess birthday cake. A bunch of friends came over including another online friend Chris had run with in Missoula the year before. It’s not as weird as it sounds, really. At Deadwood, Shannon ran a half-marathon personal record while Chris ran the full marathon just for the “fun” of it. Later in the month, Chris also ran a 4 mile race, Hayfever, in Belle Fourche. He was the defending champion, but wound up finishing 2nd this time to Belle’s high school cross country star.

Our friends, Amber and Steve, and their kids, Kyle and Abby, came to visit for the 4th of July. We watched the fireworks show, which Caiden loved and Chloe absolutely hated, went to the rrrreeeaaaalllyyy long parade, watched the rodeo, and rode a bunch of carnival rides.
Chris ran another race on the 4th too, the Black Hills Roundup 10K and once again got to meet Rupert from the Survivor TV show. Later in the month, Chris and Lauren drove back to Missoula. Lauren was moving back after having lived with us for almost a year. Chris went back to run the 2nd annual Missoula Marathon. As it turns out, he had been keeping a little secret from everyone ever since his failed attempt to qualify for Boston in Fort Collins. Without telling a soul, he had decided that, as long as the weather wasn’t blazing hot like it had been last year, he was going to try again to qualify. Well, the weather turned out to be nearly perfect for running a marathon and, on July 13th, Chris qualified for Boston by running the Missoula Marathon in 3:09:41, which also got him 15th place overall and 1st place in the men’s 30-34 age group. Shannon’s mom, dad and sisters, Lauren and Kelly, along with Chris’ mom were at the finish line to greet him. Kelly broke the news to Shannon with a frantic phone call. Afterwards, Chris celebrated at the Iron Horse, an old college hangout, with the family and some more running friends from online (seriously, not weird). After returning to Belle Fourche, Shannon and Lacey surprised Chris with a congratulatory party at the park across the street from our house. The local sports guy also wrote an article about Chris’ accomplishment in the Belle Fourche Post and Bee. The month ended with yet another trip to Montana, this time for the whole family as we headed to Hamilton for Shannon’s 10 year high school reunion. We had a fun time in Hamilton visiting with old friends and their families and going to Lake Como.

August was hot, but not nearly as bad as the year before. Shannon ran her second half-marathon of the year and set another personal record at the Leading Ladies Half-marathon. In fact, she ran so much faster than she told Chris she would that he showed up a couple of minutes too late to see her finish. Her time was 2:05:12 and is her fastest time for a half marathon to date. The next weekend, Chris volunteered at the Lean Horse Ultramarathon (50 or 100 miles, depending on how insane you are) in Hot Springs. He camped out at an aid station for 27 hours, giving food and water to runners as they came by. Despite all the pain and misery he witnessed, he’s still convinced that he should run a 50 miler next year.

September brought the start of school, soccer and football. Caiden started his second year of preschool and Chloe her first. Chloe was kind of unsure at first, but she loves preschool now and is the best listener in her class (she doesn’t talk, just listens). Caiden started playing soccer in and under-6 league for the first time. He was also unsure at first, but after we told him it was okay to take the ball from the players on the other team he did great and quickly became his team’s leading scorer. They didn’t win a game all year; their closest one was 6-4 and Caiden scored all 4 of his team’s goals. He LOVED soccer. High school, college and NFL football got started too and Caiden had a blast watching the Belle Fourche Broncs , BHSU Yellowjackets, and pretty much any football game that’s on TV. Chris has him good and brainwashed: Caiden is a loyal Seattle Seahawks fan.

October started off with Shannon running her third half-marathon of the year, which earned her a Black Hills Trifecta award (a gold necklace). She ran the Crazy Horse Half-marathon in Hill City. She also met an online friend the night before the race for dinner, proving that Chris isn’t the only one with “imaginary” computer friends. Kelly moved back to SD and the kids were really excited to have her back here. Now, if we could figure out a way to get everyone to move here….. The first snow fell on the 11th, but was soon followed by temps in the 70s, so it didn’t stick around long. Chris ran a 5K in Rapid City hoping to set a new personal record at that distance but a brutal 50 mph breeze didn’t help matters much. Shannon also tried to run the 5K, but sprained her ankle in the first 30 seconds of the race and couldn’t finish. Caiden dressed up as a Seahawks player (told ya he was brainwashed) and Chloe was Sleeping Beauty for Halloween. They each brought home their body weight in candy.

November started off with Chris in Colorado Springs for work. While he was there, another big blizzard hit the Black Hills and dumped another couple of feet of snow and closed the roads for a couple of days. Chris and a co-worker had a close encounter with some black ice on the drive home. The Forest Service vehicle was roughed up pretty good, but they both escaped unscathed. On Thanksgiving, we headed to Rapid City for what has become our family tradition since moving to South Dakota. Chris ran the Turkey Trot 5K in the morning (and finally got his personal record) running it in 18:43, and then we went out to eat dinner so we wouldn’t have to deal with leftovers for a month.

So, December is here again. Caiden and Chloe have a Christmas program coming up at their preschool next week. After spending last Christmas at home, we’ll be heading back to Montana this year. First, we’ll head to Lincoln to see Chris’ mom and stepdad and then on to Hamilton to see Shannon’s family. Of course, Caiden and Chloe can’t wait for Christmas; they are counting down the days. Caiden is now convinced that Santa is watching as he saw Santa at the Forest Service Christmas party where Santa told him that he had been watching Caiden playing his Wii. Maybe we will get some really good behavior out of him until Christmas now!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!!

Love, The Stores Family
Chris, Shannon, Caiden, and Chloe