Meet The Early's

On Saturday, November 2, Briley competed in the Kansas State 6A Cross Country Championship at KU’s Rim Rock Farms, north of Lawrence. She’d raced this course earlier in the year at the Rim Rock Classic, clocking in at 19:06. Of all her courses, this is her least favorite—it’s incredibly beautiful, but also incredibly hilly, with steep inclines and declines that often cause runners to fall. Still, her recent training was tailored specifically for this race, and while she had the usual pre-race nerves, she felt ready.

Though Briley’s team didn’t qualify, they drove the 50 minutes to cheer her on, performing their traditional “Blue Wagon” cheer before the race. We were initially worried about rain, with a 60% chance in the forecast, but it stopped just as we arrived. Briley’s support crew included Grandma and Papa Early, the Bobziens, Allison and Ellie, the Brawners, Asa, Papa Sparks, Uncle Rick, and Baylor’s girlfriend Dorothy, who runs middle school cross-country at Barstow. Even Briley’s school principal came to cheer her on. With foghorns, cowbells, signs, and boundless spirit, our family and friends made sure she felt the love.

We arrived early so Briley had time for her warm-up and pre-race routine. She was excited but focused on her goal: maintaining her 7th state ranking and breaking 19 minutes—a huge achievement for this course. The weather was ideal, with temperatures in the upper 50s, and the course was wet but manageable.

After a slight delay, the race started at 11:15. Our family spread out along the course, cheering Briley on at every turn. Her strategy was to avoid starting too fast, knowing the competitive field would likely go out hard. By the one-mile mark, she was in 15th place but held her steady pace as others began to fall back. By mile two, she’d moved up to 7th. She climbed Cemetery Hill (a grueling climb named for the old cemetery at the top), passing one more runner to take 6th place.

The last stretch, known as “Skyline,” is a long, gradual downhill leading to the finish. Briley had a 5-second gap over 7th and was about 15 seconds behind 5th place. She sprinted down the hill with an incredible finish, crossing the line at 18:58—10 seconds ahead of 7th place, 10 seconds behind 5th, and 2 seconds under her goal.

At the finish, Briley was swarmed by teammates, coaches, and family. Exhausted but ecstatic, she was all smiles. She was thrilled with her performance, the support she received, and her official 6th place finish, earning her First Team All-State honors. Autumn and I couldn’t be prouder. Briley’s dedication over the years, getting up early every morning to train, has paid off in this remarkable achievement. As we celebrated, the rain began to fall—a heavy, steady rain that lasted through the awards ceremony. It felt like Autumn’s own tears of joy, watching over us…but then I remembered Autumn was not a cryer and that was a lot of tears 😂.

Despite the rain, Briley’s teammates, coaches, and my crew stayed until 2:30 for the awards ceremony. With a huge smile, Briley Mae received her 6th place medal. We then made the rain-soaked drive home, where we spent the rest of the day drying out and basking in the pride of her accomplishment.

Congratulations, Briley Mae—hard work pays off! Now she is working to get ready for the Garmin Cross Country Championships in Huntsville Alabama on December 7th. Wish her luck!

Cousin Support Crew Prep

Ready to get warmed up

Love that she wears her breast cancer ribbon tattoo

Briley's Support Crew with their signs

Grayson is enthused 😂

Brave Caroline drug all her kids by herself, wheeling

her double stroller through the grass...Autumn would be proud!

All her fans ready for the start.

And they are off.

Pacing herself with the second pack

Separating from the second pack and passing her way

up to the lead group

In uphill chase mode

Sprint to the finish

Hurts so good!

Plenty of hugs at the finish for this girl

Look at that smile!!

I never mind a sweaty hug!

Rainy Wet Awards Ceremony

All Smiles

Top 20

Pure Joy!

Teammate Support Crew

One last rain soaked picture

Our October was filled with cross country, soccer, football, dance, Baylor driving 😅, birthday parties, halloween party's, haunted houses, chiefs games, and of course Halloween.

Briley's stellar XC season continued with KC Classic, where she came in 8th place with a time of 19:10, an improvement of over 1:30 from her time last year at this race. This was even an "off" race for her, because she was coming off a hard race the weekend before at Rim Rock. She got a well deserved recovery week after this race.

That afternoon I took Finley and Atticus to their school carnival at MTE. It was a beautiful day and Jared, Emmy and Sully came to join us. Given that its fall, I have been really missing Autumn's delicious fried chicken and apple pie so I decided to try my hand. I spent a couple days trying to track down her recipes as she has some in her magazine clipping folder, some in the recipe box, and some on Pintrest. I eventually was able to track them down and while not up to par with hers, it was a good effort for my first time!

Jared invited me to the Chiefs Monday Night Football game against the Saints that Monday as it was the annual Crucial Catch Game, where they honor cancer fighters, survivors, and fighters who have passed. Autumn's Surgical Oncologist Jamie Wagner, and our good family friend, Jill Shahan, a triple negative breast cancer survivor got to throw out the first pass. I was not aware they were doing it, and as we making our way to our seats I heard them announce them on the PA system; it was so cool to watch. Given that they are now 9-0, I don't have to tell you the Chiefs won...it was actually one of the few games that was not a cardiac ending.

Both Baylor and Atticus wrapped up their football games the following week, or I guess I should say for Baylor, his football career 😂...he is done with that business. Baylor's team went undefeated on the season, but that did not change his mind about returning his focus back to cross country. Atticus' flag football team also had a good season, and Atticus was able to score a few touchdowns which is always fun.

The weekend of the 11th we decided to go back to Kirksville as we were not going to be able to make it back until Thanksgiving. The kids had a long weekend so we took advantage of it. Briley stayed behind in KC with Aunt Lissy to do some Senior Photo's. They came into town Saturday evening and did some more photo's with Ellie out at the lake. As we were driving into town, Jonathan Cleaver invited us to his brothers Halloween costume party that evening. While we did not have costumes, we went anyway and the kids and I had a blast catching up with the Cleaver crew and enjoying a nice hayride round their property. We spent the rest of the weekend relaxing with family and the kids enjoyed their cousin time with the Bobzien's and Farwell's. The kids are really enjoying having all these cousins in Kirksville now. My Mom and Dad gave me my birthday present and I have to say, its a pretty cool one. It's a replica of a house favorite halloween decoration we had growing up. We hurried home after church to get back in time for boss lady, Mary Clair's BIG kitty cat 3rd birthday. This girl is living her best 3-year old life

The following Thursday Grandma Julie came into town for a few days to watch Briley run and watch Finley and Atticus play soccer. Briley had EKL Championships on Thursday and she had a good race. Given that she does not have a real cross country coach and has been doing all her own training plans, I decided to hire her an actual distance running coach to help her get ready for college and what will be an important track season. He put together a pretty tough training plan for the week leading into EKL's with the idea that State, not EKL's or Regionals, was were she needed to be in peak form. So even though she had a tough training week, she still ran a 19:11, coming in third. The next day Briley decided she wanted to go to KU for their Crimson and Blue college visit day. Since Grandma Julie was in town to grab the other kids from school, I called her out for the afternoon, and her and I headed over to Lawrence. We came, we saw, and thankfully, as a Mizzou fan, she was not impressed with KU. That evening we went out to the Louisburg Cider Mill, an annual outing for Autumn and the kids, with the Brawner's, my Aunt Pat with Delaney and Otto. We got some delicious apple cider donuts, pumpkins, played in the hay, and then headed for some Mexican.

The weekend was filled with Finley and Atticus' soccer games. Finley's team had another stellar season, winning the Division 1 Championship for the 3rd year in a row. Atticus joined a new team this year, and after losing their first game, went on to only lose one more game the entire season, and that was on a last minute goal to the top ranked team. It's fun to watch these two do their thing. All of our kids were such different soccer players. Briley was a speedster with a rocket leg, Baylor was the smallest, most physical kid on the field who always seemed to come away with the ball...and maybe a yellow card. Finley is a finesse, goal scoring machine, while Atticus is all about the skill moves, passes, and tough goals. That Saturday night Finley went with some friends and parents down to the Edge of Hell haunted house in the West Bottoms...Autumn, myself and even Briley would not dare to go into those haunted houses but Finley did it and loved it...she is built differently than us I guess 😂. Baylor ended up going to the Beast the weekend after Halloween with his girlfriend Dorothy and some friends, and while nervous about it, he did it and said it was fun. Two brave kids!

Briley had regionals the following Saturday at Johnson County Community College, which is were she ran her first race of the year. I hosted a pasta dinner for her and her teammates on Friday night. She had an amazing race, finishing in 2nd with a new PR of 18:46, and qualifying for State the next weekend. Her coach wanted her to take it easy the last mile and she said she did, so it was amazing that she still got a PR. She looked as comfortable as I have ever seen her. However, the race was not without some drama. She has a coach that is new to XC and he mistakenly ran more runners than he should have. They delayed the awards for Briley's group for about 30 minutes as they waiting for a ruling from KSHAA about if Briley's team, and therefore Briley, should be DQ'ed. By the letter of the law they should have, but since the team did not qualify, and Briley was the only runner on the team that did, thankfully they decided to not DQ her and also allow the girl who came in 16th (top 15 go to state) advance to state. All's well that ends well and Briley handled it all so well. She is mature beyond her years...most of the time 😜. While we were all at the XC meet, Baylor spent the day at driver's education and is now officially a permit driver 😬. We have knocked out a couple long drives, we drove out to see Autumn, and he has been driving us to and from school, and on other errands. He got off to a rough start, but he is slowly getting better. Finley had a halloween party and birthday party that weekend as well, so busy weekend all around.

The next week was Halloween week. We carved our pumpkins on Tuesday night and Finley and Atticus had their school Halloween parade and party on Halloween. Sadly we are down to two trick or treaters. Atticus went as Beetlejuice and Finley went as Sleeping Beauty and her friend Katerina went as Maleficent. Baylor and Briley, along with Briley's friend Ella hung out at the house, baked cookies and handed out candy. Finley went with her friends Katerina and Ella and I took Atticus with his friends James, Michael and Thomas. It was a beautiful evening and they both filled their pillow cases. I was talking to a couple of dad's and we all agreed that it's sad to think we do not have too many more years of trick or treating with our kids, it's always been something that Autumn and I really enjoyed. Halloween was on a Thursday this year and Finley and Atticus did not have school on Friday, much to the chagrin of Baylor and Briley. Briley's class had a Senior Skip day but Briley had to go down to KU Medical Center for a CAP's tour. She is in the Exploring Health Profession's CAPS class so she has gotten to shadow various specialist and has learned a lot about what she might want to do.

October was incredibly busy, and at times overwhelming, but we survived and we are all finding our way.