Out

I won't be posting next week while at Disney, so have a good week...I will tell the mouse you say hello....

And wish me luck, we are leaving at 2:00am to make the drive.

See you in a week...

It's only Tuesday...

Random bullets for today:

• Everyone at work thinks I am good at finding out information. IT'S CALLED GOOGLE. Or the HELP MENU.
• My right shin is tight for some reason today.
• I am getting new running shoes tomorrow.
• Ray met Jon Voight on Sunday night at a bar in Dallas, Texas. He just walked up to the table Ray was sitting at and asked him the score of the football game, like he was just some random person. Ray snapped a photo with his iPhone.
• Grandma is here, so that means that one of the girls is sleeping with her each night. Which in turn means the other one is sleeping with me.
• My kids are bed hogs, even in a king sized bed.
• Did 6 miles last night, have 18 more to do before Friday evening.
• I woke up this morning thinking it was Wednesday and wishing it was Friday.
• The leaves are starting to change here, yet it is still in the 90s during the day.

I realize I have been MIA....

I realize that I was missing most of last week. These past few weeks have been a blur....and it is only getting worse this week.

Ashley is tracked out of school, Ray is on a trip, my Mom is here to help out, Girl Scouts starts today, we leave for Disney on Friday night/Saturday morning for 9 days.

Yes, 9 days. In my favorite place on Earth.

And I haven't packed, I haven't finished my spreadsheet with our plans, I have a concert to go to Thursday night (Lady Antebellum), and I have to fit in my long run for the week before work on Friday. I have a doctor's appointment on Wednesday AND I am playing my bassoon for Audrey's class that afternoon since they are focusing on musical instruments this week.

So wish me luck this week. I have to fit in my runs some how as next week I am making it a step back week where I will only run 20 miles. I just might hit 100 miles for the month of September, which the most miles I have ever had in month prior to this is 70. So yea, this month is pretty crazy.

And October doesn't get any easier....

Long Run Fail

Let's get one thing out of the way first: College Football is dead to me now. At least the Redskins beat Dallas last night. One redeeming thing for the weekend.

Moving on.

So Saturday morning I planned on running a 5K with my good friend Nikki (who graduated from JMU and I talked smack with about the football game until Virginia Tech decided to LOSE) whose Mom passed away from Ovarian Cancer. It was the Gail Perkins Memorial Ovarian Cancer Run and Walk. So then I was going to do my long run on Sunday morning of 9 miles to finish out the week. No biggie, although it did kind of screw with my schedule. I am pretty used to having Sundays of no running.

The 5K was hard - as in extremely hilly hard. As in my chip time (although there was no mat at the start, and I was in the back of the pack to start) was 30:15. I ran with Nikki the whole time, and at one point we were running up a hill, and we both decided we could walk up the hill faster than we were running.

Finished up there, and then it was a normal Saturday. Ashley cheered at a town about 45 minutes away, so later on Saturday we headed out there. By the end of the game after driving and sitting in bleachers in on and off again rain, my right calf hurt. As in walking it hurt. By the time I got home at 8:30, I iced it and hoped for the best. But Sunday morning it was still sore, and I made the executive decision to skip my long run for the day. It was hard and I questioned it over and over again, but I am glad I did it. I think mentally I needed a break as well. And this morning, there is no pain at all in my calf so running can commence again.

This week was actually supposed to be a step back week in mileage with a long run of only 4 miles, so obviously that is going to be changed to 9 miles. I think it will all work out in the end.

First Day of Pre-K

Audrey had her first official day of Pre-K this week...and yes, Ray and I are counting down the days until we no longer have to pay for her school and she goes to kindergarten. She wears a uniform to Pre-K which I am hoping makes my mornings run just a little smoother.

Notice the white croc...Ray took Audrey to the pool one day last week, and sprayed her with sunscreen with her shoes on and it turned her shoe white.

Some Really Good Runs Last Week

As I mentioned in my last post, we left early for the beach last Saturday. We wanted to be on the road by 8am, but I had 8 miles on the schedule. So I did what any other crazy fanatical runner would do - I got up at 5:15am and ran.

It was like a tale of two runs...look at my splits below:

Mile 1 - 10:46
Mile 2 - 10:49
Mile 3 - 11:03
Mile 4 - 11:14 (Walked to take a Gu)
Mile 5 - 9:46
Mile 6 - 9:53
Mile 7 - 9:18
Mile 8 - 9:04

Look at that last mile! I will say that the first 4 miles had a ton of uphills in them and the last 4 had more downhills. I always struggle in the beginning and it shows. But I was very happy with the negative (sort of) splits.

Monday I had a tempo run on the schedule - 1 mile warm up, 3 miles at about 9:45/mile pace, 1 mile cool down. I was so excited to be able to attempt this outside instead of at the gym since we were still at the beach and it was very, very flat.

Mile 1 - 10:51 (I obviously take my warm up mile very seriously..)
Mile 2 - 9:12
Mile 3 - 9:19
Mile 4 - 9:51
Mile 5 - 9:53

I was very, very happy with how that run went. Let's hope I keep up the good running vibes the rest of this week. I have a 5k on Saturday and 9 miles on the schedule for Sunday.

Labor Day Weekend

We are lucky enough to have good friends who bought a beach house in Oak Island, NC this summer. We celebrated the last long weekend of the summer with them at their beach house. There was a concern at first for hurricane Earl, but considering it didn't even rain in Raleigh, we figured it was safe to head to the beach for the weekend. We left early Saturday morning and we were on the beach at noon. I will say that the waves on Saturday were huge - the biggest waves I have seen on a North Carolina beach. The kids could really only play in the waves near the shore and couldn't really boogie board. Sunday was calm and clear (as you can see from the pictures below). We were on the beach for over 6 hours on Sunday. Yes, the kids love the beach as much as I do. And our friend rented a paddle board for the day too. All the kids took a turn trying it out. It is basically a huge surf board with a paddle and it was so much fun. And it was also one hell of a workout.

Here is Ashley the first time on it. That's our friend helping her out. He's the master surfer.

She's getting the hang of it.

I just like this shot with the boats in the background...

And she finally grabs a hold of the paddle. I am not sure how much she used it, but at least she tried. In the end, she caught a wave while she was sitting in the middle of the board and it was like watching it in slow motion as the paddle board took a nose dive and sent Ashley face first into the sand. But she was okay after some crying and went back on it later. She just didn't want to ride any waves in on it.

Audrey just hung out...but don't worry, she got a turn too.

She wouldn't let go of my arm. She lasted only a few minutes, but still, she did it!

And then it was my turn. And this is the only photo that was okay to post....all the others were not flattering to say the least. My quads were burning when I got off the board. And yes, I am wearing a weird hat as I forgot my sunglasses. Actually it is my Virginia Tech hat, and no, I am not ashamed to wear it even after we lost to Boise State.

Running update

I promise pictures of Ashley cheering at the high school football game last night will be posted tonight (that is mostly to appease my Mom...).

I get kind of bummed when I read some running blogs that preach and preach about the benefits of running 30-40 miles a week. I think that I am not doing enough and it will affect me in my races.

But then I step back and realize a couple of things. First off, I ran my first half marathon last year without taking my mileage over 17 miles a week and I had a pretty respectable time. Then I ran another one without going much over 15 miles a week. So I am hoping that my 20-30 miles I am running a week now will be an improvement.

And I am busy - working full time, two kids in multiple activities, a husband who owns his own real estate business with wacky hours some days, a husband who is also training for the half marathon, and I lead my daughter's brownie troop and am team mom for cheerleading. I am doing what I can to get the miles in, and it's enough.

So this week has been all about squeezing in runs when I can. Monday night after the kids went to bed I hit the gym for 5 miles of speedwork which I hit all my paces (yipee!). Wednesday morning was a 5 miler and it was an adventure. It was hot as I got started around 8:30am after the kids were at school and I got snapped at my a HUGE turtle and I almost stepped on a snake. I hate snakes.

This morning I got up at 5:30am to get 4 miles in before the kids got up. I will do the same for my 8 miler in the morning. I normally run at lunch time on Fridays, but it is supposed to be 97 here today and we have a lunch event at work today and Audrey will be with me at work since her school is closed for a teacher workday. It was really nice to get up and get it done. I can see why Ray likes getting up early and running. And I stayed away from the path around the pond by our house as I didn't want to encounter anymore snakes or turtles.

Ashley and Audrey have been invited to a Camp Rock 2 movie party tonight which they are extremely excited about. It's a perfect way to start the holiday weekend.