Tuesday, November 25, 2014

doodling

I've been a long-time blog-reader of Miss Zoot and have followed her on Instagram as well. She was pregnant with her daughter at the same time I was pregnant with Julianna and she became a runner just before I became a runner. She's a die-hard Harry Potter fan who posted a lot about young adult reading material (which I am crazy about) so I couldn't quit following her even when I stopped reading blogs.

Recently, she began posting these doodles on Instagram that she'd started making and I was intrigued. I didn't think too much about it at first because I'm really not artistic, but then last week I gave it a try.

Y'all. My first one was horrible.



For some reason though, I kept doodling. I've learned from experience that I need to do something to keep busy in the week immediately after one of my races so I don't get down and this has helped.

It was fun and relaxing and therapeutic.


I made one for Jules and one for Josh and



I went and bought new pens based on Kim's recommendation and next I want to try some on graph paper.

Josh and Julianna have both gotten started too.



What do you do to relieve stress?
What are you going to do this week to relax?

I wish you all a happy Thanksgiving, friends!


Wednesday, November 19, 2014

marathon recap 2.0



I ran my second marathon on Saturday morning. It was the Anthem Richmond Marathon and the coldest on record since the race began in 1978.


We met with other runner's from Fleet Feet Winston-Salem in the lobby of the hotel at 6:45 am for a quick picture and pep talk from our fearless leader. Then we headed to the starting line. It was 25 degrees but surprisingly with all of the crowd gathered it didn't feel that cold.




I was tremendously nervous. In April, with it being my first marathon and just wanting to finish I wasn't very nervous at all. I had confidence knowing that I could and would finish it. This time, having a time goal made it so much more difficult to relax and my stomach was in knots before we got to the starting line.

My Goals
I would have been thrilled to finish in 5:20, satisfied to finish in 5:30, and extremely angry if I hadn't been able to finish in under 6 hours. There were only pacers for 5:00 and 5:30 in the back. I started directly behind the 5:30 pacers and kept with them for the first two miles. I knew it would feel slow but they were doing evenly paced mile splits and since my "real" goal was to finish in 5:20 I thought that would be good to start out at their pace. The pace should have been 12:10/mile overall for my goal and 12:36/mile overall for the 5:30 pace goal so I made myself not go in front of them for a bit.



By mile 3 I really couldn't stand it anymore so I pulled slightly ahead. I still couldn't feel my toes but everything else was fine. I had hand warmers in my gloves and the run was feeling pretty good. I laughed at a sign near the beginning that said, "You've already set a PR! This is the coldest Richmond Marathon on record!" and another that said, "I just want to cross the street."

Here's what I wanted my splits to look like and what they actually were according to my RunKeeper.


I was a few seconds ahead of pace for every mile (even in mile 10 when I went to the bathroom) until mile 17 when I started struggling. My goal sheet said to cross the half at 2:39 and I hit mile 13 at 2:39. I wanted to be at mile 20 at 4:05 and I reached that point at 4:09. By mile 21 I was running then walking short intervals.

I kept ahead of the pacers until the last 7 or 8 miles. Jonathan ran from mile 13 almost to mile 20 with me and then my dad met me at about 20 and ran to the finish with me. I was glad to have both of them there.

The crowds were amazing. There was a marching band and a few party stops with loud music. There was another cute three-person sign with the Frozen characters on them: "Do you want to run a marathon?" "It doesn't have to be a marathon." "OK Bye." There were lots of people in their yards cheering and supporting and offering beers. I actually took a cup of coke from a kid around mile 22 and I really don't know what I was thinking when I did that.



Anyway, it wasn't a bad run necessarily, but I never really felt like I found my groove the whole run. At one point I tried listening to my audiobook which I can zone out to sometimes but it didn't work that day. I really didn't want to deal with switching to music. I fueled with salted caramel Gu and really struggled to quench my thirst which I think was a result of the Gu and the cold and not hydrating enough with those.



The course was absolutely gorgeous! I loved the part by the river. The sunshine shining through the leaves was beautiful. It made me feel like I was at home running Salem Lake which is one of my favorite places to run.  Compared to Raleigh, the course was so much less crowded. I think that was because the half and the full courses don't really run together. It was windy on the bridges but warm in the sun.



The downhill finish was glorious. I saw my mom, Jonathan, and my training partner Kristine there cheering. I hated that there were three sharp turns in the last quarter of a mile so you could never really SEE the finish line. That just means that if I run it again I'll know what to expect at the finish. Here I am at the end realizing I'd just crossed the 5:30 mark.



My thoughts overall: I'm so glad I did this race. While my time wasn't exactly what I wanted, it was a great experience. I wish I had done the Richmond race first instead of the Raleigh one. It's certainly a learning curve and you gain so much from every experience. For example, I've noted that from both of my full marathons that I wished I would have pushed a tiny bit harder that last mile. I wish I had pushed a bit harder at the end to finish stronger. especially to get rid of that darn 40 seconds, but it was still a PR of about an hour and ten minutes and I'm pleased with that.



I've made myself commit to taking a season off from full marathons and not signing up for another before next fall. I'm pacing the Mistletoe Half and I'll probably do two or three other half marathons before then, but I'm hoping to train for Richmond again next year and have just as much fun.

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

stories

Several good songs came on in a row on K-LOVE the other day when we were out and about. The kids sang almost every word to the first two with me. Then an old school Third Day song came on and I began singing loudly.

Josh asked, "Mom, how do you know all the words?" I told him that this was an old song that I loved and that I even had the CD somewhere. He said, "Oh! Is this that macaroni guy?" It took me a minute to figure out he was talking about Toby Mac but when I did I finally answered his question and told him that it was a group called Third Day.

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Josh asked me what an atom was a few days ago and I did my best explaining it to him. His response? "You mean my dookie is made up of atoms?"

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Josh went to Tanglewood with his class last week and the park happened to be getting ready for the Festival of Lights during the time his class was there. Days later Josh randomly told me this story: "Mom, did you know that when they discovered America they were walking toward Tanglewood and they were scared because there was a sea monster chasing them?"

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"Nanna, do you have an old cell phone that you're not using that I could give to my sister because she really wants one?"

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Friday, November 7, 2014

random thoughts for Friday

bullet points full of randomness

  • If my husband is taking steroids (for a poison ivy/oak rash) then why I am eating like I am as well?
  • How do you decide what's on the menu for Thanksgiving? Do you always have the same exact things at your house or does it change? Does someone make a list and everyone divide it up? Ours will be a bit different this year since we are going to the beach with just my mom and dad and it's going to be a small challenge to figure out what to fix when there's only 4 of us (plus the two littles).
  • I picked up a few 2009 world almanac's that our media center was throwing away and I'm trying to think of some craft ideas that I can do with them. They're in very good condition. Any suggestions? Anyone seen anything cute on Pinterest with book pages?
  • Did you know that Target carries select TOMS now? I used to absolutely hate these shoes and I'm really not a huge fan now for myself. They're just too flat for my foot and the nasty plantar fascitis it's got going on, but my kids love them. They love that they can slip them on quickly and easily and they go with practically everything so I'm excited about this.
  • The top three things on my daughter's wishlist right now: a cell phone, contacts, and a fur vest. How hilarious is that?
  • I'm reading The Goldfinch and it's one of those books. I mean, it's one that since I'm in the middle of it I don't want to be working or eating or sleeping I just want to be reading. And since it's 784 pages that's a wee bit difficult.

Any randomness you want to add? Leave me a comment. Happy Friday!


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