Seabrook Marathon

I had a huge long post and it was lost when the stupid internet went out.  Grrr.  Anyway, I ran the Seabrook Marathon last weekend.  I started out with the walkers at 5:30am.  Yes, 5:30am.  My Dad was nice enough to get up at 3:20am to drive me down to Seabrook so that I didn't have to venture onto the Gulf Freeway the early morning after St. Patrick's Day on my own.  Thanks Dad!  I started with the walkers at 5:30 because I could barely walk on my right foot Monday and Tuesday.  I was nervous that I was going to have to walk a good portion of the race.  I walked the first loop (6.5 miles) with the walker gang and then took off.  I ran the 2nd loop pretty fast (for me) and the 3rd loop was slightly above average pace for me.  So I had a delima with the 4th and final loop.  Do I run it and finish in under 5 hours or do I slow way down and walk some to push my time closer to the 5:30 range?  Since the race director made it clear that the 5:30am start was for walkers and those finishing >6 hours, I decided to walk.  Since I walked the 1st loop anyway I figured that I might as well.  I think I finished at 5 hours 20 minutes, but I'm not sure since my stats aren't on the website.  I've emailed the race director, but Brian says I'm blackballed from racing since I 'abused' the early start.  I would like to state that I made sure I wasn't the fist early starter to finish.  There was a woman in front of my that I stayed with almost the entire race and then when I decided to walk the 2 miles on the last loop let her go ahead.  I'm sure she finished at least 10 minutes ahead of me.

I was very aware that had I ran the 1st loop I would have blown my PR out of the water.  That was very surprising.  I was really not expecting to feel as good as I did this race.  It was a really nice course and I got to see the Bay at sunrise.  I stopped to chat with volunteers and tried to encourage as many runners/walkers as I could.  It was fun seeing everyone 8 times (literally) since it was an out and back loop course.  The only down side was the humidity.  I'm not used to running in Houston's humidity and my sweat just would not evaporate.  I was dripping the entire time.

After the marathon we headed to the Kemah boardwalk for lunch.  I was starving.  Logan and Isabel were on their best behavior.  I very very rare occurrence. I was especially proud of Logan.

Potty trained! And Logan cannot fly.

Yes! One kid out of diapers during the day! Isabel clicked with potty training and just decided she was ready last week. So glad I didn't stress about it and force the issue. Just one accident the first day and one at school, but besides that she's been a rock star.

I'm sick yet again. Not sure what's going on. My eyeballs hurt and it hurt and it hurts when I move my head. I'm just about sick of being sick. This cough is also lots of fun. So annoying.

I had to make a super quick stop to Target today. Logan was flipping out-as usual. I got the usual, 'oh, he must be tired/hungry/not happy with the cart/sick/crazy' etc etc comments, but then I hear an 'excuse me'. 'excuse me!'. So I turn around and this woman goes 'are those shoes comforatable?'. Keep in mind that logan is tripping out and izzy is telling me she has to go potty. I was like 'uh, yeah, they're very comforatable' and try to leave. This woman is clearly high because she tries to talk to me again about my damn shoes. At least some people are oblivious to my crazy kids.

In more fun news we got to visit with gramma, grampa, rich, joanne, Lucas and Ethan over the weekend. Ethan is so sweet and cuddly! Lucas is hilarious with his 'oh no' over and over again. Will miss those dudes.

Austin MARATHON!

Yay! I'm done!

Izzy opens the cookies up (with her teeth) and Logan gives me a hug.

You can sort of see the pain my calves are feeling. Compression socks are a beautiful thing. I wore them all day after the race and slept in them and had zero soreness the following days.

Cookies. Yay!

#4! Izzy can't believe it.

Beer!


I got a PR at the Austin Marathon! WHOOP! So excited to have run it and run it well. It was a perfect day to run and so much fun! I was very very nervous because while I did the proper training, it was definitely the minimalist training plan. After numerous nightmares about forgetting my bib, D tag (the timing device), headphones, etc etc, my alarm woke me up and I prepared for the day. Coffee kicked in and things got moving. Brian dropped me off near the start line around 6:30am. Plenty of time for the 7am start. I immediately got in line for the port-o-potties and was there until almost 7:50am. Got to the start line just in time for the National Anthem and then was off around 7:15am. Started off great! Checked the trusty Garmin and saw that I was starting off a bit too quick, so pulled it in and tried to stay around 11 min/miles. It was hard because I was so ready to run the crap out of this race. I love hills and this race has them. So super nice guy chatted me up around mile 2 and was telling me how 'great' I looked. Um, yeah, it's mile TWO. It was still nice though. He was a cheerleader for all of us running around the same pace. I heard someone complain that her 'feet really hurt' around mile 5. I almost laughed. Come ON. It's a marathon or 1/2 marathon. Either you didn't train at all or you're a complete cry baby. Either way, I do not empathize. We finally got to the 'Survivor Mile' at mile 10 (I think). It's the 'yellow' mile. Almost everyone is wearing yellow and the street is painted in chalk with motivational sayings and there's fun music, etc etc. I was dedicating this to everyone I know/knew who is fighting the good fight against that stupid stupid cancer. I thought about people I had lost (my Grandmother) people I didn't know, but who had been taken way too early (Allison's Dad, Auggie), friends who are battling cancer and people who have kicked the ever-loving shit out of cancer (MY DAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!). There are many (so many!) other people and friends of friends that I know who are battling cancer. I really truly dedicated this mile to everyone batting and/or trying to cope with cancer or a cancer diagnosis. It's almost every single person in my life. I hope one day it's not like this. It was a very emotional mile. Cancer sucks. I want to punch it in the face. For that mile, I felt like we did just that. Austin, you kick some serious ass.

So after we split off from the 1/2'ers there's definitely a different feel to the race. There's a camaraderie that is so amazing. We are going 26.2 miles together. I was following a girl, ahem, woman, Allison, and her boyfriend(?) the entire time. They were doing such an amazing job encouraging one another. It was so fun to watch. I was also watching a Dad and his son (I'm assuming) encouraging each other to keep on keeping on. The son needed the most encouragement, which was encouraging to me! Keeping pace with a USMC dude was also pretty fun. He was amusing and kept telling us 'only 11 miles to go! ANYONE can do 11 miles!' I tried to focus on his calves that were firing at sinful rates. It was like watching 'The Human Body' exhibit with a live human. Pretty impressive.

I felt fantastic the entire race. Not something I'm used to. At all. My ass really started to catch fire the last few miles, but the crowds and Viv kept me in it. I had a plan to dedicate miles to my kids and to family members along the way, but that just went to pot. Honestly I was giving glory glory to my fist born the entire second half of the race. I tried to focus on Izzy and Logan for certain miles, but looking down at my shirt and seeing that precious face had me reaching for memories of Vivian. I thought about her and our life together the entire 2nd half of the marathon. I have really, really been trying to be thankful for the 2 years (and 9 months in utero) that we had together.

Around mile 22 I saw this uber-fit lady from my spin class. I wasn't sure if it was her or not and it was crowded at this point, to I didn't stop to chat, but I should have. She was having a really really tough time dealing with a knee injury. Thankfully her mom walked the last 4 miles with her. At mile 25 I saw Allison and her boyfriend again. She was walking and looked like she was hurting. I got all up in her face and told her she looked great and that I had been following her for 25 freaking miles and that she better not let me beat her. She looked like she wanted to punch me in the face. After running through campus I caught a glimpse of the capital and thought 'this is it! You freaking DID this!' I was so happy, but then I saw the last hill. Why why why do race directors think it's fun to put a steep hill at the last 800 meters of a race? I was NOT going to walk, but my calves were screaming. I trudged on. I made it up the hill and as we were taking on the final descent (!) for the last 100 meters I saw Izzy. Yay! I was SO happy to see my family! I stopped and hi fived and out of the corner of my eye saw Allison run past. She did start running again and beat me! I headed off to cross the finish line and was so happy I was practically dancing. I low fived the announcer guy with some serious gusto. He was probably thinking 'annndddd here's Allyson who just snorted some coke or meth or something.' He was a good sport and announced me. Of course I forgot to look up at the finish line, so my picture sucks as usual. I always remind myself to look up, but never do. Next race.

Since they gave out the shirts at the expo we didn't have the giant cluster eff that was the 2011 race. It was easy to navigate and even with my slower finish time there was still lots of food and water and stuff left. I met up with the family and ate some of Isabel's delicious cookies she brought. Yum.

It was a great day and I think it made an impression on Isabel. She keeps asking me about the race and 'last night when you ran that race way far away?' 'What was that called?' I'm like 'a marathon.' Over and over. She always goes 'yeah, that's right. a marathon.'

Mardi Gras!

Happy Fat Tuesday Ya'll! I just made the best shrimp creole. It is SO so good based on a teeney little spoonful a second ago. I was going to make some king cake, but Brian isn't feeling well and I don't want to be stuck with a giant mess of deliciousness to finish off by myself. So creole, good beer and sushi rice will be the perfect Mardi Gras dinner. Yum. We're listening to the Louis Armstrong Pandora station and Izzy goes 'it's Lady and the Tramp song.' Maybe Brian will come downstairs to enjoy some dinner. He came home from work a little early and went straight upstairs to bed. Not feeling well. :-( So that's our Mardi Gras.

I'll do a race recap post later. Spoiler alert: It was AWESOME!

The Horrible Day

Today was one of those days where I just wish I could have fast-forwarded it. It started out ok. I got an awesome spin workout and SHOWER in before Iz and Logan woke up. I had also had 2 cups of coffee before I heard 'I AWAAAAAAAAKE!' so that was awesome. Actually up until 8:30am the day was going well. Then all of a sudden Isabel decided that today was going to suck. She took me and Logan down with her. She whined all.day.long. I mean all day. If she wasn't whining she was crying. Logan is still getting over RSV, so he wasn't particulary pleasant either. I usually try to plan one outing a day to keep from going bat shit crazy in the house, but today I didn't. I'm really (really!) trying to not spend as much money, but it's so hard when you have 2 toddlers and try to find things to do to entertain them. Even just a trip to Target means we end up with something in the basket. I'm just trying to avoid Target from now on. Finally after lunch I had had enough and loaded the kids up (no less than a 20 minute adventure) and we headed to the park/playground. If you tell Izzy we're going to the park she freaks out and tell you 'NO playGROUND.' Geez. Noted. She told me she 'didn't want to go to the playground with swings.' Ooooohhhhkay. I knew which playground she meant, but thought it might be a treat to check out a new one. So we went over to Dick Nichols Park. I unloaded everything and the freaking playground was closed for maintenance! How did I not see this before unloading everything?! So we ended up at the Circle C park. We haven't been there much because the parking lot is super close to the play structure and it's gravel lined. Logan can finally be trusted to not try to eat rocks for at least 3 minute intervals. It was a beautiful afternoon with highs in the upper 70s. Why does this piss me off so much? Oh yeah, because it's FEBRUARY 1st! WTF is it going to be like in March, April, August?! I want to move back to N. Cali. ASAP. I loathe hot, bumid weather. Loathe.

So we get back home and of course noboday wants to take naps when we get home althoughIsabel is running on 9 hours of sleep and Logan.....don't get me started on Logan. I finally got them both down for naps and then watched 20 minutes of Gossip Girl. Yes, GG. I know the house is a wreck and dinner needed to be started, but sweet baby Jesus, I needed 20 minutes to MYSELF. I vacuumed the playroom before Logan got up. He just wanted to be held, so making dinner was a challenge. Then Izzy got up. Then the shit hit the fan and I wanted to run away. Then Brian called to say he would be a little late. Ugh. I was done with today. But but but, Florence + the Machine is on ACL tonight!

It's days like today that I thought 'hum, maybe that's not a bad idea.' when I read something about Babywise. If you know me you know that Babywise is pretty much the opposite of how I try to parent. But today, today, I was thinking it wasn't such a bad idea to get those little itty bitty infants on YOUR schedule. Damnit. PS- No offense to any Babywise Mamas out there. I just do not agree with it myself.

In more fun news....my newest nephew is being born tomorrow morning! I'm so excited! I can't wait to meet him! Also, my parents bought an awesome new sports car. I love to live vicariously through my parents.

As I was chasing after Logan and Izzy while walking home from preschool yesterday a fellow MOMS club mom was driving by and stopped to chat for a minute. She asked how things were going. I said 'fine, ok today.' I asked her the same and instead of the usual 'ok' answer she got real and said 'This week is ok. What day is it? Oh, Tuesday.' I told (her husband) if I have many more weeks like last week I'm going back to work. I just can't do this.' I could totally relate. Being a stay at home mom/wife is the hardest job I've ever had. I've had some tough jobs (hello oil refinery pipe inspector). But, I am lucky that I get to do it. I try and remind myself that it's a privelage to get to stay home with these little ones and that not every mom that wants to gets to do it.

Oh yea, this morning Isabel said to me 'You just don't understand everything in my life.' Hahaha. I was literally LOL as soon as I was alone. Gems.

Getting Stuff DONE!

This afternoon I left Brian with the kiddos and headed out to get 'just a few things.' Four hours later I came back home with a loaded cargo area. I just can't help buying little baby things. I figure buying baby gifts is way less expensive than having another baby, so I'm actually saving money, right?! I finally bought some frames to put our fantastic pictures Amy Melsa took of us in November. Between Lucas' birthday, new baby's birth/baptism, and random birthday parties to buy for I got so much bought and ready to go. I also may have taken a trip to Homegoods. This store is my sanctuary. I usually don't buy anything, but it's so much fun to think of what you NEED. I mean, a 3 foot metal chicken, yes please! I did buy a little piece of art for the kitchen that commemorates my love of wine.

This week I'm going to a tutu making party for the Color Run on Saturday. Our team is the Rainbow Runners. And not one of us are gay. I love it! I have to think of a rainbow treat to bring. Apparently rainbow jello shots are covered. Awesome!

TBAR

This is what Brian says to me when Logan does something particulary eyebrow-raising. Tonight he was actin' a fool and spinning around until he got dizzy, stumbled around, and then spun some more. He rolled around on the carpet for a while and then wanted a horsey ride. When he decides that it's nap/bed time he'll just lay down on the ground wherever he is. At the park, in the store, in the family room, etc etc. He said a few more words tonight. Poopoo, balloon and something else I can't recall.

Isabel is feeling a bit better. No more fever. Still on rescue asthma drugs and inhaled steroids. I imagine we'll be keeping her on the steroids for at least another month, but only 1-2x's a day. We have got to get her inflammation under control. We were doing it 1x/day since her attack in December, but I think she needs 2x/day, especially with it being stupid cedar season. Austin is SO bad for allergies.

I did my last solo long run before the marathons. 21 long miles. I downloaded a short story that I listened to for about an hour and a half. It made the miles fly by. I finished up another audiobook and then turned on the music. There were a ton of people on the trail finishing up their long runs before the Austin Marathon in 2 weeks. I didn't have to brave East Austin by myself, so that was nice. It was the perfect morning for a long run. Clear and cool. I had on tights, compression socks, long sleeve shirt, jacket, ear warmers, and gloves for 10 miles and then ditched the jacket and ear warmers. I feel suprisingly great after the run. No 'hot' spots like I normally get and no soreness yet. Just tired. Probably doesn't help that I haven't had much sleep this week. I must say, I dread and really look forward to my long long runs. Having almost 4 hours to myself to focus on myself is pretty boss. It does kill a Saturday pretty quickly, so I think this might be my last marathon season for a while. I honestly missed the kiddos badly around mile 12. I just wanted to be home hanging out with my family. I'm very proud of my accomplishmet though. A 21 mile run is nothing to scoff at, and I need to remember that. Regardless of what happens on February 19th, I've put some serious miles in. Even with my very (very!) reduced weekday schedule I've still sacrificed precious family time for my fitness goals. It's now time to put up or shut up.