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A Tale of Two Races

On May 8 (Mothers’ Day as you might recall) I ran my 3rd Title 9K. And on May 15 (one week later) I ran my 5th Half Marathon, The Colfax Half Marathon. These are their stories (dun, dun).

Title 9K

Distance: Contrary to the event title, this is actually 9.9K, or about 6.1 miles (I didn’t know this last year and was slightly livid at the 9K mark to find that I still had 1K to go).

Course: trails, with a bit of up and down and a short section of paved road

Company: I ran this with a bunch of girlfriends and my sister … my friend Holly and I actually ran the whole thing together and thank GOODNESS I had her … I wanted to walk from the 7K mark.

Weather: The weather was hot hot hot … 85+ degrees and no shade whatsoever. I made every water stop. I felt like I was melting.

Results: Course (gun) time – 1:05:11, 10:38 pace … there was no chip time in this event though it’s not a big event anyhow and would likely not have made much difference (under 1min) … I also felt terrible the rest of the day. Aside from the girlfriends, the best part of this race was the swag, an awesome WOMEN’S FIT t’shirt and a really cute necklace.

 

Colfax Half Marathon

Distance: 13.1 miles on the course, 13.23 on my Garmin

Course: all road running, mostly flat, though Matt swears it was as hilly as Nashville (the first one. where i sort of wanted to die)

Company: I ran this mostly with Matt, though he took a potty break around mile 4 and I didn’t see him again until mile 8 … he was quite instrumental in keeping me going the last bunch of miles – I was wheezing like mad. I also ran completely without music. My good mp3 player is missing (I will find it soon, I’m sure) and I had to run with my backup Mp3 player which displays in Farsi or something so I had no idea that it had crashed and had no music on it until I was around mile 2. I also later washed it with my pants … not it really doesn’t work, in Farsi or any other language.  Honestly, the no music thing wasn’t as bad as I might’ve thought.

Weather: This time the weather was FREEZING. It probably never got much above 40 and it was misting pretty much the entire time. Matt and I both seriously considered a DNS when we were having trouble finding parking. But really, it’s great running weather once you get going. No chance of over heating and you don’t need all water stops.

Results: My chip time was 2:12:34, a 10:08 pace and a new PR (hollllla!!). My garmin clocked me at 2:12:49 for a 13.23 miles and a 10:02 pace. Victory was pretty sweet. I got to go home and have a nap and then to Smash Burger for lunch. I also got a very nice (Women’s fit, also) tech tee and a cute finishing medal.

So what did we learn from this, boys and girls?? It’s much better to run a race in cool weather … unfortunately, in Colorado, you have no idea when that will be.

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A Little Bit ‘o’ Spring

My darling hubby (who is very sweet and wouldn’t hurt anyone intentionally) had a little misunderstanding with our beloved sitter a couple of weeks ago. He made an off-handed jokey comment to her that she took personally and was very upset about all weekend long.

 

As I said, Matt is not the type to be a jerk even a little. Unless he’s had no sleep and no food and even then it’s just a little. But she was upset and when I told him he felt horrible. So we decided he should bring her some flowers to apologize. I volunteered to make this very cute vase I saw on Makes and Takes.

It’s ridiculously easy to make. Canning jar (whatever size you like) + wire + ribbon = vase. You just wind the wire around the jar underneath the threads for the lid and twist to secure then make a handle out of the wire and hook it underneath the first wire. You can embellish with ribbon or  whatever else anyway you like. I found some great wire that looks like it was wrapped with raffia at Michael’s in their floral dept and Tabby picked out some pretty ribbon to go with. All in all the total cost for this was about $5 … $4 for the wire and $1 for the ribbon (and I could have used ribbon I already had, but Tabby fell in love with one at the store).

I think it turned out lovely and hopefully our sitter will agree.

http://www.makeandtakes.com/sweet-and-simple-mothers-day-vase
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Tabby’s Dinner Party

This kid of mine … she is the definition of social. She wants to be going and doing or having someone come visit her. ALL. The.Time. Whenever she makes  a new friend at the park or the gym, she will ask her friend to have her mommy talk to my mommy about setting up a playdate. The more the better. She is friendly with everyone from the grumpy-looking old lady at the grocery store to the cute young guy at Target and especially any kid even near her own age. She remembers people too. “There’s Emily. She went to swim lessons with me. Hi Emily!!!”

So she was a bit disappointed last Friday when I told her we didn’t really have any plans when she asked what we were doing that evening. “I think Grammy should come over. And Papa. And Gaga. And Gigi.” I said that was fine by me and suggested she call her guests and invite them. I really had nothing on hand for dinner, but I guessed we could figure something out. So Tabby called Grammy and invited her to dinner.

Grammy asked what we were having for dinner and Tabby asked me. As Ben had just coughed so hard he’d thrown up, I responded with, “I don’t know … at this point, probably pizza from down the block!” Then she asked Tabby if she could bring anything.

“No,” says Tabby, “Just bring yourself. No wait. How about a salad?” Gaga, Papa and Gigi were likewise invited.

Nicely Set TablePapa's Place

After nap, we talked a bit more about her dinner party. She was happy with pizza but she wanted to set the table. So I helped her get out the paint chip placemats and some cloth napkins. She very carefully paired placemats with complimentary napkins and told me who each combo was for. I suggested she make place cards to set at each place so people would know who she had set the place for. I lightly penciled the names and she traced over them and then decorated them with stickers.

Around five, we talked about ordering the pizza. What kind should we get? Tabby rattled off everyone’s favorite type of pizza and Daddy placed the order and Tabby delegated pickup him and Ben and Papa. The pizza paired with Grammy’s salad was very nice and Tabby helped me pull some chocolate chip cookie dough (homemade) out of the freezer to give everyone a nice dessert.

I think it’s fair to say a good time was had by all.

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Lousy Smarch Weather

The residents of Denver woke up this morning, YES THIS (May 11) morning to SNOW. I know it’s not a lot. I know it didn’t stick to streets, but I had to scrape off my car and put the kids in real shoes with socks and jackets. To say it dampened my mood is a gigantic understatement.

However, it did COMPLETELY justify my procrastination vis-a-vis our garden. Yay! I think I may supplement my usual minty green tea with some hot chocolate this morning. One excellent thing to come out of this cold snap though … excellent race day conditions for Sunday!! I could certainly do without a repeat of last week.

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Our Little Ski Bum

My poor hubby. His birthday is jammed in with Mother’s Day. And it’s not that anyone thinks Mother’s Day is necessarily any more important than his b’day, it’s just that there’s a LOT of mothers between my mom, myself and our extended family and friends. It’s a numbers thing. So frequently his b’day kind of gets the short end of the stick. And his b’day is also in pretty close proximity with Ben’s which means two years ago I was exhausted from having just had a baby (and a bunch of relatives in from out-of-town for my brother-in-law’s graduation) and last year we were doing the first birthday thing. So like I said, not much birthday love for Matt. But this year, I swear I redeemed myself. I DID!!

Last summer at the Vail Farmer’s Market, we saw an awesome artist, Sara Melzer. She does gorgeous India ink portraits of ski bums! They’re super colorful and kind of wild and splashy and Matt and I both loved them. We thought at the time about commissioning her to do a portrait from one of our favorite photos of Tabby in her ski gear but we couldn’t really swing or justify the price at the time. So I filed it away in my brain.

This past winter, seeing Matt skiing with his baby girl I knew I had to have the portrait made for him. He just loves sharing his favorite sport with her and takes such pride in her enjoyment and emerging proficiency. So this March I emailed Sara about getting it going and she was wonderful to work with. I sent a few photos, including this one, my fave and she agreed, that was the one. So she took a couple of weeks, worked up a proof and emailed it to me. I was thrilled!! Since Vail is a couple of hours away, I could either have it mailed to me or pick it up … shipping was steepish so I bribed my awesome cousin and his girlfriend with Indian food and he picked it up for me when he was in Vail over spring break.

I made a few slip-ups and I was scared to death he’d figure it out before the big day, but he didn’t! He was totally surprised and he LOVES it. We don’t know where we’ll hang it just yet. But we do know we’ll need a second one featuring Ben … now I just have to find the perfect ski suit.

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Happy Birthday to My Hubby!!

It is so hard to believe that when I met my husband he was a mere 18 years old. Wow. Is that possible? Let me do the math real quick … YES. He was 18 years old and it was our first semester of college. Today he turns 31.

Everything I loved about him from the beginning: his incredible energy and enthusiasm for life, his keen intellect, and his oh-so-caring nature is all still there. And 12 years has brought even more to love. He gets major props for being a great husband and father. He is my true partner, involved in almost every aspect of our life together from housework to home improvement to projects to leisure activities. And you’d be hard-pressed to find a more involved father; he truly knows our kids and loves to be with them.

Happy birthday, Matty! Thanks so much for all you are and all you do.

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Paint Chip Placemats

[flickr size=”small” float=”right”]5687169316[/flickr]For the kids’ party I made placemats as party-favors for the guests. Basically I just printed large graphics with the kids’ names on them and laminated them. The laminating sheets came in a box of 100 so I’ve got a few to spare. Somewhere in my travels, I saw mention of “paint chip” placemats and I tucked the idea away in the cobwebby part of my brain. Then with 60+ laminating pouches at my disposal, the idea surfaced again.

So I fired up photoshop and divided off a 11×17″ (300 dpi) set of pixels into 4 rectangles with these white borders (100 pixel width).  Then I filled in the rectangles with the various shades and added text layers for the colors’ names and a phony-baloney paint code below. I bought a few sheets worth of printing from our office color printer and brought them into corporeal being. A trip through the laminator and voila! Placemats!

They look very pretty on our incredibly scarred and scratched IKEA table (now in its 9th year of existence). Tabby always wants the purple one and tries to match/compliment the napkins with the placemats.

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This Time of Year

This is the time of year when I’m exhausted just looking at our calendar. From Ben’s birthday (end of April) to my sister’s (early July) we are just slammed! Holidays, weddings, birthdays, graduations, travel and RACES.

We’ve been so go-go-go that I really feel like I’ve lost my groove. For weeks and weeks I was super good about getting my butt to the gym and avoiding crap food. But the past week has been a freaking train-wreck. I’ve had pain in my foot and I’ve been a bit less active because of that, but I’ve also been doing some dumb dumb things like playing Sims 3 and staying up too late and then skipping my workout in the AM. The fact that I haven’t missed a training run is a miracle.

And the food. Really, we shouldn’t talk about it. It is terrible. I had pizza on Friday, Thai food (curry made with coconut milk) on Saturday, a giant burger on Sunday and then fried nastiness from the movie theatre last night – a grilled cheese sandwich and some cinnamon rolls. The grease stains the kids left on my pants can attest to how bad that stuff was for us. On top of that, I feel terrible when I eat that way more than once a week. Emotionally I’m guilty and mad for eating that junk and physiologically I have way less energy and my GI is not a happy camper either.

And let’s not talk about the house. I can feel my blood pressure rise just thinking about it. There is junk EVERYWHERE. The kids’ kitchen stool is out in the yard still because Ben threw up on it last week and we took it out there to wash and it hasn’t come back in yet. Laundry is in baskets (mostly folded at least) all over the place. We have mystery EVERYTHING in the fridge. There are random bags that we’ve taken all over creation and still not unpacked so I know where virtually nothing is.

But enough bitching and moaning. I need plan. A plan of attack. So here it is.

  • No computer games unless it’s the weekend and the house doesn’t look like a disaster zone.
  • Spend 10 minutes before bed each evening returning things to their proper places.
  • Continue making and executing meal plans … but nothing new, nothing fancy. Just get it done.
  • No more slacking on the training. Every Damn Day (except possibly Saturday). Just Do It.
  • JUST SAY NO. No more stuff. No more dates filling up on our calendar with anything except the best. No more Ms. Nice Girl.

This Thursday I am taking the day off work. I get to go see Tabby in her school program and then I get some blissful hours of mental health time. I will be using at least part of that to veg with a book or have a nap but I know I will use a bit of it at least to work on getting my life in order. Order means I can read to and play with the kids, hang with Matt and do other things for myself without distractions. Order is good.

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Weekend To Do(ne) List

Well a few things remain, but mostly it was a successful and good weekend!

  • host playdate with T’s friend from preschool (friend got sick and could not come. T was hugely bummed out)
  • first screening (for the kids) of Sound of Music, complete with M ‘n’ Ms and popcorn
  • homemade pizza night with family
  • FIRST workout 2.2 (5 miles faster than race pace)
  • go to yoga b/c it’s important to my long-term fitness even though (let’s not lie) I find it very boring
  • catch up on Big Bang Theory and Bones
  • send the kids off for a sleepover at Grammy & Papas
  • clothes shopping  because none of my clothes fit (I bought exactly ONE thing)
  • grocery shopping
  • clean up the flower beds and get them ready to plant
  • go out for Thai with my hubby (at the restaurant where my cuz works)
  • stay up way too late on Sat night
  • sleep in on Sunday
  • long run with the gang (FIRST 2.3)
  • pick up my darling kiddos from Grammy & Papa’s
  • yummy bad-for-me burgery lunch (with sweet potato fries)
  • park time with our good friends
  • take some photos of the kids
  • put away laundry (mostly done)
  • clean the house
  • have dinner and basement finishing planning session with friends
  • clean up mess dog left when he went on an “chew plastic” rampage in our absence
  • send loads of emails
  • relax and play some video games
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Back in the Saddle Again

I’m getting us back on track with cooking! I swear it! We’d been doing so well, but the past couple of weeks we fell off the wagon big time. Life got … busy. Real busy! We have had parties galore, events of all kind, and plenty of little in-between projects. Meals this week have mostly been OUT. We never do that! Except this week and sort of last.

So … this weekend and next week we’re getting reacquainted with the kitchen. YAY. Here’s what I’m planning to cook up:

Thursday: Lime grilled chicken with mango quinoa salad

Friday: Pizza Two Ways; that would be with buffalo chicken and bleu cheese for us and something boring (bacon and olives, probably) for the kids.

Sunday: I think we have people coming over, so I will probably make Pork Ragu

Monday: quiche! – we need to use up the innards a bunch of our Egg-Bot Creations, so I will make a couple of quiches, probably one with crust (since I have one in the fridge) and one without. Fillings will be whatever I’ve got hanging around the fridge/freezer/pantry.

Tuesday: Mediterranean Meatball Pockets

Wednesday: something from Indian Slow Cooker, TBD

Thursday: creamy chicken taquitos or maybe this chicken tamale casserole since it’s Cinco de Mayo!!!

All right … now that it’s planned. I just have to EXECUTE.

 

Speaking of which, I have a brand new training plan I’m working on. I have a half marathon in August that I”m training for and I decided I wanted to do it up right. I’m not particularly invested in this specific race (though I did enjoy it last year), but it’s about the right time frame to execute a good training plan. I am using the FIRST method, made popular by the Runner’s World Book, Run Less, Run Faster. The “less” thing is all a matter of perspective it turns out since it’s more running than I’m used to. You do a speed, temp and long run each week and it’s supposed to improve your performance. To which I will say … we’ll see. I had to start in wk 2 because I miscalculated the start date (oops) but my first workout went OK, so I will keep at it. Actually, even if it didn’t go OK, I’d probably keep at it.

I made up a spread sheet for my training that calculates all the minutea associated with a training plan like this: speed, pace, km vs. miles, etc. It was a pain in the butt, but now I have it in all nicely digitized and I can change it based on my speed improvements by just changing my 10K pace. If you are interested, you can check it out: FIRST Training for Half Marathon.