Rock Your Socks 10K

Today was the Rock Your Socks 10K (or half marathon). Since I am in the process of training for my first half marathon I decided to do the 10K. I felt good throughout and had a good pace. The weather was overcast, but a little muggy and I was definitely a little sweaty. I wore my daughters riding socks and am a little apprehensive to post the pictures as it made my legs look a little funny. So...my time was 57:58, not super fast, but a great Sunday morning run. I tuned out to "this american life" for the entire time, I didn't even think about what I had to do today. To me that is the beauty of running you can just totally tune out and be one with the road. Hope everyone had a good run:)

Baseball Try outs

Today my eight year old "Big Ben" tried out for summer baseball. There were 21 kids trying out for 12 spots. Chances are that Ben is not going to make it, but his two best buddies will make it. We spoke to him before the try out and told him that it was not a big deal if he didn't make it just so he went out and tried his best, yadda, yadda, yadda. When he got home I immediately started peppering him with questions, "how did it go?" "did you have fun?" "was it okay?" He dutifully answered every question and then looked at me and said, "Dad said if I don't make the team that we can go and get Lacrosse goals." I just kind of looked at him and then realized it was time to drop it. I was worried because I didn't want him to be disappointed if he didn't make it, but I think that kids are more resilient than we give them credit for sometimes. Will he be sad? Maybe, but he will probably be over it pretty quick. We could all take a lesson from that.

Now on to my running stuff. I am exactly 3 weeks away from my first half marathon. I have been training hard, but am feeling good. We are going to do one more big run next week and then start to taper a bit. I have been feeling the need to run everyday but I know that it is not good for me. It seems to be what gives me a piece of mind. Then I come home and am calm. I think that my positive run days=positive mom days. Good or not good? That is the question.

Out of Shape in Elementary School

I took the day off of running today because tomorrow is my loooonnnnngggg run. We are running 10 miles tomorrow morning. Instead, I worked at the Walkathon. Each class spends a half of an hour walking/running to raise money for the school. It was a bit of an eye opening experience. We have a lot of overweight and out of shape kids in our community. It made me sad. Should you be out of shape in 1st grade? Should you not be able to walk for a half an hour in fourth grade? What can we do to make kids want to be active?

I am lucky my four kids are active. Siri rides horses, the boys play football and baseball and even Izzie plays soccer. I talk to them about my running and how much I love it. We talk about eating good things and sometimes even eat "bad" things together. Are we perfect? Not by any means, but I definitely think we are missing something in our schools and at home. Now, if I could just figure out how we can fix it.

Mother's Day

Today is Mother's Day and as per usual my kids were very excited. It starts with breakfast in bed and each child has their part. Siri is in charge of the menu, Ben the orange juice, Izzie the silverware and Andy sits in bed with me and eats. Then I get all of the fun treats that they made for me at school. This year both Siri and Ben wrote me letters as to why I am a great Mom, which made me a little teary eyed. I don't always think of myself as a great Mom. I guess all that I can hope for is that I raise 4 kind, polite and generous children and that they are all happy in whatever endeavor they choose.

Now...for my favorite gift, my husband got me a gift certificate for Runner's Alley. I asked for it and I was glad that he went and got it. I don't know what I possibly need right now, although I have my eyes on a cute pair of pink compression socks that will hopefully make me fast and my recovery time quicker. Isn't that what they are supposed to do?? Anyway, I am sure that I can spend it and probably spend it pretty quick.

Well...it is time for lunch and I have 4 very hungry children who I thought ate a pretty big breakfast this am. I forget that they run on "time" versus actual hunger. Then off for my "Mother's Day Run." Hopefully the wind dies down or I might get blown away. Happy Mother's Day!

My 9 Mile Jaunt

Yesterday, my friend M and I did our 9 mile run. We are training for the Worcester Half Marathon on June 13th and we are following a Hal Higdon guide. I think that we had a great run. We were trying to keep our pace between 9 and 10 minute miles, "slow and steady!" and we ended up finishing in 1:23. I tried Gu for the first time, strawberry bananna flavor, and by the end of my run I was starting to have some stomach gurgling and had to race home pretty fast. I will have to try a new brand or maybe the shot blocks. Some people have told me that they don't use anything except water, but I don't want to take any chances running out of energy on my first half.

My goal is to finish under 2 hours. I feel like I can do it, but I haven't seen the Worcester course yet so....it might be a big goal.

On another note I attended the "Battle of the Bands," at Sky Lounge last night. I am definitely getting old. The music was loud, it was dark and you couldn't talk without screaming. By 1o pm I was wishing for my comfy bed and a good book. Needless to say, I guess that is why I don't get out much.

Happy Mother's Day tomorrow. Hopefully everyone can get out for a run! That is the only thing that I asked for....and maybe a gift certificate to the running store.

College Love Won and College Love Lost

Today I decided to take a day off from running and instead save up for my 9 mile jaunt tomorrow morning which of course led me to some anxious moments. What am I going to do while Izzie is at school this afternoon? I didn't have to clean, as my cleaning lady visited the house this am, my laundry was caught up, what is an OCD runner to do? So....I read a book for 1 hour and it actually felt good and I thought about what I wanted to write about today.

This morning while I was getting ready to take the kids to school I had the Today show on and they were reporting on a college lacrosse player from UVA who had murdered his girlfriend. Siri was in the room with me and immediately was engrossed in the story. I wanted her to leave the room and then thought that maybe this was a teaching moment. Siri is almost 10 and entering middle school next year. She has already shown a keen interest in boys and for some reason I don't know if they are the type of boys that I want her to bring home. That lead to our teaching moment, "Wow, Siri that is an awful story. I hope that you know if someone is ever mistreating you, you can come to Mom and Dad or someone you trust." Siri's reply, "Mom, if a boy hit me, I would hit him right back!" (can you tell that she has two younger brother's?)

The Today Show had me thinking about my own college boyfriend, who I thought was the most perfect boyfriend ever. We had big dreams. We were going to move to Antiqua with his Uncle and work or out to the West Coast and live on the beach. All the normal college boyfriend/girlfriend dreams. We've all had them. You are going to be with that person for the rest of your life, you pick out your kids names, "One boy and one girl please." You know what kind of car you are going to drive and you even sign your name with his last name. Of course the dream was not fufilled. He was not perfect. He drank to much, was a big story teller, never held a job, and hind sight being 20/20, used me to help him make it through school which in the end took him 5 1/2 years. I moved on to start dating my husband and realized there were much bigger dreams out there. I do have friends who married their high school and college sweethearts and it worked fine for them. I just wonder if the dreams you have in college at 21 are actually ever achieved?

Think of me on my 9 mile tomorrow morning. I am running with my new hydration belt and some different Gu flavors that Izzie picked out. Hopefully I am able to write about it tomorrow afternoon.

Running with Izzie/Tall Mom's Virtual 5 K

Today Izzie and I ran a 5 K. I returned to running this year after a period of feeling sorry for myself and my position in life. After a few months of talk therapy and a little something, something, I am definitely on track and training for my first half marathon in June. Running with Izzie is always a trial and a treat at the same time. The trial is that she weighs 33 pounds and god only knows how much the stroller weighs, we live in a town with hills and that she puts the sun shield up and down, up and down always pulling it out of its holder. The treat is she chants 'go mommy go' up hills, she talks to me about the geese we hear, and she laughs during the entire run.

So anyway we ran the Tall Mom's Virtual 5 K this am as something fun to do. Of course, I am just reading Mels instructions regarding creating a bib for myself and taking a picture and I don't have any of that, but I do have my time and my route. I ran a 5 K in 33 minutes, with Izzie. I am definitely not going to win anything, but in the end I guess I did win something, 33 minutes with my best girl.