Recent break

You've probably noticed my lack of posts recently. I was trying to really decide what I wanted this blog to be. It's still about my running journey, but that is only part of my life. I've decided this will also be about my life in general and my family. First and foremost I am a mommy and wife, next I am a runner.

I did do the Historic Half on May 18th. I was running with my BRF (best running friend), her goal was a sub 2. I ran about 11 miles with her, then lost her in the crowd at Hospital Hill. I finished in 1:55:29 (and for the first time ran the whole way and even felt like I could run a couple more miles!). She finished in 1:58:00!! We still have one more half this year and she is working towards a 1:55:00 finish!

Other big news: We booked our Disney vacation! This will be my first trip to Disney as well as a first for my kids. My husband, mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and my parents have all been before. We'll have a huge group, and will have so much fun! We are trying to keep this a complete secret from the kids! We want to surprise them with the whole experience. Most of the planning is going to be by me. I think everyone else is having fun watching me plan and get excited! I won't post (for safety reasons) when we'll be going, but it quite a while away! Every once in awhile I might post how planning is going and what the plans are, just because I'm so excited to go!!!

Today is Kaitlyn's last day of preschool. She thinks that she'll start Kindergarten on Monday. It's hard to explain to a 5 year old that she has to wait until September! I'm going to try to keep her busy until my other two get out of school on June 19th!

John, my husband, has been attending PMP bootcamp this week. He is exhausted and mentally overwhelmed. I know he'll be glad to have this out of the way!

My Little Corner of the World

Recently we have been moving things around in our house. We have a 3 bedroom townhouse. About 18 months ago we moved things around so each kid could have their own room and John and I moved our bedroom to the basement. The only problem with that was I lost my "office" area and craft corner. During this time my "area" has been a small corner if our dining room table. I noticed that my stuff kept moving and disappearing, which does not make for a happy mommy!

So we moved things around again! John and I are still in the basement. My son kept his big room, and the girls are together again in the master bedroom. The small bedroom is now mine! When bought the house we used it as the nursery, it is only about an 8x8 room. I don't have a desk or chair just but I will soon! 

The closet is filled with my craft things and running gear.

Much better than under the stairs and shoved into a small drawer! 

I also can display all my running medals and other goodies all in one place now!

Always earned!

My Diva 5K winnings!

Do you have a place in your house just for you?

Weekly Workouts for April 6th- 12th

April 6th was the Cherry Blossom race (see race recap). My schedule for the week after that was: Monday rest/recovery, Tuesday 5K pace intervals on the treadmill, Wednesday was easy miles on the treadmill, Thursday was goal pace on the treadmill, Friday was cross training, Saturday was my long group run.

Here's how I did:

Notice Wednesday my split, I realized at mile 1.25 that I had to go potty! So I went and came back and finished it out. Thursday was supposed to be 6 miles, but I was pretty done by mile 5 so I had to stop at 5.5.

Saturday:

The lady I ran with only needed 5 miles, so I got there early and did 2 on my own, met with her and ran the 5 and then finished out with 2 more on my own.

The rest of that day was spent watching my husband play softball with our church team.

Cherry Blossom Recap

Cherry Blossom 10 miler, April 6, 2014

The expo was quick and easy to get to and get my packet. Not a whole lot at the expo that I haven't seen before. So I didn't buy anything!

My bib, I was in the first wave of "regular runners", the elites were the first official wave.

My Flat Mama for the race (all but my watch and music, both were charging!)

Before the race- while waiting on the Port-a-Potty line.

After- feeling pretty good!

My Stats: I finished in 1:20:16, well within my set goal of 1:20 to 1:30!

All in all a great race, I felt good. I did walk for about 10 seconds each mile starting at mile 5, just to catch my breath and enjoy the beauty of the city!

Weekly workout March 30th-April 5th

My schedule this week was supposed to be: Rest Sunday, tempo run Monday, cross train Tuesday, easy treadmill miles on Wednesday, easy treadmill miles Thursday morning, an easy 3 mile group run on Thursday evening, rest Friday, and walk 30-45 minutes on Saturday

Here was my weekly workout for the treadmill:

Monday- pretty good!

Wednesday- awesome!

Thursday treadmill running didn't happen, so I went out with a friend before our group run- not too bad:

This is a our group run- we did good keeping it easy!

Tuesday and Saturday I did walking for 30-45 minutes. Sometimes I find that so much harder than running!

Weekly Workouts For March 23-29

My normal routine is Sunday rest, Monday treadmill, Tuesday cross train, Wednesday treadmill, Thursday morning treadmill, Thursday evening group run, Friday rest and Saturday long group run.

Here is my weekly treadmill routine and what I did each day:

As you can see I shorted my miles on Thursday, but I knew I was running that night. 

Here is what my running buddy and I did on the Thursday evening group run:

We usually aren't that "slow" but we started another workout routine that we were pretty sore from, so we slowed down a lot for us!

Here is our Saturday morning long run:

This was a pretty good pace for us! We were dealing with being out late the night before- MRTT Bunco night!! And we also had some fog and drizzle, but it was a good run!

Here is the new workout routine we started this week in preparation for the Marine Corps Historic Half:

It's a pretty intense routine. As you can see, we do something every day. I'm not as sore now, as I was at the beginning of the!

I did attempt my cross training day on Tuesday. We have Amazon Prime, so we can try videos out as part of our membership. I decided to try (for my first time EVER) a yoga video. I made the mistake of trying the Jillian Michaels yoga video. I made it about halfway through before I realized this is not what I needed. She's tough, and gets results, but I wanted something a little more gentle to stretch me out not make me more sore! I will try another yoga video this week- any suggestions?

Realizing Some Things

Since I've been running, I've always chased a PR in all my races. I've come to realize, after that rough Rock N Roll race, that it's not fun to do that anymore!

I ran/walked the last part of the race in pure agony and questioned myself every step of the way, why I was even doing this. I think in that moment I realized that I wanted to enjoy running, not always run for  a PR.

I will still set myself some time goals on my races. But I won't always run to get my best time ever! I want to run because it's fun!

My next race is The Cherry Blossom 10 miler here in DC. My goal time will be between an hour and twenty minutes to an hour and thirty minutes. My PR for a 10 mile race is 1:19:05, so I think my goal is doable!