Yesterday, 9/20/08, we celebrated Lilah's 7th birthday.  My sister Nora and her children came to my mother's house for dinner and cake.  We were also joined by Doug's parents.  Lilah's birthday has seemed to be the never-ending birthday.  She has received cards and money in the mail, birthday dinner and shopping with grandparents and now this get-together.  She still has something else to come from Aunt Rebecca and Uncle Barry.  Lucky Girl!

We also spent some time taking pictures of Brittany as I am still working on her senior pictures. I like this one at the top. 

Britt is also very good at taking pictures and grabbed this one of my sister Meredith and me.  Meredith usually is very reluctant to allow photos, but isn't she beautiful.  

Today I finally made my 8 mile run.  In fact, it was 8.5 miles this am at Clearbrook.  Beautiful weather and temp.  Perfect weather for a long run.  Tisa came today and ran!  Yeah!!!!!!! She did 12 of the 15 laps.  I hope this was not too much since she has been off for 2 weeks.  Valerie also came and ran along for a while.  She is very low maintenance and can come any day!  I am so pleased that we finally made that run after 3 weeks of attempting it.  First, the course was shorter than anticipated and the laps did not add up.  Then, the heat was too much to finish last week.   Good day!  Only 5 more for 1/2 marathon!

Special Olympics 5K 9/20/08

It was a beatiful day for a race.  The Shenandoah Valley Runners held a 5K to raise money for the local Special Olympic chapter.  The race weather was 50 deg and beautiful.  Karen Nguyen and Valerie Ashley joined me for the run.  As you can see, we all came home with medals.  How fun and encouraging for runners of all abilities.  

Here is a look at the fields.  Not the most exciting of photos, but overall a gorgeous morning. 

The best part of the day was taking another minute off of my PR which brings me to 31:36.  The worst part was missing Tisa during the run.  I hope her foot is healing because we have a goal, a big goal coming up in November.  "Come on Tisa"

Funny Story

This morning, Isaiah came to me and asked if he could wear my Nike plus sportband.  Of course I put it on him to wear around the house.  He was still in his pjs and poopy at that.  He then went to Doug in the office and said "I go for run with Tisa".  Doug said ok and left it at that.  Isaiah then said, "bye Mommy, I go for run"

I heard the door shut and figured he was checking out the jogger on the front porch.  After a few minutes, I went out and he was no where to be found.  I yelled for him and he yelled back "I running"  He had made it about 4 houses away to the cul-de-sac, with bare feet, pjs and poopy butt.  He came to the drive way and on to the porch.  We chatted about what he was doing and he put his hands on his thighs and said "I sweaty".  How funny.  My little running man!
We had him pose for a few running shots of course after we laughed our butts off.  
Here he is checking his time on the sportband.
Here we are after our short run this afternoon.  A pretty fast one though.  I just did the neighborhood which is about 2 miles with 2 pretty good hills.  I was smoking, for me and did it in less than 20 min.  Isaiah helped me with crunches afterwards (feet on my stomach, sitting on my face, etc.  )  A funny little man!

HHHOOOTTTT!

Today was to be 8 miles at Clearbrook Park with Tisa riding a bike and running with our friend Karen.  All 3 of us are planning to run the 1/2 marathon in November.  Who knew the forecasters would be correct and we would actually have a 95 degree day?!?!?!?  This was a tough run.  We took several walk breaks for water and ended up only completing 10 of the 14 laps needed for 8 miles.  Total distance 5.68 miles.  

Since we have added "no gravels" to our list of running no-nos , we will also add "no 95 deg runs".  

This is what I thought I would look like today!  HEEE  HEEE!

      

This is probably what I really looked like

Funny!!!  I am grateful for Tisa coming today to ride along with us.  I am hoping she will be back up and running (literally) very soon.  

Ran 4 miles today.  Again, I am giving this NIKE plus thing a try.  The band says I ran 3.62 when I ran 4.  Will try the callibration feature.  Don't really know if it will live up to the hype for me.  

My running buddy is injured.  Tisa has been complaining of foot pain off and on for a couple of weeks and after our long run in Berryville, she was hurting so bad she had it checked out.  "Posterior tibial tendonitis" is the official diagnosis.  The MD told her she could run, but I'm nervous about further injury.  I think Tisa is questioning it too and is headed for a second opinion.  

                               

                               

The World Wide Half Marathon is coming in about 1 month.  I have signed up for the half marathon.  Not sure I'll be ready to stick with it, but it is my goal to use it as a long run for that weekend, which just so happens to be a scrapbooking weekend as well.  I am starting to question how I can fit it all in this fall.    

Long Run Ughhh!

Today was supposed to be a long run of 8 miles.  "supposed to" being the key phrase.  Tisa and I traveled to Berryville to run on their fitness trail.  We had heard it was approx 2 miles around so we thought 4 laps should get our 8 mile long run.  Well, the trail is actually 1.86 which times 4 = 7.44 miles, basically the same as last week.  It turned out to be okay though, because Tisa and were both pretty weak.  We are wondering if our legs were tired earlier because of running on cinders/gravel instead of pavement.  The course was flat though, with a great shaded area each time around.  The rest of this day has left me tired and kind of grumpy.  Maybe it's because I just worked 3 days in a row, although not busy, still time away from home.   

I got my NIKE+ sportband back.  I think I will give it another try.  It wasn't far off today.  Ran 7.44 and the band said 7.23.  Was good for checking our pace also.  Check out the site NIKE+ to read about the NIKE+ sportband.   I had previously had issues with it and sent it back.  I would love for it to work so that I can track my miles and check my pace. 

Big Changes/fitting it all in!

This past Monday, the Palmers took down the crib for the last time. Here is the whole Freak Fest in the crib.  Hard to believe all 4 of these people were at some time in this crib.  It has been a good one having been a purchase from a yard sale 14 years ago.  We decided to take it to the dump since it is so old and the wood for 2 of the wheel inserts is splitting.  Isaiah has taken to whole thing really well.  He jumped right up into the twin bed that night and never came out of the room ALL night.  I was hoping for a tear or two, you know, just to be needed, but he didn't event give me one!  He is such a big boy!
Makenah started riding lessons today.  She is trying this for a month and then maybe tae kwon do for a month to see what her next hobby will be.  She had lots of good comments this evening.  I am curious to see if she will even try tae kwon do.  She kissed this horse on the nose when she was grooming him at the end of the lesson. 

Now, onto me.....

I ran last night 9/3 with Tisa at Clearbrook Park.  Here is the link to a map of the park.  The red dotted area  is the course we run.  The number of laps depends on the mileage we want to cover.  Clearbrook Map   Tonight we did 6 laps for 3.4 miles.  Each lap is 3000 ft with 5280 ft being a mile.  I felt pretty comfortable with the run.  It was a little humid but the sun was setting and it is shady.  

The fun comes in me getting to the park to actually run.  My day was full of running with a dental appt in Romney (1 hour away).  I am having a bridge put in to cover 2 spaces.   Today I needed 3 shots of local for numbing.  My jaw is still killing me the next day.  Then, I came home to get the girls off the bus and Makenah has forgotten a book for homework.   We call her friend to see if we can make copies of the pages.  The friend has already c0mpleted the pages so we have to cover the answers with post it notes so as not to copy.  Lilah is dragging her feet as usual and takes 30 min to get a snack.  Now we rush out the door to get Hannah to the library, pick up Isaiah from daycare, go to the bank, then back to the library to pick up Hannah.  Now home, it is now 5:45 and Doug has not started dinner and he has to leave in 30 min to video his Wed evening regular commitment.  I am supposed to be at the park in 45 min to run.  I need this run as I have been pretty much cooped in my car for the last 3 days (Mechanicsville Mon, Charlottesville Tues, and Romney Wed. )  So we make quick spaghetti.  I am anxious with the kids because no one can eat as fast as I would like and all I am thinking about is getting to the park to run.  Seems kind of crazy when you actually stop and think of how I am making my family crazy with my need to run.  Is this really the example I want to be?

They tolerated the park well.  Hannah played with Isaiah on the swings and Makenah did homework.  Lilah, well, she is just Lilah and blissfully played and waved to me on each lap around.  Then, we loaded up, went to Target and purchased white out to finish covering all of the answers on the spelling homework that Makenah had to copy.  Bedtime, tucking in, paying bills, dishes.............

Crazy Week!

This week has been a challenge with a 5th little person in our home! My nephew Nicholas spent the week with us.  Mainly because I miss spoiling him as I did my niece and also to give my sister some much needed time off.  She works very hard to keep her life going and Nick is a handful when coupled with a very active teenager with ATTITUDE!

I was able to get in a long run with Tisa this past Friday.  7.5 miles!!!! Holy cow, I can't believe we did it.  We went to Clearbrook Park which means 13.2 laps around their track.  It was overcast and about 72 degrees.   We did the run without stopping in about 1 hour and 20 min.  Tisa even said she could have run another lap.  I was concerned that someone had taken over Tisa's body because that comment was totally out of character.  I am so proud of both of us for how far we have come.  It makes the 1/2 marathon seem more attainable. 

Yesterday 8/31, we took Nick back to Mechanicsville.  I was able to run a short run of about 3 miles in my sister's neighborhood.  It is a great place to run, flat, and some shading.  The traffic is always minimal when I am there although she says it is too much for her to walk sometimes.  I listened to a podcast while running by ashlanddave.   ashlanddave.podbean.com    I have been following him lateley catching up on back issues.  He talks during one of his weekly runs.  Pretty cool to listen to others working in runs, working toward goals and dealing with life at the same time. 

Tisa called tonight to set up a running schedule.  Hopefully will do long run this coming Monday to stay close to the weekend schedule of increasing by .5 miles each weekend.  That means 8 miles this time.  WOW!  I know we can do it. 

My daughter Hannah started a blog this week.  She will be completing 8th grade this year and I have given her this task to write a blog for the year.  She got a new Mac laptop and I am hoping to take some of the free classes at the Mac store so she can get the full effect of the computer and perfect this blogging thing.   hannahs8thgradeyear.blogspot.com