January

Wow, January is a ridiculously long month.   So long I'm having a hard time remembering what happened.

New Years Day I ran a 5k with Erika.  It was freezing and I could tell I hadn't been running much. Despite all that, I finished 12th out of 97th in my age group.  That's fun.

We took a family adventure to Bellingham.  It's about 90 minutes north of us.  The drive was beautiful.  We saw 4 Bald Eagles!

I got a cool bike jersey at the local brewery.  Can't wait till it's warm enough to wear it outside.

And we had a nice family walk along the waterfront. 

We ended the day with hot chocolate.  This place puts the whipped cream on the lid.  Pretty cool idea.

As for training, I had a pretty decent month.  I pulled my hamstring, so that had limited my running a little bit.  Thankfully it was a minor pull and it is getting better quickly. That said, I'm still only running 3 miles at a time.

Here's what the month looked like:

Running- 20 miles

Biking- 198 miles (I want to get back on my bike to ride the 2 miles so I'd be at 200)

Swimming- 1 mile - Clearly I need to find my way back to the pool.  I really thought I swam more than twice this month.  ooops.  

Here's how my month went, compared to my goals.

• Date night once a month-check
• Family adventure once a month-check
• Daily routine for the kids-haven't even thought about it
• Daily routine for me-nothing
• 30 min of quality time with the kids-I haven't actually timed this, but I think i'm pretty close most days.
• Create recipe binder-haven't worked on this.
• Plan and prep meals for the week-I'm getting better with this but there is room for improvement.
• Make Boise my best race yet-I've been pretty good with my training.  Missed a couple days here and there, but over all, not too bad.
• Enjoy a half marathon-nope
• Stretching and strength training ever week-I've been doing TRX every week and stretching more than in the past. I need to be better about stretching.  I WILL start yoga in February.  If for no other reason than my Groupon will expire.  I'm trying to get Erika and Julie to do it with me but  I'm not having much luck.
• Eat 3-5 servings of vegetables a day- I'm falling short with this one, but I am eating more than in the past.  That's a start.
• Drink 64 oz of water a day.  Not sure about this one.  I'm drinking a lot.  Not really keeping track of it.

Best Race Yet

One of my goals for this year is to make Boise my best race yet.  I decided it was time to see just how to make that happen.

• Trust my training plan and stick to it.  I have faith that Erika knows what she's doing.  If I follow what she has planned, I'll be ready.  Sometimes rest days suck, but they are necessary.  Sometimes bricks suck, but they are necessary.  I need to trust the process (got that from Jim Harbaugh) 
• No excuses.  Kids will get sick, I will be tired, things will come up.  I need to find away to make it work.
• Be flexible.   I would love to get my training in from 10-1 every day.  That's not going to happen all the time. Some days I will have to be up early and some days I'll have to wait till the kids are asleep.  I need to be ready for this.  I can't give up because the day didn't work out as planned.
• Listen to my body. I need to stick to my plan and not cave to excuses, but I also have to listen to my body.  If I have a 6 mile run planned, but my calf feels tight, I'm going to have to do less.  I WILL NOT LET INJURY MESS UP THIS RACE!!
• Eat right.  It's hard to have a good training session when you have 3 glasses of wine and a bag of M&M's the night before.  I need to think of what I put in my body.  Maybe just 2 glasses and a handful of M&M's :)  
• Enjoy the journey.  I'm doing this because it's fun. I might not enjoy every minute, but I if it's not enjoyable, why do it?  Maybe the last 10 minutes of a bike will suck, but the rest of the day I'll feel good about my accomplishment.  

That's all I can think of. Anyone else have suggestions?  

Lessons Learned from Ramona and her Mother

Pnut and I have been reading a lot of Beverly Cleary books recently.   We just finished "Ramona and Her Mother".  I'm certain I read this years ago.  Reading it as a mom, I saw it in a different light.

Here are some things I learned.

Children need mom time.- Ramona was so excited one Saturday morning, to learn there were no errands to be done.  She could sit with her mother and they could sew together. The way the book described Ramona when she was sitting next to her mom was amazing.  You could feel just how happy Ramona was, just to be sitting next to her mom.  Just because they were doing something together.

Pnut has been letting me know (in painfully exhausting ways) that she needs mom time.  She's been acting out, picking fights, and just being difficult.  So today we are having a girls day. We are going to the Science Center.  She is over the moon excited to be going without Little Dude.

Families should eat together. I realize this isn't ground breaking news.  Everything you read/hear says that you need to have family meals.  Every night Ramona has dinner with her family.  They sit around and talk about their day.  It's nice.

We have starting having family meals.  It's only been 2 days, and Brian usually isn't home, but the kids and I sit down and eat.  It has been great and the kids love it.  It has also cut down the fighting over food.  I put out the meal, and Pnut and Little Dude decide what they want and how much.  So far, so good.

Keep it simple. Ramona and her family keep things simple.  For her birthday, Ramona had a few friends meet at the playground.  Mrs. Quimby made a picnic (tuna fish sandwiches and fruit) and had a cake.  That was all Ramona needed, cake, friends and monkey bars.

For some reason we make things so complicated now.  We think our kids need more than they really do.  Mine would be happy at the playground with friends.  They would not be happy with tuna fish :)  Sometimes complicated gets overwhelming.  I think it is time to simplify things.  I'm going to start with the kids playroom.

It is ok for mom's to think of themselves.-Mrs. Quimby went to work after Mr. Quimby lost his job. Once Mr Quimby found a new job, Ramona thought her mom would stay home again.  To her surprise, her mother wanted to keep working. She enjoyed her job.  It was something she did for herself.  It gave her a sense of accomplishment. 

There are times I feel bad for taking time for myself.  Deep down inside I know I need it.  I deserve it.  Sometimes it's hard.

I'm sure there are many other lessons to be learned from Ramona and her family. I promise I won't write a book report on all the books :)

The Guilt of No Excuses

Today started out as a typical day.  My alarm went off at 5am.  I went downstairs, poured a cup of coffee, inhaled it, walked the dog, choked down a smoothie, and got on my bike.  Things were good for the first 45 minutes.  Then Brian came in (clearly upset) and said the kids were awake and crying and he had broken a vase.  I climb off my bike to assess the damage.  Little Dude was in tears.  From what I gather he was upset he couldn't find me.  I cleaned up the broken glass and started to make breakfast (chocolate chip pancakes and bacon).  By this time Brian is upstairs vacuuming up the glass I couldn't pick up.  I hear him yell.  Apparently he vacuumed up one of my necklaces.  My fancy, I can't believe I got this, necklace.  So I dug through the vacuum bag and got the necklace. Thankfully it was not broken.  I finished making breakfast, turned on Doc McStuffins and climbed back on my bike.

I felt guilty.  Brian was pissed off.  The kids woke him up on the morning he was planning on sleeping in.  I had tried to wake up early enough to get my training in before everyone woke up.  This didn't work out.  Part of me wanted to just wanted to forget about the rest of the ride.  At least I got 45 minutes in.  But another part of me said "Screw that!!".  If I am going to take this race seriously and give it my all, I'm going to have to ignore the excuses.  I'm going to have to be selfish sometimes.  

In the end I was able to do the entire 80 minutes. I'm so proud of myself for not giving into the guilt.  I got my ride in and my family survived.  I do, unfortunately, think I'm going to have to start waking up even earlier.  I'm going to do what I need to do in order to train and keep my family from falling apart.

This will not be me!

2013 Goals

I've been thinking a lot about goals for this year.  Here's what I've come up with:

Family goals:

• Have date night at least once a month.
• Have at least one family adventure a month.
• Create a better daily routine for the kids.
• Create a better daily routine for me.
• Spend 30 min of quality time with the kids each day. (no phone, no tv, no computer)
• Have family dinner every Sunday.
• Create recipe binder.
• Plan and prep meals for the week on Sunday.  

Personal goals:

• Make Boise 70.3 my best race yet.  Whatever it takes! (More on this later)
• Enjoy a half marathon. I have yet to run one, injury-free.
• Stretching and strength training every week. (This includes FINALLY trying Bikram Yoga)
• Eat 3-5 servings of veggies every day. (You'd think a grown up would be doing this anyway)
• Drink at least 2 Nalgene bottles of water a day.

I'm going to print these and hang them somewhere so I see them every day.  Maybe a daily reminder will keep me on track.

Have a fabulous 2013!