Saturday 7/21/07

I am so thankful this morning! First, I got my first response about my sponsor letters. I sent them out earlier this week and I've already gotten a response saying she will send a check - Thank you Cheryl! Then, this morning I went out for a 6 mile run. The weather was absolutely beautiful - nice and cool (bit of a breeze though) and the sunrise was spectacular. I did the run alone because Bill had to go into work today so I had to do a shorter run (my scheduled Sunday run) but I will be meeting up with "the group" tomorrow for a 12 miler.

This all made for an excellent start to the day!

I'm hoping now that the majority of the sponsor letters are out, I will be able to catch up on some of my other interests. I haven't looked at my Bible study book (It's Not About Me) in about a week and Julie has already posted the next chapters questions. I am really enjoying the book - it is easy to read but contains a lot of interesting points. I will also be receiving my copy of the next Harry Potter book - OK that's really weird, just as I finished writing the name Harry Potter, the UPS truck stopped at the house and delivered the book. We usually don't get our UPS deliveries until the afternoon! So, as I was saying, I'm really looking forward to getting into those 2 books. Then, of course, there is all that lovely housework that needs to be done - something I'm NOT looking forward too especially since I've let it go for a while. Finally, I also want to get a jump on planning for the upcoming school year. I at least want to get a month or 2 worth of gym classes planned so that it will be an easier transition into the start of the school year.

OK, I've waited a good 5 minutes - time to take a look at the new Harry Potter book. Later! Keep on runnin'!

It has been a while - 7/20/07

Things have been pretty busy around here. I've started my big fundraising push and have been spending a lot of time getting letters made up, envelopes stuffed and mailed. It actually took a lot more time than I originally thought it would. But the majority of the letters have gone out and I'm really hoping I will get a lot of positive responses!

My training has been going well. Although I have been feeling pretty tired this week which has resulted in some switching around of workouts. I think I will still end the week with the proper amount of total mileage though so I'm feeling good about it. Eating has not been as good as it should be so my weight loss has stalled a bit. I am making water consumption a priority because that has been lacking lately. I'm hoping that will also help curb the munching aspect of my nutrition plan.

Other than that the only other thing that has happened this week was my evaluation meeting with Saralee. It was very positive and I am happy that I will again be working with the three year olds and will be co-teaching with Jeanette. I'm looking forward to the upcoming year - both Jeanette and I will have a year under our belts plus Saralee wants all of us to sit down and come up with a plan for the year. This will help ensure that the kids are progressing at an appropriate level but I think it will also help Jeanette and I stay on the same page. Since we are both in and out of the classroom throughout the week it can be hard to keep up with each others plans and ideas.

Gotta go - keep runnin'

Thursday 7/12/07

I've had some really good runs this week! Tuesday and Wednesday were runs with Pat and Lori. I finally got a chance to meet Pat who was the person who directed me to this running group in the first place. It was great to finally meet him - he is a triathlete as well as a distance runner. He just ran in a 1/2 Ironman triathlon.

I ran on my own today (3 miles) so I decided to really try and push the pace today. I've really enjoyed running with the group but it has also been significantly slower than I was running before. Overall I think that is a good thing especially now that the miles are going to start to add up. However, I also want to make sure I get in 1 or 2 runs a week at a quicker pace. I still have my eye on doing well in my age group for the Delaware Distance Classic so I want to make sure I get in at least a bit of faster paced running.

OK, back to today's run. Like I said, I went into it with the goal of pushing the pace. I didn't have specific pace in mind but I was hoping for between 7:30 and 8 min/mile. It was also nice and cool, finally so off I went. I did the first mile in 7:24, the 2nd mile I did in 7:03 and I was still feeling pretty good so I kept on pushing and finished the 3rd mile in 6:17. The average pace ended up being 6:58 min/mile. Needless to say I was thrilled with the effort and the results - I also didn't have much left at the end which I also consider a good thing!

I still have a few more weeks where my shorter runs are 3 miles long and I will continue to do 1 or 2 fast paced runs. Once the runs get longer I may just run a portion of the distance faster.

Gotta go - Keep on Running!

Monday 6/9/07

No that's not me - LOL!

I finally got out for a great rollerblading workout this morning. I've wanted to get out the past 2 weeks but it just didn't work out. Today was hot, but because I was out really early and because there is a great wind as you skate down the road, but it really felt good. I went 5.5 miles in a little over 30 minutes. I finished up the workout with about 35 minutes of resistance training.

A bit later in the day I took the kids and Boomer to the trail that I've been running on. It is so hot out today that I decided to get the kids out in a place that I knew there would be lots of shade. I didn't want to take them to the pool in this awful heat so we'll do that tonight after dinner. We all had a great time - Will was a bit upset that we weren't going to see any water but was quite happy when we found a bird watching perch. The kids had a great time climbing up the ladder and then sitting up on the standing looking all around. I think Boomer and the kids are quite tired right now so I feel like I did my job - LOL!

I'm looking forward to some great runs this week. My mileage this week should be around 27 miles with a long run of 11. I'm gradually adding up those miles and it is awesome to have friends to run with. One of my new training partners is also planning on running the MCM so I'm hoping to be able to run it together!

Keep on runnin'!

Long Run 7/7/07

Went on a great group run this morning - it wasn't nearly as many people in the above picture - there were 3 of us. Doesn't really matter how many people there are though - I have just loved running with other people. We covered 9.6 miles in just under 1:40. I really think the slower pace is helping me a lot and just having other around is awesome!

I'm meeting Lori tomorrow morning to run the trails again. So, of course, I had to go out and get some trail shoes. They were expensive ($110) but luckily I had a gift certificate left for Women's Sports Specialties so I only ended up paying about $63. They are Asics and they felt really good so I'm hoping that they will feel good while I'm running and will help protect my feet from all the rocks and such.

Nutrition has been good so far today. I'm really making an effort to keep things reigned in because I had my splurge meal last night and I tend to make 1 splurge meal into a couple of splurge days. I've finally started to move my weight down and I want to keep that trend going.

Off to start a nice healthy dinner

FRUSTRATED!

I got a neck spasm today while at the pool. The "funny" part was that it kicked in when I sat down to relax in a chair. I'm sure catching Will jumping off the wall was the cause for the spasm but it didn't kick in until much later. I'm really hoping it doesn't mess up my long run tomorrow! It will usually hurt for a few days and then the pain is gone. I got a heat pack on it at soon as I could but it still really hurts.

One good thing is that I haven't let it frustrate me to the point of eating poorly. I did have my splurge meal tonight but that is where it will end! I am really trying to focus on not using food as a crutch - I want to use it for what it was meant for which is giving my body nourishment. Yes I will always enjoy the way food tastes but I don't want to be a slave to it anymore!

It's been a good week!

Boy has this week been busy. Bill has been off work since Wednesday so we've been able to spend a lot of family time at the pool. Bill has been able to go to some of the kid's swim lessons and then we've stayed to have lunch and play in the pool. They put on a really nice 4th of July party which we will have no problem going back to next year!

My workouts have been going really well. I ran with Lori and Jim on Tuesday and then by myself the rest of the week. I'll also be meeting Lori on Saturday. This week we will be road running so no trails this week - I hope we jump back into that soon. I had such a great time with that last weekend but I will need to get myself some trail shoes.

I had some up and down days nutritionally. Tuesday was really bad - I started binging on banana chips and could not stop luckily my weight wasn't drastically affected. Then Wednesday was better but still not great. But man did I rock the house yesterday - I had a great day and the scale finally moved downward. I dropped to 138.5 which is a 1.5# lose for the week so far. It really made me feel good to finally see some movement - it really fires you us to be rewarded for your work.

I am also really trying to make an effort to change my way of thinking. I started reading Taming the Feast Beast and it has brought up some interesting points. Then I read an interesting post on LL and it made me realize that I'm still really struggling with the "diet" mentality. I need to move past that thought process and begin to view it as a lifestyle. I don't think I have really made that transition - some of the parts of the puzzle are there (mostly with exercise) but many of the nutritional parts are still askew. That will be my main focus for a while.