No Time

No time to write... though last week I did get an interesting bellydancing workout. Have another later this week. Def. harder than it looks! Yow, abs! Very fun.

I got new sports bras and fitness shorts. Those feel good. Need to hunt down new sneakers.

Julia's still having trouble adjusting to napping at school so she's a crab on my long day but she's doing decent when I leave her to go to gym. Doesn't wig out or anything. The only downer is that I only get one hour at gym, and this has to include driving to and fro time.

Realistically... it's not happening for half marathon. I may have to switch over to the 5K. I'm trying to cope with how I feel about all that.

I'm also trying to cope with how I feel about the holidays and trying to meet the needs of the extended family.

Paul and I are doing better. But now I'm being attacked by wooden turtles so can't go there... that's a lengthy one. A little person around here wants me to help her put then to sleep with a blanket because they are "sleeping."

Oh, and I didn't even mention the "dinosaur" who sleeps in the garage. Friday night our neighbor called us and Paul ended up rescuing a Savanah monitor out of her bushes. I hoep the pet just escaped their cage. Because what cruel person would abandon a monitor in this chilly weather?! It would die! He can't live with us... I have to try to lcoate the owner or find him a new home.

But Julia thinks it's great that we have a new "dinosaur" however temporarily.

Hurricane

And here I thought we'd make it to November (and the end of hurricane season) with no action. Argh.

Ugly weather today and we're under tornado watch. My poor tabebuia tree may have had it -- it's bent at the bottom and posibly snapping and the top is scratching at my office windows. I don't want to go outside to try to restake it and I can't really see the bottom from the window well. Too much rain.

If that's the only thing we lose, I'll be grateful. I can always get another sapling and start over.

bye!

Just a quick post to say that I am mostly packed and really busy. We will be cleaning all day tomorrow, then leaving DC on Tuesday AM. I will be out of computer contact for at least a week. When I get to AL, I will start my marathon training in earnest and hope that all the preparations I did before now will help me skip these two weeks of training. Hope everyone has a great couple of weeks!

Excited

Well... looks like I got my child care problem worked out at long last!

I just have to pop down to school tomorrow to confirm my timesheet with the director. The idea is that I'll be teaching preschool on Tuesdays and be there all day. I'll pick up one of the hours with pay, then give the other 4.5 hours without pay. In return I get to leave Julia in school for 4.5 hours over Wed, Thurs, and Fri so I can hit the gym with peace of mind.

The rest of the time is on the weekend and then Paul can take her so I can go to the other gym close to my house.

Been giving it a whirl this week to see how Julia copes with being at school without me on site. Today I left her and and I went to visit the gym by work today. Brand spanking new, clean, pretty and uncrowded. Woot! I'm totally psyched.

Now that all my crazy fundraiser stuff is over for the year, Paul and I have been hashing out our home life and schedules so getting that squared away helps.

I have to confess that I'm worried about actually making it to the race but race or no I must train. We start TTC next year and I need to get ready for that. Also need to make an appt. with the midwife I want to use for a VBAC. That gives me a chance to map out my second pregnancy and find the people I want to support me through it and make changes if I end up not liking them.

Busy, busy.

no exercise

but good solid packing was accomplished! As promised, my mother in law arrived and took the babe while we packed the babe's room. Almost everything is packed, trashed or in the good will pile. All that is left is the disposable soon, but currently still usable (like meds and creams) and stuff we will definitely be packing on our trip (the handful of fall clothes we have for our chickie.) I also packed some baskets in the hallway and have plans on packing the bookcases first thing tomorrow when I get home from work.

Tomorrow night I hope we can get a little exercise in between the packing. I need to get my clothes seperated out into piles for taking and good will (I have so few things, I will probably take the all on our trip.) And probably go ahead and make my first donation run, things are starting to pile up.

want to be motivated

I called in motivational help from my peeps (i.e. Cat and Nikki) earlier and they rocked! I got out and got moving, did what I could do, even though it wasn't what Hal wanted me to do. It is what I could handle tonight and I feel 10x better for having started.

Exercise:

• What : brisk neighborhood walk
  
• Distance: 2.2 miles

The first day of HH is here! The first two weeks of half marathon training couldn't have come at a worse time. I am consumed with packing and preparing for the move this week and will be "homeless" next week. (In reality we will staying in a very nice cabin on a mountain in Tennessee that allows pets, but doesn't provide an ideal place to exercise. I plan on hitting the mall a couple of times, but we will only have the little umbrella stroller which isn't even condusive to long walks.) I am going to just focus on doing something 4 days this week and a couple of days next week. Today I started with a 2.2 mile neighborhood walk. We walked fast and I pushed Iz so it was a great workout for me. We even ate in tonight thanks to Mike heating up the leftovers for taco salad. We use the soy crumbles that are already flavored for tacos and they are deee-vine. For these first two weeks, I am just going to focus on total milage that Hal suggests and not worry about the breakdown. If I hit 12 miles this week, I will consider it a great success. If I hit 12 miles next week, I will consider it a miracle!!! Week 3 will provide no excuses.

Gosh, I can't believe the half marathon is only 12 weeks away! I can't wait.

Welcome to HH!

• Plan: Stretch + Strength
• Reality: yoga for 20 min. before bed

I feel a little bit behind considering that I have to get on with the Hal Higdon schedule today.

The house is a mess, there's booth things and posters all over, I have to clean the fridge because produce delivery is tomorrow, I have a lot of paperwork to do, I want to sew my curtains, I want to move on my lesson plans... just busy.

Saturday? Was a lot of fun and thankfully, we made a profit on the festival of $300 ish. Last year the school lost $1000 putting it on so certainly an improvement. All the other parents are thrilled, but I'm a little on the bummed out side beause I would have liked to see a profit of a few grand. But everyone's on a different learning curve for fundraising and of course, I've got a different personal benchmark in my head for what "successful" is for a festival. I happen think a few hundred is great for a bake sale, but a festival that size ought to be scoring in the low thousands.

(Sunday I went to a quarterly meeting and got the real numbers from the fundraising auction I was pushing along all summer. It was over $14,000! )

Gretchen and I are getting along well and as I get to know her better I'm excited about all our ideas for playgroup and a small business down the road.

Our arts and crafts booth went over well at the festival and it was better than the booth we did at VegFest. This weekend we're going to a natural family expo not just because the topics interest us, but because we want to study booths and keep improving our booth for promoting attachment parenting and our playgroup.

I rediscovered a casual friend I used to work with years ago in college at the festival. She left because she was pregnant and I remember her farewell baby shower. It was a shock to see that baby be a 10 year old girl and two other kids besides.

Paul also saw some other kid at the festival and later told me he arrived at the same conclusion. That it was a shock to see the time of our relationship summed up in the lifespan of some other human being. Weird.

But Erica is in the cloth diaper biz now so I bought a mess of Bummi and Mother of Eden training pants from her for Julia. Gerber is up to it's usual standard in craposity -- the gerber training pants I bought for kicks performed like I expected. May as well use panties!

So Julia's in panties and home and training pants out and about and Paul and I are enjoying the trimmer diaper bag.

Sunday evening we went to a pet blessing service and it was very enjoyable to have pets in the sanctuary and have a pet theme. I was moved to tears and Paul asked me if I was ok later. I wasn't expecting it but I got sentimental remembering pets in the past.

There's a series of body + spirituality things I want to attend and have to register for.

So I'm good... but busy... and after I finish cleaning house and get Julia to sleep I need to exercise so ... lunch and carry on....

not a great day

Today I just feel disconnected from myself, from life, from Mike, from exercise and eating right. It is probably just a coping mechanism for all the stress I am under with the move. And it is crazy how I run right to food when I feel this way, and I realize that I am doing it too. I am trying to regroup tonight. I made a healthy dinner, using stuff from our pantry, and have a menu planned for tomorrow. No exercise, but am hydrating, so hopefully exercise tomorrow.

How was your day Cat?

Yargh

Paul and I just finished making posters for our tables at the preschool fundraiser. In five hours we have to get up and pack up and get over there to start helping to pitch tents for booths.

Yargh.

I'm mostly looking forward to it, but it's going to be a looooong day.

Back and ready to pack!

I am back from my trip and boy, I ate bad! And drank lots! Two things that I probably shouldn't have done in combination. But I did get one 20 minute run in and realized that it is REALLY boring to run alone. This weekend, back to running and PACKING! I am supposed to start HH this week too!

No, thanks.

Somebody asked me yesterday if I wanted to do a short fundraiser (6 weeks) and I delined. I don't mind helping one Sunday to babysit a table, but I don't want to be organizing anything. I'm done with major volunteering for the year!

Two more days til Julia's preschool fundraising festival thing and I have oodles to Xerox, bake sale things to bake, posters to make, yargh.

And next week... I move on to half marathon junk. That's all I want to do.

jog at last

After two days of rain, we got a jog done.

Exercise:

• What : jog
  
• Time: 1:08:53 minutes
  
• Distance: .6 miles warm up, 2.75 miles workout, .3 miles cool down
  
• Lap Times: 3:38, 3:52, 3:57, 4:01, 3:59, 4:03, 4:11, 4:06, 4:07, 4:09, 3:50
  
• Minutes/mile: 15.9

It was a slow and painful run. We went out around 2 because we couldn't get Iz to go down for a nap and she normally sleeps while we run so we thought we would kill two birds with one stone (or the vegetarian, animal friendly version of that cliche). We thought it would be an easier run since we had 3 days off, but I was struggling from the beginning. It could have been because of lack of hydration? Or sheer exhaustion from my day with my sister and neices and a clingy baby yesterday? Whatever it was, I was thinking about stopping after 2 laps. There were baseball players in the batting cage beside the track and everytime they cracked a ball, I imagined the ball whacking me in the back of my head and me hitting the asphalt face first. Regardless of the bad visual images, we got through it, thanks in large part to Mike who kept up a steady stream of conversation the whole time.

Onto food - I made AMAZING chocolate chip banana pancakes this morning. We normally don't do pancakes, but I don't know why. They aren't that bad calorically and man they are a yummy treat. Today I had a banana at the edge of edibility so I smushed it, added clumps to my favorite pancake mix, stirred in some chocolate chips and voila! We have been using the sugar free syrup (my mom is a diabetic and we have it on hand for her) and it saves us a lot on calories. The whole meal ends up being 6 or 7 points depending on the chocolate chips, so about 300 calories. Not that different from our normal breakfasts. Tonight I am making my healthy corn pudding, sweet potatoes and veggie sausage. I want Mike to have some leftovers becasuse I am off for a few days on a business trip. I am taking my running gear and WW notebook. I will report back in when I return on Thursday.

smoothie

Still raining here so no exercise tonight. I think we will just skip the one we were meant to do last night, so one more 2.75 tomorrow if the rain lets up, then start the 3 milers next Tuesday.

I had a great day visiting my sister and neices. We gave each other nicknames, mine was tofu. (The girls think it is very odd that I am vegetarian.) We went to panera for lunch and then to cafe smoothie after shopping. God bless america, they had their nutritional info right in front of the store, easier to find than their menu, and I was able to make a reasonable choice (strawberrry banana smoothie with splenda for 169 calories). I love it, they gave the splenda option, they tell you right up front how much it is going to "cost" nutritionally. If I ever need another smoothie, I would go to them again.

Vegan Lunchbox

http://veganlunchbox.blogspot.com

Totally rocks!

Esp. for a lunchbox making newbie like me. (C'mon, my kid's only 20 mos old!)

Stoked

Left Julia at preschool today since I had an 11 AM appointment.

Appointment went great -- I'm really stoked about working with this teahouse... even if I WASN'T trying to develop a professional relationship there, I would totally be at this teahouse anyway to give them my business. Organic, veg food, eco-friendly -- what else could I want?

Gretchen also left her eldest at school and she and Julia both did well. Julia had NO problem -- she was fresh from a nap and knows everybody and felt totally fine. I've been leaving her there and running short errands to Target and back this week already. So next week I'm going to see about trying to leave her there and hitting the new LA Fitness.

Parents came over and overall it went well.

raining

It is raining here today, alternating between heavy and downpour, so no exercise tonight. We stopped and got a couple of movies on the way home and plan on leftovers for dinner before snuggling up in front of the tube. I had an amazing lunch with my co-workers, yummy thai food with everyone toasting me, how wonderful. And tomorrow I am going to spend the day with my sis and neices. I have gotten so close to her now since I have lived here (she only lives 45 minutes away and is the only family in a 5 hour radius). I am going to miss them TONS when we leave, it will be hard to say good bye tomorrow. I hope they visit me and I visit them at least once a year. Hopefully it will be dry enough when I return tomorrow to fit our run in.

Have a cozy weekend guys! It feels like fall is really here in these parts.

humid

Exercise:

• What : neighborhood walk
  
• Distance: 1.6 miles

A quick neighborhood walk with my man. And he suggested it. Boy, do I love him. I stayed home with Iz and had a great day, but it was raining most of the day so no park and no outside walks. We did go shopping and I got an outfit for the wedding I am going to in a couple of weeks. I took Iz to the mall playground and she was having such fun it was hard to take her away (that and the kicking and screaming.) We then met up for lunch with Mike (burritos in the car while Iz slept. Romantic, no?) After lunch and her nap, we just hung out and home and played. When Mike got home, I went and got my hair cut (maybe not the best decision in a rash state of mind). Then the walk and you are all caught up.

It is supposed to be super rainy tomorrow so I dont' know what we will do. I have been known to run in the rain before, but Mike and Iz won't. And if it is a downpour, I won't either.

Prep, prep and more prep

Thanks, Amy! No, I didn't get to eat out... we ate in and had people over instead.

I'm trying to get the last of the auction paperwork done.

Julia's preschool thing is in another week, so there's a lot of prep for the craft area. I have to get something to string beads on for the jewelry craft, Xerox the puppet craft and find some rings and jumbo popsicle sticks, make some display posters, and figure out how to set up tables. I'm starting to wonder if I don't need to rent a tent because it will be a PITA if it rains and all the crafts get rained on!

I take a meeting tomorrow (arranging things for playgroup) and there's another one Monday (problem at preschool with aggressive child and how to cope with it).

I have to order another sports bra and new sneaks and while the bra is no problem, the sneakers I'm having issues with. I've recently started focussing on veganizing/greening our personal products and clothing and not just food. On the one hand -- just the next step in my personal path for how I want to be living.

On the other hand, scary bananas and damn inconvinient.

New Balance shoes aren't totally PVC free and while Asics are, I never got them in wide enough so I had to keep returning them. Yargh.

So now I have to revisit my underpronator shoe problem where I thought NB's had solved it.

Wow!

"Wow!" is Iz's favorite word of late and she says it just like her daycare provider. But it also applies to today's truly amazing run. Tonight we were supposed to add a lap and do a total of 11 laps or 2.75 miles. Like always, I was dreading it (looking back at my past entries, has there been a run I was psyched about beforehand?) But there was a game in the stadium complete with cheerleaders and fans so running around the track was out. We opted for a relatively flat neighborhood road where we knew that we would feel comfortable running on the road as opposed to the sidewalk. We just ran back and forth, one "lap" took about 15.5 minutes so we figured it was about 1 mile down and back. Because of our normal slow pace, we just opted to do 44 minutes of running instead of worrying about the exact milage. It was great! A change of scenery and terrain really helped pass the time. We didn't talk as much as normal, but it didn't seem to matter, the time passed quickly anyway. The only problem was the cars parallel parked by the soccer field that made us feel a little too exposed in the road.

Exercise:

• What : jog
  
• Time: 44.5 minute jog plus 30 minutes warm up and cool down

Tomorrow I am taking the day off with my girl. I though we would do a little shopping in the morning and hit the park before her nap. After her nap, who knows?

PS Cat - I ate out for you! I hope you got a chance to eat out too!

amazing lunch and no exercise

Wow, what I lunch I had! I should move and say goodbye more often! It was yummy bread with butter, a big salad of greens, tomato and buffalo mozzerella. Oh, and a little small tiney amount of the most amazing bread pudding ever, covered with white chocolate sauce and raspberries. My friend and I were supposed to split it and she did the tragic thing of STOPPING before it was half gone. WHAT WAS SHE THINKING??? So of course, I had to continue nibbling. Hopefully I just ate my half. I counted it as a hardy 8 points and will pray to the weight watchers gods that I am in the ball park. I had an apple for dinner to offset the explosion of calories from earlier in the day.

No formal exercise and our walk ended up being a stroll through an art center which was amazing, but not aerobic. Tomorrow, back to exercise for real.

I had another short shopping trip yesterday and scored a very comfie pair of jeans. I am thinking of going back for another.

When everything is aligned

Today before I went to work at school I had to stop at OfficeMax to xerox junk for playgroup work. And there were people in fornt holding signs about the LA Fitness open house. They open on Thurs or Friday this week!

And Liz will take Julia for me sop I can hit gym before I hit work.

And I got callbacks on some things I was trying to arrange.

And my business cards came in.

And my produice was here when I got home.

You know, a lot of things in my life lately have been lining up just so... one thing leading to another so neatly.

Love it. Love it. Love it.

Call it chi, call it flow, call it being in touch with the pulse of the planet -- totally intoxicating.

last 2.5 miles

and I didn't stop once this time.

Exercise:

• What : jog
  
• Time: 1:03:24 minutes
  
• Distance: .6 miles warm up, 2.5 miles workout, .3 miles cool down
  
• Lap Times: 3:43, 3:54, 3:53, 4:03, 3:43, 3:55, 3:56, 3:51, 3:47, 3:16
  
• Minutes/mile: 15.2

This was probably one of our better jogs even though I really didn't want to go out today. I got sick this morning and threw up (nope, it wasn't morning sickness!) so all day long I was wondering if I would use that as an excuse to not run. But, as you can see, I didn't. We talked the whole time, kept a nice even pace, enjoyed the cool evening. It was nice. At one point Mike asked me if I wanted to speed up and I thought I would die. It was all I could do to keep going. When he said that to me, I felt like I was doing my best and it still wasn't good enough. (Not that Mike would ever intentionally make me feel bad.)

Food consumption today was also on track after my less than desirable morning. Again, I wanted to go out to dinner, but instead I decide to make some mexican omelets. I made rice and beans last week and we have been finding interesting ways to eat the left overs. We had tacos over the weekend and tonight, black bean omelets with cheese and salsa. They were ok. On the side, we had my healthy version of corn pudding, that definitely got two thumbs up!

Tomorrow I am going to have lunch and hopefully a nice walk with a friend. Otherwise, no exercise scheduled. We start the 2.75 mile jogs on Wednesday. If we want to finish the couch program compeltely before we start HH, we will need to jog every other day. 3 weeks till we move!

Schmoozing

Today I was at our local vegfest doing the playgroup booth and passing out playgroup junk, preschool fundraiser junk, environment junk, and pet junk. Yep -- that's me.

Meet and greet and walk the street... the one woman, promoting four groups show.

I really hope it becomes an annual event -- totally psyched about the growing veg scene here.

Paul and Julia fooled around while I was working and once I got done I got a chance to hit some of the booths that interest me and I ran into people I knew already.

Which tells me two things.

a) I've finally found my community locally

b) I'm getting out and about building contacts like I wanted to this year

c) I'm feeling really ramped up spiritually and lifestyle-wise. We're still talking about moving and buying a house that is closer to Paul's work, our church, and our points of interest in town so maybe... just maybe... I can give up the car and hit the bike commute thing a bit more. It all depends on what kind of house we can find and ... at what price.

There was an evening 5K at the end of the festival but Julia and Paul were zonking out, and I have to admit I was knackered too. Add the drizzle and it was esp. appealing to wait for although it WAS "at your own pace" and seemed stroller friendly.

We didn't have time to make a "Save Roe" rally and I don't think we'll hit the local places doing www.dineforamerica.org on wednesday since we're getting together with friends and our budgets this week won't fit in dining out and I don't want Julia grouchy after preschool because she's staying up too late. Likely I'll get her to bed and they'll come over to hang out.

Y'all try to go out to eat on Wed. for me.

Tomorrow I have to do some business and get the house back in order. Saving the world is going to have to take a backseat to doing some laundry.

Exercise:

• What : neighborhood walk
  
• Distance: 1.6 miles

Nice slow walk today.

I cooked dinner! Shocking. I made corn pudding, an old family favorite. I used egg substitute instead of egg and 1/4 stick of butter instead of a whole stick, but otherwise was fine and tasty and not so heavy. Also made green beans and mashed potatoes and Iz ate as must as we did! That shocked me the most, I though baby stomachs were supposed to be all small and tiny.

So food went well today too, only 1 point over. I am actually looking forward to this week. I have lunch with a friend on Tuesday and my co-workers are taking me on a farewell lunch on Friday. I am wrapping up a project and then preparing for a visit to another university next week. Should be busy, but not stressful.

walking v running

Cat - you are reading my mind about walking instead of running. Or both. It is something I am going to be thinking a lot about between now and the start of HH. I would like to continue running because I feel like it is improving my overall fitness faster than walking did. But when it comes to Disney I just want to get over the finish line. I might start walking the longer walks on HH, then running the short ones, or split every workout in some way between walking and running. I would like to work on improving my running time, but to do that I need to run shorter distances. On HH they have one day you do a shorter distance, so I could do a faster run on that day. I want to finish the couch to 5k training program running because I want to be able to run 3 miles straight and maintain that level of fitness for longer term, but after that is over, I don't know what exactly I will do.

No formal exercise today, though I hope we will get out for a neighborhood walk later. Other than that, we will be cleaning and doing laundry and enjoying the beautiful weather.

Two weeks from today we start HH!!!

a little more about running

When we run "fast" (13 min/mile), it feels good, my arms are pumping properly, my legs are making a nice even stride, my muscles are responding. But I can't keep it up. I run out or breath in a lap or less and am left gasping for air and walking. When I run our normal (15 min/mile) speed, everything hurts. My back aches, my feet hurt, it feels like I am doing something awkward and strange, trying to dance that I dont' know the steps to. But I can breath and talk. Not alot, I am still working hard, but I don't feel like I have to stop right away.

So I am frustrated. I want to run faster for my back and legs and feet, but I have to run slow for my heart and lungs. I hope that I can one day run a speed that will keep all my bits happy.

it's easy to stop

but harder not to finish. I stopped in the 9th lap and walked half the lap, but I started back up again and finished with my fastest lap ever.

Exercise:

• What : jog
  
• Time: 1:03:16 minutes
  
• Distance: .6 miles warm up, 2.5 miles workout, .3 miles cool down
  
• Lap Times: 3:43, 3:26, 3:34, 3:58, 3:32, 3:58, 4:02, 4:01, 4:45, 3:15
  
• Minutes/mile: 15.3

shopping

Thanks for fixing comments, Cat!

We just got back from shopping and I scored a couple long sleeve t-shirts and a sweater and Iz got 4 long sleeve t-shirts. I need to take inventory of both our closets to see what we need on our "real" shopping trip this fall. (We are meeting my mom and sis for a weekend of outlet mall shopping!) I also found an outfit for the wedding I am attending, but of course they didn't have it in my size. I am going to try and order it online and hope it gets to me before we move.

weigh in

Today being the first saturday of October, I weighed. I had no idea what I would see since our eating is out of whack even though we are exercising lots. Well, it was good. I lost 3 lbs in September, giving me a grand total of 45.5 lbs lost since January. So:
from jan - july 1- 38.5 lbs
july - 1.5
august - 2.5
sept. -3
Even though loss has slowed alot since January, I haven't gone a month without one and that makes me very proud.

We are going to the mall now to buy some long pants and t-shirts. I have shrunk out of all of my clothes and now that the weather is turning cooler I have nothing to wear. That goes double for Iz, but she has grown, of course.

Haloscan

Ok... changed over to Haloscan comments and dropped the blogger ones. So hopefully that ought to cut on the comment spam.

More later... late and I have errands to run in the morning....