The Magic number is 1034.32!

1034.32 miles. I ran 1034.32 miles this year. I am proud of that accomplishment.

I know it has been forever since I have written a post. I have been busy. I was doing a good job updating the blog until November and then it went down hill. So here are some pictures to show you what we have been up to.

As 2013 comes to an end I am happy with how my year went.
Here are my goals that I set out to do for 2013:
1. Keep Running: I would like to run 1,000 Miles this year! I would also like to run several half marathons. I would like to have 10 half marathons run by the end of 2013. That would mean I would need to run 7 this year!! I am already planning my race schedule.
My running goals were right on. I absolutely kept running this year. The mileage was awesome. Just in case you forgot I ran a total of 1034.32 miles this year. The only goal that I didn’t accomplish was to have 10 half marathons completed by the end of the year. It was in the plan but the weather didn’t cooperate. The day I was going to run my 10th, which was going to be in Brooklyn, NY at the Holiday Half, there was a snowstorm and I didn’t want to drive in the bad weather. So I will complete my 10th half marathon in 2014, not that big of a deal.

2. Blog at least once a week. During the Blog set the weekly running schedule and then do a weekly recap on what I did!
I didn’t really keep to this but I am still happy with my blogging. Blogging takes way more time than you think so I am okay with the outcome.

3. Follow through with things. I often start things or have really great intentions but then I just don’t do it! I don’t know why but I am going to try to do a better job at following through on things. I hoping that this Blog will help with this!
I am doing a much better job with this in all aspects of my life. I am making an effort to keep things going. So again I am happy with this.

4. More play time with the kids. Both the weekdays and weekends get so consumed with getting stuff done that I don’t take quality time to PLAY with my kids.
This of course I can always work on. I have been spending much of this break getting things organized in the house with the hope that things will run more smoothly around here. Because things are running more smoothly I am hoping that it will lead to more time with the kids doing lots of fun stuff.

5. Enjoy this year with my Husband…2013 marks being married 10 years. I want to make sure that we are getting quality time together this year. Here is to more date nights!!!
I did enjoy 2013 with Dave. Disney was awesome and we did have more date nights even though I know we could use some more.

6. BE HAPPY-I have so many reasons to be happy! If I believe it then I will be it!!
I can’t argue with this one….yes I am happy and why shouldn’t I be. There are so many reasons I have to be happy.
2013, I think was a success. We had a great year and I am looking forward to what 2014 will bring for my family and for my running.
Goals for 2014 are coming in the next post.
For now…Happy New Year…I hope 2014 brings much happiness and peace to all.

Running Update!

Slowly but surely I am back into the swing of things with running. I haven’t done any super long runs since the marathon. The farthest I have gone is a little over 9 miles. I have a half marathon on Sunday that will get me right back into the swing of things. But before I get too far off on my miles I wanted to do a quick update!
Total miles added since my last mileage update on September 28th: 107.13 miles
Total for the year: 839.3 miles

To reach my goal I will need to run at least 20 miles a week until January 1st and I will have run 1000 miles this year. As long as I stay on track with my training plan I will have no trouble running 20 miles a week!!

November is here. The holidays are coming. I can’t wait. The holidays are so much fun we these little guys.

Second part of October

The second part of October has been fun and still busy!!
October continued to be filled with more family time!
First we went pumpkin picking.

A few days later we were cutting into those pumpkins to make some spooky jack-o-lanterns.

And of course October ended with Halloween.

Marathon Weekend

We drove up to Rhode Island on Saturday. We first stopped by to see Ben and Lauren’s little cutie. Karsten is supper cute and super tiny. It was a nice stop off because it totally took my mind off of the race. After some yummy pizza and some snuggle time he headed to Newport.
Once we arrived to the wonderful Howard Johnson’s the kids and Dave stayed in the hotel and I headed to get my bib and shirt. It was pretty easy! After returning we headed out to find a place to eat! Turns out the rest of Newport was looking for a place to eat. We tired to find some place yummy but everywhere had a long wait. Waiting for food with kids is the worst. We ended up going to subway! Although it wasn’t anything great I knew that it would be fine for a pre-race meal.
After subway we went back to the hotel. The kids got ready for bed and I of course got everything ready for the race.

I actually got a good night sleep and was ready for race day! The rest of the weekend was family time. We spent time eating, swimming, sight seeing, resting, and enjoying the wonderful fall weather at two different farms. You can read about the race here.

The weekend was so much fun and Dave is excited to do more of these little weekends away. So now I just need to figure out when our next weekend away will be so I can add more medals to go with these.

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First part of October

So it has been really busy. The fall always is. I wanted to quickly tell you about what we have been doing in the first part of October.
We started the fall off by celebrating my Dad’s birthday!!

Then three days later Ashley turned two! I can’t believe that she is already two! She is talking up a storm and becoming an independent little girl. Her birthday morning started with a birthday donut!

That night we went to see Dave’s band competition.

The next day we celebrated Ashley’s birthday with small little party. It was a fairy theme! Lots of pink!

The first part of October was busy! Along with a new running shirt, I got myself this awesome new bracelet. I love it!

The UnitedHealth Care Marathon Newport RI 10/13/13

The marathon has come and gone but it was great! The weather was perfect and the views were beautiful. I have so much to say about the weekend that I am going to break it up into two different posts. The first will be about the race and the other will be about the weekend.
So the race…
The race was at 8 am. There was no parking at the start/finish so we needed to get a bus from the marathon parking lot. We arrived at the lot about 7 am. The parking was easy to get to and the busses were right there. There was no waiting. It was a cool morning but Dave and the kids came with me to the start so I was able to dress so I wasn’t freezing. Once we got to the start area we waited around but it didn’t feel like it was forever, even though I was totally freaking out. I was feeling really nervous even though I knew that I could do the race. Dave kept telling me that I would be fine. The night before the race and race morning are the worst. I always wonder why I put myself through it but that feeling so quietly is forgotten once the race starts.
Here is a picture before the race! Can you tell that I am freaking out?

I then headed over to the start and waited. The race didn’t start right on time because people were still getting bused in. It was crowded!

Once the race got started I was ready to go. I was looking at my watch a lot because I knew that didn’t want to go out too fast. The half marathon runners and full marathon runners run the first 13.1 miles together and it felt like I was the only one running the full marathon so I didn’t want to get wrapped up with my pace.
The first half of the race was all around the mansions and the coastline of Newport. It was absolutely beautiful. I did stop to take two pictures during the race.

The second half of the race was beautiful too but I forgot to take pictures. I was a little more focused on running during the second half. It did get harder as the miles added up but I never hit the wall. I was sore as I was running. I stopped to stretch two times and did walk up the hills during the second half, which seemed to have a lot more hills. But really before I knew it I was through the finish line. I was immediately so proud of myself and felt like I could surely do that again. Which is a good thing considering I already have registered for my next marathon.
Here I am with my kids, celebrating my accomplishment.

All in all it was a great time. I was happy with the race I ran. My time was 4:39:03! I took off about 55 minutes of my last marathon time. Who would think that being 8 years older and having three kids would make me go faster. I am looking forward to seeing what I can do next.
I will take a few days to rest but I am so ready to get out there are run again.

Fall Running

I did it again!  I ran another 20 miles.  It wasn’t as pretty as the first 20 miles but I did it.
I quick mileage update!
Since my last post: 81.55 miles
Total for the year: 732.17 miles

If you remember my goal was to run 1000 miles this year.  I think that I should make my goal!!

Fall Running really is the best…whenever I run outside in the fall, I always look around and say to myself, why wouldn’t I run, it is absolutely perfect and beautiful out.  I love the leaves under my feet.  Looking forward to my 12 miles in the morning.

Newport Rhode Island marathon is two weeks from tomorrow.  I am excited and of course getting a little nervous.  I feel that I am ready!  Even though I only have two more weeks of this training plan, I am beginning to think about my next training plan for Disney, which is only 106 days away.  I am also thinking about what races I want to do next year.  First one I am thinking about is the New Jersey Marathon.
I am still hoping to get two more half marathons in by the end of the year.

There isn’t much other news except that Dave is super busy with band, I am super busy with school and the kids are really enjoying school.

Sorry for the FEW pictures.  I guess I need to take some pictures because I really haven’t taken any in a long while!

20 miles

20 miles completed! It felt good and I do believe that I could keep going if I had too! The rest of the day I will be relaxing and getting my weekend chores done: laundry, cleaning up the house and papers graded. It is a perfect day for the to boys have their first day of soccer. Hoping that it will make them tired so we can all go to bed early tonight.
I am enjoying this wonderful day by spending sometime outside! Hope you are too! Happy Sunday!

The Beginning!

That is what I did this summer. Although it is a little off because I did run another 18 or so miles after I took this picture but I needed to get it to my principal so he could share what I did this summer with the rest of the staff.

The summer has come to an end and school has started!!
The summer was awesome and so far everything with the beginning of the school year is going better than expected!

Jeremy started a new school.

Ian started a new school too!

Ashley is just looking so cute!

Dave and I are happy with the start of our school year too!!!
Running has been going great!
Since the last post I have run 94.81 miles, which means my total for the year is 650.62 miles!

Tomorrow I tackle 20 miles. Looking forward to finishing a book and starting a new one thanks to audible.com and to see 20 miles on my Garmin!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Mileage Update!

I didn’t record any of my mileage in my last post.  Again since I haven’t been keeping up with the blogging I won’t go into all the different runs but I will total up my mileage.  Since my blog post on July 18th I have run 81.68 miles.  That brings up my yearly mileage to 555.81 miles!

Also because I haven’t been keeping up with this whole blogging thing here are some random pictures from all the of the summer time fun that we have been having!

Fun at Popi and Mimi’s house!

Disney World!

Yummy!

Boys being boys!

Movies

We have been eating a lot of dessert lately.

Do you have dessert with every meal?  What is your favorite dessert?

Have you started your back to school shopping yet?  Me-Not really, don’t want to feel like it is here already, having way too much fun!!