recovery week

The past few days have been a little rough for me while I recover from the half-marathon. I wasn’t expecting to be in as much pain afterward as I was. I assumed that if I could run 10 miles, 13.1 wouldn’t be much different. I was so wrong.

A few weeks ago, right in the middle of training for the half-marathon, I developed plantar fascitis in my left foot. My doctor is also a runner, and between him and all my running friends, I felt pretty ok about dealing with it. But despite all the precautions I took (ibuprofen, ice, stretching, sleeping with my foot in a really awkward brace contraption), it flared up with a vengeance after the half-marathon. I couldn’t put my left heel down when I walked, I had to walk on the tip-toes on my left foot. (Awkward, to say the least.)

So I’ve been taking it easy, doing some yoga/strength exercises to try to stretch my muscles out. I’ve gone on a couple of short runs this week, and I feel… ok-ish? My left foot still hurts if I’m on my feet too much (like last night when the girls and I went to the grocery store), but it’s manageable.

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Other stuff that’s been going on this week:

I had a parent-teacher conference with Catie’s teacher this week. Which was not particularly eventful, but there was one major surprise there: he mentioned that Catie is reading ahead of her grade level.

This is the same child who, 1 year ago, was so far behind her peers that the school had her working with a special ed teacher doing a “reading intervention” program. The same child whose first grade teacher told me that no matter what we did with private tutors, she was going to be behind the curve in second grade too. (I’m still angry at her first grade teacher for saying that to me and Dave. What the hell, lady?)

And now she’s ahead of grade level. Not by much, it’s not like she’s reading “War and Peace” or anything, but STILL.

I mentioned to her teacher that it surprised me because I still have trouble getting her to read at home, and he said, “Oh, that’s a shame, she’s a beautiful reader. That’s all she really wants to do in class is read.”

I’m still a little bit stunned by that. Although I shouldn’t be, Catie has made a lifelong habit of surprising me when I least expect it.

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On the Lucy side of things: I think most parents say that the “terrible twos” are really nothing compared to the “treacherous threes,” and based on my experience with Catie, I would have been inclined to agree. But man, Lucy is just hilarious and delightful and so… easy. Like, way easier than any toddler should be.

I keep half-waiting for her to turn into some type of toddler demon hellbeast, but maybe her daytime personality is easygoing to make up for 3.5 years of waking me up at night? Kids have survival skills and all.

And because I’m always worried that I’ll forget this stuff someday, these are a few recent Lucy gems:

* When something bothers her, she says, “it makes me annoying!” (I will never correct her.)

* Most mornings, she climbs into bed between me and Chris, and goes back to sleep for a while. There was one day that she had missed her nap and was up past her bedtime, so she slept HARD all night. It was a weekend, and around 7:30 a.m., the whole house was sleeping quietly, and suddenly a tiny voice yelled, “EVERYBODY DANCE NOW!” Chris and I were like, “Oh ok, guess Lucy is awake.” I don’t even know how she learned C&C Music Factory, since that song came out about 20 years before she born.

* When we went to see Cinderella last week, one of the plot points of the “Frozen Fever” short before the movie was that Elsa caught a cold, and every time she sneezed, her ice powers would go crazy and tiny little snowmen would pop up everywhere. So, on Monday, when Catie came down with a fever (she’s fine, it was a fluke 48-hour thing), I told Lucy that Catie was sick. Lucy said, “I think she might make tiny snowmans when she sneezes.”

I said, “No, that’s silly, Catie doesn’t have ice powers.”

Without missing a beat, she said, “Maybe instead she make tiny Steves.” As in the main dude from Minecraft.

I was impressed with how clever that was, because she knows Catie doesn’t care about Frozen, so she took the general concept and applied it to the thing Catie loves, Minecraft.

* She can spell her name, and I don’t know if that’s normal for a 3 year-old or not, but Catie didn’t spell her name until closer to kindergarten, so it seems impressive to me. (I take no credit, that’s all daycare.) She likes the trailer for the Scarlet Johannsen movie “Lucy” because they flash the name at the end, and she says, “L-U-C-Y spells Lucy, dat’s me!”

* Dave texted me the other night when the girls were with him, Lucy had her iPad and was trying to look up Frozen videos on YouTube. Catie will often ask for help spelling the names of whatever she’s looking for (like Skylanders videos), so Lucy was obviously copying Catie when she said, “How do I type Frozen?” Dave thought it would be funny to just tell her the letters and see what she did with it. She managed to get the keyboard open and she typed all the letters correctly except the N. It’s both amazing and a little unnerving when you realize that your kids will be more tech-savvy than yourself sooner than later.

* She sings, “Meeeeee in the skyyyyy with diamonds!” Dave taught her that one, and while I have never been a Beatles fan, I have to admit that it’s pretty damn cute.

princesses, geeks, and runners

I was thinking that the weekend leading up to my half-marathon would be lazy and involve eating lots of carbs. Turns out, I was only right about the carbs.

Friday, Lucy’s daycare was closed for a teacher workday. It just so happened that the same as last year, the teacher workday was also the day of Catie’s school Fun Run. So Lucy and I went to watch Catie and her classmates run around like tiny maniacs.

Catie at her school Fun Run.

Selfie with Lucy. And Elsa.

Lucy had to get Elsa in our selfie (of course). After the run was over, I was able to get a picture with my big kid.

Me & Catie after her Fun Run.

I love it when I get to go to school functions like that. I often feel like I’m phoning it in with school-related activities, because I have to let the stay-at-home moms do all of the classroom volunteering stuff. Just from a practical/work schedule angle, it never works out. So I get super-excited when I get to show up for something for her.

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After the Fun Run, I had promised Lucy that we would go see the new Cinderella movie. To be fair, though, Lucy didn’t care much about Cinderella, the only thing she really wanted was to see the “Frozen Fever” short before the movie. Like, she had to do a costume change between the Fun Run and the movie theater, so she could wear her Anna dress to the movies.

Daycare is closed, so it's Mommy & Lucy Day. We're waiting for Cinderella to start. But really, she only cares about the "Frozen Fever" short before the movie. ("How many more minutes?" every 10 seconds.)

It was fun, especially since she and I don’t get a lot of “Mommy and Lucy” outings, just the two of us.

As far as a movie review, “Frozen Fever” was cute, not as funny as the movie, and a lot shorter than Lucy would have liked. But hey, apparently they’re making Frozen 2, so I guess she’ll be set when that comes out.

As for Cinderella: I really liked it, and it made me cry more than once (damn Disney), but I’ve always had a few problems with that whole story. Cinderella is basically the girl at your high school who came from an abusive family, who married the first guy she could get as soon as she turned 18, just so she could escape her awful family. Those stories don’t usually end with a “happily ever after.”

And, I don’t know, there’s something that rubs me wrong about Cinderella’s “have courage and be kind” motto. Let’s face it, Cinderella is a total doormat to her stepmother & stepsisters. So sure, “have courage and be kind” is an admirable ideal for your life, but you don’t have to be (and probably shouldn’t be) kind to people who treat you like shit, and I think that’s a potentially damaging message to send little girls. It’s basically saying that you don’t have to stand up for yourself as long as you play nice, and that’s, frankly, a total crock.

Hey, what do you know, feminist beliefs conflicting with a Disney princess movie, how original am I? Honestly, the movie was fun, and I’d venture to guess that the vast majority of little girls grow up knowing that princess stories are make-believe and are smart enough to distinguish between them and real life, so whatever, let’s move on.

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On Saturday, Comic-Con was here, and I knew Catie would love it, so we went. I asked Chris to come along to help me wrangle the kids (I was worried Lucy would get overwhelmed or scared of some of the cosplay people, and it helps to have an extra adult there to tag team with). Chris isn’t the type who requires a lot of arm-twisting to get into nerdy outings, so he was game.

I had shown Catie pics of other Comic-Cons and people who dress up for them, and she decided that she needed to wear a costume as well.

Catie wore her Spyro (Skylanders) costume to Comic-Con.

She went as Spyro from the Skylanders video game that she loves. She ended up not wearing the feet part of the costume (made it too hard to walk) or the mask (too hot), but even still, a surprising number of people there knew exactly who she was.

I’d never been to any type of Comic-Con event before, so I wasn’t sure what to expect, but it was pretty fun. And it led to this, which may be my favorite picture of all time:

Catie and the stormtrooper. I am the proudest geek mom you ever did see.

Proudest geek parenting moment to date. (Lucy was a little freaked about the stormtrooper, but she high-fived him from a safe distance.)

The main thing (or, uh, person) Catie wanted to see at Comic-Con was David Tennant, who played Doctor Who. Unfortunately, getting a photo or autograph with any of the celebrities at Comic-Con is a separate charge from the general admission fee, and his was somewhere in the neighborhood of $150 extra. I might have considered forking that over, except it sold out before I could even make a decision. So, nevermind then. Catie can pay additional Comic-Con fees when she’s an adult and has her own disposable income to spend.

(It was only $80 extra to get a picture with William Shatner. And although it seemed like a bargain compared to David Tennant, I didn’t pay for that either.)

We kinda-sorta got to see David Tennant, because his VIP Q&A session was shown on a big projector screen in the main hall, so we camped out and watched that for a while.

Listening to the David Tennant Q&A session. (We didn't get in, but they had it on a big projector screen in the main hall).

It’s not the same thing as getting to see him in person, but oh well. I bought the kids their souvenirs (Olaf & Elsa toys for Lucy, Pokemon for Catie), and they left happy.

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Now for the half-marathon!

Saturday evening, I dropped the girls off to spend the night with my parents, so I could get to bed extra early and not worry about Lucy waking me up. (She’s a lot better, but still sometimes hit-or-miss.)

Sunday morning, I headed to Laura’s house, because she had a parking pass and offered to carpool with me.

As for the half-marathon bullet points:
* These things start stupid early. It was still dark outside. Why are there no half-marathons that start at, like, noon? You get up at a normal time, have a light brunch, then go run. That would be great!

* Did you know port-a-potties don’t have lights? So if it’s dark outside, it’s dark inside them? Let me tell you, if hell exists, some part of it will probably involve having to use a port-a-potty in the dark. That several hundred other runners have used. OMG. I just… I have no words.

* Related: one of my fears with this half-marathon was that I’ve never personally experienced the phenomenon of runner’s bowels, but I figured that with my luck, the first time it happened to me would be when I only had access to port-a-potties and there were several thousand witnesses around. As it turned out? It wouldn’t have mattered, because all of the port-a-potties smelled so horrifically foul that nobody would’ve known it was me anyway. (For the record, I was fine. I had to stop to pee somewhere around mile 8, because I’ve had 2 babies and my bladder is lame. But no horror stories.)

* The people who run this marathon are so incredibly nice, and the whole thing is set up really well. There were people cheering for us at various points, with big posterboard signs: “run like it’s the beginning of the Hunger Games”, “you run better than our government,” “the faster you run, the sooner you can get drunk”, and my personal favorite, “run like your iPhone is at 1%!” I was also impressed with how friendly all of the other runners were, with each other and with the volunteers. I had to get off the trail at one point to re-tie my shoe, and a couple of people asked if I was ok or needed help.

* Turns out that Sean Astin was in town for Comic-Con, and signed up to run the half-marathon at the last minute. Laura said she passed him and almost yelled “RUDY!” but didn’t. I didn’t see him, probably because I was not thinking about looking at other people’s faces while I was focusing on just getting through the run. If I had seen him, I was thinking about telling him my name was Frodo and asking him to carry me the rest of the way to Mordor. Either that a joke about The Goonies. Oh, missed opportunities.

* I gave my parking pass to Chris; he picked the girls up from my parents’ house on Sunday morning and brought them to meet me at the finish line. That was pretty awesome.

Ran my first half-marathon. Didn't die. Chris & the girls met me at the finish line. Pretty great day.

My final time for the half-marathon was 2:40. Which is probably not impressive by most people’s standards, but whatever. I finished. And that’s all that really matters to me.

(Even though Catie totally stole my medal for herself the minute we got in the car.)

old house, old life

My half-marathon is a week from today. Yesterday, I had my last long training run, and ran 10 miles. The town I live in has a pretty great system of connecting greenways, and yesterday I took a route that ended up in my old neighborhood.

The house we live in now is only about 5 miles from my old place, but I never go by that house anymore. It’s not that I intentionally avoid it or anything, I just rarely need to go anywhere in that direction.

One of the weird things about long runs is the way that my mind can sometimes wander. I started thinking about how different my life is now, versus then. And man, if that wasn’t a lesson in gratitude.

Almost exactly 5 years ago, I tried to start running for the first time in my life. I remember starting the couch-to-5K program, when the idea of being able to run for 20 minutes without stopping was just unimaginable. I can now run for 2 hours, which is not something I would’ve believed I could ever do. (I mean, ok yes, I do still take some walking breaks here and there, particularly on really steep hills. Even still: TWO HOURS.) I’m really proud of myself for the progress I’ve made with that.

I also started thinking about how at this point four years ago, I was pregnant with Lucy, and my marriage was falling apart. Everything I thought my life would be – husband, two kids, pretty house in the suburbs – was vanishing in front of my face, and I was terrified. I remember telling my mom that my due date felt like a countdown to a death sentence, because my life as I knew it was ending. I cried at every OB appointment. I actually had to find a new doctor for all lady-parts related issues, because just walking in the door there, even two years later, gave me a lump in my throat and that horrible stinging-behind-your-eyes feeling when you’re about to cry.

It’s weird, I was so scared to have Lucy, because I was essentially going from a married mom of one kid to a single mom of two kids. But I can’t imagine life without Lucy, and watching how her relationship with Catie has developed is one of the greatest joys in my life. Also, I’m now in a happy, loving relationship with a man who accepts me completely, never invalidates my feelings, and never shuts me out. That’s pretty different than my life four years ago. (I don’t mean for that to sound like a slam on Dave. He’s not a bad person. But the two of us as a married couple were not a good match.)

So while it’s true that it’s not the life I thought I would have, it’s actually so much better than I ever thought it would be.

And now: half-marathon in 7 days. I’m a little nervous, of course, but after that run down Memory Lane (see what I did there?), I’m ready to go rock this.

how I talk to my kids about diet and exercise

This past Sunday, I went for a run while Chris stayed the girls. The half-marathon is in 6 weeks (yikes!), and I try to do my long training runs on the weekends when I have more free time. The kids are with Dave on alternate weekends, but when it’s my weekend, I usually leave them with either Chris or my parents while I go for a run.

I’m very careful with how I talk about diet and exercise with my girls. And a lot of that is because of my own baggage: I picked up a lot of negative body image feedback from hearing my mom complain about how fat she was when I was a kid. Back then, she was maybe a size 8 or 10 at the most, so she was most definitely not fat, but I know I internalized a lot of what she said. I don’t want Catie and Lucy to pick up any negative self-image issues from me, so it’s something I approach with extreme caution.

Since Catie is older, I can talk to her a bit more. We’ve talked about how Mimi has back problems, and how I want to make sure I don’t end up in pain like she is when I get older. My emphasis is more on health/strength, not the number in the back of my jeans. We’ve talked about how she gets enough exercise because she gets recess every day, but grown-ups don’t, and my job means that I sit at a computer all day, so I have to make my own recess time.

With food, we talk about how it’s important to eat healthy foods that are good for our bodies, and how some foods are treats that are only “sometimes foods” – all the normal stuff, I guess – but I don’t really talk to them about my food habits. They eat their food, I eat mine. Unless I point it out, they aren’t going to notice that they’re eating mashed potatoes and I’m not. So I don’t make an issue of it.

But even still, they pick up on stuff. Catie once made a comment (and I cannot remember the context of how it came up) that she was “glad everyone in our family is skinny.” I kind of did a mental record-scratch, and said that “skinny” isn’t necessarily a good thing, because if you’re too skinny, you won’t be strong enough to do the things you want to do. The point is whether or not we’re healthy, not whether we’re skinny or fat.

(And we’ve talked about how we don’t talk about other people’s bodies because it might hurt their feelings. She’s friends with a little girl at school who gets teased by other kids for being overweight, and it upsets Catie a lot, so it seems like she gets it.)

And then there are stupid things that come up, like when “All About That Bass” came on the radio for the 37,000th time, and Catie asked me what it meant when she said “boys like a little more booty to hold at night.” In that case, I just said that it was kind of a grown-up joke that was inappropriate for kids, and she didn’t press it.

So, I get that they’re going to pick up on body image expectations from society no matter what I say, and that the best I can do is basically damage control.

Lately, Lucy has been fascinated with my exercise habits. If I’m doing a strength training workout at home, she tries to join in with me. She’ll say, “Lookit me! I do my essacise too!” Then she’ll do a dramatic pratfall and land on her face, and I basically die because you really shouldn’t laugh when you’re doing push-ups.

This past Sunday, when I was getting ready to go for my run, as soon as I put on my workout clothes, the questions started:

Lucy: You all sweaty now?
Me: No, baby, not yet. [I hadn’t even left the house yet.]
Lucy: Why you wear that headband?
Me: It keeps my ears warm when it’s cold outside.
Lucy: Why you wear headphones?
Me: Because I like to listen to music when I run.

And the one she asks the most often:
Lucy: Why you go running?
Me: Because you keep growing and getting bigger and stronger, so I have to be strong too, so I can keep up with you.

A couple of hours later, after I’d run over 9 miles, I walked in the house sweaty and exhausted. The girls were on the couch with Chris watching a movie. Lucy saw me, and hopped up and ran to me.

She said, “You do your essacise, so you strong now? You can carry me now?”

And all I could think was, oh, my sweet girl. I’ll carry you as long as you’ll let me.

Me & my Lucy.

running with others, & the current playlist

As I’m sure I have mentioned plenty of times, I like to run by myself. As long as I have my music in my earbuds, I can zone out and I’m good to go. But, since I’m doing this half-marathon in March, I thought it might be good to try running with other people.

One of the marathon sponsors (GNC) hosted a 10K training run on Saturday morning. (For those of you who are not good with the metric system, like me, 10K = 6.2 miles.) I like to do my long runs on the weekends anyway, and I thought that sounded like a good practice run. And it would be a chance to try out running with other people around.

This was supposed to be Dave’s weekend with the girls, but Lucy came down with a fever on Friday, so she was super-clingy and didn’t want to leave me. Dave and I texted and agreed it was fine for her to stay with me on Friday night.

Saturday morning, I got up early and left her sound asleep with Chris and went to meet up with the running group. Chris is Lucy’s favorite snuggle buddy in the world, I knew she wouldn’t be upset to wake up and find me gone, if he was there.

I was a little nervous, mainly because I’d never run with other people and I didn’t know what to expect. But it’s not like this was a race or anything – it was just a training run, that’s all, not a competition. I knew I would be on the slower end of the spectrum, so when we started off, I stayed to the right of the sidewalk to let faster people pass me. Somewhere around the first half-mile point, I glanced over my shoulder and realized there was nobody behind me, and I was DEAD LAST. And the next closest group of runners were so far ahead of me that I could barely see them. So that felt pretty terrible and discouraging, and I had a couple minutes there where I wanted to cry, or turn around and go back to my car because what the hell was I even thinking with this whole half-marathon thing, I’m too slow and I can’t do this.

Then I decided, well, I might as well keep going, because I wanted to get my run that day anyway.

Eventually I caught up with a few of the other runners because they had gotten lost and had stopped to try to read the map that we’d been given at the beginning of the run. (This route was pretty close to my house, so I knew my way around fairly well.) I managed to keep up with them for the rest of the run, and chatted with them a little. They were friendly and very encouraging.

The route had a lot more steep hills than my usual running routes, so that was hard. I finished the entire 10K faster than I’ve ever run in my life, and I was still dead last, but I kind of stopped caring toward the end, I was just happy that I finished. (My legs are still feeling those hills, two days later. The half-marathon route is supposed to be much flatter, for which I am incredibly grateful.)

Meanwhile, Chris got Lucy fed and dressed, and drove her up to meet me at the end. It was really great to see their faces there at the end of 6.2 miles.

I guess my overall verdict is that it started out crappy, and ended up sort of fun. But if given the choice between running with a group or running by myself, I’d probably still pick going by myself. Which does leave me a little worried that I’m going to hate the entire half-marathon experience, but whatever, at this point, I’ve already signed up and I’m not backing out. Guess we’ll see how it goes.

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Semi-related, I’ve been getting bored with my running playlist, and I went looking for new songs to add to it. I found several blogs where people post their playlists, and I found it helpful for finding a few new songs to add to mine. So, in case any of you are looking for new tunes to get your feet moving, here are my current favorites. Some have been on my workout playlist for years, others are new.

“Uptown Funk” – Mark Ronson & Bruno Mars
“Centuries” – Fall Out Boy
“My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark” – Fall Out Boy
“Rock That Body” – The Black Eyed Peas
“Pump It” – The Black Eyed Peas
“Miss Jackson” – Panic! At the Disco
“Hey Brother” – Avicii
“I’m Shipping Up to Boston” – The Dropkick Murphys
“‘Til I Collapse” – Eminem
“Come with Me Now” – KONGOS
“Bleed It Out” – Linkin Park
“Can’t Hold Us” – Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
“Love Runs Out” – OneRepublic
“Shake it Off” – Taylor Swift

(General disclaimer that my workout playlist has very little to do with a song’s artistic merit, it’s just whether or not it has the right tempo. Hell, a good chunk of these songs I bought on iTunes because Catie wanted them, then I decided I liked them for running. So don’t judge me too harshly.)

Procrastination Placeholder Post

Thanksgiving is tomorrow, and I’m starting to panic a little about all the things I need to get done today, so it seemed like a good time to put off everything on my to-do list by writing a blog post.

I had the girls last weekend, and I try to plan outings for us whenever they’re with me, but I had a little bit of a hard time trying to figure out something fun for us to do.

On Saturday, Catie wanted to go to Dave’s. He joined a gym that has an indoor pool, and she wanted to go swimming. He didn’t mind taking her, and I think it’s good for her to get some one-on-one time with her dad, so I said ok. Lucy wanted to go see my parents (she likes being the only grandchild, it means she gets ALL the attention), so I took her over to their house, and went for a long run.

I’m trying to do my long runs on the weekends to train for the half-marathon. And even though I don’t technically have to start a training plan until next month, I want to get a jump on it now, because I’m pretty sure there are going to be days in January and February where I wimp out on doing the super-long runs.

I was only planning on going maybe 7 or 8 miles, like I have the last few weekends, but I was mentally calculating the distance from my parents’ house, rather than my house, and math isn’t my strong suit, so… well.

teeeeeen miiiiiiiles
I ran over 10 miles. And THAT is not a sentence I ever thought I’d type.

By Sunday, I had figured out a fun outing for me, Chris, and the kids. We headed downtown to the NC Museum of Natural Science (where we had Catie’s birthday party), because I had gotten an email that they were having a special exhibit called “The World’s Largest Dinosaurs.” Sounds totally up Catie’s alley, no? And it was great.

The girls got to sit in a model of a dinosaur footprint.

2 girls in a dinosaur footprint. #WLDinoNC

And they got to dig for (fake) fossils.

From this afternoon: serious excavation work happening at the science museum dino exhibit. Even though Lucy doesn't really understand the concept of goggles. #WLDinoNC

It really was the perfect type of thing for Catie, even though Lucy got a little bored and whiny about it. (She was more excited about going up and down the escalators over and over.)

At one point, there was a little movie about a dinosaur, and the girls sat on the floor to watch it. Then this happened, and I damn near melted.

These moments don't happen often, but they sure are sweet. Watching a movie about dinosaurs at the NC Museum of Natural Sciences.

That kind of thing doesn’t happen often, but it’s pretty great when it does.

The kids have been with Dave the last couple days, but I get them back tonight and I’ll have them through Thanksgiving. My brother and his girlfriend are coming over from Charlotte, so I’m excited to see them.

Oh, and my cleaning ladies come today, which is my favorite thing about every other Wednesday. Having a clean house right before a holiday? Even better.

And now I’ve got to get started on all these side dishes I need to prep before tomorrow…

running, working, family-ing

I registered for a half-marathon. I’m kind of back and forth between super-excited and also completely terrified, because I have literally never done any kind of official race at all. Like, not even a 5K. And it’s not even about trying to compete with other people for me, because I know I’m an “average at best and actually pretty slow” runner. It’s more that I just want to prove to myself that I can do it — that I am capable of running 13.1 miles — if that makes sense.

The Betty Rocker workout challenge in October definitely helped boost me a lot, and I’m still using her workouts a couple days a week for strength training. I’ve also lost about 6 pounds since October 1st, which wasn’t something I was actively working on, but you won’t hear me complain about it.

In related news: all of my disposable income is now being spent at sporting goods stores (I need workout clothes so I can run through the winter months), which is further proof of how we change as we get older, and how 20-something me wouldn’t even recognize 38 year-old me.

(Oh, the race is next spring, after my birthday. So I’ll be 39 when I run my first half-marathon. That’s… probably not something normal people do, I’m guessing.)

I will try not to talk about it too much because blah blah blah nobody cares about my workout regimen. But it’s kind of A Big Thing that’s on my mind right now.

no1currr
(Added because it’s one of my favorite GIFs of all time.)

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I don’t talk about it much here, but my job has been so good lately. I changed managers a few months ago, when my manager moved to a different team (I can’t remember if I ever blogged about that or not). I was initially really nervous about it, because my new manager is a guy that I’ve worked with for the entire four years that I’ve been at this company, but I could never figure out whether or not he liked me. But the transition has been very easy, and we have a really great working relationship now.

Last month, I had my first performance review since changing managers, and I got some really great feedback, as well as a raise. I feel like I’m insanely fortunate to have a job that I enjoy, and get to work with people I really like.

Work has also gotten a lot busier recently, which is part of the reason the blog has been so quiet lately. But it’s all good stuff there.

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Oh, and I got more pictures back from our family picture day, and I just… my god, I don’t know how I got so lucky to have these two beautiful little girls.

girls_serious_faces

They’re so different, and so much alike. They are each their own individual little people, and they are delightful.

The other day, I thought about how when I was pregnant with Catie, and we first found out she was a girl, I was terrified, because I didn’t know if I’d be a good mom for a girl. I’m not a super girly-girl type, and I have so many body image issues of my own that I was afraid I’d project onto a little girl, and I just thought I’d be terrible at it.

(Funny thing: it was the opposite when I was pregnant with Lucy. By that point, I was scared of having a boy, because having a girl was all I knew. That time, I was relieved to find out we were having another girl. I was like, “oh, another one of these? Ok yeah, I got this.”)

I think Catie and Lucy are proof that we get the kids we’re supposed to have. Because they’ve expanded my horizons and my worldview so much, and the fact that I can now have extensive conversations about both dinosaur fossils and Disney princesses without batting an eye? I think that just makes me a more well-rounded person than I was before I had kids.

me and my girls

Oh, this guy of mine is pretty great, too.

me and Chris

(Side note: that picture was so awkward to take — “look over our shoulders at each other, say what now?” — but I really love the way it turned out.)

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to reading online reviews of running shoes, because apparently that’s the type of thing I do with my free time now. Yeah, I’m a weirdo. I know.