Long Runs

In our running group, we always do our long runs on Saturday mornings. I've attended every single one up until last weekend. I had the GOTR race last Saturday. I was going to do both when I thought the race started at 9am, but it started at 830a and I wouldn't have had time to make it their in time. Then I also missed yesterday.

Kate, Kara, and I at the concert

Kate's AWESOME photo of Mr. Church

Friday night we (Kara, Kate, and Kate's husband) went to Topeka to see Eric Church in concert. It was originally going to be Kim and her boyfriend Kevin instead of Kara and I, but Kevin couldn't go, so Kim invited me to go, then Kim got sick and we asked Kara to go. It was kind of a big fiasco because we all work together and we were needing to leave work early and then Stephanie called in sick. But we ended up making it work. Well, we didn't get home until about 2am and I didn't get to bed until even later. So, waking up to be running at 7am then working after wasn't going to happen.

On a side note, the expo center the concert was in had a bunch of stairs that we had to go up. In my old life, I would've looked at those stairs with dread, but now, I looked at them with excitement! I ran up those stairs and I wasn't even out of breath when I got to the top!

Anyway... When Kim got to work on Saturday, I asked her if she had run with the group and she said that she hadn't, so I asked her if she wanted to run tomorrow (which is now, today) and she said she did. So we made plans to meet Sunday at 7am. We met up for our 60 minute run and we ran the outside perimeter of the park, which we never do. I really liked it! We started our run next to the zoo and you could hear the animals in there going crazy! It must have been breakfast time! When we got about half way, I needed to walk for about 10 seconds, and then we were back to running.

At one point in the middle of the path we saw a turtle! It was so cute! Kim said "There, now it feels like we're going fast!" We also saw a beautiful butterfly fluttering around! I love seeing stuff like that while running! We got back around and crossed the wooden bridge to get back to the park and we realized we were not at 60 minutes yet, so we did the small loop and ended at 62:35 and we did 4.49 miles! It felt great! It really gave me confidence in our 10k that is now less than 2 weeks away!

It was also my first run with my Garmin and I loooove it!

Paul is changing the brakes on my car right now and afterwards I think I'm going to take Elliott to the zoo! It's so nice out and we need to renew our membership anyway. She is finally at an age where she will really enjoy it! She loves looking at her animal flash cards and making all the animal sounds!

Hope everyone had a great weekend!

A shout out to Karen who ran her first 5k yesterday, Jen who is also doing a 5k today, and Katie who is running her first marathon today! You ladies are great!

Running Purchases!

I got a phone call from my babysitter at work yesterday afternoon saying that Elliott had a 101 degree temperature. She asked if she could give her some ibuprofen and I said that was fine and asked if I needed to come get her. She told me that she would give her the medicine and see how she did. She called back and hour later and said that her fever hadn't gone down at all. I called Paul and told him to go pick her up. I stayed home from work today and took her to the doctor and she has a double ear infection. We got some amoxi (and a new doll) and she seems to be feeling better.  

Kim and I went to the group run last night. It was horrible! I started out with my legs feeling like lead and ended with me trying not to vomit! And it was super hot! We decided to start running in the mornings since it has gotten so hot! We also decided yesterday that we are going to run TWO half marathons this fall! We were already going to do Prairie Fire, but I heard about one called See Jane Run. It's a woman's' half and it supports breast cancer. There is champagne and chocolate at the finish line! Prairie Fire is October 14 and See Jane Run is September 15. We think we are crazy, but I think it's going to be fun!

Also, I'm finally getting a GARMIN! I'm so excited! That had been my reward for my 50lb weight loss, which I achieved a while ago, but I was slow to pull the trigger on buying one since they are pretty expensive. It dawned on me one day to look on Ebay. I had been trying to get one, but kept getting outbid, and then I won one this week! I hope to get it early next week! I think it will help my training a lot! I also bought some CEP compression calf sleeves and a Nathan hand held water bottle from amazon! I'm so excited!

Compression Sleeves

Hand Held Water Bottle

Kim had a bigger hand held water bottle, but it was kind of weird to carry (she let me try it out) and then she got this one yesterday and it is so much better! So I bought one too! Since it is getting hotter, we are going to need more water!