Holiday Weekend Eve

Happy holiday weekend eve!

Big weekend, half marathon is THIS Sunday. I'm excited to run it, really, I am. And this is the course, kind of a scam that only a small portion is along the beach.

I feel somewhat prepared, like I can run it at a comfortable pace and not die. The weather is going to be dreamy, high of 82.

My cousin is flying in this afternoon from Texas. She has been my biggest motivator to actually run and train for this thing. Accountability is what it's all about. She's training for a MARATHON, but this will be her first official half marathon.

When you have big plans, that's when things go wrong, right? Well our AC unit has decided to crap out. So we're dealing with that and they wont be able to get the part until Tuesday. Nice. Welcome to VA cousin, sorry we have no AC.

Hope you all have a wonderful Labor Day weekend!

PS- No Weigh-in Wednesday post, but I'm still at 162. Mother heffer!

You win some, you loose some

Ever have a run that SUCKS? Like it is the hardest two miles you've ever run. And just the day before you ran five miles like it was a walk around the block?

Well that happened to me last night. It was so hard. I'm 100% sure it had to do with me trying to lowcarb it all day. Turns out, you need carbs to exercise and not feel like you're going to die.

But it got me to thinking that maybe there really is something to this eating clean business.

So I've decided to not try to do any stupid dieting until AFTER half training and the race is over. And maybe I'll skip stupid dieting all together and jump on the clean eating wagon.

Good-by weekend

I've started living for the weekends. And that's no way to live. Need to fix that.

However, I ran TWICE this weekend, that never happens. The weather has been amazing. Highs in the mid-80s. That's perfect running weather in my book. I did 3.5 miles both days.

I had a goal of five, but my Saturday run sucked. It was the hardest 3.5 miles I've run in a long time. I hadn't run in three days and pretty sure that's what did it. And I may have not been hydrated. So Sunday was going to be my day for five, but I ran out of time.

I knew I'd be short on time so I decided to try and push myself. I consistently ran 9:30 min miles. I'm usually a 10:30 or 11 min. So I was happy with that. Gotta make it count one way or another.

I plan to run almost every day this week, The Half is THIS weekend.

In non-running news, I made a version of this, but slightly skinner. I'll share deets this week.

Pinspiration on left, my skinnier version right

Also took Mr. Mister for a swing AND a stroll on his shinny new firetruck. Big weekend for the outdoors.

Only photo of him smiling. He pretty much just sat there with a "So what?!" look on his face. 

Wednesday Weigh in

1-6-3 Fuck.

That's what went through my head this morning. How in the world. And don't give me that muscle weighs more then fat BS. I mean, it does, but I don't want to hear it. My clothes aren't getting any bigger.

I'm tired of letting my weight and scale rule my mornings and am considering really only weighing once a week. Why is it so hard to let go of weighing every damn day?

I need to get a handle on my eating. That's 80% of the game and I'm obviously not doing something right. Food diary again? I guess I'll dust off MyFitnessPal and get to logging. I also took a look at an old SkinnyMeg post on how to figure out your calorie need. Check it out here.

If my math is correct, to loose 1lb a week, I need a net intake (food - exercise) of 1,575 and 2 lbs, 1,075.

On a positive note, I ran 3.1 miles last night, thats a 5K for you non-runners. No, not an actual 5k. No t-shirt, no entry fee and no fellow runners. Just me, my running shoes and some tunes, pounding the pavement.

I need to push myself more on these shorter runs (PS- I can't believe I now call these short runs). I need a running buddy and an actual plan. Any takers?

Half ready

Well hot damn, I busted out a little over 10 miles on Saturday morning. Dare I say I could have run more? I think I'm ready for this half marathon that is now only TWO weeks  away.

Ran 10+ miles and lived to tell about it.

I ran at a local park. There's this five mile bike path and if you notice, I didn't quite do the entire loop. Ya see, if I would have run the entire loop and run past my car, I'd have only run 5 miles on Saturday.
I know myself, so right when I got toward the end, I turned my ass around and committed to running another 5. Know yourself and do what you need to do. Apparently the bike/jogging path is right by an Archery range too, nice.

As I ran alone on Saturday morning, I had a lot of time to think. One hour, 47 minutes to be exact. Every time I wanted to stop and walk I just kept thinking nope, you don't need to and you'll feel so much better about this if you don't. It wasn't that I was in pain or out of breath, I was just tired of running and wanted to stop.

So I kept going. And that got me thinking about how far I've come. A year ago I was 2 weeks postpartum and couldn't run a mile if I wanted to. And now, 10 miles like a boss. That's crazy.

So while the scale hasn't moved in months, I'm happy with this non-scale victory and how far I've come.

PS- I've gotten hooked on HBO's The Newsroom. Watched the first 6 episodes of season 1 this weekend. So good!

Birthday Party Hangover

Mr. Mister's one year b-day party was a success. Crowded and a little warm, but a success.

Family and friends crammed into our house and celebrate one year of Lucas. The hubs and I were celebrating living to tell about it. Kidding, kind of. First year of parenthood is HARD. Wonderful, but hard. 

Here's the photo roll 

Cookies for the adults

That little train was on the Hubs 1st b-day cake

Thanks for clowning around! 

Our little ring master

We made it!

In other news--

I ran FIVE miles on Friday and a pretty decent pace. I was happy with it. THREE more weeks until the half. Oh my! 

I also ran last night. Three miles IN SHORTS!

I need to step up the frequency of my runs. No matter how far or not far I run jog, its still a struggle. I'm 100% sure it's because I'm not getting in enough runs jogs and/or cardio cross training during the week. Three weeks, gotta make them count!

And best for last, Real Housewives of Miami is on tonight!!! Get excited.

Little collage of pics for you pinners...

Party Planning

Give me a good theme and I pretty much a bad ass party planner. Or at least I think so.

Mr. Mister's big one year old birthday party is going to be a circus/carnival theme and thanks to pinterest and google, I've shelled out more money than I care to admit on decorations so far.

I even made my inspiration Pinterest board private so no one would know what I was up to. Now that I type that, it sounds kind of dumb. But anyway, here are some sneak peeks of what's going on.

Hot mess of decorations. 

I LOVE rubber cement. LOVE. 

Weigh-in Wednesday

Oh no, I'm up to 163.4!!!! WHAT?

I've been running and watching what I eat for the past few days and I've gone up instead of down or even maintaing. Yikes.

Protein day today. Gotta get this under control!

We had a great day celebrating with Mr. Mister yesterday. An entire year old. Wow.

Here are a few pics of the little guy. We did first birthday photos and a cake smash, that's why he had numerous outfits.

Birthday Eve

A year ago today I was a miserable pregnant person. I was so swollen and puffy. And 200+ pounds!

I only had one pair of non-flipflop shoes that fit my massively swollen feet. I wear a size 8.5 and they were size 10. Crazy.

I feel asleep on the couch and around 11:15 p.m. I woke up to move from the couch to the bed and that's when it went from sleep time to go time. My water broke. OMG. Holly Fing shit, we're having a BABAY!!!! 

4 hours later, yes, FOUR hours and no epidural later, I was holding our sweet, sweet baby boy. 

Birth photography, best money I ever spent. 

Love.

Everyone says it, but it is so true, I can not believe it has been an entire year. It has flown by. Flown.

This weekend he climbed into his stroller, walked around with his walker and talked up a storm. Where is that little newborn baby I was so scared of? He's long gone and being replaced by a busy, busy toddler. 

In other news, I ran 7.1 miles this past weekend. And I painted a wall. 

Before

After

Talking right to me!

Do you every go to church and feel like the minister is talking right to you? How did they know?!!

Well today I felt like Mama Laughlin was blogging right at me. I was just talking how about how I've gotten a little too slack and am not seeing/getting results I want and have no one to blame but myself. Well I got a good dose of motivation from her today to get my ass in gear.

Go read her Suck it up Buttercup post and pick up some motivation yourself!

A Disney Cruise

Yes, I've been back for almost 2 weeks, but have been lazy on posting. I call it a vacation hangover.

Well I a nutshell, the cruise was awesome and I HAVE to tell you all about it. Really the most awesome vaca I've ever been on.

And just for comparison sake, not to brag, but so you don't think all the other vacations have been stay-cations, here's a list of vacations I've been on during my adult life:

• Japan
• London
• Hawaii
• Bahamas (all inclusive)
• Mexico
• Punta Cana (all inclusive) 

And this was hands down, the best trip. Alaska was awesome, but the greatness of the trip had a lot to do with the big mouse. I am in no way a huge Disney fan. Cool if you are, but I'm not. I mean, I like Disney, but am not a Disney freak. With that being said, I had and amazing time on the Disney cruise.

Disney is the big cheese of making sure you have a wonderful experience from start to finish. And it is just that, an experience.

This means the boarding process up until you leave that cruise terminal to go home is seamless. There were 18 people in our group, herding cats ya'll, and we managed to not have a single mishap.

Getting ready to get on the boat, lets get this party started!

The service was top notch and staff went out of their way to make sure you felt special. I was really impressed by this. The kid clubs and activities were loved by all the kiddos in our group. Like they didn't want to ever leave. I have an older nice, 18, and they even have an 18-21 year-old group. She meet some peeps from all over the world and had a ball.

Adult activities for us older kids were endless too. There were even places to escape from all the kids with an adult only pool, coffee shop, bars and a cafe. I didn't get to take full advantage of the nightlife, I went to be early with Mr. Mister all but one night.

But everyone else in our party said the shows were spectacular and the Hubs had a good time having some adult beverages with the guys at the Cadillac Lounge. He also went to a late movie one night and got to watch the Loan Ranger (just came out) in the onboard movie theater.

There are entire blogs and websites dedicated to tips and tricks so I won't reinvent the wheel here. I will pass along the website I liked most when we were planning our trip, THIS ONE. Lots of good tips along with ways to save.

The first few days were spent at sea. The ship had endless activities to do and if you were board, it was your own fault.  The third day we went into Tracy Arms to see a spectacular glacier. Here are some pics.

That evening we did fancy adult only dinner at the Palo restaurant.

Brothers + their wive and my oldest niece. 

Me and Hubs

That next day was our first port, Skagway and we only did one excursion here. I would tell you to do at least one at every port. Without it, you go look a the same jewelry and souvenir shops you just looked at in the last port.

My mom and oldest niece did a helicopter tour to a glacier and it looked pretty amazing. My aunt and uncle did a helicopter ride out to a dog sled place and then went dog sledding. They said it was out of this world. Both expensive, but put them on your list.

As a group we did the train ride and then panned for gold. It was fun and the train ride was worth the money. We got to see spectacular views and got some fun photos like this one...

Group shot, with half the group. 

Panning for gold

Me and my momma.

Back to panning for gold. We're gonna be rich!

Looks like Mr. Mister has gold fever too!

Quick stop at um, some place.

Back on the boat and onto the next!

The next two ports we just went around town and hung out on the boat while the rest of the crew did excursions. My photo taking seemed to be nonexistent but it was truly a glorious time and wonderful to spend so much time with the family. We all made sure to make it back to the boat in time to have dinner together every night. 

It was fun asking the kids about what they did that day. Their stories about whale watching, lumberjacks  and walking on glaciers still blows my mind. Some lucky kids for sure!

I'm already dreaming about our next one. They do a European cruise ya'll, EUROPE!