So let's see....since the last time I posted....I'm trying to think of what's been going on. We are all doing really well, Sophie is doing fantastic! I can't believe she's going to be 2 years old in less than 2 months. Which means I need to start planning a birthday party because June will be here before I know it...just like April is almost over! I'm thinking we're going to throw her an art party. She loves to color so I've got a few ideas floating around in my head.
Sophie is a little miss Chatty Kathy, she says new words every day! She can count to 10, she repeats everything we say and really annunciates well. She is a happy girl who can turn in an instant and become she devil toddler. Girlfriend has a temper! I say she gets it from Ricky, he says she gets it from me and both our parents say she gets it from us. So there you have it, Sophie is a good combination of both our temperaments.
Weather has been warmer here but water temps are still cool so we haven't been to the beach at all, waiting for it to warm up just a little bit more. Ricky is chomping at the bit to get his boat in the water so hopefully this Saturday we can take it for a spin.
Running is going really well. Ricky and I both ran the Cooper River bridge Run on April 2nd. This was Ricky's first 10k and he did awesome, he finished in 1:02 and some seconds. I beat last years time by 5 minutes 55:03.
Last weekend I ran the Charlotte Race Fest half marathon. A little back story on this. I ran the Kiawah half marathon back in December. If you recall it was cold and rainy, pretty miserable conditions. Although I ran the pace I trained for, I was just getting over a cold and didn't feel like I did as well as I thought I could do. So the theory with this race in Charlotte was to run another half in nice spring temperatures. Yeah, I should know by now that my luck sucks. It was beautiful weather all week....until Saturday. They were calling for severe thunderstorms Saturday morning (rain, wind, thunder, lighting, hail....you get the picture). So needless to say I was less than thrilled to be running in the rain again. I woke up Saturday morning and watched the weather channel for about 30 minutes and decided to go on with it. They said severe weather would not hit until late morning/early afternoon. We got there with minutes to spare and I was off and running!
To make a long story short (too late) the weather overall wasn't too bad. Sure it sprinkled, and then it would downpour, but it wasn't cold and at times the sun would try and peak through. The course was very hilly. I'd forgotten how hilly Charlotte is, so this was a real challenge for me. I can proudly say that I ran the entire course, up hill and all, in 2:07:00, almost 3 minutes faster than Kiawah! I'm super proud of that accomplishment and have already signed up for the Myrtle Beach Mini Marathon October 23rd. I guess you can say I'm addicted. One thing I did this time around that I did not do at Kiawah is I stopped for water and Gatorade the last 3 miles. I think this really helped me at mile 12 (that was 95% up hill).
I'm still up in the air about signing up for a marathon. There's the Thunder Road Race in Charlotte in November. I was thinking about doing that one but now I'm thinking I will just do the half marathon. There's always the Charleston Marathon in January so that may be the one for me. I don't want to try to get pregnant until January or February so this could work out perfectly.....stay tuned for that decision.
One problem that I seem to have when I do a long endurance run is I seem to retain a lot of water a few days after. I hear this is a common problem with the breakdown of muscle fibers and such but I seem to gain a good 3-4 pounds after a long run. Not sure what I can do about this except to increase my water intake but I swear I drink a TON of water so it's actually kind of frustrating. Then again as much as I swelled when I was pregnant, I'm not surprised.
No more races until the fall, unless a small one pops up here and there. I'm going to continue running long runs on the weekends until it gets too hot and humid to do so. I'm looking forward to beach and boat time with my family.
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| After the race |
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| Crossing the finish line! |
