Twin SupaStars

Yesterday Mai told me we were going to play "Twin SupaStars" (what an imagination!) and so she proceeded to put our hair in pigtails and barretts and put glitter gloss on us and eyeshadow and headbands. She kept twirling around for her daddy - "aren't I gorgeous, Daddy? We're Twin SupaStars". We headed out to the store (she was very insistent I not change a thing about my appearance before we left) and the moment we opened the door there was a downpour of hail lasting less than three minutes that covered the ground and caused all kinds of trouble on the roads. Weirdest weather day yesterday. Snow, Sun, Rain, Sleet, Hail, dark dark clouds, blue skies...

Today's workouts:
Noon: 30 Mile bike ride - man are my legs toast.
P.M. : 40 minutes in the pool

I got a GREAT phone call from Michael today. He just sounded so awesome and well!! He's finishing up his last planned chemo treatment and they'll do a bone marrow biopsy in about 6 weeks and if shows he's still in remission, they'll be heading home - and Boy, does he sound ready to come home!

He mentioned that he and Nicole were on the Pac Crest website today looking up info on the 1/2 marathon and eluded to the fact that they might just be in Sunriver with us come June!!! How awesome would that be!

He was just so positive and thankful for such a good God and inspired me so much ~ wonderful to hear him sound like - well...like him! God is Good!

Hugs

Lets start with the wonderfully enthusiastic, look on the bright side of life, Crystal who is in picture #1. She met me as planned at my gym last night to work with me on my swimming. She immediately put me at ease with a "you're a good swimmer" - probably meaning - at least you're not doggy paddling - but still - it felt good to hear a positive comment. We worked on several things - making sure I was completely expelling my breath underwater before taking a new breath to help with my breathing. To help with my roll (which she said wasn't bad for a beginner - again, making me feel more confident!!) she brought a floaty thing for my legs so I didn't kick and could focus on rolling. After about 45 minutes (most of it talking about her experience with triathlons) we hit the hot tub for almost an hour. What a workout, huh?! It was good to get some positive feedback and some little things that I can immediately work on before the next group swim and of course getting to know a fellow TNTer better!

Got a great night sleep for our run today. It was supposed to be a 35 hilly bike ride but the coaches changed it due to the snow forecast. We ran 10 miles at Leif Erickson. It snowed on us but didn't stick - and I was way too overdressed and sweaty. I chased Audrey for about the first 4 miles before she turned around and ran the last uphill mile by myself. At the 5 mile mark I hooked up with Tim, Kristina, and my mentor, Couloir (middle three pics) which made the last 5 miles speed by with some conversation - mostly about dogs but with some fundraising stuff popping in, too.

The last pic is of one of our honored teammates, Natasha. She is seven and in need of a true miracle to reach 8 years old. There is a pizza party tomorrow night for her so the kids and I get to attend since they are finally cold-free!

Tomorrow I signed on for a 35 mile "rebel" ride (no coaches) but sheesh, the weather is just not cooperating. It's snowing again. I might just end up at the gym tomorrow morning for some stationary bike.

Ok - hugs. Do you hate them, tolerate them, or love them? I LOVE THEM. I feel like every encounter with someone you like should start with a hug. Mai asked me the other day why I always hug Grammy and Grampy and Uncle Ron and Aunt Jenny every time I see them - easy answer, I love them. Goes to show you the kidlets notice everything ("why don't you hug Grandma and Grandpa everytime you see them?")I also love my in-laws, yet gave up on the hugs with them many years ago. Maybe I should start it up again - maybe it won't feel comfortable at first, but eventually maybe my hugs will rub off on them and they'll hug other people at random, too.

Then on Friday I ran into a guy at the gym that I DO NOT REALLY KNOW AT ALL. I met him one day about a year ago at the gym and we had TNT in common so we talked for awhile. Then we met up for a run one day. I've seen him since maybe once every month or two at the gym or the grocery store and every time we see each other we hug. It does not feel weird, it doesn't feel forced, it just feels nice and friendly and he's practically a stranger. I always walk away a little happier after seeing him - even if all we do is hug and say Hi, how you been? Fine. See you later.
Cool, huh? Why can't every chance meeting with people be like that? - leaving you better off than before you saw them...
Hug a couple people today and see if it all seems brighter in some way.

HOWEVER, I CAN NOT CAN NOT CAN NOT stand it when people sign off {{{{{{{hugs}}}}}}}. Wonder why....

Let it Snow Let it Snow Let it Snow

Normally I love the snow, but c'mon - it's almost April - I'm ready for some Spring flowers. I just found these pics of Tracy from Dog Mountain two years ago. It was soooo beautiful. We are hiking it again for Mother's Day this year and trying to get some girls from the gym to go with us. I can't wait ~ the view is wonderful and the flowers are so gorgeous.

I finally broke down yesterday and e-mailed my TNT coach about my swimming misery due to my lack of getting to swim class and within 5 minutes I had not only an uplifting e-mail from her but also from several other team captains/mentors offering their help. I took up Crystal's offer and she's meeting me at my gym tonight to work on me in the pool ~ HOORAY!!!

Yesterday's run went great - it's so easy to get stuck in a rut of running slow and easy and forget that you used to be able to run fast (relatively) and that you still can if you just pick it up and GOOOOO.

This morning's workout will be upper body, abs and then a six mile moderate run at the gym. Tonight will be my one on one with Crystal!!

Has anyone else been watching the Paul McKenna on TLCs "I Can Make You Thin"? This week he taught a stress relieving tapping method that Steve and I were ALL OVER! I've used it several times this week in work situations and it totally works! The show itself is interesting to me in that a couple weeks ago I told Steve I was going to quit eating foods I don't really really like. Instead of eating what I "should" PLUS what I "want" I was going to just eat what I want and then a couple days later Paul McKenna showed up on my boob tube telling me he agreed :o) I'll take that as enough approval. Yep, I'm easy.

This morning's run workout will be 10 min w/u, 3 miles at about 15 seconds below my time trial pace with 90 second jog between each mile and a 10 min cool down.

Yesterday's spin class sucked so bad that I'm going back for more tonight at 5:30 to be followed by some drills in the pool from Total Immersion. I did some fairly light weights for tris/bis/shoulders before spin yesterday but my chest strain really bugged, so I didn't push too hard. It still hurts mildly today but seems to be getting better.

Hawaii....sun...sand...surf...absolutely no stress...time for Steve and I to reconnect...

I'm so ready for this vacation.

I just looked out my window and it's snowing...

Hump Day

How does time fly this much faster when you are old? Do you remember how long a week would take when you were just a kid? My life seems to revolve around month end reports as I get older. Every month when I realize it's time to do my business reports it seems like I just finished them up a week ago, yet in reality it has been 30 days! I MUST find something more wonderful to base my time table on.

First pic is Mai on the run for Easter eggs. Second pic is with HER baby "Oven". She was so proud to feed him by herself. Third pic is the Lego Star Wars ship (485 pieces) that Jack put together BY HIMSELF when he was sick and stuck at home.

Let's see - I don't remember much before last Friday. Friday was a good 20 mile bike followed by 20 laps in the pool. Saturday was an 8 mile trail run with Ki - We ran the back side of Leif Erickson so I would call it a new trail for her and should have had my camera along to do be able to do a "Kiara Tackles the Trails" entry, but I did not since she wasn't supposed to be on the run with me. I was dropping her off at the kennel at 7am before my 8am run with the TNT group, but the kennel didn't open until 9. Whoops! This is so typical of me. I also didn't know exactly where the group was meeting so I found them late and although some hadn't started running yet, we can't have dogs on the runs and I had my new car, not the truck, so I was afraid to leave her in it for fear of chewing my car to pieces, so we went off on our own. Everyone else ran Wildwood and we opted for Leif.

The kids and I headed to Eugene after that to hang with the family and color Easter egss. We went to Ron and Jenny's church Sunday and then over to their house for a wonderful brunch. We had a good time and then headed home for my 40 mile hilly ride. I got about 17 miles into it and then slammed a gel and then headed back towards the bike path near my home ~ which turned out good since I ended up with massive GI distress ( from the gel? from too much chocolate at my moms? I don't know) and after riding up and down the bike path for about 7 more mile doubled over in pain, I headed home. Quite a bit short of my 40 miles, but I later found out the rest of the group only did about 34 and it took them close to 4 hours!! Geez! They were obviously doing A LOT of hills.

Monday I swam but didn't count laps - still wasn't feeling that great. Tuesday I finally did my 20 minute track time trial since my lungs are back to normal, then I swam my 20 laps in 26 minutes - so a bit better! - but I pulled a muscle in my chest (ouch). I still can't figure out why my breathing sucks so bad! It's irritating. I made a promise to myself that I would make it to group swim at 5:30am this morning no matter what so I could discuss with Coach Jane, but then Mai was up with an ear ache and well...getting up early didn't happen. Bummer - 'cause there was a newspaper reporter/photographer there today and I thought with my bright pink cap and goggles I just might make the papers ;-)

I'm feeling even more out of sorts than last week. If I could just get the breathing part down on swimming I could concentrate on technique, which would be stellar. The biking of hills is still a mystery to me. I feel like the rest of the team has a much more solid base now than me, and I'm having so much trouble getting to the group gatherings for help.

Today my plan is to just relax, enjoy, keep it simple, don't stress on what has passed and been missed, just focus on what I can do in the next three months to improve and ensure that my body is effective in this race. I have upper body and a spin class on the books for noon.

We leave for Hawaii in exactly two weeks! I can't wait to melt into the hot sand for a nice long nap.

I'm BAAAAAAACCKKKK!!!!!

First I have to share this strange and disgusting, yet colorful fungus? that is all over the evergreens in my backyard. It happened last year and a day later the gelatinous globs had dried to rusty flakes that were barely obvious from over a couple of feet away. I'm not sure if it is something that is going to kill the trees or not, so I guess this year I will check with someone who can tell me how to treat it before I lose all the beauty and privacy they offer in my backyard.

Anyways, as my post title suggests: I'm BAAAAACCCKKK!!! I know that last week I said I was back, but that was not even close to being the case. My lungs were still damaged and workouts were nil. Mai finally got better as of about Saturday ~ just in time for Jack to wake up at 2:15am yesterday with a horrible ear ache. We were up all night and then took him to urgent care as soon as they opened to find out he has a bad ear infection. The medicine has already kicked in and he's feeling great! So I figured my scheduled workout would suffer yesterday, but the 55 minute run with Ki went just great! Today I did legs and 25 minutes of incline walking at the gym. I hit the pool for 20 laps (THAT's 40 lengths people!!) and to me that is a lot! Unfortunately that is only .61 miles - about 1/2 as far as I will be swimming on race day. So if 20 laps took me 30 minutes, then twice that is an hour...and that is way too slow for racing. I've gotta pick it up!

I made a commitment on my TNT blog to work on hills for 15 minutes each day this week, so this evening I headed a couple blocks away to a some hilly streets and worked on technique for 15 minutes and then took Ki for a two mile run ~ so today was definitely successful and my lungs feel pretty darn good.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE race reports. I've only done three races myself and the reports were less than entertaining, but I got one from my brother yesterday that I thought I would share ~ He inspires me!! I loved the part about the tequila drinking 40 something woman - I want to be her! Give me a shot of booze, a kilt and I'm off...

Well it was not the best morning for a run, let alone a race.

But if the bag-pipers were going to be there then so was I.

That's right, we didn't need no sissy gun. We went off to men in skirts (kilts).

Anyways, I ran the Lucky Clover 10K this morning. 5K on the trail (a little muddy) and 5K on the road (a little hilly).

It was cold and damp, but I did a long slow warm-up, and the rain seemed to let up to a light sprinkle just before the gun, er pipes.

The trail run was beautiful, through the woods, fields, and filbert orchards of Doris Ranch in Springfield.

The road coarse had two hills in the first mile, but then was downhill and flat for the last 2+.

I was hoping to run at or below 8:00 per mile with a finish under 50 minutes, but was unsure because of the trail and the hills.

I went out a little fast but then settled in and felt pretty good through the trail section.

The hills were tough but I didn't push too hard, and used the last downhill to gain momentum for a fast finish on the flats.

My finishing time was 47:53. 7:41 per mile. I didn't know I had that in me at this point in my training.

I was 20th overall and the 15th male finisher. I think one of the gals that beat me was a woman in her mid 40s. She was standing next to me at the starting line in a kilt, drinking tequila out of a flask. It being the Lucky Clover and all, she could at least have been drinking whiskey!

I did get second in the 35-39 male division, and got a cheap medal for my efforts.

Overall it was a great morning and a good first race back.

Thursday - I've lost track of everything

After two weeks of sick kids and myself getting sick, I think we're finally coming out of it! I ended up taking Mai to the ER Monday night but after waiting there for two hours, she just wanted to get to bed, so we left without being seen. Every time I think she's getting better, she ends up having a bad night. This particular virus affects the legs. She had been waking up screaming for two nights that her legs hurt and I couldn't figure out why, but eventually found out lots of other kids are complaining of the same thing. Poor babies! I finally got a workout in last night that didn't suck - an hour on the bike and 20 laps in the pool.

I'm nervous about the upcoming weekend. We have a group ride at Mt. Tabor on Saturday and it's going to be nasty wet weather. What I'm worried about is that it is a "Mt." I hope my lungs can handle this. Coach e-mailed us that we're doing a short part off it called the race route. "It's an easy climb and easy descent, half mile each... but you are going to repeat them back to back for 45-60 minutes with mentors watching your form. It's a great fun workout and a great buildup to the long climbs to come. Don't fear this workout team, climbing and descending are fun. They are what make biking in Oregon beautiful. Embrace them!!!!" So I have no lung capacity for the uphill and I'm deathly afraid of going fast downhill on my bike - looks to be a wonderful morning ;-)

My brother just started running again (two kids under three...you know what he's been doing!) and within about two months has worked his way back to 7:00 and some odd change minute miles. Grrrrrrr. Do I even want to go there? It seems like such hard work, when 9:00-10:00 minute miles are so fun. Guess I won't offer to run the Eugene 1/2 marathon with him. He'll be home and showered before I ever cross the finish line. I am still thinking about doing it though since lots of our team are doing it as a training run. I think Dad is going to do it, too, so it would be a family event.

Hopefully I'll be back to updating more often now that I'm feeling good enough to workout again!

Playing Catch Up

Lots going on last week and I can't believe how little I've been blogging. Let's see, this last picture is of Mom and Mai on Jack's scooter last week. I love how my mom gets down and plays with the grandkids! First pic is of the group before the run on Saturday at Vancouver Lake. After 75 minutes of running there were the most delicious home made lemon pastries I've ever had the pleasure of enjoying. Wish I could have gone to breakfast with everyone, but the kiddos were too sick, so I headed home.

The three pics of Ki are on the muddiest, rainiest, most hail dogpark day in history. She had a 1 year old labradoodle that kept her running and busy for over an hour. After max the doodle went home she was left to play by herself for the most part. I couldn't get her to come to me for anything and rather than trying to chase her all over the dog park trying to catch her and looking the fool, I just let her dig a HUGE hole for about a half an hour. I figure that's one hole to china that's not in my yard - and THAT IS A GOOD THING!

Weekend workouts: Oh, first I just want to say that Jillian Michael's making the cut workouts are even more awful than the Afterburn ones. I thought I would die - either from the workout or from just sweating to death. We've only done one - maybe another on Wednesday if Tracy and I manage to hook up.

Saturday a.m. 75 min run with the tri group up at Vancouver Lake. Then gathered up the whole family(fed them tylenol and told them they were feeling better) to hit the gym for lifting followed by swimming laps.

Precor CP
LT: 130/12 TT: 130/17RP

HS Shoulder Press
LT: 120/8, 100/3, 80/7 TT: 120/16RP

Lifefitness Triceps
LT: 85/5, 80/4, 80/3 TT: 85/13RP

Close Grip Pulldowns
LT: 135/5, 120/5, 120/3 TT: 135/5, 120/6, 120/4RP

Lifefitness Low Row
LT: ?? TT: 130/7, 100/10ss

SUNDAY

Lifefitness Bicep Curls
LT: 70/17 TT: 75/5, 70/7, 70/5RP

Calves on leg press
LT: 180/9 TT: 180/8ss

Seated Leg Curl
LT: 90/27 TT: 100/23RP

Leg Press LT: 500/6, 410/15 TT: 500/7, 430/17ss

followed by 20 mins on the treadmill on 15 incline. My dad and bro and I are climbing St. Helens in April so I need to start adding incline walking in a lot more.
Laps in the pool again.

This afternoon I practiced a bit of golf - Ladies Night starts up again in a couple weeks!!! HOORAY!

The bible study is going great. I went to lunch with one of the women on Thursday and just felt really blessed to have her input on some things and also to realize that she is just a woman with a life and her own set of troubles just like me and that I need to quit thinking that everyone has it together so much more than I do. On the other hand, she is really a wonderfully open Christian woman who is living a life of honor and I enjoyed her company immensely. The study itself is AMAZING!!!!! I thought the first 1/2 about Daniel's stories was just wonderful but now that we're getting into the prophesy and end times stuff - I'm just mesmerized.

Ok, I guess that's enough for now. I did a 20 mile ride today - it was supposed to be longer, but it wasn't happening. I waddled home and Steve started laughing when he saw me. He said I had bun legs and that they were so swollen it looked like I don't even work out at all. I wondered why they were rubbing together so bad as I left the gym today. They are SOOOOOOOO puffy and overtrained right now.

Oh ya - Steve ended up in the ER yesterday after he crashed his dirtbike. He's fine - hit his head real good (but was wearing his helmet!! good boy!!) and thought he broke his hand but it's not - Pretty swollen and ugly, though.
Ok...now that's enough.