12 Miles and a Tempo

This past weekend I planned to run my long run on Saturday and do an easy recovery run on Sunday.  Saturday morning I just wasn't feeling it.  It was raining and I felt lazy.  I wanted to lay around and play with Carter so that's exactly what I did.  I went for an easy run later in the day.  During my run I thought about what I'd do for my long run and started getting pumped up and excited to run hard the next day.

Enjoying the rain.

My plan going into Sunday's long run was to log 12 miles.  I also wanted to get an 8 mile tempo run at 8:00 pace in.  I decided to run 3 easy miles as a warm-up, 8 miles at tempo pace, and then a mile cool down. 

When Carter went down for a nap I left for my run.  It was 75 degrees with a cool breeze.  I started off with my 3 easy miles and glanced down at my pace after a half-mile.  I was running right at 8:30 pace.  I had figured my easy miles would be closer to 9:00 pace.  My legs just wanted to take off and run fast.  Running 8:30 pace felt slow.  I couldn't believe how good I felt as I finished my first 3 miles in an average of 8:25 pace.

With 8:25 pace feeling so easy I knew I would either rock the run or lose steam part-way through.  Luckily it was the first, I totally rocked my run!  My next 5 miles ranged from 7:50-7:55 pace.  Around 6.5 miles in I passed a guy who turned, looked at me, and said "Man, you're fast".  It was nice to get a compliment and reminded me of one of the great aspects of running, the community.

As I headed into the last 4 miles I started to pick up the pace even more.  Mile 9 was 7:47, mile 10 was 7:43, and mile 11 was 7:35.  The last mile of my run was supposed to be a cool down, but I was feeling awesome and around half-way through the run I decided to run the last mile hard instead and log a 9 mile tempo.  I realized I was going to finish in an average of 8:00 pace or under for my entire 12 mile run and was tempted to go ahead and run all the way to 13.1 to see what I finish a half in, but decided that was silly since I'm running a half in a couple weeks.  Instead I decided to rock out the last mile and couldn't believe it when I finished mile 12 in 7:17.  Putting me at an average of 7:55 pace for 12 miles.  Runs like this are what I work for, what I train for, what it's all about.  It's looking like I'll definitely be able to reach my goal of a half-marathon at 8:00 pace!

I'm getting really excited to run a half.  I feel like I'm in really good shape.  A couple months ago my brother and I decided to run a half-marathon in October as a tune-up for our half in November.  I'm so glad we did.  The half-marathon we registered for is next weekend and I'm so ready to see where I'm at.

After such an awesome run I was feeling fired up and ready to conquer the world.  I called Ty to see what Carter was up to and he had just woken up 10 minutes earlier.  I couldn't wait to get home and play with our little man.

Such a perfect face to come home to.

Pumpkin Picture Overload

So remember the first day of fall when I was talking about letting Carter paint a pumpkin?  I thought Ty might not think it was a good idea, but when I told him, he was all in.  He picked up a pumpkin for us last night and we went to town with the pumpkin today.  I'm glad it worked out to do it when Ty was home because it was definitely a 2 person job.  One person taking pictures, which was Ty, and one person making sure Carter didn't get paint in his mouth, which was me. 

This leaf looks delicious!

Crafting with Carter is one of my favorite things to do.  Carter first experienced paint in February at 2 months old making Valentine's Day cards.  Through all of my experiences using paint with Carter I was most concerned he would put his hand(s) in his mouth covered with paint and ingest the paint.  I was pleasantly surprised when he was so interested in painting the pumpkin he try to put his hand in his mouth at all.  The only problem was when he grabbed some grass and a leaf and tried to put them in his mouth with a hand covered in paint!  Between the cuteness of Carter painting the pumpkin, Ty's amazing photography skills, and our fabulous new camera I just couldn't pick a few pictures, so be prepared for picture overload!

Just getting started.

I love the handprints on the pumpkin!

RAR!!!!

This is a great picture to end on.  True happiness!

A Perfect Rainy Day

Today was one of those perfect days where all day long I felt so lucky to be me, to be married to Ty, to be Carter's mom, to spend all day on the weekend with my loves (Harper included).  Carter slept through the night again Wednesday and Thursday which makes a HUGE difference in how I feel.  I wake up refreshed and spend all day feeling like I'm hopped up on coffee.  Not just like I drank a cup of coffee, but like I went to IHOP and drank an entire hoddle of coffee.  I still crash at night, but man do I have extra energy during the day! 

This morning was the first morning I can think of that I slept until I woke up on my own without a wake up call from either my phone or our little man.  Carter woke up once last night around 4 am and then slept in until 9 am.  I'm considering that the latest he's ever slept.  I couldn't believe it!  I got up at 8:30, pumped, and did some cleaning around the house.

When Carter woke up I dressed him in a onesie that was Ty's when he was a baby.  My heart swelled looking at him and seeing how cute he was.  Then I pictured Ty in the outfit as a baby and couldn't help but giggle from the cuteness of it all.  You know when your heart is so full of joy and the only way to release it is to let out happy little giggles.

As Carter was eating breakfast it started raining really hard.  We went into the living room and watched the rain through the window.  Carter was so adorable and absolutely loved it.  The window is perfect for a baby his size to place their hands on the window and peer out.  We have my parents to thank for that wonderful Christmas present!

The rest of the afternoon was spent playing and rolling around on the floor with Harper.  She is still so obsessed with Carter.  I fed Carter kiwi for lunch and figured out his little trick.  If I'm sitting right next to him he fusses and won't feed himself.  If I walk off, he instantly starts feeding himself no problem.  I watched him eat lunch while I made some pureed squash.  Then I put him in his Bumbo while I finished making the puree.  I think we have a future beasticle on our hands with Carter.  Anytime I use the play tray on the Bumbo he rips the tray off and plays with it instead of his toys.  Anyone else's baby do this?  Cracks me up every time!

Carter had a clothing change after half the kiwi ended up smashed in his lap.

When Carter went down for his afternoon nap I took off for a run with Harper.  The temperature was just below 70 degrees and Harper had a blast.  The perfect ending to a great day was a family trip out for dinner and shopping.  Our insurance check came today and we replaced our camera.  I'm so excited to finally get Carter's 9 month pictures done.  They will be 2 weeks late, but better late than never right?!  Now for the cherry on top, watching "Parks and Rec" while snuggling with Ty on the couch.  There just aren't enough days like today!

Carter and His Grandparents

Carter has such amazing grandparents.  He is such a lucky and very loved little boy.  I uploaded pictures and videos from Ty's phone to the computer and had a blast looking through everything.  I found a couple videos of Carter with his grandparents that made me smile so much and so hard my face hurt.  This first one is with his Grammy and Grampy.  We were out at a restaurant and my mom was feeding him.  A few times she would pretend to feed my dad, who was holding him, instead.  Carter didn't get upset at all, he just looked at my dad.  It was so adorable!

The next video is with Ty's parents.  We'd been trying a sippy cup with Carter and he just wasn't interested.  Ty's dad shared some water out of his cup and Carter was all about it!

Carter's Favorites Right Now

Just recently Carter started clapping and man does he love it!  At first he would clap along when I would clap and say "yay".  Now he claps all the time.  I'll be driving in the car, peek up at him in the mirror, and he's just clapping away.  Probably to himself in the mirror.  While I'm running I'll look down and his legs are stretched straight out and he's clapping.  It's just plain adorable.

One day at lunchtime when I went to visit Carter I was holding him and bent down to pick up my purse.  When I bent down he leaned and almost went upside-down and started laughing.  I then very slowly and gently leaned him upside-down and he deep down belly laughed.  We spent a solid 3-5 minutes with me leaning down and him laughing hysterically.  That night I told Ty what had happened and he picked Carter up and leaned him upside-down.  Of course, being a dad, he was much rougher with Carter than I was, swinging him between his legs.  Forgive the mess in the background of the video, we were still reorganizing and cleaning after our house was ransacked!

Growing Pains

As Carter has outgrown clothes I've packed them away in storage totes.  Once I had packed away clothes ranging from newborn to 3-6 months it became apparent that we didn't have enough room in the garage for as many totes as we would go through.  We decided to pick up some vacuum storage bags so we could store the clothes in a closet or under a bed.

This weekend I went through the clothes and organized them into 3 large vacuum storage bags.  One of newborn clothes (including the car seat insert and bath tub insert), one filled with 0-3 month and 3 month clothes, and one with 3-6 month and 6 month clothes. 

That's how my boy's size compares to his old newborn clothes.  Where has the time gone?!!?

It broke my heart a little bit as I packed away some of my favorite outfits and jammies.  Each outfit had a favorite memory tied to it.  This was the outfit he was wearing when we went to our first doctor's appointment.  This is the outfit he was wearing when he rolled over for the first time.  This is the outfit he wore on his first trip to work with me. 

The hardest part was pulling out his newborn clothes and seeing how little they were.  As I looked at the newborn onesies I pictured the first time he had worn them.  How small he was.  How he felt in my arms the first time I held him.  I couldn't help it, the tears welled up in my eyes.


I guess I'm a bit of a masochist because I just had to put my favorite little newborn outfit up against him to see how much he's grown.  The end of the pant leg came to his knees.  I pictured his little tiny newborn self laying on top of his big, chunky 9 month self.  He has grown so much!  Sometimes I have a hard time letting go of that itty bitty baby who was too small for newborn-sized diapers, but then I look at that smile.  That precious smile with 2 little teeth sticking out of his bottom gum.  And this age?  This is the one I want to hold onto.  That is until the next one.  Because it's just so much fun.  There's just so much to love.  So the growing pains, those are all momma!

Just because he's so cute!

 

Just Charge It

When I was training for my 2nd marathon my running buddy had a Garmin Forerunner.  I loved having the freedom to just take off running without a plan.  Training for my 1st marathon I would go out the night before and map out my run, measuring the distance with my car.  I know it's hard to believe such a lack of technology once existed!  I asked for a Garmin for Christmas and my parents got me a Garmin Forerunner 305.  It was big and clunky, but I loved it.  It was my most prized possession right behind little Harper Lee.

I used my beloved Garmin during every run for 4 years.  Then one day I set it outside to pick up satellites and when I went out to take off running it still hadn't picked up satellites.  I tried day after day for weeks, but no luck.  It just wasn't picking up satellites anymore.  I tried every trick in the book, every trick I could find online, I even called their help line and it still wouldn't work.  I was slightly heart broken.

Ty showed me the newer version of the Garmin, not only was it smaller, but it also came in pink!  We used Christmas money to buy me a new Garmin, this time the Forerunner 10.  I loved that it was smaller.  There were only 2 down sides.  A smaller watch meant a smaller screen which meant only 2 things could be displayed on the screen at a time.  So instead of having distance, overall time, and pace displayed I only had distance and pace on my screen.  The other was battery life which pales in comparison to the Forerunner 305.

The size difference in my Forerunner 305 compared to my Forerunner 10.

When I first learned how to drive I was always struggling to keep my car gased up.  I never noticed I needed gas until the empty light popped up.  Unfortunately I ran out of gas multiples times due to this.  My phone consistently runs out of power because I don't remember to charge it until the reminder pops up letting me know I'm at 20% battery life.  The same thing happens with my Garmin.  It doesn't get charged until I'm running along and low battery pops up on the screen.  My old Garmin was a beast.  One time the low battery reminder popped up within the first couple miles of an 11 mile run.  I made it the entire distance and it didn't die.  New Garmin, not so much.

Today I set off to run an 8 mile tempo run with a mile warm up and a mile cool down.  When I turned my Garmin on after reaching the trails to run I saw there wasn't much battery life left so I turned it off and ran my warm up without it.  I figured my Garmin could make it 4 miles without running out of battery and then I'd use the Nike Plus Running app on my phone for the rest of the run.  Good ole Garmin made it 5 miles before automatically saving the run and turning off.  I pulled my phone out to use it and guess what, it was dead!  I thought, man, some bad luck today or bad charging on my part.

My goal for the 8 mile tempo run was 8:00 pace.  I finished the first 5 miles at 7:57 pace.  I felt like I picked up the pace for the last 3 miles, but I had no way of knowing.  I'm sure I hit at least an 8:00 minute pace which makes me feel good about my progress toward a half-marathon at 8:00 pace! 

My goal from now on is to be more consistent with charging my Garmin.  The plan is to charge my Garmin before each long run.  I ran out of battery life during a 12 mile run a few weeks back as well.  Hopefully I'll start doing better.  I eventually got better about getting gas in my car and haven't run out of gas since high school so I know there's hope!

Ty also ran an 8 mile run this weekend which is the longest he's ever run!  I am so proud of him.  When he first said he wanted to run a half-marathon I was excited but unsure he would put the training in to get there.  It's amazing how far he's come as a runner in just over 2 years.  When he first started he walked a lot and his fastest mile was 12:00.  Now he's down to 8:30ish pace during 5ks and finished his 8 mile run at 10:40 pace.  I could dedicate an entire post to how proud I am of him and his running accomplishments, but I'll save that for later.  Possibly once he finishes his first half marathon!

Ty and me before his very first 5k, a St. Patty's day run in 2011.

Ty, me, and Carter before one of Ty's last 5ks, the Firecracker 5k on July 4th.

First Day of Fall

Although I was sad to see summer go because it meant the end of Carter-filled days, I wasn't sad that we would soon be saying goodbye to 90+ degree days!  Fall is ushering itself in with style here in Oklahoma.  The high today was in the low 80's and I took Carter for a run in the middle of the day.  The warmest it's supposed to get all week is 88 which means I can go back to running with Carter right after I pick him up.  He normally takes a short little nap while I run and that keeps me from having to either wake up at 5:00 am to run or wait to run until after he goes to bed.  It's a much better set-up for us, so hooray!

Napping at the end of our run today.

I was itching to get outside today due to the beautiful weather and I was finally able to talk Ty into hanging Carter's swing.  We found it at a garage sale when we were pregnant and couldn't pass it up for just $5!  Carter initially wasn't sure of it, but smiled and laughed once I started cheering for him.  He kicked his legs and went wild.  The best part was watching the hair on the side of his head blow in the wind.

Now I'm looking forward to a trip to the pumpkin patch, carving pumpkins, and eating some more Halloween Oreos.  I'm contemplating letting Carter decorate his own pumpkin with paint.  I'm picturing it set up outside with Carter dipping his hands in paint and splattering it all over the pumpkin and probably all over lots of other stuff too.  Maybe I'm crazy, maybe Ty will nix that idea, maybe I'll do it in secret before he gets home...  We will see!

If you watch this video, I'd just like you to know ahead of time that I didn't know Ty was filming.  I thought he was taking pictures.  Otherwise I would've toned it down a bit.  I'm slightly embarrassed by all my talking, but Carter is still stinkin cute!

Jammies

The outpouring of love and support after the break in has been incredible.  We are surrounded by amazing friends, family, and co-workers.  My co-workers have gone out of their way to help us out.  Showering us with cards, gift cards, and cash.  It was all so unexpected and heart warming.  My co-teacher spread the news after I texted her Friday evening and the text messages came pouring in right away.

One of my co-workers went through all of her son's clothes, pulled Carter's size, washed them, boxed them up, and brought them to me at school.  She knew we were the most in need of jammies so she packed lots of them.  I couldn't stop giggling over how cute they were.  Carter has always worn footie pajamas.  Most of the jammies she gave us were two-piece jammies.  They are so cute but also make me a little sad because he looks like such a big boy in them! 

Last Friday poor Carter was sausaged into 6 month jammies because he only had a few pairs that hadn't gotten stolen and they were all in the dirty clothes.  On Saturday my mom picked up an adorable pair of Robin jammies equipped with a cape and all.  I kept laughing every time I looked at him.  I hated taking the cape off for him to go to bed.  He looked so precious.

For now you will have to put up with the poor quality of pictures taken with my phone.  I'm not sure when our insurance money will come through and after replacing our computer, we don't have the money to replace our camera yet.  My co-workers gave us enough money that we could buy a cheap camera, but I'd like to get a really nice one like we had.  The picture quality was simply amazing and now that I've been spoiled by it I don't think I can go back!