Running With Strollers

I'm still here, and still working on my running. It's been fun to do shorter distances and to do intervals because then I get to feel fast even if it's just for 2 minutes or whatever. I've actually gotten to where I can do my 400s at about 7:30 pace and that feels really good! Of course that also makes me feel like I'm going to puke, but you know, those feelings are so similar. ;)

Recently I decided I wanted to start a stroller jogging group so I talked to some of the other moms at church and at Elle's preschool. I was surprised and excited by how many people were interested in doing it!

Today was the first day we met. I was so excited to have 5 other moms show up! It was cool to see 4 mini vans parked outside my house, and a line of strollers going down the street. Most of the women who ran with us haven't been running lately or at all, so we decided to start with the Couch to 5k training plan.

The first workout is a 5 minute brisk walk to warm up, then alternating between jogging for 60 seconds and walking for 90 seconds for 20 minutes. I think this was really good. I want this to be fun for everyone and not get anyone burnt out. We're hoping to find a 5k at around Christmas time to do together.

I led the way and watched the time to tell everyone when to start and stop running. We ended up turning around later than we should have so we walked for a while once we finished the running. It was really fun to just hang out with those women and get to know them a little better. I really hope I can help them learn to love running! It was also really cool that we covered 2.4 miles. That seems like an awesome start.

We're going to be meeting every Tuesday to do the first workout of the week, and everyone is going to do the other 2 workouts on their own.

I'm still sticking to my schedule: speed work on Mondays and Thursdays and a long easy run on Saturday. Of course I still haven't done a long run since Utah Half, but I'm excited to start that up again! (I wonder how long of a run I should do on Saturday...) Tuesdays are an easy 4-7 mile run so I'll just add a few miles after the group run.

I'm really excited about all this! If you want join our running group, just let me know.

Elle's 5th Birthday

My baby girl turned 5 last week. We had such a fun day on Saturday to celebrate. We went to the zoo in the morning with my dad and my sister. It was so much fun!

We got to see one of the 5 tigers really close and in the water so that was really cool!

The kids love the tiger statues almost as much as the real tigers.

We rode the marry-go-round and the train.

And some wooden horses...

We saw the bird show, and even though we've seen it a million times. This one was a particularly exciting one though. One of the macaws landed on the bald eagle and they had a little tuffel. It was crazy, but luckily neither of them got hurt!

After the zoo we came home and grilled hamburgers then got ready for the party.

We had like 10 4-5 year olds over, most of them girls since it was a princess party!

Crazy was about the only word to describe it.

And (drumroll...) THE CAKE:

Elle couldn't have had a better birthday and I think she was very happy! Thank you to everyone who came!

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Zucchini Muffins

Ingredients

1 1/4 cups whole white wheat flour
1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup cocoa
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/2 cup butter, melted
1/4 cup milk
1 tablespoon lemon juice (I didn't have any so I used more milk)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups shredded zucchini
1 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon and salt.

Combine the egg, oil, milk, lemon juice and vanilla; mix well.

Stir into dry ingredients just until moistened.

Fold in zucchini, chocolate chips.

Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups two-thirds full. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20-25 minutes or until muffins test done.

I doubled the amount of zucchini and lowered the sugar so the zucchini/sugar ratio would be a little healthier. But then I meant to double to amount of chocolate chips, and ended up quadrupling it so that may have flipped my sugar/zucchini ratio back over... But it was really good! If you eat them while they're warm it's almost like they have a molten chocolate center. :)

A Whole Lot of Nothin' Goin' On

Ok, that's not true. A lot of things have been going on, but just not much triathlon training which is kind of nice for a change. It's been a week and 2 days since Utah Half, and I've gone running twice, and swimming once and I'm already in need of a new training plan. I have to have something to work towards, otherwise, I just can't get myself up in the morning! I've been so tired and feeling sick in the mornings that going running is the last thing I want to do! I think it's because I've thrown caution to the wind - eating some treat or other every night while staying up late, watching movies with Pete. (By the way, we just got caught up on Fringe, and the people who wrote that are just mean.) From here on out I'm going to try to be in bed by 11 or sooner, and no more eating after 8pm. I hope that helps.

Anyway, here are some of the things that have been going on this past week:

George has kind of learned to eat food and he's just so proud of himself! (None of this baby food garbage, though, he only wants things he can feed himself like that apple)



He also figured out how to stand up in his crib all by himself so we had to lower the mattress. Again, he's just as pleased as punch about it. Standing is his favorite, and it's pretty much all he wants to do lately.




I celebrated my 31st birthday with a delicious peanut butter chocolate cake from RubySnap that was to die for! It was gone within 3 days, and I ate most of it. Pete informed me today that he only ended up getting 2 little pieces of it. Oops. Well, it was my cake, and I had just done a half Ironman so I'm ok with that. :)


Photo bombed by my own husband!

It was kind of weird turning 31 three days after finishing my last race of the season where I had 31 written on my calf. I kind of already felt like I was 31 even back in July when I did Echo. I had 31 on my calf then too. It's kind of weird how they do that. No biggie, though.



Here are my kinds on the way to pick up my cake. I usually like to make my own cake because I like to bake, but, like I said, this one was to die for so I made an exception this year! We got cookies while we were there too. Fun birthday!



Also, Elle moved up to a booster seat so that's exciting! Her first official day of preschool (at this school) is tomorrow. I hope it goes well!

It will also be the second day of my new run heavy workout schedule that I got from Run With Jill. I'll just changed the days a little and added swimming so my week will look like this:

Sunday: Off (Maybe a walk)

Monday: Track 400m workout followed by Nike Training Club workout (NTC)

Tuesday: 3-6 miles easy followed by NTC

Wednesday: Swim

Thursday: Lactate Threshold workout followed by NTC

Friday: Swim

Saturday: long easy run 6-8 miles

At least that's the plan for now. We'll see how it goes. I did my first speed workout today and did intervals around the park while Mindy and Elle played. The loop around the park is a little more than 400 meters and it took me 2:06-2:13 to do (feeling like I was going to puke!). My goal is to get that down to 2:00 or less.