Making a Comeback!

For the past few weeks, maybe longer (I am not sure how long ago my last post was without looking), I have been dying to write, to catch up, and connect with other bloggers again.  This summer I have been TERRIBLE about reading blogs, writing on my own, and keeping up with my other technological fun stuff. We have had lots going on this summer.  We have season passes to the local waterpark and on the days it hasn't been unseasonably chilly, that is where we can be found.


We've hiked, biked, had birthday parties, park playdates, attended story time, gone to the zoo and a theme park, vacationed, and chilled out at home.

 We went to Old Man's Cave.  It is absolutely gorgeous there and a good place to get some family fun and exercise in.  The kids loved the new panning for gems/fossils thing they added since we were there last.

We have memberships to the zoo and even though it is over an hour away we try to go as much as possible! Also, Curly had to have 2 parties this year because her pool party got rained out so we had a small party at the house for family only and then had her pool party the following week for all the kids that were invited.

 For Curly's birthday this year we decided that we would get her a couple small things from us and then get her an experience.  Everyone always buys them so much and the house is only so big, so we decided we would take her to Kings Island for the first time.  I think she rode everything she was big enough for, the above "supergirl" ride (as she called it) at least 3 times!  Rex loved walking through their animatronic dinosaur park.  It is apparently the largest one in the world?

 We love our library's story time! For such a small town they always have great programs: Reptile guys, the zoo, life-size puppet theater, etc.  We also have gotten lucky enough to get to know another family that homeschools and our kids get along great! We have done lots of playdates in the last year.

 All in all, I am calling this a successful summer! I am not liking the turn of the weather and have my fingers crossed that we will have at least a few more warm days so we can get more use out of our waterpark passes before the cooler weather is here to stay.

The title above is not only making a comeback to blogging.  I am about to amp up my running all over again.  I have a goal in mind that I want to start working toward (more on that later) and I need to get myself back into some semblance of order when it comes to running.  The Husband has been working over quite a bit and it doesn't seem to be on a certain day so some days I have planned to run I end up needing to alter the plan.  Either way, I have big plans for the weeks to come and I intend to post about that tomorrow.. maybe tonight if I can sit down and write again.  I need to document my madness. =)

Happy running!

Making My List..

Before I get into the true topic of this post I am soooo excited to announce that I am a new Sweat Pink Ambassador as well as a new Girls Gone Sporty Ambassador! Both emails came on the same day! How cool is that?! I am already loving being a part of this group of amazing, inspiring, and strong ladies!







So, on to what I have been meaning to post about for a couple days.  I mentioned awhile back (way back here) about my thought of a goal to run a half marathon in each of the 50 states but never really followed up on if The Husband thought I was nuts or not.  Well, turns out he didn't, and he is actually liking the idea of checking out all the states.  Also, although he said he would never run a half, I actually have talked him into running some with me! Exciting!  So, I have begun making my list for all the half marathons I want to run in each state.  I have a semi-finished list at this point but soon I will put a tab at the top so I can add to it.

After thinking about this goal, and how long it could take, and the fact that I could keel over one day and never finish (kidding), I decided that I wanted another goal that would happen sooner!  Enter 35 before 35! I really wanted to do 30 before 30 but we are just transitioning to being a single income family so that I can homeschool the kids. Considering that I will be 30 in 2 years and around 2 months, there aren't all that many half marathons within driving distance so travel/hotels would be included a lot, we decided that 35 before 35 would be more manageable.  It averages out to around 4 a year so the plan is to do 2 out of state toward my 50 state goal and 2 that are local.

Another exciting thing is that this allows us to re-do any race we really like and try other races in Ohio without me stressing that we should be doing a race out of state to put it toward my 50 state goal.

Here's the list for this coming year, I believe:

November 2013:   Marshall Half Marathon                                        Huntington, WV
March 2014:         Just a Short Run Half Marathon                            Allison Park, PA
May 2014:            The Flying Pig 3-way (5k,10k,Half)                     Cincinnati, OH
                                            OR
                             The Indy Mini Marathon                                       Indianapolis, IN
September 2014:   Twilight Red Rock Half Marathon                         Las Vegas, NV
October 2014:       Nationwide Children's Hospital Half Marathon      Columbus, OH


I am excited to start doing all of these races! Luckily 2 of those are within driving distance and one is being incorporated into our vacation.  I am also excited to say that The Husband has some running friends in Vegas who we think will run the Vegas run with us.  It has a 1000ft elevation gain in the 1st 5 miles, though, so that should be fun. Orrr something like that!

This weekend, The Husband and I are running the Biggest Loser 10k in Charleston, Wv.  I am pretty excited to run my first race with him and to do another race.  I was having withdraws =).

Anybody have a half marathon they want to recommend for me to add to my list?
Has anyone run any of the Biggest Loser races? 
 
Happy Running!

Beach Vacation 2013

The Husband and I have talked endlessly about moving somewhere that we can be closer to the ocean.  We both love the south and the beach but we have been held back for various reasons.  However, we just found out he got a new job through the federal government so it may open some opportunities to transfer here in a couple years (yay!).  Anyway, I was sooooooo beyond ready for vacation this year. I apologize in advance for the 8 trillion pictures I will most likely subject you to in this post! =)

We had a pretty busy week with getting the house ready for my Grandma to come house/dog sit and then Curly had her dance recital on Sunday and then we got up really early Monday June 3rd to head south.

  Our kids haven't been the greatest car riders but we were hoping they would do well.  We flew to Florida last year but in the meantime they had lots more opportunities to "practice" long rides when we would make the 4.5-5hr drives to see The Husband some weekends while he was working out of town.  In all, the 10 hour drive wasn't very bad.  The kids mostly stayed entertained and didn't fight very badly and we had a pretty smooth trip.  We stopped about half way or so to have a picnic lunch because we were trying to not outdo ourselves on "bad" vacation food.  The place we stopped was pretty neat.  It was called Pilot Mountain and when we asked the Ranger where there was a picnic area he told us "about a mile and a half that way" as he pointed up the road.  Well, we found out it was a mile and a half UP the mountain.  The views were sooo pretty from up there!

Taken on the way home but we ate lunch at the very top of that "knob"

Day One: We got to Myrtle Beach at around 4:30 and went straight to the hotel to check in.  We were right on the beach and on the 21st floor so those views were pretty amazing, also! The room turned out to be fairly nice with a small kitchenette, a living area, and a separate bedroom. We didn't have a ton of time that night so we decided to just take a walk on the beach and head back to the hotel and order food from the hotel restaurant to eat in our room. 

 

The view from our balcony

Night One

Day Two (Tuesday): I got up pretty early this morning and went for a short run (2.55 miles) on the exercise path that ran along the beach road.  It was so nice to run and have an ocean view. We went to this little Zoological Center.  They advertise it as a zoo but I wouldn't really consider it that.  There were lots of animals like deer, ostriches, goats, bison, ponies, a camel etc. that you could feed from either bags you buy at the front or from the quarter machines throughout the property.  I have to say that I wasn't impressed with this place.  The kids liked being able to feed the animals but they were in small cages and it just wasn't the conditions I like to see animals in.

After the "Zoo" we went back to the hotel, ate lunch, and went to get lunch and hit the beach.  Rex scares me because he has NO fear of the ocean.  He doesn't care if we are beside him or not, he just bounds out into the water.  Curly barely wants to get her feet wet and she wants me holding her had when she does even that! =)  So, this trip to the ocean for actual swimming was interesting.  The Husband was taking Rex a little further out into the water while he held him and as I was standing at the edge of the water I saw a small shark swim straight toward my boys and curve right around The Husband's legs and keep going.  Now, anyone who knows me knows that sharks are my biggest fear! I have gotten better but my heart used to speed up to just see them on TV so of course I start panicking and calling them back in! It was pretty nerve wracking for me.

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Day 3 (Wednesday): This day we went to the Alligator Adventure place.  Rex is obsessed with all thing prehistoric and lately has focused some of that attention on alligators and crocodiles.  We figured he would get a kick out of this place and we were right.  They also boast the largest crocodile in captivity Utan who is 18ft long and 2000lbs!! It was pretty incredible to see an animal that large with that many teeth. They also have a large group of albino alligators which is also a pretty spectacular sight.  We saw a live show and a feeding while we were there and the kids really enjoyed it.  On this evening, I took another short run.  My dad and sisters were walking down from their hotel so I couldn't take a long run but ended up doing about 2 miles at a faster pace than normal. 

Day 4 (Thursday): We had some rain and bad weather this day because of the tropical storm making its way up the coast.  The Husband also had his phone interview for his new job so we hung around the room for awhile and when it was almost time for his interview the kids and I vacated the room and went to TCBY and some of the beach shops while he interviewed.  Then that evening we went out to dinner and went shell hunting on the beach.  The waves were pretty brutal from that storm and had washed out a huge portion of the beach the night before. It was nice and flat though so when the kids told me they wanted to run, we did.  We would run out pretty far and then back to The Husband.  I would say we got in around a mile all said and done? 

Day 5 (Friday): I got up again this morning and took a short run.  I ended up running about a 5k but it seemed SO much farther because I was running into Tropical Storm winds.  It was so strong that I would come out from behind a building and would get hit by the crosswind and get knocked sideways a little bit.  It was pretty crazy.  When I got back the rain had started pretty well so we decided to go to Wonderworks which is a science type center with lots of hands on things for the kids to do.  The kids call it the "Upside Down House."  They had tons of fun there.  When we were finished we walked around the little "Broadway at the Beach" area it was located in.  It reminded me a bit of Downtown Disney in a way.  Cute with lots of shops and restaurants. It was a little too early for dinner so we went back to the hotel to pack a bit before going to dinner.

Day 6 (Saturday): We got up around 8 or so this last morning, finished packing, and hopped in the car to head home.  A few miles down the road we stopped at a huge store that had a fruit stand, fireworks, random vacation stuff, etc.  The ride home was pretty uneventful and we got home around 9pm.

It was a pretty good vacation overall but I can't say that I will go back to Myrtle Beach.  Florida and Georgia will always have my heart =)