5 years out: Analysis of my first 5K

At the end of this month it will have been 5 years since I ran my first 5K.  It was in Delaware - an easy route in the misty rain.  Cool temps.  I remember making it to the half way check point no problem and then almost dying on the trip back.  I ran it with my good friend Kellie.  We motivated each other - she's a great runner.  She never goes too fast or too slow.  She always maintained a great pace.  It was fun running with her. And she was patient with me…..
We finished the race that day in about 33 minutes.  So around a 11 minute mile pace.  We trained starting in January.  It was touch at the beginning, but we finished the race and I was able to put that notch on my belt.

Fast forward to today.  I'm 5 years older.  I have 2 more kids.  I have less time.  I am out of shape.

There is no denying these statements.  They are what they are. And they seem to be bigger speed bumps in the process to returning to an "in-shape" self that I had 5 years ago.

My workout routine is spotty at best.  In 30 minutes I can cover about 2.25 miles now.  A little less if I'm pushing a baby in the stroller.  I'm not disappointed in that at all.  I'm not even that sad about my weight.  I'm frustrated by the lack of muscle tone.  And the only way to fix this is to be more consistent.  

I cannot for the life of me figure out how to manage consistency with my schedule.  The ever fluctuating, different everyday/every week, schedule that involves shuffling kids to school, me to work, home for naps, cooking dinner and so much more.  Life with one child is SO much less complicated you don't realize it until you add a second, then a third to the mix.  Love them to death and wouldn't trade what I'm doing right now for the world, BUT this puzzle cannot be that difficult to figure out.

I've hit the pavement twice this week.  With activities on Tuesday/Wednesday night (that I need to interact with people) I try and avoid getting outside.  There's just not enough time.  So, my schedule must be Sun/M/Th/Fr.  This sounds doable.  But then Brandon will be gone for a week - this is where consistency gets frustrating. And laziness sets in.

So for the next 3 weeks I will try and make myself get out on Sun/M/Th/F.  We are counting down to our next cruise.  I need to put on a bathing suit.  It's do or die time.

Catching Up.

Sometimes life gets so busy.  I think about all these cute and cleaver posts to put on my blog. My poor blog that sees no love.

I'm going to try and make it a point to write at least 1 time a week.  We'll go from there.  I think it's fun to look back on things, and in essence this is like a digital diary of my life.  It will be a fun reminder of how things were.

Today is St. Patrick's Day.  My kids are growing up so fast.  JJ is in 1st grade now and doing amazing. He passed the first tests to get into the gifted program at his elementary school for next year.  We'll be proud of him whatever the turn out is, but I love the fact he loves to learn.  Yesterday, I took him and MJ2 to our local park - we actually have a large National Military Park in our town.  We don't often get away without the middle MJ1, so it was nice for him and I to just talk about history and look at all the memorials while MJ2 took a car nap.  He's so smart.  But stubborn too.  He went to school today, the first day back after break, with his uniform on plus a green undershirt so he didn't get pinched.

MJ1.  Spunky girl just had her 4th birthday a little over a week ago.  She's growing so quickly.  We found out that she's made it into our public school pre-K for next year.  She's excited about being a bulldog!  She loves to learn too.  Very sweet, helpful, but also very opinionated.  She's outspoken, and once she feels comfortable, will rule the roost.  I hope she finds her light next year and shines.

MJ2.  Baby girl is 16 months now.  Growing like a weed up and out.  Girl has an appetite and keeps me on my toes.  She's starting to talk and understand when I ask questions.  Today when I picked her up at school she had on one sock.  I asked her where her sock was (I saw it was not with her shoes, so knew she had recently lost it).  She walked right over, leaned down, looked under a crib on the other side of the room and pointed.  Stinkin' smart.  Love she's becoming her own personality and starting to communicate and interact with us more.  It's so fun.  Cherishing every last second since she'll always be the baby.

So that's catching up on life.  I'm still teaching preschool and love it.  I have 15, absolutely adorable kiddos this year.  Smartest group yet.  They're insightful and remind me that when our minds are young our imagination and ability to dream big is still so vivid.  I hope they keep that alive as long as they possibly can.  I promise to report more tomorrow.  I have more things up my sleeve, but want to keep this one at a tolerable length.

Busy Life

I love my life.  I will start with that.

I have 3 awesome kids who make me proud to be a mom. They learn new things daily and amaze me at the amount of love I see in them.

I love my job.  I love teaching preschool - nothing makes me prouder than seeing 4 year olds "get it".  When things click in their brain - when they get the lightbulb turned out.  I love it.  I'm shocked to be saying this - but I love it more than teaching middle/high school kids.  It's exactly where I need to be.

I love our church.  I love the family we have there.  Our small group - I cannot tell you the difference this has made in our lives.  Tuesday nights make me happy because I know I'm going to spend time with a wonderful group of people (and our kids will too!).  I love serving in our worship ministry.  I love being a part of that amazing group of talented people.

I love bags.  Y'all knew that already.  :)

And most importantly I love my husband.  He is such an important part to making things work.  He is a piece of our crazy life puzzle that just doesn't work well without him!

Now - having said all that, I have to find some time in my days for me.  Not sure what part of the above needs to suffer, because it would be hard to choose from any of those to pull back on, but it needs to happen!

I have found a 5K I would like to do on December 7th.  It is September 7.  It is exactly 12 weeks away.  I am literally sitting on the couch right now.  So this will be a couch to 5K scenario.  I can do this.  I will do this.

So, if you see me out and about and have read this I hold YOU accountable for asking me how its going.  I am going to fill out the paperwork and send in my check this week to do this race.  I am committing financially.  Now I just need to commit my time and focus to this.

Here's to new and healthier beginnings.

Here we go again....

Here is my proclamation that I will start to blog again.  As I sit here, about to fall asleep at 2pm in the afternoon - I will blog more.  I can't hardly cook a meal, sweep the floor, or fold the clothes - but I WILL blog more.  Yea right.  Well, I will try.

So here's an update of what's going on....
JJ starts the big 1st grade Monday.  He's ready.  And so am I.
MJ#1 is starting pre-K3 a week from Monday.  She is super ready.  And so am I.
MJ#2 is 9 months old and is the sweetest, predictable baby I've had.  She will miss her mama come Monday when she goes to daycare (only half a day - but still).  And I will miss her so much too.

That's about it.  Trying to stay sane, not be too OCD about things, and keep speaking to my children with an inside voice.  Wish I could get a nap every once in a while.  But it seems with 3 no ones schedule lines up.

Here's our menu for the week:

Monday: Grilled Chicken, Potatoes, Green Beans
Tuesday: Slow Cooker Roast Sandwiches
Wednesday: Breakfast
Thursday: TBD
Friday: TBD
Saturday: TBD

See....I can't even plan a weeks worth of food.  Yes, I will have time for this.

MJ#1 Birth Story

I had a friend ask if I had birth story's for my kids....had never thought about it! I started with the most dynamic birth, MJ #1.  It's definitely an entertaining story.  I'm glad I got this down for when she gets older I can have her understand the misery she put me through! Haha :)

MJ #1’s birth story

March 8, 2010

I had been having some increasing contractions, but they were still very irregular.  I started to chart them to make sure I wasn’t missing anything.  With Jackson my water had broke so I knew that labor was starting.  I went to work that day and sat down most of the day in front of the overhead projector.  Nothing was out of the ordinary so I just kept writing them down and keeping track.

March 9, 2010

I went to school just like normal.  I was continuing to track my contractions throughout the day.  They weren’t terribly strong, but they were there.  Still irregular, with the shortest between them around 7 minutes.  I packed up my bags and remember looking at the clock as I was leaving – it was 3:32pm.  On my ride home I called the nurse on-call and asked when I should head to the hospital (my original due date was March 14^th).  She again told me what I knew, that they needed to be 5 minutes or less apart before I went.  Our home was 30 minutes from the hospital where I was to deliver, so I wanted to make sure I gave myself plenty of time.  I told her they were inconsistent and all over the place, so she said just wait until they get consistent and then head that way. 

I arrived at my house and went inside to see JJ and my mom (JJ was 3 at the time).  I had some presents from friends/family that had arrived that day in the mail.  As I opened the presents, my contractions started to intensify.  I started to write them down again – and at this point I decided that my husband (who worked about 15 minutes away at the local university) should start to make his way home.  By the time he would arrive we should be ready to start heading to Dover to the hospital.  Only problem was my mom had our car, so she had to go pick him up.  She loaded JJ up and started heading that way.

Once my mom left things really picked up steam.  I went and laid down on our bed to hopefully relax.  The contractions intensified more.  I started to feel light headed, so I got up and got a drink that had some sugar in it.  This is when I felt the urge to go to the bathroom.  I walked into the bathroom, sat on the toilet and had a BM.  The contractions were really strong at this point. My husband called to check on me – which I could barely talk.  He tried to get anything out of me – and I really could not say anything.  At this point, still on the toilet I felt like I needed to go to the bathroom again.  After about 10 seconds I realized, this was not a ‘go to the bathroom’ feeling.  This was a ‘need to push this baby out’ feeling.

I was still home alone – and at this point terrified.  Brandon was trying to still talk to me on the phone as he was making his way back from work.  I still was pretty much a mute because I was in so much pain, and also holding the baby in. He made the decision to get off the phone with me and call an ambulance.  He called me right now to let me know they were on the way.  Only problem was there was no way I was getting up to walk to our door to unlock it.  I was laying on my bed, two cats curling up next to me, just scared to death I was going to be alone in our apartment having our second child.  Brandon stayed on the phone with me the whole time just talking me through it.  It took about 10 or so more minutes before he finally made it to our house – still beating the paramedics.  When he got there he instantly went and found towels, scissors, and started to get water going to boil on the stove.  Yea – TERRIFIED.  Haha.

The paramedics got there, examined me and told me I was nowhere near having a baby.  I about ripped the guys head off.  My contractions were varying from 1 minute apart to as short as 20 seconds apart at this point.  Never regular.  They put me on the gurney and wheeled me to the ambulance.  Two awesome paramedics stayed in the back with me and talked to me the whole time we traveled 8 miles to the closest hospital (not the one I had planned to deliver at).  When they were timing them they were trying to make me laugh – they had just gone through OB training the day before and thought my call was a practice run.  So they knew exactly what to do. 

The ambulance driver blew through lights and got us to the hospital in about 10 minutes (mind you – this was all in the I-95 corridor of Delaware.  HEAVY traffic). 

When they pulled me into the L&D triage, the nurse listened to MJ #1’s heart to make sure all was good.  It had not occurred to me until this point that she could have been stressed.  Glad I didn’t worry until then!  She then checked me – and when she did I screamed.  The nurse’s face was priceless.  She quickly removed her gloves, threw up the sides of my bed and started yelling down the hall to the nurses station.  They were going to have to move fast because MJ #1 was ready to be born – probably on the next contraction.  She got at the head of the bed and Brandon was at my feet.  We pick up a nurse on the way to the elevator, just incase something happened while we were on our way to the delivery room.  We were literally sprinting as fast as you can with a hospital bed down the hallway.  We got in the elevator, made it out to the delivery floor and right when they pushed me into my delivery room a contraction was coming.  I was in the hospital and I was not waiting anymore!  I warned them, to which all the nurses started telling me to hold on because nothing was ready – they were still getting gloves on and there was no doctor there to deliver.  I wasn’t waiting though – the 1^st year resident literally walked in the room right when I started to push and caught MJ #1.  No lie – caught her.  And then the pain was gone.  MJ #1 was born at 5:14pm on March 9^th, 2010 – 39 weeks, 4 days, 6 pounds, 8 ounces, 19 inches long.  Girl had a schedule to keep! She was perfect – but the doctor told me that the next time, if there was one, that I needed to plan my delivery.  I delivered way too fast! There were no pictures in the delivery room - things happened so quickly we had nothing of her first hour.  

JJ and baby sister.  One of the first pictures of MJ #1.

Homemade Advent Calendar

I decided earlier in the fall that I wanted to make my own advent calendar this year.  Since Thanksgiving was on the 22nd this year, I knew I'd have a bit of time after the holiday to create my calendar.

I didn't do anything too complicated.  Here's what I used:

Christmas themed scrapbook paper
Red/green scrapbook paper
25 envelopes
Mini-clothes pin clips (found in the scrapbooking section of your craft store)
Twine
Wood dowel rods
Christmas lights

Obviously there is a lot of room for variation here.  The only thing we bought to complete this project was the dowel rods.  Everything else I had at the house.

The hardest part was coming up with the list of activities for my kids to do.  I wanted to make them really specific for them - stuff they'd enjoy.  Here are the activities they'll be doing everyday, starting with December 1st (which was Saturday):

Dec. 1: Attend the our local Christmas Parade of Lights
Dec. 2: Go see Santa on the KC Southern Train
Dec. 3: Paint Christmas ornaments
Dec. 4: Make grandparents a special Christmas card
Dec. 5: Make the official Santa letter
Dec. 6: Celebrate St. Nicholas day - read the story of St. Nicholas
Dec. 7: Family Game Night
Dec. 8: Go for yogurt after MJ #1's dance recital
Dec. 9: FaceTime grandparents and sing Christmas carols to them
Dec. 10: Make snowflakes out of paper and decorate the dining room with them
Dec. 11: Take your list and go see Santa!
Dec. 12: Write a Christmas card to a friend we won't see
Dec. 13: Build Santa's workshop in the foyer
Dec. 14: Make your teacher a Christmas card
Dec. 15: Family Christmas Movie Night
Dec. 16: Wear your Santa hat - ALL DAY
Dec. 17: Bake and decorate Christmas cookies
Dec. 18: Turn on Christmas music and have a dance party!
Dec. 19: Transform our hallway into the North Pole
Dec. 20: Read the Christmas story in the book of Luke from the Bible
Dec. 21: Drive to find Christmas lights (after they've had a bath in their Pj's!)
Dec. 22: Decorate a gingerbread house
Dec. 23: Watch the Polar Express and have a Movie Night in our Pj's
Dec. 24: Bake cookies for Santa and read Twas the Night Before Christmas
Dec. 25: Christmas!

Here's a picture of what our calendar looks like :)

Here's an up close of the envelopes

Here's how I clipped them to the 'tree'

The final product.  The kids have been super excited about it so far this season!  Yea me! :)

Christmas gifts

I have been working really hard on getting all my shopping done this week - for the kids and Brandon.  And my other big goal this year is to purchase 99% of the things online so I don't have to deal with the stores.

Brandon heard a little saying last year on KLOVE (an awesome radio station - if you don't know about it, google it.  It will change your life!):

Something you want
Something you need
Something to wear
Something to read

So I have adopted this little rhyme to help me purchase gifts for the kids (plus one from SN).  Honestly, buying presents for your kids can get crazy.  And overwhelming.  Because you want them to have cool stuff, but that ends up just breaking the bank. Here's what I have so far for the kids:

JJ:
Want - STUMPED (first two things on this child's list was an iPad and an iPhone - yea, not gonna happen)
Need - Checkers game with the floor mat (so the big checkers)
Wear - A new A&M 12th Man Jersey
Read - Two books on incredible fishing stories for us to read at bed time

Currently at around $85 for those 3 items.  

MJ #1:
Want - Her very own Disney Princess Magazine subscription (she gets so upset every time JJ gets a magazine in the mail.  He has subscriptions to 4 magazines.  Yes, 4. And he's only 6).
Need - the Leap Frog Jr. Tag Pen
Wear - a cool new pair of Keen sandles
Read - 3 books to accompany her Tag Pen

Around $100 for these 4 items.  Keen shoes were sort-of free.  They were purchased with a gift card that Keen gave us for some faulty shoes.

MJ #2:
Nothing for this girl yet - I mean, what does a 2 month old really need?  Diapers? Paci's? How cheesy would it be to wrap those up!?

And then there is the stockings.  I tried to get these between JJ and MJ#1 very similar because they are two little dramas if they do not get exactly what the other one got.  Here's where they're currently at:

JJ Stocking:
Lego Christmas Tree
$15 iTunes gift card
Stuffed Scooby Doo
Scooby Doo Wii Game
And probably some random candy

MJ#1 Stocking:
Snow White Lego Set
$15 iTunes gift card
Stuffed Phineas (because she LOVES her brothers - and there are quite a few fights over him)
Dora Wii Game
And random candy

MJ#2 Stocking:
Yep - nothing yet!  Probably some teething toys or something.  Poor kid. Haha. At least I have a stocking with her name on it hanging from the mantel!

So honestly, I'm not doing too shabby!  Sort of proud of myself. I have or have placed the order for everything listed above (except candy and iTunes cards).  So I feel like I'm ahead of the game.  I also like blogging about this so next year I can remember what I did for them.  Now if I can just remember to take pictures of the Christmas decorations I've put up so next year that won't be so difficult!!!