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May 15, 2008
Little Miss's New Ride
On Tuesday, I got a call from REI that my BOB was in, 2 days early. I also got an e-mail notification, but it was only for the stroller and not the handlebar console I'd also ordered. I decided to take a chance and drive the hour to pick it up yesterday. I lucked out and they were unloading the console when I arrived. The BOB box was pretty huge:
REI had offered to assemble it, but I opted to do it myself. I only had two spots where I had trouble with the instructions, but I figured it out in the end. I decided to take Katie out for a test walk last night, and thought I'd be nice and take Molly, too. Unfortunately for Molly, she got left behind - the BOB is much lighter than our normal stroller, and Molly yanking on the leash threw me enough off balance that I almost tipped the stroller over. Katie tolerated the short walk, so I decided we were a "GO" for a run today.
She looked a little confused when I strapped her in this morning.
I expected that pushing a 21 pound stroller with an almost 12 pound baby would slow me down a lot, but I was able to run about the same pace as I've been running. Not to be too big of a nerd, but I felt kind of "tough" running around with a stroller, especially when I had to run up hill. I stopped to peek in at Katie a couple of times; it seems she stayed awake for the first mile and then decided to snooze. I had thought beforehand that I'd be lucky to get in 3 miles, since I didn't know how well Katie would tolerate running and how I would deal with pushing the stroller. We ended up running 4 since she was doing okay and I was having fun. Next time, I'll bring a water bottle and it'll be even better.
9:03
9:08 | 18:11
9:16 | 27:28
9:28 | 36:56
------------------------
4.04 miles | 37:15 | 9:13/mi.
walk CD | 0.21 miles | 3:22
I'm not sure how well she liked running with me, but she didn't hate it at least.
We had her 2 month appointment today and I had her get two vaccinations. (She was supposed to get 5, but we're going to space them out). The first one wasn't so bad because it was a liquid. But the second one was a shot and she didn't like that one bit! She got bright red and cried, it was sad. But after nursing, she decided she was okay and conked out. The pediatrician said Katie's doing great. She's 11lb 9oz now, which is 70th percentile - she was only 48th percentile at birth. She might be a shorty like me, though, since she's only 22.4" (54th percentile).
May 12, 2008
How to Hug a Baby
My boss sent this to me and I thought it was funny:
HOW TO HUG A BABY
--Instructions for properly hugging a baby.
1. First, spy a baby.
2. Second, be sure that the object you spied was indeed a baby by employing classic sniffing techniques. If you smell baby powder and the wonderful aroma of wet diapers this is indeed a baby.
3. Next you need to flatten the baby before actually beginning the hugging process.
*Note: The added slobber should help in future steps by making the 'paw slide' easier.
4. The 'paw slide'
Simply slide paws around baby and prepare for possible close-up.
5. Finally, if a camera is present, you will need to execute the difficult and patented 'hug, smile, and lean' so as to achieve the best photo quality.
Dogs, if this is done properly, will secure you with a warm, dry, climate-controlled environment for the rest of your life.
If you don't pass this along, a dog will come out and pee on your computer!
I guess you didn't send it fast enough!
May 11, 2008
Happy Mother's Day
I celebrated my first Mother's Day by being a big ol' slacker. Little Miss and I slept past 9, and by the time I'd fed her and was ready to run it was almost 11:30. While it was sunny, it was chilly and windy (almost 40 MPH gusts) so I was going to treadmill. But I really didn't feel like getting back on the treadmill, and I did feel pretty tired running yesterday so I decided to take a day off. I can run tomorrow. I was thinking I needed a cut back week anyway.
Yesterday I ran 6 miles, for the first time since Jan 12 when I was 32 weeks pregnant. While I was feeling kind of tired, it was a lot more enjoyable than last time. Yesterday I ran 6.01 in 57 minutes (9:29/mi), almost 4 months ago it took 70:23 to run 6.03 (11:40). The weather was a lot better yesterday, too!
Since I last posted, we were notified that a daycare space has opened up for Katie next month so I will be going back to work in 4 weeks. I'm still not 100% confident in that decision, but I want to give it a try and see if we can make it work. I think it will be really good for both Katie and me to interact with people our age.
I'm trying to decide when to go and get my BOB. Since I have to drive 80 miles to get it, it would probably be easiest to go on a day I don't run so that we can get on the road earlier. It's supposed to come in on Thursday, but Katie's 2 month peds appointment is that afternoon. (She's due for her first shots, so it won't be a super fun appointment). In theory, I could probably get up to REI and back before the appointment, but we would have to get out the door pretty quickly in the morning. So maybe Friday, and then we could test it out with a walk and maybe try running on Saturday.
Katie's getting really good at lifting her head up. We did some tummy time earlier, and she held it up for a pretty long time. I took pictures, but my laptop is still stupid and won't read the SD card. The Engineer wants to reinstall Vista, which would probably fix that issue and that it also won't read CDs, but backing everything up is such a pain.
May 7, 2008
New gear coming soon ...
I bit the bullet and next week I'll be the owner of this:
REI has BOB's 20% off, so I ordered myself the Ironman stroller. I went through ebates.com for a 3% cashback, and I'm going to pick the stroller up at the store to avoid shipping charges. I had hoped I might be able to get it this weekend, but I've been given a tentative 5/15 pick-up. It'll be nice to do something other than treadmill during the week; I hope Little Miss tolerates it.
When I posted pictures the other day, I forgot to post and write about my belly/weight progress. As of last week's weigh-in, I have 2 pounds of pregnancy weight left to lose. Then I'll just need to lose about 12 to get to racing weight - but I should be approaching 25 mpw by the end of this month and that seems to be around what I need to be running for my weight to drop back into the teens. Of course, it might not be that simple but I prefer to look on the bright side of things. I haven't had to work particularly hard to lose what I've already lost, after all.
So here's a composite showing my 2 week PP (postpartum) belly versus my 7 week PP belly. It's getting better, although I swear it looks less round in person. The jelly belly is tightening up, although what's really weird is that I seem puffier/more jell-o like above my belly button instead of below, which is my usual problem area.
Still have work to be done, though - here's what I looked like at 4 weeks pregnant:
What's funny (to me) is that because of the weight I gained trying to get pregnant, I was so unhappy with the state of my body then but now I think it looked pretty good. Something that surprises me about my post-pregnant body is that I'm not really that bothered by the jiggly belly or that I'm not yet wearing my pre-pregnancy pants. While pre-pregnant me would probably by unhappy by the state of things, I'm overall pretty pleased by what I see. How can I not be proud of a body that grew another human being?
Doesn't mean I don't want to get back to looking more like this (taken the morning of the '06 Chicago Marathon while watching the weather reports), though:
May 5, 2008
Sunny Days
We might finally be getting some spring weather here! Saturday was crappy, but Sunday turned out to be a really nice day and today it got up to 70! I went outside to run yesterday, and other than the wind it was a pretty good run:
58-62 degrees | From SW at 22 mph gusting to 28-30 mph
1 | 9:04
2 | 8:51 | 17:56
3 | 9:05 | 27:01
4 | 9:25 | 36:27
5 | 9:08 | 45:36
--------------------
5.05 miles | 46:00 | 9:07/mi.
walk CD | 0.31 miles | 4:55
Mile 4 was pretty windy so that sucked, but the other miles weren't so bad. It's encouraging to be running closer to 9 min miles again. I ended the week at 19.5 miles; I think I'm going to continue working my mileage up to 25 mpw this month and then next month start adding in some strides and tempos or something. I had hoped to maybe be able to run this month's half-marathon but that's not possible. I'm not sure when I'll be racing next - the track club website seems to be down about 90% of the time lately and it's the only accurate local race calendar. I'm not sure I'll be brave enough to run the All Comers Mile next month, but I do know I'll at least be racing in July with the Women's Race (4 miles) and I will probably shoot for the half-marathon in August.
I realized it's probably better for me not to be committed to a fall marathon this year anyway. Little Miss is an EBF baby (exclusively breastfed) and I have a goal of not introducing solids to her until she is at least 6 months - which would be September. I'm not sure how my supply is going to be affecting by returning to work, and something tells me adding marathon training into the mix might be a bad idea. It's very important to me that we make it to the AAP-recommended 1 year and that has to take precedence over my running goals. I'm hoping I will be able to mix the two, but I need to do so without having committed money to a race looming over me.
Her bib says "Insomnia - One who is unable to sleep through the night"
It is so hard to get a picture when she's making happy faces
The Engineer calls this one "Little Miss hates Vista, too"
May 1, 2008
Decisions
I'm getting back on track with running, although it's a little more challenging to get my runs in during the week. On the weekends, Little Miss can hang out with the Engineer, but unless I want to wait for him to come home from work I have to try and fit my runs during the week in while she naps. I got in almost 18 miles last week, and am hoping to run 18-19 this week, hopefully with a 5 mile "long run."
I'm trying to decide if I want to buy a jogging stroller. I took Little Miss up to the Twin Cities on Monday (an 8 hour trip! Most of our jaunts around town are no longer than 90 minutes) and got to test out the BOB Revolution and the BOB Ironman at REI. (Because as is per usual, I cannot look at something I want here in town, I have to drive 70+ miles). I really wanted to look at the Baby Jogger, but REI only had a bike trailer and USA Baby only had the City Mini model, which isn't really a running stroller. The big debate with choosing a stroller is whether to get a fixed wheel or a swivel wheel. You need a fixed front wheel for actual running, but people like the Revolution because you can lock the swivel when you run but then have the flexibility of the swivel for taking it on walks or around town. (On a side note, I really hate trying to find information on running strollers online - something like 95% of the reviews are people talking about taking them to the mall, the grocery store or the park. It's a running stroller, I want to hear about how it works for running!) Testing the strollers out, I was able to determine that the fixed wheel wasn't so bad, and since I might not always be on perfectly flat pavement (and again, I want to run with the stupid thing, I have a stroller for the mall/walking), I think that's the route I need to go. So I'd probably go with the Ironman, even though I HATE that it has the IM logo since I will never ever be an Ironman and I know people get funny about non-Ironman people with IM-branded stuff, because it's less expensive than the Baby Jogger and I know of coupon codes to get it even cheaper. BUT it's still going to be around $300 and that's a lot of money - especially since I don't even know how often I'll want to use it. I don't see myself wanting to run with it on weekends when Little Miss can have "Daddy time" and that's when I'd be racing or doing long runs anyway (non-stroller runs, in other words). It'd be great to have now to run in the mornings with Little Miss while we are having semi-decent weather (although I have at least a few weeks before she can go in the stroller for runs). But if I'm back at work, I'm not sure when I'll get in my runs and if they'd be during times that I could take Little Miss along. If I'm going to spend $300 on something, it needs to be something that will get a lot of use. So I have to figure this out.
Little Miss and I toured a day care center yesterday and got put on the wait list for next month. I still have 5 weeks of maternity leave left, and am conflicted about going back to work. On the one hand, I like my job and co-workers and miss interacting with other adults. I think I would miss contributing financially, even if most of my salary would go to day care. I think it'd be good for Little Miss to spend time with other kids and adults. But on the other hand, the Engineer has been back at work since she was 2 weeks and he has said he feels like he barely sees her during the week. Part of that is he works longer hours than me, but that's when I start trying to figure out when I'd see her and how I'll fit running in. If I were to get up early (like 4 or 5) I could run before work, and then I'd have 4:15-bedtime with her. But I don't want to go to bed at 8, and I'm not sure if there'd be enough time in the morning to get in a mid-distance run, shower/dress, feed Little Miss and get her dressed. But that's probably the option I'd have to go with, since if I run after work I wouldn't pick her up until 5 or 6 and then we'd only have an hour or two before bedtime. (Sometimes I'd be able to take her with me in the stroller if we get one, but July-September, it'd be way too hot, and June is a little questionable for weather).
Twin Cities was 75% full as of Monday. I kind of want to run it, but I'm not feeling able to commit to a marathon at the moment. Especially not one that costs close to $100 and that I've already been burned on twice. I think an 18 week training program would start the beginning of next month, and I won't be ready to start Pfitz and don't want to do Higdon. I could do Pfitz's 12 week program to buy myself some time, though. Or I could try to modify Higdon's plan. But without knowing how going back to work and all that is going to work, its hard to predict how I'd be able to add in marathon training. So I think TCM is out and I'll have to settle for just spectating. It looks like Des Moines, which is 2 weeks later than TCM, allows for race weekend registration so that could be an option. Logistically, the Lakefront Marathon in Milwaukee would be a lot easier than Des Moines, but it's the same day as TCM and it's approaching 50% full already.