5K on St. Patty's Day

Dan and I rand our first 5K together a couple of week's ago! It was so much fun. As you can tell from all of the green, it was a St. Patrick's Day weekend race. Can you see us in the picture below?!

This was a really fun race downtown and it was actually a 5K, unlike my Turkey Trot experience, which made it even better :)

Besides actually being the length that the race said it was going to be, my run was so different from my first Turkey Trot. Mostly because I have been working really hard on running consistently lately. But also because I was able to use my Garmin throughout the race which really helped me to control my pace and not get caught up in what everyone else was doing. 

I went into the race wanting to run it in sub 29 minutes, but running with a lot of people can be pretty motivating, and I was able to blow past that time and finish in 27:38, which is a 8:54 avg pace!! I felt pretty exhausted at the end of it, but was really proud of myself overall for doing better than expected! I ended up placing 45 out of 222 in my age group and 222 out of 1,241 for all female competitors!

Even though I am not running races to place or have the fastest time, I do love seeing improvement in myself overall. Looking back at my Turkey Trot run, I remember having to walk at times and I finished with a 10:26 pace. It's awesome to know that all of my training is actually paying off in a tangible way :)

Dan also did well for not training at all. He finished in 28:14 which is a 9:06 average page, coming in 506 out of 937 male competitors and 69 out of 111 in his age group. For not training one bit, that is pretty awesome. Even though he did well, it has taken a bit of work to get him to agree to sign up for another race. But I think I'm pretty close to getting him to sign up to run the Bolder Boulder 10K with my over Memorial Day weekend. I'll keep you posted :)

While Charlie didn't attend, he did stay in the St. Patrick's Day spirit.

I was on such a roll!

I can't believe I haven't posted on here since January 24th! I was doing so well for the year up until then, but now I am back! Whenever I stop blogging for a while I always find that I miss it. It helps me to keep tabs on what is going on in my life and it's even more fun to look back on older posts to see how things have changed.

Plus, what else am I supposed to do with the bajillion photos that I take each year? :)

I'm blaming this hiatus on my new running hobby. Or more specifically, my 1/2 marathon training plan that kicked off at the end of January. I'm pretty new to this whole running thing, so it was a huge awakening to see all of the hard work that it actually takes to get into running shape.

Besides my training, I got promoted at work, went to Breck, ran a 5K with Dan, joined a running club, went on Spring Break to San Diego with D, and generally just started to get way more into health and fitness. Also Dan started doing yoga and loves it now! It is pretty much one of my favorite things to do with him at the moment.

It has been a busy two months, but I hope to start posting more regularly now that I am a bit more used to this whole health and fitness no matter what else is going on mentality :)

Kombucha

 Have you tried it?

I am in the midst of a love/hate relationship with it right now. It's essentially a fermented Chinese tea, that I have been hearing more and more about. It contains probiotics, enzymes, polyphenols and organic acids that are supposed to promote health, well-being and balance in your body.

Their are a ton of different varieties and brands out there, but right now I have been trying different flavors in GT's Kombucha brand. A few things to note if you've never tried it but are thinking about it:

1. There is stuff floating in your drink. It looks gross, but it's actually the live culture that all of the healthy ingredients from the drink came from. I've found that if you don't think about it, you don't even realize when you've swallowed it.
2. The flavors I have tried so far have all been carbonated. Perhaps this is not really a surprise to anyone, but it was to me.
3. It has a slight smell and taste of vinegar. Nothing that strong, but it's definitely noticeable. I tend to like the flavors that have some juice in them to balance out that taste.
4. So far my favorite flavors have been the Gingerberry above and Strawberry Serenity.

I'm not sold on the health benefits yet, but I do think that it acts as a bit of an appetite suppressor and it keeps me from overdosing on caffeine from afternoon lattes :)


POST EDIT: One more thing to note. On each bottle, there is a little blurb that says, "DO NOT SHAKE". They mean it. I accidentally did this morning and I still can't open the bottle yet without Kombucha spilling everywhere!

The view from my front step when I woke up this morning...

Sure it's not the best mountain view money can buy but it's still so pretty. Also, note the moon! I think that means that I was up early, which for me is quite a feat!

Happy Friday!

Back at it

This weekend I got back into running again. It's the first time I've run since the end of 2010 and it felt really good to test out my new running gear from Christmas, which I'll cover off on in another post. I did a quick run with Charlie on Saturday, which was rough. But my run with him today was the best because Dan came along! We had never run together before and it was fun. I'm not sure that Dan would characterize it the same way, but with a regular running habit, I think he might.

My training plan for the half marathon kicks off the week of 1/31 and it has me running 11 miles the first week. Since I have not been running any, it's time to get my butt in gear.

2011 - 315 N. Goals

Last week I posted a list recapping all of the projects we were able to complete at the house in 2010. Here's a look at all of the things I'm hoping we can accomplish in 2011.

1. Paint our fence... (I referred to it's current state in this post, and it has not changed much since)
2. Hire a tree trimmer to take care of some tree branches outside of our expertise
3. Hire an electrician to remove some old knob & tube wiring that's still in our attic
4. Have insulation added to the attic roof
5. Remove wallpaper from the 2nd bedroom and paint
6. Have the remaining carpet removed downstairs and refinish all of the wood floors
7. Paint trim in dining room
8. Touch up paint in our bedroom and the sunroom
9. Paint wall under the stairs
10. Have front porch steps fixed and apply stone veneer
11. Remove rotting wood under front porch and replace with lattice
12. Install shelves in the downstairs linen closet
13. Pick out new paint colors for house exterior and paint
14. Have quote done for kitchen renovation in 2012

It's a lot, so even if we just get half of this list done I'll be happy. With a house as old as ours, I'm surprised I could keep this list to only 14 items!

Public Service Request

Dear News 1st 5,

I find the promo spot that you have been running for the past few months that announces that you now read obituaries during your morning newscasts weird and disturbing.

I know you may be lacking in the ratings, but really, obits? That's what you think is going to get people to tune in? I can understand that you want people to know about new station offerings, but seriously... obituaries month after month. It's just strange now.

I've already banned the local news (don't worry, all local stations, not just yours) from our home to avoid awkward newscasts and surprisingly frequent technical difficulties. Don't bring the awfulness into the commercial break too.

Seriously.

Stop.

Much appreciated,
A local promo spot viewer