Vacation... kinda

Sorry I've been away! I went on a family vacation (without my family). I was invited to go with my best friend and some of her family on a camping weekend. It was a blast! I don't have any pictures though, sad face. I kept forgetting to take them and when I would remember we would be doing something way away from my camera.

My best friend's family, or at least the part that came with us, are major alcoholics. Which calls for a great time. They get up at 8am and open a beer and then drink until the crack of dawn. I tried to keep up but I just can't stay awake that long. I tried a couple times to outlast some people but every time I went to bed, around 2-3 am, there was still at least five other people completely awake.

I'm still finding bug bites on me, last I counted I had 13.

On another subject, I went from being awesome at sticking to my training schedule to not exercising at all. I knew that I was going on this vaca thing and wasn't going to run so I ran everyday last week (nearly). Then I got back and haven't ran at all! I know! I keep telling myself I'm going to but just can't talk myself into it. If my sister was here I would be all over it but trying to motivate myself is not working. I'm going to try for tonight and see what happens.

I also signed up for 2 races in the next couple months. First is the Milestone 10K. They actually made this race specifically for people training for the Savannah Rock N Roll. It is half way though "training" and they have the 10K and a half so whether you are training for the full or the half you have a nice little run to test your training out on.

Then I also signed up for this Gladiator Rock and Run thing.

One of my friends is getting together a team and I decided to join. I did a Muddy Buddy earlier this year and thought it was fun so I figured I would give this a shot. I'm excited and can't wait for all the runninf packed fun I'm going to have!

oh, and I just realized that today is my year anniversary for getting out of the Navy!

New Shoes?

I've been seriously considering going to get my gait checked out. I've never really been a firm believer in needing this done because when I first started running I thought that I wasn't a serious enough runner to do it. Than after running my first half I decided that I had no issues with the shoes I have so obviously it is pointless cause I did fine in my none gait oriented shoes. Lately however I've been having some issues. Mainly blisters. The shoes I've been using are relatively new (as in less than 6 months) so I don't know why I would be getting blisters in them now. It is about time I start considering myself a runner.

I saw this in a postsecret I was looking through and it made me kinda sad.

Running a marathon is no joke (I wouldn't do it). It made me feel bad because doing something like that is amazing. Only 1% of people ever run a marathon and to be so upset about the way you look that you don't wanna share the joy of accomplishing it with people you know is saddening. I really hope that whoever wrote this is in a better place now and can share the story without feeling like people will judge them.

Plank you very much

I was supposed to get up Saturday morning and go running with my American Cancer Society group but, I slept through my alarm.  So I got up this morning (later than I wanted to because again, I slept through my alarm). I made it out to Lake Mayer anyways and started on my what was supposed to be 4 mile run. I don't know what was wrong but I was just not feeling it today. I ended up quitting before I even hit the 1.5 mile mark. I was kinda mad about it so convinced myself to finish 1.5 miles and as soon as I got that went on to convince myself to just go a head and do 2 miles. The last half a mile was not going well. I felt like I was running around 9:30 min/mile but according to my handy dandy Garmin was only going 10:40 min/mile. Which was disappointing because I normally run around 10:20 and I felt like I was going to die doing the 10:40. Oh well, not everyday can be an awesome run. I got out there and tried and that's all that matters. 

On to the important stuff... I bought this the other day...

If you haven't seen it I would recommend it. I'm a huge JenAn fan. It wasn't as funny as 21 Jump Street (if you haven't seen that one, rent it while you're at it), but it was still pretty funny. 

I also started reading this.

I like the movie so I thought I would give the book a try. I know, this is going to sound dumb but I'm going to say it anyways... I think I like the book better than the movie. Yup, I pointed out the obvious. You are welcome. The character Marcus is a lot more likable in the book, which I think makes the story more interesting. 

Back on to the good stuff aka my awesome workout routine. I was this article online the other day about a 6-week plank challenge. I thought, "hey I need to work on my core, I'm going to try it". So Starting today I'm going to be letting y'all into my awesome planking life (sorry Tebow fans, I don't think that counts as exercise). I changed up the rules a little because I didn't quit like what they had going but it's still the same concept. I started by holding a plank as long as I could. This is what I got.

I'm going to be doing 3 sets of planks everyday slowly increasing the seconds I hold until the end of the 6 weeks. At the end I'm going to hold a plank as long as I can and see if my time goes up at all. I'm hoping to get up to 2 minutes. That's my goal. Hopefully along with the extra seconds I'll also have a nicer stomach. I'll post some pictures later on of my abs fat so y'all can see the progress I make. 

Anyone ever try anything like this before? If so, how did it go?

Wish me luck!

Tin Man

Since walking for 8+ hours on Sunday I had decided to take Monday off from running to recover. When Tuesday rolled around however I still wasn't feeling the love from my feet. Yesterday though, I told myself that I would at least try.

It's weird how much you can miss running.

I went out planning on running around 3 miles but quit after 2. My legs were still tight from all the walking I did. When I normally start out running my legs feel a little stiff but loosen up after a minute or two.  Yesterday though, they did not. The whole time I was running I felt like I needed some WD-40 to get everything working properly. 

I plan on running 3 miles today and hopefully since yesterday my legs have decided that they are going to join me for the run.

 On another subject, I was crusing around pintrest and found this awesome reciepe.

Egg Muffins

I was so excited about it that I went right out to Kroger and got all the ingredients and went to work.  They were super easy to make and come out looking really cute. I wouldn't say they taste amazing or anything. They just taste like egg. But they are pretty handy because you can make a bunch at once and than put the rest in the fridge for later. I was a little iffy about this cause I'm kinda picky about what I reheat, but this morning I tried em out for my self and they tasted the same as they did when I made em. 

Give it a try! If you like egg you won't be disappointed!

Walking a Marathon

Thursday I went to Barnes and Noble, which if you know me can get pretty serious. I normally go there for one or two books and end up leaving having spent $100 plus after 5 hours of being there. Well, it happened again. I did impress myself a little though. I put back like 3 books. Go me! When I buy books that have sequels  I try and buy the whole series that way I don't have to worry about going to get the next book when I finish and it not being there. I convinced myself otherwise. I still bought WAY to many books.

I did do a good job of getting a variety. I've been reading tons of good things about Born To Run so I thought I would try it out. My roommate and I were watching Something Borrowed the other day and I thought that the movie was pretty sad and figured the book would be even sadder so decided to torture myself by buying it. Sometimes a good cry over a book is completely necessary. The others were pretty random buys. I just walked around and read a bunch and decided on the others.

Right now I'm reading The Guardian by Nicholas Sparks. I'm about half way through with it and I like it. It hasn't gotten sad or anything yet but the story is interesting enough to keep me wanting to read more. I heard that it was one of his better books. I'll let ya know what I think when I finish. 

Yesterday I was trying to raise money for the American Cancer Society by walking around the park that I run at from sun up to sun down. I got out there at 6:30am and was not doing to hot on getting donations. Most people would wish me luck but not donate. I had an awesome sign that I wore so people would know what I was doing. 

I kept a tally of my laps so people would have an idea plus I had my handy dandy garmin with me. I knew he wasn't going to last that long though, that's another reason why I kept track of my laps, so when he died I would still know about how far I had gone. 

I didn't make it much further than that. I think I did one more lap after this gave out. I had some blisters on my feet and they were causing me to walk funny which made my ankle hurt. I tried to hobble though and actually get to 26 miles but I can up short at 24. I decided that injuring myself and not being able to run would be stupid just to walk a marathon. 

My ankle still hurts but I've been icing it and I don't plan on running on it till it feels better. Hopefully it'll feel fine tomorrow. I don't see how I could've seriously hurt it by just walking. But I guess we'll find out later! 

Did you do anything fun this weekend? Ever wanted to walk a marathon? I wouldn't suggest it.

Kick to the face!

I wish I had an awesome July 4th story to tell but... my life is boring. Where I live there are always TONS MILLIONS a handful of people here for the holidays. I guess Tybee Island is popular or something? News to me. I went down to the beach last year to watch the fireworks but it took us 4 hours to get home. If you have never been to Tybee, there in a 2 lane bridge going on and off the island. So, when holidays come around and everyone wants to go to the beach the road backs up pretty bad. We (my roommates and me) didn't want to put up with that this year so we skipped out on the awesomeness.

My sister and me did go out to the beach the next morning though to help with the beach clean up. It wasn't nearly as dirty as I thought it was going to be. We cleaned it up for a bit and then decided that we were going to go for a nice run along the beach. 

It was sunny so I don't know why it looks overcast in my picture... weird.

The last couple times I've ran I noticed that my calves are not playing nice. That being said, I can up with a sort of solution.

Compression!

I've worn them 2 night in a row and I feel like that are helping. The last time I went to run it took half the time for my calves to join me on my run skip around the park.

The other day after my sister and I finished our run and were getting in the car I noticed this huge slightly smaller than huge spider on the roof of my car. I HATE spiders.

So, I see this spider on the roof of my car and panic. Mainly because I don't want to get bitten and end up like Peter Parker but also because I have an old convertible and I know that the spider can run right under roof and be IN the car. I'm looking around trying to find something to kill this horrible being and there is nothing. The spider starts to run toward the safe haven that is inside my car and I can only do one thing at that point... show that bitch who's boss! I lifted my leg and smashed him with my super awesome kick to his face. My sister watched this whole thing unfold and all she could say afterwards was "I've never seen you kick that high before." yup, what can I say, when my life is in danger, anything can happen.

Did anyone do anything entertaining for the 4th?

Mid Year Resolutions

Geez, I've been meaning to get on here and update but for some reason I just feel like I don't have anytime. But don't worry! With it being the middle of the year, we have Mid Year Resolutions to think about! YAY! I don't actually do this, I just thought that it is half way through the year and people who do make resolutions should be checkin themselves to keep on track. I am not one of those people. Not that I'm better than anyone else but I do know me and I know that making one isn't going to make me try harder to accomplish anything. With that being said... my MYR are as follows:

1. Finish watching the office. I'm on season 5 and think I have a great shot at finishing it this year.

2. Run a half marathon. Half way there... I signed up to run the Rock 'n Roll Savannah half with the American Cancer Society in memory of my Great Aunt Frances. I'm trying to raise money for cancer research so yall should stop by my page and give a little love (aka money).

My American Cancer Society Donation Page

3.  Ride my bike more.

4. Finish the Fifty Shades series. I have about 200 pages left on the last book. Go me!

Man, I know what yall are thinking, this list is crazy hard easy. Yea, that's the point. Why would you make a goal that might not happen. I say, if you are going to make goals, make sure you can accomplish them. Your life will be less depressing if ya do.

Do you have any NYR's that your getting close to finishing?

Good luck to everyone with your resolutions! I'll try and keep ya'll up to date with how mine are going.