Struggles of a working mom marathoner

I was due for a 14 miler this Sunday.... then, last minute, my hubby decided we needed to go to the beach one last time before we settled into fall. I got up super early the day we were to drive to the beach, went to the gym and did arms and abs.....



       Because we decided last minute ad I could not get a dog sitter we had to take our dog with us. I found a dog-friendly hotel and we were all set. Look at his yummy little face. 

                           Knowing we would probably be eating crap the whole vacation I gathered some veggies to make juice.   


                 I absolutely adore Rehoboth Beach. First, it's the location to my favorite marathon, the Rehoboth Beach Marathon in the early winter every year. In fact, I already have a room reserved at my favorite hotel for this year's marathon.... My hubby has not yet decided if he's running his first half at Rehoboth this year....if not, I will run the full. When you have kids only one parent can run a race at a time.... the other watches the kids. 


Shoot!! this picture is just gorgeous....and it also makes me so sad....my kids are growing so fast!!


My sweet guy.... nowhere exists a man more gentle and sweet. 

         Rehoboth at night on a Holiday is super fun. This is around 9pm Sunday. I knew fairly early on that I would not be getting my long run in during this vacation. 


The hotel offers free breakfast. Here is my son making himself one of those amazing waffles....The picture after is of him AFTER the waffle.....hi.la.ri.ous. 

My daughter trying to convince me to buy her another sweatshirt she does not need..... nope, we did not buy this one. 

The Local bookstore had this book.....for all you Walking Dead fans...

Came back home to find my watermelon plant had grown quite fast. Now it's the size of a lemon....


So when is this run going to happen? Ready? It's going to take me 4 hours at the gym..... I will go before work tomorrow and need to be done by 6am to get my kids' and my lunch ready for the day. If I get all this done tonight, including my coffee brewing BEFORE going to bed I may be able to get in another half an hour of sleep. So I will be running from 2:20am-6:20am! Don't worry, when we got home from the beach today I took an obligatory 2-hour nap and been resting in bed all afternoon, as well as hydrating with only water. Running at the gym is as boring as runs go....therefore, I have also been charging my iPad so that I can watch a few movies while I get this run in. Wish me luck!!

Celebrating 4 years of no antibiotics, no strep throat and no flu or flu shots.

          While making my juice today I came to the realization that this is the 4th year I have been juicing vegetables and fruits. I am celebrating four years in which I did not get plagued with my twice-a-year illness of strep throat chased by strong antibiotics. Four years of not getting the flu or even needing a flu shot. I have to confess though, I have never had the flu shot, neither has my hubby or my kids...ever! I strongly believe that although my kids do not drink the juice as often as my hubby and me, they still reap the benefits from our juicing. I can only credit that to them benefitting from perhaps a raised family-wide immunity that stems from our our juicing.  I now juice about twice a week and generally make my juice from apples, carrots, ginger, celery and beets. Here is a pic of my mom's Breville juicer. To make a giant pitcher I used 2 cored apples, 2 lbs. of carrots, a thumb-sized piece of ginger, 2 medium beets and 1 lbs. of celery. I took pictures of everyone in the house at the time drinking it. I had two 8oz. glasses. When home we too have our own Breville juicer. 

Tastes best with some ice!!

Totally enjoying my juice!!

My beautiful mami drinking her glass of juice.

My son tasting it.....when he was a toddler he'd drink tons of it. He's become a bit more picky with age. 

              My daughter drinking her juice....she will have a glass usually IF she helps make it. 

Build Your Best Body- entry 10

I took my Franken-sneakers out for my first run, a total of 4 hard non-stop miles and it did great. I even PR'ed for the mile and the 5k for this year.........I need to strengthen a few stitches on the sides, but otherwise, the sneakers worked out beautifully. 

A PR smile!!......I guess it helped that I ran a flat-ish course and did not have any street crossing to stop at or a dog to drag around. 

I made juice of course.....slowly running out of supplies. We have not driven anywhere since Friday due to the storm....maybe tomorrow I will get the nerve and drive to the veggie store 3 miles away.....but for now we have enough left for maybe one day's worth of juice. I make about 50 ounces of veggie/fruit juice daily and my hubby and I share it evenly. If I don't make it he will pick up the ask. 

Making curry chicken dinner with steamed rice, I can smell it simmering as I type.... Dinnertime in 15 minutes. 

Oh, and of course....red wine to celebrate my PR......LOL. 

Snowcation

Today I ran 4 miles and walked an additional 2.6 miles. 

Here are kids sledding in my neighborhood. In walking a few blocks this morning to go peel my son from this fun, fun place made me realize I could run in this!! yes!! All I needed was my Yak Trax. Not one fall, not one slip while running in these. So far in two days I've logged 8 miles in these,  and I've had them for 3 winters now, so they hold up fine. Want to feel invincible? buy one of these and run in them. 

            After 4 miles of running in the snow I got back home pumped! My daughter had wanted to go walking to the supermarket (1.3 miles away). We geared up, grabbing reflectors and a flashlight and walked. This was the gorgeous sunset we saw on the way there. We walked back in the dark. I am a huge believe in reflective wear and flashlights now...I am pretty sure my life has been made tons safer by just wearing them. My daughter thought the reflective vest looked like I was wearing a bra over my jacket. "Safety over fashion", I told her.

Amphipod Xinglet Reflective Wear

It was getting dark....but after my 4 miles, Mamacita and I walked to the market and back, a total of 2.6 miles. She was a real trooper. 

Got back home and made the family some Seared Lemon Shrimp. 

We had to make a triple batch of Amy's Carrot Cake Oatmeal Cookies, they go pretty fast. Here is the online link to the blog that has the recipe. Granted mine have a "rough" look to them, probably because I had to substitute some items seeing as I could not go out and get them in the storm. But the cookies are delicious. Thank you Amy's Heathy Baking Blog at http://amyshealthybaking.com 

Looks like the snowcation will continue.....

Build Your Best Body- entry 9

We are ready for the 'storm of the century'. Yes, That is guava you see....I have some great news...I'm 5.8 lbs down since I started my 'primarily plant-based eating plan. 

Went to Target and this was the bread aisle. I then went to Safeway supermarket and just had to laugh at their inflated fruit prices....Thank goodness for the new Korean supermarket in my town. I can buy $50 worth of veggies and fruits for only about $30. 

I ran 4.10 miles in the blizzard....proud to say I was the only runner out there. The fast growing snow did a number on my butt muscles...I had to literally kick forward with each new step to clear the snow before me for the last 2 miles. 

Thank you Yak Trax. Not one slip, not one fall....

Build Your Best Body - entry 8

 

A big storm is approaching and we have school off again tomorrow....went to buy some essentials...LOL. No seriously.... as health conscious as I want to be, we all need some wine every once in a while.

          Nora told me she was not feeling too hot and was coughing a bit. She surprised me by asking me for a juice. So you see! she has been listening to me blab on about the benefits of juicing....She told me she did not want all the normal things I usually put in mine, instead, she wanted a simple carrot-apple juice. That's it....carrots and apples.

 

Here is her juice, it's probably about 14 ounces...she drank it all up after dinner.

 

Now time to make my juice for the night!!

Build Your Best Body -Entry 7

 

Ready for juicing this morning.....I see bock choi, ginger, apple, lemon, carrots.... 

I missed a few days of posting so from now on I am calling each post an "entry" and not list them as if they are consecutive days. 

Best thing that happened today was that  ran for 5 miles on a new route while Nora was at her gymnastics class. I was perfectly bundled for the run and it felt great. I even had a PR on the fastest mile for this year, or so my Garmin tells me.

 

This is how I pack mangoes to take to work with me....no matter what it's not a pretty sight to see me eat a mango. 

Packing my lunch and snacks for work and after-school saves me from buying any emergency outside food.

Build Your Best Body- day 6

Did five non-stop running miles in the pouring rain last night with my dog, Brad...got back home at 11:30pm completely drenched and feeling amazing. This one run was so painless, it got me thinking. Perhaps all the fruit and veggie juices from the past week have been helping my joints, or maybe the 4.5 lbs I have lost from my "primarily plant-based" eating has helped me feel less tired, OR......maybe, just maybe it's Zumba. I've always been dead set against cross-training, yet, I have the sneaky suspicion that doing Zumba once a week has helped my other less-used muscles give me more overall stability and strength. 

Today I took Nora to the Alexandria Animal shelter, about 15 minutes from my house. No, we are not looking for any new pets right now. We already have four pets, a parrot, 2 cats and a dog. But Nora loves to pet animals and so we go often, as often as we can I should say. Here is one of the fur babies we met. His name is Diego and he is a chihuahua/pom mix and he was just the sweetest. Loving animals is one reason I am doing this 'primarily-plant-based eating plan, so I only thought it appropriate to share one of the animals.

Tonight's juice has a handful of kale, another handful of dandelion, 10-13 carrots, 1 ginger chunk , 1 small beet, 2 apples, 1 lemon and 1 small bok choi bundle.

Here is little momma, again, helping me make my juice.

I bought myself new sneakers! Here is a very crappy quality picture of what they look like. 44mm toe to hell drop (like the one I run in) and just amazing.....Can't wait to run in it tomorrow.

The day has been dark, broody and blah....great weather for reading in bed!! yes!!