724.1 down...

**In all the craziness of the holidays, I didn't thank Stephanie at It's all happening for nominating me for a Stylish Blogger Award. THANK YOU!!**

On to today--thank you all for your support over this mad dash to the finish line for 2010 goals. Kel is absolutely right that if I don't follow through on this, I'll forever have an asterisk next to 2010 when I think about it. So, how much of a compulsive over-achiever am I? Let's start with this week. I have this week off from work, a few days with the kiddo and a few days without, which is an unbelievable luxury for me. So what did I do? I not only made a to-do list for my time off, but I prioritized the items on it. Sadly, I didn't even think to feel nerdy about this until I realized my husband had probably seen it. Busted.

So compulsive me over here went to the gym at 5:30 last night and laid down 4.5 miles. Then went back today and did 6 more. That brings me to 724.1. Only 5.9 to go. I can do this. That's just one more 6 mile run. Bring it. Day after tomorrow. Gym is closed tomorrow (insert name-calling here) and my street is still a solid sheet of ice.

And while I'm at it, today was freaking awesome. I slept in. I scrapbooked (see other blog). I finally bought blinds for my scraproom--the last room in the house with nothing on the windows. I ran. It was fantastic. And tomorrow is going to rock my face off.

A very special announcement

I am pleased to announce the launch of my new blog, JoannaScraps.

I decided to create a separate blog for scrappy reasons described on the welcome post over at the new blog (which I encourage you to read). But there are some running-related motives as well. See, I have the distinct joy of having two hobbies that I love. But I get that running and scrapbooking do not go together for all runners, especially those of you of the male persuasion. I wanted to be able to blog about both without boring all you fabulous runners to death. Or just simply confusing you with the intermittent post about my beloved Slice. Or adhesives. Or border punches.

Should you feel inclined to stay current on all things crafty, I've created a link to JoannaScraps, which is in the right sidebar here. Page design will be evolving over the coming weeks. Stop on by!

Joanna Lite

What happens when I am unemployed (technically) and ordered to "Lite Duty," i.e., can't lift anything over 20 pounds or engage in strenuous exercise? Oh, breakfast is still eaten at Panera on Saturday morning. Oh yes. But the week gets filled with none other than those crafts projects that had been on hold.

The first project was the babe's Christmas stocking. He's 2. It was time. I'd given myself 6 months to finish it. I am, after all, the woman who once took YEARS to finish a scarf for my Mom (a vaguely fancy one, but a scarf nonetheless). And it took me less than a week! A week!! It still needs to be sewn up (it was knitted flat rather than in the round) and I still need to duplicate stitch his name onto it, but neither of those things should take too long. Plus I don't exactly know how to do either very well and need to call in help again.

And of course, old pictures found their way into an album at long last. These are from February 2008 and had been printed and on my scrap desk for almost as long. I put this together on Friday and finished it with The Beastie last night over popcorn and ice cream. She and her husband just bought their next house, in far, farawayville. I'm thrilled for them, but...

I am not ready for the continuation of goodbye-themed blog posts. I am moving in less than a month. Other people keep leaving (Meg left, The Gangsta leaves Tuesday, MB leaves later this week). And yet I remain in denial.

June is going to be big. We'll be packing up the home we've loved for 5 years and moving to a new state and a new town and settling in. It could get emotional, logistically complicated, and/or hectic. Buckle up.

...I think I'm angry still

Name that tune! Anyone?

Hint: it's from the late 90's. Anyone?

Why the post title? Simply put, we're undergoing enormous life changes and have a lot going on. Some elements of this craziness are irritating, and the stress of it all makes me a little less resilient than normal to the things I would normally see coming and brace myself for. Such is life. While stress is detrimental in most ways, it's often actually a good thing for running. Take today. I had an awesome 4 mile run. I felt like I could have run forever. It was fast and glorious.

Except for the brief on-course entertainment by the I.T. Band about halfway through.

(Sorry, that's a terrible joke. And not even original. And those of you who don't run probably don't get it.)

Anyway, twas an awesome day for running. On deck:

1. all-out mile scheduled for Wednesday. Never done one before--wish me luck! Shooting for a 6:59. Can I do it?!?

2. long-run next Saturday early morning, probably 6 miles

3. Trail race the 22nd

mileage: 254.5 + 4.0 = 258.5 miles

Warning: this is about to get super eccentric. Back away slowly if you can't roll JoannaRuns-style.

I spent all day yesterday at a crop (scrapbooking get-together). I wanted to share one of the layouts I made because it involves two of my friends (the Minnesotans). In September of 2007, Mr. Joanna, the Minnesotans and I went to an ornamental grass festival. You heard me right. An ornamental grass festival. Why? Because it was something to go do. Because it was outdoors on a gorgeous day. Because it was in a small town none of us had been to. So we went. I just got around to scrapping this yesterday, and in honor of the fact that it was a completely ludicrous thing to attend in the first place, I made a completely absurd page for it. This is not, by any technical or artistic standard, a stand-out piece. But it is ridiculous, and that was the point. Can you say bedazzled Gothic lettering? Yeah. That just happened. See below or check it here. I should probably have added ribbon to the bottom, but was running out of time and didn't think of it.

Obligatory note on Mother's Day

I had a lovely Mother's Day! Mr. Joanna and the babe bought me a blue glass vase and....wait for it...Kill Bill Volumes 1 and 2. "Volume 2 focuses on a mother-child relationship. What?" Riiiiight. Remember when I told you we watched Inglourious Basterds on Valentine's Day and The Hangover on our last anniversary? I think I'm sensing a trend here. Totally inappropriate movie viewing (not like that! jeez!!) in lieu of sappiness. I know. I just lost a Chick Point.

Three Things Thursday

Three Things Thursday (I know, it's been a while since I did one)

1. Last hard run
Last night was the last hard track practice before race day. Coach Paula was there early and had started her 10 x 800m workout, her fave pre-race workout. We took a cue from her and did a scaled-back version, 6 x 800.

1 mile warm-up
800s (half-mile intervals) at: 3.48, 3.43, 3.38, 3.40, 3.39, 3.36
1 mile cool-down

According to this post from last July, these are good times for me. I'm feeling cautiously optimistic about the race! I want that new PR!

Mileage (somehow the addition has gotten screwed up somewhere. I'm going to trust that runningahead.com has it right somehow):
214.7 + 3.9 + 5.0 = 223.5 miles

2. The news!
Mr. Joanna and I bought a house! I will post a few pictures of it later. It's a great place and I feel lucky to have found it. We close in mid-June. I still get tied up in knots regularly about the whole move, but at the same time I'm excited. And anxious about selling our current place.

3. Other odds & ends
I thought I'd throw in some of my recent crafty projects while I'm at it. I've had SO much fun making these. It's a good creative outlet for me and it's productive--two things that make me happy. Check out my recent projects here and here. These are pages from our 2005 trip to Alaska. I'm finally almost finished!

Beautiful Day

Here it is, your Three Things Thursday. Note: I'm switching from using initials to using nicknames for people. It's a fun twist. I'll put nicknames in italics for a while so it isn't confusing.

1. Our good friends who I'll call The Minnesotans had their baby this morning! She's a beautiful 8 lb. 13 oz. bundle of joy. Ears and I got to visit the happy family this afternoon. What an amazing gift. Mother & baby are doing well, and for that we are so, so thankful.

2. I am officially 10 days ahead of schedule on pacing! I did 4.1 miles today in an average pace of 9:16. I'm planning to do 6.5 this weekend and am hoping for a similar pace. Depending on how that goes, I may pick a new target pace and start working on it next week. I'd love to get down to 9 minutes eventually, but it's going to take some serious work, especially as long runs get longer.

3. That 4.1 miles brings my total mileage to 60 for the year. I am especially excited about this for two reasons: a) I'm on track to hit 80 by the end of the month, and b) IT WAS MAY 18 LAST YEAR BEFORE I HIT 60 MILES. Un-freaking-believable. I'm 3 months ahead of 2009 Joanna. And yes, I ran that 4.1 rather than 4 because I really wanted to hit the 6-0 mark. I'm a dork like that.

Side story from the gym (pretend this is part 3a). As I was walking back to my locker, I overheard a conversation between two moms whose kids were doing hockey practice. "I asked her what sport she wanted to focus on and she said crafting." Love it. It made me think of The Bestie, who I then called, because she comes pretty darn close to making scrapbooking a competitive sport. I also loved the idea of a little girl loving both. I love being both an athlete and a scrapbook enthusiast. Who says you can't do both? Since I'm on the topic, here's a link to my most recent project, still from our honeymoon to Alaska. It's a very unusual page for me, both because it has only one picture and because of the excessive layering.

Pushing the pace

Today is President's Day, a day that has always struck me as an obscure reason to shut down the Federal government. It also means my kiddo's daycare is closed, so I'm home enjoying a snowy day with my little boy. I got him all bundled up this morning to go outside so I could shovel the path to our front porch. I shoveled out a little square area for him to stand in, since he seemed hesitant, and put him down in the middle of it. True to form, he refused to move. He wouldn't even move within the square area I'd shoveled out. I tried to get him to throw a snowball but he wouldn't touch it. It's one of his lovable quirks. Last summer he wouldn't walk on grass and absolutely loathed sprinklers and other water-based amusements. This winter he won't walk on snow or salt. Otherwise, we ran errands, had lunch with Mr. Joanna (his new blog name), and played and played and played. And now the babe naps, giving me time to tell you about my weekend.

On Saturday The Bestie and I went to a crop (12-hour scrapbooking get-together at a crafts store) with The Gangsta. We always have a good time at these. It's good time to hang out and be super girly and tease each other a little bit and spend some money on crafty goodness. When I left my house to go pick up The Bestie my jaw dropped a little bit. We had hoarfrost unlike anything I've ever seen. The frost was so thick on the trees, weeds, everything, that it looked like thick snow and ice. It was drop dead gorgeous. We got to the crop a little after 9. I spent the day making Mr. Joanna a Valentine's card and completing 3 honeymoon pages (might have a picture of two of them later). It was a slow, fun day.

Sunday was possibly the best Valentine's Day ever. We were just us and it was fabulous. We went to church in the morning, then the boys headed home and I headed to the gym for my long run (more on that below). I got home and got cleaned up just about the time the babe was waking up from his nap. We played and all ate dinner together, then went out to get an ice cream cone from McDonald's (49 cents of terrible wonderful) and rent Inglourious Basterds (to watch after the babe was asleep, of course). That's who we are--a couple that goes to see The Hangover on our anniversary and rents Inglourious Basterds on Valentine's Day and plays with our little boy in between. I think that about hits the nail on the head.

So the long run, on the 'mill again. It was great! It took me longer than usual to settle into. I didn't feel like I hit that groove until maybe mile 2.5 or so, partially because I forgot to change the incline on the 'mill until some point after 1.0. With the 'mill at a 0.5% incline, I got through 6 miles at an average pace of 9:28! I'm definitely happy with that. I'm on course to get that average pace DOWN before training gets very serious.

Mileage: 45.9 + 6.0 = 51.9

Aaaaaaand we're back

Apparently my last blog post was sort of out there. You'll have to excuse me for that. It was written from deep within the fog of my dissertation, which I'm happy to report is now out with my committee. One good thing came from my post though--I discovered runjessrun, and that she follows my blog! Good stuff. I now follow hers, too.

I promised I would explain my "not even pretending to try to run." But, the more I try to come up with a metaphor for what those two weeks were like, the more I realize that I don't know how to verbalize it. I had anxiety so badly at times that I couldn't sleep despite complete exhaustion. In the middle of it I got a bug that's going around and that, for most people, sucks but isn't a huge deal. It put me in the ER so dehydrated it hurt to move my eyes. I know that sounds dramatic, and drama's not really my thing. I tell you all of this as a way of saying, "work got so out of hand there for a while that I internalized it and it messed with me completely." I am SO glad I got through my deadline and now have time to do things like run and update my blog. Oh, and go to a crop with my bestie next weekend (!!), which I am so excited about.

I finally got back to running today. On the 'mill, of course, with this crazy storm that's coming through. You know I love the list, so here it is.

1. I totally underestimated how much fitness you can lose in 16 days

2. I have dissertation weight that must be lost. Seriously. It has got to go.

3. I am officially behind on my short-term mileage goals for the year. The 1000 mile challenge (or, the 730 mile challenge, as I like to call it) is still motivating me though, so I guess it's doing its job.

4. My mileage this time last year was 18.5! So lame! So at least I'm still ahead of that.

5. longish run planned for Sunday afternoon. Yea!!

Mileage (a few runs from pre-crazy didn't get put here, so here's everything):

20.8 + 4.6 + 4 + 3.5 = 32.9 miles

In other post-crazy news, I've finally had time to tackle one of the two big projects I set out for 2010: scrapbook my honeymoon...that happened in 2005. I've had so much fun starting that. Scrapbooking is such a good creative outlet for me. I don't post all my layouts online (this is a running blog, after all), but every now and then it's fun to show you what I've been up to. So here you go--one of the pages from our cruise to Alaska. You can click on it to see the description of it on twopeasinabucket (a fabulous scrapbooking website).

Familiarity and down time

Work has been going at an insane pace recently. In the tiny windows of opportunity that have come up, I've been grateful for the chance to run. On Tuesday of this week I got in a 6 mile run (I was overdue for a longish run) and today I did 4.6, outside. It was 34 degrees and the streets were no longer icy. Today's run was an example of how rooted our lives are in this place. In the span of 4.6 miles I saw three people I knew--the mail delivery woman (she goes to our church), a custom draperies installer I know, and one of the guys that built our house.

My run today was made possible by my taking the day off. Though I was away from work for some time around Christmas, there was virtually no alone time, or real down time in it. On top of the insane pace I've been keeping recently, a small breather was very much needed. The day went by much too quickly and left me wanting another. Aside from my run, I also slept in (a lot) and finished one scrapbooking layout I've been working on. I just really appreciated the time.

Mileage update:

10.2 + 6 + 4.6 = 20.8

Slice

I've had several topics working their way into blog posts in my mind, but none more consistently than my Slice, so I'm devoting this entire posting to a review of it.

Background

The Slice is a cordless design cutter made by the scrapbooking supply company Making Memories. It uses designs stored on SD cards to cut shapes in paper in any size between 1" and 4" in half inch increments. In function, it is similar to the older, popular Cricut. To give you an idea of what I'm talking about, I'll show you some examples of where I've used the Slice on my layouts. I used it to make the fence, tombstones, house, tree, witch, picture frames, and "Moo" letters on this page; all of the white scrolls here; the lettering on this page; and the flowers and lettering on this page from my niece's album. Without a machine like the Cricut or Slice, the only way to get lettering or images like these is to a) cut them by hand using a scrapbooking scalpel from a computer-printed template (arduous and time-intensive), or b) buy pre-made embellishments (if you can find the color/size/image you want). I honestly don't know what I ever did without such a machine.

At the crops I've gone to over the last few months, I've gotten some questions about the Slice. How does it work? Do I like it? How much are the SD cards? I decided to address the pros and cons of the machine and give it a sort of review here on my blog.

How does it work?

It is mechanically straightforward to use, which I like about it. You:

1. apply Slice adhesive to the glass cutting mat and let it dry, about 2 minutes

2. press your paper to the glass mat so it sticks

3. turn on the Slice and insert the SD card that contains the design you'd like to cut

4. navigate through the on-screen (Slice screen) menu to select the design and size you'd like to cut

5. press the start button and hold the machine in place until it indicates that the cut is complete

6. remove the paper and design cut from the glass mat

7. turn off the Slice

The adhesive needs to be washed off of the mat and reapplied every so often. The instructions indicate that it should be replaced after every 4 cuts (I think), but I always do many more cuts than that. You can do the cuts while the Slice is plugged in, but it can also be used as a cordless device if you wish.

Do I like it?

I can't say it enough: I love it. Although I love the album I made just before getting the Slice, I still can't imagine scrapping without it. That older album that I love, some of it I love because I spent literally hours cutting out scroll work and lettering by hand and buying stickers and embellishments. It is so much easier to be creative and to create nice looking pages when I press a few buttons and the Slice cuts everything for me. Like I said, I love it. But, nothing's perfect. So what's the nitty gritty? What is great and not so great about it?

Pros

The biggest selling points of the Slice, for me (and this is not a complete list of pros), were the size, cordless-ness, availability/price of SD cards, and coordination with Making Memories collections. The whole machine is 3 pounds and is about 5x5" and 4" tall (or so). Making its size even better is the fact that it can operate without being plugged in. Why do these features make it so nice? At crops, Cricuts take up an enormous amount of counter space and space can become tight. Not only does the Slice not take up a lot of space, but if need be it can be moved so that you can work on it at your personal work space or in a place where more space is available. It also then does not take up a lot of storage space at home, and let's face it, everyone wants more space to do paper crafts.

Availability and pricing of the SD cards is also nice. New, retail price ranges from about $40-$50, and the cards rarely go on sale in big box crafting stores like Michaels. New, retail Cricut cartridges are around $70. Additionally, you can usually find Slice cards discounted somewhere online, and available new at drastically reduced prices on Ebay (usually $20 or less). There are over 30 Slice cards now available, with themes ranging from holidays to babies to travel, most with a different font.

The final bonus that I want to highlight is that Slice cards coordinate with Making Memories collections. For instance, I had bought some Making Memories metal Halloween embellishments a while ago just because they were cute. When I got the Slice Spook Alley design card, I saw that the embellishments coordinated with the designs on the card. I really like the potential this creates for making coordinated layouts. While I don't want to make this a Slice v. Cricut rivalry, I will point out that Cricut is made by Provo Craft, which does make some other scrapbooking products, but has decreased production in those areas as the Cricut has taken off.

Cons

There are three primary drawbacks to the Slice: its size limitations, its adhesive, and its margin of error.

The primary drawback of the Slice is also one of its strengths: its size. As I mentioned, it cuts shapes anywhere from 1 inch to 4 inches, with sizes available in half-inch increments. Some of the whole words available are cut on the diagonal and consequently can be cut to be as much as 5.5" long, but that's the absolute limit. You cannot use the Slice to make die cuts like this gorgeous 12x12 paper. It will cut beautiful shapes like this in up to a 4x4 inch size. It also will not cut letters more than 4 inches tall.

Adhesive, I think, for any design cutting machine, is an issue. The problems with Slice adhesive are that a) it's expensive (though much less so on Ebay), b) it smells truly awful, and c) using too much or too little can mess up your cut. As to the smell, cover your nose or go outside to apply it. I cover my nose and mouth with a sleeve and it's just fine. Using too much adhesive makes it difficult to remove cuts from the glass mat, while using too little (or not changing it frequently enough) often allows the paper to move as its being cut, causing irregularities in the cut. (Side note: irregularities also appear when the machine needs to be recharged). All of these things are avoidable once you learn the machine and how much adhesive works best for you.

The margin of error was something I'd read about before buying the Slice. When you indicate that you want a 2 inch "a" to be cut, the letter that's produced will not be 2 inches tall. It will be scaled so that the tallest capital letter of the font would cut at a 2 inch height. This rule of thumb gets a little bit squishier when cutting shapes rather than letters. Expect to have some trial and error when settling on a size to cut, especially when you are just starting with the machine.

Conclusion

All told, I strongly believe that the pros outweigh the cons, and other than the size limitations (which are also part of why I love this system), the cons can all be more or less prevented as you get to the know the machine. I love this machine and would buy it again in a heartbeat (ok, ask for it as an anniversary present again in a heartbeat). Owning one will also encourage you to get addicted to the Making Memories blog, as I now am. No complaints about that!

The second week of November? Oh, that blur.

Unbelievably, it's Thursday and I'm only now finding a quiet minute in the week. Running hasn't happened this week. I just literally have not had a spare minute in which to do it. I'm planning a good run on Saturday though, so I'm looking forward to that. Here's a mileage update from last week though. The 5.1 run was really nice. Meg and I put on our big girl shoes and decided to bite off a longer distance than either of us had done in a while. It was a good time, even if we walked a little bit of it.

409.4 + 2.8 + 3.3 + 5.1 = 420.6

Other projects! As I said before, I've taken on the project of finishing my scrapbook for 2005. I started by filling in some missing events from the end of that year, Christmas and my brother's wedding. Last weekend I finished a family trip to Chicago and Christmas at our house. You can see those pages here, here, and here. I made these at a crop with some friends. It was the third crop I've gone to, and they just keep getting better. At this crop there were five of us there together. It made me want to make a scrapbook page of pictures of my favorite scrapbooking dwarves, who have noun names instead of pronoun names: Embellishments, Adhesives, Perfectionism, Organization, and Slice. We make a fun set. The pages of my brother's wedding are up next, and I'm really looking forward to making them.

Post-race updates

Things have calmed down a bit since the race. As all the stories and pictures have come together, a few things have surfaced that merit updating on here. For instance, I later found out that the woman who drove into the course in Detroit was eventually arrested. Thank goodness! Unfortunately, that's the most exciting update. The rest are: my IT band still gets tight (but doesn't hurt) even on short runs, I got new shoes (the 4.1 mile run below was their debut), and I'm in love with my race tag.

After taking a week and a half off, I finally got back to running. Yesterday afternoon when the babe took his nap, B and I took one too. The 60 degree weather and blue skies overpowered my need for sleep though, and I laced up my new shoes and headed out. I'm so glad I did. Weather like this in November has to be savored. It's just incredible. I need to work this afternoon, but I might tear myself away for a quick run. It's too nice to stay inside.

402 + 3.3 + 4.1 = 409.4

Since I've now given my niece's First Year album to her parents, it's time to start a new project, and I've chosen a worthy one: finish scrapbooking 2005 and 2006. I finished 2005 through my wedding day some time ago and parts of the rest of that year and 2006 are finished. However, there are large chunks of both years that just never got done, like our honeymoon, my brother's wedding, Christmases, and my besty N's wedding. Basically anything complicated I skipped over. It is time! It's getting ridiculous. I don't want to leave you with the false impression that I have the years between 2006 and now finished. Quite the contrary. I like lists, so here:

1999-2004: finished

2005: finished through my wedding with parts of remainder of year completed

2006: maybe 1/2 to 2/3 completed

2007: hardly touched

2008: coming together, but I've barely touched my son's baby pictures, which will likely be an entire separate album

2009: are you kidding me? I'll probably scrapbook the Rock & Roll half this coming weekend, but I think that will be the first thing done for this year

Right now I'm working on last Halloween (I'll post the pages when they're finished) and like I said, will probably do Rock & Roll this weekend, but after that, I'm on a mission to finish those older years. I'll probably cover more of my crafts projects on here now that my running season is coming to a close.

Gearing up! Errr, ramping down I mean

It's the final week. Excitement level is up, mileage is down, hence the title. I went to the running store today and bought a thing to carry an arsenal of Sport Beans in, plus the beans themselves. I'm mentally starting to make a list of everything I need to take to Detroit, and what of those things cannot be trusted in a checked bag. What can't I replace at the expo if my luggage doesn't make it? What can I run without? I am so excited!! My knee seems to be doing much better, so I'm lacking confidence, but feeling very encouraged about race day.

Saturday I was scheduled to run an hour. After the first 2.4 miles, Coach Mike said I was running a little faster than a 5 mph pace, so I should aim at running a little over 5 and should not get carried away and do more than 6. Starting the back half of the run, I was warmed up (it was maybe 40 degrees out, so the start was chilly), excited, and just couldn't help myself. I ran as fast as I wanted. I had a ball. It was great. I did 5.4 and came back at around the 55 minute mark. I got glared at a little bit for going so much faster than my race pace, but I just smiled. It was a great way to end long run training. Into the week now, I ran 3.3 today and will probably do the same tomorrow, since the rain is heading back in by Wednesday.

Here is an update on miles. I would like to point out that I have officially passed what was always my annual goal in college, 365 miles, or a mile a day for a whole year. It always seemed like such an easy goal and yet I never did it. So, big smile for that.

361.8 + 5.4 + 3.3 = 370.5

I have a million other things going on, though at the moment most notably scrapbooking. I went to another crop this past weekend and had a GREAT time. I finally finished my niece's first year album! I'm still working on coating a page that's having some issues with ink drying, but the actual making of pages is finished. I will be giving it to them this weekend, which will be another part of the fun. I'm excited about this weekend--can you tell?

Trip to DC

Mileage has been way down the last week and a half. Last week I was out of town for work. I just plain didn't have time for a 12 mile run, so I did my best, which was 5.3 miles. I also got in a 3 mile run on Monday morning before flying back home. Tuesday I took off to get unpacked, caught up on sleep, and get settled in. Wednesday I (brace yourself) planned ahead and brought running clothes to the office so I could break for a mid-afternoon run. It's starting to get dark early, and I had a hundred other things to do that evening, so I ran when I could. It turned out to be a great decision, because the weather was gorgeous when I ran and turned ugly not long after. It's been raining for the last two days, and hence, I've been inside, being lazy. So, the mileage update.

350.5 + 5.3 + 3.0 + 3.0 = 361.8

I'm definitely not as prepared as I would like to be going into my first marathon. I never got to the 18 or 20 mile long runs. My mileage these last two weeks has been way down. It might rain on race day, which I'm not really prepared for. Regardless, I'm excited for the race and hoping for the best!

In non-running news, I'm closing in on my niece's First Year album. I am so excited to finally be giving it to them when we go to Detroit. I'm headed to a crop tomorrow to wrap up work on it. N is going with me tomorrow too, and we're both pretty excited.

As for little Elliot, his babbling is becoming alarmingly more word-like every day. Yesterday while going upstairs it really sounded like he said, "I'm just climbing." It's amazing to watch him develop. I took him with me to DC so he could have some QT with the grandparents. He hung out with Grandma and Grandaddy Paulson for a few days and with his Nana for a few days. We also got to visit with my friends Jamie and Will. It was Will's first time meeting Elliot, and Jamie hadn't seen him since last Thanksgiving. I was SO happy to have the chance to see them and catch up. Elliot did very well with all the transitioning from place to place, and seems to have had fun with everyone. Grandma Paulson took the picture below. The travel was long though, and so he was overjoyed when we finally got home on Monday night. His face just lit up when he realized that we were walking into the house. He ran around the first floor, rediscovering his toys, opening all the drawers he has access to and waving around his play objects (like a sheet of stamps we let him play with). It was great. And his return to daycare on Tuesday was with even more enthusiasm.

Game on, again

After failing the 16 mile long run and nursing a hurting knee through Monday, I woke up last Tuesday pretty sick. I spent all day Tuesday and half of Wednesday in bed. I worked a few hours of Wednesday from home, and returned to the office. However, I didn't feel good enough to run or work out all week. So, I went into this week's long run after a week off.

I was cautious. I did a 6:1 times run/walk, took ibuprofen before the run and at mile 8. I'm very happy to say that it went well. I ran most of the first 8 with Meg and the second 8 with Coach Mike, who is pulling for me to finish the race. I finished all 16 miles and felt so good at the end that I debated tacking on an extra two. Ultimately I decided not to press my luck. With my success this past weekend, I've decided that I will line up at the start at the Detroit Marathon, and will give it my best. If excruciating pain happens and I don't finish, I've vowed not to beat myself up about it. But I will start, and I am hopeful.

The rest of the weekend was fun! Saturday night N and I went out. I enjoyed some great scrapbooking time. I am SO CLOSE to finishing my niece's album. It will definitely be finished in time to take to the Detroit. I've had so much fun scrapping recently. N and I have had great fun talking about scrapbooking and learning from each other. I've been reading scrapbooking blogs again and browsing layouts on scrapbook.com. Another joy has been my Slice. Before I got it, I occasionally cut out words and shapes by hand. I knew I would appreciate a machine that would do that for me, but I did not know how much I would appreciate it. I've used it on almost every page since I got it. I just keep finding new ways to incorporate its goods on my pages. What did I do before?!? I am officially a huge fan. I would love to post pictures, but I don't want to spoil the "reveal" of my niece's album before giving it to them.

Tonight Meg and I went for a really fun run. It was short (2.6 miles) and FAST. It's becoming windy, that wind that sets in during the fall and stays through the thaw. It's still nice though--temperatures in the 50s and 60s through the day. It was great weather, a nice neighborhood, and of course a great running partner. I had such a good time. Then we downed cheeseburgers. Good stuff.

Mileage update--looks like I'll hit 400 for the year!

331.9 + 16.0 + 2.6 = 350.5 miles

On again, off again

After the 14 mile long run I was feeling encouraged. This week, I'm back to being unsure of the likelihood that I'll enter, much less finish, the race. I am so frustrated.

Last week I very happily plodded through my cross-training and mid-week runs. Saturday was my first (ever!) 16 mile long run. I thought things were going just fine until about mile 12, when, after walking a little bit to talk to one of my teammates, I just couldn't get going again. The outside of my knee hurt, a lot. I stopped and stretched. I tried walking on it for a while. I tried slowly jogging a few times to try to stretch the tendon back out and get going again. It just wasn't happening. So I sadly walked back to our starting area and made note of my miles for the day: 12.6 out of an attempted 16.

I am so frustrated, and more than a little bit disappointed. It's made worse by the fact that I also didn't run today because the outside of my knee is still a bit tender from Saturday.

I am going to try again this weekend, one last time. If I'm even going to attempt the race, this coming weekend has to work out. I'm amending the game plan: ibuprofen at the start and at mile 8. Timed 6:1 run/walk...as in, I will actually wear a watch, and will police myself from the very beginning, no matter how frustrated I get with the pace. That's the plan. If it doesn't work, I will go to the race to cheer for my new teammate, Nick, who just moved here with his wife from Michigan.

So, the saddest mileage update ever:

316.2 + 3.1 + 12.6 = 331.9

On to happier things! I'm going to go scrapbook for a while before bed. This trip to Detroit includes a LONG overdue delivery of my niece's first year scrapbook.

taking a week off

I thought that if I did a walk/run, I could get through my 16 miles this weekend. I tried. I made it through 8 miles and later wished I hadn't even done that. The knee is not better. So as an extreme act of preservation, I'm taking the week off. Through all of this, I have appreciated an amazingly supporting team. Two of them offered contact info for a massage therapist. Another brought a foam roller for me to try out. There has been a lot of support and encouragement, and I have appreciated it a lot.

Adding Wednesday and Saturday miles:

273.0 + 3.5 + 8.0 = 284.5 miles

In other news, yesterday I went to my first crop (marathon scrapbooking party). I was there for 9 hours and finished 6 pages. I had a lot of fun!! It was fun to see the younger girls there (high school age). There wasn't much to do in my town when I was a teenager, so seeing them made me realize what a nice, safe option it was for teens. Damaris schooled me on adhesives. I learned how much Jaymie loves embellishments. I saw the incredible range of tools people have. There was an entire table of Cricuts!I hope to go to another one sometime.

waiting for data

Yes, I'm doing the unthinkable and posting to my blog while at work. I'm waiting for data and really have nothing else to do, so I decided it was a good time to update the blog. It's just been an insanely hectic spring. I'll try to pick out some highlights to catch up on the month of April, in roughly chronological order.

I got the month started on a good note, by passing my prelim on April 1. For those of you who are not insane and consequently pursuing a PhD, the prelim is the second of the three big hurdles of a PhD program. The first is the qualifying exam, which is usually an exam covering coursework. The second is the prelim, which is a defense of a dissertation proposal. I've learned that this means different things for different programs. Sometimes passing it is permission to start research. In my case, I had already done a significant portion of the research. It was a mid-process check with my committee and a time for their input on my ideas to move forward. I was pretty anxious going in, but it turned out to be a really constructive exam.

Easter weekend I went to Chicago just to get away for a weekend. It was long overdue and much needed! I went on Saturday morning and came back on Sunday evening. On Saturday I ran around with my friend Lynn. That evening we had dinner with her husband and a good friend of theirs from college. On Sunday I slept in (which was half of the point of going) then went to the Art Institute for a few hours, then headed back to the hotel to get my things and head to the train station. It was my first night away from Elliot since he was born. This trip has made it clear to me that the occasional weekend getaway is a great thing. Everyone needs a break every now and then!

This past weekend I bought a new car. This had been a long time in the coming. Two weeks prior Brendan and I spent a lot of time talking about whether it was worth it to keep up the maintenance and repairs on my Sable or replace it, and we decided it was much more practical to replace it. I loved my Sable. I'd had it for over 7 years and put over 70,000 miles on it. It was 13 years old with 129,000 miles. I loved that car. It had been my Grampa's and felt in some way like an extension of him. But, it was time to move on. So after a lot of tears I forced myself to go look at cars. After much test driving and hours spent on Edmunds, I decided on a 2009 Toyota Prius. I will post pictures of both the Sable and Prius when I get home. I'm still taking nominations for names for the new car. Please make suggestions!

Throughout all of this I've also been working on a scrapbook for my niece, Nadia. It's coming along. I just finished a spread for February that I'm particularly happy with. I'm currently on the Christmas pages (I'm doing them very much out of order). I'll post some pictures when the whole album is finished and given to the proud parents. In the meantime, suffice to say I'm really enjoying working on it. As N says, hobbies keep us sane.

Saturday night we went to card club, a monthly get-together of us and five other couples we're friends with. It's always a good time. We found out that one of the couples is expecting their third child. We're really happy for them!

Monday (two days ago), Elliot took his first unassisted step! I didn't even see it. Brendan was playing with him in the living room while I was working in the kitchen. Brendan said he took one step then fell over. I haven't seen him try again since then. He's happy cruising and using his new walker toy (thank you, Lisa!). We'll get pictures/video as soon as we can. I think he'll start walking more regularly in no time, but we'll see. I just love to watch him figure things out. His other new trick is turning on the water in the bathtub while I'm getting ready for work in the mornings. I think he's pretty much the greatest kid ever.

a quick scrapbooking update/question

So I started working on my niece's baby album this past weekend. This is the first time I've worked with a 12x12 post-hinge album. Much to my delight and surprise, I discovered that the "pages" (hemmed in by built-in page protectors) are a true 12x12 size. I don't have to cut 1/2" off of my background sheets! From what I can tell, the biggest upside to the post-bound album is the true size page. Personally, I've always used page protectors, but I can see that it's a con in the sense that it makes it harder to use pockets on pages. Do any of you have much experience with post-bound albums? If so, what do you think of them? Do you prefer post or strap-hinge albums?

ch-ch-ch-changes, and I'm crazy

I was encouraged today by my friends Lisa and Dorie to feel like I can use this space to blog about my crafts projects and the rest of life. I never have because originally this blog was devoted to training and fundraising for my first race. But life has gone on and I'm realizing that this would probably be more interesting for everyone involved if I widened the scope. So here I am.

First though, an update on running. This past Saturday I ran 3.7 miles!! I wasn't sure I would make it that distance, since my longest run before that had been 2.8. The weather was in my favor, which helped, and I was feeling good. I'm starting to feel like maybe I can do this again. But I'm also crazy. I'm going to attempt to run the Disney Marathon in January. I'm working with the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's Team in Training again. This time around I will need to raise over $3,000! Be warned that there will be lots of fundraising in the months to come! So, wish me luck. I might be crazy to try this. All of a sudden, the Indy Half in October has become a training run. I'm really excited about Indy, but still intimidated about Disney. I might just be crazy, but I'm going to give it a try.

In other news, yesterday was Elliot's two month well-baby check-up. It went really well. He weighs 11lb. 11oz. and measured 22.5 inches. He got his immunizations, screaming as all babies do. I planned to feed him right after the shots, which soothed him a lot. After he finished eating he had forgotten the pain. I think the day wore him out though. Last night he slept better than ever. He slept from 11pm to 4:10am, then from 4:40 until almost 9am. It was so nice to get so much sleep!

On the scrapbooking front, I discovered something nifty a few days ago. Some background: a while back my friend N gave me a white pigment ink pad. We both thought it would be great to stamp white shapes onto colored paper. Not so much. Turns out the ink fades about 90% when it dries on regular paper. So for a while I wasn't sure what I could do with my white ink pad. Over the weekend N and I were scrapbooking together. We came up with a layout that involved a printed vellum background page. Unfortunately, I had only one sheet of the printed vellum and I needed two for the two-page spread. I went to the local crafts stores but couldn't find another sheet. On a whim, I tried to "paint" a pattern onto plain vellum using q-tips and the ink from ink pads. I tried a few colors of ink on a test strip to see which looked the best. Much to my surprise, the white ink works beautifully when applied to vellum. Here's a picture of the result. And yes, I'm just now getting around to scrapbooking my 2005 wedding.