6 Miles and the bigger race

Yesterday I ran (ahem...I use the phrase "ran" rather freely. I jogged about 1/2 of it, power walked the other half) 6 miles last night in 93 minutes. That translates to 15.5 minutes per mile. Not stellar, but steady for me. Because the Spokane Marathon states in it's rules that you cannot run with headphones on, I ran it without. It was the first time I ran without headphones, so I was stuck with just the noise in my head for an hour and a half. The voices went something like this:

Mile 1: Just walk, your calves need to warm up.

Mile 2: Ok, they're flippin warmed up now, they're @#$% BURNING! What have I committed myself to? Why am I doing this? What was I thinking? Oh, look at that nice house...

Mile 3: Running now, downhill, but still, running! It's nice out tonight, just cool enough.

"All I want is a proper cup of coffee made in a proper copper coffee pot,
I might be off my duck, but I want a proper cup of coffee from a proper copper pot.
Iron coffee pots and tin coffee pots don't do so much for me,
if I can't have a proper cup of coffee from a copper coffee pot then I'll have a cup of tea"

....Song running through my head courtesy of "Trout Fishing in America", Oliver's favorite band right now.

Mile 4: Dude, I'm BADASS! (still downhill at this point)...Then, I had to pay the piper. All that downhill meant I had to go UP at some point. A new route tonight meant a lot of uphill but a very good glute workout.

Mile 5: I only have 2 miles left, I only have 2 miles left, "All I want is a proper cup of ARRRRRGGG GET OUT OF MY HEAD!!!"

Mile 6: As the sweet little Punjabi man shuffling along on the sidewalk across the street was gaining on me, I somehow found the energy to beat his 85 year old bones to the crosswalk. I am soooooo coool!

But, I did it. Every long run on a Sunday means I've gone further than I've ever run (or hiked for that matter, my longest backpacking adventure was 5 miles...I am such an outdoors woman!) so it's an accomplishment for me every time. October 11, here I come!

Speaking of marathons...My friend Dana, AKA Mommybrain and Toddlerbrain, (you may remember the sandwich pictures just for her pregnant tummy!) is having some issues with pre-term contractions that are being somewhat persistent. If you have time, please drop by her blog and leave a note of encouragement! She is a WONDERFUL mom, funny lady, and good friend. It breaks my heart that someone who is trying her best to be a great mom and wife still has to suffer through scary times like these. Pulling for ya girl!

Oliver's Dancin Feet

A few days ago when it was so stinkin hot (not having that problem now, are we?!?!), Shawn and I took the boy down to Crossroad's splash park. Oliver had a GREAT time in the water, but it's what he did OUT of the water that still has us scratching our heads...


At the beginning of the dance, you must grab your arms and hoot like an owl.



Then, you shake your tuckus like you have to hula for your life.



Rotate and gyrate as you bounce back and forth on your heels.



Then, for the grand finale, spin all around...



And around...



Hey baby, I'll see you tonight at the 6:00 show. Hey wait? Where are you going? Wait!


And just because I'm going to h-e-double hockey sticks for where my mind went when I saw these, I'm sharing the fun.

Hey! I even have my pants on and I'm still going! Cool!

Party at 4 am and a naughty word...

I must not have had Oliver's monitor up loud enough last night, because when I finally heard the seriously sad "Mama, morning? Mama, get up? Mama??!?!" sobs coming from his room he had already:

1. Locked the door (this happens when he's not quite awake enough to turn the handle, but it means he was working at it for a bit)
2. Turned on the light
3. Rocked for a bit, the rocker was still moving
4. Played trains, the evidence was all over the floor
By the time I got there, he had had enough. He was standing on his train table, sobbing, snot and tears everywhere. Mind you this hasn't happened in a looooong time, so maybe my "HURRY CRYING GET UP FAST" neurons are fading.

As we rocked together when his room had been put back to rights, (after several inquires of "Mama? Wach e show? Wach e moo-ee? Yeah, yeah!" and SEVERAL explanations about how 4 am wasn't time to watch Elmo...) we must have woken Shawn up, because Oliver told me all about how he could hear Dada in the bathroom. Walking back to bed, Dada tooted and Oliver heard. He then proceeded to tell me all about toots until I was able to get him to quiet down again. Just as I thought he was going to get sleepy, I hear his little voice, very soft, very tentative....

"Fart"

I busted up like you wouldn't believe. It was a combination of timing, his "I know this might be a naughty word, but I'm going to try it out on you anyway" voice, and then, the GIGGLES. I lost it, so of course he started chanting "Fart Mama, Fart!" and we were both laughing pretty hard.

I'm hoping that the fact he fell asleep pretty quick after our giggle fest at 4:30 am will allow his memory to forget that one. Still, I hope I never forget that soft, sweet little voice saying his first "naughty" word. Fart.

Awards, friends, and SANDWICH PORN

This whole blogging thing (when I'm not off on Oliver and Shawn related trips!) is great fun. I have been slacking a bit lately, but was planning on a few posts this week. My whole issue with this is, I don't really have all that much traffic. Sure, you, my loyal friends and family (Kolby, lovin Tager's sign language video!!!! Tina, we HAVE to get together again, Thanksgiving two years ago was much too long ago!! LOL).

That might not be an issue this week, so here I am, getting off my tuckus getting a post done. This was orginally going to be titled "For Dana: SANDWICH PORN". I'll explain that in a bit...Dana, the lady in the title, is a great friend and has a very, very, very great blog herself. Two as a matter of fact. And a toddler. And she's pregnant. Whew. Too busy for this girl! Anyway, she presented me this morning with an AWARD and bestowed it with some very sweet words that, truth be told, kinda made me weepy. Thank you, I actually really needed that this week!

So, just in case I get a bit more traffic this week, I'll get those photography posts up (days 12-14 of the Jessica Sprague class were really cool!), put up some posts about our adventures lately (Oliver now has his own "mo-er-cy-kle", and we hit Las Vegas for kids AKA Great Wolf Lodge), a bit more about my own exploits (can we just say that I've had waaaaayyyyy too much wine the last week?!?!? LOL). But, first, let's honor the dear lady known as Mommybrain...

Dana, you had to go and do it, didn't you? You had to extol the virtues of a crack-shop, errr, sandwich shop called...JIMMY JOHNS. It must have been fate that my very first visit to JJ's was punctuated by a huge hug, totally unexpected, from you! For everyone else, let me explain. Dana is expecting her second little one, and has been craving a Jimmy John's sandwich quite frequently. I finally found this place she has been waxing rapasodic about, and who's there? YEP. DANA!!! TOOO FUNNY. Since then, I have taken a JJ's to Shawn for lunch, and now HE'S craving them too...AND HE'S NOT PREGGERS!!! Seriously, since my first visit to JJ's on Thursday the 6th, we have been to JJ's THREE TIMES. Yes, THREE times in 6 days. So, without further ado, the sandwich porn. PS: Dana, there is a JJ's in Redmond too...Right by the new Whole Foods...5 freekin minutes from my house, 1 freekin minute from Shawn's office...

The anticipation...

Oh yeah baby, I love the way you stick that tomato out.

Ohhhh, are you letting your alfalfa sprouts hang out? Let them out!

I love the crinkle of your paper, it sounds so naughty.

Oh, oh, oh, munch, slurp, snarf...

Don't say I didn't warn you, it was titled SANDWICH PORN! LOL

Confession Time...

I'm going to say it out loud, here on the blog so you all hold me to it...I'm going to run the Spokane 1/2 Marathon in October.

Whew. I said it! I started my "training" today, building milage each week until I'm ready (ha! as if!) for the 13.1 on October 11. Four miles today and next Sunday with smaller runs and cross training during the week.

I must say, when I hit mile 3 today, the calves quit hurting and I hit my stride. Could have done 5 miles today, but I'm going to stick with the schedule so I don't burn myself out.

I'll be blogging about this as I go, not so much to report out to all of you, but to have a journal of sorts for me to look back on.

So, why am I doing this? A couple of reasons:
1. I hate running, and you should do at least one thing you hate and have to really push yourself for at least once in your life. That said, I'm kinda getting hooked on the "runner's high" that I'm starting to get...
2. I need to get in shape, and having a goal to aim for is pretty motivating.
3. My sister Megan is such a great inspiration; she ran the full Spokane last year! I love my sis with all of my heart, and truth be told, I wish I were more like her in several ways. So, I'm giving this running thing a shot. THANK YOU MEGS!
4. I want to say to Oliver that your physical health is important AND walk the talk.
5. Cool t-shirt at the end. (just kidding!)
6. Hey, it's something else to scrap about! HA!
7. It will be nice to have something to also "walk the talk" about when I'm teaching my students their Health units this year.
8. Running is good thinking time. Me time. Alone time. I plan to think deeply about the problems of the world, and I'll get back to you when I've solved world hunger and the problems with the Middle East.

Thanks for your support!

Day 11: Selective coloring

Day 11 was a refresher of sorts for me, I had taken another Photoshop class where I learned to add a black and white layer then erase the layer where you wanted the color to show. JS had us instead add a hue/saturation adjustment layer, drop the saturation to add a very subtle sepia tone, then use a black paint brush to mask out the areas you didn't want the adjustment layer to show. I like her technique much better as you can go back and use a white paint brush to touch up the areas you got a bit overzealous with. Overall, it's not a technique I use a lot, but there are some photos that just scream for this treatment.

This photo was shot by Shawn at the Pacific Science Center butterfly house. Nice bokeh babe! (bokeh is the term used to refer to the ultra blurred background behind a sharply focused subject. Don't I sound all smart and stuff! LOL!)

Day Ten: A mishmash

Yes, there is no day 9, it's a pretty subtle technique that I won't bore you with. However, today's photo incorporated Day 9: The photo edge burn. Day 10 was taking a photo through the use of: layering to adjust color, layering in texture, clipping to a mask, adding a transparency, adding type, and creating an edge burned effect (darkens the outer edges so that the eye moves inward). This was taken on the Fourth of July overlooking Lake Washington from my good friend Adrienne's condo. Thanks for the invite girl! See, I DID do something with all of those sunset photos! LOL!

SOOC shot:



The same shot, cropped and "funned" up:

I'm still not real happy with the placement of the text, I think I should have moved it down a smidge.