On to week 13...

WOW!! It's been almost a month since my last post! In my defense the envelope stuffing has been taking up most of my free time. We started with 56 boxes (each has 500 envelopes in it), and are now down to 12 boxes! The deadline is May 30th - so it's a good thing we're almost done! There have been lots of offers to help (thanks to all of you!) and many friends have come by (repeatedly, in some cases) to spend time helping me with this project. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU to all of you who gave up time for this. And a SUPER THANK YOU to my husband, Nick, who's been stuffing envelopes in his free time - even when I'm not there to help!

Since my last post and a few great things have happened... I received a donation from a name I didn't recognize and after investigating found out that this person, Jennifer, wanted to make a donation to CCFA (her nephew, Mark, has Crohn's), she's a runner, and somehow she found my blog and webpage. Of ALL the people participating in this event, she could have donated to anyone but I was lucky enough to receive her generosity! In an effort to thank her the team dedicated our long run in week 12 to Mark! Check out the pic below!

I also got notice that my father-in-law's company does corporate matching, so his donation was doubled - completely unexpected! I've been counting the dollars as they come and was pretty sure the envelope stuffing would carry me to the goal, but with these two surprises I'll be coming in over!! I am super appreciative of each and every donation!

On to the training.... It's been going really well, I think. The 10 miles last weekend from Solana Beach to Torrey Pines was not easy and the hills were evil, but there's still time to get better before race day. We have 8 weeks to go and I feel fine when the running is basically flat so there's hope that I'll finish with a great time in Napa! A lot of credit has to go to the team and coaches, though! Everyone is so encouraging and supportive - I am certain I wouldn't be doing this well if it weren't for their instruction, help, and cheering! Thanks to all of you guys!

Finishing week 9, just starting the envelopes!

Week 9 - a recovery week. Apparently all this means is that we run less on Saturday (6 miles this Saturday, rather than last Saturday's 9). As for the week, there was little "recovery" - just lots of running. But, it's all still going pretty well and the fundraising is steadily moving along... I'm almost at 70% of my goal!! Hooray! Thanks to all who've donated!

The envelopes for the Rock N Roll Marathon arrived on Monday this week! Our spare bedroom is now envelope HQ for an operation that is taking over all of my free time. The good news is that there have been lots of offers of help from everyone. My SUPER husband also has been working on boxes each night this week, too. Because of his help, we have 4,000 done, 24,000 to go! Pics below are of the room with all the stuff in it and the first completed box, which was done on Monday night.

I'm off to stuff... Hope everyone has a great Friday and a fun weekend!

The End of Week 8...

Hooray - it's the end of week 8! On to a recovery week - which in the past, hasn't felt as good as it's sounds. Running is still a lot of work - recovery week or not!

I'm writing this from the infusion center at UCSD today (which also happens to be Easter - Happy Easter!). I started Remicade two weeks ago and am still in the "load" phase. I'll be back in a month and then the normal schedule will be every other month. The process takes 2 hours or so and I thought the Benadryl was going to make me tired, but not so this time. I am wide awake and able to get lots done. Thanks UCSD for free wi-fi while my veins suck up the drugs!

It's a little strange being here because this is where cancer patients also come to get chemo. I feel like I'm in the movie Fight Club - an invader. However, it's just another reminder that I'm lucky to have drugs that work and that I'm not in bad shape. Things are good!

As for the running... Saturday involved 9 miles, but it was nice and flat which made it tolerable. I thought it was going to be tough because I'm not good at hydrating myself, but we did pretty well. I showed that we were running 8:40 miles, so not too bad. But, some of the faster people were missing (in part because of our pub crawl the night before) and my pace (as evidenced by 8:40 miles) is slower than theirs. I'm sure the time will improve - we still have 10 weeks to go!

I'm including photos of the "crawlers" from Friday night! Thanks to everyone who came out! We had a fun time and the bars that participated (Splash, El Take It Easy, The Office, True North, Pink) as well as the businesses that donated to the raffle (Queen Bees and Pigment) helped make our event excellent! The next event will be envelope stuffing; the delivery is coming tomorrow (Monday) and I'll be sure to send out announcements about envelope parties soon (as well as pics)!

Hope you all have a good week!

Finishing Up Week 7

WOW! I've been really slacking with the blog posts! Actually, there hasn't been a lot to say that is super interesting. It is running after all...

In any case... we did 75 minutes last Saturday on the coast again (Fletcher Cove in Solana Beach). According to the USATF website, it looks like we ran a total of 9 miles around an 8:30 minute/mile pace. Not too bad! We are running this Saturday at Lake Miramar - 8 miles. It's supposed to be sunny and warm! We're finally throwing in distances to our practices and that somehow makes me feel like the runs will be longer. But, clearly, last Saturday we did more! Oh well!

On Wednesday we did fartlek's (yep - said like fart + leak). These are not fun - 1 minute of faster-ish pacing, followed by 1 minute of slower-ish pacing. We did this for 24 minutes and were told by the running coach that Wednesday's practice was going to seem easy as we get further into the training. This did not motivate me to want to keep doing fartlek's (I call them on/off's)!

The pic below is of my good friend Frances and me at practice last Wednesday. She's also running and fundraising - which is awesome! She's a great friend to do this - all while she and her squadron are getting ready to deploy in late July.

Some upcoming events Frances and I are planning to help raise more $$:

Friday, 4/22
Pub crawl in North Park at 6p. $10 donation and drink specials! Details to come!

Envelope stuffing for Rock N Roll Marathon. They've agreed to donate $800 to our fundraising. We just have to stuff 28,000 envelopes in 4 weeks (don't do the math - it's a scary number!).

If you're interested in any of these opportunities let me know!

Have a good rest of the week, everyone!

Moonlight Beach run on Saturday, 3.26.11

Above are pictures from our run on Saturday at Moonlight Beach in Encinitas.  It was a very LONG 75 minutes, but we did just over 8 miles (or so says the USATF site).   The weather was cool, though, which helped.
I ended getting home too late for the hike for the hike with husband, friends, and dogs.  It's probably a good thing - my legs wanted to do nothing for the rest of the day.
On to week 5... !

wrapping up week 4

it's friday afternoon and week 4 started wet and is ending a little damp.  it's good though - free water is always better than turning on my sprinklers!

this week the runs were a little more challenging... i ran with the advanced runners on wednesday night in pacific beach.  the run was supposed to be an easy 15 minutes out and then 16 minutes back of 1 minute fast and one minute slow, alternating.  the advanced runners that night were all guys and their easy pace is a little faster than mine.  so, the 15 minutes out was work, and then doing the on/offs was evil!  i stayed with them and when it was over i just wanted to go home and go to bed.  but, it's good to have other people to run with.

tomorrow is another group run in encinitas (about 45 minutes north of my house).  the nice part about run is that it's by the water - which i don't see much on my side of town.  it's also fun to check out other parts of SD that i wouldn't necessarily travel to on my own.  i think we are running 75 minutes tomorrow - i hope i survive!  and then there might be plans afterwards to go hiking with my dog, husband, and friends.  doing nothing on sunday is going to be GREAT!

Week 3 Complete!

so here we go... week three is done.  we ran in PB (Pacific Beach) on wednesday this week and then at lake murray this past saturday.  we've been focusing on "time on feet" rather than "distance on feet."

saturdays are our long run days.  the beginner & intermediate folks did 50 minutes, advanced ran for 60.  lake murray is an "in and out" and is about 6 miles round trip.  i decided to run with the advanced people because... really i don't know why i decided to.  i just did.  we did at least 6 miles, maybe even a little more.  i think ending week 3 by doing a 1/2 of the total distance is really good.  things are looking up for july!

i also am running on my own... either doing the college area run on the days i work or going to chollas on my days off.  i even took mason (the dog) with me for one run.  he's not exactly comfortable to run with but there are parts of chollas where i can let him off his leash, and then he's great!

hope everyone had a great weekend!  on to week 4!