Random ramble

I've been thinking some lately about how I named this blog and intended it's content to be triathlon related. And yet, I don't really do triathlons. Not right now anyway, and there are days where I wonder whether I'll even get beyond the occasional sprint distance race. I really have nothing of value to offer in the triathlon forum, I'm just a pregnant lady trying to not get too fat over the next 16 weeks (but yes, today I bought a mixed berry pie) and then I'll be a nursing mom (which made running pretty uncomfortable last time) trying to lose the baby weight. Would I love to do something like an Ironman race someday? Sure. But the earliest I see something of that magnitude working it's way into my life is approximately 2016. Even then, how would I really work it out so I still had time to spend with the kids, husband and work? Maybe I never will. I'm in awe of how some people are able to do it while balancing things so well and then I've seen some things that make me wonder how people could skew their lives so completely over something that's really extra in life, not essential. Maybe it's just that it's not essential to me. I realize that could also change with time.

I've already got a first race planned for next season, though. It's an annual local 5K, the same one Hot Wheels and Superdad are going to race at next Saturday. The baby will be about 8 months old by then, surely I can manage to plod through a measly 3.1 miles. Then there's a sprint tri in August at work, I'm planning to volunteer this year and then return to race it next year. Maybe I can improve on my second-to-last finish from last season, but maybe not. And really, that's fine with me. I think what I'm really lacking is the competitive gene. What is it that keeps me from wanting to push myself? Again, I'm not much for introspective thought lately, so I'm not too worried about it.

I do know that the first 3 days of spring have wiped the boys out and I'm so glad we've had this time together. After a couple hours with dad at the park on Thursday, our long day outside yesterday and then an afternoon with me, grandma and grandpa today at the park, they're both snoring away on the couch, the wonderful breeze coming through the curtains on this gorgeous Saturday afternoon at almost 70 degrees. I guess this is just where I'm at right now. If training for a sprint tri, or maybe an Olympic, is something I can do while maintaining my current work-family-training balance with time, great. If not, triathlons aren't going anywhere before the kids are grown and on their own. For now I'm content to be a wannabe triathlete, but I don't really wannabe anywhere other than where I'm at.

And yes, I am feeling better, thanks.

The perfect day

It was actually a decent week overall, I had three really good workouts and then 2 unscheduled days off. But, such is life with two young kids that don't often sleep well, so I'll focus on the 3 good workouts and keep it at that.

The weather most of the week was awful, which was unfortunate for many families that had kids home on April vacation. However, yesterday afternoon and today were gorgeous. I decided to take a half vacation day, especially since work has been a bit depressing and stressful lately, with a round of layoffs last week and another one expected next week. We headed off to the state park with the boys and spent about an hour and a half on the beach. At first they didn't like the idea of getting their feet wet, but once I took off my shoes and they saw me get my feet wet, well, they couldn't get enough of it. Of course even with their jeans rolled up to their knees they ended up soaked, but it was great to see how much fun they were having running into, and away from, the very small waves that come ashore at our beaches. We had to run to the grocery store and stop by the registration office for Hot Wheels' kids race next Saturday. Superdad has decided to run the 5K as well and his brother's going to run, too, and our 5-year old nephew will run the kids race with Hot Wheels. We got home, grilled some chicken (marinated in a chili pepper and pineapple marinade we bought at Target from Archer Farms- excellent stuff!), with baked potatoes and corn on the cob. Then we took the dogs out for a walk around the neighborhood and finished it all off with a water pistol fight in the yard, which turned into an everyone-get-mom affair. Just the perfect day. The boys are relaxing with a little classic Tom and Jerry before heading off to bed.

There are only six weeks left before my triathlon swim. I'm planning to hit the pool faithfully on Tuesdays and Fridays between now and then. That's the plan, anyway. Now that the weather's getting a little warmer, maybe I'll be more in the mood to swim than I have been as of late. I'm bummed that my mini lap counter is still on backorder, but it should be here in a few weeks.

Pregnancy status: 114 days to go

Blah

That's about the only way I can describe how I'm feeling. I didn't have anything of consequence to say this week, the funeral on Tuesday was nice for a funeral. It was fun to see a lot of family I haven't seen in years although there were obviously some tough times. Watching my grandmother say good-bye to her oldest daughter was very sad. She has so much faith, though, she was strong through the whole thing and kept reminding us how happy she is that my grandfather now has his daughter with him. She's survived her husband by almost 11 years and now her oldest daughter as well, it doesn't seem fair. It was also tough seeing my aunt's grandchildren saying good-bye. She has four grand-daughters ages 13, 12, 9 and 7. The poor girls were inconsolable on the way out of the church after the service, I think that was more upsetting to everyone than anything else. On a side note, the priest celebrating the funeral mass actually answered his cell phone during the service! His phone rang during one of the readings and he left the sanctuary to answer it in another room. My cousins were a bit outraged.

I made it to the gym three times, nothing great to report there. Spin class is back this session on Thursday mornings and that's always a tough workout. Other than that we were hit with another round of lay-offs at work this week and I'm likely to be shuffled in with a new boss and new responsibilities within the next couple weeks. On one hand I'm looking forward to the change and new challenge, on the other hand, it's not really my best time for adjusting well to changes. My brain's a bit scattered lately, but I'll get through.

Today we're celebrating Hot Wheels' birthday with my husband's side of the family so the six cousins will all have fun playing together. We'll have baseball and tetherball outside and other outdoor toys before we come inside and eat the delicious cake! I might be posting less often if I don't have much to say, I'll still be around, though, and you never know when the mood might strike me to share all the mundane stuff going on here.

Pregnancy status: 120 days to go.

A week of highs and lows

Earlier this week we celebrated Hot Wheels' fourth birthday. The night before, after the kids went to bed, I decorated the house with numerous birthday decorations. Including 15 2-foot metallic streamer type decorations with different pieces hanging from the bottom that look like hats, cakes, balloons, stars, etc. I realized that our ceiling paint is not amenable to sticking scotch tape so I had to settle for doorways and items to hang them from. This makes the ones in the doorway a bit low if you're over 40 inches tall, as two of the house occupants are. Anyway, it's worth it because Hot Wheels was very excited when I called from work to wish him a happy birthday. In a couple days we'll take them down again until Superman turns three. We went to Chuck E Cheese's for lunch and invited one of Hot Wheels' friends from school along with his mother. The kids all had fun playing the games and then we came home and Hot Wheels opened his gifts. He got the ESPN Better Batter set, which is really cool. He also got a set of Star Wars books and 2 new lightsabers that light up and make cool noises. We all had a sword fight since we now have 4 lightsabers and then we played baseball in the family room for an hour or so. It was a great day. I love that the boys are getting old enough that some of their toys are really fun. Before he went to sleep I told Hot Wheels about the day he was born, he likes to hear about it, and how when he was born he gave us the best present ever, our new names- mom and dad. He thinks it's cool that he's the one that made us mom and dad, although he doesn't get to concept that we were ever anything else. It's funny to think about.

That was clearly the highlight of the week. The low point would be this morning when I learned that my aunt passed away due to complications from Alzheimer's disease. She was only 66 years old and she was such a social and vibrant woman that it was really sad to see what this disease robbed her of over the past few years. I am sorry for my mother, it's her older sister, because she arrived at the nursing home only a couple hours after she had passed away. I know she really wanted a chance to say good bye, whether my aunt would have been aware of her presence or not I'm not sure, but I think it would have brought her some closure. It's also especially sad for my grandmother who has now outlived her husband and oldest child. She's a strong woman, my grandmother, still living on her own at almost 89 years old. Guess I'll be making a trip for the funeral this week. It will be nice to see family that I haven't seen since our wedding, but too bad that it's not under better circumstances.

Nutritionally another bomb of a week. My workouts were off (see the ugliest mile) and I guess I decided this week that I should eat everything in sight, including birthday cupcakes, more cherry pie and a piece of carrot cake at lunch. I hope it's a phase. If it's not I'll be outgrowing my maternity pants pretty soon. Whatever, I'm just going to take things easy for a couple days and then worry about getting back into the normal swing of things. Maybe I'm on a hormone overload week. I guess it happens when a parasite Critter is aboard.

Pregnancy status: 21 weeks, 5 days. 128 days to go.

The ugliest mile

I was awake before the alarm went off, a good sign that I'm ready to get up. But I was so comfortable I just stayed in bed for about 10 minutes, Critter was awake and rolling around so I poked and he or she kicked for a few minutes just to say good morning.

I approached the treadmill, the one under the TV with ESPN, hoping for a good Sportscenter to keep my occupied for a while. Enter weight: ugghh, weight. Oh well, at least I get credit for burning more calories now that I'm trying to move more weight over that distance. Enter speed: 6.0mph- I can still do a 10-minute mile, sure. Go.

The first 2 minutes are always awful, I know that. Usually by about 4 minutes, things improve. At six minutes, I needed to take the towel that had been covering the display off to wipe my face. SIX? That's it? Maybe the display is broken and it's really supposed to be sixteen. No? Crap. Alright 4 more minutes, I can do it. Heart rate check- 165 a little high for only six minutes in. I usually leave the display covered while running but I watched just about every second of the next 4 minutes tick by. At 10:00, 1.0 mile I was done. Heart rate- 170- yeah that's high. Down to 4.0mph, I can walk for 20 minutes, no problem. Between Critter bouncing on my bladder like a trampoline, my heart rate at 170 after only 10 minutes and the fact that I felt like a giant pear trying to shuffle along on the treadmill, it just wasn't happening this morning. I walked an additional mile at 4.0mph but even that seemed harder than usual. An ugly, short workout this morning, but at least that's 200+ calories out for the day that I wouldn't have worked off if I had stayed in bed. (did that yesterday)

There's a bowl of cereal calling my name.

Outdoors and tag sale season

What a great week it was to live around here. Every day last week we were outside at a school playground, park or beach. Except one afternoon when we went to play at the house of some friends. Yesterday we went to the best playground, over near grandma's house. It's at a school and the set-up is awesome. It's a circle with openings at opposite ends- well, I know a circle has no ends, they're just opposite each other. The circle part is a wood-like deck system and every 10 feet or so there is a slide, tunnel or other climber that the kids can take. In the middle of the circle is a rubber like trail surrounded by woodchips with some park benches perfect for moms. The best thing about this playground is that for people watching more than one child, there's nothing that would lead them to take off in opposite directions, as they always seem to do. We were there over an hour and then we went back to grandma's house and the kids ran around for another hour chasing bubbles, balls and other available amusements. Superman was awake for all of 45 seconds on our way home before conking out for a nap over an hour and half long.

Today we went out to the favorite new trail in the woods for another exploring trip. For 2 boys that have such varied interests, we're lucky that they both enjoy these little expeditions as much as they do. We followed a bumblebee, watched water striders on the stream, found the best twisty vines in the woods and took our own version of a path to get where we wanted to go. It was fun and tired them out after an hour and a half. Superman fell asleep while I was carrying him home and took a quick nap.

Yesterday also marked what I think may be the start of tag sale season. In case tag sale is a regional term- it's also garage sale, yard sale and rummage sale season. We hit 2 tag sales yesterday, both hosted by schools. We hit the jackpot on kids books, always my favorite section, at the second tag sale they were 12 for a dollar and we found Berenstain Bears, Franklin, Hot Wheels and Star Wars. The kids got a bunch of junk, but it was a box for 50 cents at one tag sale and a bag for a dollar at the other tag sale. Even if they only play with the stuff until Tuesday, we'll just throw it in the attic until we have a tag sale of our own. I abhor pack rat behavior except when it comes to the kid stuff and books, I guess. I love buying them books. While they do have a lot of toys, I don't mind buying small stuff. Tonight we're playing with Marble Works. It's an awesome track system that we set up so the marbles race through tunnels, down chutes, over jumps and to the finish. It's great for them to see how to set up stuff like that even though they're not quite old enough to make their own tracks yet. Of course they just like to race the marbles through the tracks that we make. Right now, Superman is sending marbles through the tracks and Hot Wheels is playing with his cars on a Little Tikes race track mountain that we picked up at a tag sale last year.
Nothing training related to report. It was an okay week. This coming week is the break between class sessions at the gym, so I might sleep in a bit for a couple days. It's birthday/Easter/my sister visiting week so we'll be busy.

Pregnancy status: 21 weeks, 133 to go.

Nineteen! And first race excitement

I have a confession. I'm a swim slacker. When I started thinking about doing a sprint triathlon about this time last year the only thing I was sure I could do was the swim leg. I swam on a summer swim team for a few years up until I turned sixteen and started working. I wasn't the fastest person on the team, but I don't think I was the slowest. It's possible that I was, but it's one of the only sporting events I was involved with that I don't clearly remember being the worst one on the team. (Softball, basketball, cross-country- worst one on the team, that was me) Anyway, I didn't train much for that sprint triathlon swim, maybe 10 times I hit the pool and we did one open water swim to bike practice as a team. That was the only team training I was able to attend and my coach was clearly underwhelmed by my swimming abilities and gave me some small training tips. Things like- "you end your stroke to early so you're only getting half your stroke finished" and "your entire body position is wrong in the water so you're not swimming efficiently", you know, little things that could easily be fixed in the 2 weeks remaining before the first triathlon of my life. Anyway, I decided I wasn't going to be able to make any big changes at that point, I'd just go with what I've got. When we arrived for the tri, our coach asked us to estimate our times so they could be at the right spots to see us. The swim exit was easy, coach was right by the transition chute checking out our times. I had estimated about 12 minutes for the 500m swim- I think he thought I was giving myself too much credit. I think he was shocked to see me out of the water with a 10:19, putting me in the top 1/3 of the field. As I ran by he turned to someone else with us and said "wow, she's already out?" and I loved that swim, truly I had a great time. My second triathlon, the swim was cut woefully short, it was supposed to be 500 meters, but I think it was more like 300- which is bad for me because the swim's the only spot I can get some distance on anyone at the back. Of course as soon as we hit the bikes they all pass me like I'm standing still.
The point of that rambling was that I'm an okay swimmer to start with. So, when I get to the pool for a swim "workout" I tend to just hang out and do some laps. Nothing too exciting or strenuous, but I figure until I'm something other than a crappy biker and runner, those are the workouts to push myself because I've got tens of minutes of improvement to make there. What am I going to gain by pushing my swimming- maybe 2 minutes in a sprint? It's not great reasoning, but it gives me permission to slack in my own mind. This morning I decided to at least work a little hard for a little while and let me tell you- those of you that workout hard in the pool every time, it's tiring! I can usually repeat 100s on 1:45 continuously but this morning I tried to push it, I got down to the 1:35-1:40 range a few times and I was sucking wind! I'm still having breathing issues, not sure whether it's this cold still weakly kicking around or that I've got pregnancy congestion, so that added some discomfort and difficulty to those repeats. I've enjoyed reading Triteacher's swim analogies. This morning I thought about scooping the water and also swinging the rudder, I mean Critter, towards the wall when breathing. I think that actually helped, although again, good form is tiring. That's when I decided to do a few stroke count 50s. As you might guess from the title of this post, I hit NINETEEN. Okay, I only did that twice, but it was on the non-flip turn leg which I think is more accurate because I tend to push harder off the flip turn than off the start wall. Most of the laps were 20 or 21, still better than the first time I tried counting, all because of form- with some great analogies. Thanks, Triteacher! Maybe I'll have to start putting in real workouts at the pool, some day.

There's a first race coming up at our house and it's not on my race schedule. Hot Wheels is going to participate in his first kids run at a local 5K at the end of April. Dad's planning to run the 5K, I'm considering run/walking it but I'll be a last minute decision. Hot Wheels, though, has been asking for months when he's going to get to run in his first kids race. I wrote the race organizer to find out the distance but she wrote back and said they vary the distance based on the ages of the entrants. Superman keeps saying he wants to run, too, but most of them require that the kids be three and since he just turned two he might have to settle for spectating with mom, dad, grandma and grandpa. Hot Wheels says he's practicing whenever we go outside and he runs around for a while, he seems very excited. I haven't even told him yet, that the race organizer said all the kids get a finisher medal, I'm going to let that be a surprise. If it's a full quarter mile on the track, I'm not sure he can run the whole distance, but we'll see what happens. He keeps telling me that he really wants to win his race and I tell him that as long as he tries that will be great. With the two of us as parents I'm afraid he's more built for endurance than speed so I'm trying to hint that while he might not be the fastest kid, he shouldn't let that bother him. We'll see, he's got 4 weeks to "practice". We're not actually telling him to practice anything, he's doing it on his own, I don't want anyone to think I'm out there with a stop watch pushing intervals on a 4-year old. I'm just so excited that this is something he's really taken an interest in, he says he wants to race like mom and dad. I'm flattered that anyone would call what I do "race", I'm more in the finish-without-dying category, but I'll take the admiration.

Pregnancy status: 20 weeks, 5 days 135 days to go.

While I do enjoy winter

It's just so awesome that spring is really here. Monday after work the kids wanted to go to the playground so we put on coats, hats and gloves and headed off to play in the 45 degree windy weather for an hour or so. Yesterday, it was nearly 65 degrees and gorgeous! We all packed into the car and headed to the nearby state park and beach. Hot Wheels got to play with his remote control monster truck in the park with dad and Superman and I hit the beach for a while. He ran around in that sand like crazy- I told him if he caught a seagull he could bring it home so he was pretty motivated. After about half and hour the battery on the rc truck was done, so Hot Wheels and Dad joined us and then we headed off to do a little hiking around the woods. We didn't get too far, though, we circled a pavilion on a hill and then the boys wanted to run up and down the hill for a while. You can see they enjoyed themselves. I was thinking- "You're voluntarily running hill repeats? Crazy kids." but to see how much fun they had running, and rolling, down that hill and then trying to run back up to the top it really made me realize that this stuff should be, and can be, fun. More nice weather expected today so we'll head out to another beach park for more fun, we're so lucky to live close to some great places to play. To me there's nothing like the smell of the salt water, especially in the spring, and the sound of the waves on the beach. It's almost like a mini-vacation to me just going to the beach for an hour or so, perfect.

I'm finally about over the cold. I'm still too congested to swim, but I hit the elliptical trainer yesterday and this morning I participated in step aerobics class. My joints have definitely gotten looser and I hit the floor once when my ankle rolled, but it was a decent 45 minute class. Tomorrow's cardio intervals class and Friday I'll swim, really, I will.

Celebrating Half Way

Today's the day that Critter's half done cooking! Only 140 left to go, time's really been flying by this time around. Makes me wish I'd get another go around, but we'll have a wonderful time as a family of five. It's also the 4-year anniversary of Hot Wheels' due date. He decided to arrive late so we've got a few days until his birthday. Superman arrived right on time, I hope that this one doesn't come early- I lose out on maternity leave if that happens.

Superman and I seem to be on the getting better side of this cold although it's a good thing we bought tissues recently because between the two of us, we polished off a box of 80 tissues yesterday. Not sure I'll make it to the gym tomorrow as the past two nights haven't involved much sleep, we'll see. The weather's not going to be great today, either. I think it's a watching-cartoons-under-a-blanket-on-the-couch-day. That will be fun.

Seriously?

Another cold? I've only really recovered from the last never-ending cold about 2 weeks ago and sure enough, Thursday morning I woke up with a sore throat and the echo in my head could rival something out of the Grand Canyon. I muddled through cardio intervals class on Thursday morning but when I got up to head to the pool yesterday morning I realized I was just not going to make it through a workout. I didn't even make it through the whole day at work, I left at lunch time and came home. Not that I get rest at home, but staring at my computer, trying to make sense of the numbers and words through the haze of the head cold just wasn't working either. Hot Wheels started sniffling on Tuesday but he never really got much sicker. Superman and I, however, have caught this cold full force. Poor Superman had a fever of about 100 degrees yesterday and again today. His cheeks are flushed and his eyes are watery and red. He looks so pathetic and he still refuses to slow down. You'd never know he's sick to watch him running around but when he's not running around he actually sits still, which is not a normal state of being for Superman. He didn't sleep well at all last night, so I'm anticipating that he'll nap this afternoon- another rarity in our lives. I'm hoping I'll be back to the gym on Monday, even if it's just some time on the elliptical trainer or treadmill.

Wednesday morning I decided to sleep in and I stayed home until my 8am doctor's appt. It was nice to be home for a while with the kids before heading out. There's a part of me that thinks maybe it wouldn't be so bad to just give up this working out deal and sleep later in the morning, go to work later, but still get home at the same time. The larger part of me knows it wouldn't be worth it, but sometimes it sounds nice. The ultrasound appointment went well, Critter was active and cooperative. We were able to get all the required pictures for the doctor to declare "Normal Baby Ultrasound". My mom was disappointed that she couldn't figure out whether Critter's a boy or girl, I think she was hoping to figure it out and then she says she would have kept it a secret but I think that's doubtful. The technician was able to tell, but the rest of us will found out in August.

Thanks for all the positive comments and wishes after my post earlier this week. I'm not sure where the pity-party came from, but it's over now, thanks for coming. I think the aches and pains I was feeling were the precursor to this impending cold and I had to think about the fact that even before I was pregnant I had good weeks and bad weeks with working out. It's just life. And people have days when they've got more or less energy no matter where they are in life. The thing I felt most guilty about was my lack of patience with the kids, I hate to feel like I spend all my time with them picking on them- and for much smaller things than I would normally take issue with. I know that they're fine with some time on their own- part of their jobs as kids is to learn to entertain themselves and a down day for us as parents is just going to happen.

Here's a mommy moment: I remember reading an article written by a woman in the United Kingdom about how she's bored to tears by her children. She won't take them to the park or a museum, she doesn't play games with them and she won't come to watch them if they're taking part in activities like sports. She does not attend birthday parties with her children, she sends them with the nanny. She talked about how she was doing the children a favor by teaching them early in life that the world does not revolve around them and how it was just as important that she gets manicures and go shopping as it would be for her to interact with them. There were tons of comments left, some people agreeing with her for not coddling her children, but most expressed disgust at her selfishness and wondered why she had the children in the first place if she didn't want to spend time with them. When I read that I just felt sad for all of them. I admit that not every minute of time spent with the kids is the most exciting, but to be unable to see how wonderful it is to watch your children grow and interact with the world around them is sad for all of them. One of the reasons I want to stay involved with triathlons is that I do agree it's important that my kids see that I have my own interests and for a while after they were born I didn't have much of a balance in my life. We have a small house and there are only about 10 places to hide for a game of hide-and-seek, but all four of us played last night for about 45 minutes and the kids had a blast. How would they feel if I told them it was too boring for mom to play hide-and-seek, they should do it themselves? First I think they'd feel like I was bored by them and not the activity- they couldn't distinguish between the two at this point. Also, I think that will taint their enjoyment of activities, if it's too boring for mom then it's probably too boring for me, too. The article sounded like she does care for her kids I just think later in life they'll all regret the times they didn't share.

It's finally nice outside, almost 50 degrees already at 9am. I think we'll head out for a walk in a little while. The fresh will help knock this cold out faster, I hope.

Pregnancy status: 19 weeks, 6 days; 141 days to go.