Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Honeydew Melon

Thanks BabyCenter.  And we're having babies Friday - 35w1d - so place your bets.

http://www.expectnet.com/games/dilbatotini

Sunday, July 24, 2011

NYC Marathon Training, Week 3

15 Weeks to go. And so it continues.

Monday
Scheduled: Rest
Actual: Rest


Tuesday
Scheduled: 3 m
Actual: 3 m (28:01) and Crossfit (29 squats and 400 runs. I did 65 lbs on the squat and was sore for 2 days. I think I did 4 sets in 25 minutes.)

Wednesday
Scheduled: 5 m
Actual: Rest.

Thursday
Scheduled: 3 m
Actual: 3 m (29:47, 101 degrees without index, holy hell) and Crossfit (deadlifts and pullups. Did 135# and green band, 55 reps total of each).

Friday
Scheduled: Rest
Actual: 5 m on treadmill (43 and change)

Saturday
Scheduled: 6 m (long)
Actual: Rest.

Sunday
Scheduled: Cross
Actual: 6.75 m (1:05:51. And I only stopped 4 times which is a record for me, not even considering it was 83 degrees and so humid I literally dripped when I stopped)

Weight:unknown, since I refuse to record a number after eating fast food :)


Saturday, July 23, 2011

shopping

Since we sold our house, we've been house shopping!

Keep in mind we saw 46 houses before buying in PA, so we anticipated nothing less here, especially given our quite limited budget given our losses in PA and the reality of NJ real estate taxes (about double PA, like everything else here).

We've seen some gems....mostly gems of estates, with "vintage" kitchens circa 1953 and not touched since, original carpet, second floors that smell like they haven't seen an open window since 1964.  In an effort to not be a digital packrat, I've deleted the photos from the places we walked out of saying "not a cold chance in hell".

But here's some gems from the houses we've considered...

This one is a nice property. 3/1, with potential for expansion with just a small/bathroom sized dormer into 4/2.  Nice big corner lot (by our standards, about 1/4 acre) nice neighborhood and good schools (just 3 blocks away!), though the other side of the street backs up to a small highway.
Lawn furniture needs to be on FAUX GRASS. Don't hurt the real grass. The gnome is watching.

An older house, also in a good area, nice fenced yard, some character. 3/1 with a big family room addition on the back.
And creative decor all over the basement. Plywood and spraypaint is my idea of a finished basement for sure!

These are from a tiny little house, one our realtor calls a "dollhouse". It is actually super cute, a 2/1 with a fenced yard and a nice garage and a finished basement.
Random pile of painted rocks in the middle of the basement.

OH. Enter the finished area, and its a basement "fireplace". Interesting remodeling choice, but OK.


And the kitchen...compare the width of that doorway to the width of the stove.  No requirement to host Thanksgiving!


Monday, July 18, 2011

NYC Marathon Training, Week 2

Week 1 was a success. Onward and upward right?

Monday
Scheduled: Rest
Actual: Crossfit. I honestly have no idea what I did Monday night. I need to find my book. In the car I hope (?)

Tuesday
Scheduled: 3 m
Actual: Rest. I can't recall why either.

Wednesday
Scheduled: 5 m
Actual: Rest. House shopping. Good excuse I think!

Thursday
Scheduled: 3 m
Actual: 3 m (28 and change, neighborhood I'm house shopping in) and Crossfit (managed 2.6ish rounds of the WOD, which included waiter walks (35# - kind of complicated to type out but a basic movement in practice), lots of sit ups, and supermans.

Friday
Scheduled: Rest
Actual: 3 m (29:29, first mile was with the pup)

Saturday
Scheduled: 9 m (long)
Actual: 5 m (48:33. did about 1/2 mile with Bailey, then 6x400, then went home. Then felt guilty and returned out for another 1.5 miles, albeit with lots of stops. Time does not include stops of course. Intervals ranged from 2:07/8:30 pace (first one - wtf?) to 1:52/7:31 pace.)

Sunday
Scheduled: Cross
Actual: 9 mi. 1:30 ish. I almost bailed at 6... stopped at home for a while...waiting till evening - in 85+ heat - AND eating ( fabulous) Red Robin for lunch was a bad combo. I stopped a lot (watch off! ) That said, the last three miles felt better than the first three!

Weight: 167 (this is from 7/18 though; I forgot to weigh myself over the weekend)



Thursday, July 14, 2011

pineapples.

Today my baby mama is 33 weeks pregnant! Just one more milestone to go!
I get weekly emails from a baby site, and word on the street is she is carrying around two PINEAPPLE sized kiddos. Unreal. Tough cookie, my wife is, considering she's going to be pregnant for 4 more weeks!

Monday, July 11, 2011

name games.

We picked out first names for the babies long ago. No debate really. We have similar taste. Easy peasy.

But middle names.
Ugh.

Now, keep in mind, neither of us use our middle names. I kind of want to skip them since we're having issues and the babies will have a massive last name, but have been vetoed. We like the idea the kids could choose to go by their first or middle name later, or even both (ala Bobby Jo?). There is some merit though, to this since my brother uses his first name professionally (its kind of awful) and his middle at school/socially.
So help me out. What criteria did you use to pick middle names?

Sunday, July 10, 2011

NYC Marathon Training, Week 1

And so we begin the 18 week program....I'm planning to do weekly recaps ala a blog I follow in an effort to keep myself on track.


Monday
Scheduled: Rest
Actual: Rest. 4th of July, yo.

Tuesday
Scheduled: 3 miles
Acutal: 3.37 mile run, 31:20. Woot for a successful first day of training. Excuse me while I pat myself on the back. (Train station to flat land for 6x400. Stopped - always untimed - about 6 times. I'll blame the heat.  Intervals from 1:47/7:10 pace to 2:05/8:23 pace. Not bad, aside from being a pretty broad spread! I think that slow one was half uphill though.)

Wednesday
Scheduled: 5 miles
Actual: 3.04 miles, 26:44. (around the gym sort of, no idea on number of stops. At least one when I accidentally ran into the train station parking lot)
& Crossfit WOD. I can't remember the Rx offhand, but in 20 minutes I did 3 rounds + 10 shoulder presses of 6 rope progressions, 5 kick ups (aiming for a handstand pushup), 15 should presses (45#), and 10 overhead squats (45#).

Thursday
Scheduled: 3 miles.
Actual: Dinner at a Mexican restaurant. Happy Birthday to me.

Friday
Scheduled: rest
Actual: 3.34 miles within the Crossfit WOD, which included 75 burpies. I might have cheated a little on the burpies and not hit the ground on almost all of them. It was raining. And I was wearing my favorite race tee. I can't remember my total time but I timed the running parts and that was around 27:30.

Saturday:
Scheduled: 8 miles
Actual: 2.07 miles, 19:51 with the dog. This is probably our fastest run together. I think I need to figure out how to run and not slow down with the leash, because I KNOW he is faster than me!

Sunday: 
Scheduled: crosstraining
Actual: 9.64, 1:34 or thereabouts. I went to a running group for the first time ever this morning. They were doing 6-10, and I decided to take the 6 route and do the last two on my own (I was worried I couldn't keep up at the end and didn't want to look like a tool my first time out.   I did 6 miles there, or so I thought...the woman I was running with stopped off at her house, and I headed back to my car, and went home to get the dog for my last two.

Then I realized it was a lot later than it should have been. Anyway, I went home and got Bailey, and we did a mile. Despite our good run Saturday, he was not having it (10:47, not counting total stops), and I did the last mile on my own.

Then I downloaded my garmin (9:46 average). Then I saw a giant streak of non-recording. Um. Ok. So I finally hooked up the Garmin Connect business to see the streets I missed, and backtracked my run on mapmyrun.com.  Looks like I didn't record about 1.64 miles, give or take (hah). I have no idea how long it was, running with my new stroller pushing runner maybe-buddy, so I decided just to record it under the average pace of the rest of the run.

Anyway, long run success.

Total mileage for the week: 21.3
Crossfit: 2x

Weight: 167.5 Saturday AM


Monday, July 4, 2011

on the road again

OK, like my track record indicates (I won't even link to all of these posts) I have a lot of trouble getting motivated to run outside a training plan. I haven't done well at all trying to stick to the 5k plan I posted since, well, I can run 3 miles without a problem and I just am not in a mindset right now that makes me feel I can run them well (e.g. PR, etc).

So I've sort of moved on. I'm scheduled to run NYC this fall (and am nervous about training since a) it is a full and my half training of recent (er, 18 months+) has blown/I am lazy and b) we will have two little helpless babies at home). Given these "issues, I've opted for  a lower mileage plan (as compared to the plans I was browsing aiming for a 4 hr race, "intermediate" training, and so forth.

Enter Mr. Hal. I used Hal Hidgon's novice half program for my first (really second but first in years) half in 2007 with great success (broke 2 hrs on my first try!).  I used other plans for my 2007 and 2008 fulls but have decided its time to go back to my roots for my 2011 full (which I will not screw up, lol. I can do this, right?)

So Hal's Novice Full program it is!  I decided this week - since training starts next week on this 18 week program, omg - I would do the program with a 6-7 mile long run to ramp up (one ramp!) to the 8 mile run next weekend.   There's two really appealing things about this program:
1) It has 4 days/week of running. In my experience, its REALLY hard to do more than that + crosstrain + go to work + do things like see my relatives I live with.
2) I has stepback weeks. I think this will be really important to my sanity this fall. See previous note about upcoming babies.

So this week, I embarked on my trial run of sorts...here's how it went:

Monday: Rest & dinner out with both of our moms!

Tuesday: Crossfit. I was supposed to run 3 miles too but I was SO tired from our 4:30 am trip to the airport with my mother in law.  We did handstand pushups and pullups for 20 minutes. I can't do either, so you can imagine how modified it was. And I'm super graceful. I am sure the coaches laughed about me all night.

Wednesday:  planned 3 miles with 6x400. Did 2.98 with 6x400 (splits from 1:54/7:36 pace to 2:01/8:05 pace). Also did 0.8 with the dog.

Thursday: did 3 miles. Planned on Crossfit but bailed.

Friday: did 5 miles split between a 2 & a 3 mile run about 30 minutes apart. Overall pace was 8:49 but I stopped a lot in the last couple of miles...

Saturday: rest day, swam 1/4 mile though...

Sunday: 7 miles on the schedule. Did nil.
Oops.

Marathon training starts this week though, no more excuses!

Friday, July 1, 2011

showered

We've been so lucky to have such generous friends and family.

First, the team we (used to, sob) coach threw us a shower...


Then my "internet friends" threw us an INCREDIBLELY generous virtual shower!
just one of the awesome gifts!




Then our families threw one!






We still need a bunch of little things, but we have some duplicate items so I think its all pretty much covered....now to find a house for our babies to grow up in...