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The Great Day of the Turkey 2014

January 23, 2015 by Life is a Run · Leave a Comment

If you have been following us for a while you know that the Capital One Bank Dallas YMCA Turkey Trot is our Turkey Day Tradition! This year was no different! We left the boys at home and headed out to fit in this 8 mile race before the craziness that is Thanksgiving day started. We love this race, the atmosphere, and the fact that it keeps getting better!

This year we got to run this race with our girl Catherine…Chase bailed on us 😉 womp womp!

We rode down together! We were a little sad after DRC Half that we rode separate, and left separate so we sucked it up and went together. Two breast pumping people in one car is a little entertaining. We dare someone to pull us over when that is happening. You do what you gotta do right?

We got to the race right in time, SHOCKING… we know! We wanted to run this as together as possible which sometimes is difficult in this crazy race but we did, minus a few random spots. We all were able to meet back up from separation and finish together! Also we would like to add that they changed the course yet again, but I still think we are a fan of the original. We want to run over the bridge.

We crossed the line together and were super surprised that this year they included a MEDAL!! Not that we run for medals, or are “medal junkies” but we thought it was a fun addition to an already awesome race.

We usually enjoy Mimosas at Beth’s sister house after the race but this year we had to nix that due to time, but we kept the tradition alive just in separate houses. Who doesn’t love a mimosa, or two, or three?

And what would a Thanksgiving post be without now saying that we then spent the rest of the day with our families and had fun enjoying Miles and Lane’s first Thanksgiving!

Perez Family of three! (Hollands didn’t take a family photos – oops?)

DRC Half 2014

January 21, 2015 by Life is a Run · 1 Comment

Not only was DRC Half our first half marathon since having Lane and Miles, but it was also our first time to be separated from our babies and/or breastbumps for an extended period of time – you know what we are saying?? (sorry if you’re a dude reading this) Because we planned to get there at the last possible minute we both rode down there separately. On top of getting down to the race site at the last minute we also planned to leave as soon as we were finished with the half. Not time for dilly dallying for LiAR!

We should mention too, thankfully we both got to run this race together! Teal ended up having to register for the race the morning of. When she got to the registration tent it was 7:14 a.m. (one minute until registration closed) the volunteers were already closing up their computers. This is where we get to insert the babies make getting things done harder excuse, riiight?! Ok, fine, we know we aren’t the first in this world to have babies, but it is interesting to get things done. So don’t be surprised if we periodically use that excuse. 🙂 Anyway, Teal got registered and we met up at the port-a-potties. Do people meet up at other places on race mornings?

When we got to the start line we ran into the lovely Lauren of The Unlikely Runners. So good to briefly catch up with you lady! Our main goals for the day where and stop us if you’ve heard this before – don’t die and finish. 🙂

Oh how goals sure change when you have major things happen to your body! But of course, Lane and Miles are more than worth temporary setbacks in running!

Thanks, Robert, we stole this picture from you! 🙂

We stuck together, chatted each other’s ears off, occasionally listened to the conversations of other runners and appreciated having the other with us!

The weather was nice for our first half back and to that we are thankful to the race day weather gods! 😉 We complete our half running the whole way! We were pretty darn proud of ourselves. If we could run DRC Half then surely we would be able to make it through the half at Dallas Marathon with continued training right?

Well, it would be kind of sad if that was it for the day. Rode by ourselves to the race, complete our first post partum half and then rode home by ourselves, that’s it? No way! Naturally we forced our husbands and our babies to come celebrate with us at brunch afterwards! And we love celebrate with a tasty mimosa. 🙂

With all of that said….that is a wrap on half marathon no. 22!

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again, we love the medal series the Dallas Running Club is doing with this race!

Fun fact: DRC 2013 was our first half as pregnant ladies. Doesn’t it make it fun that 2014 was our first half as moms??

Filed Under: Races Tagged With: Dallas Marathon, Dallas Running Club, DRC Half, Half Marathon, postpartum, pregnant, race, race goals, running

The 2014 Running of Tour des Fleurs 10K

December 4, 2014 by Life is a Run · Leave a Comment

This was the first race we ran together post baby for both of us! If you’ll remember when we ran Liberty by the Lake on the 4th of July that was Teal’s first race back and Lane’s first race on the outside! 🙂

Let’s stop for a second and admire how beautiful White Rock looks in the background of the above and below pictures.

Neither one of us had really run as far as a 10K since having Lane and Miles so we knew that we weren’t reeeeally ready to run TDF, BUT we’ve run it the last 4 years so we didn’t want to miss it this year. We love this race! In fact we probably say that every year. Plus you basically have free admission to the arboretum so we forced our husbands and babies to come along so that we could have photo time afterwards.

Per usual we ran this race with Bitner because he’s part of the tradition of it too. 🙂 Not to mention it’s his birthday weekend so it’s an all around Bitner weekend and we are so glad he made the trip up here from Austin. We are still in denial even now that he has left us for Austin. And our girl, Catherine, came out to run it for a second year with us too. You’re welcome for that, TDF!

The plan for this race was stick together, know there will be some walk breaks and finish! It was a good hour plus of catching up on life, babies and everything in between. We were even lucky enough to catch Mark out there on the lake getting in a 20 mile run for the day.

We finished the race, got our finisher’s hats and made our way to the pumpkins for photos.

hehehe #newmomfail

We will see you next year, Tour des Fleurs! 🙂

Filed Under: Races Tagged With: 10k, arboretum, pumpkins, race, running, Tour des Fleurs, White Rock Lake

Liberty by the Lake 2014

October 21, 2014 by Life is a Run · 1 Comment

Soooo you are pretty used to us being super behind in our race recap so here is our race from JULY!! Whoops!

Liberty by the Lake is a super small local race that we got turned on to by our runner friend Michelle! She hosts a Fourth of July Waffle eating party at her house directly following the race. Who doesn’t love waffles and these are cooked by the lovely and super talented Chef EK?!

We are also a little sentimental about this race because last year we watched our friend Brian run all the way to the race from his house, run the 10k and kill it, and then run to MK’s house, and then home! He was kind of a running badass.

We wanted to squeeze this race in but it was going to be rather interesting. This was Baby P’s first race on the outside and only a week after Teal was cleared to actually run again from her C-section. Beth was also still running at a good 36 weeks pregnant!

Teal had not yet really mastered getting out of the door by a set time and this was really the first time she was going to try and figure out how to nurse an 8 week old, run a race, and get back to nurse him again within a 2 hour window. Let’s just say it was rather interesting! We both got to the race separately and with enough time to check in and find our friends! We managed to squeeze in a few pictures with our favorite runners before the race started.

Thanks, Mama C, for letting us steal this picture from you!

We set out for the 5k and just decided to be super conservative about the “race.” Teal pushed Baby P in the stroller! We basically ran that entire thing, minus a few “insert the pacifier” stops and a small water break at about 2 miles! Baby P survived his first race on the outside with flying colors! Teal was super nervous to take him out and actually run a race but he did awesome!! Beth was still seriously doing awesome and still running with Baby H already at 36 weeks.

It was then off to our Fourth of July celebrations! Beth headed over for waffles and Teal to her granny’s to watch the neighborhood Fourth of July parade. You can definitely say that this year’s Liberty by the Lake was a little more “low key” than last year but nice to see friends and celebrate! 🙂

Finally a picture of MK in the post! Thanks for letting us steal this pic from you too!

Waffle Party attendees

Filed Under: Pregnancy, Races Tagged With: 5k, breastfeeding, Fourth of July, liberty by the lake, postpartum running, pregnant running, race, running, running and nursing, The Colony

Wounded Warrior 2014

October 9, 2014 by Life is a Run · Leave a Comment

Ok, so if you saw yesterday’s post you might be thinking, huh?! Well, we migrated over to our own self-hosted site quite awhile ago, but we still get so many inquires about Advocare over on our old site we thought we’d make it abundantly clear over there we are operating over HERE!

And now we shall take you back into time to four months ago! 🙂 Sorry for all life flashbacks, but we want to keep a record here of our races and what not so back to June when Beth was still pregnant……

For the past three years I have run the Wounded Warrior 10K each June and really love this race even though usually it is super toasty outside. We are talking about June in Texas here. But I didn’t want to miss out on running Wounded Warrior for my fourth year in a row although I’m pretty sure no one would have minded if I said I’m pregnant I’m out this year.

why yes I did take a pre race care selfie 🙂

We actually had a WAY cooler summer this year so I was hoping for some great race day weather! As it turns out it actually was raining that morning and the race was delayed due to lightning and so by the time we did all get out there to run it sure was humid. I was going to take it easier out there and do lots of listening to my body. About 1.5 miles in I had some round ligament pain and had to stop to walk. Of course I had lots of people around me checking on me to make sure I was ok. Such sweet people!

Luckily, my friend, Cassie, out there let me tag-a-long with her on the course and we did a nice run/walk combo to get through the 10K. I’m so glad that I did still commit to running this race. The heat was my biggest fear about keeping up with running. This is probably the least exciting race recap, but if you made it through this then THANKS!

And I shall leave you with this picture because it’s funny! 🙂

hashtag pregnant jokes

Filed Under: Pregnancy, Races Tagged With: 10k, Half Marathon, Irving, pregnant jokes, pregnant running, racing, running, Texas, Wounded Warrior

Running Moms Rock 5K

July 31, 2014 by Life is a Run · Leave a Comment

Back in April I had this brilliant plan that I would keep up with running 5Ks after completing Kacie’s Run and that way I could get a collection of race t-shirts that would fit my growing pregnant belly. Except I pretty much didn’t follow through with that at all. Ha! Both Teal and I had become apart of the local chapter of Moms Run This Town and I heard from our girl, Catherine, that she would be participating in the Running Moms Rock 5K along with some of the other moms.

I might not be a mom to a baby on the outside yet, but I figured since I have a baby cooking I could participate in this 5K, right?

Unlike most races that start in the wee hours of the morning this one was at 5:00 p.m. We are in April here in Texas and the heat has already come out to play for the year, so it was a bit toasty out there. This race was so last minute for me that I actually signed up at the race site.

Even though it was just a 5K, I definitely had a case of the going out too fasts. Oh, well, you live and you learn plus this whole running while pregnant thing is still very new to me. I met up with DK on the course and we completed the 5K together. It was good to have a buddy out there and to catch up with her since I hadn’t seen her in awhile! I brought home a time of 33:58.

25 weeks 3 days pregnant at the Running Moms Rock 5K

Since I was last minute on this race I didn’t get to participate in being on a team for the race and coming up with a costume to wear, but thankfully the other ladies in the MRTT group let me still be apart of their photo after the race! Don’t they look cute?

photo cred: Jolene A from Moms Run This Town

Back to my brilliant plan of running 5K’s so you get a t-shirt instead of a tech tee, well, that definitely didn’t happen here. Who knew they’d actually be passing out tech tees for this race. So while I was successful in running a 5K I was not in having an extra large shirt to fit my pregnant belly. Oh well!

Filed Under: Pregnancy, Races, Uncategorized Tagged With: 5k, highland village, Moms Run This Town, pregnant running, race shirts, races, running, Running Moms Rock, tech tee

Kacie’s Run 2014

July 3, 2014 by Life is a Run · Leave a Comment

Not to get all sentimental but Kacie’s Run is special to us! We have now run it 3 times and was one our first races together when we started all this running madness. Last year we got rained out, booo mother nature, but this year the weather was awesome. As you know this race is put on by Teal’s school district to honor one of their former students and to raise money for Special Olympics! What’s not awesome about that?!

We met up Saturday morning and found some of Teal’s old co-workers. We have talked about our friend, Chris, a few times before and he actually ran his first 50 miler with Catherine at Rocky Raccoon in February. We found him dressed as a Flying Monkey from Wizard of Oz. Yep, we really don’t know why but his entire school was dressed as Wizard of Oz… at least the ones cool enough to dress up. He cracked us up because he was going to just “run” the race until another co-worker, Duncan, wouldn’t dress up because he wanted to “race”. Chris said “Now, I am racing this thing and he will get passed by a flying monkey!” It was on and it was cracking us up!

How cute were this year’s shirts?!

Teal really had no idea what would happen with this race. She basically just showed up either ready to walk the entire thing or run/walk, but probably not run. She really hadn’t run in over 2 weeks and the last time she ran she made it .25 of a mile and had to walk and pee. She basically ran/walked 2 miles and wanted to die. Sorry TMI, but good lord the bladder pressure is REAL! She didn’t drink water before the race (she knows this is bad) to give herself the best chance at not having to pee over the 3.1 miles. IT WORKED! She was actually able to run that entire dang thing without peeing and without walking! It was very interesting to run sans headphones and that pregnant! People on the course were super awesome and supportive and really made it easier to keep running. It’s nice to still be able to move at this point and just be active!

Beth ran this race at just over 21 weeks pregnant! Remember how Chris was going to work on beating Duncan dressed as a flying monkey, well he did and Beth… pregnant Beth, was just behind Duncan by about 8 seconds. Take that! Ha

This was Teal’s last race before Baby Perez got here! We are glad it went well and we look forward to coming back next year. You guys should totally join us! We say this every year, so when are some of you going to take us up on that?!?!

Filed Under: Pregnancy, Races Tagged With: 5k, CFBISD, Kacie's Run, pregnancy, pregnant running, running, running for two, Special Olympics

Rock ‘n’ Roll Dallas 2014

July 2, 2014 by Life is a Run · Leave a Comment

So at this point it’s July and it’s about dang time I put up a recap of my last half marathon in MARCH, right?! Right! Here goes – when we ran New Years Double on January 1st Teal did the half and I did the the full so we found ourselves yet again at not the same half marathon number. Don’t you love how we try and keep that the same?? It just makes it easier to keep count!

I had signed up for Rock ‘n’ Roll Dallas as the last half I would run during this pregnancy. The weather has been pretty good for this race minus 2012 when it was hot! I didn’t then and still don’t now really know how pregnancy and hot weather mix, but it completely scares me! 🙂 Anyway, I thought this would be a great last half to do plus it was great motivation to keep me going with running. And my cousin/friend, Chase, would be coming up from Houston to run this race as well!

It was hard to have goals for this race other than finish it! At 20 weeks pregnant and still not really noticeable that I am pregnant I just didn’t know what my body would want to do that day. While you couldn’t totally tell I was pregnant my pace had definitely slowed down some so I knew I was not going to be busting out a new PR or anything that day. Of course, as race day got closer I did have this idea in my head that maybe I could achieve a 2:10 half, but again this would take a lot of listening to my body.

I got in my corral just minutes before the first corral was signaled to take off. I was getting nervous, but was also thankful that it was kind of chilly out there instead of really, really hot! When it was our turn Chase and I took off together although we didn’t stay together long because of a potty break. 🙂 In our family we joke about how some of us have the world’s smallest bladders and lucky for both Chase and me we inherited it! I knew I would see some friendly faces out on the course so I just tried to start off conservatively and keep an eye out for people to say “hi” to!

photo cred to Amy Stubblefield

My first sighting was Amy from NTX Runners who snapped the above picture of me. Since I waited until the beginning of July to write this recap (minus the few notes I put in my phone) I can’t remember now when I expected to see Teal & Catherine out there cheering, but it was juuuust shortly after this and I was soooo happy to see their smiling faces!

My happiness of seeing them is evidenced below. 🙂

A little blurry, but I was surviving which is good to do somewhere around the 3.5 mile mark of a half marathon. 🙂 So I kept on going and the next big thing I remember from the course was that I was running through a neighborhood, saw this group of people outside of a house and thought that little kid looks familiar! Ohhhh, it’s Cason! As in the son of J-Si from KISS FM and sure enough his wife, Kinsey, holding their daughter and their son, Cason, playing. Though I didn’t actually see J-Si out there anywhere. Bummer! But I thought that was fun since I’m a Kidd Kraddick in the Morning fan!

Shortly after this I saw the most awesome cheering squad comprised of FRUNNERS!! Right around mile 8 which made me oh so happy! I mean, look at those happy faces and look at that hot dog! 🙂

photo cred to Mama C

This left me with a goofy grin on my face and not even a mile down the road from that sighting did I hear the sounds of a police officer being an awesome cheerleader for all of the runners! This was the first time I’d really heard an officer be THAT encouraging and vocal towards runners on a race course. I loved it! So pretty much the goofy grinned stayed on my face that much longer thanks to him. Before you know it I was telling myself you only have a 5K left! And then it was you only have a mile left! Somewhere I was able to tap into a bit of a reserve for a final kick right before the finish line.

I don’t know who exactly gets the photo cred here, but Lisa texted me the picture 🙂

Oh, did you wanna know if I actually came in around 2:10 or not like I had put in my head?! Well, I made it across the finish line in 2:09:19! I was pretty darn proud of myself and felt like I ran a really conservative race considering I was in fact running for two. 🙂

With that I was caught up to Teal with half marathon no. 21 in the books! We will see you half marathons again on the other side of our pregnancies! 🙂

Filed Under: Pregnancy, Races Tagged With: 20 weeks, frunners, half, Half Marathon, J-Si, Kidd Kraddick, Kidd Kraddick in the Morning, KISS FM, pregnancy, pregnant running, Rock 'n' Roll Dallas, running, running for two

The 2014 Running of Large Marg

May 8, 2014 by Life is a Run · 2 Comments

Ok. Not that race recaps are the most exciting thing in the world but they get even harder when you decide to wait for.ever. to post them but here goes! Hope you are still reading! 🙂

We signed up to run the Levee Run in March because lets face it, who wouldn’t want to run over Large Marg? We love Large Marg and Teal was still holding on to her jealously from when Beth got to run it the first year without her. 🙁

At this point Beth was about 17 weeks pregnant and Teal about 30 weeks, so we pretty much knew we wouldn’t stay together since our times were very different at this point. Teal was already having a hard time not having to stop often or pee and her pace was pretty slow at this point. Beth was still able to stay pretty close to her normal pace and way less peeing was going on. Hope you guys like knowing that information about us?

We couldn’t miss an opportunity for a picture so we made sure to stay together for the first .5 miles to at least get on the bridges together and take a pic, the rest we ran alone…. BLAHHHHH. And blah for sure with this race course.

Now, while we do not bash this race by any means, the best part is literally the bridge and the rest is basically LAME. The race does an awesome job of stalking the bridge with so many cheering people. The trek across is loud and awesome because you get what seems like 10 schools of children cheering with signs, noise makers, instruments and anything else they can find! It’s awesome! The rest is dull, no cheering, no real on lookers at all, almost no water stops, and it runs you through the design district which is basically a bunch of buildings. It’s only a 10k so really it’s not that big of a deal or different from many 10ks with cheering or water or anything like that… just being whiney 🙂

The course had no bathrooms along the course. Teal had to stop and use a construction course bathroom and then another random one just sitting on the street at around mile 4.5. Pregnancy will make you lose any pickiness when it comes to needing to go. They were disgusting!

The race finishes over the bridge, which gives you something to look forward to. The kids on the bridges actually made one of us cry while passing. They are just so positive with their cheers and really make you “in a super cheesy way” feel inspirational. One lady’s sign said, “ these kids are watching in awe of you.” Which is kind of cool to think about!

Next year we totally plan to hang around. Perhaps one of the coolest things about this race is the after party. It’s located in one of the newest up and coming parts of Dallas and is located in the same area as many of the new local breweries and restaurants that are around after serving local beer and food. What’s not to love there, well, except when you can’t participate in the adult beverages?

Filed Under: Races, Uncategorized Tagged With: 10k, bridge, Dallas, large marg, levee run, pregnant running, running

Honkers Marathon, Spoiler: We Did the Half

February 26, 2014 by Life is a Run · Leave a Comment

Back in January, Beth and Brent had one weekend where they were invited to three weddings. In order to make it to at least 2 of the 3 they decided he would stay in Dallas and attend one and Beth would set off into the sunset with Teal to California for another wedding. 🙂

Conveniently, the California wedding was for Beth’s high school buddy who let us stay at his house each time we went out to Cali for Disneyland Half, so Teal had gotten to know him. When we came up with the plan of the two of us going out to California based on planning to try and get pregnant we anticipated that both of us would be with child on the trip. 🙂 So that also meant we probably wouldn’t be staying up late drinking adult beverages which meant we could definitely squeeze a race into the weekend too!

We searched the internets and narrowed down our search to two races – we ha d a Saturday option and a Sunday option. Turns out that Sunday’s option was the winner of the two which was Honkers Motivational Marathon. We liked the name of the race. 😀 Annnnnd part of the logo involves a duck which Teal is named after a duck so it’s fitting, right?!

The first time we’ve ever gotten a tech half zip pullover

Ok, really we found out later that the logo features a goose not a duck. A Canada goose to be more specific. 🙂

Contrary to what we thought – we did stay up late both nights that weekend, but we were able to get out of bed Sunday morning anyway and made our way to Riverdale Park.

The race was on the smaller side and was entirely along the Santa Ana River Trail as well as being an out and back course. From the beginning the plan was to stay together the whole way. 🙂

We still have wedding hair!

Off, we went! Pretty sure we stopped around mile 1 for a potty break. The joys of running pregnant, right? Shortly thereafter we ran by a lady whose capris were so see through we could actually see the tattoo on her butt cheek (because you know we notice these things which is why we wrote THIS blog post).

We are both pregnant running here although you cannot tell that AT ALL

At one point we had a back and forth game of catch up with the course director and he said to us, “hey get your camera back out I’m going to photobomb you!” Haha, OK! Such an encouraging guy!

We caught up with a runner who was out there doing the full and we offered to take a picture for her who gave us more background on the race than we knew about. The woman who started the race was a friend of hers that wanted a way to celebrate her remission with cancer and run her……marathon (OK so it’s been to long and some of the details are foggy now and we have pregnancy brains!), so the Honkers Marathon was born!

And just like we said we would run together…..our finisher’s pictures prove that we did! This was half no. 21 for Tealio and half no. 20 for Beeper!

Filed Under: Races Tagged With: California, goose, Half Marathon, Honkers Motivational Marathon, out and back course, pregnant running, Riverdale Park, running, Santa Ana River Trail