To Marathon or Not to Marathon?

December 12, 2012 by · 37 Comments

Remember that goal I set… have an awesome race, gain some confidence going into the marathon, and don’t need a PR, just a good race? Yea, that didn’t happen.  Then immediately you start to reflect. Why did it not go well? Maybe it was because I did 15 on Sunday, 3miles of speed work Tuesday, and 10 miles at marathon pace Wednesday, and 2 weight training days? So 28 miles right before a ½. Probably not the best idea.  Or, blame it on the weather? It was hot, humid, and gross. My chaffed sports bra lines can show you that for sure.  My legs ached the entire time, even hinging on cramping, especially around miles 7-9. Or maybe it is because this isn’t fun for me right now? I’m more or less running scared. I had a lot of issues last year,Plantar Fasciitis, I have very little cartilage in my knees (thank you dad, he doesn’t either), I have a random hip issue stemming from no cushioning in my bottom two vertebrates (like what happens to 70% of people over the age of 65, except I have it now). I know… I may sound like a whiney excuse maker, but it’s the reality of the situation. So I hope this doesn’t cause your eyes to roll at me. So really I’m not sure… but either way, I should be happier about finishing a ½ marathon than I am.  Boooooo hiss on this attitude but I can’t shake it!!

I have tried everything. EVERYTHING!! Rereading race stories of people, looking over my plan, making changes, looking at the shiny medal I would get at Louisiana Marathon, positive self-talk, negative talk, self-bribery, sarcasm, rest, breaks, I even at this point would pay someone to run next to me the entire time. Takers?? Anyone? Bueller… Bueller?

As of right now, I am NOT going to run the Louisiana Marathon. My heart has also never really been in this race, which to me makes it wayyyy harder. I have refused to let myself get excited (revert back to running scared, White Rock Marathon memories, pain, disappointment). I say this, but I have not gone as far as to change my race, or really even stop training. I have looked at a few other plans, more “finish” a marathon type plans, instead of what we have been doing, that have a few less miles.

The main huge issue is I just truly don’t think my body likes anything over 13.1 miles. I have just now started to feel those issues pop up that kind of remain bearable running under 13. Really half training is not bad on my body, but upper mileage just starts to cause everything to freak out. I’m still sore on Thursday from Sunday long runs. Everything hurts, and every remedy doesn’t work, ice baths, foam rolling, stretching, adult beverages… ha. Nothing. It just feels like crap. This doesn’t happen for a half. I mean it does but NOT to the same level, and it requires way fewer miles per week to run. Duh, half!   So I am not sure if it is “worth it.” I can do it, but what will I feel like after, what will my body do? Can it handle the rest of training and the run? Maybe I’ll just play it on feel? Can you train like that?? UGH!

I could run another marathon… and finish… I think. But I don’t know how fast, how happy, how painful/painless it will be, what damage will be done… etc? Am I supposed to drop to a half and not ever attempt the distance again to “save” my body/mind, so that I’ll actually keep running.

Am I a weenie?

Then to add further confusion to this madness. I am not a lone runner. I have a race buddy. A badass race buddy. I don’t want to not do it and her do it alone, train alone, be out there alone. Not that she wouldn’t be anyways… I’m slower (and ps I’ve known this forever, check out the about us page, so this is not it either) Don’t worry I have run that option through my mind as being a “mental” reason for this. It’s not.  But you get the point. Also that jealous streak sets in of “I’m so close to this person, and she can do it, and I don’t feel I can.” (race distance not speed) Ouch… but it’s true, and you all know what I am talking about. We are human. So yea… I don’t know what to do.

Do I just need to become a bike rider?

So there you have it. My sad whiney, god only knows what rant.

What would YOU do?

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Happy Half-a-versary to LiAR

December 11, 2012 by · 12 Comments

Let’s just start by saying good Lord this was an early and long morning. Ok, fine, we’ve gotten up earlier for Disney races, but still. Everything said you should NOT be in downtown Dallas later than 6 a.m. Fiiine, cue alarm clocks going off in the 4 o’clock hour. Beth picked up Teal at 5 a.m. and we were in a parking spot by 5:30 a.m. So there we were with 2.5 hours to kill before the start of the race. Our early arrival insured us an awesome parking spot and first use of port-a-potties!

The corrals and port-a-potties all to ourselves!

The corrals and port-a-potties all to ourselves!

Portapotty

It’s normal to be this excited about a port-a-potty, right?!

Thankfully we realized the Luebs were down there just as early as us. More people to entertain ourselves! Then of course it was time to head to our corral where we found even more frunners to hang with before the official start.

LiAR before the race!

LiAR before the race!

Frunners in Corral A!!

Frunners in Corral A!! Photo courtesy of Heidi

Teal: I, for the first time in a while, prepared for this race in terms of, eating right the few days before, getting enough sleep before, laid out my clothes, painted my finger nails, downloaded a new playlist…etc. I reallllly wanted this race to go well. I said I didn’t need to PR and I still say that, but I did want it to feel good. You know like, those runs that almost feel effortless. I haven’t had a single one since the marathon. I wanted one just as a boost of confidence. NOPE. Fail, giant zero. This didn’t feel good. It felt like work, and I did work.

I really had debated this week’s training runs. We were scheduled for 10 at Marathon pace on Thursday. I decided to still do the run, thinking more long term to the marathon, and decided to run it a day earlier, and then rest my legs until Sunday. I figured it would be ok, but I didn’t know. Running a half marathon with 28 miles on your legs that week was probably not the best idea. I really didn’t think much of it, apparently I have more faith in my legs than they have in themselves, I thought they would recover. I don’t think they did.

Beth: So it was kind of important to me to do all that I could to make a potential PR happen at this race. This means I skipped my 10 mile run at marathon pace on Thursday. A big oops there since it goes against one of my December goals. Brent and I actually had two Birthday parties we wanted to go to the night before which had me eating a sushi dinner – not my norm, but at this point with food I don’t really have tons of issues. *knock on wood* Something I don’t take for granted, trust me! When I didn’t get full from sushi I ate goldfish on the way to the next Birthday party.  I made Brent take the bag of goldfish away so I wouldn’t eat them all, but I was still hungry. Which resulted in me stealing part of someone’s spinach quesadilla. Haha. Not my typical night before a race! Oh and not to mention we hit traffic going home, so I definitely got to bed later than I had anticipated.

Miles 1-4

Teal: These actually felt good, my pace was good, I felt like I could keep it, my legs didn’t feel bad. It was super super humid 90% and even on some accounts I saw 100% humidity and close to 70 degrees. And huge eye roll to those who say perfect running conditions. Nope. They are not; try 50 degrees, no humidity. I’ll take that. I was drenched by mile 4 and my hair was sticking to me. LOVED running over Large Marge (also known as the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge). Love that bridge and it’s a great addition to Dallas. Brian L. was at 4 to cheer us on with Mama C, Fiona and Dat! Boost of energy!!

photo courtesy of Mama C which means she's not in it :( Dat, Fiona & Brian L.

photo courtesy of Mama C which means she’s not in it 🙁 Dat, Fiona & Brian L.

photo courtesy of Mama C

photo courtesy of Mama C

Beth: Back to my goals again, I said I wanted to run a strong race and I knew that had to start from the beginning. I told myself this wasn’t the Turkey Trot and I’m not about to start being a crazy people dodger. I did the bare minimum to go by people slower than me. I kept making a conscious effort to see how I felt and slow down if necessary. My mind was also all, look! Old Red where I got married. Look! Belmont Hotel where your Bachelorette Party was and the Shepard Fairey mural you took some engagement pictures in front of that! I knew after I crossed Large Marge I’d see my first set of familiar faces and was ready to see them too!  And I looooved hearing Mama C call me Beeper at this point! Pumped me up!

photo courtesy of Mama C

photo courtesy of Mama C

Miles 5-8

Teal: Love, loved, loved running passed Scottish Rite. I love that hospital and spent a ton of time there in High school. I volunteered in Child Life my senior year, and in other areas of the hospital my Junior year. Patients and parents were outside cheering us all on. This was new and a totally good addition.

I start to feel more pain in my legs at this point. I feel labored and pretty stiff. My calf muscles were really tight and my quads ached. I just wanted to stay steady. I saw my husband and Brent around 6 and high 5’ed them. Wasn’t expected to actually see them so that was super awesome! I ended up getting super tied up at the water station around 7. I actually just stopped. It was a cluster. I think I probably spent 2 minutes here dealing with the madness. My music stopped playing and it was in my skirt zip pouch in the back. I couldn’t get it out or then back in. I asked a spectator to help me get it fixed. I think she was like “what in the world do you want me to do?” I was annoyed here and the stop made me stiffer. BONUS!!

Beth: Parts of this section of the course were similar to the past two years. Um, so I kind of just blew by Scottish Rite without paying attention.  Oops? I think I was just really determined and focused that I really kept to myself a lot this race and I might not have survived had I not done so.  I only really expended extra energy 3 times and it was each of the 3 times I saw familiar faces. Well, I guess, I expended energy in trying to see my husband which I never did. :-/ But gah, that looking for him in the crowds was tiring me out.  That’s probably just the weather factor right there. I kept thinking in this stretch, why didn’t I ask him w hat he’d be wearing? Why didn’t we figure out a mile for him to be in? I did know that Rebekah would be right around the split of the half and the full, so I kept looking for her father-in-law since he’s much taller than her. 🙂  Loved getting that high five from her at that point it totally pumped me up. Also, the wind that was occurring in random bouts during this part pumped me up as well!

Miles 8-10

Teal: I was looking everywhere for people. I thought Rebekah would be here and she was but I missed her. It really does kind of make you dizzy to find people while you are running. Which leads me to another weird thing about this race, it NEVER thinned out. It was seriously thick with people the entire time. This surprised me and it almost felt like maybe the streets were skinnier this year. I’m feeling very labored at this point and I really just wanted to stop. My legs are tight, super tight, and this is affecting the way my knee works. It always has affected it, and I have had some issues recently with the longer runs. Post runs it will hurt to even touch. This is what is happening now around 9ish. I really just want to get done and it was somewhere around this point I see the 2:10 pacer on the loop around and just said, stay in front of him and I’ll be happy.

Beth: I had known where the mile 8 sign was because we had already run by it and the split was really us running down the other side of part of the street we had just run up.  In my mind I was just trying to get to the last 5K get there and you go this.  I was going back and forth between you could PR!! It’s not happening today! Either way I knew I just need to keep going. Then I saw Brian E. in here, yelled at him but you know just to get his attention not in angry way and was glad to see a familiar face right then and there! Thanks for being out there Brian!

Miles 11-13

Teal: Just really wanted to be done. I really had no desire to keep going except I just wanted to be done. I think my shoes are too big too… I’m running this stretch just thinking of stupid things like “ I want to eat at El Fenix, can I actually ride the escalator at Ross Perot, can I have a mimosa when I’m done, how close are we, if I was a snake my feet wouldn’t hurt, why am I not Harry Potter or Meb, or a super speedy runner, what am I going to eat for lunch next week.” I just kept thinking of the dumbest stuff to make the time go. Also, while I do *think* I like this course, it has a lot of uphill, I clearly was on another planet for the down hills because I don’t remember them. Dallas is a big city, I hated the little loopy out and back thing we did between 12 and 13, there is plenty of room to not do that, it was such a tease too, because you could see the finish line and you still had to run up and around for about .70 of a mile. Lame.

photo courtesy of Brian L.

photo courtesy of Brian L.

Beth: It should also be noted that my thought process was kind of similar to Teal’s here – what is this new restaurant next to El Fenix? I wonder if it’s good?? We should try it sometime! Anyway, and then here’s where we make our back into downtown.  Here’s where I start thinking, man, I didn’t actually give the course map a good lookin’ at, did I? Surely they wouldn’t give us a hill right here before the mile 12 marker? But we are coming into downtown from this side it’s pretty much inevitable there WILL be a hill right here. And I’m kind of glad I figured that out so I could back off my pace a little and make it to the top of that hill alive. The out and back thing was miserable and I kept wondering if people would just cut it? Haha. It was also in this stretch I saw a runner laying on the ground and being worked on by EMTs.  I have no idea what the outcome of that was but in that moment it made my heart heavy for sure!

13.1

Teal: Done and I stayed under 2:10. Not bad and really in retrospect pretty good for my week’s work itself. Not disappointed in time because that is about average for me. I am more disappointed in the feel of it, how labored it was, and the fact that my knee proceeded to be in throbbing pain for well over an hour after and then just dull pain even as I type this a day later. Damn knee…. Anyone want to trade??

Beth: Somehow, someway I had a last little kick to give at the end. You better believe I crossed that finish line with my arms up in the air.  I knew I was teetering the line because I’d heard my Runkeeper tell me I’d hit the 1:55 mark however many yards back.  So I immediately got out my phone, got on twitter to look up Brent’s twitter (I’d set his to tweet my time) and saw that I had PR’d by 11 seconds!!!! Holy crap!  Later that day I looked online at the official results which put my time at a 12 second PR. WHOOP! I had opted to wear my Aggie ring to this race and try and take some of good juju that was out there from Johnny Football winning the Heisman! 🙂

We did it! Half marathon no. 15 for the two of us and two years of racing under out belts!

with MK! We are so awesome that we are standing in number and height order!

with MK! We are so awesome that we are standing in number and height order!

Us with Melvin! We can't even tell you how much his encouragement and support means to su!

Us with Melvin! We can’t even tell you how much his encouragement and support means to us!

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Going Back to Where it All Started

December 7, 2012 by · 10 Comments

This weekend we will be running the race that started it all for us as Life is a Run…well, kinda.  We say kinda because they changed the name on us from White Rock Marathon to Dallas Marathon and the race course is very different.  Not to mention the starting line is no longer in Fair Park, but that’s been the case in years past since this race did start in 1971 and this wouldn’t be the first time the start is actually in downtown Dallas.

Excuse us while we steal a couple words from some of our frunners (stolen word #1 – credit to Mama C), but there’s one frunner in particular, Michelle, who just had her half-a-versary (stolen word #2) and we are about to have our’s!  Hearing that phrase from MK really puts this coming weekend into perspective.  Because really this weekend is kind of a big deal in our world or at least a reflection on where we started and just how far we have come since 2010.

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2010 when we became half marathoners!

We both had been runners in different times of our lives, but 2010 was when Teal asked Beth if she wanted to run a half with her, a distance neither one of us had come close to running.  It’s cute to think now how we use to run for time not for distance, you know like, long run this weekend is running for an hour and a half – oh my!  It’s also cute to think how neither one of us ran with a phone or any device with GPS.  We ran on feel alone. Ohhhh how the times have changed!  And who would have thought in 2011 we’d come back to run White Rock Marathon as our first marathon!? By the time we come back this year to toe the line at the half marathon distance it will be our 15th half marathon upon it’s completion.

In 2010, we had pretty much the perfect weather and little did we know that we were actually going to be spoiled by that.  We would like to pat ourselves on the pack for actually starting our first ever half in very appropriate running gear.  Yes, in the above picture we have fleeces on but we had Michael, Brent & Kate holding onto all of that for us while we ran.  Then 2011, for this very week leading up to the marathon we were both panicked.  WHAT?! Rain on marathon day??  What will we wear? What do we need?  Well, we learned lessons from that one. You could read about them here.

Teal finish photo

Teal becoming a Marathoner!

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Beth becoming a Marathoner!

It’s race week once again for White Rock/Dallas Marathon and per usual we have no idea what we are going to wear because we are pretty sure the projected forecast for Sunday has changed in some form or fashion each day this week. We mentioned in our weekend post how we’d hit a record high last Sunday in the 80’s. Well, we’ve had chances of a cold front coming through Sunday and we’ve had highs of 77 or something like that, so we’ll just have to see how it all plays out. As long as there isn’t rain we should be good! 🙂

In pre-race posts of the past we’ve given you a goal and we are going to kind of do that for you here.  Our individual thoughts, expectations and what not going into Dallas Marathon this weekend –

Teal: I am actually for the first time in a while nervous about a race. I usually just go and run and that is that. I know for a fact that I can make 13.1, clearly!  I haven’t set goals for a while because they started to have the opposite effect on me and they weren’t motivating. I am nervous because I do really want/need this race to go well. It is the last one before the Marathon… dun dun dun. AND I seriously, as dumb as it sounds, am still stuck on how completely and totally crappy last year was for this race (i know it was the full), but still and that has carried over into my marathon training. Sooo really if I was goal setting, my goal is to have an awesome race and to gain some confidence going into the Marathon, confidence that I pretty much do not have right now. I don’t even need a PR, I just want my race to feel good. How to make that happen?? I don’t know. So there goal set. Wish me luck.

Beth: White Rock Half 2010 holds my half marathon PR.  The closest I’ve come to my 1:56:39 PR was at Big D this past April, but I was still 34 seconds away from my PR.  I want so bad to beat that and I want to say that I could do it this weekend, but I just don’t know if I can. I’d like to run a smart race where I definitely do not start out too fast and have enough left in me to speed across that finish line.  I’m afraid of making “get a new PR this weekend” a goal because I’m not fully sure I can do it.  All year I though I’d come back to this race and conquer it with a new PR, but when I heard about them changing up the course it kind of changed things for me a little bit. So just like Teal is nervous, this goal I so want is making me nervous for race day Sunday.

So there you have it some of our reflections as we run our Half-a-versary race this weekend and what we think going into it.  Bring on half marathon no. 15 for #LiAR!  May the speed be with us!

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A LiAR Christmas List

November 27, 2012 by · 6 Comments

So Black Friday and Cyber Monday have come in gone, but we bet you are still shopping for your friends and family for Christmas.  We are definitely still shopping!

This holiday season we decided to compile our own list of running gear we would love for Santa to bring us on Christmas morning! 🙂

1. Flipbelt – Who isn’t always looking for the perfect way to carry everything you might need on a run? Ever since Courtney told us both about these we’ve been dying to get our hands on one for each of us.  Of course a lot of the other belts out there for carrying around personal items we haven’t tried, but this one has completely got our attention!  For $24.99 it’s not a bad belt to try out, right?

 

 

2. Brisk Run Headband – This is one item if Santa wants to get it, he better get on it!  It’s currently on FINAL SALE at Lululemon! Eeeee!! We still get our fair share of cold weather down here in Texas that we should own at least one of this….or two or three! You can never have too many colors! 🙂

3. Compete Every Day Hoodie – This isn’t the first time we’ve mentioned CED on our blog and it probably won’t be the last time.  We love this Dallas based company – love what they stand for, their quality workout apparel and awesome customer service.  When they started advertising this hoodie we both immediately wanted it! Santa, we’ll take a small and a medium, please!

 

4. Point 6 Socks – These socks rock!  Beth had the opportunity to snag a free pair when she was shopping for her dad for some new socks for when he is active.  Definitely fell in love and the thin layer of wool in them really does help prevent blisters!  Great stocking stuffer right here!  This is also another company with fabulous customer service.

 

5. Daily Om Duffel – Sometimes you just need a new gym bag! Right? And right now Lululemon has the peeeerfect colors for the two of us! We are trying to figure out however why they named the Teal bag the color that they did instead of just using the awesome name of Teal!  Beth is still obsessed with grey since it was one of her wedding colors, so don’t you think we *need* these bags?! Haha

 

There are always a lot of things out there we’d love to try and test out ourselves, but then we probably wouldn’t have any money to enter any of the races we hope to run!  We also are in no way being compensated for this blog rather we simply wanted to share with YOU items that have caught our eyes!

What are you asking for this holiday season? Do you have a fellow runner you are buying for – what are you getting them?  We want to know!

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Our Turkey Day Tradition

November 16, 2012 by · 15 Comments

It’s time for the Capital One Bank Dallas YMCA Turkey Trot AGAIN! Hard to believe that Thanksgiving is literally right around the corner.  We actually got the email Tuesday that said Packet Pick-Up was starting Wednesday.  WHOA!

We love this race because  1.) it’s super fun 2.) the atmosphere around this race is hard to match 3.) it’s pretty much a tradition for us at this point oh and 4.) who doesn’t find it great to burn 800+ calories and enjoying everything you eat that day!  That’s right because each we like to participate in the 8 mile portion of the this race.

Apparently we aren’t the only ones that like this race. Time Magazine actually just listed it as one of the Top 5 Fun Runs to Try Now! Fun Run is exactly the correct terminology, while you could definitely hit a PR in this type of race (both of us did last year 🙂 ) it is definitely not its true purpose.  Even though it is actually one of the largest fun runs in the country, the race is well organized and put together, but some cramping occurs at the beginning making it more fun to take in the atmosphere and enjoy the run through some of the best parts of Dallas! Many families come out for the 5k distance and you are even allowed to bring your pet! Teal is not sure Wilson could handle it though, he is too chicken. 🙁

The Turkey Trot always comes up with something fun and after 40+ years they haven’t run out of new ideas. Last year you might remember that we dressed up as Turkeys and participated in the Guinness Book of World Record challenge to gather the most people dressed as Turkeys in one location! Oh and we did actually break the record! Does this make us famous??

Check out our awesome costumes and Beth’s sewing handy work.

This year they have decided to start the Mascot Trot.  They have invited all of the Dallas area schools to come cheer on the North Texas professional mascots as they race each other around Dallas. There will be “Champ” from the Dallas Mavericks, “Ranger Captain” from the Texas Rangers, and “Rowdy” from the Dallas Cowboys’ mascots and they will all compete in a race with the official Turkey Trot mascot, “Tommy the Turkey.” We didn’t even know they had one!  This happens the day before the race so anyone can come out and watch, even the runners! Maybe you could even be spotted on Good Morning Texas!!

This will be our 3rd year in a row to run together as Life is a Run, but this is something that has been around us for a long time dating back even into our high school running days and hopefully we can keep it up!

Turkey Trot 2010 with Bitner and Chase

There is ONE more thing that makes this day special in addition to it being a day of family (Thanksgiving) and the Turkey Trot, but it is also Teal & Michael’s 4th wedding anniversary!

Who is running the Turkey Trot this year?? We as usual would LOVE to see you.

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The Day of Preparations {Wedding Weekend Take 2}

November 12, 2012 by · 9 Comments

Just kidding there are some pictures of my aunts and cousin from the Bridal Luncheon! Tada –

Aunt Leslie, Kate and Aunt Cindy

Saturday morning things got rolling early, but not the butt crack of dawn early. Those of us staying in the hotel met at the Starbucks attached to it so we could wake up and make sure the below photo happened for the day.

At the Bridal Luncheon the day before the Bridesmaids passed out hoodies they’d gotten and one of their rockstar Mom’s embroidered them all with our names, well, my mom’s said “Mother of the Bride” and they gave me a men’s button down shirt they’d had embroidered as well for me to wear while I got ready (as seen in our latest Wordless Wednesday). Absolutely loved the shirt for getting ready AND my hoodie!

We all got to Old Red Courthouse about 9:00 a.m. to start getting the place ready for the entire wedding and the hair & makeup ladies were arriving shortly after that to get started on all of us ladies! There were reception centerpieces to set out, mantles to be decorated (the reception room had two), place cards to be put in corks, etc.  So very grateful to each and everyone of the ladies and Bitner for their help with everything! I really and truly have the best friends in the world!

 

 

One of the BIG wedding craft projects that took a TON of time was to make these flutter curtains. I’m pretty sure the original idea came from pinterest, but linked me to this blog.  You see I needed sooomething to decorate these beams that would be above the area that Brent and I stand for the wedding.  When I found the flutter curtains I wanted to do them just modified as narrow and long curtains.  Teal, Kate, Rebekah (on the right in picture below), Mandy, Brent and myself together probably cut a couple thousand fabric circles for this project.

Trying to figure out hanging the curtains, but ultimately my dad, Bitner and my brother would do the hanging later that day

I can’t even tell you how many hours went into making those curtains, but a whole heck of a lot of them that is for sure!  I like to think that it really wasn’t that stressful of a day.  We got things put out in good time and eventually got to all hang around in the bridal suite area of Old Red to watch others get their hair and makeup done. My wedding coordinator, Bethany, handled all the other details and if a vendor was late arriving, I had no idea! We may or may not have broken into some of the wine/prosecco/champagne at this point (shhhh – don’t tell the venue that) and the Caramel Eileen cupcakes I had Trailercakes bring extra with the delivery of the groom’s cupcakes so we could partake in a tasty treat before the wedding.

 

And then my flower girl, Meranda, and my ringer bear and nephew, Wesley showed up it meant we were really getting closer to the wedding getting started! The Groom and his Groomsmen and Ushers were arriving and pictures were beginning to happen.  My wedding coordinator had the idea of taking the follow picture since Brent and I were waiting to see each other until the ceremony, and I love how it turned out and that the huge staircase at Old Red made it work.

 

There are more with him turned around and me facing the wall and a couple of me peeking over the railing trying to see him. 🙂 The venue really does create a lot of great pictures and they do still have a courtroom in it which is where the wedding party mainly hungout before the ceremony began and then after while we waited to go back in the ceremony room for pictures.  I just think that Wesley and Meranda were the cutest on my wedding day and here are a couple of pictures of them in the courtroom.

 

And I can’t leave out a picture of my littlest nephew, Easton! He looked absolutely adorable this day!  This picture is technically from after the ceremony, but I wanted to include it now. This is half my blog I can do what I want right? 🙂

My brother, Scott, Easton & me

I’ll leave you with one last picture of me with my ladies before we officially started the evening!

 

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October Report & November Goals

November 6, 2012 by · 9 Comments

There are just really not many clever ways to make the title of these blog posts more exciting….anyway!

The Report:

1. Complete the Tyler Rose half marathon for our 3rd race in the 4 seasons challenge. It’s coming up October 7th!

F: We bailed on this race because we decided it was the best life choice at the time in terms of getting to goal number 3 in one piece. Not to mention the fact that it was Beth’s dad’s birthday and it would have been madness to run the race in Tyler and get back to Dallas. We decided that Texas doesn’t really have 4 seasons anyways. 🙂

2. Start marathon training!

C: Sorta? We have done some of our running and have for sure missed 2 long runs so we shall see how the rest of this month goes. We hope it won’t kill us too much as they were “shorter long runs”

3. Get Beth married!

A++: Done! She is now a Holland! Recap of the wedding coming shortly!

This picture cracks me up!

It really was an an incredible night! Oh, and check out that ring – he’s really my husband now! 🙂

 

 

The Goals:

Teal –

1. Get my house in order without losing it! I am too routine and orderly for this mess. See this madness…

 

2. Get my butt/mind in gear for marathon training. I feel so blah about it right now. It doesn’t feel right or like it is supposed to happen and I need to figure out how to get excited about it!

3.  Send out Christmas cards by the end of the month! We have only done this once and I want to make it a tradition.

4. Successfully host Thanksgiving at my house for the first time (ties to number 1 big time). Pressure is on for number 1 for sure!

Beth –

Please be shocked and amazed that I find myself in sync with Teal and have almost all the same goals for this month! 🙂

1. Get my house in order!  I didn’t get ALL of my stuff moved out of my sister’s house before the wedding and with wedding presents there are A LOT of boxes over at my new house with my husband. 🙂 🙂 We both don’t like messes so this is hard to look at right now until we get it all organized and into place.

2. Get in the game with marathon training!

3. Have all Christmas cards addressed and ready to be sent out by December 1st!  I’m so excited to send out Christmas cards this year! 🙂  I have them already to order, so this goal shouldn’t be too hard to tackle!

4. I’m bringing back my yoga goals, and in baby steps. Yoga once a week!  If I don’t start doing this I’m going to need to either cancel my membership or freeze it to save some moolah.

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Advocare Ten Day Cleanse: Our Survival Tips

October 19, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

After completely another cleanse we want to share with you some of our tips to help you get through it. 🙂

– The fiber drink you drink on the mornings of Day 1, 2, 3, 8, 9 and 10 you want to CHUG IT.

– But before you even get to that stage mix the fiber drink packet with COLD water and feel free to add some more water in as you get towards the bottom (it has a weird consistency, not a taste thing, but a consistency thing).
-A newer tip we learned and tried this time around – if you buy Spark in the orange flavor mix your fiber drink packet with one spoonful of Spark and it’ll taste more like you are drinking OJ with pulp.
-Some people might actually find the Peaches n Cream flavored fiber drinks to be way better than the Citrus flavored fiber drink. Look into that!
-Do the cleanse with a buddy to keep yourself accountable!

-Plan all of your meals ahead of time so you are set! Preparation is clutch. We set up on Sunday for the 1st seven days and then Sunday to the end! Plan ahead of time to make sure you will have the least distraction within your 10 day time frame and whatever you do AVOID birthdays, big life events, etc!

There you have it!  Remember you can buy the Advocare cleanse or any of their products here through Teal.

Have you done the Advocare 10 day cleanse before, is there any advice you would give that we have left off?

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September Recap & October Goals

October 1, 2012 by · 5 Comments

Ahh yah! Look at us, we are posting our goals ON October 1st!  We aren’t complete slackers……well, read on and decide for yourselves! 🙂

Teal:

1. Make Bridesmaid dress fit!

F-: I have no clue, I haven’t tried it on again. Maybe I should do that??

2. Read my book club book before September 23rd without having to cram, but hopefully Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult will hold my interest (I am not a big fiction book person and the club turned down my 100 Year Lie suggestion).

B: I finished and technically the night before so that is better than the last time where I was 15 minutes late and couldn’t shower because I was finishing it on the way out the door!

3. Log food within 100 calories of goal.

B+: I logged 21 days straight and for the most part those days were fairly close to this goal. That was for sure the best month I have had lately in logging food!

4. Not cry on my 30th Birthday!

A+++: I didn’t and now I am 30 and the world has not ended and no one has called me old. And PS: Thank you so everyone for all of the awesome birthday wishes, you made it so much easier to handle!

Beth:

1. Run 20 miles a week.

F: Only one week out of the whole month I actually made 20 miles and that was this last week. :-/ At least I did it once instead of not at all??

Daily Mile monthly log

2. Not kill anyone….haha, not trying to be morbid, but wedding planning is HARD!

A+: I didn’t! Everyone is still alive! I did cry a couple times, but again, everyone is still alive!

Joint:

1. Figure out and finalize our marathon training plan!

A+: We did and we even signed up for a few races to go along with it! Check out our Race Schedule page if you want to join us for some races.

2. Run a good, strong race at Tour des Fleurs since we will be basing our training times off of this 10k!

A+: We both PR’d at TDF, so we definitely count that as a good, strong race!!

***

This month since things will reeeeally be crazy since Beth & Brent’s wedding is only 26 days away we are joining forces and only having joint goals! They are:

1. Complete the Tyler Rose half marathon for our 3rd race in the 4 seasons challenge. It’s coming up October 7th!

2. Start marathon training!

3. Get Beth married!

photo courtesy of Jeffrey Lynch

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When You’re Too Busy to Run Just Run for the Tacos

September 28, 2012 by · 7 Comments

Ummmm how is it September 28th?  We know it has flown by and it is officially less than a month until Beth’s wedding! And yes we know we say that every month…maybe when the wedding is over we’ll stop saying it. 🙂 Maybe. Crunch time for everything and we are having a super hard time getting all of our running in soooooo we have therefore signed up for a last minute race just to make sure we get it in! On Wednesday we both signed up to run The Great Taco Run 10 miler! This ends up being perfect because right after we signed up a few things came up to get done over the weekend and now we at least have a paid excuse as to why we have to run first! You do what you gotta do, right?? This is a perfect distance for us this weekend given its only 1 week until the Tyler Rose half marathon, the 3rd of our four seasons challenge!  Neither one of us have gotten in a good long run in a while (raise your hand if you are not shocked by this trend!)

(source)

 

Apparently tacos are becoming the new post race eating trend and this Dallas race has decided to jump on that bandwagon. We totally don’t mind, and in fact we are pretty sure this will make Beth’s fiancé jealous! 13 different taco shops in Dallas will be at the after race portion to hand out tacos to the runners! The runners will get to try each taco and vote on the best! HELLO, we aren’t sure why we didn’t think of this first. The winner is apparently announced on October 4th, which just so happens to be National Taco Day, in case you didn’t know!

Bonus- this race supports Friends of the Katy Trail, one of the most popular running trails in North Texas, as well as the Trinity Strand Trail who is working super hard to organize a new 7.8 mile trail along the Trinity River waterway! So we totally don’t feel bad for “last minute signing up” for this race just to get in a long run.

Beth has actually run a 10 miler sans Teal at the White Rock ‘n’ Roll race in May. She finished with a time of 1:32:16 and Teal has never actually run a 10 miler before! Either way we should both be in for a good long run!

Will we see anyone there?  If so let us know because we, as usual, would totally love to meet/see/hang out with you!

How do you guys balance life’s madness with running? We like tips for sure. We are literally about to start training for our second marathon! This race will actually kick it off! Let us know how you keep on track!

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