Where did October go?

Oh yeah. I was out of town for the past four weekends. While every trip was absolutely wonderful (i.e., we got to see ALL our kids!), I am ready for a weekend of wearing sweatpants and lying on the couch.

The first weekend away was to Knoxville, Iowa, to meet Erin's in-laws-to-be. Much visiting, laughter, wine, and beer was had by all. Erin is lucky to get such a nice set of second parents. And we're lucky to get Tim! (Lunch with Emily).

The next weekend was Des Moines marathon. Have I mentioned that I completed the half? (Got to see both girls and Tony too).

The weekend after that was back to Des Moines for wedding dress shopping with Erin, Emily, and Beth (Tim's mom). While I haven't seen much of "Say Yes to the Dress", I had envisioned a bit more angst than actually occurred when Erin chose her dress. In her words, it took her longer to decide what to have for lunch than to choose a wedding dress. I won't give it away, but it's long, ivory, and strapless. And she absolutely GLOWED when they put the veil on her her. My little girl will be a beautiful bride!

And then last weekend was the longest road trip by far:

We got to go see Alex, Aly, and Ella and their new house in Grand Rapids! Ella is going to make Dwight want a new dog yet:

I told Dwight from the back it looks like he has a blonde girlfriend

Crazy eyes!

The entire first half of the Nebraska-Michigan State game

The family

The visit was much too short, but we got in eating, drinking, walking, and shopping (for clothes and wine!)

Two comments from Dwight on the ride home:  1) "Wow. There sure are a lot of adult superstores, aren't there?" and 2) "I can't wait to get back to My Fitness Pal". I had to agree with both statements.

Yesterday's breakfast:

I met some of the museum girls downtown at the Zin Room for lunch to celebrate Katherine's birthday, and this was lunch:

Turkey, avocado, bacon panini. But notice that I ordered a salad for my side and not the fries that I really wanted. Baby steps.

We shared two desserts between seven of us - it WAS a birthday after all! I didn't get a picture of the chocolate ganache cake, but this is the fried ice cream. (Ice cream and cake!) It's on a dinner plate, and was seriously the size of a baby's - a LARGE baby's - head.

 I am tired of everything I've been making lately, so I pulled out a favorite cookbook to make our menu for the week:

Why yes, that is a kitty ear in the bottom right of the photo

Last night's dinner:

Today's breakfast:

Today's lunch:

Leftovers, and a kombucha. Before you judge that creamy delicious salad dressing...

Aly turned us on to these last weekend. I couldn't find them at Baker's, but Whole Foods had them. Seriously, for 35 calories, you get two tablespoons of the blue cheese. 

That's pretty much it, except that I am so thankful that we don't have to listen to political advertisements any more!

 TTFN!

A reminder

QUIT FORGETTING THIS!!!

More marathon musings and some food

This makes me happy whenever I walk to my car

I was talking with Emily on Monday afternoon, and she told me about a friend - and I am using that term loosely now - who cheated on her "marathon". A mutual friend was suspicious because she had passed her and when she checked this girl's time, found she had finished significantly earlier. She had missed two of the checkpoints, and so ran a 20-mile race. Still not insignificant, but don't go telling people you have run a marathon. I told Emmy that she could run with Paul Ryan (in reference to him shaving more than an hour off his marathon time). She asked me if I had seen the signs in Water Works Park, the one that said "Paul Ryan's marathon", then "If you were Paul Ryan, you'd be done now." I HAD seen them, but politics were the last thing on my mind; I thought it was referring to someone who had died at that spot during a previous DSM Marathon. Just goes to show that cheating will come around to bite you in the butt. (Just for fun, if you're interested in calculating your race time in Paul Ryan time, you can do so here).

I wore my medal to work on Tuesday, and my friends oohed and aahed enough to make me feel special. I had even chosen to wear a top to match the ribbon. One of the women from the administrative side of the museum was in the shop and my friend Cathy (yes, same name, same spelling - it was popular in the 50's) asked her if she had noticed my ribbon. Susie said yes, pretty haltingly, until Cathy told her is was for the marathon. She said, "Oh thank God. It's so ugly that I thought it was maybe an art project or something - I didn't want to say anything!"

And speaking of the Joslyn, one of our potters was in early on Tuesday, and I bought a few pieces even before we put it out. Come check it out if you're in the area and need something for a gift or for you. "To me from me" are always good gifts.

I was pretty sore Monday, so was glad that I hadn't used the gift card for a massage and pedicure that Aly and Alex had given me for doing the calligraphy for the wedding. (Thank you, thank you, thank you!) I had a massage Tuesday afternoon after work, and it was glorious - the best I have ever had. My guilty pleasure has always been pedicures, but I may have changed my mind. While my calves and feet were a little achy, she could SEE the knots in my shoulders and upper back before she even touched me - no surprise since I could definitely feel them. She told me I should come in regularly for even half an hour and have her work the kinks out. If you're in Omaha and need a good massage, see Ashley at One Drake Place. She is a little bitty thing, but amazingly strong!

My pedicure was yesterday, and I had my nails painted OPI Russian Navy - the exact color of my bruised toenails!

I really seriously will stop talking about this race soon. I took Monday and Tuesday off, and as I had to be somewhere early yesterday, I hopped on the treadmill instead of running in the dark. And cold. I cannot even express how much I hate the treadmill. I know it will be a necessary evil this winter, but that doesn't mean I have to like it! Tomorrow is outside - it's supposed to be cold, but at least dry.

I have been really hungry this week, and I know it's because I haven't planned any snacks. We have a bag of Chicago Mix popcorn in the pantry that keeps calling my name, and I have been horrible about resisting. So I will plan better snacks, and hopefully be able to ignore the treats. Or at least eat a reasonable portion size. For example, my snack this morning was an Abs Diet banana split smoothie:

And it looks like I have dessert for after dinner tonight

BREAKFASTS:

Greek yogurt and slice of chocolate chip banana bread (Thanks, Debbie!)

Hard-boiled egg, yogurt, 1/2 PB sandwich

Oatmeal with 1 T PB, almond-coconut milk, and 2 tsp brown sugar. And coffee

 LUNCHES:

Leftover rotisserie chicken and roasted Brussels sprouts, milk

This just sounded really good when I saw it in the store

And it was. There was a nice little kick to it.

 DINNERS:

Rotisserie chicken, roasted Brussels sprouts, carrot sticks. I love a colorful meal!

I was feeling carnivorous. Filet, baked sweet  potato, and salad. I ate half the steak and will have the other half on a salad with blue cheese tonight. Dwight has a meeting and I can't eat popcorn for dinner.

So that brings me up to date. My tummy is rumbling so I need to go find something healthy to eat before settling in for an afternoon of knitting. I started a new project - a scarf that will make me think every other row.

The pattern is Three Sisters Scarves #2. I found it on Ravelry. This is NOT my scarf; if it turns out well I will post a picture. My yarn is in shades of blues and browns

I'm using one of my favorite yarns, Handmaiden sea silk - made from silk and a cellulose from seaweed. It just feels so good in my hands! The needles are little and the pattern is airy, so the scarf drapes beautifully. I made the Three Sisters #1 last year, and while similar, this pattern is a bit more difficult. And by difficult, I mean that I have to pay attention! No mindless knitting here - except for the even rows.

In case I don't write tomorrow, I have a fun weekend planned - hockey tomorrow night, and then I'm headed to Des Moines for a day of wedding dress shopping with Erin (our bride-to-be!), Emily, and Beth, Erin's mother-in-law-to be. I'm pretty excited, since I have never gone wedding dress shopping - mine was a Gunne Sax dress. Hey, it was 1981.

And if that wasn't enough fun, we're getting together with a bunch of friends to watch the Nebraska-Michigan game on Saturday night. Go Huskers!

Thinner thighs in thirteen miles

(Edited to add WHY I was excited to see the Des Moines skyline).

Well, actually 13.1, but it flows better to say thirteen. Thank you, Jeanie, for the title of today's post!

We drove over to Des Moines on Saturday and were met at the hotel by Emily. She has run three half-marathons, the country's biggest 20K, and it was the eve of her first marathon. Having done these races before, she knew how to pack a goodie bag:

The caplets are Imodium for one of my biggest fears. See the race poster quotes below

In the little raffia-tied box was this necklace, made by one of Emily's friends. She makes wonderful stamped jewelry - marathon-related and not. 

This necklace is such an inspiration. I, of course, put it on immediately, and thought of it several times during the race. I have it on now, so I can remember that I did it. (And it is way classier than my finisher's medal, which I will be wearing to work tomorrow anyway).

[Here's a plug for Cindi Douglass, Emmy's friend who makes the jewelry. Her work is beautiful and affordable. If you need anything for yourself or a gift, check out her etsy shop at www.etsy.com/shop/CharmedbyCindi.]

It was a day of necklaces. Jeanie brought me this cross, and she was wearing the same herself. She said she couldn't NOT buy it when she saw it was called the Walk Cross. I have never trained with jewelry on, but I wore both necklaces on race day.

Good swag was to be found at check-in at the expo:

You'd think maybe there would be Gatorade, but no, we got Red Bull - beverage of choice for athletes everywhere?

Jeanie and Tom and Dwight and I had an early dinner at a local restaurant. We had tried to get into Spaghetti Works, but it was booked solid from 4-8 p.m. Emily suggested we would have better luck at a local pub that the out-of-towners wouldn't know about, and she was right. I had a chicken/avocado panini that was absolutely delicious. And french fries - carbs, right? Jeanie got her carbs in a glass of wine. She said the next day that our time would have been faster had we allowed her to have a second glass that night!

Emily and Tony came over to the hotel, and after spending the evening visiting, we went to bed pretty early. I had my alarm set for 5:00, even though the race didn't begin until 8:00. I wanted to get my breakfast eaten (PBJ, banana, and a cup of coffee) and everything taken care of before we headed over at 7:00.

It was pretty chilly at the start, but I didn't wear a pull-over because I didn't want to deal with it later. I knew I'd be plenty warm before the first mile was over. And I was right.

We met Emily and had a pre-race picture taken:

And took care of of some pre-race business:

I was so anxious for the race to start. I was literally jumping up and down waiting for it to begin. I felt like Tigger - boing, boing, boing! Just a few minutes before 8:00 the national anthem was sung (got some tears in my eyes then) and the race began. It took us slow folk about ten minutes to get to the start line, and then we were off.

When we saw Tom, Dwight, and Erin at about mile 2.5, I was so happy that I ran over to give them hugs and kisses:

This smile did not leave my face all day!

And of course we had to pose for another photo:

We ran a little, walked a lot, and talked non-stop. The best part of this race was having uninterrupted time with my sister without having to share her with anybody! The weather was gorgeous - a beautiful sunny fall day. And we got to see a good part of Des Moines by foot! This was a welcome sight at about mile 8:

Where the finish line is!

An even more welcome sight was the Mile 12 marker, which I thought I took a picture of but which turned out to be a video. So unless you want to watch 1 second of the Mile 12 marker and 6 minutes of the inside of my SpiBelt, I'm not posting it.

The crowds were wonderful! We got high (or rather, low) fives by little kids, a dance team was performing by the State Capitol, there was a drum line in Water Works Park, any number of musicians playing along the route, and wonderful signs. I saw some and Emmy saw others (since she had 13.1 miles more than I did), and here are a few of our favorites:

"Don't poop your pants"

"You are pretty and you run fast"

"This seemed like a good idea - 4 months ago"

"Hey. Getting up early and making this sign was hard work too"

"26.2 miles because 26.3 would just be crazy"

"Worst parade ever"

And Emily's personal fave, "These 26.2 miles are for every girl who was ever chosen last in gym class"

My favorite sign, though, was when we turned the corner and saw the finish line. (Again, tears.) We still had at least half a mile to go, but we knew it was there. My feet were feeling it by then, and I knew exactly where the blisters were.

We want a bagel and we want it now.

It was a good day for the Bollinger girls!  Emily ran the full marathon - her medal is much bigger than mine.

I know I've been talking about this race for what seems like forever, so I'll stop now, although it may seep into conversation here and there, kind of like "One time? At band camp?", only it will be "One time? When I did a half-marathon?" Hey! I did a half-marathon!