TGIF

I haven't really had anything interesting to blog about this week. :) Work was super crazy last week and was slightly less crazy this week, but still pretty busy. We had a warm spell again, so that was nice! Now that March starts this weekend, it definitely feels like we're starting to turn the corner towards spring. Yay! I dressed for spring today though, and the temperature has dropped about 15 degrees since I got to work, so I am dreading walking out to my car. Hopefully the weather will stay dry for tomorrow morning's run!

Which reminds me, I don't think I ever posted on here that I officially signed up for the Chicago Marathon this fall! Or maybe I did. Sorry if that's a repeat. Anyway, I'm kind of excited. I think it will probably be my last full marathon for a while. Having to get up early every single Saturday and watch yourself on every Friday can really get to be a drag. So I'm hoping to have a really good run and kind of go out on a good note. Hopefully the third time will be a charm!

For anyone who wants to head to Chicago to cheer me on (hint hint!), here is the link to the race info: http://www.chicagomarathon.com

The race is Sunday, October 11. Only 225 more days! (According to the countdown clock on the website, I did NOT just know that.) Typing that actually gave me a flutter of nervousness in my belly. :)

I guess that's enough rambling. It's probably late enough that I can head on out of work for the day. Have a fabulous weekend!!

Ouch!

I'm not sure what I did but my left quad is freaking killing me. I did weights today at the gym and yeeowza, it's hurting. Please heal by tomorrow, as I want to enjoy the nice weather with a run outdoors!

I made a delicious (and healthy!) dinner tonight. Broiled salmon (with a slightly sweet mustard glaze), whole wheat couscous, and steamed broccoli with a little bit of goat cheese. Soooo good. And then I had some berries for dessert. Yum, yum, yum. So simple but so good! Of course, having two glasses of wine is probably not what you're supposed to do after dinner, but it's baby steps. :)

Congrats!

I know she doesn't read my blog (I don't even think she knows about it!), but I wanted to congratulate my old friend Maria. She just welcomed her second little girl into the world! Congrats, Maria, Chuck, Claire and now Eleanor! And Dillon too, of course. :)

It's Saturday!!

Thank goodness it's the weekend!!! Yay! I finally got to get a nice long run with my group in today. I only did 9.6 miles, but that was great considering 1a) my legs were killing me from the squats the other night, 2b) my long runs lately have only been 8 miles, 3c) we did the giant hill and 4d) I only ran one other day this week! eeks.

Now I'm trying to motivate myself to finish the cleaning I started earlier. Will someone please invent a self-cleaning home? That would be lovely, thanks.

I was starving after my post run nap, so I hit Weilands, the slightly fancy grocery near me. I picked up a container of berries and decided to splurge on it. OMG they were so freaking good. I love, love, love berries and these were delicious. I could have eaten the whole pound in one sitting but I was able to restrain myself and only eat half. :)

Ok, I think I'm going to go clean now. The thought of having clean sheets on the bed when I get in it tonight is rather appealing, and I know those sheets won't change themselves...

TGI almost Friday!

This has been a very long week, so I am SO glad it's almost over. I got up at 3:45 this morning to get to work for a 5:00 shipment of art. Brutal. And then I worked 10 hours and didn't leave until 3. Needless to say, I took a nap when I got home. I tried to just take a short nap but I could not wake back up. Now it's biting me in the a$$ because I need to go to bed and I'm not tired. Oh well.

I finally hit the gym tonight though. I need to get back into weight lifting. I checked a book out from the library called The New Rules of Lifting for Women. I heard good things about it about a year ago and finally got around to getting it. So far, I really like a lot of what they have to say. I'll post a more thorough review soon. Anyway, I did day one of the lifting routine. On paper, it sounded pretty easy, but I'm already sore! That is not a good sign. Oh well. I hope it goes away before my long run on Saturday! I haven't had a good long run with my group in a while so I'm really hoping to have a nice one.

Todd and I are going to plan our vacation this weekend. We're planning to go to California in April. We'll visit his best friend from college, who lives near Oakland, and his family (his son is Todd's godson) and also go off on our own to Napa/Sonoma and maybe also a day or two in San Fran itself. If anyone has any must-visits, let me know! I've been before so both of us have seen all of the standard tourist attractions, but there's always tons to do. I am definitely looking forward to some winery action. Shocker, huh? :)

so busy!

Sorry I haven't been updating, but I have been a busy girl. I'm taking it easy and trying to get caught up on things tonight.

I coordinated a wedding on Saturday, so last week was very busy with last-minute things for that. In addition to the standard coordinating stuff, I also designed and made their menus, programs, favors and seating chart. Here's a pic of the menu and favor mockups:


The wedding was on Valentine's Day, so they went with a Valentine's theme. (They went with the two hearts on top of the menu. They're conversation hearts, in case you can't tell.) Her dress had red in it and the bridesmaids wore black. They were so sweet and wonderful to work with. I coordinated a wedding for the bride's cousin in 2007, and the bride and groom met at that wedding!! How cool is that? Anyway, the bride looked absolutely beautiful and I really enjoyed myself even though I was working. :)

After my whole day at the wedding on Saturday, I had to get my long run in on Sunday morning. The weather was cool but not bad and the trail was (finally!) clear, so it was actually a really nice run. It started off slow because I was so tired, but no biggie. And then I had to head in to work in the late afternoon. Our huge Andy Warhol show closed on Sunday night, so I had to go in for the final preparations and that sort of thing. My coworker and I always go in after the shows close and get ready. Since it was Warhol, they kept the show open later than normal, so I was there until almost 11 last night. And then today was the first day of de-installation, so that was hectic. It was an exhausting day today, but we actually got a ton done. We're moving really quickly.

And to start my weekend off, after the wedding rehearsal, Todd made a fabulous dinner for Valentine's Day, since I was busy on Saturday. He did an amazing job, and it was really delicious. Here's what he made:
Some brie and sausage to munch on
Soup: cream of cauliflower with a drizzle of olive oil
Salad: Mixed greens with roasted beets, candied nuts, hearts of palm, sprouts and homemade blue cheese dressing
Main course: Seared scallops, herbed polenta and mint-lime snap peas
Dessert (made by me): Creme Brulee with triple chocolate brownie

yum yum yum! :) Plus wine and champagne. :)

Ok, that's probably enough yammering! I'll try to post more regularly now that the worst of the craziness is over. :)

sorry!

I've been slacking on my posting. Sorry! I'm busy at work right now, since we're about to close our Andy Warhol exhibition. And I'm busy with my side job, since I am coordinating a wedding on Saturday. And I'm still trying to run and lose weight and all that jazz.

I went to my last hip hop dance class last Saturday because I have to miss this weekend's because of the wedding. In addition to learning some hip hop moves, I learned that I suck at dancing. :) My friend who took it with me and I both agreed that while we got more confident in class, our confidence for the dance floor out of the classroom has plummeted.

I'm heading off to bed early. I was up until after 1 am last night working on the menus and favors for this wedding. I love doing stuff like that but I always, always, always underestimate the amount of time it takes me! Someday I'll learn. :)

Accountability

I just wanted to say that when I got home last night, I really, REALLY didn't want to go to the gym. I was figuring all sorts of ways to talk myself out of going. And part of the reason I was able to convince myself to go was because I had mentioned it on here. So I went, and did a pretty hard interval workout. Sadly for you all, it means you'll probably be hearing more about my exercise and diet plans because it makes me feel more accountable. :)

Unrelated, I picked my dad up from the airport last night. He had been out in California. He saw my great aunt out there, who is 101. 101!!!! Holy cow. My grandmother is turning 91 next week and my grandfather will be 90 in August (all on my dad's side). Nice to know I might have 60+ years to go....

nothing new

Nothing exciting going on here. I need to go to the gym tonight since I couldn't haul myself out of bed this morning. I'm going to try to do some hard-core intervals on the treadmill. I've been reading a lot about how much more efficient intervals are supposed to be for fat burning, so I'm going to try to incorporate them into my runs more often. I've been doing some intervals, but I don't think I've been doing them hard enough. I think I need to do shorter but faster.

I'll try to do something interesting so I can post about it. :)

False eyelashes, anyone?

I feel like all I've been blogging about lately is the weather. :) It has been crazy, but still. Enough is enough. I'm still going to post this though.

I went running yesterday morning before my hip hop dance class, mostly because I wanted to get it out of the way. It warmed up quite a bit later, but if I waited, I would have still been running at 1:00. So, even though it was about 0 degrees when I left the house (and by weather.com's account, -11 windchill), I toughed it out. I only made it a little over 8 miles instead of my planned 10, because it was soooo cold, and really tough going through the snow and ice still on the trail. It was a lot like running in sand, that was how much snow there still was. Every footstep kind of slid a little bit. I am very sore today, as I'm sure I was using all sorts of different muscles.

But my main reason for posting about this is to post this picture. It really cracks me up. I had to stop running for a minute about 35 minutes in because my water had frozen, so I had to unscrew the cap to get any liquid. I knew my breath was freezing somewhere on my face, because I could see it out of the corners of my eyes. I just couldn't tell where. I had my cell phone with me for emergency purposes, so I snapped a pic. I look like a freaking lunatic!


It looks like I have little feathers on my lashes. :) I'm sure the few other crazies I saw out there got a good laugh on my behalf.