Saturday, February 28, 2015

Snow run, FINALLY!

I finally got my wish!  A snow run and a long run at that!
And I finally got to try out my YakTrax!  Had them since christmas and hadn't gotten to use them.  
Let's just say that I LOVE them.  They made running in the snow SO much easier!  I can't wait to take them back out again tomorrow when we have even more.  
Hi snow cows!  The snow was coming from the south and east and yep, my normal long run route goes mostly east and south.  I need to invest in some snow googles I guess because my glasses kept fogging over and then freezing.  I would have to put them in my pocket to warm them up and get the ice off of them.
Snow flakes up your nose and in your eyes hurt!  We are suppose to get around 6 or so inches and I am super excited to get more snow runs done.  We got all of our normal weekend stuff done last night  just in case, so we are good to go if we are stuck inside all weekend.  I needed to do speed work during my long run, and while I pushed as hard as I could, I still couldn't hit the paces I needed to.  Blame it on the snow, or the fact that I didn't really fuel properly last night (we had chinese while out shopping because andrew suddenly LOVES sweet and sour chicken) or maybe the fact that I was up coughing last night more than I have been all week.  Whatever it was, I am proud of the effort I tried to put in, and the fact that I got 10 miles done.  
And I am super excited about this!!!!!  I never thought I would be able to hit 100 in a month again.  While my ankle is bothering me, I do think that is treadmill related and not related to the number of miles I ran this month.  







Friday, February 27, 2015

a quick check in

What a crazy week at work again!  I haven't had much time to sit down at all and my nights seem to be just as equally hectic.  I am seriously thinking about investing in a laptop so I can blog at night in bed.  Those few minutes when everyone is settled and ready for sleep seem to be the only minutes I have left to do anything.  Seriously, moms of more than one,I don't know how you do it!
Almost 100 miles this month and it is a short month!
Running has been okay this week, mostly just getting mileage and not doing intense speed work as set forth for my plan.  I just can't seem to kick this cold completely. I put it out on FB as this cold/virus has been going around most of  KSU lately, and I got tons of, oh it lasts 3-4 weeks at least.  Sigh.  I don't have three to four weeks to give so I am being cautious and just doing mileage at this point.  I gave up my long run last weekend because I felt really, really bad, and i knew it was not a good idea.  While my coughing is minimal now and mainly when I get hot or wake up in the morning, I am still going to be cautious this weekend and just do an easy paced long run.  I just might get my wish too to use my Yaktrax that i got for christmas!  I sure do love snow runs so kind of excited for this! I did get on the dreadmill again this week, and did 4 miles on it of 5.4, 5.5, 5.6 intervals at 1% incline.  Every three minutes I increased the speed and that seemed to keep me from going insane.   I still hate the treadmill but definitely appreciate it when I can't get outside or have a baby sitter.

I am not getting as many cool pictures during my run since it is actually quite chilly out now so I will leave you with some random pictures of andrew:)
These are two of my favorite pictures.  I have to say, we are in the midst of potty training and this has been way easier than I ever imagined.  I had pictures of us holed up in the bathroom for several days on end with gnashing of teeth and accidents all over the place, but it has been a breeze.  He still occasionally has accidents but pretty much is 100% in regular thomas undies now.  I am so grateful to our preschool for starting the process and maintaining it during the day.  

Will check back after my long run!  Hoping for some snow!!!!




Sunday, February 22, 2015

The runs (LOL)

This is my week in running.  I started the week with the cold that was going around KSU.  It started out with just a sore throat and a raspy voice.  I decided to keep running all week until it got the best of me on Saturday, the day of my long run.  I spent most of the day in bed. I wasn't running a fever but I was coughing and congestion and just overall felt horrible.  Here is how my week ended up even though I had this stupid cold.

Monday:Rest day-One of these days my schedule is going to allow me to get back to the pool

Tuesday-Tempo run on the dreadmill, 5 minute warm up, 10 minutes easy running (5.2, 2% incline), 15 minutes 9:10-9:20  (6.3, 2%), 5 minutes easy (5.2, 2%), and 10 minutes hard (6.3, 2%).  I was really worried because I have honestly never done any speed work on the dreadmill (remember odd feeling of falling).  I started out at 6.1 and worked my way up to 6.3-6.4 for my tempo portions, and I surprisingly felt great.  This run gave me a TON of confidence about doing speed work on the treadmill.  Sore in my ankle lower leg area, lots of icing.  5 miles total.

Wednesday-Recovery run back on the dreadmill, 5 minute warm up, 40 minutes of 9 minute run, 1 minute walk, and 5 minutes cool down (5.2, 2% incline).  3.72 miles total.

Thursday-Hill repeats.  The roads weren't as cleared as i had hoped but the temp was bearable and my hill was clear.  8 repeats and walk down recovery.  4.85 miles total.

Friday-off

Saturday-Had planned a long run with my BRF.  Ended up spending most of this day in bed.  I am very glad I did this.  I have run through illnesses before and made them way worse.  I still won't forget the long run I had last year, coughing up a lung and eating I don't know how many cough drops.  I am kind of stubborn when it comes to schedules and I learned my lesson the hard way by having to take a full week off.  This time I decided history wouldn't repeat its self.

Sunday-After staying up late with andrew who decided that bedtimes were for the birds, I had already made up my mind to sleep in a little and go out a little later in the morning.  I still was on the fence as to what run I would do, a long run or a recovery run.  I got up and fueled and felt better but still not 100%.  I had decided to do my recovery run and just miss a long run.  It's not the end of the world and I was not to panicky about missing it.  I set out to run my 5 minute warm up, 30 minute easy, 20 minutes of 4x1s and 5 minutes cool down.  Despite the 15 MPH sustained north winds, I was dressed warmly and overall felt great.  Well, that is until about mile 2, when my tummy started talking to me.  It started saying things like, you'd better find a ditch and soon.  Well, I did have any TP with me so tried to make it home and well, that just didn't work.  I won't go into any details but I was unable to finish my run so had one more 4 x1 and the cool down left.  I still got 4.5 miles in and I will take it.  I am taking it easy the rest of the day and watching daytona and looking forward to a better week this week.

Note to self: Basically climbing hills for three workouts:one hill work out and two work outs on the treadmill at 2% incline is not a good idea.  Now that I have some confidence with running faster on the treadmill and not crashing and burning, will work on making the incline a little less severe.  My legs, specifically my old injury and my ankle are all not happy with me and i have been pretty much icing most of the week.

Total mileage for the week:

Monday=0

Tuesday=5 miles

Wednesday=3.72 miles

Thursday=4.85 miles

Friday=0

Saturday=0

Sunday=4.5

Total=18.07




Friday, February 20, 2015

Quiet

I have been fairly quiet this week mainly because I have been SO busy lately at work.  Usually i have snippets of time to work on a blog, but this week has been gangbusters.  I am helping a student in another lab do a project in my lab that is taking a ton of time, plus we just got through our back log of samples finally.  I am not complaining in one bit, the busier we are, the more assured I am of a paycheck LOL!
The view from my office when it was snowing again and I was in a panic
So far this week has been about the dreadmill.  I actually left work early tuesday due to snow and icky weather and picked up andrew early, so we could be home before it got really bad.  We were already late to work/school because of several inches of snow dumped on us the night before.  I managed to squeeze in all of my work surprisingly in the few hours I was in the lab.  When I got home, I had hill repeats on my schedule.  Since the roads were not in good shape, and because I didn't want to do my recovery run and then two speed work sessions back to back, I opted to go ahead and move my tempo run to tuesday.  That's right I said tempo run and dreadmill in the same sentence.  I normally avoid ALL speed work on the dreadmill, because of my fear of falling, but I am getting so close to my first half of the year that I had to put on my big girl panties and just do it.  Once I got andrew settled with a snack and a thomas movie, I jumped on.  I told myself I would just try and hit the slower end of the range of pace I was suppose to do, and then slowly move towards the faster end of the pace if I wasn't panicking about falling.  I did use the incline again, and I was able to get up to 6.3 with a 2% incline.  I was so stoked after this run, mainly because I was able to gain a ton of confidence about my ability to do speedwork and for long periods of time on the dreadmill.  Then because my hubby's crazy work schedule the next day, I was able to get back on the dreadmill and knock out a recovery run.  I did have to break it into 9 minute run, 1 minute walk but hey,  it was a recovery run.  Recovery is all about taking it easy right?  I also had hills on my schedule for thursday and I was lucky enough to get out in daylight (it's almost spring!) and get my hill work done.  I have two more runs this week, another long run with more HMP time interspersed and another recovery run.  I may be hitting the dreadmill yet again due to my hubby's work schedule (Again, not complaining at all).

Overtime is a good thing and the only one who will really loose out is poor miss stella.  She got to go yesterday and was biting at me and over the top, which honestly, kind of helped me get up those hills!  I need to invest in her a little dreadmill of her own!  I am nursing a head cold also that is slowly making it's way into my chest.  I am trying everything to keep it from doing so and living in denial a little bit, but I think I am in for a loosing battle.  Last night I was up at 3 am coughing, and while I am not coughing during my run (mostly after) I know first hand how not letting yourself recover from any illness involving coughing can really kick your butt and cause you to be off for a longer time.  I may have to ditch this weekend's runs all together if this gets worse.  I feel like overall my training is going really, really well and a run or two missed is not going to hurt me at all.

Have a great weekend!

Sunday, February 15, 2015

My week in running re caps

My coach has asked me for a run down of my week.   I usually tell it in a story like form but I need to make it concise for her.  I really like how Angie at A Mother's Pace breaks it down weekly, so I may try that too.  Here are the runs for the week:

Monday: Rest day

Tuesday:400 meter repeats-It took me almost 7 miles with  the warm up and cool down and 10 x repeats with walk back recovery.  I was able to hit all of my repeat times either a little bit below or on the dot.  I really was worried about this work out because my legs still felt tired from switching my long run to sunday, but I managed quite well.  Major runner's high after apologizing to my hubby for being so late (It took me almost an hour and a half to complete).

Wednesday-rest day-had to take a professor out for dinner

Thursday-Recovery run that was suppose to be done Wednesday.  5 minute walk warm up, 40 minute easy pace (5.2, 2% incline), 5 minute cool down done at the gym on the treadmill. I can't believe how many treadmill runs I have done recently.  I usually avoid the dreadmill like the plague.  It does get easier with your BRF on a treadmill beside you.  Ankle bothered me afterwards so iced all night.

Friday-Tempo run outside thanks to nicer weather.  5 minute walk warm up, 10 minute easy pace, 10 minute at 9 minute pace, 5 minute easy, 10 minute at 9:15 (I had a range of 9-9:20 and I must have been tired), 10 minute easy pace, 5 minute cool down walk.

Saturday-Back to the dreadmill, recovery run.  5 minute walk warm up, 30 minutes easy pace (5.2 at 2% incline), 1 minute walk, 4 minutes easy run (5.2, 2%incline) repeat that 4 times, 5 minute walk.  My legs really bothered me after this . I think the dreadmill makes my legs hurt every time I run on it. I  feel like I have been hit by a bus after running on it every.single.time.  I iced my ankle and leg all night.

Sunday-Long run.  Well, I can't do speed work on the treadmill and this long run called for some speed work again.  25 minutes of it to be exact.  We finally got a good night's sleep and when the alarm went off to fuel and caffeinate, I shut it off and slept another hour.  I am glad I did.  The problem was as the day went on, the temperature went up but the wind also increased.  So you had to make a decision do you want to freeze to death due to the wind or due to the temp.  I chose the wind and boy did it kick my butt.  The work out was 5 minute warm up walk, 25 minute run easy pace, 25 minute tempo basically at 9:30 (goal HMP), 20 minute easy, and 4 minute run and one minute walk with a 5 minute cool down.  I honestly haven't had to run in the truly cold weather so I was fumbling to try and get everything together and make sure I didn't forget anything.  I totally put on the wrong shoes (both sets of my running and retired shoes look the same), and forgot my ear warmer (I had a full head hood on but needed more ear protection, and I had to come back and get my fuel as I almost left without it as well.  The first 25 minutes plus the 5 warm up was into 17 mph sustained winds.  I was worried it would totally sap my energy for the speed work but I wanted to get that portion done first versus at the end of the run.  I was able to turn south before my watch beeped for the tempo portion.  25 minutes at 9:30 pace felt good but hard and I did have about 7 minutes of that into the north wind.  I fueled after that portion and my shot bloks were like stones.  Even though I had them in an interior pocket, they felt frozen solid.  I tried warming them up with my hands but that wasn't working.  I finally had to just put them in my mouth and hold them there one at a time till they thawed out enough to chew.  That took about 3 minutes of walking into my 20 minute easy pace but it is what it is. I so wish I could do regular GU.  Bleh.  The rest was around a 10:40 to 11 minute pace and some in the wind.  I was very grateful when it was done.  My snot rockets had frozen on my gloves and face and my face felt very chapped even though I had much of it covered up.  It wasn't my favorite run ever but it is done and i am glad.

It has been a hard week because Andrew has had tummy problems yet again.  One night we were both up from 3 am on with him and then I stayed home with him that day just in case it was viral and of course he was fine (and didn't nap AT ALL).  He has also suddenly been getting up super early in the morning, so I am kind of a zombie this week.  I can definitely feel how tired I am when I run. I am hoping this is a better week since we think and hope we figured out the cause of his tummy issues.

M:0 miles
T:7.34miles
W:0 miles
TH: 4 miles
F:5.02 miles
Sat:4.84
Sun:9.02

30.22 miles for this week, five days of running, four in a row.  Don't forget this counts my warm up and cool down in the mileage.


Saturday, February 14, 2015

Random pictures

You know how you take random pictures and then you don't really have a good way to get them into a certain blog post?  Well, that is what this blog is about, randomness!
I told him Diesel 10 was evil and he didn't believe me.  Diesel 10 was suppose to have batteries and we conveinently forgot them.  Then Uncle Cayce added batteries and Diesel 10 decided to rip a curl out of andrew's hair.  Evil, evil Diesel 10.
Helping mommy in the lab.  Sometimes I have to go out in on the weekend and do stuff.  He likes to go with and color and help.  He can finally fit his hands into my small nitrile gloves.  He pretty much wore them all day that day.
I am loving the Dr. Cool ice wraps.  This is the next bigger size to the little purple one I got for my ankle.  This one ices my whole shin and I love it.  Andrew says I should have gotten red.
My favorite student fixing the interface of my blog.  Thank god for youth:)
Weird clouds the other night.  They looked like feathers.  
He likes to ride on my back all the time now.  I like to do squats with him on my back for a good work out.  He now weighs 31 lbs!
He insisted on wearing his train hat to school the other day.  I let him.  Too cute.
Our new sunday thing.  We go grocery shopping and before we do, we eat at Long John Silvers.  He LOVES the hush puppies.

Okay, enough randomness.  Running recap tomorrow after my long run.  That will be four days in a row of running!







Thursday, February 12, 2015

Life


Ah life, just when I think I have a nice easy routine down, you throw a curve ball at me.  I was so excited for this week of running.  I am sickness free and other than one re adjustment due to a planned dinner on wednesday night, I was gloriously returning to 5 days a week of running.  I was riding a huge runner's high from doing speed work and not dying during my long run.  I had briefly thought about changing my speed work on tuesday to my recovery run on thursday, but when I peeked at my plan for the week, I noticed I had speed work both days.  I had to pick my poison.

The weather was still pretty nice tuesday, so I chose to keep my 400 meter repeats on that day and save my tempo run for the colder day, which always helps me hit my pace a little easier.  Let's just say that Tuesday night's run was amazing. I was able to keep all of my repeats under my time i was shooting for.  The sun was still up for most of my run, so I could actually see the gravel road and my surroundings and no creepers on the road this time.  I did kind of misjudge how long it was going to take to get through 10x400 m repeats with a 15 minute warm up and cool down.  Whoops.  Thank goodness for walk back recovery, so I could text my hubby and let him know I was still alive and running.  By the end of my work out, I had hit almost 7 miles of running, YIKES!  I floated on a cloud for quite a while feeling very badass about that work out.

Then life happened as it usually does.  I had a dinner wednesday night, so no running, and thursday morning around 3 am, andrew woke up with a tummy ache that proceeded into vomiting and diarrhea.  I was up scrubbing floors and toilets and my poor hubby had to get up and take a shower with andrew to clean both of them off (my hubby seems to always be a target of the puking).  While I really, really needed to work, today, I wasn't sure if this was stomach bug number 4 or just this random tummy thing he had been having.  We finally got back in bed around 6 am, and slept till 8:30, at which time my hubby found out that he didn't have to work this morning due to some issues at the plant, yeah! He did have to go in at lunch time for a meeting this afternoon.  While we didn't catch up on our sleep, we got a little more before he had to head out and I had to pull it together and be a stay at home mom for the day.  I also had to make sure all the experiments at work were taken care of.  Add on top of that the fact that andrew has refused to nap today for some odd reason (did someone slip him some caffeine when I wasn't looking?), and you have one tired mom and kiddo.  I still need to run tonight, but there is no way I can pull off a serious tempo run so once again, moving my runs around.  I can just do an easy run tonight, speed work tomorrow night, a shorter recovery run saturday and then my long run sunday.

Yawn.  Pass the coffee!!!!  Going to go run with my BRF at the gym on the dreadmills (even though I have one at home) so that she can try and keep me awake for at least 40 or so minutes.  Just had me a big ole cup of go juice (and I may regret that later tonight when I am trying to sleep).

BTW, I am on instagram now, so look for redaussie3.  I am participating in an instagram challenge by Run This Year and am really having fun with it.  I should have joined a long time ago!  Now I don't have to bore my childless friends with 100 pictures a day of my kiddo LOL.  I can just drive my followers crazy!

Sunday, February 8, 2015

weekly run down

Snow just in time for the California Bionano crew's visit
What a week!  I have been super busy at work and the company we are a service provider for, Bionano Genomics, had several techs come to KSU to work on our machine and to hash out some new protocols.  I am sure excited about having updates of both to make my life easier!  It has been frustrating, but super cool to go through the evolution of this company.  We were laughing at how at the beginning, I had to sort of put the chips together myself before I could even run them!  Now they can sequence an entire human genome in one chip in one 24 hour period!!!!!!  This is WAY to awesome for me to even fathom!  We had some late nights and some fun days and I can't wait for them to come again.  Usually, they only come when we are having problems, so this was the first time they came to just work on stuff and learn together and learn we did!

Of course having visitors meant some eating out, some beers, and some changing of my beloved schedule.  Add a crazy one day snow storm to make the roads icky and it got interesting.  I was hoping to get back to five a week runs this week, but it just wasn't meant to be.  I was determined not to freak out about it as I use to.  Type A here, remember:)  Anyway, I did my speed work Tuesday even though I had planned on switching my tuesday and thursday work outs.  My legs felt like lead, the road I do my repeats on was a muddy mess, and some weirdo kept driving up and down where I was running, which made me have to keep stella on a leash, BUT when it was over, I felt so badass!!!!  I may or may not have gotten a great strength work out as well with the amount of mud I was carrying on my shoes.  Stella also got pretty muddy, so we had a bath post run.  She wasn't real thrilled about it, but we got it done.  Then I didn't get to run again till friday on my way home from work.  The guys left around 3 and my experiments finished up around 3:30, so I changed at work and hit linear trail.  Thanks to the snow melting, it was pretty muddy still, so once again, strength training and running all wrapped up into one session.
Still playing around with the fitsnap app.  This was no filter though!
I had to also switch my long run and recovery run days, which I think was a good thing because my legs felt very tired friday from tuesday's work out.   It was also a very gorgeous day, so post run, we spent quite a bit of time in the park just soaking up the 70 degree winter day.
Today was my scheduled long run.  I was a little worried because I had some half marathon pace miles in the middle of my long run.  I should also say that this is the pace I want to run for my next PR, so a little faster than what I have ever run a longer run.   I warmed up a few miles with my BRF who had run a race the day before (and WON 2nd place in her age group WTG) and then I peeled off and got a few miles at my HMP.  It felt good, not too tough, but I did have to repeat the mantra "strong" to keep me going.  I did think to myself a few times can I really run this pace for an entire half?   I gelled right after my speed work was done and then started up again with some easier paced running.  I ended up doing over 8.5 miles total and I felt GREAT!  Major runners high here.  Still kind of floating on a cloud.  
Afterwards stella and I completed our instagram challenge for the day, taking a pic of us stretching out our calves.  I am really having fun with this one for sure.  I am new to instagram, and having fun looking at people's pictures




Monday, February 2, 2015

Stomach virus ROUND 3

It was a long weekend that started off in a bad way.  The return of the stomach virus DUN DUN DUNNNNN (think of belt from The Croods).  Yep, it made a glorious return hitting tony and I the hardest (well we did get out of it last time that andrew had it) and only slightly hitting andrew.  This is the SECOND time in a few months I have gotten this crap and the third time total for our household.  I use to be such a healthy person till I had a kiddo.  Seriously!  I saw the doctor maybe once a year for my yearly check up.  Now she knows my first name and asks about my races and such.  Sad really.  Anyway, we kept andrew home from daycare just in case (he had one really bad diaper first thing friday morning and that was it).  We were so happy to have a fourth member of our family who could go and get us gatorade and ginger ale by the end of the day.  My poor hubby had been up all night the night before with it and seemed to be on the downhill side of it friday during the day, but he stayed home just in case as he was pretty exhausted and weak.  I was on the uphill slope of it all friday.  Good thing I had several good nurses to take care of me.  This is my BIL's dog Zooey.  She was most concerned about me.
Stella was also concerned, as in concerned about our running, as we had two runs planned for this weekend.
Stella's nursing skills include sitting on your chest, so you can't breath and putting her nose on your face.  It is really endearing as long as you can still draw breath.
Yes, andrew was very concerned about his various Thomas the trains getting sick so he coated them all in sanitizer
I felt better saturday morning,  so decided to move my run till that afternoon, and just do my recovery run, since hopefully I was in recovery mode illness wise.  I decided to go to the gym to get on the treadmill next to my BRF, since it was snowing and or raining ice pellets.  I didn't think I could handle super slow running in less than ideal weather.  I did 55 minutes of pretty slow and easy running.  I didn't even look at the miles, was just glad i got the time done, and didn't have any potty catastrophes.  I did start to burp towards then end, and I was still having those nasty egg burps, so I want to say a HUGE apology to the guy that got on the treadmill next to me after my BRF left:)
:)
My view from my treadmill
After another rough night, I decided to run at home just in case of egg burps or worse.  It was weird, I felt fine saturday during the day, so much better so that I had eaten some foods sparingly, and we had gotten out and braved the crowds to get our grocery shopping done prior to the bad weather.  Even though I had a rough night Saturday night, I slept in thanks to my hubby (who was back to normal, thanks goodness) and moved my long run to that afternoon.  I had decided since the roads were covered in ice that the dreadmill was the best way to go.  I surely don't need a new injury thanks to falling on ice.  I had referenced one of those treadmill conversion charts and decided to go slow but to try to stay somewhat near how fast I go during a long run.  I try to stay around 10:30-10:45 but I have this weird fear of falling off of the treadmill, so even going that fast felt unsafe to me.  I followed the chart and increased my incline to 2% and kept it at 5.2 mph which was around 11 minute miles.  I also rocked out to my rock my run app and some podcasts near the end so I could forget the fact that I felt like i was dying a slow mental death.
I also decided to sport my super dorky brooks headband that I had acquired a while back during a shoe demo night at the MRC.  After my time on the dreadmill, it weighed 5 lbs.  I did sweat ALOT and I even chaffed.  I had the fan on and everything.  I really don't know how people do long runs on dreadmills.  I had to get off once around mile 2 to go to the potty (and I am very glad it was my home potty and not the one holer at the gym).  After that, my stomach settled and was fine.  I did do some experimenting with drinking gatorade during my run and I did gel at 45 minutes.  SO even though I didn't hit the mileage I needed to hit, I did put in the time and got some experimenting in.  BOOM.  Take a crappy run and get useful data out of it:)  Yep, I said data.  Scientist to the core baby.
I also tried running in my new swiftwick socks that I won through I run this Year.  Yes, I know I need to update my badge on the top of my blog page.  I do know that it is 2015.  I had been running in their normal swiftwick socks, as I had won a pair or was given a pair at some point last year.  Unfortunately, after two days of treadmill running, I have a huge blister on the bottom of my big toe and I am not sure if it is treadmill related or sock related.  Will have to test these out more on the road to make a final conclusion.  My hypothesis at this point is the blister is all treadmill related.  See, scientific theory again:)
I was really glad that I did get my longish run in prior to the super bowl last night.  We attended a party at a friend's house, and I knew there would be kick ass food and home brew there.  I was so hoping my stomach was up for the challenge, because I LOVE good food.  I think my hubby and I both ate very trepadaciously, and shared a couple of home brews, followed by about a gallon of water just in case.  We were both rewarded with good tummies last night and a good night's sleep, finally.
This little dude had a blast.  There were MANY children there of varying ages, and the boys that lived there had a train table, so he was pretty much upstairs all night long playing hard.  They also had a kitty who got a TON of attention from this little guy.  sigh.  I guess we need to look at introducing a kitty back to our pack.  He had not had a nap at all sunday, so I was really worried about melt downs, but he didn't have one till we left.  He proceeded to pitch a huge fit and then pass out as soon as we strapped him in the car seat.  We can't wait to go over and play/party again.  

I am looking forward to a nice week of no sickness and some good running!!!!  Have a great week y'all!