Recovery week 4

As always, here are some random pictures.  You're welcome (and yes I said that in my head like Maui).

I am a sucker for personalized TRAIN ornaments

Coach let me decide if I wanted structure until my next training cycle.  She gave me the option of a payment free month and me just doing what I wanted when I wanted, or structure and a plan, and I voted for structure.  When I said the S word structure, I think she mistakenly took that for the other S word, speed work.  I was a little surprised to see speed work back on the schedule so soon.  I really need to think about my goals for this spring to see where we need to go with my speed work.  Part of me would like one more crack at a 2 hour half, but part of me is kind of enjoying not having time goals and letting PRs happen as the may.  My A race is certainly my trail marathon for sure, but Running with the Cows is post my marathon, so there is that.

Monday:  Rest day.  Which turned into oops, wrestling day at the last minute, and oh yeah you didn't get this ambassador program you wanted.  Bummer.  I need to work more on building up my social media and moving this blog to a better platform, so I get it.  I have a couple more ambassador programs  out there, so holding out hope that I might get one of those!  The most important to me is the AMR ambassador program, so I guess I will be checking and rechecking my emails until I hear back :).

The last selfie post phone screen destruction

Post wrestling and pre eating, I was skipping in the parking lot with Andrew, and my phone, which has not been in a case due to it's weird over heating issue/shutting down issue hit the ground at just the right angle to completely shatter the screen.  Of course i have almost a month left till I can upgrade.  Insert screaming into pillow.  Lucky for me, I have a super great grad student/friend who can repair screens.  She quickly directed me on what to buy and we found a screen I could pay a little bit more for shipping and have by Wednesday.  I really, really don't like not having a phone.  I listen to podcasts, talk to my mom, update my facebook, you know all the important things in life on that stupid phone.  

Tuesday:  Speed work.  1 mile warm up.  2 minutes hard, 2 minutes easy x 8.  Cool down till you hit 6.  We had three of us plus both dogs, and we had a blast.  It was feels like 18 when we started, and feels like 16 by the time we ended.  We all were at different speeds and different recoveries, but we ended up running the warm up and cool down together, and got some Christmas light looking in at the end.

Wednesday:  Rest day.

Naughty Elf, stay off of my medals!

Thursday:  An easy 4.  Nothing like a good recovery run post some hard speed work.  We are all still trying to get back into the routine and we are all struggling.  I have a fear since we have a new member to our running duo, that I am going to sleep in and miss our run, so I am waking up at 4 am on the dot every morning, go figure.

After attempting to repair my phone screen and being unsuccessful, I threw myself on the mercy of the minions at the sprint store.  I begged for them to help me figure out anyway to speed up my upgrade.  After much button pushing and hmmmming the kid at the store decided the best way to circumvent the fact that I was NOT due for an upgrade till the 1st of the year was to add a second line and deactivate the first line.  I got a great  (I think) deal on a new iphone 7, plus I got a new tablet on my data plan that we can use for trips to Tennessee or trips period since little man's tablet is only good on wifi.

Friday:  Nothing.  Absolutely nothing.  Bad me.  We did have another one of our freezer meals and this one was delicious.  After the first couple were just meh, the rest were AMAZING!  This was a cilantro lime chicken that you cooked in the crock pot all day and the whole house smelled so good!  We served it with tortilla chips and sour cream, but I bet it would be good over rice as well.

Saturday:  8 miles and then MY FAVORITE MURDER PODCAST!

First we ran.  8 miles of sun, cold, and podcasts.  My new phone is wonderful as the temperature doesn't seem to phase the battery life at all!

Then we ran to town to get some stuff for Andrews school's week of holiday fun money money money.  If I were a pintrest mom, I could have made all of this stuff, but alas, I am not, so to target we went.  We found a really ugly Christmas sweater that he should be able to wear for a couple of years, elf ears, some Christmas socks, and some bows.  

We also got a tree from the local tree stand.  It's a little smaller than our usual tree we like to pick out,  but that was all they had left, and andrew picked it out, so it's ours.  Honestly I think it will be nice having a slightly smaller tree this year.  Less to decorate!

Later, we headed to KC to see the live taping of one of my most favorite podcasts, My Favorite Murder.  First we went shopping at the Legends, where as usual, I stocked up on stuff for my kiddo.  I wish my clothes went on sale for 2 and 3 dollars a piece!  WOW!  Then we headed downtown to eat and see the show.  Unfortunately the Yard House, where we wanted to eat and have a drink or two pre show had a 2 hour wait.  Instead we ate the House of Protein, and were pleasantly surprised.  They had some amazing food!!!!  The sweet potatoes needed a tiny bit of sugar, but other than that, YUM!  My egg whites and steak breakfast burrito was delicious.  

Robin did a great job with our tickets and we were 6 rows from the stage!!!!  This theater was beautiful and I took lots of pictures of the woodwork and lights and ceilings.  We got one drink and settled in for the show.  Let's just say I laughed, I cried a little (i am a sap), and I clapped and screamed for almost 2 hours.  SSDGM baby!!!!!

 

Sunday:  4 easy miles.  After not getting in till midnight and then not really getting much good sleep, I woke up feeling not so great.  I had only had one drink, so not really hung over, but just not feeling great due to lack of sleep.  Apparently I have become an old woman and I need like 12 hours of sleep a night to feel good.  Of course I had a million things to do, so after two cups of coffee, I tried to tame the laundry/dishes/dog hair tumbleweeds.  We also grocery shop on sunday mornings and we wanted to recreate some of the freezer meal dishes, so we ran to Manhattan to get groceries.  Post running around like a chicken with my head cut off, I finally got out the door for a run...in shorts and a t shirt!  Is this winter time?  So weird for Kansas in December.  I decided to run solo with Miss Stella and we just took it easy.

Post running, we decided to finally get our Christmas stuff out and start decorating.  It's really getting fun as Andrew gets older.  He can actually help put ornaments on the tree and help daddy put lights on.  Starting to feel a little more festive, even if it is super warm outside and it doesn't feel like winter at all. 

Our tree with the Snowmen glasses on

Have a great week!  I feel like I am finally getting back into the groove, so time to start getting that strength training back on as well as ALL of my prehab and rehab exercises.   Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Season's Greetings!