New Year's Eve

New Year's Eve started out bright and early with Sarah. It was probably our coldest run together of the winter (31 degrees - but dry - yay!) We had 7 miles on the agenda for the day. I thought it would be great to do a run from Bellevue over the bridge onto Mercer Island (out 3.5) and then back. I thought it would be moderately hilly. Yeah -- holy hills! We passed the time by catching up on stories from Christmas, plans for New Year's Eve, goals for 2012, etc -- but we were both struggling a bit at times. Other gals might bond over drinks and dinner -- we bond by sweating it out and running up and down hills together :) Here is a picture of us 7 miles and about 1 hour 10 minutes later (we had already removed our cold weather hats/headbands):In other big running news --- I bit the bullet and registered for EUGENE -- the full 26.2 miles!!! Crazy to even think about... but I am just starting the training program and taking it one mile at a time :) Sarah registered for a half-marathon in San Luis Obispo, it is the weekend before my race. She is doing the marathon training, and if all goes well, she will upgrade to run the marathon.
I know I have said it before, but I am really lucky to have met Sarah (and some other running friends recently). Our run on New Year's Eve was seriously therapeutic for me -- we chat things out during our miles together -- and everything seems so much clearer when we are done. We are just getting started -- we will have PLENTY of long talks (long runs) coming up, I am sure! Here are the kiddos later in the morning. We took them to a park to burn off some energy. They are SO much fun at the parks now -- I love that I don't really have to worry about these two toughies much anymore. Such a big change from a year or so ago... I used to dread when they would get close to the "big kid" area. The kids had a birthday party to go to later that night -- and then Travis and I enjoyed some cosmopolitans together (I might have forced those on him -- but he liked them!), played board games, and stayed up to watch Dick Clark and the ball drop together. It was much-needed bonding time after a crazy December filled with him traveling a lot and me trying to keep everything together and prepare for Xmas at the same time.
Happy New Year!!!