Weekly Update - Long Overdue!

There has been a lot happening lately!

The finished product! 2 years worth of car rides 🙂

Closer up! Yes, every inch is stitched!!

Sierra wanted to help me as I finished Violet’s stocking. Her help lowered my “productivity” by about 90% :). Note the saying on her shirt? “Dream Big”!

Training Updates:

I’ve started PT for
my right glute and hamstring which is really helping. My right glute hasn’t
been firing, causing the hamstring to do most of the work when running. My
pelvis is also tilted because of the imbalance, which was causing the tender
spot at the top of the hip.

When you’ve logged a lot of miles, I’ve found that you’re
generally “strong” and when something stops working right, other things are
strong enough to compensate (at least in the short term). I feel like the right
hamstring and quad were on the verge of a true injury, though, so I’m glad I
went in and am on top of it!

I’ve been running for ~2 weeks now.

Week 1: The first week didn’t go very well. Chris gave me
just 3 runs to do: a 3 miler, a 5 miler, and a 7 miler. The “off” days I was to
do a strength circuit or gym lifting. The 3 miler was glorious (blog here). 2 days later I
attempted to motivate myself to get out for my 5 miler after getting home from a
couple of appointments during the day. I absolutely didn’t want to head out. I
argued with myself: it always feels better once you’re out there and done, so
let’s just start! But, 5 miles is a really long way. Remember the last 5 miler you did pre-NYC? Bad memories flooded back of just struggling to finish those “easy” 4-5 mile
runs… oh, this is not going to be fun… But you don’t want to tell Chris that
you skipped the 2nd workout he gave you!

What do you think I did?

I didn’t go out. I made a wonderful dinner and did the
dishes and laundry instead and didn’t regret my decision at all – cooking and
cleaning was a lot of fun! I’m such a housewife now – when did this happen??

I have nothing immediately on my plate, so pushing myself to
start training sooner than my brain wants to just isn’t necessary. I have to
say I am surprised at how long I’ve taken to recover from this training/racing
block – it’s never taken me longer than a week! I wrote Chris in complete
honestly – I’m a firm believer in open communication, and the more info I give him the better he can adjust things to help me be successful.

I did the 5 miler the next day, and after another day off I made it through the 7 miler. I ran with Nate, and he asked me a couple times if I was okay to keep going after
my right leg hit my left fairly hard during the run. The hamstring also gave
out a couple of times. Sigh. BUT, the legs didn’t “come undone” like they have
in the past, so there was at least one success!

Week 2: This week included another 7 miler, but this time followed by a 5
miler the next day. My first 2 days in a row! Yikes! I am proud to say that both runs went
really, really well!!! The longer run was slow, as I’m trying to keep my HR at
165 bpm (I think that has been easier for me than straining for a certain pace). I expected my legs to struggle through the 5 miler the next day, but they
didn’t. In fact, for the first time, I felt a little bit of that
“Nichole spring” in the legs. I wasn’t worrying about staying upright or my
right leg crashing into the left! The pace was quicker as well (8:00 miles,
wa-hoo!) with the same HR effort. I am still smiling about these two runs 🙂 !!!

After a day off today, I get to try 8 or 9 tomorrow. I am SO
excited! Wish me luck!

Life Updates:

I went home this week to spend time with my sister and nieces visiting
from Denver.

The first stop: the Marshall Lyon-County Library! I worked there in high-school. It was fun to bring the girls there to hang out!

I was able to go to the Brookings SD Children’s Museum with my
mom, sister, and nieces (Sierra, 4, Violet, 11 months). It’s a great place to go!
There are a lot of different rooms with “themes” and each one captured their
attention.

Sierra as waitress at the Children’s Museum. I was lucky enough to receive pretend ice cream with ketchup and mustard.


In the story corner at the museum!

At the grocery store together! I obviously liked this section of the museum :).

There were numerous “laughter attacks” again, per usual. I figured
out what the chunks in the oven were from earlier this summer (blog post here).
My sister apparently brought up 6 mozzarella sticks one afternoon, “but only 4
came out! I thought I had just miscounted!”. Only my sister! You probably had
to be there, but I’m still chuckling about this! More laughter came at the expense of my uncle and the girl at
the Mattress Barn and my grandmother’s Apples to Apples playing ability (oh, did I
play that card? Oh, my!). My grandma won that game, though! What does that say about our playing
ability?

Me + Sis!

Then it was a family Thanksgiving celebration, complete with
the typical holiday meal. I absolutely love Thanksgiving; it’s my favorite holiday
meal by far!

Big girl Violet!

Friday evening we went out to celebrate my grandma’s 80th birthday. It was a lot of fun. I was most impressed by Leighton’s appetite:


Leighton’s meal. He ate it all, plus dessert. WOW. Can I please be a collegiate male distance runner?

Yep, gone. Impressive.

We celebrated Sierra and Violet’s combined birthdays today.
It is so fun to see the absolute joy on a 4 year old’s face when they open a
present. Scooby Doo stickers! Look at this, Grandma – puzzles! Ohhh, a Jessie
doll (from Toy Story)! Violet was content with watching her sister and trying
to put all of the gifts into her mouth.