FILL IN THE BLANK FRIDAY

I need: to let God handle it. i cannot stress this enough.

I want: to relax. which i'm planning on doing a lot of today and tomorrow. for once. it'll be good for the soul.

I'm proud of: alli and i. we have trained so much for this weekend and i'm so proud of us for making it all the way to 26.2.

I pray: that the race on sunday goes smoothly, that i enjoy it more than i have anticipated and that i can run all 26.2 miles without stopping. even once.

I hope: that everyone will turn to God and realize that's the only way. i also hope that i don't have to go to the bathroom during the marathon. i know that's tmi, but it's really what i'm hoping for.

I wish: i could have more control, but then again, i wonder, do i really?

I'm looking forward to: marking an item off my bucket list!

HAPPY FRIDAY TO YOU!

and for kicks, check out this awesome article on the marathon this weekend!
http://www.kansas.com/2012/10/11/2529273/bob-lutz-seeing-the-world-262.html

CARLINA WHITE STORY

scary stuff.

if you're a nerd like me, you were watching the Carlina White Story on Lifetime last Saturday night. 

as if I wasn't already a crazy person, this movie gave me every reason to not trust anyone and to be that over-protective 'crazy' mom. the movie, based on a true story, depicts a young couple who had taken their 3 week old daughter to the ER after she had gotten ill. it was minor. a fever and some antibiotics would help, but the hospital was going to keep the baby overnight. ann petway, dressed as a nurse, tells the mother of the child to go home and get some rest and that she would take care of her baby. although the mother insists that she stay, she leaves, trusting the 'nurse'. it ends up, that the baby was abducted and was never found, until 23 years later. 

fast-forward to tuesday afternoon. real life.

banks attends an in-home daycare. good stuff.

garrett returns home with banks and tells me 'do not freak out.'

what do i do? freak out. duh. doesn't he know better?

this is the story we got from our provider yesterday:

"Still in shock that we had a stranger come up to the fence and ask the kids "to help him find a puppy". I think we all know that's a give away. He took off fast as soon as he saw me. The kids came and told me right away all except one sweet 3 year old who tried to follow the man. I hate to think of what could of happened if I was just one minute later. Praise God for keeping us all safe!!!"

after speaking to our provider more i also found out that there had been a woman in the neighbors backyard watching the kids earlier that day. the neighbor had told her to get out of her backyard. later that afternoon is when the man had asked the kids to help him find his puppy. our provider quickly ran outside to ask the man what he wanted, but he ignored her and hurried to a car that was waiting in the street, with a woman driving and sped away. it was a blue pt cruiser.

this is SO scary. hate it. hate that there are people that even try to mess with people's minds. hate that there are people who want to hurt kids, or take them from their parents, or do anything in the wrong. it's not fair. the main reason i write this post is so people are aware. i'm so thankful for the smart little kids who ran inside when the man approached them to get an adult. talk to your kids. prepare them for situations.

LUCKY 13?

thank goodness the race isn't friday. and thank goodness it's not on friday the 13th. i couldn't handle that.

but, it is the 13th week of training and the final week of training and that makes for one happy gal. 

oddly enough, i have compared this training to my pregnancy with banks quite a bit. every week, we're one week closer, just like when i would get updates to my gmail account notifying me that i was in week 18 of my pregnancy, and that i was one week closer to meeting our baby. Now i'm consistently updated on which week of training i'm in and that i'm one more week closer to the race.

this week i'm reminded that it's here. It's induction time. No turning back. this is the last week of training. and the race is only 4 days and some odd hours away. 

There are many similarities when training for a race and giving birth. we opted for a natural childbirth with no pain medication. this accomplishment [giving birth naturally, without meds] is often compared to running a marathon. i've heard people who haven't had kids say that they want to have their children naturally because they've heard it is no worse than running a marathon, and they've already tackled that accomplishment. i'm actually looking forward to [and extremely scared of] seeing the similarities and differences between each. 

i can't help but feel a little like i did the week of Thanksgiving last year. anxious, nervous, excited, and wondering if i could do it. at least in this instance i know that i will be running at 8am on sunday, and i don't have to wonder when the race may start, unlike labor. i'm glad it wont' start at 4:20am like it did on November 29, 2011. that is just too early. 

they say to eat pasta before a race. carb-load, in fact. on November 28, i ate my last pre-baby meal at Olive Garden. pasta & chicken & LOTS of breadsticks. I'm pretty sure that was just the carbloading i needed the day before my labor of a marathon. 

Labor started out, exciting, fun, and easy. and by cm 7 i was in agony. i'm guessing this might be a lot like mile 18, or 19. but, we'll see. since i'm crazy, and interested and crazy interested in weird things like labor and marathons, i decided to do a little searching on the comparision. here's what i found: [some of it's tmi, some if it's just plain comical]

"Go to the grocery store, take a look at the 80 oz "tube" of all natural ground beef. now imagine if you will, that coming out of your a$$. then ask yourself "what is more painful?"

"Just watching my wife give birth was 10 times more painful than the 3:40 marathon I ran during an Ironman. Fortunately it was 100 times as rewarding."

"I've run 34 marathons, 1 50K and have had one child. Hands down the childbirth was the most painful thing I've ever experienced. People tried to tell me since I ran marathons that childbirth would be easy, unfortunately that is not the case."

"Skinny hips are good for running not for giving birth. Plus the aftermath of childbirth is much worse than the damage inflicted by a hard marathon or a 50K."

Read a labor vs. marathon story HERE. It's a great one. At least I think so!

if you've done both, i'd love to hear your feedback. i'm always up for a crazy labor or marathon story. it's really just fascinating what our bodies are able to doing. 

There are so many more stories I've seen and heard. I'm really looking forward to making my own comparison and hoping that natural childbirth is A LOT more painful and A LOT tougher than a marathon. All, I know is that the no matter how proud I might feel or how big of an accomplishment running a marathon will be, it definitely won't compare to the way i felt last year on November 29, 2011, but then again, what would?

MARA-WHAT?

if you are sick of reading about running and marathons. you can stop reading now.

i've decided to dig into the history of the crazy 26.2 mile race as i brace myself for my first marathon in a short 6 days. to me, it's a fascinating race. maybe i'll change my mind after next sunday, but for now, i just pray and prepare myself for something that i've been dreaming of doing. completeing a full 26.2 miles without stopping - continuous running - in an organized fashion. 

i really know nothing about the definition of a runner, or even that there is one. i think everyone can have their own definition. if you run everyday you are a true runner. if you run a half-marathon. if  you run competitively. if you do this or you do that. for me, this will be defined by the marathon. i've dreamed of doing this, and for a long time I just honestly thought it was crazy talk and that there would be no way that I would ever be able to complete 26.2 miles. and then I had banks, and i thought the dream was over. after having him, i honestly felt like my body would NEVER be the same and that running any further than down the hall to stop him from getting into something or fast enough to get there before he hurt himself, would be about all the running i did. and then i thought, i want banks to be proud of his mama. i want to be able to tell him about motivation, determination, and succeeding in reaching goals. so, then it began. i can do this.

the history of the marathon is just about as crazy as running it. here are a few tid-bits for ya.

• The modern Athens Marathon commemorates the run of the soldier Pheidippides from a battlefield at the site of the town of Marathon, Greece, to Athens in 490 B.C.
• Legend has it that Pheidippides delivered the momentous message "Niki!" ("victory"), then collapsed and died.

SERIOUSLY? he collapsed and died? This is not cool. This does not make me feel too confident for next week. oh. em. gee.

• The Athens Marathon is recognized as the original marathon course and it's the same course used in the 2004 Olympics held in Athens.
• The first modern Olympic games were held in 1896 in Greece.
• The legend of Pheidippides was honored by a 24.85 mile (40,000 meters) run from Marathon Bridge to Olympic stadium in Athens.
• Athens Stadium, the finish line for the Athens Marathon stands on the site of a stadium used in classical times.
• Spiridon Louis, a Greek postal worker, won the first modern Marathon with a time of 2 hours, 58 minutes, 50 seconds, an average pace of 7:11 minutes per mile.
• At the 1908 Olympic Games in London, the marathon distance was changed to 26.2 miles to cover the ground from Windsor Castle to White City Stadium, with the 2.2 miles added on so the race could finish in front of royal family's viewing box. This added two miles to the course, and is the origin of the Marathon tradition of shouting "God save the Queen!" (or other words relating to the Queen) as mile post 24 is passed.

Another interesting fact: 

Long after the re-establishment of the marathon in the Olympics, distance races such as the marathon did not include female participants. Although a few women had run the marathon distance, they were not included in any official results. The marathon was deemed too grueling for women to do for quite some time. The first woman to run a marathon was Katherine Switzer in 1967.

So, there you have it. Some fun facts about this crazy 26.2 miles. Stay  tuned for more this week as I countdown the days until I can cross off an item on my beloved bucket list!

TWELFTH WEEK. 12 DAYS.

i'm gonna barf.

well, maybe literally.

the kiddo is acting sick again. i am sitting here with a headache and a sore throat and my first marathon is 12 days away.

yea, i think i might barf.

this is totally craziness. i can't believe the race is this close. i can't believe i've been a slacker so much lately. i can't believe that i'm starting to get sick NOW. why, now? really?

isn't that how life rolls. what a good example, tessa. you are life. that's how life is. so we are just going to roll with the punches.

week 11. was again. crappy. i didn't get all of the miles in. we didn't finish 20 miles. and i just feel crappy about that. but, this is what i did do.

i have no excuse for sunday. apparently, i went to church, shopped and spent time with friends and the two miles just slipped my mind. oh, well.

it's a little insane to me to think that even though i didn't complete all of my miles, i still worked out, had some longer runs and ran 32 miles. people, that's only 6 more miles than i will run in one setting in only 12, TWELVE- FREAKIN' DAYS!

i'm really not sure where the heck october came from. but it popped up outta nowhere.

it's october. and that already gives me anxiety about november. my BABY will be one in november. that surely isn't right. and doesn't even seem a itty bit possible.

back to running.

so, i began the twelfth week of training tonight with 5 miles. done. done. and i'm going to say an extra prayer for the next 12 days. for sure.

although, i'm a little  A LOT freaked out by the amount of time i have left to train, i can see the light at the end of the tunnel and i'm SO ready to get this over with. once again, i love running, i'm really, honestly, looking forward to the race, but it's time. i'm done with this stupid schedule that makes me feel so dang guilty when i don't follow it day-by-day. i'm ready for a little less running, a lot more yoga, and the freedom to do it whenever my little heart desires. so, there.

339.6 miles of training down. 

let's do this. 12 days. 12th week. 26.2 miles. i can. i can. i will. will.

I'VE BEEN WORKIN'.

too much yes. on fun stuff. yes.

i'm working on a new blog & web site! and i'm so excited. 

as some of you may know i've been designing custom invitations, signs, logos, ect.. for a few years now. i love it. i never get sick of it and so heck, why don't i make it more official.

the word official freaks me out just a little bit, but i'm taking the plunge. so here in about a month you will be able to check out an official blog and an official website with all sorts of cool stuff.

here's a glimpse of something you might find on the new site. right now, we're workin' on content including pricing, policies, contact information and all that other stuff that isn't quite as cool and fun as the design part.

go custom. it's the cool thing to do.

stay tuned for the official introduction to the new site!

1. custom save the date: amber decided to package her save the date with one of their engagement pictures. we decided to do a green band with their custom monogram to wrap everything together.
2. custom invitation // printed on cryogen metallic #100 paper
3. custom RSVP card // printed front and back for postcard mailing // printed on cryogen metallic #100  paper
4. custom monogram used for favor bags, and as an addition to save the date and invitation wraps
5. custom accommodation card// printed front and back on cryogen metallic #100 paper
6. custom rehearsal dinner invitations. these were sent with the invitations to the wedding party. printed on lime green #100 cardstock to add color & stick with black ink only printing - genius - and cost effective
7. custom table names // printed on cryogen metallic #100 paper. we glued these to kabob sticks and stuck them in green apples on all of the tables. each table name was named after a concert, place or special moment the couple shared to tell guests more about them.
8. custom HE/SHE signs. amber and pat wrote a list of things he liked about her and things she liked about him. for isntance HE:: makes me smile, is the best dressed man, is motivated, ect...  SHE:: loves me for who i am, is the most giving person.. ect... these were placed across from the guestbook table at the reception. a personal touch for sure.

and here's how all of the pieces came together. not pictured above // middle picture: programs printed front and back and used as fans at the outdoor wedding. a black feather and ribbon was added to each program for a wild touch.

DOUBLE DIGITS, YO.

our little, not so little, boy is 10 months old. 

i remember when i was 9 years old and i just couldn't wait til' i was 10. that's because the number ten is a double-digit number. duh. that was way cooler than single digits. 

so,  banks is now cool. well, cooler. 'cause he's actually the coolest. but, ya get the point.

as month ten begins, we reflect banks' last month.

he no longer eats baby food - he won't eat baby food.

he is saying mama and dadda regularly. he says ball every now and then.

he waves, claps and high-fives.

he had his first virus :( and got antibiotics.

he's had his first severe diaper rash and it's no fun at all.

he's standing for up to 5 seconds. no walking yet.

he crawls with one leg.

he's the fastest crawler i've ever witnessed. 

he throws a ball on command and always applauds himself afterward.

at 9.5 months he weighed 21.5 lbs and was 28.5 inches long.

he's wearing 9-12 month clothing

he chews on everything. shoes, highchair, socks, cups.

he loves to stand at the window and look outside - he seriously does this for 30 minutes at a time.

he rolls himself in the rug.

he's awesome. and he helped mama pick out a halloween costume that we are going to make together - homemade costumes are best. for sure. he also decided on a 1st birthday theme and we are planning away.

happy 10 months banks! you are the most handsome little boy ever. and i just love you to freakin' pieces.

enjoy our month 10 photoshoot!