New Races and Work Outs

I got us all registered for April and May races today (and yesterday).

For April we are going to do the Zoo Zoom race again. I'm just going to do the 5k though so I can be done at the same time as everyone else. Last year it was kind of annoying being at all staggered times. I did sign Trevor up for the 1 mile run though. As soon as he stops coughing up a lung we'll have to get him out to do some "training" hehe. Melissa said no thanks, she'll just pay to get into the zoo lol.

My sister in law is coming too and signing up my niece for the kids short run again. That was sooo cute last year! I'm still trying to decide if I'll wear my new crazy tiger pants!

For April I signed us up for the Wounded Warrior run on Memorial Day weekend. It's in Manteca at a park we've run around before (we used to call it the big slide park when the kids were little). 

Oh my look how little the boys were so cute!

My step mom said that they are running that race too and that my dad is going to have his truck in the car show. That sounds like it will be a fun day!

Since today was the last day of March I decided to finish off the week I had left off on for the Bikini Body Mommy challenge. Tonight I did Day 45 and 47. They are the same work out, 4 exercises with 3 reps so I did 6 total reps. Ouch! Definitely feeling that in the tops of my legs and back a bit.

I ended up taking a whole week off after my half (just didn't feel like doing anything) so I'm a week behind "schedule". I've decided to just "re-schedule" for April :) It was nice having time off and I actually am looking forward to going for a run instead of dreading going out.

I'm thinking about doing another work out also but I need to look it up again and decide. The Bikini Body Mommy ones are good but they don't take very long to do and I feel like I could do more.

I've got my calendar printed out, now to just get it filled in!

Back To It

Monday morning we got up, packed, had a quick breakfast with our friends and then started the long process of getting home.

First up? Waiting for the shuttle back to the airport. Lucky for us it was only about 10 minutes late and the guy driving it thought he was a comedic tour guide. Lucky for me I could tune him out after 2 sentences.

We got to airport and made it through check in and only slightly got yelled at for taking off my sweatshirt at security. Apparently they don't have the rules there that you have to take off your shoes and sweatshirts. Color me confused.

We began boarding our flight and of course we did not have seats together again but behind one behind like on the way there. Poor Scott had a woman with a baby on her lap next to him. The baby screamed for at least 45 minutes before and during the flight. Maybe if the mom would have brought you know, a toy or two maybe she would have been a little entertained. It amazes me how people don't bring toys for their little ones when they go places. My kids always had at least one thing to hold onto. I really liked when the mom told this baby, who was maybe 8 months old, that she was "pissing me off". Uh yeah she totally understood that. Nice. Eventually the little one fell asleep and all was calm. I actually fell asleep myself and woke up right before we got to the city we were to land in.

I was so hungry when we landed we decided to just eat at the little cafe again before going home. Worked for me! I was so hungry I forgot to take a picture of my meal. It was a burger, not too exciting but filled me up! Last crap meal? It would have been if I wouldn't have had some nachos later. Eventually I'll get my shit back together and stop eating crap. Hopefully before I have to go buy all new clothes right?

So after getting home and getting back "on schedule" I'm in that little funk where I don't have anything planned (other than my bikini body mommy work outs that I have been neglecting). I need to decide if I'm doing the Zoo Zoom race or not and what I'm going to work on now.

I'm thinking I need to make food a top priority. I need to sit down and do some meal planning and find my will power that I left off  in a pink box somewhere.

It started so simply

Ugh shit is way too complicated for my 40 year old brain sometimes.

Melissa's phone finally bit the dust beyond repair so we went to the phone store to get her a new phone. I wanted to get her a smart phone and after about an hour of waiting we finally had someone to wait on us. The gal was super nice and helped out a lot, which was great after all that.

So anyhow it turned out to be the same price to get an iPhone 5s as a 4s. I have a 4s and Scott has just a 4 that he is always bitching about that his sucked compared to mine so I was like hey let's get us 2 new phones and then we can give the kids our phones. 

I get home and we back up Scott's old phone and then plug in the new phone and somehow it updated with old 2013 info and not the last year. Fuck me really? So then we spent the rest of the night messing around with his phone and then my phone updated ok just didn't want to add all my music, which is ok, I have the CD's I can put it back on. I finally gave up after an hour and just wiped my old phone clean and handed it over to Melissa.

Scott doesn't want to clean his off because he has a game on there he's been playing for 2 years. I guess he can go track down Trevor whenever he wants to play it? lol

This morning I go to take out the old sim card in Scott's old phone and I can't get the little thing to pull out and then it FLINGS between my bed and this open back desk I have. Can't find it anywhere. Spent like half an hour going through the drawers and everything. I told Trevor I need a break (is 8:00 too early to drink?) and got some coffee and sat down for a sec. He walks in there and finds it in like a minute sitting on the ledge of the drawer guts (can't think of the name). I had taken the drawers out and even went through them all trying to find it and I'm pretty sure I looked on the ledge thing like 20 times. Ah well at least it's found.

Remind me next time I get a new phone to make the people do everything for me. That was too damn stressful. Guess that's what I get for trying to be nice.

Oh and while I'm typing this I try to make the kids a new Itunes ID and he tells me to put his bday in there and then it kicks it out saying he's not old enough and now it won't even accept my birthday. UGH. Stupid phones.

ETA fixed it. Ok I'm done fixing this crap.

Vegas!

We got back to Vegas around 3:30, just in time to check in at our next hotel New York New York! I've always wanted to stay there and found a good deal on a room. Sadly it came with a view of a roof. Darn those good deals! The room itself was nice though.

First up? Lunch! We opted for the Mexican place inside the hotel. I ordered the "crispy tacos" and was kind of sad when they came in some baked shells. Booo!  Not too fancy, not too great. The margarita was good though.

 

After Linner we walked down the strip a bit and showed Sarah and John some of the sights. They had never been to Vegas before. 

We got lucky and had the fountains at the Bellagio go off when were standing right there.

Inside Caesar's Palace

 Local talent riding up the escalator on a scooter (he waited for the elevator to go down when he got to the top...)

Meat locker inside the NYNY

Pool at NYNY

 The strip from our hotel parking garage

After walking up and down the strip Scott and I hit the slots and the large margarita bar until we got tired. Went back to the room, took a nap, then got up at midnight and hit it again. Somehow I ended up winning $80! Score! That gave us back some money we had lost and we actually ended up coming home with some.

We had a slice of late night early morning pizza and went to bed!

Last Day in Utah Zion National Park

Sunday morning we got up and packed up our stuff. Then we went to breakfast back at the Switchback Grille. The hotel gave us free breakfast vouchers for there. If it wouldn't have been free I wouldn't have went there. It was like a different place in the morning though. The staff was a lot friendlier. We got seated at the same table but this time the windows were closed and the heaters were blazing! The first thing I did was ask them to turn them off. It was like a sauna in there! Thankfully they didn't take too long to switch them off.

For breakfast they had a buffet. Fresh fruit! Cute little waffles, eggs, potatoes, an omelet station, etc.

Sadly most of the fruit was icky. Darn! The potatoes were fantastic though (of course lol). Might have had a few more of those and another little waffle.

Right after breakfast we checked out and then went for a ride through Zion National Park. Everyone was too sore to do any hiking so we just did a drive through. It was so beautiful. Maybe some day we can go back and camp there and do some hiking.

After touring the park we were back on the road again. Back to VEGAS for another night!

Recovery Food

After our recovery nap Scott decided he was hungry and I decided it was most definitely margarita time. We walked across the hotel parking lot and went over to Jack's Sports Grill and bellied up to the bar. We ordered some nachos and drinks and just sat back and hung out.

We probably would have stayed longer but Scott's legs started cramping up so he hobbled over to the hotel and we just hung around for a bit until it was time for dinner haha. I swear we spent most of this trip eating.

We walked back across the parking lot and met everyone at the place next door to Jack's, the Switchback Grille and Trading Company which is way more fancy than I am. It had that snobby feel to it. We took our seats out on the "patio" which had one open wall to the outside. It was beautiful, but cold! After some begging we got them to turn on a heater.

Lots of fun drama at the table tonight. "Girlfriend" and the girls so not getting along. I think I might have kind of liked the Girlfriend actually. I like old eccentric people, they are so interesting. I was a bit too far away from her to carry on a conversation though. 

I decided on one of the "cheaper" items on the menu, a BBQ chicken pizza. I was kind of eyeing the seafood cobb salad and my friend decided that she would order that and we'd share. Works for me! The salad was really good. The pizza was ok. Hate to say it but the boxed California Kitchen BBQ pizza is way better. Love that stuff. 

After our $80 dinner we went back to the hotel and changed into our swim suits and met at the hot tub! Ahhh it was so nice to sit there and relax and just chat! THIS is vacation. We stayed out there for a couple hours until we were all wrinkly and over heating and then went back and hit the hay!

Zion Half Marathon

Saturday morning! The big day! And it's 2:30 am and I CANNOT sleep.

Instagram

Facebook

Words With Friends

Dice With Buddies

Repeat repeat repeat

Ohhhh I forgot that I am not going to be able to use Pandora for my run so might as well add some songs from Itunes!

That kept me busy for a couple more hours. I was so excited when Scott finally woke up and we could turn on all the lights and make some coffee.

We had a bagel and a banana for breakfast and met Sarah and John out front to ride down to the race starting point. That ride seemed to last forever and all I could think of was 13.1 miles is REALLY long. And uphill.

When we got to the starting area and parked we got out of the car and were hit with a freezing cold wind. AWESOME. So glad I changed into shorts. I was so, so cold. We did the usual wait for the port a potties and then went into the "warming tent" until it was time to go line up.

 After what seemed like forever it was finally time to line up. We had to walk up a big hill to get into the starting area. I was thinking "this is probably the only downhill we are going to run!".

We all stood around there and froze a bit more and then suddenly everyone was moving and the race was on!

The wind seemed to die down right after we got started but it was cool enough for me to keep my little jacket on until about mile 6 or so.

Some areas were just so beautiful! People were stopping to take pictures. I tried to do some while I was moving with my phone but that didn't always work out well.

 I was feeling really good with my running. Just running about an 11 minute pace. I was just going for a run in a beautiful place, not trying to break any records or win anything.

About mile 6 or so it just started getting really steep. I alternated between running and walking for the rest of the race. I had to go pee but every time I got to a station with port a potties the lines were super long. Like 15 people deep. I may have just went off the road into some high scrub brush and peed there. Maybe.

Around mile 8 I was praying for more port a potties. I didn't care how long the line was because I had some business to do! Finally at mile 9 I got to one. I said 'Thank God for Port a Potties!" and everyone laughed.

That's one way to get "vacation belly" cleaned out. Oh just go run, that will take care of that "I can't poop" problem.

This is about mile 9 when here. Not too long after this John caught up to me and we ran together almost until the end. I had to stop to catch my breath and he went on ahead of me.

My end time was 2:41 minutes. Super long but I did have 2 potty stops in there, the one I had to wait in line for. AND it was mostly all uphill.

A nice tired selfie with my medal!

 

My Runkeeper slowly added on a bit more mileage and ended up with about 1/2 a mile more than I actually ran.   I found John and some of his family. One of his cousins just came to watch and the friend of the other had already finished running. I think she said she came in about 2:15 and I later found out she's in her late 50's. Another rock star woman!! Women like that totally motivate me! 

It wasn't too much later that Scott came running in. I didn't get a  good picture of him coming in because this family of kids ran in to run in with their mom. Which, yeah I guess that's nice but NO I don't think that's nice really. Let Mom have her 5 minutes. Unless you ran it all too, then you can run in with her. Plus it was bad for the other runners having to dodge kids all over the place. I wish they would have had a bit more crowd control on that beginning of the shoot there. (Scott is the middle of the picture in a red shirt)

Sarah came in right behind him. They had walked and ran the whole thing together! 

John's cousin had come in after me and before Scott and so we were all done. 

We hung out for a bit and then Scott and I decided to just walk back to the hotel (about 2 miles). 

We got back to the room and took a nap!

I think this was actually my "easiest" half marathon. Mostly because I didn't wear myself out before hand. Nothing hurt. It was great! I'm so glad that I picked a lower mileage training plan this go around. It make a huge difference in how my body felt. 

I'm still not planning on running anymore half marathons for awhile but Scott is talking about doing the one in Monterey again in November and I'm not feeling like I'd totally hate that idea. We'll see!

Vegas to Utah

Friday morning we were going to get up nice and early (surprise!) and meet my friend Sarah and her husband John for breakfast. They were actually at the same hotel and had got in on Thursday also but were pretty much passed out by the time we got there. They live in Texas so they are two hours ahead of us and actually ended up going to breakfast at 7. Since we didn't even go to bed until 3 we got up at 8 and went to breakfast on our own.

The first restaurant we came to when we went downstairs was Hash Hash To Go Go (what weird name) so we put in our name and then went and played slots for a few minutes while we waited for our buzzer thing to go off. After a few minutes we were up a few bucks and our table was ready (score!).

I ended up getting the basic breakfast and Scott got a pancake bigger than his head. Their biscuits were home made and they had home made strawberry jam. It was yummy!

Right after breakfast we finally met up with Sarah and John, ran up to our room, got our stuff and checked out.

Sarah and John had rented a car and we all jumped in and then were on our way to Utah!

 Utah? Why Utah? To go to the Zion Half Marathon of course! I'd never been to Utah before so this was all kinds of fun and exciting.

Our drive was to take about 2 1/2 hours and most of the scenery looked pretty boring. Just the desert.

Eventually it started getting rockier and prettier. 

'

 Before I knew it we were there! That's the fun part of travelling with great friends! Time goes by so fast and you totally enjoy yourself.

The road that took us up to the Expo and hotel was also the road that we were going to be running our half marathon on. That was good and a little bad to see what we were up against. Long slow climbing hills.

We got up to the place that the race was going to start and where they were holding the "expo". We stopped under the FINISH line to snap some pics.

We got our packet stuff and walked around the expo. Scott thought I should get this headband (but I didn't). The only thing I bought was some GU because I didn't have time to get some before we left on our trip. Oh and a sticker for my car. 

We walked through the gift shops and Sarah found this. We probably should have bought it haha.

Some selfies in front of the mountains

and some walking around the visitor's center. SO beautiful!

We were all kind of hungry but we were supposed to meet John's cousins and uncle for dinner later so we went into the Brew Pub (which seems to actually be named the Zion Canyon Brewing Company). We were told that outside was full but they'd seat us inside (ok we didn't care, just wanted some food). We got some water and eventually ordered and then waited. And waited. And waited. Eventually we just got up and left because the waiter didn't seem to remember we were there.

Instead we went and checked into our hotel and Scott and I had a bag of popcorn and a stale granola bar from the mostly empty vending machine. At least we weren't hungry right?

We were staying at the Zion Park Inn which was a little spendy for me but we wanted to stay in the same hotel as our friends. The hotel was really nice and had great views. We were on the first floor and this was our view out the window.

Beautiful! 

At 5:30 we went to meet up with John's cousins at a restaurant called Wildcat Willies. It was us two couples, two cousin's, a friend of a cousin, his uncle and his uncle's girlfriend. 

This uncle and his girlfriend made all our meals that we ate together over the days quite interesting. The uncle is in his early 80's and his wife died about two years ago and this "new girlfriend" came along real quick after. The daughters were NOT HAPPY and don't like this girlfriend who is a bit eccentric. It's of course obvious to the girlfriend that the girls don't like her. That made for some very interesting situations! Lots of snarky comments flying around. Drama, drama, drama!

So we all sat around one big table and this is when we all met and so dinner was full of some getting to know you conversations along with family talk with the cousins and uncle.

Meanwhile Scott was enjoying a rack of ribs and I had a bacon cheeseburger with blue cheese on it (and sweet potato fries). That was interesting. It was good but a lot. I ended up taking half back to the hotel for later.

After dinner we walked down the street and found a little grocery store and bought a few things to take back to the room. Since we had a fridge we picked up some coffee creamer, some bananas and stuff for breakfast before the race and just some snacks for later. I'm so glad we did that since we ended up eating almost all of the food over the next couple days.

That's definitely something to think about when you are doing a "vacation race".

It doesn't really matter how many races you  have done, the night before is always filled with a bit of excitement. I set out all my stuff (but last minute in the morning switched to shorts) before I went to bed.

And then crashed out at about eight and slept like a baby.

Until about 2:30 am when I was WIDE AWAKE. HA!