Back in October, my family and I ran our first mud run together. We ran the Terrain Racing 5K here in Las Vegas and it was epic. Both kiddos have done the Kid Spartan races, kids Dirty Dash races, and have participated in a runDisney kid 1 mile race and fun 5Ks like the Bubble Run. So they are definitely not strangers to running, obstacles, and getting dirty! But, this was the first 5K mud run and it was the first time we’d all participated together, as a team.
They were so excited to be a part of the race and run alongside us and other adults. This was a pretty tough race and they did so well. They climbed walls and cargo nets that I thought were pretty high and scary. They trudged through muddy water, flipped tires, carried sand bags, and went up and down some pretty steep hills. They did it all with so much determination and courage. They never gave up. They tried all the obstacles and hardly needed any assistance from us. Jason and I were so proud of them. I think the best part was having so many other runners come up alongside them and cheer them on, especially Elysse, who was so tiny compared to everyone else out there! I could see how good and empowered it made them feel.
I’ll admit, I was a little nervous that there might be whining or bickering out there but we all kept it cool and got along great! The kiddos didn’t fight and actually encouraged each other to keep going. We seriously had the best time! I can’t wait to run another race together as a family. I would most definitely recommend running a race or participating in an event as a family. I just wish we would have done it sooner.
It’s great to get the kids involved in staying active and setting some healthy fitness goals. Come back Thursday for tips on how to get the kiddos excited about exercising and running races!
Hey remember me? Yea, it’s been a hot minute since I blogged. OOPSY! These past 2 months away from the blog has shown me that I really do love blogging. Coming here and sharing our family travels, the ups and downs of life, and having a place to log my running and staying accountable to my fitness goals is really important to me. So why did I take a blogging break? Because I got lazy. That’s the plain and simple truth about it. And it cost me. Not being accountable with my fitness goals these last few months has definitely left it’s pounds, um, I mean mark. No, really, the pounds came on too! Plus, I missed having a place to share and update on what’s been going on in this messy life of mine.
But, this isn’t a blog post about regrets and feeling sorry for myself. With a new year, comes a clean slate and I’ve had some time to meditate on what it is I want to focus on with this blog and I plan on sharing lots of great things in the coming weeks and months. I hope you stick around around for the ride.
Before we get started on making It’s a Messy Life better than ever in 2017, I want to look back at all the fun and adventures we had in 2016.
The biggest thing for us in 2016 is that we purchased our home! After living in Las Vegas for 7 years, we finally decided to plant some roots. Although purchasing our home seemed to take up most of our time and resources this year, it was a great decision and we’re excited to be homeowners! I look forward to sharing more from our home, as we decorate and make it our own.
2016 also marked our 20th wedding anniversary in August! My family threw us a sweet 1920’s theme anniversary party at my sister’s house and it was such a fun time. And, Jason and I decided to put off the bathroom remodel in the house and take ourselves on an epic adventure to Peru! We took off without the kids for 8 days and crossed off a few things from our bucket list, including visiting Machu Pichu! I can’t wait to share more from our trip soon and share tips and tricks to traveling outside of the country.
Aside from these 2 major events, I also ran the LA Marathon in February. This was my first full marathon. 26.2! I was so grateful to have my family there cheering me on! You can read the recap HERE and check out the fun we had afterwards too exploring LA with the kiddos on THIS blog post.
In other running related news, I finished the year with a pretty low milage of 327.30 yearly miles. Although it was not a year full of a ton of races, the races I did run were great. I especially loved running the Terrain Mud Run 5K as a family! I just realized I didn’t blog about that, so be on the look out for that race recap, along with some pretty funny pics of my kiddos in mud 😉 For more race recaps of 2016, go HERE!
As a family, we had a pretty fun year too! We went on our 2nd annual summer camping trip to Lake Navajo in Utah. We traveled to LA twice and Ventura Beach. We saw the super bloom at Death Valley, enjoyed seeing it snow up in Mount Charleston in December, we spent lots of spring and fall afternoons hiking Red Rock Canyon, and visiting the water parks this summer.
Although it was a stressful and busy year (yeah, I know, which year isn’t, right?) I still think 2016 was noteworthy and we can always find some good in every season of our life. I hope you also took the time to reflect on this past year and were able to find the good in it too!
One of the best reasons to choose a race in a different city is the opportunity for a race-cation! You know, where you sign up for a race and plan a trip around it! Because I love to run and I love to travel even more, it’s no wonder most of my races are out of town. I love being able to combine two of my favorite things! Mostly, these are just weekend getaways like for the L.A. Marathon and sometimes they are full-on family vacations, like for Disney’s Wine and Dine Half Marathon in DisneyWorld. Either way, it’s always exciting to get away and run in a new place!
Last month I got to race the Ventura Beach Half Marathon and we made a nice little family trip out of it. The kids had already started school, so we let them play hooky and we left Friday morning. We headed straight to L.A.’s The Grove shopping center where Elysse had an appointment with a personal shopper at the American Girl store! You can read all about her amazing experience and my recommendations when visiting this store HERE. While Elysse and I shopped and had lunch at the American Girl Cafe, Jason and Diego spent their afternoon catching PokeMon Go at the nearby La Brea Tar Pits. They also grabbed a bite to eat and even did a little shopping too.
In case you didn’t know, Friday afternoon traffic through L.A. is insane. We thought because we were leaving a few hours before rush hour that we would be ok, but it was still really congested and it took us quite awhile to get from Los Angeles to Ventura. When we finally arrived at our hotel, I realized just how chilly the evenings are in Ventura and we were not prepared! Elysse still got in the pool before we headed to dinner. She’s crazy and maybe I’m a little crazier for letting her get in. But hey, it’s a vacation!
Saturday morning, was packet pickup and our family day at the beach. The first thing we did, was head to Old Navy to get some sweaters because the morning was cold and cloudy and I knew the evening would also be chilly. Then we headed to Trader Joe’s to grab food for our beach picnic lunch later. At this point, we’re all starving, so we had to find a place to eat a late breakfast on Main St. Finally, around noon, we made it to the beach. Packet pick up was right next to the pier and super quick to find and get my bib for the race the next day.
After all of this, it was finally time to relax at the beach for the day! The weather was cool but it did get pretty sunny once that morning fog rolled out. We spent the day lounging, making sand castles, and gathering shells. Diego had gotten a skate board while in L.A. so him and Jason practiced skating along the bike trail. It was seriously one of the most chill out days at the beach we’ve ever had. Even though it was too cold for actual swimming in the ocean, it was a blast! We were all so stuffed from our big breakfast, that we didn’t even have our lunch or snacks until we got in the car to leave.
As soon as we got back to our hotel, Elysse was ready to jump in the pool again! I don’t know how she has so much energy. But, because we didn’t swim in the ocean, we figured why not! So her and Jason stayed at the pool while Diego and went up to the room to get a head start on showers and get ready for dinner.
Sunday was race day and it was perfect! You can read all about my race recap HERE. Unfortunately, with school on Monday, we decided to head back home soon after the race was done. After my race, we headed back to the hotel to check-out and for me to get myself all cleaned up from the half marathon. After breakfast we decided to take the scenic route and find the Musical Road in Lancaster, CA. It was originally made for a Honda commercial. It’s a quarter mile bit of road that when driven on it, it is supposed to sound like William Tell Overature or better known as the theme from the classic Lone Ranger tv show. Was it worth taking the scenic route for this? Absolutely! There are only a few of these musical roads in the world and even though it wasn’t perfectly in tune, it was still a fun little side track.
Click the photo to see and hear our drive over the Musical Road!
We also got to see one of the largest wind farms in the world as we drove back to the interstate. We had no idea we’d be seeing that, but when we kept seeing so many rows of windmills, I quickly googled and found out it was the Alta Wind Project, also called the Mojave Wind Farm, the third largest onshore wind energy project in the world. Pretty neat bit of trivia 🙂
All and all, our family race-cation was a much needed break from the busy months we’d been having with packing and moving and the kids starting new schools. I highly recommend when looking for your next race, consider making it a race-cation! I’m sure the idea of traveling and getting away will be a nice motivator as you put in those training miles!
My daughter is almost 8 years old and she is so much fun to around! Sure, her and her big brother bicker more than I like. And, yes she whines about minor paper cuts or when asked to go to bed. Oh and one more thing, she is so forgetful! It’s kinda ridiculous. BUT….she is also an amazing spirited kid. She has the best imagination and I just love to see her play with her dolls and make all kinds of crafts from sewing clothes for her dolls to making pop-up greeting cards. She’s such a girly girl too.
So, it came to no surprise that about a year ago or so, she began to show interest in American Girl dolls. Now, I was not about to spend that kind of money on a doll for her. It seemed way over priced. Honestly, I’m not big on buying my kiddos too many toys. I can’t remember the last toy we bought them. I’m way more willing to spend money on taking them on fun adventures and experiences. That being said, when she came home with a D in writing on her progress report last year, Jason promised if she brought that D up to a B she would get her American Girl doll. Well, I gotta hand it to her. She put in the work and made huge progress. She came home at the end of the year with all A’s and one B, yup in writing. We were all so proud of her and her grandparents who live in NY, knowing about the deal made with her, sent her the money for the doll as an end-of-the-year gift. She was beyond excited and we were beyond grateful!
When it came down to buying the doll, we considered just ordering it online since there isn’t a store in Las Vegas, but it just didn’t seem as fun. I knew they had a store in L.A. and since we’d be in California in September, we thought it would be a lot more fun to go to the actual store and make it part of an experience! There I go again with the “experiences” huh!
Elysse patiently waited the month or so before our trip and it was so worth it! I did my research and came up with a good strategy to make the best of our trip and not break the bank!
Playing around in the store before our shopping appointment.
With her grandparents already contributing to the purchase of an actual doll, I knew we’d have to splurge a little on clothing and accessories. Jason and I came up with a budget and then I sat with her and we checked out the website and started thinking of which doll she’d like. If you’ve never seen the website, you should check it out. The accessories and clothes are insane! I got an idea of the things she liked and then it came down to deciding. Mind you, we did this at home and not in the store! I didn’t give her an exact dollar amount, I just steered her in the general ball park. We decided we’d buy her doll 1 outfit, a pair of glasses (like hers), maybe a matching t-shirt or accessory for Elysse. Plus the one thing she absolutely had to have, which was a carrying case for her new doll.
When I was checking out American Girl website, I saw that they offered personal shoppers and that it was a totally free service. Well, I was totally up for that and made our appointment. Our personal shopper greeted us as we arrived to the store, gave us a tour of the store, along with a little history on the dolls and each of their stories. It was definitely a treat for us, especially since this was our first visit. This store is huge. It’s about the size of a department store, think Macy’s but only with doll stuff! Plus, it was just super nice to have someone helping Elysse choose her doll and not having to ask for assistance every time she wanted to see a doll or accessory. I also loved that she gave us time to shop without her, so there was no sales pressure! It turned out they were running a sales promotion on TrulyMe dolls, where you purchased 2 outfits and an accessory and received 20% off. So, in the end, she ended up with an additional doll outfit for her doll. She chose a fancy glittery outfit and a gymnastics outfit. Plus, matching glasses like hers and the coveted doll carrier. Once it was time to make the purchase, we didn’t have to go to the check out, but rather we went into the personal shopper office and we sat in comfy couches, while she took care of ringing us up and throwing in a few goodies, like a poster and magazine, for us. I can definitely see the advantages of this on a busy weekend or during the holiday season.
My happy little shopper! The store has 2 levels! It’s that huge.
The other big splurge was having lunch reservations at the cafe. Yes, there is even a cafe in the store. Elysse wanted to eat at on the balcony and it ended up we were the only ones outside. To be honest, there were only a handful of other tables filled during our lunch spot. I’m sue this was because it was a school day and it was also the later lunch slot. You should know it’s not set up like a regular restaurant, but rather you can only make reservations for specific time slots and you choose from a few options in a pre-fix menu. You can also host private parties there. Once seated, the service was just ok. Nothing amazing. They did have a special seat for Ely’s new doll, as well as a plate and cup for her to “eat”. But that’s all. Our food was not very tasty. Think over-priced theme park meals. The food was bland and not very appealing. Ely’s fries were probably the best thing at the table. But, I suppose you pay for the experience. It was not something I would do again.
All and all, the American Girl shopping experience was a success! Elysse and I had some quality mother-daughter time. She absolutely loves her doll and takes her everywhere! It’s super adorable to see her interact with Lilly. I really like the American Girl philosophy and how they work on empowering girls and encouraging them to enjoy girlhood by playing and using their imagination. They also have educational books, movies, crafts, and activities that help girls face various issues as they grow up.
Below is a summary of my tips if and when you take your own daughter, niece, granddaughter, friend. And, if you’ve been before and love it, please let me know that too! I’d love to hear any other tips you may have.
Twinsies out for a stroll!
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3 Tips for Enjoying Your Day at the American Girl Store
Prepare a budget and set expectations before your visit. Unless you have an unlimited budget, this will be a lifesaver and especially a money saver! One could easily get carried away in that store 🙂
Get a personal shopper. It’s a free service and they’ll will help guide you through the store. Plus, it’s pretty cool to have that personalized service 🙂
Skip the cafe. Unless your daughter really wants to go and you really want to make it a special occasion for her, I don’t recommend it. As much as I want to say it was worth it, I just can’t. The food is bland and sub-par. I would have much rather made a reservation at a nearby “fancy” restaurant and enjoyed my meal a lot more. I would suggest you do the same 🙂
You guys I PRed!!! Woohooo!! I am so excited to give you all the details from the Ventura Marathon & Half Marathon event earlier this month. I got to participate in this awesome race thanks to RacePlace. As an ambassador for RacePlace, I was offered this race entry at no cost, but this review and recap are my own thoughts and opinions.
The marathon and half marathon took place on Sunday, September 11 but they had fun events on Saturday too. There were also various bike race distances, an adventure race, 5K, kids races, and K9 Shuffle! Packet pickup and expo were held outside right next to the pier and there was a live band and some food trucks too. It was definitely a beach party atmosphere!
We left Vegas Friday morning. Totally let the kids skip school for this trip! Every year we take a 3 day weekend getaway to the beach right before school starts and this year we just didn’t make it. So, this became a fun little race-cation! More on that part of our trip in another post 😉
We kept to our plan and got to the beach right around 11am or so after our huge brunch at Cajun Kitchen Cafe right on Main St. in downtown Ventura. First stop was packet pickup. Like I mentioned, the expo was held outside right next to the pier. It was super easy and quick to get my bib and swag bag. I loved the goodies we got! Just look at all the stuff I got! I really like that hat and the bag is great too. Roomy and useful. I gotta say I was getting tired of the drawstring bags mot races are giving. Plus, race photos were free!
The expo itself wasn’t super big but that was fine with me. I don’t particularly enjoy those big expos where it’s inside and stuffy and there’s a ton of people all around you! Anyhow, once we were done looking around and getting the kids some ice cream we spent a relaxing day on the beach. Dinner was my usual carb-loading pizza with some protein and lots of veggies 😉
Race morning was smooth and easy. Jason was just dropping me off, so parking was not an issue for us, although it seems there was plenty of parking options. The folks that were directing traffic were friendly and showed us where he could park to drop me off. I had forgotten my Garmin in the room, so we had turn around and grab that for sure! I got to the race, which started right in front o f the pier, with just enough time to get my headphones on and line up near the 2:30 pacer before we took off. Everything seemed organized and relaxed.
I went into this race with zero expectations and just happy there were no hills and it was a flat course. My training had not been as regular as it should have been. I did get my long runs in each week, but only running 2-4 miles once or twice during the week. So you can imagine my surprise when I ended up passing the 2:30 pacer and felt great around mile 5. I was so sad when around mile 6 I had to stop and pee in the port a potty. I considered not stopping, but of course, that just made me have to go more! LOL I sped up a little bit to try to catch up to the pacer again but I reached the turn around point (it was an out and back race) and still didn’t see them. I slowed down a bit and maintained a steady pace until about mile 10. At this point in a half marathon I always feel anxious and ready for it to be over. I found a really nice groove and kicked it up a notch. Once I spotted the 2:30 pacers I took off. I was a woman on on a mission! I came up to them and they told me I was doing a good job. I replied back with a thanks and told them I had been trying to catch up with them the whole race! It was great to hear them cheer me on as I kept going and passed them. I knew I was going faster than usual, but I was still feeling great. I didn’t want to look down at my garmin and see my pace out of fear of slowing down once I saw it! Crazy, I know. I just ran for myself and only when I crossed the finish line and stopped my watch did I see I had a new record! I finished in 2:24:26 beating my previous record of 2:25:27. I don’t know how it happened, but I’m so happy it did! Maybe I can finish my next half in 2:20 😉
Thanks agin to Raceplace for the race entry and to the race directors and volunteers who made this my best half marathon to date! And of course, thanks to my ever supportive family for coming along and cheering me on! They’re the best! XO
I am so excited to share that we have a new home! Things have been pretty crazy around here these past few months with everything that goes into purchasing a home, packing up our old place, and still keeping up with work and family life.
We moved in right at the beginning of August and with the help of our family and some great friends, we managed to get it all done pretty quickly. The home was pretty much move-in ready, with painting being the main thing to work on once we moved in. Choosing paint colors was kinda stressful, but I am so happy to not have to stare at brown poopy colored walls anymore! It’s also been super exciting shopping and buying new appliances. Talk about being a grown up, huh! We’ve got plans to remodel the bathroom too! Now that we’re settling in, we have some fun ideas for decorating and make the space our own. We also have a bit of work to do in the front and backyard, but we’re waiting for the weather to cool down before we begin those projects. Watch out, we are taking this homeownership thing serious.
I’ve been on Pinterest way more than I care to admit and have made more trips in one week to the Home Depot than I would like. But, I’m really looking forward to decorating, remodeling, and making this house our home.
We’re using the hashtag #CasaEmeric on Instagram for all things home related and sharing peeks into the house transformation! I’ll be sure to share a tour of the new place as soon it’s all done.
Tower of boxes and biggest moving truck we could find!Fancy new appliances! Everyone takes a selfie with their new washing machine, right?#casaemeric
I cannot believe summer is almost over. I’m not gonna lie, I am looking forward to cooler temps and getting back to my routine. This summer has got to be one of the craziest times for us! I’ve been pretty much MIA from blogging most of the summer. Not cool, I know. I miss it and have so much I want to share! Kids in year round school makes it tough to plan a whole lot, plus add to that packing up for our move in the middle of it, and well, it was not the most adventurous summer we’ve had. Did I mention it felt like the hottest summer in Vegas too? With temps in the 100+ most days we did not want to be outside. Ugh…Hello Fall!
Of course, we knew this summer was going to be busy with not-so-fun adulting stuff like buying a house (more on that later), shopping for appliances, painting, packing and unpacking, etc. so we didn’t make our bucket list too long or too ambitious. Yet, even though we kept it simple this year, it helped us to slow down and take some much needed breaks because the boxes to unpack will still be there when we get back, right?
Here’s a recap of what our summer bucket list looked like for this year:
Xtreme Flip Out | Beach Trip | Picnic at the Park | BBQ with Friends
The only thing we have scheduled is our annual trip to the beach at the end of summer. We normally go the 3rd or 4th weekend of August, but this year that was not possible for a few reasons. So, we’re turning my Ventura Half Marathon into a little racecation and spending some much needed family time away for 3 days! The other 3 things may or may not happen before Labor Day but that’s ok. We’ve have a great summer and I will be posting individual posts about our camping trip, Wet N Wild, and Cowabunga Bay in the next few weeks. I also want to share more about our house buying experience soon too!
So, how have you been spending your summer? Any fun adventures? I’d love to hear about your summer bucket list too!
On Monday, I shared our family’s 6th annual summer bucket list! We’ve made so many fun memories and traditions since we started participating in the summer bucket list challenges put on by The Happy Family Movement. They’ve discontinued the yearly challenges about 2 years ago, but the site is still up and you can go there get more info and ideas for creating a summer bucket list.
I got interested in the summer bucket list challenge because we always had ideas of things we wanted to do over the summer, but lots of times we got so busy being busy that we forgot to have fun. Creating a summer bucket list has been a great way to ensure a fun summer. It becomes intentional and we’ve made it a point to enjoy our time together as a family. Since creating our summer bucket lists is such a huge part of our family life, our kids look forward to it every year.
Here are a few tips that have worked for us (through a bit of trial and error) on creating a fun and successful summer bucket list that everyone can enjoy.
Don’t be too ambitious. Every weekend doesn’t have to be spent at a theme park or away from home for it to be fun and memorable. Kids just want to spend time with you. They don’t need every activity or event to be super elaborate. This is especially true for younger kiddos. Some of our fun and simple activities have included: going out for frozen yogurt, backyard camping, geocaching, and watching the sunset.
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Get the whole family involved. Everyone will be more excited if they have a say in the list, so we make sure to talk about it together. Dinnertime or driving in the car work great. Kids will come up with some pretty far fetched activities sometimes, so it’s good to give them boundaries and suggestions as to what kinds of activities you can/prefer to do, especially if this is your first time putting the list together.
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Limit your list. We found that keeping the list to about 10-12 activities is much more realistic than trying to include 20+ things. Putting too much on your list can add stress about getting it all done and that’s the last thing you want. Your list should be about sharing a fun time together.
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Display your list. Once you have our activities all picked out, make sure to display the list in a place where it can always be seen. The last thing you want to do is create all this excitement and then forget about it. You know the saying, “out of sight, out of mind”. Through the years we’ve put it at the bottom of the staircase, on the fridge, and on a banner across the kitchen window. Bonus points if you get the kiddos involved in creating a fun way to display your list 😉
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Include traditions. Most of our traditions became traditions purely unintentionally, but now that we have them we are intentional about keeping them. We make sure to include them each year in our bucket list. I’m sure you probably have summer traditions yourself already and maybe you just didn’t realize it. Things like, BBQing with friends, watching fireworks, going to the beach, these may all be things you do each year that can easy be incorporate into your family’s summer bucket list.
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Document. Now that you’ve put some effort into creating and displaying your list, you have to go out and do all those fun things! And, don’t forget to document along the way. Whether you use a professional camera, a point and shoot, or just your iPhone, it’s important to snap a few photos for prosperities sake. We tend to use all 3! Here are a few ideas on places to document your summer: personal blog, special hashtag on instagram (ours is #emericsummer2016), facebook album, scrapbook, chatbooks, or even a yearly calendar. There are lots of options! Whatever you choose, it’ll be great to look back at the end of the summer and relive all the cool things you did!
For some ideas on the kinds of activities we’ve included, take a look at our summer bucket lists throughout the years:
Activities change as kids get older, but I hope to continue our summer bucket list tradition until the kiddos are grown. Again, it’s a great way to be intentional about spending time together as a family, creating memories, and having fun!
Do you have a summer bucket list? What fun activities have you included? What fun adventures do you have planned for this summer?
It’s summertime!! Today is the first day of summer in Vegas and we are under an excessive heat advisory, with temps to reach up to 115 degrees. It’s tough to plan fun outdoor activities in this heat, but we try to get creative with our list.
Although the kiddos go to 12-month school and don’t have traditional 3 month summer breaks, we are still excited about having some free time this summer. Today is the first day of their summer track break this Friday and we’re planning to make the most of their 4 week break before they go back for 4 more weeks in July. Their school year ends August 3, so they’ll have another 3 week break before starting up in their new grades at the end of August. Yup, it’s confusing. Yup, we don’t love it. But, we’re making the most of it.
Here’s some of the fun we have planned for this summer:
This is the 6th year of creating summer bucket lists as a family! Take a look at 2 of our past year’s summer bucket lists ( 2015, 2012) and come back tomorrow for some tips on how to create your own family summer bucket list to help you make some awesome memories this summer!
On May 21, 2016 I ran the Trails of Fury 10K. My daughter also ran the kids 2K race that day. Trails of Fury is a trail race organized by Desert Dash and they always pull off a great race. I’d volunteered a few times on other Desert Dash races, so I had race credits for this race, bonus!
We had to wake up even earlier than usual for a race, since we had to take a bus to get to the race location. The BLM (Bureau of Land Management) didn’t want a lot of cars out on the trail parking lot, as to not to disturb the environment. The weather was unseasonably cold for end of May and pretty windy. They provided plenty of snacks and hot cocoa and coffee to help keep us warm, as well as space heaters. We had to wait for the half marathon and 5K runners to go before the 10K got started. Thank goodness there were seats for Elysse and hot cocoa and space heaters to help keep her warm and whining was down to a minimum 😉
I hadn’t really trained much for this race. After the L.A. Marathon, my running has really been sporadic. I decided to sign up for this race to help me get my running mojo back. During the entire run I felt sluggish and slow. I took way too many walking breaks and the gradual uphill really got me! The downhill, as usual, was fun and I was grateful that the downhill was at the middle and then again at the end. I started the race wearing my jacket but after the first mile I got hot and took it off. Since the 10K consisted of 2 loops, I passed the start line and saw my husband and daughter. I handed them my jacket and just kept on going. After the 1st loop, I really was trying to give it my all, but sadly, my all was not much to give. My lack of running and especially my lack of trail running, was evident. I was glad to be done after the race, but I actually did enjoy the run. It made me remember how much I did enjoy trail running and I really hope to get back to it.
Now, about 30-45 minutes after my race it was time for the 2K kids race. Elysse was ready to run and was super excited to get started. Desert Dash just recently introduced the kids races to their lineup, so there were only a total of 3 kids for this race. I sure hope they keep it for future races and that more kids show up for them. Running is such a great sport and it can really help teach kids the importance of training, endurance, and rewards for hard work. Elysse started the race strong and she finished strong. She led the whole time and came in first place. That really made her feel so proud of herself and in turn, we were also so proud of her. She gave it her all and it paid off! I can’t wait for her to run another race again and that she can find a true love for running!
It's a Messy Life 