A whole bunch of random things

So, apparently the Maryland/DC area where I live has been wracked with terrible storms and power outages this weekend. Luckily for me, my sister wisely choose this weekend for her baby shower, so I've spent a lovely weekend in upstate New York with family and sunny skies.

I was off to a bit of a rough start, because Thursday night, I was still on west coast time, and my flight was Friday morning on east coast time, which equated to about 3 hours of pathetic sleep. In fact, I believe we had a first in our marriage and Eric actually went to bed before me, but not before we watched the first 5 Games of Thrones episodes. 

I arrived in my hometown of Rochester, NY around 9am and went for a 7 mile run. Based on Daily Mile, everyone is suffering from the heat and humidity this summer. Somehow, combining those factors with no shade, a plane ride, lack of sleep, and dehydration didn't turn into an enjoyable run.

After that monstrosity, I spent some time with my sister doing one of the very few acceptable activities for this type of weather.

 

I was able to compare this beach to both the Atlantic AND the Pacific, having been to both in the past month.

After a slumber party at my sister's new apartment, I was super excited for my Saturday morning run. It had all the makings of a total winner. I went to bed early, had a new audiobook on my ipod to listen to, and I got to run on a nice trail along the Eric Canal.

Practice for JFK, right?

This run was one of the worst I can remember. My legs felt dead, my chest was tight, I had to take walk breaks, and, even worse, I looked forward to them like CRAZY. I'd never listened to an audiobook while running, so that was good times, but the run was still 14 miles of suck. Also, the book was Anne of Green Gables (obviously not my first time reading it), which I'm pretty sure is even cooler than blasting Celine Dion at the end of a marathon.

Obviously, the only way to redeem myself was to convince Kari to sign up for the Wineglass Marathon, which is two weeks before we run the Hartford Marathon together. Perfect, because I needed another fall marathon for my 50 mile race training (or I could just run for 4 hours alone, but let's be serious), it has a net downhill, it has wine in the title, and we get to cuddle up together here.

 

The race is only about an hour and a half from my parent's house, and they just redid my old bedroom and turned it into a lovely guest room. They read Kari's blog, so their reaction was basically as if I'd told them I was bringing a celebrity home. Ashley, it's not too late to sign up!

Since I'm linking to bloggers like crazy, this weekend I met my first male blog friend, Minch, in real life, and explained that it was blogging law that you have to take a picture together. Check out his blog, it's hilarious, and chronicles the perils and rewards of online dating, plus all sorts of other stuff.

Sunday morning, I did a 10 mile run, and finally felt like running wasn't the worst idea ever. It would be great if that feeling would continue. Still, I can say I ran in three different states on three consecutive days, so there's that.


Wed - California
Thu - Maryland (actually I had to abort that run after like 2 and a half miles because my stomach was rebelling, but it still counts)
Fri - New York


Sunday was my sister's baby shower! The theme was lemons (the fruit the baby was the size of when they found out they were pregnant). My stepfather and I juiced 16 POUNDS of lemons for fresh lemonade. So I'm sharing pics, because we worked hard, and my sister is such an adorable pregnant lady.

I wish I could take credit for these cupcakes, but I just chopped the veggies behind them.

Favors! Homemade lemon hand scrub. That I actually did help make!

 

What juicing 16 pounds of lemons gets you.

His first word will be "Aunt"

Last but not least, we busted into my new "Yonana" maker, a birthday gift from my sister. It turns frozen bananas (or any fruit) into ice cream. No joke, you just push it through the machine and it turns into soft serve consistency.

 

It's kind of a workout

 

Doesn't it look like ice cream?

Do bad runs make you overanalzye things to death? I was ok with a bad run Friday, because the reason was clear, but Saturday all my ducks were in a row, so it's driving me crazy not knowing what the problem was.

Do you like baby showers? I usually dread them more than going to the dentist because I'm a ginger and don't have a soul. Since this one was for my nephew, I loved it. But that will be the only exception, other than my own, or for any future nieces or nephews.