Quote for the Week

"God gave you a gift of 86,400 seconds today. Have you used one to say "Thank You"?

-William A. Ward

Finally feeling like fall

Can i just tell you that it felt so great to wake up this morning and see the sunshine along with blue skies and crisp autumn breezes after what was 10 days of gloomy rain storms and humidity. I hope that this fall like weather will stick around for a while. It's been a great weekend and I actually don't feel any sort of dread for the work week. Life is Good :)

I am quickly approaching the Half Marathon date and my training is going really good. I wasn't able to do the Shelby Bottom Boogie 15K on Saturday morning because it was stormy (think clashes of thunder and lightning bolts) but since I was up early, I headed to the gym and did my 9 miles. And thanks to my boredom, I increased my speed the last 3 miles and finished in a good time of 1:34:15. I'm feeling really good with my long runs and hope that the feelings last long enough to finally grab a personal best for the Evansville Half Marathon on October 11th. My goal is to finish in under 2 hours and 30 minutes (my training pace of 11 min. miles would equal 2:20 but I'm giving myself some lead way). My fastest (which is really slow) time to finish was when I did the Evansville Half Marathon in 2007 and finished with a time around 2:45. Here's hoping that I don't fall apart in the next two weeks.

Quote for the Week

"Grace isn't a little prayer you chant before receiving a meal. IT'S A WAY TO LIVE."

- Jackie Windspear

"Personal" Day

So I took a "personal" day on a Sunday. I had such a full weekend of birthday parties and was a little on people overload so after getting a good night's sleep on Saturday night (just shows you how exhausting it can be, being around people) I woke up on Sunday and decided to take a "personal day". Nope, it didn't require me to get time off approved, but I made the conscience decision to skip church and indulge in some "me" time. Clearly it was the best option!

I had to be up early so that I could take care of my bosses dog so after doing that errand I went to the grocery store. Here is where i realized that the best time of day to do grocery shopping in Nashville is around 9:00 am'ish. My guess would be that either people were in church or tailgating for the first home game of the TN Titans because the grocery store was like a ghost town. Talk about little slice of heaven :) I grabbed Starbucks, a muffin and the Sunday paper and spent a solid hour at home enjoying my morning. Then I went into productive mode for the next 4 hours and cleaned/organized my closets (clothes, shoes, cd's, handbags), my dresser, under-the-bed storage, bookshelves and bathroom cabinet. I took a late lunch around 3pm and then returned some phone calls from friends and then headed back to Green Hills to take care of the dog yet again and then did my 8 miles on the treadmill. Whew....it was too rainy outside to run so thankfully I had the Emmy Red Carpet Coverage to keep me distracted and motivated (nothing like seeing the skinny starlets in glamorous designer dresses to keep this fat girl running). Other than feelings of boredom, my fun was good and I managed to finish in 1:23:08. I'm feeling great about my training this time around.

Of course after running, I sent a couple work emails since I was at the mini-mansion (where my work laptop is) and then headed home to eat (my stomach was growling during the drive home...guess that's what happens when you burn over 1100 calories running). I took a quick hot soak in the tub cause I thought it would feel good on my legs but I was quickly reminded how much I hate being in the bath tub...UGH! Well let me re-phrase that, if I had a garden tub that i could fully submerse myself in, I would take a bath every night. However that is not the case and I simply don't fit in a standard bath tub so it's not a pleasurable or relaxing experience. I grabbed some dinner and watched a little bit of "You've Got Mail", one of my favorite fall movies, and then talked to my friend Caron before bed time.

It was a great day and I realized that i should definitely take more "personal" days! Life is good!

Weekend Full O' Birthday Parties

Tis the September weekend to celebrate friend's birthdays. Friday night we celebrated Stacey's 40th Birthday (friend from church). It was about a group of 15 or so and we had a great space at the back of BB Kings in downtown Nashville. Here are a bunch of pics:

The Birthday Girl: Stacey

Katie, Amy and I

Jon, Patrick and Chris
Amy (Striking a pose), Me and Heather
Amy, Me and Jill

Then on Saturday night, we (mostly an entirely different group of church friends) got together to celebrate Patrick's birthday at South Street. I actually realized that I didn't take any pics of the birthday boy on Saturday so I'll use this pic from Friday night and then other pics from his bday bash.

Patrick (birthday boy) and Katie

Me and Crazy Amy

Mike and his pub chicken (more like half a chicken...it was HUGE)

Timmy and Michelle

OK...I'm about "peopled" out after all these parties

Lists

Seriously....I don't think that I would be able to do my job if I wasn't able to write out lists. List of things that I have accomplished, things that I need to do, things that I need to organize, things that I need to shop for, etc. etc. etc. Strike that last sentence...I don't think that I could live life without keeping lists. I have lists in notebooks, on legal pads, on post-it notes, in my agenda/day-planner, in my journal, on my bathroom mirror (gotta love the dry-erase pens). It's actually a little scary to think about all the lists as I write this post.
Just call me a list-a-holic!

But as much as I love making lists....there is nothing better than crossing things off the lists and watching it disappear. Now that really makes me one happy girl :)

Busy-ness

Do you ever wonder about the how or why of being busy? As we hit the halfway mark of yet another month, life continues to be moving at warp speed. At this rate, I'm afraid that I'll wake up tomorrow and it will be Thanksgiving. Sheesh!

Work is busy...SUPER busy and about to be SUPER DUPER busy with the return of my boss next week. My "social" calendar is also rapidly approaching "busy" status as I have something on my calendar everyday until next Monday and then another 5 day stretch of social activities starts again. My "workout" calendar is busy because I am trying to stay disciplined to following the training schedule at hand for my upcoming half marathon. Looks like with the increased evening activities I am going to have to make the switch to running in the a.m. And if you know me at all, you know how vital it is for my own sanity to have "alone time"....where do I find time to fit that in???

Quote of the Week

So I've always loved reading through books of quotes. My friend Tra'Cee always writes quotes on the envelopes of the letters she writes to me. I love coming across those quotes that just turn the "bright light" on upstairs. There can be such power in words.

So I have decided to post a "Quote of the Week" every Monday and I will try to post this first thing in the morning (unlike my late posting now). Please feel free to share your favorite quotes with me and I'll be happy to use them too.

"Unless I accept my faults I will most certainly doubt my virtues."

Hugh Prather

Run Run Run

Could it be that I have finally found my groove for running again? I'm telling you for awhile there I wasn't sure that I'd ever enjoy running again but the past 7 weeks of disciplined training is paying off and I'm starting to feel comfortable in running distance again. Hallelujah :) And just in time....I'm running the Evansville Half Marathon on October 11th and as I'm approaching the half way mark in training, I actually feel like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel..

With my dad in tow, we did The Franklin Classic 10k on Labor Day. Of course, I had to tweak my training schedule to accommodate a race on a Monday but did a spin class on Saturday (45 mins of cardio) and took Sunday as a rest day. I knew what I wanted to goal myself but I'm always apprehensive about setting a time goal because I tend to freak myself out, panic and then ruin my run. Thankfully, this wasn't the case on Monday.

My goal and comfortable pace averages around a 11 minute mile. I knew this course was hilly so I could prepare mentally but I forgot just how hilly it was. Nevertheless, I seemed to be on goal at each mile marker and here is my final time: Gun Time=1:10:16 Chip Time=1:09:28 Pace=11:13. I am not going to lie...I am pleased! This just backs up one of my personal running mottos "Slow and Steady finishes the race".

Fun Family Weekend

I enjoyed the long holiday weekend with a visit from my parents, sister Holly and niece Elaysha. They arrived into town on Friday night and stayed until Monday afternoon. We filled this time with shopping, shopping and more shopping, good food (even did our own grilling on Sunday night) and just spending quality time together. I am so blessed to have good family :) And I had to snap a couple pics of the star of the show....Elaysha Bug.

We were trying to take pics and realized that she was busy snacking on a cookie

Which then caused us to break out in laughter and silliness...

She just keeps growing up so fast....my beautiful Elaysha Bug

Little Blogger Hiatus

I'm back and it's already September. I just have one question...where did the summer go? I'm going to write more later and recap the summer but make sure to go back through some of my posts as I am going to do some backdating posts with pictures of the past 2 weeks that I "disappeared".