our fake maui...

Ed and I went to Maui as a graduation trip gift to ourselves after he took the Bar exam. It was relaxing, beautiful, wonderful and overall a total blast. We always want to go back, but stick firm to our policy to visit more places before we do. Plus it's pretty pricey. However, this weekend, we found what we deemed as our fake Maui during our six-year anniversary last minute weekend getaway.

We have both been feeling the stress and strain of work and life. Last year our anniversary was less than stellar, just a total bust, for a variety of reasons. This year, we decided we wanted to celebrate our anniversary in style for a bajillion reasons. We wanted a place that wasn't too far away, but that would be relaxing and low key.

Being near water and nature is ideal for us, we'll pick that over a city any day. We knew of a place called Big Cedar Lodge on Table Rock Lake so I gave the lodge (lodge is a bit of an understatement) a call on chance, told them it was last minute and our anniversary, and we were in luck. The resort totally hooked us up, they had an amazing room waiting for us! Sweet.

Ed and I agreed, this was by far the most incredible weekend trip we have ever taken together. We had an amazing amount of fun in this beautiful part of the country. It's why we deemed it our fake Maui. We decided that in the future when we need to get away, when we can't handle real life another second, we will head to fake Maui... because it's cheaper and faster than the real thing!

We had a full day on Saturday, and took lots of pictures. Below are just the pictures of Friday night (we arrived pretty late) and Saturday morning. More to come on the rest of it later (empty promises... i hear you saying it now).

*this was waiting for us when we arrived, they even gave us a card. if i actually liked cake, i'm sure it would have been delightful, instead ed had the dirty work of eating the whole thing*

*our room, the doors leading out to the balcony, it was delightful*

*ed on the walk to brek*

*nature on our walk to brek*

*ed eagerly awaiting his biscuits and gravy, the boy doesn't mess around, if there are b&g in the vicinity, you better get the heck out of the way, he will take you down in order to get them*

*waiting for some delicious (and it was) brek at one of the restaurants, i had a brekkie sandwich with eggs, bacon, and cheese, and some hash on the side*

*some nature on our walk back from brek*

*this was our 'lodge.' our room was on the top floor, and the third balcony over (the one not covered by the tree)*

*and this is where we spent the rest of our morning, hanging out in these rocking chairs (there were two) on our balcony reading, talking and enjoying the view*

best part of my day...

Time to list it up, and there is one thing from yesterday, so don't judge on my inability to post in a prompt manner.

1. Lunch at Abuelos, because yet another co-worker is leaving, which is sad because I heart her. It's official, all my favorite people have left the building :( But it was a fun and yummy lunch to celebrate a fantastic person!

2. Ed and I decided to get out of town this weekend to celebrate six years of making it through being married. We decided to celebrate with a last minute weekend getaway! Any guesses where we are going? I mean really, because I have no idea.

3. Katie and I met at the Park last night to do intervals after work. I am terrified of doing speed work outdoors because I always feel like I will suck. But guess what? We didn't suck. We did 4x800's, with a one mile warm up, 5 minutes between each 800 and about a 10 minute cool down. We felt pretty great about our run. Katie kept track of overall time and distance on her Garmin, I tracked only the intervals on mine.

Here are our interval stats:
Run Distance: 2.0 Miles
Average Pace: 7:48
Best Pace: 6:16 (score)
Calories Burned: 213

Our total distance was about 4.5 miles, I'm not sure on total time, hopefully I'll get those stats from Katie tonight since we are meeting at the park again for an easy run.

Even though I was nervous to do speed work outside, we were hitting my goal pace thanks to the handy dandy pace calculators I have been using. My goal interval training pace is between 7:30s and 7:50s for 800's. So last nights 800's weren't as fast as I would have liked, but hey, this is only my second week doing speed work, so I say not bad.

summer has officially started...

For me, summer has officially started. Not because last weekend was memorial day weekend. Nope. And not because the heat and evil, evil humidity have descended upon this fine flat city. No, no. I know summer has arrived because lawyers league softball season has begun. For the last five years, it just doesn't feel like summer until the summer law clerks flock to local firms like the salmon of capistrano and the festivities surrounding their arrival ensue.

*milo at the first softball game of the season, he usually doesn't take his eyes off of ed, i was bribing him here! ed is in the background at first base.*

So within the last week, it felt like summer has officially arrived. The softball season started last night, and it didn't disappoint. Stormy weather, cold beer, fierce competitiveness from type A personalities, and degrading yells from opposing council--I mean players.... ahhh the sounds of summer. So if you are thinking I am so excited for all of this because I'm a killer and key player for the firm team then you would be quite wrong. Oh HECK no. I turn into the town idiot when you get me near a ball. I am there simply to consume beer, distract players and wait for the fried deliciousness that follows each game. It's delightful. I'm pretty sure Kristen the Running Lawyer and I have a sole purpose during softball season, to make sure the proper food and beer are ordered post game.

*ed playing first base.*

*storm clouds hanging out over the fields.*

*i had to include an action shot. our team did win the game, which is not typical.*

However, thanks to my healthy lifestyle, it's going to take some re-conditioning for our summer Tuesday night fare of fried goodness, tacos and beer. Because Kristen, Ed and I all agreed this morning that our stomachs HATED us thanks to dinner last night. Although Kristen and I are doing far better this year than we were last year. Ed's imitation of us post games last summer is hands down one of the most entertaining things you will ever see. Basically he mocks us for our fine fried food and beer inhalation skills. However, Kristen and I kept clear of most of the fried goodness. I give us mad props for NOT downing an entire basket of jalapeno poppers on our own. A weakness for us both. We were good little runners and only had one popper each. Runners = 1, Poppers = 0! Score. We'll see how long that lasts, we have many weeks to go.

Like I said, in addition to softball, summer doesn't feel like summer until the festivities begin. Last week marked the 5th Annual Wine Tasting. It is always a fun event, there is plenty of wine to taste and it's always interesting to see (coughahem...taste) what everyone brings. I'm personally always tempted to sneak a box of wine into the party. Ed and I brought a randomly picked Australian Shiraz that I can't remember the name of, something with Gnarled or Oak in the name. But apparently we are wine geniuses because WE WON for best red.

*edder and i at the wine tasting.*

*kristen and i being blahg-arific at the party. really i just followed her around all night being all.. whatcha doin' where you goin'... and taking pictures. not at all obnoxious.*

*i think i interrupted a VERY important conversation to take this picture..... mmm-hmmm, i think they were actually contemplating where to play street craps. classic.*

Kristen hosted the event this year at her beautiful and amazing new house. It takes a lot of guts to host this group, trust me. But I think her house fared okay. The party was tame in comparison to past years... past years where I can't be positive, but there may have been yoga push up-offs (the clap during the push up move) between Kristen and I and one of the partners, while we are in, of course, dresses. There was also no making up haiku's for partners this year, that's pretty much my wine tasting party standard.

*uhhh yeah, there sure was a chocolate fountain at that party....
runners = 0, chocolate fountain = 58.*

*everyone loving the chocolate. yum!*

Mmmmm summer is here and I love it!

getting speedy...

Now that I have every length of race that I have wanted to do under my shoes, I have a new mission. Getting speedy. I realized I never really, truly buckled down and focused on getting fast. I have never trained as hard as I could have in regard to speed, and I get extremely frustrated at my lack of speed. However I've realized that I can't be frustrated at my lack of speed when I don't fully concentrate on getting speedy. That is going to change this summer. Oh yes, they will call me speedy pants by summers end... I hope. I am focusing all my running energy on getting a 10K PR.

Since I am determined to work on speed this summer, I figured why not team up with Runners Lounge and make it official. I have started a 10K group over on runners lounge and am going to be writing about my journey to get faster at 10Ks at least every other week. Nothing like a little accountability to keep a runner honest, right? Documenting my amateur attempts to get fast, because I am no pro, I'm hoping will help me stay motivated, and maybe inspire some others to join me in this quest. Having others in the same boat always helps right?

The good thing is I'm a huge research nerd, so when it comes to something like figuring out how to get speedy on my own, I research the poo out of it. I'm also pretty systematic, I like lists, I like research, I like to figure out a plan before I ever get started. So in my quest to get faster, I have been doing research and calculating the speeds at which I need to train for my goal 10K pace. My goal by the end of the summer is to run a 48 minute 10K, I know that isn't super speedy for most people, but for me, it is. I have goals beyond that (my ultimate goal is to run a 46 minute 10K... in due time), but I feel like it's a good starting point, not to lofty to make me frustrated if I totally miss it. I think it's a very realistic goal.

In my research I found a few websites that helped me decide my paces and training plan for the summer. I used the McMillan Pace Calculator and the Runners World Pace Calculator (both offer differing paces) and I compiled the two to come up with my goal paces for the long and tempo runs, 400's, 800's and 1600's that are in my summer training plan. I'll be doing speed work anywhere from 7:00 - 8:00 miles. I think these pace calculators are a perfect starting point for deciding a training pace.

To get my goal pace I just typed in my goal 10K time (it usually tells you to enter your best recent race time) and went from there. I think it's a great starting point. So I hope you all will dig my summer speedy training, and if you are in Runner's Lounge already feel free to go and join my 10K group where you can share your training tips and ideas, many minds are far better than one!

Cheers to a great summer of speediness my friends!