I take it back...

In recent weeks, I've probably been overheard telling some not-married-yet folks to elope.

I take it back

I'm not your traditional bride, I did not pick out specific shades of color to be matched in dresses, flowers, tablecloths, tissue paper and invitations. I didn't even get flowers at all. Most of the tiny details involved with wedding planning were not even addressed throughout the course of our wedding planning, so that must be considered as I give the following advice.

I'm so glad we didn't elope. I'm so glad we didn't get married with five months (I tried and TRIED to get us married on December 13th). Because so much of our family and friends wouldn't have been able to come. I have tried (and I think succeeded) to buck the notion that weddings are EVENTS and the planning must equal to that of a presidential inaugural ball or something. I saw my wedding as a sharing of love between myself and my fiancee and I wasn't sure I understood why there needed to be 160 other people involved in that.

But now I do.

I have a huge family. Holmes' family isn't exactly tiny. And almost ALL of our family is going to be together in one place this weekend. To me, that's AMAZING. We have family in California (both of us!), Mississippi, Kansas, Maryland, Georgia, Florida, North and South Carolina, and Virginia. I am honored that all of these people are coming to one place (over a holiday weekend!) to celebrate with us. Same goes for our friends. Holmes and I don't really make too many casual acquaintances. If we're friends, it tends to stick. So back to that 160 number. So many of our friends are making the trip as well. People we have seen in years. And even more are coming out to the after party (only not invited to the wedding because the family is so huge, not because we don't love them as much).

I'm so excited I cannot put it into words. For so long I was so excited about the wedding. About sharing a last name with my best friend and a man I often just sit and stare at (because, well, that's a whole different blog post), about being married, about the promise of a safe, loving, fulfilled future. In the past week or so as friends and family have called to finalize accommodations and plans, I've realized how great it's going to be to see all of them as well.

It's going to be a busy week. I have a quiz, a midterm and a few observation hours left for school work. Then I have to pack. That will be quite a task, several days of being in Greensboro, then the wedding and related events, then the honeymoon! We head down to NC Wednesday afternoon. The arbor is still in Raleigh, so we need to pick that up on the way down. Thursday will be "last-minute" errand day, which I know could end up taking hours. I have two tiny projects to finish for the items for the wedding itself and I need to wrap some gifts. It's really not that bad. And I'll be putting my cousin Tina to work :)

The "planned" fun starts Friday, the bridesmaids, my mom and I are getting pedicures. Except for Miranda because she no likey people touching her feet. She'll be wayyyyy across the room getting a manicure ;)I haven't decided if we are having a rehearsal yet. It's possible we won't. The rehearsal dinner is at 6 on Friday night. Early bedtime for everyone, Saturday morning pictures start at 9:30am! WOOOO!!!! The ceremony is at 11am, anyone is welcome to that, really. It's at the arboretum in Greensboro. The weather forecast jumps and falls 5-7 degrees every time I look at it, so I've just stopped looking at it. Ok, that's not true, I'm still checking it twice a day, I just don't believe what it tells me. The reception is full (who said no one would come to a holiday wedding). We'd love to ask more folks to come, but literally, the room is almost at legal fire code capacity. So we hope everyone will make it down to Natty Greene's Saturday night, we'll be there by nine!

I hope today and tomorrow go by quickly. I can't take the waiting any longer!!!!!!!!!!

counting down

Eight days until we go to Greensboro.

Nine days until we see a whole lotta family

Ten days until we start seeing a lot of friends

Eleven days until we GET MARRIED

Twelve days until the honeymoon

Hopefully I will never be busier than this. I don't have kids, so I know that's some lofty wishful thinkin'. I'll rephrase "Hopefully I won't be this busy again until I have kids". There we go.

Four classes, cramming 8 weeks of work into 5. Like the winter/spring session though, I'm really enjoying it. Thank goodness, I just can't imagine going to school for something you don't really enjoy. I would go nuts.

Just to catch everyone up since I haven't blogged in ten days...here's some random stuff...

Holmes scored a spot as a bassist with a band here in Richmond! The band has been around for a while I guess, but they haven't played since December. They are playing a show Friday night at the Capital Ale House downtown...Stoke Row is the name. I am so thrilled for him....and can't wait to see him play on stage Friday night. He's also started playing with a church here down in Midlothian. We went for the first time on Sunday and I think we're really going to like it there. The handful of people I've met so far are really nice. We think it's Forest Hill-ish...but we are at one of the satellites, so I'm not sure if the main campus is the size of Forest Hill or not...

We found a place to live...I think I mentioned that already in a post...oh well if I did. We start moving in as soon as we get back from the honeymoon. We're hoping to have a housewarming on August 22nd. There's a 5k that morning as well, if anyone is interested in running with us. (Yes, I try and plan every event around a race)

The wedding is set. There are teeny details to take care of when I get home next week, but they are no big deal and since I'll be done with all my assignments by then, it'll be no problem to get them done. The weather forecasts are looking promising.

Riley has been at home with Mom since Holmes and I have been so busy. Packing stuff up in boxes tends to freak him out...so we're sparing him the anxiety. I miss that dog. It's amazing how much I miss him. Mostly during the day...he was a REALLY good school work break. I suppose I could still get up every two hours and go for a walk myself, but that seems weird.

As usual, I'm sure I'll close this up and think of a million more things I meant to post, but oh well. I have 20 words to define and use in paragraphs. Yippeeeeeee. Happy Wednesday!

Race for Autism 5K

A couple months ago, one of my bridesmaids, Neena, called to tell me she was thinking of running in a 5k in June. She hasn't run a race since her first one back in 2007, so I was excited for her. She tells me it's June 13th, which I gently remind her is the date she/we picked for my bachelorette party. Then I realized, I would WANT to run a 5k for my bachelorette party :) So we decided to sign up and run it! Her husband also decided to train with her and run it. It was being organized by the Autism Society of North Carolina and apparently they made a really decent amount of money! For what was a tiny, well organized if a little haphazard event, it ended up being a great race. Last minute, one of my other bridesmaid's, Ben (yep, a guy), decided to run too. He's an ultra runner, but has been battling ankle and shoulder issues (yeah, I don't know, maybe he handstand walks some of this runs?).

The sun was out and meant business. It was under 80 at the start, but probably not far. At least 70% humidity I'd guess. Fortunately, there was a semi decent amount of shade on the course. For the first time ever, I lined up at the very front of the pack. It was really exciting. High school track star SHOT OFF at the sound of the horn of course. There were about ten of us that ran together at first. I had planned to go out quick, but not 7:10 pace quick. So I backed off a bit, felt pretty strong through the first mile. Then the hills came. They weren't awful in reality, but two of them were enough to make me feel like dying. I focused on my "little steps" mantra for hills and tried to keep my feet under my body. On the second hill a chic in red shorts passed me. At this point, I was still the third girl. Now, fourth. I knew I'd already passed the 2 mile marker, so I was doing my best positive talk in my head. But then my negative side got the best of me and I couldn't NOT focus on all the times in training I'd pushed too early and burned out before the last kick. I love kicking at the end of a race. I wanted to be able to do that at this race too. I think I hung back a bit.

Then another female passed me. Fifth. Shoot. We had a great big downhill at this point and I knew the big long uphill to the finish was around the corner. I say, long, it was maybe a tenth or two tenths of a mile. But at the end of my first hard race, I was angry about it. I remember reading about how elites *recover* on downhills and tried to adjust my form there, and picked up quite a bit of speed before attempting catapult myself up the hill. I looked at my watch for the first time since two miles and realized, holy crap, I think I actually might beat my goal. I started pushing. Since I actually started this race at the line at the horn, I was able to watch the official race clock and that was fun. I did NOT watch it click past 00:24:00.

My official time was 23:49. Ben's was 22:52. Neither of us have run a 5k in over a year. It was REALLY fun. We stuck around for the awards ceremony. It was clear three of the other females that finished before me were not in my age group, but I was pretty sure one chic was. Neena told us the awards for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place in age groups were decorative plates that had been painted by children with autism from the local schools. I was SO excited about that. When they posted the results, I was second in my age group (20-29). First is my age group was 23:22. I'm pretty sure it was the chic in the red shorts. Shoot. HA. The guy jumped on the mic and announced that first in age group would receive the awards. I was truly SO bummed about not getting a plate. BUT then they announced that 1st, 2nd and 3rd overall male/female received medals. So I was sort of defaulted to 1st in my age group because 23:22 was 2nd female overall! My plate is painted with the words "Race for Autism" and has the puzzle piece logo painted in the middle. I adore it. Ben picked an orange one with a yellow helicopter. I was 22nd overall out of probably about 150 runners. (222 were registered, but a lot of folks walked).


Neena finished REALLY well too for her second race ever, on fairly short training while working full time, being in grad school, and being my bridesmaid ;) She broke a ten minute mile pace, even if she did yell some choice words at the last hill! Her husband Aaron finished his first race in kick a%$ time too!

Race Results

No time to blog about it today...it was hot, there were a couple cruel hills (like to the finish), but I beat my goal.

I have pictures and stories to tell soon.

parallel Bible

Back when I was involved with Campus Outreach, I used to carry a concordance and bible around with me...

If you have ever seen a concordance, you know this is loony, because they are HUUUUUUUUGE

I was spending a LOT more time in the Word back then and I loved loved loved looking up meanings of words and cross referencing and blah blah blah. It's really super interesting what you can discover about the Bible that is deeper than "Jesus loves you" (although, that's deep enough, really. if that's all you get, that's enough). These days, all I usually do is a quick perusal of the Our Daily Bread devotional and verse. Today, Ecclesiastes 12:1-7 mentions something about when times are bad and its cloudy and the grasshopper drags along and all desire is lost and men are afraid of heights. Huh? men are afraid of heights? this is a sign of bad times? So I decided to see what insight an online concordance might be able to provide. Turns out the verse just means, men are old and to weak and scared to try and walk up a hill, they've just sort of given up on life. Right, that's not super interesting. But that's not why I'm writing this. This is about the COOLEST website I found. Parallel Bible. You type in a verse number and it lists the verse it just about every bible translation you could possibly imagine (and wow, there are a lot.). Then it also has definitions of certain words, cross references for verses in other books. It is really really cool.

Just wanted to share.

On an unrelated note, I want to pray for all of my teacher friends. The ones that have been laid off, the ones that might not be asked to come back next year ("your position has been *dissolved*" ugh), and the ones that are about to be subject to pay cuts. It's also going to be significantly harder to find summer jobs, because all the bankers have filled the server/lifeguard/barista jobs. Education was supposed to be the industry that wouldn't be hurt by the economy...because it's *so* important. Yet car companies are having money thrown at them while schools are slicing jobs and resources left and right.

Happy Friday :)

UGH

Race is Saturday. My attempt at running a 24 minute 5K is 35ish hours away.

At the risk of provoking the Con Man I must whine about this week.

I should've run Monday, so I could run speedwork yesterday, easy today and take tomorrow off. But I didn't, because Brian Williamson and Michael Cell created the most wonderful tasting beer EVER. And Holmes and I had way way too much fun at a wedding and after party (they had $4 New Belgium Black Ale, oh so yummy). So I didn't run Monday. Tuesdays run was bad. I wasn't into it. I've had a bad run here or there before though, big deal. Yesterday, I took BOSU (because I'm addicted) but did NOT overdo it. I took it rather easy in fact. That brings us to today. I went out to run speed work. I thought I'd wait until the afternoon for two reasons. I really didn't want to run inside at the gym (the track there is six laps to a mile) and I don't know what the local school tracks are like in the morning. And then I thought as a nice bonus, it would be good training for how hot it could potentially be Saturday morning. Today on the log was 3x800s @ 3:58 with 400 jogs. 5 miles total. I did 4x800s last week a smidge faster than that (3:55, 3:33, 3:39 and 3:42) and felt GREAT. I thought it was a little strange to do track intervals two weeks in a row. My schedules usually switch out speedwork for tempo runs every other week. Oh well. I went to the track. It was about 85 ish degrees, I'm guessing 50 or 60% humidity, but it was cloudy, so the sun wasn't beating down. I had two huge bottles, one full of gatorade and one full of water. I'd been hydrating all day as well.

Oh, that was the worst thirty minutes of my life. I started the warm up mile and felt off. Just heavy and weird. I went and grabbed my iPod out of the car, kept warming up. I started my first 800 and after the first 100 I realized I was going way slow. So I sped up, hit the first 400 at a good pace. By the time I was halfway around the second 400, I was SUCKING WIND. I pushed and finished. I over-pushed though and the first 800 was in 3:4. Grabbed gatorade and water. Sipped a bit of both and was still able to jog my recovery. Flipped the shuffle around and found my usual kick me in the rear songs. I started my second 800. All of a sudden it was torture. 2nd 800-3:54. Goal, yes, but I had to walk my second recovery lap. I started my usual self talk....only one more, no big deal, two laps? what is that, come on. I started my 3rd 800. I got to the 100 mark and started slowing down involuntarily. I could feel it and I was looking at legs, willing them to move. I tried to think back to mile 19 of the marathon, the big hill at 22, the people I passed at 25. It didn't work. I could not convince myself to keep going. So I stopped. I started walking. I've never quit. I rounded the end of the track and Garmin told me my total distance was 3.11. I decided that was enough and walked to my car.

Soooooooooooooooo.
Do I run two easy miles tomorrow morning? To complete my weekly mileage AND to remind myself that running does not suck? So I can get to the start line without this being the last running feeling in my body? Do I abandon all hope of my goal for Saturday? Last week's speed work is promising, right? My last two months of speedwork have been pretty on key as well. 1600s and 800s, all on target and yet not all out.

For now, I shall pout and finish my never ending school work.

Any insight is appreciated.

forgot a couple things

I really meant to mention this in the blog earlier this morning...

I'm SO sorry to everyone I've neglected in the past couple weeks. I haven't been answering phone calls or catching up with people online or in real life! You can email me or text me and I'll probably get back to you...
but really, just about every spare minute, I've been reading or doing assignments. I've been taking dramamine any time we are going to be in the car for more than twenty minutes and taking my books with me.

Since I have this open, I'll add this...my run this morning was awesome. I decided to only go 8. The number 9 just annoyed me this morning. Does anyone ever feel like that? I wasn't tired or worn out, I just did not want to run nine. It was sorta strange. I was able to get a couple quick miles in. I didn't push it on the uphills (and there are some long ones on this route). I also saw Charlie Engle. He lives in my parents town, but I've never seen him out running. It was REALLY cool! For those of you that don't run, it would be like showing up to the driving range and seeing Tiger Woods...like stepping into the batting cage next to Chipper Jones...like hitting the tennis court and bumping into Andy Roddick.

There was also a little old woman who was really excited for me. I know this because she hollered "do yo' thang little girl, do yo' thang!" and smiled from ear to ear!

long one...catching up...on my, well, rambling

May and June of this year will probably go down as two of the most exciting (and busiest) two months of my life!

My first nephew was born, I finished a marathon, I had a bridal shower, I made A's in my first two graduate school classes, Holmes found a new place to live, my bachelorette party is coming up, wedding planning is in full swing...

School is really busy this session...I'm taking four classes and one has an observation component. I'll be at a clinic for three hours twice a week. I'm really interested to learn more about SLP therapy with adults... I really am enjoying the classes though. The topics are interesting even if some of them are really hard. All of my instructors finally decided to let me turn in all my assignments early and take the quizzes early. Otherwise, I'd have to be hunting down a computer with reliable internet on the honeymoon! But this doubles my workload for the month of June. Holmes is SO helpful and so supportive though! I made a 92 on my first quiz and a 100 on my first assignment. Also, I've been awarded a graduate assistantship that will start after the wedding. It's nothing fancy, I think I'm organizing a library, but I'll take it!

I've kept up the strength training and cross training. I'm loving it AND can see the difference after just a few weeks! I'm newly obsessed with BOSU class...unfortunately they don't offer it at the gym near our new place, so I have to enjoy it as much as possible until July! The class is a lot of cardio, but it incorporates intense core work. The instructor includes weights and resistance bands as well. She also encourages "friendly" competition...having us team up and run sprints back and forth across the groupx room. This past week, she had us do this near the end of the 1.5 hour long class. This was after I ran four tempo miles that morning. It was GREAT! Talk about training fast twitch muscles to work hard when fatigued! I'm also doing Body Pump once a week and cycling once a week. All this really does take up one or two hours each day of the week and obviously adds to me being so busy, but I'd go crazy without it, I know I would.

My speedwork has been going REALLY well. The *race* is next week and I'm actually starting to get a little anxious. Even more than I was for the marathon. I think Holmes and I decided to run some part of the Thunder Road races in Charlotte in December. So after this 5k, I think I'm just going to *run*. No training plans in place until August to get ready for Thunder Road...that should be interesting...

We signed a lease for a new place in Midlothian. It's much closer to Longwood... We are SO excited about the place. We will have SPACE! We can't wait to have people over to visit and for parties! There WILL be a housewarming, probably the second weekend in August, involving funny aprons.

Wedding planning is really going great. Holmes, my mom, his mom and my grandmothers have been SO helpful. There is so little left to do! I did have a dream though last night, that all of these crazy things went weirdly wrong the day of the wedding. Then (in my dream), I 'woke up' from my dream and hunted down a pen to write down the things that happened in the dream so I would remember to take care of them in real life. But I was dreaming that I wrote them down, so I have no idea what they were. The only thing I remember is that the venue of the reception changed and we didn't tell Patrick Rock (the band). It was weird. Good story, huh. So then Steve stabbed him. But really, I can't WAIT for the wedding. So many of my cousins are coming that I wasn't sure if they could make it. And so many of our friends are coming...it's going to be such a great reunion!

Few more random things:
Congratulations to Mike White and Kristy!
WOOOOOOOO to Mir and her girls for committing to the Couch to 5K plan!
Happy (belated) one month birthday to widdle baby Jackson!
Happy Birthday today to Julie B!



I'm off to get in 42, I mean, 9 miles before we head to Cary for Brian and Rocky's wedding!