Running, summer dreams, pita chips,and other random thoughts

• I ran 60 miles in April!Which is pretty crazy impressive to me since I ran 20 miles September to February. I ran 8 miles last Sunday! But the best part about that is that I felt great during AND after the run. This is huge because in the past any time I've run over 6 miles, I felt awful about 30 minutes after the run. Stomach cramps, awful headache, weak feeling for hours. It kind of killed the runner's high pretty dang fast. After I ran the Capitol 10K in Austin, I felt horrible. Worst ever. But I persevered and kept reading and trying new things.... So now do you want to know what my, apparently weak, body needs to survive an a very slow 8 mile run?   I drink this very lovely pouch of pre-workout gatorade before the run and eat a small thing of applesauce. While I'm running, I nibble on a clif bar (which I'm becoming slightly addicted to) and water. And I guzzle a post-workout gatorade thing as soon as I'm done. I haven't decided if doing all of this makes me tough because I didn't just give up, or if it makes me a total wimp, because, seriously, it's ridiculous. But regardless, I can run miles and feel good. That's success. This Sunday I'm going for 9 miles. We'll see! 
• I have never ached for summer so bad in all my teaching years. Never. It's probably because of our vacation plans - nothing super crazy, but Grant and Mason on a plane should be the best thing ever. And, at least daily, Grant will say some random thing like, "On Buhcation, can we feed the 'eagulls?" The boys' excitement is definitely contagious.  It might also be because we're planning on doing some pretty major improvements to our house. Planning being the key word there. We are terrible at saying we're going to do stuff and then chicken out at the expense. But it is time. It. is. time. But the real reason I think I'm so ready for this school year to be over is because it's just been hard. That's all I'm going to say. But I'd like you to pay attention to the italics on the word hard.
• I'm addicted to cinnamon sugar pita chips. I'm under the delusion that because they're pita chips, they're healthy. However, eating a whole bag of anything in one sitting probably kills what little health factor there might have been. And this is why I continue to run and drink 19 different varieties of gatorade to do so.
• Mason is in the Little Olympics tomorrow. I cannot wait to watch him! He's doing the long jump and chin-ups. I don't know how in the world his teeny arms will do chin-ups! But I can't wait to scream my head off for him!
• I'm doing mini-sessions for Sprinkle of Grace right now. The secret motive behind them is because I really want to get a new computer. I fully expect my computer to go up in a puff of smoke at any moment. In just the last two years, it's processed 30, 000 pictures. Go ahead. Try to wrap your mind around that number. It's insane. It's a 4 year old computer. That's like 80 in computer years... It's time. Right? Someone tell me it's time, so I don't feel guilty about it... 
• We're going wedding dress shopping for Bekah on the 19th! Can't wait! :) 
• Kylah is having Camilla no later than May 29th!
• Summer! It's going to actually get here! :)

pictures without a purpose

I'm having problems with one of my memory cards. In an effort to figure it out and find a solution to the very bizarre problem, I needed to take a couple hundred shots that didn't matter. In other words, I just started taking pictures of Mason and Grant. There wasn't a coordinated wardrobe, hair doing, face scrubbing or fingernail cleaning.
And here's the pictures I got. Pictures that weren't supposed to matter, but somehow seem to matter more than any pictures I've taken in a long time. Just my boys being who they are - crazy-haired, dirty, smiley, and completely stealing my heart.

I adore this shirt. Oscar the grouch and Grant just seem to go together. Even though Grant is so not a grouch. Maybe it's the trash can home, because Grant's a mess. Constantly. Or maybe it's that it's a soft and snuggly shirt and he says it's his "comvortle" shirt...Yeah, I bet that's why.

I am in love with their shaggy blond hair.

I didn't know it was possible to love a giggle so much.

Can I stop time?

Seriously. Let's stop time.

home

I've never seen such beautiful wildflowers as there were at home this weekend.

There were fields and fields of Indian Paintbrushes.

And oceans of bluebonnets. I think God had a really great time making the Hill Country.

Why?

Oh. Hi there.
I do still exist.
:)

Lately, I've been thinking about why. Why I do the things I do. Why do I teach? Why do I have Sprinkle of Grace? Why do I spray paint old furniture bright shades of red? Why do I run? Why do I do all that I do?So very philosophical of me, don't you think? :)
I don't know. Maybe it's some sort of thing that happens when you get older and realize you should probably have yourself figured out by now.
Also. When I have a Why for something I'm doing, I always do it so much better.
It's like cleaning your house. Don't you always clean house better when someone's coming to visit? I do. I'm always faster, more detail oriented, and focused. My definite goal is "make this house look good for _______." When I just clean because  we, like, run out of clean spoons, I'm never as efficient. I hop around from task to task, skipping any task but the most essential, because, really, cleaning the house for just the three boys I live with is not quite as motivating since the cleanliness is undone rather quickly, and really, everyone was okay with the slight mess from before.
But when someone is coming to visit, I have a definite answer for the why I am cleaning. And I get the job done.
So, if I could pinpoint exactly why I teach, clean, work, photograph, run, organize, etc I think I'd be way more effective...or just stop doing it.

So today I'm tackling an easy why. Why I run. 
About a month ago it occurred to me that the capitol 10k was approaching and fast. And I had run, oh, about 8 miles since October.
I had canceled my membership at the gym because I would rather do anything besides run on a treadmill and Mason hated going to the daycare thing in the gym and that meant I could only run in the morning at 5:30 so I'd be back for Troy to leave by 6:30 and waking up at 5:30 after staying up until 11:30 to edit pictures....well, as you can see, the excuses for never going to the gym were...there.
Troy gets home after dark basically every night of the week and I have two boys who can't watch themselves.
And I can't run at night alone.
So when could I run?

So, I finally asked Grant's daycare provider (who I adore) if she wouldn't mind watching Mason and grant for about 45 minutes a few days a week so I could run after school. She agreed.
 So I started running and, since I had a 10k to get ready for, regaining distance was my goal. So I did that slowly, eventually working up to 7 miles last Sunday. A very slow seven miles, but seven miles nonetheless.
So now I had figured out HOW I could run. But...why?
Do I really care about my time for the Capitol 10k?
Do I want to run a half marathon some day?
Am I trying to lose weight?
Do I want to be faster? Run farther?
Why running? 

Well, after about three afternoons of running after school, the why I run became very clear.

It's because running gives me at least 30 minutes of silence a day.

30 minutes without "Mrs. Wilde....Joe took my purple butterfly eraser and he won't give it back!"
30 minutes without "Jenny, have you decided what intervention will work best with Johnny?"
30 minutes without "Mom, where's my nerf gun that fires 32 darts at a time so that you'll never be able to pick them all up?" Okay so that question has never been worded that way...
It's 30 minutes of no one needing me.
It's 30 minutes of just me.
And whether I run fast or slow, up hills or down, for miles and miles or just a few, it's just about me.
And I think every one of us deserves that in our lives.

And on days when I can't seem to do anything right or be good enough of at it all, I can run. I can check that off the list. I can feel success there.

Now, I know that I'll need goals as a runner. I'd really like to actually start shaving time off my Capitol 10k time rather than adding a minute every year. And I'd like to run 3-4 miles like it's nothing. I'd definitely like to be faster. And I think I'd even like to try a half marathon someday... Some very far off day... :)

But the real deep down reason I run is the same reason I think my dad ran: it's time to think, to be alone, to feel success in something, to do something for myself.  And while, I guess, in some ways, that is selfish, it's really not. Because I come home on my running days energized and refreshed. I want to cook something healthy for my family. I want to keep moving. I've thought out most of the day's troubles and put the others aside. Those 30 minutes alone make me feel better the rest of the day.

Anyway, I don't know why i'm writing this. Why, of all things, I chose this to post on my blog after months of not writing a thing, but I just felt like putting it in words. So there. :)

Why do I run?
For me.

My lovely new camera bag

I love her. With all my heart.
I need to have a shoot soon to take her out.
Really, isn't she so lovely?
And she's as beautiful on the inside as she is on the out. Except she's polka dotted and full of padding.
I adore her so....

I don't.

I don't want it to be over.
I already miss you Christmas break...