I was a selfish idiot

It has taken some time and reflection to realize how selfish it was for me to sign up for a marathon at this point in my life without fully thinking through the repercussions for my family.

I am not saying running races is selfish, or being a wife and running marathons is selfish or even being a mom and running marathons is selfish. Simply that for me, at this time in my life, it was.

I didn’t really discuss it with my husband before I signed up….oops, I’ve been married for 5 years and sometimes still forget I’m in a partnership now.

Running a marathon is a HUGE time commitment and can be a large financial one as well. Both of these were/are true for me. Currently I am a slow runner so my long runs took a LONG time. Meaning, we lost most of our Saturdays (during my training) to my long run, especially when you add in that my youngest (and sometimes my oldest) still needs to nap. This means we had no opportunities to camp or do any overnight trips this last summer.

Financially it was a big commitment as well since I chose a marathon in another state (my home state). I did use this as an opportunity/excuse to spend time with my family there but this meant plane tickets, days of extra food costs, and all those miscellaneous costs that come with traveling.

I am not saying I regret doing it. My husband was pretty gracious about it all. My kids got to see family and we as a family got to do an awesome Disneyland trip and make lots of memories.

Also, doing something for me is not selfish (that is not what I am saying) but doing something that impacted my whole family for a big part of the year…….was pretty selfish…..in MY case.

I love to run and will keep running, I love doing races too, but this isn’t my time for racing. That time will come again. For me and my family, this is the time for healthy fitness for me…..and lots of family fun together.

This coming year I look forward to lots of family camping and fun family weekend trips.

What are you looking forward to in 2024?

Day 4 at California Adventure

California Adventure kind of sucked hahahahaha. There were only a small handful of rides my son was tall enough for and even less for my daughter. So many rides were closed, things didn’t open when the park did. There was just a lot that was disappointing. We did manage to occupy ourselves for the whole day but we were super glad we only went there for 1 day.

My son loves the Cars movie so Cars land was a hit
Frozen snacks……so cold they almost broke your teeth
The rare picture of just us
I found the Starbucks!!!! Both parks had a Starbucks in them but they don’t outwardly advertise that they are Starbucks until you get up close.
He thought Chip or Dale (not sure which hahahaha) was cool but he was a little wary. My daughter wouldn’t even go near him.
There was this cool redwood forest place in the park with lots of fun stuff to climb and explore……but even parts of this had height requirements. What the heck??!!!
Nap time
My sister and brother-in-law got to come and spend part of the day with us! The kids were so thrilled
The ‘san Francisco Pier ‘ area in the park.
My sister!!!!
They both like Monsters inc.
He LOVED this wrecked car outside one of the shops in Cars land. It would smoke and make a noise like it was trying to start. He stood there forever! And we went back several times.
Micky’s philharmonic 3d show.

And that’s a wrap!!!!

It was long and exhausting but I am so glad we did it. I loved watching their little eyes light up and watching them explore so many new things.

I wish the food was better for the prices they charge. I wish some of the characters were more easily accessible or accessible at all. There were no characters from Encanto which my daughter loves and to see Anna and Elsa you had to wait in a line forever and they were behind doors until you got up there so you couldn’t even wave at them and see them if you didn’t want to wait in line.

I don’t see us going back for a very long time, if ever. It’s just soooooo dang expensive! They really do nickel and dime you…..or should I say like $20 and $50 you.

I was very happy with the time of year we went though. Granted with small kids we didn’t go on some of the most popular rides with the longest waits but with the use of watching the app for wait times and trying to be smart the longest we waited was about 20min for a ride. So, I am incredibly thankful for that because I don’t think they would have tolerated much longer.

All in all I am so glad for the memories but I don’t need to do it again.

Disneyland Day 3

Oh man, by day 3 of Disneyland and day 10 of traveling I needed all the coffee! But how dang cute are they??
She loved Dumbo……I tolerated it hahaha. I don’t love spinning things.
So freaking cute!
She loved Winnie the Pooh from a distance but was skeptical up close…… brother was napping during this time.

Sister’s nap time!!! We took it day by day and nap by nap hahaha
Goofy’s house in toon town. We spent time there everyday.
Just before the rocketships in tomorrow land. Robert loved these and apparently so did she…..I HATED them!!!! I felt like I was going to fly out!
Sometimes they have sweet sibling love…..othertimes it’s thunderdome
It’s a small world. We did this every day, short lines and air conditioning!!! Need I say more?
Snacks, snacks and more snacks. This is how we survived most lines.
Every body of water had ducks, which she is obsessed with.
Sleeping Beauty’s castle
His nap
He LOVES to drive!!

Another long, fun day.

Disneyland Day 2

Good morning!!
It was fun to see Disneyland decorated for Halloween.
Runaway railroad! Ella loved it! Robert not so much, I think it was a little herky jerky for him.
Fun in Toontown
Mini’s house!
It was fun to explore the houses and see what was just decoration and what you could really interact with.
Mini me.
He LOVED the rocket ships……I took Ella on once and she loved it…….mama did not lol. I do not like spinning things and it leans to the side and goes pretty fast! Not for me lol.
Napping on the Jungle Cruise
Star Wars land. Sort of a mini date for us to walk around together while the kids napped in the stroller.

Star Wars land is freaking cool! Very immersive feeling….but! Only 2 rides and the rest is all shops……seems gimmicky for a whole land….but 100% worth exploring…..if you are there.

It’s a small world after all!!!! The kids loved everything you could look at and mom and dad loved the air conditioning
Tom Sawyers island. Robert LOVED the caves. Lots of fun to look at and explore.
He was so stinking proud to get his ‘licence’ lol. $7 well spent. He still has it. He spent the rest of the trip showing it before every driving ride.
We ended the night on the carousel.
Hi Papa!
IT’S NOT PAPA!!!!!

Disneyland Day 1

As if I wasn’t crazy enough to sign up for a long race with 2 kids under 3 I then decided that with only 1 day of rest we would spend 4 days at Disneyland.

I loved watching them look at all the new things and explore everything.
It’s impossible to get a picture where we are all looking at the camera and smiling.
Churros!!!! Oh the amount of sugar we consumed.
This was goofy’s house playground. The kids loved these kind of things just as much as the rides.
I love that there were things for them to explore and help their minds work and not just rides.
Daily stroller naps.
Both our arms were dead at the end of each day. Even though we had a stroller half the time the kids wanted to be carried.
I love the wonder in their eyes.
Ducks! My daughter is obsessed with ducks and they are all around at Disneyland.

Don’t know how but we picked a great time to go. During the day, we were almost always able to find a ride that had less than a 20 minute wait. I can tell you anything longer than that and your kids are going to freak out. Even the 20 minutes my daughter would get really fidgety by the end. Snacks are key.

Lincoln City Kite Festival

We took a quick overnight trip to the coast to spend some time with friends and see the kite festival. This was my first time going to the kite festival…….and will probably be my last hahahaha. The kites were cool but I found it pretty lackluster as far as a festival goes.

It will go down as a good memory and I’m glad we did it but it was absolutely not our best executed trip hahaha. We had a fair few tantrums.

The kids napped on the way there.

We played on the beach until we had access to the AirBnB we were going to share with friends

The house was right on the beach and had a great view

We can’t go anywhere without injuries hahahaha

After an early afternoon of playing on the beach and walking around we played on the rental houses deck and ordered a pizza

Little man slept in a big boy bunk bed!!!

Sleeping was absolutely terrible. The room was facing west so we had the sunset which in Oregon is not until 9:30 with full darkness, not until about 10: 30pm and while he doesn’t sleep in a completely dark room, it’s a pretty dark room so it took him forever to fall asleep. He did not go to sleep until about 10: 15 p.m.

Then the casino about a mile and a half away had fireworks and some drunken neighbors decided to sing along to them, thankfully this did not wake either kid up. Then at 11:45 p.m. drunken people on the beach set off a huge fireworks that lit up the entire room for about 30 minutes which woke the baby up.

The next morning was a slow leisurely morning (I ordered Starbucks through door dash because I could not keep my eyes open). Little man woke us all up at 5:30am We had breakfast with the whole house then played on the very windy beach.

There were lots of tantrums a long the way hahahah
Cheese!!!
We went through so many outfits with the sand and water hahahahhaha

My friend and her family were in the house with us too. The babies played together a bit

Then it was time for us to pack up and head home!

Both kids were asleep within about 15min of leaving and slept pretty much the whole way home.

It was an absolutely exhausting trip and I’m still exhausted today even after going to sleep an hour early, but I’m glad we did it. I’m going to try and go to sleep early again tonight

Weekly Workouts

Sunday OFF

Monday- dirty 30 (21 day fix beachbody workout) and 2 miles

Tuesday- Yoga and extra stretching

Wednesday – upper body workout and stretching

Thursday – Pilates and 2 miles

Friday – lower body strength workout

Saturday – 1.75 mile walk ‘hike’ with the kids. Our first of many, hopefully, this season. This is mostly to get the kids used to it again. My toddler walked about half of it and my baby walked about 1/3

Total miles – 5.75 miles

2023 life update

Easter 2023

My little man is now 2.25 years old and my little girl is 11.5 months old. Life is crazy over here. Wonderful and exhausting all at once.

We just finished having back to back stomach bugs and colds. But my daughter’s sleep is still super screwed up and my husband and I are TIRED! But, I just tell myself ‘it won’t be like this for long’, and ‘you’re gonna miss this’. Both of those are songs lol, pull them up I YouTube when you feel overwhelmed, I do.

We are full swing into muddy spring days over here and go through 2+ outfits a day hahaha. I am currently nap trapped under a baby and love it so I thought I’d update you. More soon!!

Trip to southern California

It’s been a minute since I posted, a lot has been going on here so there will be a few posts coming.

First let’s talk about food. Found some food carts near my work.

Can you say flipping delicious!!!!!

Then it was off to cali!

We did some beach walking

And some friend visiting

And some drinking lol

The main reason we were in Cali was the wedding of my oldest friend! I was honored to be a bridesmaid.

Getting all done up for the wedding

How amazing is that dress!!!!!

I can’t believe I’ve known her since i was 2!!!!!

Then we did some family visiting. He met several family members for the first time.

My family loves to play tile rummy.

Then it was back home and back to real life.