Outlet

I've discovered something about myself.

Ever since Henry was born, I haven't had a lot of time for myself.  Between a baby, work, Phil and his dissertation, Phil and his dad... I don't have a lot of extra time.  Or any.  And any spare time I have, I try to sleep.  Or do laundry.  More than likely, SLEEP.

But I feel like I am needing something.  While I LOVE being a wife and mommy more than ANYTHING.  But it can't be all that I am.  And now that Henry is starting to have a slightly better sleep schedule and I feel like I am starting to get mommy-hood figured out, I think I have the time to do some more things.

I feel like I need something.  An outlet.  I have been doing a lot of thinking about what exactly that should be.  I want to create.  I want to learn.

My day job constantly requires me to learn.  The more I learn, the more I know there is to learn.  But I need more than that.

I used to have so many outlets.  I used to blog almost everyday.  I would take pictures, sewing, crochet, cook, exercise.  I miss it.  It's time to do a few of those things.  I can't do all of them as much as I did before.  And I am ok with that.  Henry's kisses are so much more fun than sewing.  But after he is sleeping, I need to do something.  For me.

I need it.  It's time.

I have a few ideas.  I have started a list.  Here are a few things from my list:

-  Do an online photography tutorial.  Brittany recommended this one.  I want to be able to take good pictures of my family without it costing an arm and a leg.

-  Learn Spanish.  I got the Level 1 Rosetta Stone for my birthday a couple of years ago.  I never went through it though.  You wanna know the reason?  I was embarrassed to have Phil hear me pronounce things incorrectly.  The guy has seen me through a couple of surgeries, through being extremely hypothyroid, larger than life pregnant (I almost weighed more than he did at one point), give birth, and postpartum.  But I still get self-conscious around him.  I don't get it.

-  Do a sewing project.  I have one in mind.  I don't want to share the details until I actually get it done though.

-  Run.  I know this isn't creating or learning, but I have had this HUGE desire lately to just RUN.  I know this would be EXTREMELY painful, since I haven't exercised in who knows how long.  I'm thinking I might start going to the gym on my lunch break.  I wouldn't go to run.  That would be gross.  But a little weight lifting would be a step in the right direction.


I know these things will take time.  Especially since life is REALLY up in the air right now.  A terminally ill parent, grad school, and a baby have to take top priority right now (not in that order).  But when I can, I think I will start working on my list.

It happened... I'm back

It started this past week.  I went to the Pacific Northwest Blogger meet-up with Jes and Tegan Friday night.  And I didn't run out of energy.

And then Saturday was a super productive day as I mentioned before.

Sunday we got up early and went to breakfast, then I went to the coffeshop while Phil went fishing, and to Danielle's house to make some freezer jam.  I got home and cleaned the bathroom, started laundry and made a salad.

Monday night I went to the gym and attempted running again.  It wasn't pretty and it was harder than it should be.  But I was able to walk/run 4 miles in an hour, which isn't all that bad considering how little I have moved since my half-marathon last October.

Then I began looking at races to sign up for.  And I realized I wanted to sign up for not one, not two, but THREE different races this fall (2 half-marathons and a 7 mile trail run).

That's when it hit me... I'm back.

Not quite the same.  The neck scar comes with a little bit of baggage.  And I'm sure there will be times when the thyroid hormones and possibility of cancer come back send me into an anxious fit.  But for the most part, I'm me again.

My blog numbers have been a little low lately.  It's probably because of the puppies dying.  Let's be honest, nobody wants to hear about puppies dying.  Not to mention that that kind of sent me into a debbie-downer funk for a little while.  But I'm feeling better!  And I am thankful for those of you who stuck around during my cancer-infertility-dead puppy pity party.

I promise we will get to the happier side of life, full of funny stories and awkward moments (I am never short of those).

So stay tuned people!

Hello there Gym... It's been a while

Something unexpected happened yesterday afternoon.  After months of absense, countless hours of sitting and resting, and endless minutes of feeling like a blob...

I went to the gym.

In an effort to loosen my very stiff, still tense back muscles I went to yoga.

It was weird.  And hard.  I'm super weak.  The mirrors in the exercise room were very unforgiving.  I feel like my fitness level is back where it was in 2009, which is pretty depressing.

Phil keeps telling me to cut myself some slack.  I have a good excuse.  And he's probably right.

But I need to get back in shape.  Especially since I signed up for the Color Run with Jes and Team Smuppies.

Jes says she isn't much of a runner, but I not much of a mover these days.  Not sure if I could even crawl 3 miles (ok slight exaggeration).

Remember how I used to run half-marathons?

Oh man... I am currently working on lowering my expectations and figuring out a plan for getting back into shape without killing myself.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Columbia Gorge Half-Marathon

Yesterday, Phil and I ran the Columbia Gorge Half-Marathon.  It is dubbed as being the most scenic marathon in the country.  And let me tell you... it didn't disappoint.

It also didn't disappoint in the hills.  Pretty sure after 2 miles, I looked at Phil and said, "This is hard" in kind of a whiny voice.  And near the end, you come across a pedestrian bridge and you can see the finish line... and they route you AWAY from it to do another loop.  Mean.  At that point, I wanted to sit down right there and give up.  But I didn't.  Hooray for me.

I started off the race with kind of a outlook on it.  I knew it was going to be hard and so everytime I had to run uphill, I felt like couldn't run.  And everytime I ran downhill, I knew I would have to trun around and run uphill, so I felt like I couldn't do it.  Excellent attitude.

That's me running in the blue.

But I realized about half-way, why my attitude was so bad:

We signed up for this race in March/April.  After we started training, we got bad news, after bad news, a little good news, more life stress.  Possible cancer bug-bite.  Work stress.  Life stress (which I am not ready to get into yet but if we are close, odds are you know about it).  A little hope.  Lump in the neck.  Maybe cancerous lump in the neck.  Still don't know about lump in the neck.

And while I should have been training, my thyroid tanked and I had a hard time sitting up.  I wasn't able to train.  I got in some runs when I could, but it wasn't nearly where it should have been.

I wasn't prepared for the race, and I wasn't prepared for the life stress I have had thrown my way.  And I have kind of had it with all the uphill stuff.

I am hoping that this race has book-ended some uphill challenges I have had recently.  That is the end in a chapter of hardships.  So I ran (and walked) hoping this would be the end of that hard chapter.  And that I will be able to move forward into more of a normal newly-married-26-year-old life where I can plan dinner parties and get cocktails with my friends or something.

We finished JUST over the goal I had set.  By seriously less than 2 minutes over.  SO CLOSE.  We are looking for another race in the next couple of months.  The race was beautiful and it was such a wonderful experience to run it with my husband and have him encourage me along the way.  It is funny because before the race I was pumping Phil up, telling him he could do it.  And during the race, he was the one encouraging me.  Good team.