Back to the grind...

Charlie and Sidney and his baby doll "sleeping" and watching Dumbo

My new haircut. Charlie tells me now all the time that I look pretty...melts my heart!

Rolling around in the kitchen...still wearing my winter hat!

We went to the zoo today and we went to the reptile house for the first time and he LOVED it! This is him looking at the Alligator Snapping Turtle in total awe. He also loved the snakes (King Cobra and Anaconda especially) and got some rubber snakes in the gift shop that he thinks are hilarious. I truly have a little boy now.

Also fascinated with the giraffes. He stayed in this spot for over 20 minutes.

Hope everyone had a good week and hope everyone has a safe holiday weekend!

Back from vacation...tanned and refreshed!

We are back from our cruise! Alex and I left on mother's day for a seven day Caribbean cruise without the little man. This was not our first vacation without him but it's always sad to leave him. He was in great hands though, and was shared between my parents for the majority of the time, my sister, and Alex's dad. Without all of you, we'd be lost...thank you for taking such good care of Charlie and sidney! So we had a great time. It didn't rain once, the temp was almost always above 85, bright sunshine, great people on the cruise, super friendly staff, just a really great time! Above is Alex in Megan's Bay on St. Thomas.
Here's us at one of many bars on the ship. We ended up becoming very friendly with the bartender at the wine/martini bar named Cheers. Katarina is from Poland and was a total sweetheart. We also spent most nights in the piano bar singing along with Lori (from Nashville) who has a great voice and learned many of our requests throughout the week. She let Alex sing along with the microphone several times, and she really made the nights a ton of fun!
From St. Thomas we then went to Dominica, then to Barbados.

Here we are in Barbados getting ready to snorkel. We ended up swimming with and touching live Hawks bill Sea Turtles. I was in HEAVEN! If some of you don't know, I am obsessed with turtles of all kinds. This was really a dream come true! From Barbados, we went to St. Lucia and then to Antigua.

This is Jolly Beach on Antigua and is really even more beautiful than the picture shows. It was such a fabulous beach. My favorite one of the whole trip. From Antigua we went to St. Kitts which was a cute little island.

Here's Alex singing in the piano lounge...

This is a point on St. Kitts where you ave the Atlantic ocean on the left and the Caribbean on the right. Very cool.

And last but not least, here's our boy. We are so happy to be back with him. I feel like he has gotten very tall and even more talkative. We got him Maracas from Barbados and he was shaking them and singing "shake it baby". So stinkin cute.

We also came home to a wonderful surprise. Richard, our dog-walker/contractor/friend was able to mostly finish the backyard that our builder never finished (for which we sued and settled also while we were gone). The fence was put up last fall but he laid the sod after dumping a ton of dirt to fill it all in, and laid brick and planted shrubs...it really looks spectacular and I am beyond pleased with the outcome! So that's it. We are happy to be home and happy to get back to reality!

Finally, Charlie pictures!

Charlie wearing daddy's Billabong hat...he has a hat fetish!

Watching Backyardigans live...he was really into it!


Sitting with mommy during intermission...

Stylin' with his Cars PJ's, Cars suitcase, and mommy's winter hat!

Look at these legs!!! Bruised from being a boy and throwing himself around the house, and showing off his spider man band aids, covering two legitimate scrapes obtained while playing on the playground. What a boy!

Marathon Rewind

Okay, so my legs hurt! Running 26.2 miles does hurt! I am feeling better than I would have imagined though. Here's a rundown of the race for those who are interested. I promise, I will put up Charlie pictures soon!

So on Saturday, I took Charlie to see Backyardigan's live with Kim and Ethan. It was fun but I was a nervous wreck and just wanted Sunday to be here and over with. Came home, got my stuff together, and took off with my mom and dad to Long Branch New Jersey. We got to the Expo where you pick up you race bib (paper number worn on your body) and chip (little plastic thingy that times you start to finish). The weather was so terrible, I felt like either crying or throwing up. It was crazy windy and bitterly cold...the kind of cold that gets into your bones and you can't shake. It was also raining. I was stressing pretty badly. Went to Lavallette NJ where mom and dad's friends live and where we were staying. Hear from Charlie (friend's husband) that the weather's only supposed to get worse...almost cry again! Went out to eat at a very good restaurant where I drank a ton of water and stressed some more. Back to Pat and Charlie's where I slept so well that I don't think I moved all night! Woke up at 4:55 am and started stressing all over.

Drank coffee, ate cereal bar, and drove to Long Branch. Used the lovely bathroom facilities (porta-potties) and was stretching for the race. Let me mention now that there was no wind, none! There was a heavy fog but no wind! And the temp was about 55 degrees, maybe a little less. It was PERFECT running weather! I was psyched!

The race itself was fine. It took me about 3 minutes to get to the actual start line from where I was lined up (you line up with fastest runners first and slower ones behind. I lined up with the five hour pacers. Miles 1-13 were awesome. I felt great and could run a 1/2 marathon pretty well I think. At the halfway point, I had been running the whole way, no bathroom breaks, and fluid at every other station. At this point, 6,000 runners were done (only signed up for 1/2 marathon) and there were some full marathoners that stopped running at this point. So for the remaining 13 miles, there were less than 2,500 runners. It really felt lonely at points. There wasn't cheering and spectating the whole way so at some points I kind of felt like, what the hell am I doing?!?! I continued to feel good up until mile 19, then I felt my left second toenail started hurting (lost the same one on the right foot after my first 20 mile training run, now I'm losing the one on the left). My feet also felt very tired, and my quads were tight.

Miles 22-24 were terrible. It felt like it took forever, I had nothing left to give, and I was running next to and chatting with this guy who is the male equivalent of "Debbie Downer". I can't even tell you all of the things he complained about but boy did he complain and whine and annoy the crap out of me! He kept asking me what hurt. Okay, can we focus on something positive?! I felt bad leaving him but I had to, he was really getting to me, so I ran ahead and finished the last 2 miles strong, especially the last mile. I had a decent kick left in me which was great. I did not get less than five hours, but I did finish and I do want to do another one sometime. The weather stayed perfect the whole time, slight breeze here and there and the sun came out around mile 20 when I started getting chilled. The temp probably stayed below 65 degrees while I was running...couldn't ask for better weather!

Mom and dad were there at the finish, mom gave me a huge hug despite my nastiness. they were very proud and I felt it! It was so great. I called Alex who was delighted but tired after running his own 10 mile race that morning. He was also planning the surprise get together for me back home. What a sweetie!

So I liked running the marathon. Marathon number 2 will not be nearly as exciting as number 1 I'm sure, but it felt like such a huge achievement. I was surprised at how tired my body felt. I expected/hoped to have more energy throughout the race without dying at mile 22. Wonderfully enough, I did not have any stomach cramps as I usually do after any run longer than 12 miles. I got some advice from my sister-in law's (Kim) brother (Chris) who just ran his ninth marathon...he said rather than focus on what you are or are not eating relating to stomach cramps, focus on your breathing while you run. I did alot of that, and boy did it make a difference! Thanks Chris!

That's it, sorry if I bored anyone, but this has been a lifelong dream of mine and I did it! Thank you Alex for allowing me to do this and take the time away from you and Charlie for all of my running and thank you to all of my friends and family who supported me and sent me words of encouragement and thank you mom and dad for being there and for everything you've ever done to get me to this day! I love you all!

What a day!

Pre-race
Mile 8

Mile 13...feeling great...8500 runners started, 6000 were 1/2 marathoners, so at this point there were only 2500 of us left...the last half felt very lonely!!! Thanks goodness my parents were there to cheer me on and take these pics!

Mile 18...is it over yet?

Finishing strong...my unofficial time was a little under 5hours 8minutes.

All done! Feeling good and happy to have crossed this off my list of things to do!

My good shoes that are now in the trash!

I'll write more at another time...my husband is amazing and I came home to a huge spread from DiBruno Bros, with friends and family coming over to celebrate my accomplishment. He also had the house professionally cleaned...what an amazing husband...I could not have done this without him, or my family who supported me the whole way! Thanks everyone! I love you all.

Random thoughts

I am at work and thankfully, our census is very low meaning that there are not many sick or preemie babies here right now. That being said, I have some down time with which to write a quick post. This has been a busy week with most of my time consumed with marathon thoughts. It is 3 days and three hours from right now. Still very nervous, still wanting it to be over already. I just checked the weather for Long Branch, NJ and it's supposed to be high of 60 with thundershowers. Hmmmm. I usually do well running in the rain so hopefully it won't effect me too much!

We have a new addition to our family...his name is Ben...he's a silver 2008 Ford Escape. He is beautiful! It's a car, I know, but I really like it! We name our cars...I have always named all but one of mine in the past. The car we just gave up was Dori. She was an Escape as well (2005) and was named Dori because of Finding Nemo and "Dori" in the movie reading the word escape and realizing that she could read...makes no sense, I know, but it came to me and it stuck. The car is named Ben because the interior color is called "stone" and I thought of the character "Ben Stone" in the movie Doc Hollywood. So he's Ben now. My first car was a mustang and was sweet but I didn't name it. I got in two accidents with it and ended up totalling it. My next car was Nelly the Nissan...cute white t-top car. Next was Connie the Contour. Then I had Elvis the explorer and then Dori and now Ben. I am going to post a poll on the side of the blog asking whether people name their cars or not...feel free to join in!

I am taking Charlie to the "Backyardigans live" on Saturday. We are going with Kim and Ethan...I hope it's a blast! When I get home from that I'll be leaving for the marathon with my mom and dad who are staying over-night with me. Alex will be running Broad Street that same morning so he won't be there. Charlie will be hanging out with Zayda for the morning. I'll let you know how I do!