Colorado Baby Shower

My friends threw me an amazing baby shower last Saturday! I felt so loved and blessed.

Because of the snowstorm, we moved the shower from our church to my friend Carrie’s house. The roads weren’t bad at all, which made me happy since we had been unsure of whether to postpone the shower until the next day.

All of the decorations were so cute – and my friends made them!

There was more food – I just took this picture before everyone had arrived.

Is that not the coolest cake you’ve ever seen? LOVE IT.

They even bought us Biscuit books, since that’s what we call Emma.

We played 3 games:

1) Guess the number of jellybeans in the bottle. The best part about this game was that I got to take the bottle home! Mmm… sugar.

2) Guess how many ounces of water a newborn diaper will hold before leaking. I guessed 9 oz, and the answer was 10. I ended up winning that game! (which I kind of felt bad about, since I was already getting so many gifts! but they insisted… and I could tell the gift was Toblerone and who am I to turn down chocolate?)

3) Tear a baby out of paper. I got to choose the winner. There were a lot of great choices, but I had to go with Sue’s baby because she included a teddy bear:

Once again, Travis and I were so blessed by the generosity – we got more baby bath/hygiene stuff, soft pillows and blankets, pictures for the nursery, crib and pack n play linens, books, adorable outfits… the list goes on. We even received a few gifts after the shower from people who weren’t able to make it. I plan to post a nursery tour soon and you’ll get to see a lot of the great stuff people gave us then – and how I re-purposed the shower decorations too!

The wonderful ladies:

So much fun!! Thanks everyone for celebrating this special time with us!

The blessing continued yesterday at work – my co-workers threw a small shower for me (aka, ice cream cake in a conference room) and gave us the stroller we registered for! I am very grateful for everything, and really overwhelmed by how generous people have been. Emma is a very blessed little girl already.

 

My Plan for Maternity Leave and Work After Baby

Back in November, I started working out what my maternity leave and return to work plan would be. It has just recently been approved. Glad I was so ahead of the ball!

So here’s my plan:

Since Emma has a 50/50 chance of coming on or after her due date, I’m planning to work right up until then, meaning my last work day will be April 5. Ideally, I’d be able to take more time off before she comes but because my time off is limited, I’d rather use it after she comes. If she comes early, I’ll start my leave early (duh).

If I work through April 5, 12 weeks of maternity leave would put me coming back on the week of July 4th. Since my FMLA leave won’t start until May 7 (when I’ll have worked at my job for 12 months), I’ll be actually taking 13 weeks instead of 12. Six of those weeks will be covered by short term disability at 80% of my pay, and 6 of those weeks will be unpaid. If I end up starting my maternity leave earlier than April 5, I’ll cut my leave to 12 weeks total.

When I return to work, I’ll be coming back part-time 3 days a week (Tues – Thurs). My boss is awesome and really fought for me with this arrangement. Apparently, transitioning to part-time is very rare where I work. My three immediate supervisors are kind of making an exception for me and offering this arrangement on a 6-month trial period. They want to make sure that the workload isn’t too much for being part-time. I had originally requested to work 2 days half the year and 3 days a year half the year (since our workload tends to be very seasonal) but they didn’t feel comfortable with only 2 days.

Until recently, I had always planned on being a stay-at-home mom once we had kids. I’m not a career-driven person by any means, and until recently, my job had bored me to tears about 80% of the time. But things at work have really turned around, and Travis and I both agree that it would be nice to be able to pay off some more loans while we only have one child, so that my staying home in the future (when we have more kids) will be more feasible. I also have a pretty well-paying job right now and we have a good friend who is going to watch Emma for a very affordable rate. So we really do come out ahead with me working.

I’m still not completely sure how I feel about going back to work 3 days a week, or what I’ll think about it in July. But I’m willing to try it out for a month or two. I try to remind myself that just because I’ll be a mother doesn’t mean I have to only do mothering things. And it’ll actually be beneficial to our family if I keep pursuing my own goals and dreams. Maybe that means working part-time. Maybe not. It’s another one of those questions I’m hoping becomes more clear once I’m living the reality.

……………..

And just something kind of funny, I got this in the mail yesterday:

My report date? April 9. I think I’m going to be able to get out of this one.

 

My Work Day in Pictures

I’m out of here, y’all.

What was the highlight of your day? My highlight was my morning coffee. It was especially good (and needed)! I went to bed at 9 and still woke up completely exhausted. Tonight, I’m going to bed right after dinner. No excuses. No exaggeration.

School’s out for summer!

I get to leave work at 12:45 today. And because it’s sunny and almost 60 degrees outside, I feel like a kid getting out of school for the summer. I have been looking forward to this all week long – it’s the little things in life.

I am so excited to go on a run in the warm daylight, and still enjoy a full night of relaxation afterward. This week has been crazy and this afternoon will be Glorious.

I just have to make it through a call about life insurance with our financial planner…

You might know that I don’t do anything with money except spend it. All things financial bore me to tears and anger. When I announced last night that I was going to bed, Travis started talking to me about life insurance. Nope, not talking about this now. See ya.

Travis asked me again this morning when would be a good time to have our phone call. I couldn’t keep my eyes from rolling. The last thing I want to do on my glorious day of freedom is talk about money. 

But, in an effort to be grateful for a husband that cares about things like life insurance and kindly doesn’t ask me to be involved unless legally necessary, I will allow the phone call to infringe. I realize it’s not necessarily a good thing that I don’t want to be involved in our financial situation, but I don’t think you’d want to be involved in something that made you want to poke out your eyes with sharp objects either. (And no, I am not being overly dramatic at all.)

After the call of gloom, I will skip happily and merrily into my free afternoon of running and reading! I might even paint my toenails with the fun purple color I bought a couple weeks ago…

What are you up to this fine Friday? Do you like talking about finances and future planning?

Busyness is the new black.

Yesterday, I hit a milestone at my job: I worked the entire day. I didn’t even check my gmail. (I decided to end that streak today.)

Things have picked up here big time and it feels so good to finally be involved, contributing, bettering the company that I’m working for instead of just schleping a paycheck home every week.

Since my blogging time has now become work time (and rightly so), I’m back to the ever-a-struggle of finding time to blog during non-work hours. Which has been tough so far this week…

Monday night, I was excused from a workout by spending an hour and a half at the vet just for Katy to get her heartworm shot. I swear, going to the vet is even worse than going to the doctor. And my dogs go to the doctor more often than I do! Completely. ridiculous.

Last night, I raced home after work for a quick 2 mile run with the pooches and then did the first 30 minutes of P90X Yoga before heading to my church for a book study. I helped clean up afterward so I didn’t get home until 10:30 – waaaay past my bedtime. But somehow, I still managed to wake up this morning at 5:15 without an alarm. This has happened to me a lot lately. How does my body know what time to get up even when I go to bed later than usual? It boggles my mind.

Speaking of that 2 mile run, I wore my new Speedy Bullet jacket for the first time. And I am totally convinced it was worth the hefty price tag. My biggest concern about the jacket was that it wouldn’t be warm enough but it was 25 degrees on my run yesterday and with just a long-sleeve running shirt under the jacket, I felt perfect. Even, perhaps, slightly too warm (though I’m not complaining). This means I don’t have to dress like the Abdominal Snowman anymore!

Even though I was very impressed with my new coat, I was not impressed with the running trail.

My choices of running terrain were: 3 inches of snow or black ice. I actually didn’t mind running through the snow but the ice scared the crap out of me. And of course, the pooches were pulling me along wondering why I was being so slow. I’m ashamed to say that after at least 10 yanks on Katy’s leash, I used it as a rein to slap her butt so that she’d slow down and not pull me over. It worked… but she was not happy.

To switch topics in a completely random way, I have a new favorite breakfast.

Mix 1/3 cup old-fashioned oats with water and microwave. Add 1/2 tbsp peanut butter and 1/2 tbsp raspberry jam and stir until blended. Add 1 tbsp vanilla protein powder and 1 tbsp ground flaxseed; stir until blended. Top with 1/4 cup freeze dried strawberries, fresh blueberries and Fiber One cereal. Mmmm…

This idea was inspired by Run Eat Repeat and Clean Eating Chelsey – they always get creative with their breakfasts. I like that this keeps me fuller for longer than just plain cereal, but it’s also a way to get my cereal fix. It’s a win-win!

What’s your favorite way to eat oatmeal?

Getting Motivated When You’re Bored Out of Your Mind

You’ve probably heard me mention before how slow things are at work, and have been since May when I was hired. Luckily, I am good at entertaining myself or I would have quickly gone mad.

However, I stink at being motivated when there’s nothing I have to do. And I find myself pushing the tasks I do have off until the next day because frankly, I can’t be bothered to stop reading blogs, mapping running routes, modifying training plans, and reading other useless nonsense on the interwebs. When I do have more than one work-related thing to do each day, I find myself annoyed because I had other things I wanted to do today. I already had plans, thankyouverymuch.

Someone driven by career goals would have quit long ago. My only “career” (and I use that term loosely) goal is to be a published author so I’m not sad to not be “succeeding in corporate America.”

Others would have at least utilized their 8 hours (sometimes 7…) a day for something that would improve their job performance. (I’m a copywriter so blogging counts, doesn’t it?)

Not me. I have seriously done everything on the Internet I’ve ever wanted to do, except anything work-related. I’ll find myself driving by a billboard that looks slightly amusing and making a mental note of the website - I should look that up at work. Things I would normally do at home (read: everything personal) I now save for work, so that I don’t lose it by 10 am and wind up in the office coffee shop, chugging spiked frappucinos.

Some days I succeed. I have enough blog posts queued up in Google Reader from the 100 or so blogs I follow that after the morning’s work of logging my previous day’s workout, checking my email (work and personal), and doing “15 minutes of actual work,” I can easily zone out until I leave at 4 pm.

Other days, when it’s slow in blogland, Reader is empty by 12 pm and I languish. I get a headache from looking at the screen and reading but what else to do? I do a crossword, check email, visit The Nest message boards, vote for the best outfits on People.com, and ::gasp:: even attempt reading the news. (But my eyes quickly glaze over and I abandon that idea. How did I manage to major in Journalism without ever reading the news? I’m just that good.)

You’d think by the time I’m done wasting hours of my life sitting in an uncomfortable chair and causing my back to need physical therapy, I’d be rearing to get ‘er done once I got home. But the combination of the winter cold, the short days, and “I’ll do it tomorrow”s combine to make me even more lazy once I get home. It’s like I’m in a walking coma. After my workout and dinner, it’s only 6 pm and I wonder, Is it too early to go to bed?  I don’t want to watch TV but I don’t want to read and I surely don’t want to be productive. What to do, what to do…

I assure you, there is a point behind all this mindless chatter.

The point is, I have realized that I am not a victim of circumstances. I make my life what it is. And if I don’t want to spend days upon days of accomplishing absolutely nothing but running a few miles and eating a bunch of food, I don’t have to.

So I’m making some changes. I’m not going to get crazy or anything, but I think implementing a modest structure for my days and evenings of boredom would be wise. So this is what I’m thinking:

At work

Do work-related activities until at least noon. Obviously, this goes out the window once I (hopefully!) start having more things to do but who knows when that will be? In the meantime, I will read books and blogs on writing style, marketing, copywriting, etc, or do whatever work is assigned to me. After noon, I can do whatever useless crap I want (unless work comes in, then I will do that). Baby steps people. It’s harder than you would think to break out of a 9-month funk.

I put this into practice today. I had a meeting this morning, worked on some event materials, organized some files and then read The Elements of Style until noon, at which time I promptly opened Google Reader and exhaled a sigh of relief. Although I did mostly enjoy reading the book. Have I ever mentioned how much I LOVE grammar and syntax? I took a Linguistics class my senior year in college for my Spanish major and wondered why hadn’t I taken any before. It was by far my favorite class ever.

At home

Do one thing every day. I have done this before and found it quite useful. I make a list of all the things I’ve thought about, wanted, or needed to do and then do one small thing or part of one bigger thing on the list every day. For example:

• Finish race memory book
• Find passport or apply for new one (I’m pretty sure it’s lost)
• Buy photo corners at Michael’s
• Work on scrapbook (1 page each night)
• Clean the dogs’ ears
• Brush the dogs’ teeth
• Buy more dog food
• Schedule bike fit
• Clean refrigerator
• Get teeth cleaned at dentist done!
• Get haircut done!
• Get physical therapy for back done!

Because…

On a positive note, I have been more diligent about going to bed early and getting up at 5:30 to read the Bible and work on my book. So at least I have that going for me!

Do you struggle with laziness when not required to do anything? Any tips on getting motivated?

Five Randos

1. I had my second physical therapy appointment this morning. I was dreading it because I thought I was going to be get poked with needles (I even had a blog post title of “Pins and Needles” thought up). But luckily, since I told the therapist that my lower back felt fine still, he said he would leave it alone. Woohoo!

But I still had plenty of unpleasantness to deal with. I told him that my upper back between my shoulder blades was still sore/tight so he cracked that area again, along with my neck, and then proceeded to massage/poke/pull my shoulder and upper back tendons as I turned my head to one side, then the other. That hurt. A lot. Not like the sharp pain of a needle but a deep muscle-y pain – like how your tight IT band feels when you massage when it with a foam roller. My shoulders are sore now, which he said might happen.

He also showed me some exercises I could do to strengthen my lower back and hips. I’ll demonstrate and post them soon, since they’re beneficial for all runners/athletes.

What I’ll demonstrate now is how to lower your keyboard:

With a keyboard tray! It took me until this morning to realize I could push the tray in (I just had it installed yesterday). Before, it was sticking out from the desk by about 8 inches. At that rate, I was going to need glasses from squinting.

Anyway, lowering my keyboard will prevent me from shrugging my shoulders so much – your upper arms should be perpendicular to the floor when sitting at your desk.

2. Lots of TV time this weekend. Tomorrow is the Olympic Marathon Trials coverage (2-4 pm MST – we’re the same as central) and the Broncos game. Go Tebow! I might have to go buy a Broncos shirt tonight…

Sunday, I will be watching My Fair Wedding because fellow blogger Danica’s wedding will be on. It’ll be cool to finally see everything she hasn’t been able to show on her blog.

But I’ll balance that TV time out with two runs – my long run of 7 miles on Saturday and my tempo run of 4 miles on Sunday (moved from yesterday because I ate too much for dinner and would have puked if I tried to run…one of those days).

3. I seem to be a running anomaly. I’ve input several times into the McMillan Running Calculator: my half marathon PR back in 2007, my most recent 5K time, and my most-likely-never-to-be-duplicated 5 mile run in the Denver RnR Half Mary Relay. Those times are all over the board and produce quite the varied results.

With the 3 different times, my predicted marathon finish time could be (respectively):

5:17:58

5:20:24

4:54:08

I’ll take the last one, thankyouverymuch.

Also according to the calculator, my long runs should be run at a pace around 12:45 to 13:15 per mile. Lately, I’ve been comfortably running, without challenge, an easy pace of 11:15/mile for my long runs. But apparently, that should be the pace for my tempo intervals, which I’ve been running at a 9:55 or 10:00 pace (those paces aren’t even on the chart).

So I’ve concluded that while the running calculators may give me a ballpark of +/- 30 minutes for my marathon time, I should just use my long runs as a judge for my goals (and obviously the runs that are closer to the marathon distance, not the 8 miler I just did last Saturday). I’m also planning on doing Yasso 800s for my speedwork during Weeks 10-16 of my marathon training plan. It’d be cool if it really works to predict your marathon time (click the link to read more details).

4. I’ve been waiting for Friday all week long. Regardless, when I woke up this morning, I was surprised that it was already Friday. Which means I have to clean my house because we’re having people over for the game tomorrow.

5a. My favorite lunch as of late has been big salads, thanks to my friends leafy romaine lettuce and Caesar croutons. If it weren’t for those two, I wouldn’t be eating salads. They have changed my life. (For some reason, I get sick of spinach every now and again and won’t eat it to save my life…unless it’s in a smoothie.)

Yeah, I scrimped a little too much on the lettuce for that salad… but I also eat the lettuce first and this was halfway through the salad.

5b. We got new dinnerware for Christmas from my parents. The dishes we got for our wedding were really cute ones from Target but since I am a dish-breaker by trade, we only had 4 big plates left and all of our bowls (minus 2) had giant chips out of them. We are really enjoying our new dishes. Thanks Mom and Dad!

They are the Platzgraff Java pattern.

It’s even prettier in person. They’re still on sale at Shopko if you need new dishes!

What’s your favorite thing for lunch? Do the running calculators predict your speeds correctly?

One of those days…

Today has seriously been the longest day EVER. I knew it from 10 am this morning when I had already done what I felt like was a lot of work and only an hour had gone by. ::sigh::

BUT!

I have this waiting for me when I get home:

My new running gear! Even though I probably won’t try it out until I wash it (never mind the fact that its 60 degrees today), I’m still excited.

I’m also pumped about tomorrow night. While Travis goes to play broomball, I am going to Target to spend a gift card from my MIL and then hopefully work on a racing scrapbook.

And now I’m going home to get my run on and stop wanting to poke my eyes out from boredom. Have a great night!

A White Christmas in Denver!

Well, it definitely snowed! Last night, when I got home from my women’s group, I told Travis that we should go on a walk in the snow. So we did.

I love going for walks in the snow.

So do the pooches.

We were very snowy by the time we got back. It’s still snowing this afternoon and so far, we’ve gotten about a foot. It was a little hairy driving to work today (because CDOT only has 75 plows for the entire Denver metro area!) but we made it! I was sooo tempted to call in because there’s hardly anyone here today (and there will be even fewer tomorrow!) but our VP ordered in lunch from Qdoba for us, which was nice and fun. Tomorrow is going to draaaaggg by though.

…………………………………..

On a brighter note, this weekend is Christmas!

I am so ready for some time to relax, hang out with Travis and friends, and eat delicious food! This is what we have planned so far:

• Dinner and a movie with friends Friday night (Christmas Eve Eve)
• Dinner with friends and their family on Christmas Eve
• Special breakfast and dinner on Christmas day, just the two of us
• Church on Christmas morning
• Relaxing on the day after Christmas, before we go back to work

We haven’t decided when we’re going to open presents yet, but my vote is Christmas Eve morning – then we don’t have to wait!

Other than going grocery shopping tonight after work, I’m all ready for Christmas, which has meant a very relaxing, enjoyable week. It’s been so nice to drive home, knowing that I can go lay on the couch the minute I walk in the door, instead of running around doing errands or workouts.

I was just thinking yesterday as I drove home, that taking this week off from training was probably the best decision I could’ve made. Instead of stressing out over how to fit all my workouts in and wondering how I’ll ever manage with marathon training, I’ve been building up excitement and anticipation and will start marathon training ready to tackle the beast of 26.2.

The slower pace has also allowed me time to reflect on the amazing-ness of Christmas and quiet my heart, which is what I’ve been wanting! Come, Lord Jesus!

What are your plans for Christmas? Are you done with preparations?

Let the fun begin!

Today at work, I only have to work sit at my desk until 11 and then I get to go shopping and partying! During work hours! Our department is sponsoring 2 families through Safehouse and we roll the shopping and gift-wrapping into our holiday party. I think it’s a pretty good idea, except Travis is bummed that he’s not invited (but I wasn’t invited to their potluck either this year).

Tomorrow, we’re running The Christmas Carol 5k – I’ll be wearing a hat similar to this one.

I would also like to find or make a tutu but it might be too late for that…

I’m hoping to get a nap in tomorrow after the race and then we’re having dinner with friends. Sunday, we’re still planning on going up to Evergreen for ice skating and dinner.

Have a good weekend! I might get ambitious tomorrow and post pictures of my tea table and our Christmas decorations. And hopefully my new 5k PR! Maybe.