I love summer. I love the heat, the water, the traditions.... It goes too fast. As we are now in July, we are about half-way through the season, and we have enjoyed a lot of sunshine.
Recently, Jack turned two. To celebrate, we took him to the zoo on his birthday. The next day, we went to the Hunt Club and then had cupcakes. Jack has been really into horses for a few months, so we made sure he got a pony ride in to celebrate his second birthday.
Almost every year, Chris's parents rent a beach house in the Outer Banks, and this year we had two weeks. Eliot had been asking ever since last year to go back to "Mawmaw's beach house". He didn't quite get that she does not own it, and when we finally explained it, Eliot was amazed that the owners like to share so much. Err... Not quite. Anyway, I have been hearing for MONTHS about all the food he was going to eat with Mawmaw and Granddad. He went down without us for about five days and then we went down for another five days the second week. Jack also stayed with them without us for two nights, which was our first night away from Jack ever. I know it is special for them all to have some one-on-one time, but, man, my heart was breaking without those boys around.
We all had a good time swimming in the sound, playing on the beach, fishing, and boating. Every year, we take similar photos (all the way back to before Chris and I got married), and I love watching our family grow over the years.
The first "family portrait" I took for us in 2007. Flared jeans and white tees.
Elizabeth and me in the sound in 2008. I think.
We had a few very hot weeks, and I'm glad to say that I have been able to keep up the running anyway. It was really taking it out of me and my pace suffered (a lot), but I pushed through by getting up early and running in high 80s/low 90s instead of 100+ degrees. I hit 200 miles today on my Nike app, which I have been using since November. The month of June contributed 53 miles to my total.... I've been going for slower, shorter, more frequent runs than the winter, and have been able to increase my weekly mileage without injuries whereas before I could only run every other day. It seems to be working for me. I generally do three miles (generally four times a week) and work in a long run (five miles) every other week. That is the plan for now, at least. I feel like these are pretty big milestones, and I can't help but question if this means that I can consider myself to be "a runner" yet. I have trouble figuring out how to quantify this and always am reluctant to assign titles to myself. I guess I always worry that someone will say, "You're not
really a runner until you run at a nine-minute pace," or "You're not
really a runner until you run a half marathon," or "You're not
really a runner until you have done it consistently for a year." The truth is, though, we're all coming at different places. Some weeks I run faster or longer or more frequently. It's never the same, and hopefully I am always working at improving. If you run, you're a runner. So, yeah. I guess that makes me a "runner".
I'm not ready to accept that summer is halfway over yet, so to keep it here, I'm setting some goals for myself.
-Go to the beach more (once a week at least)
-Kayak new places (once a week-ish)
-Take photos of the gardens
-Go to a water park (at least once)
-Go to the splashground at the Botanical Gardens
-Get Italian ice with the boys
-Get my hair cut (not reliant on the summer, but it needs to happen)
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