Wife Mother Runner Blog - Wife Mother Runner

runDisney Announces the Tinker Bell Challenge at Disneyland Resort

August 1, 2014

Just like in the past, now the race weekends are becoming more than a one race weekend. They are becoming challenges now with the chance to earn up to 5 medals (5K, 10K, 1/2 marathon, Challenge, and coast to coast if applicable). The next challenge runDisney has announced is for the Tinker Bell Half Marathon weekend in Disneyland. This event is being held at a new date this year. The race weekend is May 7-10. I wasn’t planning on doing this race, but now it makes me wonder if I should or will. I have to think about it.

Registration for the New Pixie Dust Challenge opens Tuesday, August 12. Early registration for AP and DVC members opens August 6 at 12 Noon ET, at runDisney.com

Will you be going to the Pixie Dust Challenge?

#EpicSummer2014

July 31, 2014

This summer we are having a summer to remember. Most of our summers are memorable, but this year we are making it a theme to be Epic.

Sadly that can backfire on me a little. My son was sad tonight that camp ends tomorrow. Then he told me he didn’t want to go to second grade. He said he wants to stay home and have fun.

I had to remind him that there is still a month of school vacation left and we still have our vacation to New Hampshire to go on. I also told him he has a big job to do as a big brother. He needs to help get Adrienne excited about starting kindergarten and riding the bus to school.

So I had to remind him if something that I also needed to do myself – enjoy the now. I have to take my own advice. I keep looking towards events coming up in August and September and I too, need to enjoy the now and live in the moment. I also need to keep my little Adrienne little as long as I can because once she sets foot on that bus the next 12 years are going to zip past me in a blur. I am struggling with seeing them grow so quickly. It’s a wonderful thing to see them thrive and grow but it pulls at my heart so hard at the same time.

I love them so much and we are so happy. I will have to make an #epicfall and #epicwinter theme with them to keep the fun going despite being back in school in the fall.

Dreamers Podcast – Joe Pardo

July 28, 2014

I had the opportunity to connect with the owner of the Dreamers Podcast, Joe Pardo when my friend Eddie McCoy posted to Facebook a podcast interview he did with Joe. I instantly loved the podcast. I connected with Joe and told him how much I loved his podcast and we go to talking. He learned that I was a runner and asked me to be on his show as well! I will share my link to that podcast when it becomes available. But what I wanted to do was interview Joe himself. Joe is very active with fundraising for Give Kids the World and he has created a CD called Adventurtorium which is an UP Inspired Adventure. You can listen to it from his site or purchase a CD where some of the funds are donated to Give Kids The World. Learn more about Joe, the man behind the questions from the Dreamers Podcast. I love what he is doing with his show and inspiring me to live my dream and to not let my fears or doubts get in my way.

What is your pet peeve? That’s pretty tough for me to answer. I’d have to say at the top of my list are noises, clicks, creaking, scratching, tapping, high pitched squeals and rattling. A good example of this is random rattling inside my car. Another good example would be nail clipping.

I love music and sound, but I like to hear it clean and crisp. I find it very annoying when there is a noise coming from one of my speakers. Haha, my wife could tell you how many times I have stopped movies to try and remove a noise being made from a speaker vibration for one reason or another.

When did you begin running? Through most of school, I was not very active. I would spend most of my time on computers playing video games, so it wasn’t till after high school that I really made a push to get healthier. Though I never ran consistently, I took the interest seriously in 2010.

How did you start running? Running for me was a cheap, quick and, most importantly to me, efficient way to lose weight. So I got started just running around my block and up to a stop sign that I knew netted me 1.8 miles back and forth to my house.

That was until I got involved with the Disney running community and joined the All Ears Running Team at the end of 2011. By that point I was already running pretty seriously because I had signed up for my first ever race, the 2012 Princess Half Marathon. As it turns out, I probably over trained for that half marathon, and could’ve probably run a full at the time.

Over training turned out to be a bit of a mental block because I became pretty lax after the Princess. By the time the next race for me came up, 2013 Marathon Weekend Half Marathon, I did very little in the way of training, which caused me to do much worse.

Do you have running goals or dreams? I have a lot of hobbies and goals to go with them. Including:

Podcasting (www.HowToDream.co) DJing (www.Adventurtorium.com) College Mentoring Roller Hockey As well as running.

So with running, I try to keep my goals loose. Getting out to go for a run is a small victory, but ever year I try to run at least one half marathon. I do have plans to run a Goofy Challenge, but had to put them on ice due to timing issues in 2014.

What is your favorite Disney race? Marathon Weekend’s Half Marathon because of the size and scope of the race. I get to see so many friends while down there, and it’s more like a reunion than a race.

Which Disney races have you done? 2012 Princess Half Marathon 2013 Marathon Weekend Half Marathon 2013 Wine and Dine Half Marathon 2014 Everest 5k Challenge

How did you start the podcast? While on a plane heading to the 2014 Everest 5k Challenge, a good friend of mine told me about a podcast called Entrepreneur on Fire. That’s when I got inspired to interview people who live their dreams, because I know quite a few.

Before we got to the rental car, in Orlando, Florida, I had already registered the domain name, Facebook Page and Twitter handle. By the end of the weekend I had people that were excited to be a part of this new venture, and over 100 people in my list of people I knew I could get to be on the show.

My friend, Al Kessel, offered to do my opening and closing bumpers for the show, and help me out with getting the podcast started. You can check him out, and his voice-acting career on Episode 1 of Dreamers Podcast.

I bought a Blue Yeti mic, and I got started by booking guests to record with, and haven’t stopped since!

What is your dream? I want to build a community based on the idea: Society starts with you. I want to help people reach higher, and push harder to obtain their dreams.

I have some book ideas that I plan on fleshing out in the near future.

I’d like to continue running, and being active through life. Getting myself back on track with a routine running regiment is definitely in the plan.

I would also like to eventually have kids with my loving and supportive wife, Melissa.

These are great answers Joe and I hope you are living your dream! Your podcast has helped me to work towards my dreams and I would love to report back to you later in the year and after I complete the Dopey challenge to let you know how well I did with working towards my dreams and to see what life has provided me in the next 6 months! I also look forward to guest blogging on your site and sharing what I have learned from the guests on your show! Keep up the good work Joe!

Dopey Training and Philadelphia Training All At Once

July 27, 2014

As I am on out my long run this morning I asked myself, “Why did I sign up for Dopey?” I did a 5 mile run yesterday per Jeff Galloway’s instructions and my 16 mile run this morning. I felt ok considering I did 5 miles yesterday, but then I was doing the math in my head…5 and 16 not so bad, 13.1 and 26 the following day — kind of scary. 3.1 (5K), 6.2 (10K), 13.1 (half marathon) then 26.2 (full marathon)… WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING????!!!! Seriously, I had a bit of panic over the idea.

The back to back 5K and 10K races don’t scare me, but the “Goofy” part of the challenge, the half and full marathons do. I must trust in the training Jeff is setting up for me to prepare my body for this and hopefully not get injured during the training as well. I did as he instructed and changed my intervals from what I normally use (45/30) to 15/30. It slowed down my pace to 13 minutes/mile, but also having the shorter bursts of running and longer walking helped me to not be as sore and endure the distance better. Compared to my 16 mile run a few weeks ago, I did finish it 7 minutes slower, but that was mainly because I did the 15/30 intervals.

I set my alarm for 5:30 this morning. My kids tucked me into bed last night and I read my book and fell asleep rather quickly and relatively early compared to my usual bed time. I didn’t stall when the alarm went off, I got up, made some toast and tea and got my butt out the door by 6:20. I was concerned with the storms that were in the forecast on the news and it was still a bit more overcast at that time of the morning. But once I was out there it didn’t feel as dark. There was a point in time around 7:15 that the sun came out and I was worried because it was very humid already.

As usual, my iPod was loaded up with my favorite Disney Pod casts, Mickey Miles, Be Our Guest, The DIS Unplugged so I had my usual Disney magic in my ears. The Mickey Miles Podcast was talking about California and that made me a little excited about the Dumbo Double Dare coming up next month. I haven’t had been thinking about it as much lately with other events going on in my life right now. But the training I am doing now for the Philadelphia Marathon and Dopey is rolled in with that race weekend as well. I haven’t been thinking about Philadelphia as much either. It’s funny how you put your head down and push forward with what’s on the training plan without thinking much about where you are racing. At least that is how it is for me. November and January are a long time from now for these upcoming races, but the work needs to be put in now to build up to them.

So the lesson I took out of this weekend’s training routine was about being dedicated to get up early and hit the road in the early hours before it gets too hot and also so I can spend more time with my family. With the longer runs coming up on the training schedule and my work schedule I don’t know how I will get them all fit in so I may be using my weekend mornings like I did this weekend with early starts. In the winter, I have no clue what I will do when it is dark out so early. I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.

I was also very conscious of cars when I was on the main roads. I was thinking a lot about the poor young man who was killed recently in the town next to me, on the roads that I run on. I am a very conscious runner and did move to the side of the road a few times when I wasn’t sure if I was being seen. I pray that nothing like that every happens to me, leaving my family without a mother and a wife. I hate to think that way, but it has been on my mind a lot more lately. I won’t stop doing what I love, but I will be more aware and make changes accordingly (like choosing different routes to run on that are less busy).

Here’s to looking forward to a weekend of low miles and recovery in the next coming weekends and to an excuse to sit in the movie theater with my family this afternoon!

Are You Easily Distracted?

July 25, 2014

Are you plugging along at work and then you are checking your email, Facebook, Twitter, whatever your social media favorite is? I can be easily distracted and I have also been listening to some great podcasts lately and one of them nailed what I had been feeling.

The podcast that I have learned a lot from lately is “Presentation Skills For Design Students” by Christina Canters. Episode 30 was helpful to me. It was “How to Stop Procrastinating and Get Stuff Done” with Hugh Culver.

When she asked Hugh what happens when we easily get distracted by social media things other than the task at hand that we have to do, my ears perked up. I wanted to know, why does that happen to us? It was interesting because Hugh said that mindset happens because we are having a manufactured distraction. What does that mean? It means there are harder tasks ahead of us, but we aren’t ready to work on them. Your brain sees Twitter or Facebook and says that will satisfy you because you may see something of value to you and is a quicker success than working on the larger task at hand. So it’s not the lure of the social media, but what is being avoided.

His advice to help keep focused is this:

1. Schedule the fun work – give yourself 30 minutes to “goof off”
2. Do the quality work – focused and single tasking so you can enjoy the goof off time
3. We only put in a couple of hours of quality work per day
4. Schedule boundary time – 60 minutes when you arrive to work so you can get things accomplished without interruption
5. Batch your work together (emails) – do them in groups of 10-15 minutes then stay off of it. those constant pings of email interrupt your workflow and productivity.
6. Blocking – make appointments on your calendar as meetings to accomplish tasks
7. Take Breaks – you need breaks. You need to move around, clear your head and refocus. Take breaks often.

Are you always “busy”? Being busy doesn’t mean you are always successful. Change how you think. It’s one thing to be busy, it’s another to be productive.

I already began using some of Hugh’s tips and started to batch my emails in time segments rather than answer them one by one as they come in. I am also going to try to use this approach in my home with projects. Grab 5 minutes to do a quick pick up along the floors, tables, and counter tops. Breaking things down in chunks. Are you easily distracted? What do you do about it?

Sprint Tri Is On My Mind

July 22, 2014

I still have several weeks to go, but the Women’s Sprint Triathlon is on my mind. I haven’t actually registered for it yet. I should because I do really intend to do it. Maybe that will put some fire under my tail to get me more serious about it. This weekend I did two runs in a row on Saturday and Sunday, but that wasn’t on my training schedule. I just felt like doing it. Then on Sunday I was riding around on my bike in the driveway with the kids. It felt good to be on my bike again and I have to get back on the road for some training.

The website has good information for women doing this for their first sprint tri event. They have tips for open water swimming. I need to do some training where I swim in my pool, hop out and ride my bike for several mile while wearing the clothes that I plan to race in. I did purchase a bathing suit top and shorts that are “quick drying” fabric and am planning on wearing my sports bra under the top and compression shorts under the shorts. If the shorts are too wet I may have a spare pare in my transition area to change into for the run. These are things that I will find out when I train.

For my swimming in open water training, I will be in New Hampshire in August so I plan on working on that in the lake up there. I need to find out of my Garmin watch can be worn in the water, or grab an old sports watch I have laying around in my house to give me an estimate of how long I am swimming out in the lake. It won’t give me distance but I can use time as an estimate.

My friend Danielle has been doing some sprint tris this summer with some successful first timer tips. Check them out on her blog www.liverungrow.com.

I have to admit, I am a bit nervous about this event. It sounds good on paper (just like registering for the Dopey Challenge), but I really need to get it together.