Head of the Potomac

Our first real regatta of the year... would it be cancelled?  would it go on? GAME ON!

Zack and I ready to head out together for our first regatta of the year.  I'm racing in 2 races, the women's 8 and a mixed 8.  I guess when you row for the racing women, you always do 2 races.  Little nervous about that, I hope I have 2 races in me.  Seems like an awful lot of work! :o)   It's funny that no one even asked if we wanted to do 2 races.  The fun thing, Zack is coxing my mixed 8!

All calculus all the time! Such a good boy!

He seems so grownup and like such a man!

Best bow mate ever!  Jay and I are like 2 peas in a pod, probably going to get in trouble if they keep us together!

I made it through both races!  It was tough, but not as bad as I expected it to be.  Probably because in the mixed 8, you have the guys helping row so it makes it a little easier.  Our Women's 8 came in 5/9 and out time was 20:34.4.  I don't even know if that's a good time or a bad time, but I'm fine with it.  The Mixed 8 was 4/6 and our time was 20:10.2.  Seems like our women's time was pretty good if it was only 24 seconds slower than the mixed 8's time.  Zack is a most excellent coxswain!  It again amazes me how good he is.  I don't know why I'm always amazed when my kids do something great, but I am.  He was so calm and decisive.  My favorite thing that he says is, "Stay with me, Stay with me."  It always makes me want to push harder.

I love this picture from Sport Graphics.  I know I'm not really, but it makes me look pretty badass!!  So, I'll just pretend!!   Here's to surviving my first regatta with the Racing Women without embarrassing myself or crying like a little baby!! :o)  Let's see what happens next!

Running and Rowing and Run This Year - 800miles

My running funk is still going strong, but I've been trying to fight it.  I signed up for the Dulles Runway 10K, figuring it would give me some incentive to up my running.  Not so much.... Hadn't run in over a month, when I set out to run the race.  I thought to myself, how bad can it be, it's on the runway, it's flat, how bad can it be.... Well, pretty bad! :o(   I walked WAY MORE than I hoped to, but I did finish it, to be honest I don't even remember my time. Something like 1:12.  I just don't know what my problem is... even a year ago I was doing great and now, its just like torture!  I did hit my 800 mile mark for Run This Year.

Most of the miles lately have been rowing and erging miles, but I guess there's nothing wrong with that.  Rowing is a great workout as well.  I also found the Hogwarts Running Club on line.  It's a virtual running club. They host all these virtual races with Harry Potter themes, you pay to register and you get a really cool medal for doing the race and part of the registration fee goes to various charities.  They also use this app called Charity Miles.  You use it when you run, walk, bike or in my case row... and for every mile you complete they contribute money to a charity of your choice.  It's pretty darn cool.  For instance, this month all my miles are going to the World Wildlife Federation.  Each month I'm going to pick a different charity and run/row for them.  You also compete for the "House Cup" after you get "sorted" into a house, I'm Hufflepuff, then all your miles go toward that was well.  I talked Brenna into joining with me, she's going to run on the same day that I do for the virtual 5K's.  We'll be running the Patronus 5K on Oct 3rd.  Anything I can do to get motivated.  

On the rowing front... things are hot and cold.  I still feel like I'm doing all I can to just keep up with these ladies.  They all seem so much stronger, fitter and like better rowers than me.  I still find them pretty intimidating, on the water anyway,  they are very nice and mostly fun off the water.  I'm sure a lot of that is just my low self confidence.  I just keep trying as hard as I can to improve what Coach Jeanette points out.   Just when I was feeling pretty low... I did have one glorious moment.  Last practice we were getting ready to put the boat away and Coach Jeanette called me back down to the dock and made me get in the boat and demonstrate my stroke.  Apparently, my body angle and sequence was "perfect" and I was opening my back up at just the right moment!!  So everyone had to gather round and watch me... SAY WHAT???!!!   Not only did I get a warm fuzzy, but she I got it in front of everyone!   I was pretty high on life for quite awhile... until the next sucky practice anyway. :o)  We have a regatta tomorrow.  Head of the Potomac... I'm really sort of dreading it.  We haven't practiced in our lineup, we haven't practiced at race pace except for today and that was for 4 minutes.  Since I don't think we can row 5000meters in 4 minutes, I'm not sure how helpful that was.  I have no idea what that bodes for tomorrow, except that I know I'm dreading it.  Not only that, but we've been told we're racing two races!!  I guess we'll see what happens, but I feel woefully unprepared!  One good thing... the second race is a mixed boat with the men and Zack will be my coxswain!  That will be fun!

5K Erg Test - SUCKS!!

We were tasked by our coach to do a 5K erg test and send her the results.  What the hell???  I mean, I know we're the "competitive women," but... seriously... a 5K test.  I'm not quite sure what exactly is to be gained by us doing a 5K test.  I mean, there are only 12 of us on the team anyway, so we're lucky if we can fill out an 8 for every race.  It's not like we're competing for seats, if you are at practice you get a seat.  Also, if we do have all 12 rowers on any give day, then we row the 8 and a "young 4."  So, by virtue of showing up and being old, I get to row in the 8.  Then why the 5K test??  Because she said so....
So, being a good girl and a rule follower,  I did it.  I wasn't sure even what to aim for, she said low 20's.  A 2:30 split would give a time of 25:00min.  I knew I wanted to be lower than 2:30.  I held a 2:10 for my 2K, no way I can hold that for a 5K.  Off to Gold's Gym I went...

I was pretty happy with my time.  I'm not sure I could have done much better... maybe shave a sec or two off if I repeated it, but why????  Pretty sure, I'm still one of the slowest, if not the slowest, on the team, but I'm also one of the smallest.  That's the other thing, if she doesn't do some sort of weight adjustment, there's no way for her to compare our times.  There's no way I can compete with some of the women on this team! Oh well, it's done, we'll let the chips fall where they may!

Wye Island that wasn't

We heading out to row Wye Island Half Marathon bright and early this morning.  I had sort of been dreading it, not really feeling like I'm in the best shape right now. Project Healthy Up is proceeding, but it's slow going... but we talked the Racing Women into participating so off we went.

But then the storms rolled in... and they CANCELLED IT! :o(  What a freaking bummer.  It's funny, I was dreading it, but as soon as they said we couldn't do it, then I was so disappointed!  The mind is a funny thing.

So, we de-rigged the boats and head out for the much anticipated crabs.  Did it matter that it was only 10:30am?  Nope we all had been looking forward to the food and drink and at least we weren't going to be disappointed on that front.

Wye Island 2015

Racing Women

Sad we didn't get to race

Zack ordered the soft shell crab, we didn't realize it was actually the whole crab...just a toosh creepy!

Not really sure if he's supposed to actually eat the whole thing.  But he did!  I was pretty proud of him.  He's become quite brave!  Once again, I'm confronted with the fact that my boy is almost grown. This would have been our last Wye Island together!  Next year, he'll be gone to college and I'll be doing this all by myself. I really don't want to think about that, it makes me really, really sad.  I just keep hoping that when that time comes, I'll be okay with it and not just spend my time weeping and depressed. :o)  I'll trust that it's all going to work out.

Oh No he didn't....

Brenna is teaching a freshman biology lab this semester.  She makes them fill out an exit slip, she asks a question, any question on any topic, and they have to answer it.  It's the way she takes attendance and they get an attendance point.  Here's what she got today...

Pretty darn hilarious!   But she better stay on her toes, and stay far away from this young man!

Single - Update

I've been trying to get out in my single as much as possible, but it's been more difficult now that school is back in session.  I don't really have anyone to help me carry it down except on the weekends.  We did buy a cart, but we haven't had a chance to try it out.  I am getting a little more comfortable in it.  I actually went out the other day and made it all the way to Ryan's Dam by myself!  That's 8 miles total!  It felt pretty good, strong.  I was even able to do some power pieces and a couple of times get my blades off the water just a little bit.

The water has been like glass lately and it's just beautiful out there on the water!  I totally get it!  I'm just going to keep doing out as much as I can and hopefully it will all come together.

It's done!

The renovations are finally done and I LOVE them!!  I can't wait to pee... but it's quite the decision... which bathroom to use!
Here are some before and afters....

I love this so much I almost can't stand it.  I was going for Zen bathroom, but we ended up with a real tree theme.  You can't really tell, but the mirror has leaves all around the frame and it's translucent so the paint shines through making it look like the mirror is a perfect match!

Not sure about the shower curtain, but we're living with it for a little while to see if it grows on us.

Half bath downstairs before.  I've hated the blue paint since we moved in, but we were too lazy to do anything about it.  That's why all the bedrooms upstairs are still blue.  We are making progress.

It's a little bare right now, but again, I'm just living with it a little bit to see if something strikes my fancy.

Again, we've got a real tree theme going on.  I hadn't realized that I liked trees that much.

Probably the best transformation of all.  The despised linoleum is gone, the ugly blue... 

We also got rid of the plastic dorm room shelves and the white pantry that we'd been using since Alabama.  Now we have nice matching cabinets instead!

Cooper likes to just sit and stare at the new tile and paint and reflect on how much better it looks!