First Long Run of 2016

This is how my morning was suppose to go. I had an alarm set for 6:30am and I was going to get up go run 6 miles. Well that didn't happen. What did happen was I woke up at 6:30am and fell back to sleep. I woke up at 8:40 when my husband sent me a text. Oops

I got up had my coffee and breakfast, and was going to run on the treadmill. I then discovered right before I walked in that there were several ants on my floor. Ok I know I live in Florida and yes we do get bugs in the house once in awhile, but that doesn't mean I like it. After killing the ones I saw then spraying the area and then spraying the entire outside of my house it was time to go back in the gym. I don't like bugs.

My pre run pic!

I did my warm up and stretched and it was now 11:30am, damn there went the whole morning. I wanted to run 6 miles at a 10:00 minute mile pace. Since I haven't been running much I was hoping that I could maintain that pace. First mile was good. I was watching a movie no big deal I got this. Just after the 1 mile mark, I took a walk break. Ran for a little while longer and walked again. My legs were sore. Just after the two mile mark I started running at 6.2 mph to help make up for the walk breaks. Once I made up the time I just left the treadmill at 6.2. Around mile 4 I sped up and slowed down, but never going below 6.2.

I can honestly say this is the fastest I've run 6 miles in a very long time. It felt good to run again. Lately it's been feeling forced and not fun, but today was good!

Last night I finally realized that I'm not depressed anymore. Five months ago today we said goodbye to our dog. I have not been same since. We are getting a puppy on Tuesday and I guess that is what finally got me out of my funk. I have run more in the last 10 days than I have in awhile, not counting when I had half marathons during the week. I sure do hope this is a start to a great year. 

Oh and my mom came over and gave me a massage! Best thing after a long run!! Normally I wear PRO Compression socks after a long run. 

And I totally ordered a pizza!! My sink is broke and I really didn't want to do dishes. Thankfully my husband gets home tomorrow and fix the sink. Turns out I'm not a plumber and really had no idea what I was doing. 

Dog Activity Gym

I know this is going to seem like a strange post coming from me. It's not about running or food. My husband and I are getting a puppy soon and I made this for our new puppy. I wanted to share how I made it so here goes.

What you need:

4 10' - 3/4" PVC pipes

8 1/2" x 3/4" PVC side outlet

8 1/2" x 1/2" PVC male adapter

Spray Paint (optional)

Paracord

Toys

I cut my pieces 36" long. I know the picture shows 8, but you need 12 long pieces. Took the picture too soon.

These are the corner pieces.

Here it is all put together.

I drilled four holes on each of the four top pieces, so I could tie the paracord through the holes.

This is the spray paint I used.

Here's a tip from me: Don't use cheap plastic drop cloth. My pieces stuck to the plastic and they paint started to peel.

I took the extra PVC and used on one side. I drilled holes into the tennis balls to get them to stay. I have two duck toys, a kong, a rope chew toy and a chew ring. Of course you can put any kind of toy on here.

Right now my only concern is if I should glue the joints together. I'll update the blog once we let our puppy play with this play gym.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

Well here we are again at January 1st. Every year I have goals and plans and they never really pan out. For 2016 I sorta have a goal. Losing my dog five months ago was a very hard thing I had to deal with. I pretty much stopped running and started eating. And as you can guess I gained weight and got slower.

I'm not making a resolution, cause I never keep those. What I would like to do is run more than last year. Which I have no idea how many miles I ran, but it was low. I'm kind of afraid to add up the total, but I will because my curiosity will get the better of me. So here it is I WANT TO RUN MORE!!! There maybe now that I've put it out there I'll stick to it!

I did get up early this morning and met up with the Space Coast Runners for the New Year's Run and Potluck. We ran 2.3 miles on the beach!

Do you have any goals/resolutions for 2016?