Oh, what a night!!!

We took a family vacation next week (pictures to come!!) and arrived home very late Sunday night/Monday morning.  Our flight got home after midnight, which after getting out of the plane, getting our luggage, riding the shuttle to our car, and driving home, we got home around 1:00am.

Because our dog now has special needs, we needed to hire a pet sitter to come to our house several times a day and empty her bladder, etc. instead of just kenneling her like we normally do.  The company was very thorough and even took out the trash, checked our mail, brought in the newspaper, and whatnot.  When we got home we tried to get inside and the back doors were locked, something that is not normally done as we don't have keys to those doors.  Our garage is locked and it is connected to the back doors so there you go.  Anyway, I told Dave, hey, just go unlock the front door?!  As he walked out of the garage he quickly came back - the pet sitter had his key and my key was hanging in the kitchen.  Awesome.  My parents have a spare key.  I called them and of course, it was on their key ring and it was in Florida.  So, we spent the night (can we really call it a night if we only slept 3 hours??) at my parents' house.  I finally fell asleep sometime after 2:00 and woke up several times throughout the night. 

The alarm went off bright and early at 6:30 as we had to hurry to Anderson's 4 year old well check at 7:30.  We were wearing the same clothes as yesterday and at least I felt, icky.  The doctor went well, we dropped Anderson off at preschool, and Dave and I drove clear across town to get the key from the dog sitter.  We finally got into our house just before 10am Monday, 9 hours after we got in from vacation.

We opened the door and OMG!  The house smelled like we had 17 dogs.  They did do a good job, but being that our dog now pees on pads instead of outside, I would have liked to have seen them empty the trash or put the pee pads in the outdoor trash can.  We emptied the trash and mopped the floor, and I sprayed air freshener all over the place.  Sloopy also got a bath and now it smells much better.

With only a few hours of sleep, we got showers and went off to work. 

But wait, there's more!!!

I am a very punctual person.  Being on time is being late; being early is being on time!!!  Having a toddler means we get to places barely in time no matter how much time we allow.  So when we left for Florida we were running later than we wanted to be, which meant when our gas light came on in the car we just continued to drive to the airport.  When we returned a week later we sort of forgot we had no gas in the car.  At 1:00am we didn't exactly want to stop for gas, but were nervous about the gauge being correct and time constraints in the morning, etc., that we decided to stop by the gas station a mere spitting distance from our house.  We were one of three cars - a car parked at the store portion of the gas station with a gentleman outside smoking on the hood and a police car with the officer inside the store. While Dave was pumping gas, the officer came out talking on his walkie and taking his goods to his car.  He put the bags inside the door and then went back into the store, entering from the far left door.  As he went in, a woman scurried out of the right-hand door.  She had a small coat wrapped around her and it sort of looked like she was stealing something.  The cop stopped her and made it her come back in the store.  That's when it got interesting.  See, she was wearing thigh-high stockings and high heels and when she turned around we noticed she was wearing nothing else.  NOTHING!  I got to see a "full moon", if you will.  Now I don't know if she was "working" or if she was just up to no good but I really don't like seeing that near my neighborhood nor do I like having to explain to my son that, "maybe she wasn't wearing pants because she had an accident."

Back with some vacation pictures hopefully this week.

Mini Vacation

At the beginning of December we took a long weekend down to Myrtle Beach for a little R&R.  We weren't expecting amazing weather and sitting on the beach, but just a little time away from reality.  It was a whirlwind trip - getting down there super late on Saturday, spending pretty much all day Sunday getting checked into the timeshare, Monday it rained all day, and Tuesday we left for home.  We did enjoy lots of rest, a little beach time, good food, and a fun time at the Atlanta airport.  Here's a few pictures.

Anderson was so tired after we arrived that he fell asleep on our bed just like this - all his clothes and shoes on too.

 

On our way home, we had a long layover in Atlanta.  We had a cranky toddler on our hands and needed a way to keep him occupied.  So we headed down to the basement of the airport and rode the train back and forth, back and forth.  We would walk from end to end and then catch the train again.  It was boring as hell for me, but to Anderson it was the best thing ever.

I went all the way to Colorado and didn't run a race?!

A couple of weeks ago we took a vacation to Colorado.  The first part of the week was spent near Boulder with family and the second part of the week was just the three of us touring all over the place.  Here was some of the highlights (with lots and lots of pictures).

Rocky Mountain National Park
The day after we arrived, we headed to Rocky Mountain National Park.  We did a lot of driving and little bit of hiking and just enjoyed the scenery.  It doesn't look like this in Ohio.

Air Force Academy
They say it is sunny 300 days of the year in Colorado and wouldn't you know three of the days we were there it rained?!  Our whirlwind trip to Colorado Springs was done in the cold rain.  First we stopped at the Air Force Academy and did a little sightseeing.  The chapel was super cool.  Anderson picked himself up a souvenir.   He still plays with it a lot.  Guess we chose well.

Garden of the Gods
I'm sure Garden of the Gods is super cool and beautiful, but it was 40 degrees and raining and I'm not going to lie, I was a bit miserable.  We did a small hike and took some pictures.  Someday I want to see this again when it's nicer out.

Olympic Training Center
I'm not going to lie, I had high hopes and was super excited to see the Olympic Training Center.  And it was sweet, expect you really weren't allowed to see anything.  We were given a tour which basically only showed us a little bit of the buildings.  The weight room and pool were awesome, but I wanted to see what the living situations looked like and also see the dining hall.  I was also hoping to catch a glimpse of some badass athlete.  I did win a quiz, picked up a prize, and bought myself a training journal for 2016.

Great Sand Dunes National Park
Great Sand Dunes National Park was my favorite thing we did on this trip.  We drove about three hours from Colorado Springs to the middle of freakin' nowhere and out of the ground were these GIANT sand dunes.  We layered on our clothing, strapped on the hiking backpack, and headed up to the tallest dune.  It was so magnificent.  Because of the time of year it was, there were very few people at the park.  We were the only people on the dune and it was so silent.  It was an amazing experience and I'm so glad I got to experience it with my boys.

Pikes Peak
The last full day of our trip we stayed in Colorado Springs and were blessed with good weather in the morning.  The sky was clear and I finally got to see Pikes Peak.  We took the cog train to the top where the weather was a brisk 21 degrees with lots of snow.  This was the highest I had ever been (we had been over 13,000 feet when we went to Switzerland several years ago) but I didn't feel the elevation so much.  Guess I'm in better shape than I thought!  We only got about 20 minutes at the top of the mountain.  We, unfortunately, did not get any of the famous donuts as they ran out, but Anderson did get to play in the snow.  We wore the boy out too.  He slept the entire trip down the mountain.

Manitou Incline
Finally, after Pikes Peak, we had fully intended to climb the Manitou Incline to the top.  However, it was now raining and it was a whole lot steeper than I thought it would be.  I had plans of putting Anderson in the Ergobaby but we were worried about how we were going to manage and didn't want to spend hours out in the rain, so we climbed up a little, took a picture, and headed back down.  Picture or it didn't happen!

Right now, there are plans to return in August 2016 for an epic race Dave is planning...

Florida

Just a few hours after finishing my marathon last week, Dave, Anderson, my parents, and I hopped on an airplane and headed south to Florida.  We vacation every spring in Venice where we have friends and where my parents hope to retire soon.  There's not a whole lot to do in the town, but that's kind of the point of some vacations.  My plans were to lay on the beach and chill out in the evenings.  Unfortunately, with the little one off his normal schedule he was exceptionally challenging which did not lend itself to relaxing, but it was fun nonetheless.  Here's some pictures from the trip.

Kalahari Fun with the Fam

My sister surprised us all for Christmas with an impromptu weekend getaway to Kalahari, an indoor water park in Sandusky. This place is massive and a little overwhelming - water slides, wave pool, kiddie areas, bars, restaurants, arcades and games, and a huge hotel.  It was a little like Disney World on a smaller scale, but still, people EVERYWHERE!!!  We started off the afternoon with some family fun.  The older kids hurried to the water slides.  Dave, Anderson, and I took our time with a little lazy river, wave pool, and kiddie areas.  My mom held Anderson so we could take a trip down a water slide.

We went to dinner at Chet and Matt's (seriously the best pizza in Sandusky or maybe anywhere for that matter) and then everyone turned in while Dave and I hit up the water park again until it closed.  In about 45 minutes we were able to do five water slides.  My favorites were the ones with the individual inner tubes.  You betcha, I slept well that night.

Sunday, yesterday, we got up, had breakfast and started all over again.  Dave and I added some attractions to our list.  He went down a body slide, while we both did the boogie boarding.  Yeah, I got a lot of water up my nose with that one.  And some serious wedgies!!!  Most of the day was spent chilling with my homies and making sure Anderson didn't turn into a human Popsicle. 

The ride home was quiet.  Needless to say, we turned in early last night.  I'm still really tired this morning.

Foto Friday

Y'all, I have been waiting so impatiently to show some of these pictures!!!

When we were in Montana I hired Bethanne from Marianne Wiest Photography to take our family pictures.  It wasn't the easy session with a baby.  He wanted to play in the rocks and splash in the water and because we were in a public place, there were dogs and people who were distracting.  But Bethanne did an amazing job and the pictures were beautiful.  Here's a few of my favorites.

Please do not steal these images.  They don't belong to you.

Foto Friday

Have I posted this one yet?  This is from our trip to Montana about a month ago.  I know I said I would post pictures and I haven't.  Fail.  Anyway, this is one from our last day of the trip when Dave, Anderson, and I went kayaking on the lake behind our house.  It was a little scary to stick the little one in the kayak but he did fine.

Thursday Thoughts

In a few days we leave for vacation.  We are headed with the whole family to Montana to do our thing near Glacier National Park.  Now, I'm no nature lover, but I think there's going to be a whole lot of hiking, kayaking, canoeing, swimming, and basically everything outdoors.  I am going to need a vacation from my vacation!

I have taken some good vacations in my lifetime, but two really stick out.  One was our impromptu trip to Key West.  We decided on a Thursday, bought tickets on a Friday, and left on a Saturday (or something like that).  It wasn't the usually Key West vacation of drinking and debauchery, but instead was relaxing and perfect.

Another favorite trip of ours was to Italy and Switzerland (There are lots of blog entries for this trip.  Click on June and July 2007 for more.) for our fifth anniversary.  This trip was epic!  We visited Milan, Florence, Rome, Venice, and Zermatt, Switzerland.  I loved Italy and cannot wait to go back.

And for every great trip, there's always a bad.  Although London was an amazing trip and seeing the Olympics may be a highlight of my life, taking this trip while 5 and 6 weeks pregnant was rough.  I was sick, I was tired, and I didn't want to do anything.  I couldn't experience the food or beverages.  Someday I'd like to do London again and would love, love, love to see another Olympics.

So, what is your favorite and least favorite vacations you have been on and why?

Running on Vacation

No rest for the weary when training for long races and on vacation.

Our very first full day of vacation I wanted to get in another 20 miler.  My only rule for vacation is that I got to sleep in and well, that was pretty stupid as I didn't start the run until after 10:00am and it was already hot!!!

 This is my, "I'm hot and it's only 8 miles" look.

Dave was my navigator and carried all my water and gels for me.  (My parents were watching the baby.)  It was so nice to have company.  I miss him riding with me during my long runs.

Lots and lots of refreshments.  Late in the run I actually stopped at McDonald's and added a lot of ice which I put down my shirt and into my water.

The run was long and I suffered through a lot of it.  I might pacts with myself that I could drink every half mile, or that I could stop when I reached the next mile marker.

When I reached the unexpected bridge I stopped, turned around and declared, NO!  I'M NOT GOING!!!  But I sucked it up and went anyway.

At 18-1/2 miles we were in Coligny Square where there were dancing fountains, and well, I joined all the kids in a refreshing dance through them.

Finally we were back in the neighborhood where we were staying.  We got a little lost, I finished the run, and then jumped on the back of Dave's bike to ride back to the house.  I did not want to walk one more step.

Jen Harrison-ing after the run.

I did a 10 mile run a few days later and had a great run.  At least it was redeeming from this sub-par 20 miler.  And then I ended the week with a 5K race.  More on that in another post.

Pure Michigan

Although we were not at the beach, there was lots of water and lots of sand.  Here's tons of pictures of the adventures of our short, unplanned, vacation.

Kayaking
Let's just say, I'm not so good at kayaking.  Or I wasn't very good at kayaking on this try.  Our house was right on the Platte River so we loaded up the kayaks into the van, drove aways down the road, and dropped ourselves into the river.  Then we followed into until we got to the house and got pulled out of the water.  The river had a current and we went with it.  It also had a lot of trees and sometimes those trees got in the way.  I ran into many a tree but stayed afloat.  My sister on the other hand, was not so lucky as she got flipped three times.

On the pontoon
My family rented a pontoon boat one of the days.  Unfortunately, Dave didn't get to go with us as he had to work, but I rearranged my schedule so I could go.  It was cold that morning.  I was on the boat in my sweatshirt and jeans.  I was on vacation, damn it, and I climbed in the water to try out some tubing of my own.  Everyone did some tubing and some swimming during the day, including baby Anderson.  He really did not like his lifejacket, though.

More Tubing
After hanging out on the pontoon all day and doing a little shopping around Glen Arbor, we came back to the house, grabbed our intertubes and headed out to soak up the sun on the river.  This time Dave joined us as we floated down for a while.  I was only slightly better at this than kayaking.  At least I could get out and touch and move the tube if needed.

Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes
The last day of our trip we headed to the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Park to take the scenic drive and catch some sites.  Dude, those dunes are tall and windy and sandy.  Here's a cute family photo.