2013: The Year of Baby J

2010 was the year of running and PR's (yes, that's how old my PR's are - sad), 2011 was the year of Singapore, 2012 was the year of the dissertation, and 2013 was the year of Baby J.  And that about sums it up.

But let's recap, shall we?  So many great things happened in 2013 - from holidays with family to out-of-state visitors to ginormous smores to the Puyallup Fair to volunteering at races to beach trips to roommate reunions.  It was impossible to narrow it down to just 10 events - but here they are - the top 10 events of 2013?

10) I was pregnant.  I started out the year about 10 weeks pregnant and stayed pregnant for the full first half of the year.  I'm sure you recall, since 95% of my posts talked about it.  I was sick, I got fat, running hurt.  But I did grow a human inside of me, so that was pretty cool.

Whoa.  January to June.

I did not end the year weighing the same as I started the year, which was my goal.  Oh well - what are you gonna do? 

9) I went running!  This is a running blog after all.  I ran until about 33 weeks pregnant, though there were weeks when "running" meant 2 miles... for the WEEK.  I ran 482 miles total (unless I go run 18 miles on New Years Eve so I can hit 500), which pales in comparison to previous years when I've hit the 1,000 mark.  Oh well.

May, June, and July don't look so hot.  Especially considering I ran a 10k in May - making up HALF of the mileage for the whole MONTH.

8) I celebrated the big 3-1 in - where else?  LEAVENWORTH!  While wine walks may not be as much fun without the wine, I still had a BLAST celebrating with some of my bestest friends - eating up the town's brats and pretzels and getting kicked out of pools.  It was the perfect last hurrah before Baby J arrived.

7)  I ran some races while pregnant.  First, I ran the Seahawks 12k.  Real Seahawks gave me water!  I was 27 weeks pregnant and it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it'd be.

Then I ran the Keizer Iris 10k.  I was 31 weeks pregnant and again, it wasn't bad at all, proving that all running should be done during races, since I felt terrible for all other pregnant runs.  Which, I guess, is why this race was HALF of my May mileage.

6) I made my triumphant return to running!  I ran the Leavenworth Half Marathon 3 months post-partum and it-was-AWESOME.  Seriously.  I felt amazing and blew my time goals out of the water.  Plus Leavenworth is, as always, a BLAST.  I think I already mentioned that.

 I can't believe how little Baby J used to be.  And that was after he got big.

I also ran the Salty Half Marathon and the Seattle Half Marathon, but neither were anywhere near as triumphant running-wise.

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5) RAGNAR VEGAS!  While it was so hard to leave Baby J, and pumping in the van wasn't the most fun thing ever, my vanmates were AMAZING and I had a BLAST.  I'm so lucky Nuun and Pro Compression gave me that opportunity!  I've already got two relays lined up for next summer and I can't WAIT.  Plus, I'll be done breastfeeding by then.  Yippee!

4) My baby shower.  While I admit I totally dreaded this (I hate being the center of attention) - and during the present opening part it WAS pretty bad and I got pretty anxious and sweaty, but having everyone come together to celebrate Baby J's arrival was pretty freaking awesome.  I was just plain blown away by everyone's generosity.  Plus my years of experience of eating candy makes me dominate at smelling candy bars melted into diapers. 

All pregnant women should always touch each other's bellies.  But NO ONE ELSE SHOULD.

3) We went to Europe!  London and Paris were a blast, even though a freak cold front made walking around pretty unbearable and obviously, it'd be a lot more fun to enjoy Paris if you could eat wine and soft cheeses.  Boo.  Just an excuse to go back for Wimbledon someday!

I want to go back.

2) I graduated!  After 4 years of undergrad, 2 years of Master's, and 5+ of PhD work, I FINALLY graduated and vowed to never-ever-ever-ever go back to school again.  Probably.  

That outfit sure wasn't slimming!

1) Duh - I had Baby J!  He finally arrived, and although the actual labor is an experience I will never (but would love to!) forget, his arrival has changed our lives forever (for the better, obviously!).

 

It's so hard to believe that this scrawny little nugget who never smiled despite my begging:

Is now this huge laughing 6 month old:

He's changed so much in the past 6 months - it's hard to imagine what he'll be like a year from now!

And that's a wrap!  I have so much to be thankful for.  But another year is gone just like that.  Time really does make fools of us all.

How to See London in Just 3 Days (while pregnant)

Sorry it took me soooo long to get this post up!  I can't believe it's already been a month since we were talking with cute accents and dining on delicious nutella crepes.

 That was fun.  Let's go back. 

First of all - let's recap.  JMan and I have been talking about / planning a Europe trip for YEARS.  I kept begging for it as my "graduation present" but then I kept NOT graduating!  Plus JMan didn't have enough vacation time, and let's face it, Europe is EXPENSIVE.

But finally, Rudiger decided to show up on the scene which was apparently the final kick in the pants we needed.  This was to be our final chance to go to Europe for a long long time, unless we wanted to tote a screaming infant / toddler on a 12 hour plane ride (EACH WAY) which no, I don't want to do.

Sooo, what was meant to be a full two-weeks traipsing around Europe in the summer, spent watching Wimbledon, drinking wine, and eating delicious cheeses, turned into a very wintry 6-day spring break trip.  So while I do NOT recommend doing this trip while 25 weeks pregnant (or pregnant at all), nor do I recommend doing this trip during what was freakishly freezing weather during early April (we're talking in the 20's with the windchill), it was still a BLAST. 

And here's how you can see all of London in just 3 very short days.  Okay okay, maybe not ALL of London.  But lots of London!  

The must see's and do's while in London:

1.  Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament.  Everything is just so old and impressive in Europe!  It's like they couldn't ever just "build" any old building.  It was go big or go home for EVERY building in the city. 

2.  Westminster Abbey.  The lines were long (we were there on apparently the busiest weekend of the year: the Easter bank holiday) and the prices were steep so we didn't go inside. 

3.  Buckingham Palace.  Definitely go during the Changing of the Guard, which occurs daily during the peak months and every other day during the off-peak months.  I think Kate and I got our timing off because we had planned to discuss our pregnancies over high tea...

4.  Stonehenge.  It's probably up to you whether Stonehenge is a 'must-see' for you or not.  After all, it is just a pile of rocks and it is a good 90 minutes outside of London.  We did a bus tour that took us to Stonehenge, Windsor Castle, and Bath though, and I thought it was totally worth it.  It's a 'wonder' of the world after all!  It would have been more awesome if we could have gone within the circle though - you CAN do this on private tours but you need to book these in advance, and of course, they were sold out by the time I looked. 

It was FREEZING there.

5.  Windsor Castle.  This is apparently the Queen's favorite castle (wouldn't it be nice if you had your choice amongst many castles?!) and is one of the few still standing from the 11th century.  The Queen was even actually there while we were there, because apparently she enjoys spending Easter there!  We also got to see the Changing of the Guard at Windsor, as well as one impressive doll house. 

Changing of the Guard at Windsor:

6.  Bath.  Again, Bath may not be worth your time, but I thought it was a freaking adorably precious city.  Pretty much everything in England is adorably precious though.  As we cruised through the English countryside I imagined myself living there with some goats and running a B&B.  It's also always amazing to see something so incredibly old - the Roman Baths were discovered in 836 BC and the temple was built around 60 AD. 

7.  See a show.  London is very well known for amazing Broadway shows just like NYC.  Unfortunately, again, because of the very popular bank holiday this was something we probably should have planned ahead for a bit more.  Since we finally were thinking about our trip about 4 days before we left we didn't do so much of the planning ahead bit, which I HIGHLY recommend.  I would have loved to have seen Book of Mormon or even Wicked again but both were very sold out.  We checked out the half-price TKTS booth which is probably a better option when it's not so busy and were able to score cheap tickets to "Potted Potter" - a parody about Harry Potter which I had read reviews for that it was funny.  Uhhhh, it was not.  It might be the worst show I have ever seen!  SO hopefully you'll see something better than we did!

8. Tower of London.  The Tower of London is OLD and impressive.  It was built in 1078 by William the Conqueror and houses 'the crown jewels'.  It also is very famous for housing prisoners and being a very fun place of torture.  It was much more like a "real castle" than we found Windsor Castle to be (which was very fancy and more modern - the Tower has been kept more in its original state). 

9.  The London Eye.  It's up to you whether you think the Eye is worth your time and money.  We decided we'd rather just look at it rather than ride on it.  To us it seemed rather expensive, the lines were pretty freaking long, and the idea of actually riding on it seemed BORING.  But maybe we're crazy?  Clearly LOTS of other people wanted to ride on it so maybe it is awesome. 

You MUST walk along the Thames River at night!

10.  Be dorky.  Talk like the British.  Practice with adorable words like skedaddle, pram, buggy, and brilliant.  Eat weird foods at pubs.  Have some fish n' chips.  Push carts into the wall at the Platform 9 and 3/4 sign.  It's fun!

Overall, London was VERY easy to get around.  Obviously, they speak English there which makes everything easier.  Our hotel room was very small but more like an apartment (no maid service) and included a small kitchen, which was handy.  It was in the basement and you could hear people running around until all hours upstairs, which was pretty annoying!  The Tube was 100% easy to use and we used it exclusively - a few times just to "get out of the cold"!  London is EXPENSIVE though, which I'm sure you already know.

Obviously I've mentioned a few things we didn't get to do that we would have liked to, which included going to Wimbledon (we intended to at least tour it since we weren't there during the matches), go on the Harry Potter backstage tour (which was also sold out since we didn't plan ahead), see a show that's actually good (are you getting the point yet? PLAN AHEAD!!!), ride on a double decker bus (TOO COLD!), and of course be able to drink Guinness in a British pub (don't be pregnant!!).

Next up: 3 days in Paris!

Have you been to London?  Is there anything you would add to this list? 

Catching You Up

Lots of crazy stuff going on around here!  Let's catch you up!

1.  Yep, I'm still pregnant.  Still cooking that baby - it sure takes a long time!  I had my 24 week appointment the other day and everything looked well - baby's heart beat strong at 146 beats per minute (bpm), my blood pressure was still rocking at 102 / 60, and I was up about 12 pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight (15 pounds from my lowest weight during the 1st trimester), which seems like a freaking ton to me but apparently is right on track. 

Bumpy abdomen courtesy of my refusal to wear maternity clothes.  Yes they are more comfortable, but they NEVER STAY UP!  It's so annoying. 

Although I think it's pretty freaking obvious that I'm pregnant, I guess I can understand why it's not so obvious to everyone else that I'm not just getting super chubby.  The lady who cut my hair the other day said, "Oh, I had no idea you were pregnant, I thought you just had a pooch".  When I'm not accenting the baby bump it does seem a little less obvious:

Same outfit, but less obvious. 

The doctor gave me the fun gestational diabetes test to take prior to my next appointment, which will be my last monthly appointment before I start going every 2 weeks!  Eek!  It's getting here soon!  Only a few more weeks left until I'm in the 3rd trimester!

2.  We spent last week on a babymoon vacation in EUROPE and it was freaking fabulous.  AND JMan finally felt the baby while we were there!  We went to London and Paris and I tried to pretend like the Paris Marathon wasn't happening while we were there.  :-)  LOTS to tell you about that so hopefully I get around to it someday and it's not one more post that never gets written! 

 

Also, banana Nutella crepes are the best things in the WORLD.  I really don't want to go back to living in a world where they don't serve them on every street corner. 

3.  I know all you runners already know this, but inner thigh chafe is NO JOKE.  Seriously.  It is NOT to be messed around with.  Speaking of my weight gain - which is at least some in my thighs, annoyingly enough, and speaking of my maternity pants that don't stay up, AND speaking of the 30-40 miles we walked in London and Paris - inner thigh chafe was a HUGE issue during the first half of the trip.  And it's not exactly like I brought my Body Glide! 

4.  Running is still happening!  It's definitely become a run / walk and it causes a CONSTANT need to pee which is highly obnoxious but it's still happening!  I ran 7 miles last Saturday and 7 miles again yesterday.  I only ran one sad mile in between those two days though.  Normally I LOVE to run while on vacation but a) it was freaking freezing cold in London and Paris, b) we were already walking 4-10 miles per day so it's not like I needed extra exercise, and c) the jetlag caused us to sleep weird hours like 2am - 10am so by the time I was awake it seemed necessary to start sightseeing! 

Last weekend's run was GORGEOUS and felt like SPRING.  Yesterday's run was stormy and rainy. 

For some reason my right calf has been really really tight when I've been running though, and I'm not sure why.  Do I need to stretch more?  Foam roll more?  I'll admit I don't think I've foam rolled once since I've been pregnant.  It's hardly seemed necessary with the few miles I've been logging.  Do you think my Brooks Pure Connects can't handle my growing weight?  Maybe I need shoes with more support?  Anyone have any thoughts? 

5.  Running had been happening enough that I even signed up for a race!  The Seahawks 12k will be April 21 and will definitely be stretching my abilities, so hopefully it's not a horrible decision!  Given my constant need to pee I'm also a bit worried about the number of port-a-potties the race will have (and how often on the course!), especially given that this is a smaller race.  But I did it last year (although then it was part of a 15 miler in the good ol' days of marathon training) and it was a blast, so it seems like a fun repeat.  Hopefully I'm also not dead last since I doubt many people will walk the 12k (there's also a 5k). 

Who wants to join?????

6.  I'm apparently the last person in the WORLD to finally WATCH Argo and READ Silver Linings Playbook (still haven't seen that movie) - which I did both yesterday on the 12 hour plane ride from Paris to Iceland to Seattle.  I LOVED both.  I HIGHLY recommend reading Silver Linings Playbook!  I really didn't know what to expect or even what it was really about but for some reason I just LOVED it.  Go read it!

What have I missed with you??  Who's pregnant / engaged / married / got a PR / ran a race / submitted a Nuun Hood to Coast application??