It is what it is.

The training runs have been completed.

Last long run, yes!

The jersey’s have been decorated/blinged/bedazzled.

The bags have been packed.

(and in record time – pray I didn’t forget anything)

The only thing left to do now is run Disney and then celebrate!

I definitely plan on having more than a few cocktails Sunday night after a weekend of running mile after mile after mile.

Enjoy the next few days – I’ll see you on the flip side (hopefully with a shiny new wand from Harry Potter World!).

I love how our vacations have become so active. They now revolve around “what can we do? where can we ride? can we run/walk places?”.

And that’s exactly what we did last week!

Cedar Point:

I kid you not, the best decision we made on vacation was to buy the new Fast Lane passes. They are totally worth the price when you have 2 ten year olds with you. The kids stay happy because they don’t have to wait in 2 hour lines (in 95 degree weather!), which equals happy parents.

C’s Triathlon:

My Triathlon:

A 35 mile bike ride with J (to lunch and back!):

Hodges:

Best street corn EVER. I seriously could have just eaten the corn – it was the best of my life!

Kelley’s Island, which included:

…….morning bike rides:

……..food and drinks by the water:

…….some much needed pool time:

…….morning runs around the island:

…….and beautiful sunsets:

The rest of our staycation was spent relaxing, hanging out with C, a long run (recap to come!) and watching an entire season of Breaking Bad. How did I never know about this show before?? J and I are invested now. We’re into the second season and can’t stop!

Life sucked this morning when my alarm went off and I realized I actually had to go to work. Back to reality, I guess. Until J lets me quit my job, or I win the lottery, one of the two.

Do you watch Breaking Bad? If not, what’s your favorite series on TV right now?? I love Dexter and RHONJ equally.

I wanted to share some of my favorite photos/places from NYC. It’s such an amazing place that the pictures don’t do it justice.

Grand Central Terminal:

NYC Bagels!!

Ess-a-Bagel = the most delicious (and filling) bagel of my life. No question.

Rockefeller Center:

Our brief careers as a models:

Hehe.

Gorgeous new Apple store:

Hello Soho:

Mark Isreal, who created the Doughnut Plant, is a genius:

So ridiculously delicious. I can’t even tell you. J may or may not have eaten FIVE donuts that day………I’ll never tell.

Central Park:

Times Square:

And my favorite place of all:

THE FINISH LINE!

Hell to the YES.

Have you been to NYC? Where’s your favorite place to go or what’s your favorite thing to do?? There’s still so much we didn’t have time for. I can’t wait to go back!

Hey everyone!

We’re finally home from the Big Apple! We’re getting settled in and I still need time to organize my thoughts – it was a long and exciting weekend.

So I just wanted to drop in real quick to say THANK YOU for all the amazing support and birthday wishes on Sunday. I may not have responded to them all (there was a lot going on!), but I read every single one.

Can’t wait to catch up on what everyone else has been up to, too. I’ve been out of the loop!

What do you think: Race re-cap first and then weekend highlights? Or just a weekend progression?

After all the Biggie craziness, it felt so great to finally be able to relax at the beach.

Every day was pretty much the same.

1. Head down to the pool around 9:00 or so:

(and surf on Grandpa – hehe)

2. The ladies would relax:

3. Eat lunch

4. Head down to the beach to build sand castles, boogie board, and body surf:

5. Head back to the pool where many shenanigans always seemed to occur in the afternoon:

6. Either eat dinner in the hotel room (we had kitchens!) or gorge ourselves on awesome seafood:

7. And, once again, go back to the pool. But we mostly hit up the hot tub at night:

8. Crash:

One week of pure bliss.

Back to work (and school!) tomorrow. Sigh………I’m sure gonna miss this:

Did you go on family vacations when you were younger? Where did you go? We went on one every summer. We always tease my parents because most of them were educational (you know the type, Williamsburg, VA or to see the Liberty Bell)……only a few to the beach…….

We’re here!!  It took some time, but we finally made it!

The car ride went surprisingly fast, despite getting bored while driving through the “country”:

Of course we didn’t hit any traffic until the last hour (you know, when I took  over).  And after driving around for literally an hour trying to find a parking spot we finally bit the bullet and just paid to park in a garage.  The free parking on the street just wasn’t worth the aggravation.  And after 6 hours in the car, we were just ready to crash!

But not without giving my sis the shirts we made first:

This is just a little preview – you’ll have to wait to see the front til tomorrow!! 

Despite being in a new place, we all slept pretty well.  Mandy conned me into making pancakes for breakfast, and then we set out for the expo!  C LOVES riding the public transportation in this city:

The expo was being held at the Navy Pier.  Great place, but CROWDED!  Add all the race people to the tourists and you end up with crazy town.  Seriously. 

The shirts are a little obnoxious, but I like obnoxious. 

Despite all the people, the expo was very well organized, and inspirational, too!

Since the course is an out and back along the water, it doesn’t really leave a lot of room for spectators to find you after mile 5 until the finish.   It’s not the best designed course for spectators, but it should be a pretty run!

We left crazytown and went in search of lunch.  It was almost 1:30, and we were STARVING!!

We knew we were having a spaghetti dinner tonight, so we were on the hunt for something a little lighter.  Corner Bakery to the rescue!

This place was fantastic.  It was like a bigger and better Panera.  I ordered a veggie sandwich:

It was freakin awesome.  I dominated that sandwich (and the pickle!).  I left the chips for J and C – not really my thing.

The rest of the afternoon was spent shopping and sight seeing on Michigan Ave.  We are now chillin at Mandy’s crib, waiting for our cousin, David, to arrive so we can start making dinner.  We’re creating our own inspirational pasta dinner tonight! 

Then, hopefully, we’ll take a walk to digest, and be early to bed!  The race starts at 7:00, and we have to be downtown for the 5:30am shuttle.  The shuttle guarantees us to the starting line by 6:15.  I’m not taking any chances in this crazy traffic city!  This is the earliest I’ve ever had to be up for a race so it should be interesting.  Like always, I’m not the best morning runner, so we’ll see how it goes.  I wish there were more races at night!!!!

Here goes nothing……………

Do you exercise better in the morning or evening?

I have to make this quick since we’re leaving in about 45 minutes, but I wanted to pop in and tell everyone THANK YOU so much for the wishes regarding KC. J and I were overwhelmed at all the nice and thoughtful comments. That was something that I hope to not have to go through again for a VERY long time. Hands down, hardest thing I have ever had to do.

So, this weekend we’re headed to Chicago to visit my sis, eat our fill of deep dish pizza, and clear our minds of the sadness that we’ve been experiencing this week. I thought I’d leave you with the highlights from our last visit to Chicago:

Being silly at the Children’s Museum:

Ann Sather cinnamon rolls!!

ESPN Zone:

Millennium Park:

Best burritos EVER:

(looks awful but J assures me this is the Best Thing He’s Ever Eaten – Burrito Edition – and from what I hear we’re going there again this weekend! hehe)

And family time:

I hope to be blogging this weekend, but we’ll see what happens. Please send some good luck to my sis for the race on Sunday – but, with me running beside her, I know she’s going to rock it out.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Do you have a favorite restaurant in a city you visit often? Or do you try to go to new restaurants every time you visit?

Good morning!! Are you working today, or enjoying a long weekend?? I have mixed feelings about today. I’m glad to have the day off work, but I’m also sad because it’s my last day of vaca!! So sad…..

On our way home from Savannah, J and I stopped overnight in Wytheville, VA. We were both pretty hungry by the time we got there so we asked the lady at the front desk for some restaurant recommendations. She immediately raved about the local favorite, The Log House. J and I are always about the local establishments so we headed right out.

It was so cute!

I got crazy excited when I saw this on the menu:

Ahhhhhhhhh…………HELLO fresh veggies!!!! I haven’t mentioned this, but I couldn’t find fresh fruit or vegetables anywhere in the South (well, after we left Asheville). My body is seriously craving veggies right now. Anyways, I ordered the vegetable platter which allowed me to pick 4 of the fresh veggies. It was phenomenal.

The gardens in the back were beautiful, too!

We really, really enjoyed The Log House, and would go back in a second if we were ever in Wytheville, VA again! Something tells me that probably won’t happen, though…..

Friday morning we set out for home!

Welcome Home!!!

I was so excited to get home and see this guy:

Seriously, how cute is he? And check out what he’s holding: broccoli in one hand and a chocolate/pb dessert in the other. No one can ever mistake him for my kid, that’s for sure!

Hope you’re enjoying a day off today! And, if you’re not, I hope your work day flies by!

I think we’re headed to the park for a picnic and playtime. Should be fun!

Hey, Hey!!!! Did you guys ever play the card game and get to yell SOCIAL??! Hehe, makes me laugh. Good times. Anyways, I’ll get that in a minute.

Soooo…..Happy 4th of July!! I hope you all enjoyed a nice, relaxing Sunday morning. I know I did. The whole house slept in until after 8:00, and it was glorious! That doesn’t happen very often when you live in a house with your hubby, an 8 year old, and 2 dogs….

Back to the title of this post. The restaurants in Savannah were all very pricey, and extremely touristy. It seems that’s what people do when they go to Savannah: tour the sites, and EAT! But J and I were looking for something more local (and definitely cheaper). We had heard great things about Tybee Island, so J checked it out on Yelp! and we were sold on this local mexican place, called Social.

It took us about a half hour to drive there, but our timing was perfect because it was just about to start storming when we arrived. So we sat out on the patio and enjoyed the cooler temperatures from the rain.

J ordered the fish tacos (which were mentioned on Yelp!) and I ordered the veggie taco, plus we shared an order of sweet potato fries and black beans. Our tacos were TO.DIE.FOR. Totally amazing! The fries were just OK, nothing special, and the black beans were meh. But the tacos totally made up for what the sides were lacking. J even went back in to order another taco after he was done with the first two! I seriously can’t even tell you how good these tacos were, I wish I had pictures!

Though, I was most excited about this:

Ummmm, yeah. You know how I said I wanted a cheaper restaurant? Well, that totally went out the window when I saw this lovely for sale at the register. It’s fantastic!! I’ve been savoring it piece by piece (I still have half the bar left)!!

YUM!!

I’m a total chocoholic, but dark chocolate and salt must be my 2 all time favorite things in the world. Put them together??? Perfection.

J and I weren’t impressed by the rest of Tybee Island, but to be fair it was raining and we didn’t really give it much of a chance. We ended up just walking around a little and then heading back into Savannah.

However, if you’re ever even NEAR Savannah or Tybee Island, you MUST check out Social for their amazing tacos. Do it. Trust me. You’ll thank me!

Happy Independence Day, all!! What’s on your menu today??

So, we are finally home and back to the real world. We got home last night around 6:00 or so and I was already up teaching Group Power at 10:00 this morning! Funny how fast life falls right back into place.

I have so many pictures from Savannah to show you! I thought tonight would be a good night for a picture show since I’m exhausted. All that traveling must be catching up with me…..

Enjoy!

View from the balcony right outside our room:

I can spot a cupcake from a block away!

Beautiful Forsyth Park!

Breakfast at the hotel:

Being silly, per usual:

Random city shots:

Sad to go…..

I hope everyone is enjoying their holiday weekend so far! I can hear fireworks outside right now. It should be fun to see the the ones in my city tomorrow night with the fam – they’re usually pretty fantastic!

Are you going to see fireworks this year??