Running Army Wife

My obsession lately.. I love Rose and the Doctor. I am scheming to get my husband to watch it with me during R&R. source

These. They are limited edition so I bought myself several packages.. they taste like funfetti cake. And they're amazing.  My mockingjay pin. It was well worth the investmest. I wore it to the movie and I currently have it on my old Army medic bag that I'm using as a purse right now. I'm pretty sure that having it makes me about 100 points cooler. And of course, I'm going to be Katniss Everdeen for Halloween, so I'll use it then too. (PS: Go see Hunger Games if this doesn't make sense to you.. and read the books)   Purple and green. I decided to paint my nails to match my charm necklace. And then I also remembered that my Garmin Forerunner is a light green too. I think these are my two favorite colors right now.  Green tea. Specifically while I watch Doctor Who on netflix. Yumm. And I'm not adding any sugar, so I don't have to feel guilty. Hopefully this makes up for the recent Oreo obsession.  <3 Amy

You know these pretty blue shoes I got?  Well originally I was just gonna get them as hang out shoes. Then we got these new shirts at the store: Yes, yes that's a harry potter poster behind me.  I am only allowed to wear New Balance shirts to work. This obviously limits what I can wear quite a bit. So while I was thrilled to get another option, I kind of felt like a poser for not trying out the whole minimalist running thing if I'm gonna wear the shirt. So I did some research. I watched this video: Which explains why it's better to forefoot strike instead of heel strike. It's really an interesting video. Basically to sum it up: barefoot running is better for you. People are only able to heel-strike because of modern running shoes and this has the potential to cause all sorts of problems. I'm not ready to convert 100%. In 10 years of running, I've never had much trouble with injuries. I think this is because I already don't strike ...

I just realized I forgot to post a happy picture yesterday! It's been a hard week for me, so that might be why. I did get a Doctor Who shirt this week though.. I'm a real fan girl now! So I'm wearing the shirt today.. and it makes me happy. :) Also, I'm always glad to post a happy picture every week, because that means that another week of this deployment is over! Praise God. Keep Calm and Don't Blink

So. After being at my job for a little over a month, I've realized a few things. My store is not a "running shoe store." As much as I would like it to be, it's just not. We have running shoes, we do get runners. But it's pretty much an "everyone" shoe store. And actually a good number of the customers are older people that need good shoes. This is not a bad thing, but it considerably lowers the cool factor of working there sometimes. It does make it really exciting for me though when a runner does come in and I get to talk to them about running. :)  Not all customers are gonna be in a good mood when they buy shoes. I have trouble wrapping my mind around this because I love getting new shoes, but I guess it's more of a chore for some people. So I've learned to just get the shoes they ask for and try to not take it personally.  I wear my running shoes slightly smaller than what is recommended. But I've decided to not listen to advice and...

I decided to go through some of the letters I got from James in Ranger School today. It's so cool to read them later and re-live that time in our lives. Getting a letter in those two months was literally the most exciting thing that could happen when I got home from work. James actually heard the first rumors about deployment while he was in Ranger School and wrote to tell me about it. I'm glad he did, rather than wait. I needed all the mental preparation that I could get! Also, the rumors at the time said that he would probably deploy in January.. it actually ended up being late November/early December for his unit. Even though I put it together a little while ago, I thought I'd show you my little keepsake album. The larger pages he sent were the perfect size for the album pages. He sent some smaller pages too (like the one in the picture above). That was a list of things that he was requesting for his care package. I decided that would be the best thing to show, si...

I've been thinking about this lately. My husband, being deployed, cannot be dependable emotional support . As much as he would like to be and as much as I would like him to be, it's just not gonna be like that. That's just how it is during a deployment. So I get pretty emotional during um.. that time of the month. There have been a handful of times when I've just been like "Ahh! I need to talk to James now!" When he's home, he'll help me fix the problem. Or he'll get out his emergency stash of Ghirardelli raspberry dark chocolate squares and hold me until I feel better. Obviously, those things can't be done over the internet. If I'm crying over the phone, it's really most going to make him feel helpless and frustrated that he can't be here. But sometimes when I'm upset, I don't think that far ahead and I still think that talking/crying to James will make it better. There have been at least a half dozen times in the pa...

I ran a 10k on Sunday morning! It was my first race of 2012. I was technically supposed to run a 15k race this weekend, according to my training plan . But it's too hard to find a 15k race that's nearby and I never did the 10k race that I was supposed to do.  AND I think I PRed! Unless I ran a 10k in track back in college that I can't remember. And I got 2nd in my age group! Yay! Not a huge race, but still I was happy. I had by my watch time 51:44. The official time was 51:45.. but it was not chip timed. Also, according to my Garmin, the course was a teeny bit short. As you can see, I went out way too fast (they started the 5k at the same time.. so it was hard not too). I got to mile 1 and I was like "oh no.. too fast." Then I kind of got consistently slower. And I probably wouldn't know it was that bad if it wasn't for the Garmin. And I also wouldn't know that the course was a little short. I guess you can round 6.17 to a 6.2? Can I still s...

I love hanging out at Starbucks and just chillin. Talking, reading, relaxing. There's always stuff that can be done at home, but at Starbucks you get to just sit there. This will probably happen at least once during R&R. <3 A

I've been an Asics girl for almost as long as I've been a runner. Seriously. Long time. I tried another brand once and had bad results. I switched back to Asics and the problem went away. I've been a very loyal Asics customer ever since. Seriously. You find what works and stick with it. Then I got this job at New Balance. Part of the reason why I was hired is the manager is interested in someone leading a run club from the store. But the catch is that I gotta wear New Balance shoes. Hmm. I told one of my runner friends about this and her reaction was "What?? Why would you switch away from something you know is working for you when all your training is on the line?" Um. Yeah. I got these sweet looking Minimus shoes to wear in the store when I'm working. But I'm not ready to make the jump to minimalist running yet. So I decided to bring in my Asics and have my manager look at them and (hopefully) recommend the New Balance equivalent.  By the way...

Today I did my first 10-miler of the year! Well. 9.8 miles actually. Had to cut it a little short because my brother (and recent long run partner) wasn't feeling so great. So I had to run the last mile by myself back to the house to jump in the car and drive back to pick him up from the bathroom at Walgreens. :/ Poor guy. Oh the side effects that come with running distance sometimes. Anyway. This long run was my best pace yet! At least since I was training for cross country in college.  When I put it into dailymile, I always put in the "moving time" so it takes in the "avg moving pace" which is a bit faster.. is that cheating? I figure that maybe it's not counting the time that I'm slowing down right before I stop at the light or something. Anyway. Obviously, I like the "avg moving pace" better. :)  Here are my splits: Yay! I'm so happy. My two 8 milers were good, but my 9 miler was not good last weekend. So it was really ...