Week Before Vacation Blahs...

Why is the week before a vacation the worst week ever!?  Please tell me I am not the only one who thinks this.  Peace will come at 6am on Friday morning while I am sitting on the plane reading 'The Help' and watching 'How I Met Your Mother' on my iPad.  Can't wait.
So, I know some of you have seen my "Sweat!" tab above.  It has been a good way for me to keep myself accountable for two things.  1 - Running 3 days a week and 2 - Working out 5 days a week.  I know I will never be an every day runner or a 6 or 7 day a week worker outer (I stand by this choice of words), so I am happy to get moving at least 5 days a week.  Granted, I have had a few fails, but I just move on to the next week and do what I can.  Writing everything down does motivate me to get it done. 
What are some ways you motivate yourself to work out?


Last night I committed to the Spin Challenge on the blog Run with Jess.
I want to be a SpinStar, so I will need to attend 6 spin classes in the month of August.  Sounds good to me!

On a totally random note, the college I attended, Florida Southern College in Lakeland, was named the Most Beautiful Campus in this year's Princeton Review.  It is a really gorgeous campus and is the largest single site collection of Frank Lloyd Wright architecture in the world.
Aaaahhhhh the memories of the good ol' FSC days!

T-minus two days until vacation... I've got a lot of countdowns going on.

This weekend was half great

Hello & welcome to new readers and followers!  And of course hello again to those of you who keep coming back to read my blog!

The great part of the weekend started for me on Friday afternoon when I got an email confirming my volunteer duties for this year’s Boston Marathon.  I will be directing runners and loading buses on Marathon Monday on Boston Common from 5:30 to 8:30 in the morning.  The runners get bussed out to Hopkinton for the start of the race and the Common is where the buses leave from.  I know the shift starts sooo early, but I wanted to be done with volunteer duties before the race started so I could meet up with my family along the course and cheer on my cousin, Amanda, who is running the marathon.  She is running as part of the Dana Farber Marathon Challenge team.  You can read about her marathon training on her blog, Rise to Run and you can read about her fundraising (and donate if you wish!) on her Dana Farber team page. She is doing awesome and is almost at her goal!

Even though I am not running the marathon, I still felt really cool to get an email from the Boston Athletic Association that started out “Dear Heather, Welcome to the 115^th B.A.A. Boston Marathon…”  Only a month away, it will be a fun weekend in Boston with my family!

Saturday was another great day.  I ran the Ocean Drive 5k and got a new PR!  So excited to shave 29 seconds off my time from the ESPN 5k two weeks ago!

The course was beautiful along scenic Ocean Drive and Washington Ave in South Beach.  The art deco buildings are so beautiful; they were even on our race bibs.

Super cute race bib

The post race awards ceremony took place at Nikki Beach and it was nice to relax on the lounge chairs there.  I was so relaxed I may or may not have fallen asleep for about 20 minutes :)

Between the 3.1 miles I ran for the 5k, I also ran an additional mile before the race, to bring my total for the Cupcake Marathon up to 9.1 miles.  Still need 17.1 miles, but I have a 10 miler planned for Thursday morning, plus a couple other short runs this week, so I won't have a problem reaching my goal of 26.2 miles.

The weather was so nice on Saturday; I decided to stay at the beach afterwards to get a little sun.  Before leaving SoBe, I stopped at Joe’s Stone Crabs to pick up some lunch.  Delicious!

Yummy stone crabs!

The half of the weekend that was not so great was Sunday when I woke up feeling like crap!  I was so disappointed because I was supposed to go to my first Red Sox Spring Training game in Ft. Myers.  The thought of driving over there, sitting in the sun all day and driving home was not appealing, so I bailed.  However, like any die-hard Sox fan, I got online and bought a ticket for a game next week.  I can not let another March go by with out going to a Spring Training game.  Besides, I had bought a new baseball and two new Sharpies so I could try and get some autographs before the game.  For now, my ball will sit blank on my counter for the next week, so sad.  Oh well, something to look forward to!

My sad little baseball with no autographs

I am not really sure what was wrong with me yesterday, but I do feel better today and I plan on sweating the rest of it out of my system at tonight’s spin class.  The teacher on Monday is amazing!  Can’t wait for class!

Make it a great week everyone!

ABCs of me & annoying spin class

First up, annoying spin class… Last night after work I attended spin class at the gym here at work.  I just re-signed up for the gym after a 3 year hiatus.  Reason for the break, I really didn’t like any of the instructors and/or classes they offered.  Nothing motivated me to get to the gym.  Now with summer fast approaching and knowing I would want a class in a/c through the hot summer months, I figured I would give the gym a shot.

I decided I would go to spin class on Mondays & Wednesdays because these classes would be taught by two instructors I had never had before.  I do not like the spin instructor they have in the mornings, the class is more of his “show” and that bugged me.  I was all excited to attend my first spin class last night but as I was walking into the studio, the gym manager says “Oh ‘morning spin class teacher’ is subbing for Tina tonight.”  What!?  Aaaahhhh!  His class was as annoying and boring as I remembered.  All I want from a spin instructor is someone who turns down the lights, turns up the music and barks instructions at us for an hour, is that too much to ask? :)   

What do you expect from your spin or fitness instructors?

So runDisney is giving participants of the Princess Half Marathon a $20 discount on registration for the 2012 Disney Marathon if you register by May 15^th.  Remember how I said I would decide in July whether or not to run the marathon? 

Well, this is the first discount I have seen Disney give for a race, and Disney + Discount = Irresistable to me so I do believe I will make the marathon running decision by May 15^th.  I am definitely leaning more towards “yes”, but I need to let the fact that I would be running 26.2 miles, at one time, sink in for a bit.

FYI... the Cupcake Marathon is up to over 150 participants.  They are hoping to reach 200 by Sunday!  What a fun way to motivate myself over the next couple of weeks!

ABCs of me

This post is making the rounds so I thought I'd do it too! Here it goes......

(A) Age: 33

(B) Bed Size: Full

(C) Chore You Really Dislike: Washing the floors

(D) Dogs: No thanks

(E) Essential Start To Your Day: Coffee

(F) Favorite Color: Blue

(G) Gold or Silver: Silver or white gold

(H) Height: 5'2”

(I) Instruments You Play: Unfortunately none

(J) Job Title: Account Executive

(K) Kids: No ….I mean none

(L) Live: Miami

(M) Mom's Name: Marie

(N) Nicknames: Blondie, Princess, Heath, HB

(O) Overnight Hospital Stays: Once

(P) Pet Peeve: Stupid people

(Q) Quote From A Movie: "Liver alone, get it?  Liver alone”

(R) Right or Left Handed: Right

(S) Siblings: 1 younger sister nicknamed Cheekies!

(T) Time You Wake Up: 6am

(U) Underwear: Not always

(V) Vegetable You Dislike: None

(W) What Makes You Run Late: Me

(X) X-Rays: I think I've had one of my kidney when I was little

(Y) Yummy Food You Make: Thai Shrimp Pasta

(Z) Zoo, Favorite Animal: Lions, tigers, cheetahs… love the big cats!