Here it is, a week after Thanksgiving, and I'm just getting around to sharing our stories and pictures! Time is flying.
We had a wonderful, restful Thanksgiving holiday with my family. On Thanksgiving morning we kept up our annual tradition of running a 4.8 mile Thanksgiving Day road race all together. Since it was a pretty chilly morning, the girls stayed home with Grandma and Aunt Beth and watched the Macy's Parade on TV. Apparently they were mesmerized! N was making pom poms with Aunt Beth when we returned home so she could dance like all the cheerleaders she had seen.
Grandpa, Uncle Ben, Uncle Zach, Daddy and Mama all ran the race. We had a great time-- it's an exciting race with nearly 15,000 runners, many of them in costume. M killed it with a personal record time of 36:33! I didn't even officially register for the race since I wasn't worried about my time (can't be too fast at 36 weeks pregnant). My only goal was to run as much of the race as I could-- but my plan going in was to walk the first two miles, since almost all of the second mile is a fairly steep uphill grade. I didn't want to kill myself in the first two miles, and then still have 2.8 more to go after that. So I stuck to my plan-- walked the first two miles, ran the next two, took about a .4 mile walk break and then ran to the finish. Everything felt fine, except for the fact that I started to feel my blood sugar plummet at the top of the hill. Luckily, I had brought my "energy gu" (a banana, partially squished for me pre-race by L), so I was able to re-fuel mid-race. Even so, by the time I finished I was starving again! (Don't worry, I had my muffin snack in the car waiting-- and plenty of turkey at home after that!) It has sort of been an unspoken goal of mine to continue my running up until this race, and have this be sort of a "last hoorah" of running for a while. Having achieved that goal, I feel I can give myself leave to taper off the running from here.
| The team, just before our departure on Thanksgiving morning |
The rest of our time at Grandma and Grandpa's house was spent in play, relaxation, eating lots of yummy food, and wonderful family time.
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| L at play, carefully supervised by Grandpa and Uncle Zach |
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| Grandpa, turkey carver extrodionaire |
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| "Doing the Monkey" with the Wiggles one last time before bed |
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| Sisterly play |
We got in a trip to the local children's museum on Friday, and it was a big hit. As there was a 2-1 adult to child ratio, I was allowed some time to sit on my pregnant behind and rest my race-weary legs. Ahhhhhh!
When we got home, the uncles were decorating the yard with Christmas lights. When it got dark later, we had a ceremonial tree lighting and singing of a few carols (N is still convinced that Santa's helpers turned the lights on, and she kept saying that she saw the shadow of Santa's sleigh on the house while we were singing.)
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| Family Photo Op!! |
We have SO many things to be thankful for, and throughout the Thanksgiving weekend I was feeling really aware of how many blessings have been showered upon us. There are too many to mention here... I'll just touch on one. I read a blog post over the holiday about a mom my age who had lost her mother to cancer in the past year. Reading her words, my heart really felt what it must be like to be feel the absence of your mother, and to live with the sadness that your own children will never know her. I think, for a girl especially, a mother's love and guidance are invaluable, and I can't even fathom what it would be like for my girls to be without their grandmother that they love so so much. My grandmother was moved into nursing home care the Friday before Thanksgiving, and so I've been spending a lot of time lately thinking about memories of her in her more healthy days, and appreciating how much my childhood was enriched by her kindness. I'm already thankful beyond words for my own mom, but I felt that thankfulness keenly this year in light of all these thoughts. Words fail to express the ways in which she helps, strengthens and uplifts all of us. My whole family does so much for me, and I'm so thankful for each and every one of them, but I wanted to give particular thanks to my mom. Love you Momma!
I pray that I can continue this advent season in a spirit of thankfulness. I'm already failing at that, but it is still my prayer. I'm glad I had a chance to write about it and remind myself!
Happy Thanksgiving to all!
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