High Five Friday – Beauty

It’s Friday, I’m in love. It was kind of a week here. Roman was sick and I kept him home from pre-K one day, I fought off getting sick all week and my running schedule suffered. I also had a couple of deadlines I had to work around my schedule. 

What I’m giving a big high five to this Friday, though, is beauty. There was plenty of it in my week, I just had to search for the beautiful moments a little harder. 😉

FIVE FROM INSTAGRAM

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Return of the thermal tights! It got chilly again up here. We even had a dusting of snow on a couple of days. One of the things I like most about running here is the access to trails. Trails are fun! They make my run happier and more beautiful. And since spring has officially sprung, I often find myself imagining what each trail is going to look like once the trees are green again.

Chocolate avocado smoothie. OMG. This is recovery fuel of the gods. It tastes like chocolate pudding. It’s just chocolate milk, half an avocado, chia seeds and ice. Then I sprinkled this bad boy with unsweetened coconut flakes.

New Balance sent me some workout gear to brighten my marathon training – how nice is that? I of course couldn’t wait to try it out…

…So I wore the tights the next day for my run. I usually run right after school/work pick up – I have Fran drop me somewhere so I can run home. So my school pick up outfits are usually pretty colorful, to say the least. 🙂

Speaking of school pick up, last week I collected Roman on swimming day (they have lessons once a week). I asked him how it went and he told me he didn’t like the swimming teacher, because when kids are naughty she makes them get out of the pool. I actually thought that sounded fair enough, but he was judging her pretty harshly.

This week on swimming day, I asked him again how it went and whether he still didn’t like his instructor. “Oh, I like her now, mama!” That was good news, so I said, “I guess she didn’t kick any naughty kids out of the pool today.” His reply: “Yes, she kicked out the naughty kids, it’s just today I wasn’t one of them.” The little monkey didn’t like her because she kicked HIM out of the pool for misbehaving! Talk about withholding key elements of the story. When I asked him what he did to be ejected, he got a mischievous smile on his face and insisted he couldn’t remember. MONKEY.

I digress. Now, that was only four photos and this is High Five Friday…but this one I thought deserved a space of its own. Look at this view on my run:

So beautiful. It’s such a calming view – those mountains are like a watercolor painting on the horizon. What I love most is that while it’s the same lake and sky and mountains, each time I run it’s slightly different. The wind and the waves, or the light filtered through the clouds, changes the view dramatically. It’s a joy to run beside this lake.

FIVE GREAT READS 

Jamie King, the founder of Fit Approach, ran a 100 mile race last month. She wrote about the experience here and I am just in awe of her. She finished in 29:48:14, like a rockstar.

This one is a book a friend sent to me: “Now Everyone Will Know” by Maggie Kneip. ( <- affiliate link). It’s a memoir of the author’s experience of finding out her husband had AIDS and was gay, then keeping it a secret, back in the day when AIDS was not talked about out in the open. What a powerful book. I especially loved what she learned about the difference in your life when you keep secrets versus living life honestly and openly.

I loved this discussion from Susie at SuzLyfe about pacing strategies for racing. In this post she explains subjective pacing strategies and how you can effectively monitor your pace without objective data from your watch. It gave me a lot to think about for the marathon in May.

This recipe – Butternut Squash Pasta with Bacon and Broccoli Rabe – from Michele at Paleo Running Momma, is enough to make me consider finally getting a spiralizer. YUM.

And finally, this week Tina Muir got the news she’s been waiting her whole life to hear – she is running for Great Britain and Northern Ireland this weekend in the World Half Marathon Championships! If you follow Tina’s blog, you know this was her number one running goal and I am just thrilled for her.

How do you pace yourself in a race? By feel or stats? Or both?

What have you read lately that you loved?

I’m linking up with Angela for High Five Friday! Check out her link up for lots more great reads and photos from the week.