Marathon for the Cure GIVEAWAY!

Some of you have donated to Marathon for the Cure and Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer (Thank you!!). There is research being done now that could find the CURE! And women are getting mammograms who would not be able to afford the test otherwise. I am PROUD to be a member of Team Marathon running Rock N Roll San Antonio for the Cure in memory of my sweet mom, Carolyn.

In honor of her, I wanted to have a piece of jewelry as my first giveaway. My mom loved jewelry. It never had to be fancy or anything like that, but she loved having special things to wear. She would pull out her necklaces and show them to me when I was really little and I would watch her put earrings on in the morning and wish I could wear them :-)

A friend of mine who has a REALLY cute Etsy shop, "The Dangle Shoppe" offered to donate one of her pieces to one of my readers for this giveaway.


Her description: "I call it “Milk chocolate and caramel wire knot bracelet”. The wire is a non-tarnish bronze finish. The side beads are just gold colored glass. It can fit a wrist up to 9 ¼” around. For smaller wrists, they can use a hole farther up the bracelet and let the end dangle.


Milk chocolate?? Yes please! Go to her site and look around. She has a lot of great pieces. I won't lie- I really LOVE the pink drop bracelet and all of the earrings! Want!!

To the guys, I know this probably isn't your "style" ;-) but I am sure there is a lovely lady who you may know that deserves this, right?

HOW DO YOU ENTER?

REQUIRED:

1. Go to The Dangle Shoppe's Etsy Page and look around and come back and tell me what your favorite piece is!

Bonus Entries:

1. Become a follower to my blog or let me know you already are in a comment! Who's going to be lucky 14?? ;) Plus- you'll want to know if you won, right??

2. Donate any amount to the Marathon for the Cure by going to my donation page here and leave me a comment letting me know you did. Leave a comment still if you already have donated :-)

3- Share this Giveaway via Blogger, Facebook, Twitter or tell a friend. Leave a comment for each

4- Tell me about how Breast Cancer has affected your life or the lives of those you love. Leave a Comment.

• THANK YOU to everyone who has given to the cause, together we are making a difference!!

• Giveaway will End on Sunday, October 3rd and the Winner will be announced on October 4th

Terry Hershey Park 20 miler

***Just so you know- I will be starting a giveaway tomorrow! It's my first ever on this blog and I am SO excited!!! There will also be more to come so just keep your eyes out for it all!***

So, holy moly! I discovered an AMAZING park yesterday! I have been googling places to run in the area and this one came up. It's about 25mins away but it was so worth it! It was absolutely amazing! It was a paved trail and there was an 8mile out and back trail one way and then a few miles going the other way. Perfect for long runs!

My only complaint: their map. I probably spent like 20-15 mins looking at the maps along the way. I just would get to these forks and not know which way to go. The maps didn't show forks- it just showed where the trail as a whole was supposed to go. So, I just had to sort've follow the other runners and bikers hoping they were going where I wanted to.

Oh man- lots of hills too! My mantra throughout the whole thing: "it's just a hill, get over it!" It actually worked!! I will be spending a lot of time here I think. I am so excited! It was beautiful too. Other great thing: lots of amenities! Restrooms along the way in a few places and lots of water fountains and showers! So cool! I'll give it an A+ :-) I just wish I knew it existed! It's perfect!

My first 10 miles were dedicated to Alex. You can learn about her here. It was so fitting because the Lupus foundation was having an event through out the park. There were pictures around the trail of people who had suffered from cancer and it really just hit close to home for thinking about my mom and thinking about Alex. I won't lie- I might've shed a tear. Heh, I let all the other runners think it was sweat :-) Then the rest of it- I just kept thinking about my mom and when I got to mile 18 I was back at my car and I was just like- if mom could get through it you can go one more mile out and back! So that's what I did! I struggled and stopped to fill up my h20 bottles and it was so stinking hot- but I finished strong.

So, tomorrow be on the lookout for my first ever giveaway! I am really excited about it! It'll be to help jump start my fundraising for the Marathon for the Cure (Susan G Komen).

Where the sidewalk ends...

No really. I just have to ask- why is it that sidewalks just randomly end? I really try to stay safe on runs and out of the road, but it doesn't help when the sidewalks just randomly end.

I am trying to plan my 22 miler for tomorrow and I am struggling. I hate hate hate going in loops. I know, I should be thankful that I'm not on the mill, but seriously! There are some great roads that just go on FOREVER but the downside- no sidewalks. There isn't even like the "emergency lane" or whatever it's called. I could go on the grass on the side, however, I tried that last weekend and I just ended up turning around because it was a complete mud pit.

I understand if a sidewalk ends but turns into a neighborhood because the other areas are undeveloped, but why is it that when you cross the road the sidewalk keeps going and then it just suddenly stops. Did the person putting in the sidewalk just give up and say "eh, it's Houston. who'd actually be outside? No one needs a sidewalk here." I completely beg to differ- I NEED it!! Or maybe the person had some scary experience and thought it would be best to save someone else from going beyond the edge of the sidewalk? I don't know... I just think it's ridiculous.

So, I have come up with a hopeful solution. I found a "trail" online that should be pretty good. It's an 8 mile out and back so... 16 in total. At least that's what it said. You never really know. I know, it'll almost be like a loop, but hopefully it won't be so bad. Wish me luck! If I can't do the trail, I am back to the 3 mile loop in my neighborhood. That's a lot of loops... Not to mention- a lot of loops where I could potentially pass my "arch-nemesis". I won't say too much about her. What I will say is that she is usually out running when I am and I have waved and said hello every single time I've seen her and all I have ever gotten are dirty looks. Maybe it was because I was waving like an idiot with a goofy smile while sweat was pouring off of me... who'd want to be friends with that sort of a weirdo??? Haha, oh well. She's missing out I guess ;-)

Well, here is hoping that tomorrow's 22-er will go well and I won't have to deal with sidewalks ending in the middle of it :-)

PS: The first 10 of these miles are for a girl named Alex who was diagnosed with Lupus. Cancer just plain sucks. As always- the rest are for my mom <3

Way to motivate

Whenever I go out for a run I never consider that someone I actually know will see me. Especially since we've moved here TX. I don't know a ton of people here yet so the chances of people actually knowing me is VERY slim!

Well, Monday morning I was "spotted" if you will. It was a great run for the most parts. There were a few parts where I wishing that my legs would show up to the party, but other than that- it was great. The weather was fantastic! There was actually a breeze!! That never happens in the Houston area... no really. The wind shows up for hurricanes but that's about it. Anyways, it was a good 6 miler our and back run.

I had work after the run and a co-worker came up to me and said "I saw you running this morning!" The first thing that came to mind was "oh my gosh... I hope I didn't look like a complete idiot. Hope he didn't see me when I got to that one corner and felt like I was going to die."

He then proceeded to tell me how motivating it was to see me out running. Huh? What? See, I work at a gym and most of my co-workers are pretty fit and they exercise quite a bit and I sometimes feel a little intimidated. So, when he said it was motivating I was a little baffled. He then explained that he wanted to start getting out and exercising in the morning. He was all excited and kept coming up to me for the rest of the day and saying, "I am going to start this tomorrow morning. I feel real good about it." He even thanked me for going out running that morning. He isn't a runner (yet) but maybe someday!

I guess that made me feel pretty good- even though I am still pretty embarrassed that someone actually saw me haha... I know I get wicked sweaty and can look like a total wreck- but it's nice to know that all the hard work I put into my runs are noticed and sometimes even enough to motivate.

Want to hear another secret? My dad and his girlfriend went on a cruise to Alaska this last week (lucky!). My sister called me last night and she told me that my dad told her that on one of the last days there the cruise had a 5k walk that was benefiting cancer. So, I guess it was like x amount of laps around the boat. Now, you need to understand that my dad's health isn't in tip top shape and I do worry about him often. He has a lot of health conditions, but one that makes his life more difficult is that his legs sometimes go numb on him and he can't walk for long periods of time and is in a lot of pain. But, guess what? He walked the stinkin' 5k!! It took him a while, but he did it! I think that's motivating! I know he's probably hurting from it- but someone who has a hard time walking totally stepped up to the plate and got it done! Way to be, Dad!!

hubby, me and my dad- April 2010

Has anyone ever told you that you motivate them? What motivates you?

Running For The Cure

Most of you know that I am a HUGE supporter of breast cancer research. I have run quite a few races that support cancer research and I always feel great about it. It is such a close-to-home cause for me. I lost my mother 14 years ago to cancer when I was 11 years old. It changed my life forever. Not only do I always run in my mom's memory, I also run for all the kids who have lost a parent to cancer. I don't care what kind of cancer it is because all types of cancer just suck. It's just such an awful thing to lose your parent as a young child and it shouldn't have to happen. I was with my 11 year old niece this last week and I just kept thinking- this was the age I was when I lost my mom.

Anyways, I have decided that for the San Antonio Rock N Roll Marathon on 11/14/2010 that I will be joining Susan G. Komen's "Marathon for the Cure". This means that I am fundraising for the cause! I have never done a fundraiser like this and I always feel awkward asking people for money (esp. people I don't know) however, I feel like this is a cause that has affected most of us in some way or another and it's a cause worth fighting.

If you would like to donate to the cause you can check out my fund-raising site:

Running For Carolyn

I am trying to come up with some sort of a giveaway to help make this a little more exciting, so keep your eyes out for that!

Thank you for all of your support!

Let's hit the ground running and finish cancer!!

A visit to NH

So, this last week I had the opportunity to go and visit my hometown in New Hampshire :-) It was my sister's 40th birthday and her husband wanted to surprise her by having me come out. I had such a fun time! She and I are actually going to be running the Disney Princess Half Marathon in February!

Her family have been getting into running and they have two young girls (8 and 11) and over the summer they had them running a mile loop a few times during the week. They made a goal as a family that at the end of the summer all of them would run the loop 2x. I was lucky enough to be able to participate in their family run. We stuck together for the 2 loops and the younger one did great! Then my sister, me and her older daughter ran for a 3rd lap while the younger one and my brother-in-law stayed behind. I did this lap pretty fast (7:37) and my brother-in-law wanted to "race" another lap with me because he had never been able to do it faster than 7:50 so he wanted some "competition". So we did the last lap together. He did it in 7:19 and I finished in 7:23. I am so proud of their family. The girls are learning the importance of being healthy.

It was so fun running with them- but holy crap- hills! For example, yesterday my sister and I headed out on a 3 mile run and whew.... I won't lie, it was a little rough. Then I was like "you know what? I have the opportunity to run on hills, I should tackle my old XC course." My sister lives down the street from the course so we headed over there after stopping at home to round up the family. I ran to the course (1 mile) and then I decided I just wanted to do the 2nd mile of the course- it's ridiculous. Hills, hills and more hills. Basically you are running up a ski slope... no really... there is a ski lift at the top of the hill and it's an actual skiing place haha... I was dying- esp when I saw the ski lifts! But, I did it! Then we ran up a massive hill on the way home. So, I got all my hills in :-)

It was a great time running with my sister and her family. I am so excited for February!!