Half Marathon

Well, I can officially say that I have attended a Marathon now.  Friday morning after dropping Blake off at Mother's Day Out, I came back to pick up Jill, and she, Connor and I headed off to Nashville.  My sister-in-law was going to bringing my niece, so Connor wanted to tag along and hang out with Susie.  First stop...Target.  Can't go to Nashville without a Target and Panara stop, right?  After these two stops we headed downtown to the Expo to gather our t-shirts and race bib (number) and wander around the Expo to see all of the cool things to buy.  Connor was so terrific.  We had to walk a pretty good distance from our car to the Expo and then lots of walking inside.  He did ride on my back several times, but he never complained.  He did ask every few minutes if we were almost done, but no complaining.  It could have been disasterous, but it was a very pleasant experience for the 3 of us. 

After we left the Expo headed to our hotel to meet the in-laws and my niece and drop Connor off with them.  Then, Jill and I headed out to Opry Mills for some shopping and meeting up with some of the other girls doing the race.  I use to not like shopping by myself or being by myself, but I guess after being a mom, sometimes you just need a few minutes of alone, quiet time.  So, we split up and I just meandered around the kid's clothing stores.  I hate buying clothes for myself.  It is so hard for me to find things I like or fit good but on the other hand, I LOVE to buy clothes for my kids. 

After we left there, we headed to pick up my sister-in-law from the hotel and off to eat supper at the Tin Angel.  We met up with 4 other people that were doing the race that we knew from the Y.  We had such a great time together.  Not to mention the great food.  I had the All In Pasta with added Shrimp.  It was pasta (obviously) with diced tomatoes, artichoke and spinach in it.  I just discovered a few weeks ago that I really like, no, LOVE artichoke.  Obviously I've eaten it before in spinach and artichoke dip, but never big chunks in food until about 3 weeks ago.  I love it!!  Everyone enjoyed their food.

Race day had finally come.  Unfortunately due to early knee injuries, my doctor said it was not going to be possible for me to race this time.  My father-in-law got up very early with Joy and Jill to get them to the start line.  They were there by 5:15 ready to go!  We met back up with them at mile 9 around 8:15.  How neat to watch all of these people that have trained for months all racing for the same finish line.  After watching all of our people race past the 9 mile mark we hopped back in the van and headed to the finish line.  We didn't see any of them finish.  But, they all did finish!!!  Just as we started heading back to the car it started raining.  And, we had a fairly good distance to go in the rain.  Thankfully, it didn't rain really hard the entire time back to the car.  Once we all got back to the car we went back to the hotel.  We had all planned to eat lunch together but due to the weather, I decided it was in my best interest to head back home. 

What a great weekend.  I hope that next year I'm able to run with them.  Connor is wanting to take part in the Kid's Marathon next year as well as my niece and nephew.  What fun that will be!!