A new book, a race, and random

Something cool:
I recently discovered that a new pregnancy book focused on fitness will be released soon! Kristina wrote this gem, and you can find it here on Amazon. I'm so excited for Kristina! And also excited that there will be a newer good book that tackles pregnancy and fitness. I ran through both of my pregnancies. With Kaylee, my first, I was nervous about running and basically stuck to about 35 miles a week of running (even though my doctor said it was fine to keep doing what I had always been doing). I also used the elliptical machine and stationary bike. With Emily, my second, I found "Exercising Through Your Pregnancy", which made me feel so much better about running while being pregnant. During that pregnancy, I averaged 45-55 miles a week, and ran 8 miles the day that I wound up giving birth. "Exercising Through Your Pregnancy" is a decade old though, and I've been wondering when a newer book would be written. And, well, here it is, "Fit & Healthy Pregnancy"!

Hearing about this new book got me thinking about being pregnant and running while pregnant. It would be great if we could get a whole slew of non-pregnant people to read a book like this. The important people around me supported me while I was pregnant and running, but there were still many people who felt the need to make comments insinuating that I was being irresponsible by running. You know, the old: "Is that safe for the baby?" The comment that clearly indicates that they believe it is not, in fact, safe for the baby. The sassy me always wanted to say something snide, but usually I stuck with something like, "Well, my doctor tells me it's safe, so I think it's probably fine..." And then I would be furious for the rest of the day. Those people really need to read this book! Right!? Anyway, you should really check it out, and spread the word!

I have a race this weekend:
Maybe two weeks ago I randomly decided to register for the Derry Boston Prep 16 miler, which is this upcoming Sunday. I am ever so slightly nervous. Like just a tiny bit...It is a notoriously challenging course, run in notoriously difficult conditions. But whatever, I've already registered...

Okay, I'm being a little dramatic. But when you read race reports entitled "practicing death one hill at a time" you start to wonder what you've gotten yourself into. The truth is though, I need this race. I've been running almost all my runs on the treadmill, which I believe helps keep this injury prone runner, injury free, but the fact is the treadmill isn't the same as the road. Since I will be running Boston in April, this race will give me a good idea how well my training is going. I have no idea what to expect for a pace, but I'm planning to find Raelyn and let her teach me a thing or two about the course. I met her on the start line of BayState. She ran about two minutes faster than me at BayState, and she's won Derry in the past, so I'm pretty sure she knows what she's doing. That's my race plan. Stick with Raelyn...There's not much else to say about that. The last two weeks I've run 70 miles (per week). I've had some good workouts, but I'm a bit tired. This week would have been a back off week regardless of the race, so that's good. I hope to run 55-60 miles (including the race).

Random:
I think my kids are fairly normal, but from time to time we find them running around pretending and yelling about the oddest things. Kaylee has (on more than one occasion) run around yelling that she's "hunting". Around Thanksgiving she was constantly pretending to "hunt" for turkeys. She even built a turkey trap with Nana. It was so weird, because we don't hunt or know anyone that does. We do eat turkey though, and we have wild turkeys in our yard all the time, so maybe that's where she gets it from. Yesterday she was pretending to hunt deer...When you add Emily to the mix, things really start getting crazy. We have this soft castle that includes a little princess, knight, and dragon doll. The other day Emily pointed out the knight and said "that's me, that's Emily". She pointed at the princess doll and said, "that's Kaylee", which is sort of funny because when they play "rescue" Emily is always "saving" Kaylee. Anyway, Kaylee heard her and  furiously yelled "I'm not a princess, I'm a bounty hunter!" Just for the record, the bounty hunter thing is a Star Wars reference. Kaylee has seen the original Star Wars Trilogy (once), and has several Star Wars books. But still, it was funny and odd to hear her yell it out like that. Of course, five minutes later they were fighting over who gets to wear mommy's powder blue scarf, so it's not all hunting, knights, and bounty hunters, but you know, they do keep it interesting. So I'm wondering if anyone else's kids pretend crazy stuff?