Weekly Runs in Review

During this lovely holiday week, I had a lot of running to do. 

 Already tired from the last two weeks of running, I knew it would feel a bit tough to get in this "big week mileage," before I get a rest week, next week. 

While my legs can certainly attest to being tired, I'm really happy with all my mileage. I had a great 6 mile run with a friend on Wedneday, which made the miles fly by (and gave me a "bonus mile" since I was only supposed to do 5), and Ed ran my 10 miler with me while we were in Orange County. We left early enough to catch the cool weather, and we were able to keep a good pace, 10:47 average, with a 9:33 final mile.

 To say the 3 miler on Christmas was hard would be an understatement, but Ed kept me going. And, that got me 101 miles between Thanksgiving and Christmas (not sure if this 'counts' exactly, since it includes the run on Thanksgiving and Christmas, but I'm still proud, since this is significantly more mileage than I've run in a long time). 

I'm still on the fence about this week's long run - it's supposed to be a recovery week of only 7 miles, but the idea of running a half marathon on New Year's Eve sounds appealing (or it did before all the mileage this week :P). 

In any event, I'm happy to be going into 2012 as a runner!

Transitions

At dinner this past week, Ed and I had the good fortune to spend some time with a small group of friends, including a visiting friend, who currently lives many miles away. At that dinner, she made the comment of how exciting it was to be getting older, since age is bringing with it so many exciting changes, as those in our circle move up in their careers to those next levels.

I can count myself among those "moving up."

While I had no notions of taking this on so "soon" in my teaching career, I was approached my by principal a few weeks ago and asked if I would be willing to take on a student teacher.

It seems not so long ago that I was a student teacher myself. I don't think I ever mentioned too much about it on here but, suffice to say, it was not a good experience (though, my first semester was lovely. I couldn't have asked for a better placement. It was just what happened from January on that was not so great). I still feel, in many respects, like a new teacher, so it's definitely an intimidating prospect to be acting as the expert teacher and helping a new person (who, I think, is older than me!) learn about this exceptional of careers.

Still, I think I am ready for this. I am so excited to be hopefully helping a new person into the profession, and share my wonderful class (though, selfishly, I wonder if I'll be as gracious in sharing my class once I have to sit quietly to the side as someone else teaches my kids).

I sincerely hope I can do justice to this role, but I feel that this marks a new phase in my teaching career.

Weekly Running in Review

This week marks the 4th consecutive week of running, as I get into full swing of my training. I've been feeling really great, especially with my 9 miler yesterday, where I had a 10:32 average pace, and a last mile of 9:42! This is speedy for me, so I'm thrilled. I was also proud to have gone for a run between my staff meeting and a parent night meeting on Wednesday, even though my coworkers thought that I was a little crazy. It really helped to break up the evening, and was a wonderful stress reliever.

Coming up, I get to look forward to a 5 miler on Wednesday and a 10 miler down in Orange County on Christmas Eve.

It's fun to be a runner again!

Flashback to Fall

(As I've mentioned, my poor camera bit the dust back in October. As as result, there's been a bit of a dearth of pictures in my posts (though I'm doing what I can to get around that). I finally got around to getting the pictures of my poor no-longer-with-us camera, so I can post about a really great weekend Ed and I had with his brother and sister in law. )

One of our goals, that I believe I've mentioned on here, is to take advantage of all the Bay Area has to offer this year, since we don't know where the future will take us. In light of this, Keven and Noemi came out from Visalia mid-October to join us at the Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival. 

We decided to help out with the nightmare that was sure to be parking, we would head over the hill early and partake in a 5k race that was being held that morning. 

We got there at the perfect time to snag some free parking, pick up our complimentary race schwag (i.e. a shirt and a very cute pumpkin), and cheer for the 10kers and the kids, whose races were before ours.

Before we knew it, it was time to jump in the group and get ready for our race to start. With a kiss, Ed headed to the front. I've often wondered what it would be like to be him in a race, toeing the front line with the other leaders (he would end up placing 5th overall, 1st in his age group, with a respectable time of 18:29). I headed to the back and ran with Keven and Noemi for a bit, before deciding to actually race this and pull ahead. 

And here, ladies and gentlemen, is where my camera bit the dust. I pulled it out to take the picture above, but when I pressed the power off button, the lense wouldn't go back in. It just made and unhappy sound and gave me an error message. 

So, I just have those views in my memory - running along the bluffs with gorgeous ocean views. It was probably for the best, since it let me focus on running fast, to get the time of 30:32, definitely one of my faster times in a while. Keven and Noemi finished their first 5ks that day as well!

After the run, we changed into some "real" clothes, including our race shirts, and headed into the festival to enjoy some pumpkin inspired treats. 

We began with a pumpkin shake, feeling good that we were helping out a high school volleyball team, who were making the shakes. It tasted exactly like pumpkin pie, in a shake. 

We enjoyed seeing the giant pumpkins, and all the crafts, though Ed and I were a bit disappointed that the Pumpkin festival didn't actually have that many pumpkins. We had envisioned more a pumpkin patch with craft booths, rather than the craft portion of a farmer's market, which was what this reminded me of. 

Still, it was fun. I got a beautiful glass blown pumpkin Christmas ornament (that currently looks spectacular on our tree), and we had pumpkin ice cream, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin bread, garlic fries, and roasted turkey sandwiches. It made us feel glad that we had at least burned a few calories that morning. 

Mid afternoon, we headed home, glad to be crossing one more bay area specialty off of our list!

Menu Planning Sunday

Since I need to go grocery shopping imminently, I thought I'd go ahead and do one of these posts - despite the lack of alliteration, these do make a bit more sense coming on a Sunday :).

Sunday - (after seeing this blog post, I feel quite inspired to have burgers and fries for dinner, with the requisite goat cheese and carmelized onions) Turkey burgers, with goat cheese, carmelized onions, sweet potato fries, and cilantro lime salad.

Monday - Baked chicken with leftover quinoa and zucchini


Tuesday - soft tacos


Wednesday - Out to dinner with friends!


Thursday - latin chicken with Spanish rice (Ed's new "dish")


Friday - I'm thinking out - to celebrate the start of winter break!

(oh, how much more interesting this post would be with pictures....)

Christmas Cookies: Peanut Butter Blossoms

When I was young, I think Christmastime was always synonymous with cookies. We would spend days cooking up our classic choices, filling tin upon tin. Candy Cane. Fudge. Raspberry Thumbprint. Sugar. Walnut Crescents. Russian Tea. Peanut Butter. This was the only time of year for making these treats, and we all relished in reaching in for one or two (or five) after dinner (or really any time at all).

Since I've been on my own, I've made cookies rarely during the holidays, except as gifts for parent volunteers in my classroom. It's not exactly waistline friendly to stockpile cookies for the two of us. I sort of lack impulse control for these kinds of things.

But, with a holiday work party this weekend, I decided it would be the perfect time to spend the day baking, with the plan of sending most of them to the party or with Ed tomorrow when he goes to visit his brother and sister in law. That way, I could get the fun of baking, but only have a small, more reasonable amount for us at home.

After thinking long and hard, I decided on three kinds of cookies to make, over the next week or so.

The Peanut Butter ones were first.

I have very fond memories of making these, from rolling ball after ball of dough in the sugar, to pressing the Hershey's kiss in each one, to "checking" them later, accidentally (or on purpose?) deflating the melted kisses, and then claiming that those would have to be eaten.

I may or may not have had 4 or 5 of these today (with the excuse that, since I collapsed the cookie *accidentally* I would have to eat it, and I feel exactly as if I was 10 again, only much happier :). These cookies are childhood, in just a few bites. 

Peanut Butter Blossoms

2 14-oz cans sweetened condensed milk

1 1/2 cups peanut butter

4 cups bisquick

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

granulated sugar

Preheat oven to 375. In a large mixer bowl, mix sweetened condensed milk and peanut butter until smooth. Add bisquick and vanilla and mix well, using mixer. Shape into 1 inch balls and roll in sugar. Place 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheet. Bake 6-8 minutes, or until lightly browned. Immediately push hershey's kiss into each cookie.

Contentment

Right now Ed is at his holiday party, and I'm here, alone, on a Friday night. Now, going into this, I felt that I should be a little bummed to not be there (logistically, it would only work if I drove myself out, and timing would have been a bit tight). Last night, we made the decision that I'd stay home.

Can I just say, after busy Fridays the last few weeks, that having this whole evening with nothing urgent planned is just amazing. It helped that I had a blast teaching my kids today - I really am getting more confident in my teaching abilities, which is helping me to have more fun with my kids (by my more relaxed teaching). I also feel like we're starting to come together as a class - I'm getting to know the kids more, and they seem to be getting even more comfortable with one another. I had my last time being filmed teaching science for a while this afternoon, and I felt like it went a lot better than the last time. The kids were thoroughly excited/grossed out by putting a cracker and some vinegar in a plastic bag and smooshing it up to simulate the stomach, and had a great time. I was also so much less nervous, because I trusted myself to teach a good lesson (unlike last time, where I was so worried about what my observor would think).

I felt so energized after such a fun day, I even came home and cleaned the house a bit! Then, I made some Christmas ornaments, using some clear glass ornaments I bought yesterday. Now, I'm sitting down to dinner, with a lovely glass of wine and a good book, while all the candles are burning, the tree is lit, and Christmas music is playing in the backgroud.

I'll be glad when Ed comes home in a few hours, but I sure needed this lovely, relaxing night.