Tis the season for family vacations! Missee mentioned her recent vacation to Sybil Lake in a recent post. We also just returned from an amazing week at Two Inlets Lake near Park Rapids, MN. There is nothing quite like a week at the lake in Minnesota. If you were to ask me what we do during our week at the lake, I would tell you that we do very little. Most of our day is spent relaxing by the beach or the pool, sitting on the cabin's deck or on a wooden swing by the lake, reading, playing games, and running. This year we also added golfing to our list of activities. My son and I have been trying to learn the game of golf. Our resort has a wonderful little Par 3 course that we visited twice. Both times we were golfing, we were the only two on the course. It was a great place to give golf a try. Running was especially fun for the whole family this year. I have two high school cross country runners in my family. Their coaches have set a running challenge this summer. This challenge has been great motivation for my teen runners. The photo above was taken during a late afternoon run. Despite our smiles, I was realizing that I cannot run past 9:00 AM. For you afternoon or evening runners, I commend you! During a few solo morning runs, I had some deer friends watching me from the woods. We had a wonderful week at Two Inlets Lake! Happy Running! -Stephanie *Care to Comment? During vacation, I tried to run at 4:00 PM on one day with my kids. It was so tough for me! One of my children said that they prefer that time. What time of the day do you like to exercise?
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This year will mark my husband's and my 25th wedding anniversary. I once met a woman who said that birthdays can be taken for granted but anniversaries should be celebrated because you have to work for those. Like anything else, some days are more work than others, and 25 years is a lot of practice! The group of foodservice directors I used to meet up with often (most have now retired) used to clarify when we would announce our upcoming wedding anniversaries with "to the same guy!" It is a reason to celebrate; no one announced their own birthdays, but were happy to accept and extend good wishes on anniversaries. Bobby and I had one of the worst/most adventurous honeymoons ever back in 1994. Any vacation that involves the ER, car repair, the cops (x2) and a realtor is not going to turn out well. We came home early ill, homeless, 2 new bikes short and a speeding ticket to pay. Needless to say, it took ten years to venture out on another vacation just the two of us. Since then, we've enjoyed vacations on some of our bigger anniversaries to Seattle and Vermont. It took months, but we have finally settled on a destination for the 25th--Portland, Maine. While our anniversary is in August, we will be traveling in October and hopefully catching the changing of the leaves in Maine. We are planning to fly out on a Saturday and I will be running the half marathon as part of the Maine Marathon on Sunday morning. Besides the race which looks like it will have beautiful scenery on the out and back course, we are looking at mackerel fishing, whale watching, eating lobster and visiting lighthouses as possible excursions. Because of the location of the race, we splurged a little on a downtown hotel that is walking distance to the race as well as the ocean.
While there were options for both a half and full marathon at this event, I decided that I would like to focus on building speed and strength for a half vs distance training for a full marathon. I looked into several programs and decided on Hal Higdon's Advanced (maybe they should call it "Experienced") program because it had a nice balance of speed and distance. One of the things that will be really different for me is that the weekend long runs are by time rather than miles. That was really nice yesterday when it was hot--no pressure to keep going longer than the 90 minutes no matter the pace. Other weeks when I feel particularly good or the weather is ideal, maybe I'll get more mileage in the same amount of time but either is fully completing the workout. During the week there are runs that are faster intervals, tempo runs and occasional runs at race pace. We booked our trip just in time for me to do Week 1 already this week. Eleven more to go! Summer vacation is about halfway done. I have done a lot so far this summer but am glad it's not time for school to start again just yet so I can do even more fun and/or ambitious things. Unfortunately, the days are already getting a little shorter. Maybe another week or two and I'll need reflectors on 5:00am runs and then comes the headlamps when it stays dark for most of the early runs. In the meantime, I try not to complain about hot weather because it will get colder all too soon. Besides, I have the treadmill option in our air conditioned basement if I feel like I can't do the heat or humidity. Enjoy your summer fun and happy running--Missee whWe have just returned from our favorite week of the year, that being our week on Sybil Lake near Vergas. We started doing a week at a cabin in 2001 when our youngest son, David, was 1. He is now 19. We have hop-skipped around the lake to 6 different cabins renting from 5 different parties. Thankfully the last two have been pet friendly because that's about when Charlie joined the family. It is a week where we can slow down, ditch the technology and enjoy each other's company while fishing, swimming, running, reading, playing board games and of course, eating fun foods. David managed to borrow two stand-up paddleboards from a friend the past two years which we have enjoyed a ton. It's relaxing and a good balance workout to be out paddling plus its super quiet. I also like to be able to "creep" a little on the other lake places and see the beautiful homes, boats and even enjoyed watching a bald eagle flying overhead. Charlie seems to think he is the captain of these little boats and sits right up front where he's got an excellent view while wearing his life jacket. The life jacket isn't so much to keep him from sinking as it is to provide a handle to pluck him back out of the water if he falls in. Happy to report that Charlie fell in twice during the week and I didn't fall off even once. I finished these two novels on vacation. They were both mysteries. The Driscoll author is English (from England) and there are words and phrases that are different than we say here, so kind of fun to try to figure it out. Linda Castillo writes about a main character who is formerly Amish and the current chief of police in the area where she grew up so she has an understanding of Amish culture but yet they don't always like to deal with her because she used to be Amish. I've read/listened to a number of these books and enjoy them. As far as the fun foods on vacation, my kids always want monster cookies and Chex Mix. Because we have several gluten free folks, I have to make our Chex Mix to avoid Wheat Chex, pretzels and the bagel chips. I substitute extra Rice and Corn Chex, Cheerios and GF pretzels in our mix. I made a double batch which ran out about two days before we came home. Perfect. Monster cookies can be GF without modifications other than to use uncontaminated peanut butter and GF oats. When the kids were smaller and we all ate gluten, we enjoyed more of our meals at a local cafe called the Loon's Nest, but eating out is a little tougher now, so we ate there four times instead of once a day on our peak years. I try not to make the meals too complex; after all, it is my vacation, too, and who wants to spend the whole time cooking. I make some GF lasagnas ahead of time that we eat there and then mostly stuff on the grill. I did homemade GF pizza for the first time (at the lake) on day and we had GF pancakes with cheesy eggs another day which was another first, but easy. The roads around the lake are very hilly compared to home and most of them are gravel. My pace was greatly slowed by these two factors, but I took the attitude to just go longer if I couldn't go faster. I ran 33.5 miles on five runs. Solid! I was also "reading" while I ran through my Aftershokz and finished a Needlepoint Mystery by midweek. I am currently listening to Columbine which is a reporter's accounting that combines interviews from families, law enforcement, the media and others closely involved in the school shooting from April of 1999. It is a sad tale but interesting, too. This photo doesn't show much of the hill into our driveway, but it is a pretty scene and truly was a big hill. And there was this creepy fellow who got a new shirt since last year. Every day is a beautiful day for a run at Sybil Lake! I'm starting to notice that I take a lot of selfies with Charlie. My daughter misses and loves her dog, so a lot of them go to her before they make the blog. Charlie tries not to miss anything fun on vacation, including any photo ops! Last time, Stephanie reported on her Gluten Free Anniversary. I have been GF for about 9 years and I totally agree with her sentiments especially with social functions and eating out. I've got a couple of advantages besides more experience. Two of my kids are also GF, so when I make family meals, they are heavier on the GF end with some gluten-containing options sometimes available to the others. With more people, it also helps the variety of food because it's hard to keep eating the same stuff again and again. The extra GF people also make it easier when we go out because the wait staff is more keenly aware of the need to be careful at our table although eating out is often tough. I live in an area that is more metropolitan and have many more options for buying foods although I still sometimes order stuff through Amazon Pantry such as noodles...way cheaper and so convenient. Today David and I found the most amazing deal. Mixin' It Up Bakery in Sauk Rapids had Mini Donut Day. They fired up their GF donut machine for 2 hours to get fresh, hot mini donuts. David works in a donut trailer for concessions events that is not GF, so he was really excited to be able to eat donuts similar to what he makes for others. They were $5 per bag, similar to carnival pricing, and incredible! (The link above it to their website, but it seems like there is more info on their Facebook page.) I've got two kids getting married next summer so we are already exploring the GF options for catered meals and wedding cake. No worries, Stephanie, you will get a delicious, filling meal AND dessert at these social outings. I hope everyone is able to enjoy some sort of vacation or stay-cation this summer and that it includes both some running and some fun foods. Happy running! Missee
**Care to Comment?**What would you like to know from us? Put your questions to Stephanie or me (or both) in the comments section and we'll do our best. One year ago, on July first to be exact, I started eating a gluten free diet. I actually have given up other foods as well including peanuts, cottage cheese, bananas, mushrooms, and lemon. I also limit my dairy foods. Why did I decide to eat a diet that eliminated so many foods that I enjoyed daily? After years of dealing with stomach issues (especially while running), I decided to take a food sensitivity test from Everlywell. The test determined that I was highly reactive to peanuts and moderately reactive to mushroom, gluten, wheat, lemon, cottage cheese, and cows milk. There were also fifteen foods that made it to my mild reactive list and 72 on low reactive. I decided not to even deal with the mild reactive list and stick to the highly reactive and moderate reactive items. On July 1, 2018, I decided to cut out peanuts, gluten, wheat, cottage cheese, lemon, mushroom, and bananas. I will eat foods with milk in them, but would not drink a glass of milk. What has been good about my food elimination diet? I feel better. I have less trips to the bathroom when I am out running. Mainly, I just feel better. What are the challenges as I see them? Food is very social. When I attend a gathering, food is almost always involved. I quietly scan the food options looking for what I can eat so that I do not draw attention to my plate. There are almost always things that I can eat. It is difficult to turn down treats. I work as an elementary teacher. When students bring birthday treats, I either need to decline the treat or accept it and tell them I will "eat it later." My family is supportive, but does not prefer eating a gluten free diet so I often plan to make dinner with and without gluten. After a long day of work however, I often make dinner with gluten and give up on making a separate item for myself. I end up eating something else. Going out to a restaurant is difficult. Many restaurants do not have gluten free options on their menu, but more restaurants are offering gluten free items. Even after eating a gluten free item a restaurant, I sometimes have stomach issues. I used to love going out to eat. I have learned to cook at home and eat out occasionally. While this diet has helped me personally, it is important to remember that it is not for everyone.
Happy Running! -Stephanie |
AuthorMissee and Stephanie are two Minnesota sisters and moms who love to run. We are not experts in running, parenting or anything else, but we do have years of experiences that may be helpful or entertaining to others. Archives
May 2020
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