Austin Ironman: It was the Best of Trips, it was the WORST of trips.

Saturday was the long-awaited Ironman race for my darling Hubby.  I was thrilled to go because we were finally going to visit my very best friend and we were so excited to let our kids play together.  (She has a daughter just a little younger than Munchkin Girl).  However, things did not quite go as planned and to an outsider, this trip would probably be considered a monumental disaster...Consider the evidence:

• The day before we left, Munchkin Girl and I came down with terrible colds.  We were both hacking away all night and literally didn't fall asleep until 3:30am the first night.  She woke up every 15 minutes with painful couging that made her cry and sob in agony.  I had no medicine for her cough and was helpless all night.
• Hubby flew down two days later for the Ironman and Frontier LOST his bag.  This bag contained dozens of items to do the Ironman, such as shoes, clothes, etc.  He briefly considered running naked but decided that was a poor option.  On the other hand, we'd already spent thousands of dollars to come to, and he'd spent hundreds of hours training for the grueling 6 hour race.  In the end, he bought all new stuff and did it anyway, which was a huge expense for us and quite a fiasco to drive all around Austin in search of the correct gear.
• After the race, we drove almost 2 hours to San Antonio to take the three kids to Sea World.  They were so excited to go.  To our dismay Sea World is closed during the week.  Who knew?  It was like a Vacation moment...I swear I almost pulled a Chevy Chase and demanded they get Wally World/Sea World open for us.  We ended up going to the San Antonio zoo, which I don't recommend.  If you've ever been there, you know why.  I won't go into detail.  On the way home, we got stuck in traffic and it took us another three hours to get home.  The kids weren't thrilled at all to be stuck in dead-stopped traffic for three hours.
• Lastly, my parents were taking care of the dogs and they got into a teensy fight with a skunk.  All I can say is Yuck.

Amazingly, I still consider it to be a FANASTIC trip.  People always say that during adversity that you find your true friends.  I always knew my friend was a true friend, but this trip brought that out in new and incredible ways.  Consider the evidence:

• We show up sick.  If I'm being honest, I wouldn't have been that thrilled to have sick house-guests.  We had medicine everywhere and we were both coughing constantly.  Not my friend.  She opened her house happily to her germ-challenged friends.  I quote, "I don't care if I get sick.  I'm just happy you're here."  She wasn't just saying it.  She meant it.  It's pretty nice to have someone care that much about you.
• In trying to figure out where everyone would sleep, she literally offerd to sleep on her screened porch if needed.  Again, she meant it.  She would have literally slept outside.  Luckily, we didn't need to take her up on this offer, but she still gave Little Buddy the nursery and put her own daughter to sleep in the Pack and Play in the Master closet.  Her poor little girl didn't even get to nap most days because my Little Buddy was sleeping in her bed, but she did it happily. 
• Before I came, she loaded up on my favorite cereal.  I was so happy.  I love my Quaker Oat Squares.
• After the bag came up missing, she and her husband changed all our plans, dropped everything, and tried to help us find it and her husband spent the entire day helping Hubby at the airport, checking in at the race, and eventually at the bike stores buying all new stuff. 

There are dozens of other ways she was awesome and the best hostess ever, but I can't type forever.  Research shows that women who have supportive best friends have better marriages, are happier, and live more fulfilling lives.  If that's true, then I'm set for life.  I hope all women have a best friend like mine.

The other good news is that our little girls got a jumpstart on being BFFs.  They took every opportunity over the 5 day trip to hold hands.  This went well of course until Little Buddy decided to tackle them and ruin the moment.  Oh well, probably won't be the last time that'll happen.

Have you hit a running slump? Try CrossFit

I'm a bit of a dingbat.  I admit it.  A few years ago I hit a running plateau and decided it was time for a change.  I looked into classes at gyms and the Y, but decided none of them were for me.  Then I found a class at a local studio called Mixed Martial Arts.  I had no idea what that was, but I thought it sounded like a good blend of aerobics and kickboxing or something.  Right?  Well that's what I thought and I got the schedule.  The class was only offered at 5:30am.  That seemed pretty early but I was determined to get out of my slump so I went.  I wore my little Yoga pants and my pink Nike shirt.  I walked in and everyone STARED at me.  It was a room full of heavily tattooed men dressed in jean shorts and cut off shirts.  Welllll....turns out Mixed Martial Arts means Cage Fighting.  Like you might see on TV where they are literally in cages and kick and punch each other.  Oops!  I did not stay for the class.  I think of a few of them were actually slightly disappointed to see me go.

Since then, I have actually found something that is a great solution for that plateau.  Cross Fit.  Have you heard of it?  It's a bit of a secret but when you do find someone who does Cross Fit, they are incredibly passionate about it.  There are a few gyms in major cities that offer classes, but mostly it is something you do on your own, either at home or in the gym.  The reason I think it's a great option for Moms is that the idea is that you work out really really hard, doing specific things, but then you don't have to work out for such a long period of time to get results.  Seriously.  My husband, the orthopedic surgeon, does it every day.  In fact, it is the only program he follows and he has done one Ironman already and is doing another this fall.  When he first started doing it, it seemed a little intense to me.  But soon I became a huge fan because it shortened his workout time dramatically.  At the time, he was working at the hospital from 6am to 8pm every night.  Munchkin Girl was a little over a year and I was pregnant with Little Buddy, so the more time he was around, the better! 

The website is http://www.crossfit.com/ However, I have a better way.  If you have an iPad or iPhone, download the free app called XF Diary.  It's actually geared toward pregnant women doing Cross Fit, so it's a great way to ease into this intense program.  The app will give you a different workout every day.  At first, the workouts will seem like they are written in another language.  Words like Burpee, Good Mornings, etc.  However, the awesome thing about Cross Fit is that they have all kinds of videos on YouTube to show you how to do everything.  So, to get started, enter the daily exercises into YouTube.  Type "Cross Fit Burpee" and you will get tons of videos to show you how to do it.   Soon you will know everything by heart and won't have to look them up. 

I know this sounds like a lot of work, but really can be worth it.  The workout you get it is something more intense than you've probably ever experienced if you do it right and it doesn't take as long as a normal workout.  My husband decided one weekend that he wanted to run a marathon even though he hadn't exactly been training.  He'd been following Cross Fit religiously though so he decided to try.  And he got a personal record!  Of course, he doesn't do the app geared toward preggos.  At that point, he had graduated to CrossFitEndurance (http://www.crossfitendurance.com/) , which is another animal.  Same principles, but longer and even more intense. 

Now I don't exactly follow it 100%.  I still like to run so I have some running days and some Cross Fit days and it works out pretty well.  Check with me in a few months though! :-)

Traveling with the Kids for the Austin Ironman