Happy Anniversary to Me!

It's anniversary week!! 16 years.

While the big day isn't until Friday, I thought I'd share a few things that I've already been given and have been using.

The Beast beat everyone this year with this bag of goodness and first anniversary card of the year....she may or may not have been one month early : )  -

 My awesome, amazing, wonderful husband delivered two things I have needed/wanted for a while now: a new running vest! Our dog chewed through the straps on the gray one the first week I had it. I hand sewed them back together, and it lasted almost 2 years, but a strap broke during Trail Hog and it's been tied together since then.  I love my new one, and love, love, love the color.  It's already been out on lots of runs and I love it as much as I loved my first one!


 The amazing husband also got me my Golden Poppy California State Park Pass!!! So excited to have this!!  I no longer have to pay to get into Mitchell Canyon or to get onto Mt Diablo, or any other park that charges an entrance fee!!  I've been a little limited on mountain access up to now, going out of Castle Rock. I could really only explore a small chunk of the mountain before, but now I can get anywhere on the mountain and explore tons of trails I've never been on before.  I've already been up there exploring and running trails that are new to me. I'm so excited to have this! It's good at the majority of state parks, although there are a few, mostly southern Ca parks, that it doesn't work at.  You can get more info here on the pass.

(there was a Poppy Pass picture here, but I realized our address was in the background. Oops.)

My dad totally surprised and shocked me with my first Garmin!!  That's right, people. I've been running for 6 years now with no gps watch/garmin of any kind.  Proof that it can be done! That said, I've wanted one for the past year.  I'm not super number consumed, meaning that pace/distance does not determine if I've had a good vs bad run.  The reality of where I run and the kind of running I enjoy (mountainous) is that my pace is slow.  There's a lot of climbing, and then running down, then climbing, and running down, ect....so overall pace would be pretty dismal if it's all I looked at.  That said, it is nice to know how far I've gone, my moving pace, and my fastest pace.  It's nice to know that while my overall pace is usually in the 13 - 14 min mile range, my running miles are in the 8.5-10 range.  It's also fun to see the charts of the elevation profile overlapped with my pace. 

 And, I have to also say about the Garmin, it already has me pushing harder on certain runs.  Yesterday was day 3 of running in a row. I already had 2000 ft of elevation on my legs from the previous 2 days, but decided to head out of Castle Rock and see how fast a 10k I could lay down.  I ended up PR'ing my trail 10k time by 13 minutes!! I was super stoked! I consistently run a 1:26 trail 10k, no matter the course.  Yesterdays was 1:13.  It was entirely because I had one eye on that Garmin tracking my time/pace and distance.  It's going to be great to get me back to pushing myself to go harder.  Yesterday really showed me how much I've been sandbagging!

 

 Ok, so new trail shoes were also a gift, but not an anniversary gift.  These were a running gift, and I love them both!! The pink ones are Adidas, which I have never run in, and did not take seriously as trail shoes.  However.....they have some mean, mean tread, tread that looks like sharks teeth!  They get great traction.   While I don't do anything extreme, I do cover some very steep, loose climbs and descents, and good traction makes all the difference!  Here's a link to the ones I have.

 And these are Brooks Cascadia 7's, which I also love. Brian has run in these for years and has always loved them.   These are my first pair, and I gotta say, I love them, too.  If you look at the picture of the Adidas above, and then at these, it's pretty obvious that the Brooks have a  lot more room.   The toe box is super roomy, my toes never touch anything, not the sides or the end of the shoe.  They are super comfy.  I gotta say, and I never thought I'd say this, but the Adidas have better traction.  Gasp.
So between the two pairs, I'm totally happy with my trail shoes! I did get some Velcro and Superglued it to the back of both pairs so I could wear my gaiters with them.

 No, these turkeys are not anniversary gifts, either. We recently had our Circuit Assembly and their Grandpa wanted to make sure they all had new outfits, which always makes it extra special, and isn't something we can always do.  They felt extra fancy in their outfits!

 Thanks to everyone who has already made this year extra special!!

We are super excited to be getting away this weekend as a family and celebrate 16 years of togetherness and having a wonderful family!!