VA & NC & Marathon Training

Summer travel season is in full swing! In the past few weeks, Mike and I have visited my family in VA, Mike's family in NC, attended a wedding for Beau and Jen in Florida, had a brief stay in Charleston, and spent some time at our favorite beach in South Carolina. Since I'm currently at the beach in South Carolina listening to the boys play board games in the background (I'm very particular about my board games), we'll save the recap from that trip for another blog.

Memorial Day in VA:

We were blessed to be able to have some extra time off over the weekend to see friends and family and remember the ultimate sacrifice of our men and women in uniform. Highlights of the weekend included getting to babysit Ashton, a wonderful snack spread of smoked salmon from Wegmans and other goodies, and getting to spend time with family even though it was short.

A Memorial Day ceremony I attended at GW where we had an amazing speaker and a jazz saxophonist playing the National Anthem.

Our neighbors never miss a holiday.

Courtney and Ashton at the pool at my mom's house during Memorial Day Weekend.

Rick let Ashton sit on the tractor.

I brought Ashton a special marshmallow treat of one of his favorite TV show characters.

Too cute!

Weekend in NC:

We spent the weekend after that traveling down to NC where we spent some time with Mike's family. We don't have any pictures that I know of besides this one on a cloudy day walk in Burlington, but that's because we were bring good and trying to minimize time on our phones:) I'll have to get Mike to pack his nice camera next time! Highlights of the trip included Ween's cooking (as usual), seeing Rachel who is back from France for good!, taking a yoga class with Leslie (Mike declined), and just getting to see everyone even though it was a short trip.

Probably not a good idea:

So, Mike and I are both officially signed up for the Marine Corps Marathon at the end of October. Mike is running with some Navy friends, and I am running with GW to raise money and awareness for cancer research. I was so nervous about signing up for this race, but I am inspired by stories of those who run and why they run/the causes that they run for. Below are two instructors from Mike and I's spinning classes who inspired me to sign up for the race.

Nicole was signed up to run IronMan France which is a triathalon that includes a full marathon for the running portion. Unfortunately, she got in a bike accident right before the race and has to be off the bike for a while, but she has already made plans to try again next year and has shown grace and positivity throughout the entire thing!

Robin ran a 100-mile ultra-marathon a month or so ago! She is a former lawyer who left her job to inspire others through fitness. She has a great story and a book coming out soon!

SO I guess we're going for it then. Training for me starts on June 26th and for Mike it starts a week after. We've been getting a couple of runs in at the beach to make sure we're good to go. You know we'll be providing you all with training updates along the way!