We tried a new recipe out that we liked a lot: Zucchini, Tomato, and Swiss Cheese Pie. It came from the Quick Vegetarian Pleasures cookbook. (I find this cookbook a little mixed – things taste very good, but I don’t find them to be particularly “quick” recipes as promised.) I recommend prepping the veggies the day before, then assembling and baking the pie the next day.

Before & After

I logged fewer miles than usual (17.8 miles) but I hit the gym at least 2 times per week. I did Run for Home 5K (PR!), Trots for Tots “1/4 Marathon”, and the OCES Big Chief 5K (so. hot.). I really enjoyed the first two races – the Run for Home started at the Classic Center and wound its way through downtown and along the Greenway. The Trots for Tots was exclusively on the Greenway. It was a really pretty afternoon race and I enjoyed it, but there was a lot of pollen that made things rough. The OCES was an afternoon race over at Veterans Park which is lovely, but has a notable absence of trees anywhere except the perimeter of the park. It was an exceptionally hot afternoon, and I was just glad for that race to be over.

We also hit up the Twilight Criterium downtown and had a lot of fun with our friends Amy & Andy. Here are some short video clips to show how crazy fast the pack is:

At the beginning of the month, I did the Moving for Montessori 10K for the local Montessori school. My buddy Jack ran the 5K, and since he’s made signs and cheered me on at several races (his signs currently decorate my office), I decided to return the favor:

He did an awesome job! We ate pancakes afterward.

The next big event was the Sarasota Half Marathon Relay which I wrote about over on Girls vs. Boy. We also started up a Flickr Group for Girls vs. Boy pictures that has a bunch of our Sarasota pictures in it. Here are some of the highlights:

I was nervous, but excited! / J’s compression sleeves are hardcore

PR FINISH! (The dolphin medals may have been the best part!) / We got to see the Red Sox vs. Orioles during Spring Training

The beach was amazeballs

Ok, I need to stop dreaming about the beach…

On St. Patrick’s Day weekend, I ran the Dawg Trot 5K and then headed up to South Caroline to visit with my aunt, uncle & cousin. We had a great time visiting, the weather was perfect, and I even managed to sneak in a visit to the barn to see the horses and barn kitties:

At the end of the month, I loped through the Race for Chase 5K followed by the Ready Set Speak 5K. I won my first award in my age group at Ready, Set, Speak. I received the 3rd place ribbon, but there was a mistake and I actually won 2nd… but who’s counting?! The exciting part of this win isn’t what place I got, but that it was my first award EVER in a running event. EVER. What’s more exciting than winning an award? I ran this course a few weeks earlier for the Dawg Trot 5K (my time was not great), and I shaved my time by nearly a minute and a half. I killed those hills.

All in all, March was awesome. I logged 27.5 miles running 5 races (Moving for Montessori 10K, Sarasota Half Marathon Relay, Dawg Trot 5K, Race for Chase 5K, and Ready, Set, Speak 5K), I had two great mini vacations to Florida & South Carolina, and had a great time visiting with friends and family.

April’s already a-buzz and big plans are in the works for Cinco de Mayo!

To be honest, I’m glad February is FINISHED.

On the plus side, we did have a Mardi Gras party with friends (check #6 off our resolutions).  Chip made an awesome jambalaya from scratch (even though I got eager to eat it serve it to our friends and forgot to add the shrimp at the end — oops!).  He also made biscuit beignets for dessert, which I was totally skeptical of, but they turned out to be a big hit.

I did manage to get to the gym a few times during the month, and although I had to drop out of one race due to illness, I did complete the Leggin’ it for Lincoln 5K, the Taste 10K, and the Barrow Boogie 5K.  I also moved up from #21 to #11 in the Black Bag Race Series!  *w00t*

The Grit made me really happy after I finished my last race of the month:

Next up:  March Madness!  Spring/summer clothing shopping is happening!  (Write. It. Down.) J & I have a big relay race (checking #5 off our resolutions) in Sarasota, and I’ve got a few 5Ks in mind.

January was busy! I did 3 races with J (Twilight Stroll in the Granite Bowl 5K, Jaycee’s January Jog 10K, Chilly Dawg 5K), had a great visit from Dad, and was busy GTD at work. I was all about being productive, and I did do a pretty good job of remembering to keep it “full glitz” when things got stressful, but I’m ready to make February all about FUN.

Who’s ready for Mardi Gras?! Time to bust out that jambalaya, gumbo, and beignet recipes!  (Or, we can just go to Sisters or George’s and call it a day!)  =)

Here we are at the Twilight Stroll in the Granite Bowl:

I will say that I’ve only stepped outside once since then to go run, but I have gone to two spin classes! That counts, right?

Next up, I’m headed for the Jaycee’s January Jog 10.2K. (YIKES!)

Moving right along now… With the exception of the fun resolutions we come up with for the Spynotebook Tech Club, I’m not big on personal resolutions.  This year, I decided I should have one.  Well, I take that back, I have more than one.  But really, this is the one I’m most proud of, and I expect you all to hold me accountable.

In 2012, I’ve decided I want to improve my “personal best” – and by that I mean I am going FULL GLITZ, y’all.

Cutie Patootie

Seriously, though, I felt like 2011 was exhausting.  I did a lot, and I feel good about the things I’ve accomplished, but I didn’t do such a great job on rewarding myself.  I also didn’t do such a good job with focusing on what’s REALLY important.

So, in the spirit of Toddlers & Tiara’s, I decided my mantra for 2012 is going to be FULL GLITZ and to reach that goal I want to do the following:

• Focus on what’s really important, and let go of the rest
• Be patient
• Smile more
• Reward myself with pretty things

I expect in the next year I will pass the torch on a few projects, say “no” a little more often, and maybe say “yes” to a few things that scare the pants off me.  I’d like to give myself the breathing room I really need, be patient while keeping my eye on the prize, and smile while appreciating our differences along the way.  If I get a mani-pedi or go on a shopping spree in the midst of things, all the better.  I’m overdue.

Who knows, maybe 2012 will turn out to be a pig-in-the-mud kind of year. If that’s the case, I plan to enjoy it like Miss Piggy.

October 2010

So, Chip and I joked about starting a blog a few years ago called “Freckles & Sweat” about our (mis)adventures at the gym and with food.  It sat on the back burner for a long time (and probably will continue to sit there for many more years to come), but it’s been a recurring joke in our house.  This past year, we’ve been pretty quiet about Project Freckles & Sweat while quietly plugging away, but I just wanted to take a minute to brag about how proud I am of our accomplishments.  It has taken a lot of hard work (and there is still a lot of hard work yet to come), but it would not have been as much fun without each other.

But seriously, y’all.  People who have known Chip for years — including family — don’t even recognize him when they first see him.  And that black & white dress I’m wearing?  It’s my junior year PROM dress.  Oooh, mercy.

I am so, so very proud of our 1 year later picture.

The most successful thing I bought today was NOT the iPhone 4, but rather this packet of candy. Apparently, even though our iPhone 3GS phones were purchased on the exact same day (within 30 minutes of each other!), my husband Chip was eligible for the upgrade and I was not without an additional $200 early upgrade fee or waiting till March. I understand this was totally our mistake. We checked our eligibility before we reserved our phones, saw the "$18 upgrade fee" for both phones, but failed to see the fine print of mine only qualifying for "early upgrade" status. I get it. We goofed. (I’ll also go ahead and say for the record AT&T didn’t make it obvious I wasn’t eligible, either.)

We almost shrugged and took our $200 loss, but I decided to take a chance and asked the in-store AT&T rep if there was any way we could get that fee waived especially since Chip had been a loyal AT&T customer for at least 15 years. To our surprise, they worked their magic and told Apple to sell me a phone at $199. We were thrilled! Unfortunately, that’s when the problems started.

When the Apple store rep started ringing up my new shiny phone and SIM card, the Apple system would bark that I was not eligible for an upgrade. See, instead of changing my eligibility date, AT&T listed me as "upgraded" — as in "this person just received an iPhone 4." If I had gone to an AT&T store, that wouldn’t be a problem. They would just ring up the phone at the discounted rate at the register like any normal business then update my phone details to my account after the sale.  But, you see, Apple isn’t setup that way. The way their system is setup, they can only sell you a new iPhone 4 if you are a) buying a new one without a contract ($499-$599); b) buying a new one with a new contract ($199), which I wasn’t eligible for because I HAVE an active contract; or c) upgrading my phone, which normally costs $199 if eligible or $399 if upgrading early. But according to my AT&T/Apple record, I was already supposed to have a new iPhone 4, so I’m now not eligible to upgrade till 2012!

Translation: AT&T waived my fee with no problem, but Apple had no way of manually overriding their checkout system on the spot to sell me a phone at the new contract or upgrade rate. The only thing they could offer was to escalate the case and have me come back tomorrow and try again. They told me this after SEVEN HOURS IN LINE AFTER AN HOUR DRIVE TO THE APPLE STORE.

To make matters worse, in the process of sorting things out they completely deactivated my current phone. They started to send me home without a working phone, then back pedaled after I balked. They tried for 30 minutes to figure out how to restore service to my phone before randomly trying our suggestion which was "stick another SIM card in and see if it works."

So, long story short: we are going back tomorrow to see if Apple can do math without a calculator, er, I mean, figure out how to manually discount a phone sale. (I tease, I tease.)

I have to admit, I was surprised the AT&T in-store reps didn’t have more rights to handle account questions/details. (Seriously, they had to call customer service for just about everything — including requests to change phone numbers for people. People waited for hours.) But I’m even more shocked that Apple didn’t have ANY method for handling manual transactions/overrides. Crazy.

Hopefully we’ll have better luck tomorrow.

In other news, the garden is full steam ahead (we have tomatoes on the vine ripening as I type!), and our summer travel plans are locked in.  Also, my friend Melanie started a running group. We’ve been meeting three times per week for a half hour (we’re still at the run/walk stage), and so far it’s been a lot of fun.  (Anyone else want to join us?)  Between that, a weekly yoga class, daily walks with Swiffer, and a new gym membership, I should be well on my way to meeting some of my health/fitness goals by fall.

Here’s a look back at April:

1. 365.2.91/SSAD.91, 2. 365.2.92, 3. 365.2.93, 4. 365.2.94, 5. 365.2.95/SSAD.95, 6. 365.2.96, 7. 365.2.97, 8. 365.2.98, 9. 365.2.99, 10. 365.2.100, 11. 365.2.101, 12. 365.2.102, 13. 365.2.103, 14. 365.2.104/SSAD.104, 15. 365.2.105, 16. 365.2.106, 17. 365.2.107, 18. 365.2.108, 19. 365.2.109, 20. 365.2.110/SSAD.110, 21. 365.2.111, 22. 365.2.112, 23. 365.2.113, 24. 365.2.114, 25. 365.2.115/SSAD.115, 26. 365.2.116/SSAD.116, 27. 365.2.117, 28. 365.2.118, 29. 365.2.119, 30. 365.2.120

1. 365.2.91/SSAD.91, 2. SSAD.92, 3. SSAD.93, 4. SSAD.94, 5. 365.2.95/SSAD.95, 6. SSAD.96, 7. SSAD.97, 8. SSAD.98, 9. SSAD.99, 10. SSAD.100, 11. SSAD.101, 12. SSAD.102, 13. SSAD.103, 14. 365.2.104/SSAD.104, 15. SSAD.105, 16. SSAD.106, 17. SSAD.107, 18. SSAD.108, 19. SSAD.109, 20. 365.2.110/SSAD.110, 21. SSAD.111, 22. SSAD.112, 23. SSAD.113, 24. SSAD.114, 25. 365.2.115/SSAD.115, 26. 365.2.116/SSAD.116, 27. SSAD.117, 28. SSAD.118, 29. SSAD.119, 30. SSAD.120