Brrrr!

The thermometer read 9 degrees this morning. Brrr... All of the sudden, it seems that winter has arrived, and man, it's cold out there :-)

I was in bed by 9pm last night, and Sam had a better night than the last two, so I woke up this morning feeling a bit more rested, which was a welcome change. After I dropped Sam off at daycare, I drove over to the Bowdoin field house and headed out through the woods into the Commons. It was bright and sunny, and the air felt invigorating (read: cold). I ended up pulling the hood of my comfy warm Sugio hoodie up over my hat, and definitely could have worn my warmer/thicker gloves. My hands were freezing for the first two miles!

The frozen leaves and bits of snow crunched beneath my feet as I ran along, and I enjoyed the change of pace that running in the Commons provided. When Ryan and I were running on the trails at Lake Waccamaw before Thanksgiving, we commented that the running there was a bit like running through the Commons (although the NC trails definitely have more loose sand and things aren't quite as packed overall as in the Commons), so it was fun to run along and think a bit about the 50k, wondering what sort of pace I might be able to hold during the race. I finished up the 5.1 miles at 8:30 pace exactly, but holding that pace in March might be a bit aggressive... we shall see. I did notice during the run that I was feeling my shin/calf a bit, as I had a nice leg massage yesterday morning, but I think getting things worked on a bit will be a good thing in the end!

---
In Sam news, aside from the whole not-sleeping/teething/night screaming issues we've been having the past few days, she is doing great, and is now 14 months old. Wow! We have been having fun trying to entice her to walk more and more on her own, and although she can do it, she still much prefers to hold onto a finger or hand and walk around :-)  She is saying her words with a bit more clarity now, repeating words like "baby" over and over and over. She can point to the correct pictures of socks, banana, kitty, ball and a few others in her "First 100 Words" book, and has started to use the shape sorter toy correctly, trying (and occasionally) succeeding in putting the shapes through the top, although she does prefer to simply transfer the blocks in and out of the bucket :-) I noticed she was working on picking up two of the blocks with one hand the other day, which I thought was interesting. She also now wants to put the top on and off the fruit pouches when we have them with breakfast, and loves to feed herself with the soup spoon (if we let her :-) ). When we ask her to get a certain toy, assuming it's a favorite, she will look around for it and go to it, and she has taken to patting the bed in the morning to "call" Ronnie up next to her (this is what I do when I want Ronnie to jump up on the bed with us) - it is just adorable! She really is taking it all in, and it's neat to see how she is processing things and learning. And as always, she is smiley and happy and energetic :-)