Sunday Rainy Sunday

We woke to overcast skies, puddles on the front walk and 45 degree temps. We need the rain, so we can't complain. This is what it should be like for part of April! I had decided to forgo running at the Brad and stick closer to home so that we could do something this morning together. Given the forecast, I proposed heading to Freeport, figuring we could enjoy a good breakfast at Fresh Batch and Sam could play in the play area there, and then we could head to LLBean to see "the fishies" and pick up a shirt for Ryan to wear at Jamie and Kate's wedding. Sam was excited for LLBean, and her face lit up when we got inside Fresh Batch and she remembered the slide. The place was filled with families with young kids - it's a great place to go, given the play area and the yummy food! We ended up hitting one more store before heading home - the Nike store - where we found Sam some sweet kid size Nike Frees. Adorable :-)

Rockin' the backpack and new shoes

You can't quite see the shoes in the photo, but she loves them. They are black, grey and red, and she looks so grown up in them! In the photo, she is posing with baby and some snacks in "her" backpack (ie. one of Ryan's hydration packs :-)). She wore baby around the house for a good 1/2 hour or so! Ha!

Ryan nicely tried to put Sam down for a nap so I could head out for my run after lunch (emphasis on "tried"). I haven't run on the Cathance trails much this spring, so thought I'd take a jaunt along the river and do the 7-mile loop over there. With a slight mist in the air and grey skies above, I hit the trails. Felt a little tired during the run, probably some combination of not sleeping well last night, the weather and a good breakfast but no lunch before the run, but the run itself was nice. The river was gurgling. The greens were really popping, and the whole forest looked lush. Saw more trailing arbutus, blooming violets and bluets, starflowers and lots of false lily of the valley coming up. I also saw a hawk along the Heath. Caught a definite view of the dark brown and white striped tail, so although I didn't hear it call, I'm assuming it was another (or the same?) Broad-winged Hawk. 

A few more runs this week, and it is time for TARC! From reports I've read online, it sounds like the loops are more like 6.55 than 6.2, so it will be a long 50k. Hopefully trail conditions will be good, and it will be a relatively fast course despite the extra length, but it seems likely that I'll be out there for around 5 1/2 hours. I'm hoping for less though :-)