Weekend update

Sandwiched between last weekend's friend-filled trip to southern Missouri and next weekend's return to the Berryman Adventure Race (sadly only a 16 hour instead of a 24), I stayed much closer to home this weekend.  Closer to home, but not actually at home much.

Friday night, for example, was spent at my school's first ever family campout.

On a surprisingly chilly September night (temps into the low 40's overnight), around 100 people camped out on our school field, ate hot dogs and roasted marshmallows, and generally had a really great night. There were a lot of new tents being pitched, so I'd guess a lot of kids (and maybe whole families) were having their first camping experience.  What a neat thing to get to be a part of!

We got there after dark on Friday night bc Jacob had had football practice, and we had to pack up early on Saturday morning to get him home for a soccer game (lost)...

Jacob throwing in the ball.

...and a flag football game (won)...

He got an interception that he ran back for a touchdown and a couple other good catches.

  ...before packing up to go to my father-in-law's for the annual kids' Survivor games.

Like soccer with bats

Shooting the ball with the slingshot...

...for the other kids to catch with lacrosse sticks.

After 4-5 hours of that kind of fun (I'll admit to having a very hard time dragging myself away from Gone Girl to watch/help/participate), we grabbed dinner and headed home, where we were treated to live music from the church carnival next door.

Sunday morning I was up early-ish to meet Mickey for a long run at Castlewood State Park. Glorious, fantastic running weather!

Way harder than it should have been, but what a lovely day to run!

I'd have liked to sleep in, but I'm once again signed up for the Skippo 30K, and as I mentioned yesterday on Facebook, every year I register for this race, barely train, and barely get through it.  Every year I think, If I can finish this without training for it, I wonder how I could do if I DID actually train?

This year I'd like to find out.  To that end, I've been gradually building my long runs on the weekends and doing one or two shorter runs a week.  It's still not what someone dedicated would consider good training, but if I can stay consistent it'll be a big improvement in the previous two years.

Of course, it's been a slow road back to any kind of running fitness.  I'm starting to see some glimpses of it, but I'm certainly not yet at the point where a 13-mile run is no big deal (my primary running goal) or where I could maintain 10 minute miles over the majority of the Skippo course (my stretch race goal).

But hey, the race is still a month and a half away, plenty of time for improvement for a girl who usually realizes mid-October that I'd better start training for that 18 mile race looming over me. Or plenty of time to lose interest, slack on the training, and show up on November 9 for yet another death march for my Skippo mug.