Excuses... I have a ton of them... well 3 to be exact. #motherrunner

Excuses... I have a lot of them.  An easy one to keep me from my running outside are my three kids... cute as they are (especially when they were babies) their mere presence can limit my running choices.  (I have included photos of them as babies below... to prove the cute factor.)

Wyatt - 15 months

Makenna - 17 months

Luke - 18 months

I noticed on my NIKE+ app (the way I track my running) that I had been quite heavy on the treadmill use lately. Now... the treadmill is nice... lots of advantages to my stage of life.  The kids can play and watch movies while I sweat it out with the A/C and fans blowing on me.  But... from time to time I do need to get outside... I probably should also mention that my awesome husband is a Seattle commuter... so getting up early most days is not really an option either because he leaves for work REALLY early... like East Coast early.    We live about an hour north of Seattle.

A few weeks back I had an idea... I could run at our church and let the kids play at the playground.  They are old enough now to be trusted when I can't see them the entire time.  It is a safe place to be for all of us... (no real strangers around).  It gets them outside for some exercise.  They can bring bikes and follow me for parts of my run.  Nice restrooms inside for all of us if needed... a win win.  All except for the repeated scenery for me and the killer hill that I would have to go up each time I rounded the back corner.  Oh well... I would just play Kelly Clarkson "Stronger" over and over if I needed to.  So I tried it out a few weeks ago and it worked great!  

So we went there again today.  This time though my kids were fighting more than normal and more than one time when I came down the hill from the upper parking lot I was met with one of them whining or crying that someone else had "wronged them" in some way and I needed to intervene.  UGH!  Really.  I lost it a couple of times and told them to work it out themselves.   One time I came down and they were no where to be seen... had to hit pause again on my app and found them inside hitting up the receptionist for chocolate.  Really?  More lecturing about obeying and staying outside unless someone had to use the restroom.

It is hard enough to keep a consistent running schedule and train for Half Marathons alone not to mention put 3 kids in the mix.  Don't get me wrong... I love my cherubs.  

We are blessed beyond measure... cup runneth over and all of that.  My older 2 will be back to school in 22 days but who is counting... that will make scheduling runs a little easier.   Not to mention my youngest will be in Preschool 2 mornings a week.  I remember stressing out last year when I had to use the treadmill more that I had expected and thought it would affect my Half training.  It was fine and I will be fine.  I have a 15K on September 14th, a Half on Sept 29th, and another Half on October 14th... so the running continues. 
  Sometimes it might have to be round and round at the church parking lot.  No excuses though... #getitdone !  There are a ton of other excuses I could have included here... rain, rain, and more rain... (I do live in the Pacific Northwest)... too dark, I want to sleep, too hot, too cold, I am lazy, I don't feel like it, I need to go to Costco... and more.

Click HERE if you want to see how many times I went "round and round" to get 6.2 miles in!

What things tend to get in your way when you need to plan a run?

For those of you that are parents... and don't have a full time nanny... how do you creatively solve the "I need to run" factor?

Wow... school began yesterday. I now have a 2nd grader and a Kindergartener! How did I become the mom that has "big kids"? I am very involved with a local MOPS group and have been a member since my oldest was about 6 months old. We had a "Back to MOPS" Picnic the other day to get our new Fall program going... I saw the looks on some of the moms faces as some of us "other moms" unloaded our big school age boys. They quietly moved in closer to their much smaller 2 year olds and protected them like a mother hen. I remember feeling this way. Looking at those GIANT school agers and thinking they were secretly plotting to attack my 2 year old BABY! Now I am that mom... I have one of those school age monsters riding around in the back of my mini van. If you look really closely he still has that cute baby face... and he just told me last night that he will never love anyone more than me. I am going to hold onto that for awhile.