New Running Mantra

I totally have a new running mantra.  I was reading the free kindle edition of the book "Run Like a Mother"  and one of the authors talks about how when she was training for marathons afterwards she would always be kind of dissappointed because she felt like she had a little bit left in her tank.  Finally she ran a race where she left everything out on the course and her tank was on empty by the end.  What helped he to give it her all was by telling herself to "go towards the light"  the light being the pain.  Or in other words she was telling herself to not be afraid of the pain but to embrace it.  I know a lot of times when I am running hard I allow myself to slow down because I am afraid of the pain.  While running the New Years Eve 5K we had about 400 meters left and Thomas started to pick the pace up a bit.  He told me to pick it up too but I told him to go ahead.  Then I realized that I did not want to finish this race alone and I reminded myself to "go towards the light" so I embraced the pain, picked the pace up, and we finished together. 


This is totally posed.  We took this picture after we had finished. It was so cold that when we finished the fans to keep the finish line sign up had frozen so it had fallen.

 Last night we had a fun game night with our friends Karlee and Will. We have been really lucky to find good couple friends who we share similar interests with since we have been married.  We played Settlers of Catan, Monopoly Deal (card game), and Yahtzee (card game version). I love card games because they are quick and usually don't require too much thinking and strategy.  We are super excited for Karlee and Will because they are expecting their first baby in July :)  Karlee just finished her student teaching this past semester and graduated.  She is an inspiration to me.  A super cute, fun, smart, athletic girl.  We trained for the Mesa Falls Half Marathon together and she is speedy.  She has continued to workout through her first trimester and I hope to follow her healthy example when I'm pregnant (someday).