Team Gab Virtual Race Giveaway - Winners (finally)! Also, PFTW

I know, I know, I'm so far behind on this, it's kind of ridiculous.

Medals are packaged up and will be mailed out this week, and - without further ado - giveaway winners!

Traci @tracispaci
Jennifer @ Running Moves Me
Linda, one of my PCRF teammates
Pam, the master comment-er :)
Alene at Journey to Badwater
EMZ
Lovely Renee at The Solitary Road
Elizabeth from Running for Bling

Congratulations, you guys! I'll send out a separate email, but in the meantime, take a look at the giveaway items HERE, and send me your top 3 picks - first come, first served!

I want to thank everyone, again, for your generosity in supporting a cause that is just so important to me.

I am, as always, still fundraising for PCRF, and if you are so inclined, donations can be made HERE.

And of course, a huge thank you to Nuun, PRO Compression, Aspaeris, BIC Bands, Team Sparkle, and Allied Medal Hangers. These companies - in addition to being incredibly supportive to Team Gab and my fundraising - all sell products that I use, pay for out of pocket, and believe in.

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Plan for the week!

Last week:
Monday: 13 miles (um)
Tuesday:  rest
Wednesday: 5 untimed miles with a friend
Thursday: 5 easy
Friday: rest
Saturday: 20 easy
Sunday: rest

So, turns out if I run, I don't do anything else. There was no cross training, no yoga, nada.

But, I guess since I'm running a marathon in TWELVE DAYS, running is kind of important?

Monday's 13 was pretty easy, and everything felt good. Saturday's long run.... well, I didn't die.

I did the first 9 on the treadmill, watching Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (and goodness, thank the stars RHOC is back!), and the last 11 with PCRF. The weather all weekend was runners paradise...

Mostly flat, some hills, and somehow, I managed to sneak in the last two miles at 10:33, 9:55 - which is CRAZY fast for a long run for me. Huh.

And then I refueled.

I am slightly concerned about the right quad/IT band situation, still, so that's being closely monitored. It didn't hurt enough to stop, but it is still pretty touchy, and uncomfortable at times.

I'm trying to not freak out, and just take things light and easy with Ragnar this weekend. I ended up with some fairly hilly legs, which is a bummer for the rest of my team, because I'm not just regular slow, I'm EXTRA slow when hills get involved.

Anyway.

PFTW....
Monday: yoga
Tuesday: 6-7 easy
Wednesday: yoga
Thursday: 6 speed
Friday/Saturday: Ragnar
Sunday: Sleep/eat

Three Things Thursday

1. I have completely, totally, 100% lost my running mojo. It's GONE. GONE GONE GONE. I managed one lame-o 3.5 mile run the other day with a friend, and that was just about all I felt like doing. I meant to run last night, and didn't. I have my running stuff with me today, so maaaaaaybe? Bah.

Sure hope I re-find my mojo for this weekend. Sorry in advance, Rose.


2. I bet I seem pretty mellow for someone whose daughter is going in for surgery today, eh? (if you have no idea what I'm saying, Gabby was scheduled for her port removal today). Last week when we got the call to stop treatment, they noted that her bilirubin levels were high. They wanted to re-draw labs on Monday, just to make sure she rebounded before sending her under the knife.

Well, she didn't rebound - her bilirubin was still high, and additionally, her ANC is pretty low - this measures a type of white blood cells in her system, and determines, basically, her ability to fight off infection (one of the side effects of chemo is a depressed immune system). When she was first diagnosed, her ANC had to be above 750 to even release her from the hospital.

Monday, it was 550ish.

Sooooo, we're back on hold for awhile. Instead of once a month, she'll have labs drawn weekly for the next few weeks to see how she's doing.

Guess it's a good thing I didn't plan a Port Removal Party?


3. Check out these cupcakes:



There were also chocolate stegasaurus domes that I somehow missed a picture of, but they were hilarious.
When I was party planning, I knew I wouldn't have the time to mess with desserts. I love to bake, but since I declared this the party where I DO ALL THE CRAFT THINGS, I just wouldn't have time. So, I decided to outsource. I hunted around on Yelp, and found Rooney Girl Bake Shop. I reached out to Maria, asking if she would consider a discount for the fundraising event/party, and she - far beyond my expectations - offered to donate four dozen cupcakes for the event.

Maria, the owner, was exceptional to work with - I am pretty party-planning illiterate, and only managed to explain that Gabby likes dinosaurs, and purple. And from that, she developed the designs above.
In addition to being the cutest things EVER, they are the BEST cupcakes I've ever eaten.

The cupcakes are really well priced, and better than any of the other gourmet cupcakes I've tried (and I try a LOT of cupcakes - remember in January I went to Disney World and did Tour de Cupcake? THESE WERE EVEN BETTER).

If you're in SoCal and looking for something for an event, I cannot reccomend Rooney Girl enough. You can find her website and ordering/pricing info HERE - she even delivers in LA and OC. She also has an etsy shop with amazing decorations that you can order, and have shipped. Check that out HERE.

Disney World Tour de Cupcake

On Saturday, after the Disney World Half Marathon, we did something that I'd been looking forward to for MONTHS.

Thanks to this blog here, I found this AMAZING thing....

The Ultimate Guide to Disney Cupcakes. I KNOW.

We started by taking the bus to Magic Kingdom, and the ferry to the Polynesian (have I ever mentioned that I LOVE the Disney transportation system?? It's true, I really do), where we had lunch (grown up grilled cheese - delicious!), and started Tour de Cupcake with this...

Chocolate Beer.

Initially, we were not really feeling any of the choices - there was this one, peanut butter and jelly, and something else. But how could we skip our very first stop!? That would be lame. So we sent L in to investigate, and she brought out the Chocolate Beer option.

Verdict: Delicious. It didn't really taste beer-y, but it sure was chocolatey. Topped with chocolate covered pretzels.

After Poly, we walked over to the Grand Floridian. Of all the deluxe hotels, this is the only one that never seemed like fun. It looks so stuffy! (My favorite deluxe options: Contemporary, Beach Club, Poly, and Wilderness Lodge a distant 4th).

Grand Floridian was also almost a disaster - we couldn't find the cupcakes! Luckily, we are cupcake detectives, and found them in the refrigerator case. Phew. Crisis averted.

At GF, we picked the S'mores cupcake.

Verdict: Pretty good. The beer cupcake was moister, and the graham cracker was kind of damp, and I really like burnt to a crisp marshmallows, but these were only lightly toasted. But it was still a good cupcake, and the chocolate ganache on top was SO GREAT. I guess it's really hard to go wrong with chocolate.

After wandering around for a bit, we took the monorail over to the Contemporary for our last stop on the Tour.

I picked the Red Velvet (which Becka had been dying to find) and the Pineapple Rum (pineapple is my FAVORITE).

Verdict: I didn't love the Red Velvet. I think I took a bite, and passed it on. But the Pineapple Rum was my FAVORITE of the day - the cream cheese frosting on top?? Yum. I should have gotten another one to take back to the room with me.

Overall:
I'm a little sad that we didn't expand the tour to the other resorts, but without a car, the logistics were kind of tricky - we just did the monoral loop. Plus, we were pretty stuffed (we only ate kids' meals for dinner HOURS later). If you've got lots of time to digest all the baked goods in between stops, I'd suggest you keep going. And bring friends, because it's easier to share that way :D.

The cupcakes are all $3.99 - not bad at all considering the size and deliciousness. Casey's Cupcakes near my house charges $3.50, are smaller, and are not surrounded by Disney magic.

Also, the cupcakes change seasonally, so what is available now may not be available when you go. For example, at Contemporary, I was really hoping for the dos leches cupcake, but they didn't have it - but they had pineapple, which isn't on the infographic. Oh well. Another time!

Resouces for planning your meals at Disney World:

• AllEars.net Dining - full menus with prices at every eatery in the World - counter service, kiosks, you'll find it all here. This is an excellent resource for budgeting, and I use it A LOT when we were deciding between going with the meal plan or not. (unrelated, they also had an unofficial "aid station" set up outside of Hollywood Studios during the marathon, and gave me some DELICIOUS pretzels - THANKS!)
• EasyWDW.com - this dude seems to spend all of the time in the universe wandering the parks, the resorts, the rides. It's kind of dry and mundane, but I dig that kind of detail. And he has the most pictures ever. He ALSO has pretty accurate (in my experience) crowd predictions to help you plan out your days - there are always parks that are busier than others, and he'll help you navigate the best options by day, with an explanation of why parks are recommended or not. Ideally, the unvierse will let me win the lottery, and I can have this job for the rest of my LIFE.
• DisneyFoodBlog.com - reviews of everything you can imagine to eat in Disney World.

Other desserts I've sampled around the world and really, really suggest you try: 

• The white chocolate elephant at Animal Kingdom, in the Kusafiri Bakery - excellent, and GIANT
• Chocolate caramel at Epcot in Karamel Kuche at the Germany pavillion in World Showcase
• Creme brulee, eclaires, napolean... basically, EVERYTHING in Boulangerie Patisserie at the France pavillion in World Showcase
• Creme brulee at le Cellier at Epcot in Canada
• Ice cream cookie sandwich at Sleepy Hollow in Magic Kingdom

What I Ate This Week

   
It's looking a lot like taper....

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving, and didn't pick any fights while Black Friday shopping.

We had a pretty low key day, cooking at the Snork's house, and observing their potty training attempts.

the answer is CHAOS. It looks like CHAOS.

We cooked too much food, too many carbs, and had a delightful time. Since we don't have family around, I'm grateful we have good friends to share holiday's with.

I'm also grateful to have a very, very patient H who slummed his long run with me. Curse his natural speediness.

6 easy paced miles through our neighborhood. It almost looks fall-like.

I complain about my lack of speed a LOT (I know), but it isn't lost on me that my easy pace on yesterday's taper run, is 6 minutes faster than my 10K PR from just a year ago, and 2 minutes slower than my "I might die" PR from earlier this year. I need to be less whiney.

Friday, we headed to a local outlet mall, where I obsessed a little bit over this dress...

Dolce and Gabbana. $1500, AND 40% off. COME ON.

I don't know why The H wouldn't let me buy it. He's always thwarting me.

Afterwards, I forced delicious cupcakes on my children. We picked up three different flavors, and I stole pieces of each of them. FOR RESEARCH.

We came home with dark chocolate, espresso, and pumpkin from Casey's Cupcakes.

Winner:

it's SPARKLY. 

Pumpkin, with pumpkin maple filling and maple vanilla buttercream.

Heading out for 4 easy today, followed by 11 tomorrow for my last long run before CIM. That kind of popped up on me.... Hope the weather clears up...


I don't do really well in cold rain.

Three Things Thursday

1. HOLY CRAP YOU GUYS IT'S NOVEMBER ALREADY. How did that even happen!??!
I'm closing out October with 129 miles, my third highest ever. And then yesterday, I wore my San Francisco Marathon race shirt and medal, called it a costume, and ate cupcakes for lunch, and called it "carb loading".  Best decision ever.



2. Halloween
#2 dressed up as some weirdo commercial version of Alice in Wonderland, that I didn't like, but she was super in love with, and then we got 25% off because the sales person thought the package was missing gloves, so I caved. Ugh.


Gabby was Merida from Brave. She was also the cutest thing EVER IN THE UNIVERSE.

This is how Brave people stand. Did you know?

Kid #1 was too good to dress up for me, and I have no pictures. I promise she exists.

3. NYCM and The Drama.
So the marathon is giong on as planned this weekend, despite the damage caused by Sandy. Since I'm not running, I'm pretty neutral on this decision - I've got zero invested, so it makes no difference to me either way.

On one hand - I don't think it's the worst thing ever that they are moving right along with the prep and holding the race. NYCM brings in a buttload of money for the city. Money is always needed for disaster recovery. Second, NYC'ers seem to perpetuate this sentiment that they're super tough and the show must go on (seem to, this is my opinion, not based on fact, etcetcetc). Third, they have a financial obligation to the runners. It would be irresponsible to divert those funds or use them in any way other than holding this race. Finally, I'm not there. I don't know what the actual FOR REAL, not on tv or print, situation is. If NYRR and the Mayor feel like the city can handle the race, the course is clear enough, they have the manpower to make it happen, then that's their call to make - because I'm NOT THERE.

On the other hand - I think it should just be canceled this year. It's just a race. It's not the end of the world. Even if the course is clear enough to run, and they have enough volunteers without interrupting actual city business, I don't know - based on what news I've read - that the infrastructure is there to properly handle the influx of people this race brings in. The city relies so heavily on public transit, and it's just not functioning. That shouldn't be overlooked.

Honestly, if I were running, I'd defer. As Skinny Runner said in her recaps, NYCM is an experience, and this is just not the experience that I'd want. If I had tickets/hotel and it was non-refundable, I'd probably go, and volunteer somewhere. I wouldn't be running. Not because I'm a super-compassionate person, but because I'd run for that experience, and running for me is super mental, and I just wouldn't be able to enjoy it. If I don't enjoy it, I won't bother. But I wouldn't really call people who choose to run selfish or anything. Whatevs.

Also, I grew up on the gulf coast, I'm not a stranger to watching hurricane coverage. This was no Katrina. People comparing this to Katrina are being overly dramatic and honestly, it minimizes that event. Cut that out.

Apparently I felt more strongly about this than I realized. Anyway.

Three Picture Thursday

Hit the treadmill for a few easy recovery miles on Tuesday. Jerk Shin was being a little shady, but otherwise everything feels fine. Wanted 4, finished 3, and spent 15 minutes on the bike pretending to make up for it. Tested out my new Brooks Glycerine 10's....

Verdict: Love.

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For the first time in EVER, there are ACTUALLY race pictures that I don't hate. Some, I even like....

I just cannot get over charging $40 to download A SINGLE PHOTO.

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One of my team members brought me a cupcake for breakfast.

It would just be rude to turn that down.