Constant Changes!!

It's been a busy week around here!!  My brother and his family came from Florida for the week and we did a lot!!  Well they did a lot, I did some and worked a little.  We took the kids to the Hockey Hall of Fame and Legoland in Toronto one day for our big outing.  They had a blast!!  We did lots of visiting and eating too.  I'm happy to report that I did not miss one run during their visit which is a huge thug for me.  Usually as soon as there is a change running is the first thing to suffer.  Not this time though!  I ran three times and even got up at 5:30am twice to do it.  

Yesterday Drew came to live with us.  He needed a change and some new people around.  He was having a rough go of things and we hope that this will be the place to get the support he needs to succeed.  

Today is Anna's birthday so we spent part of the weekend celebrating that.  She was sick on Friday when we were supposed to have her party but luck was with us and all of her friends were able to come on Saturday.  My favorite gift that she got was a giant moose.  She loves stuffed animals and this one is awesome!

Her sickness on Friday is a little concerning.  It is the second time since her surgery that she has woken up feeling badly, gotten sick and then been fine by noon.  She has complained about headaches a lot lately too.  We have another follow up appointment in December and had mentioned the headaches at her last appointment but they suspected dehydration to be the issue.  I think if they don't stop they will have to be investigated more.  

Things are forever changing in our lives but I wouldn't give it up for anything.  I'm finally in a place where I can cope with them and still keep my exercise routine somewhat intact, I'm eating reasonably well and everyone is happy.  Winter is coming and that is going to be the true test of my new found dedication!!  I hate to be cold!! I can do this though, I have too! 

New Shoes!!

There is nothing better than a run in brand new shoes.  That has been my running for the past couple of weeks.  I love the first runs after getting a new pair.  It's like running on a cloud:)  I got my new shoes on a Friday and while the next day wasn't a planned run I had to get out and test them anyway.  I joked after that they had rocket boosters in them.  My old shoes were past their prime and I was going slower because of it so when I got my new shoes they were so comfy that I was running faster than ever.  I have settled that down thankfully.  That first run with the new shoes had me going so fast that I was out of breath too soon and couldn't go as far!

I posted I posted about my new shoes on Facebook after I got them and got some interesting comments.  Seems some of my running friends aren't sharing that love.  A few have been forced to change brands or styles of shoes for various reasons and are having a rough time adjusting to their new ones.  I felt sad for them.  This sparked some thoughts for me, as well as some others, about how funny runners (or athletes in general) are about their gear. This week I have even come to realize that I am even funny about weather.  Fall is my favorite.  I can get away with capri's and tshirts for most runs and if I need to add a bit of warmth I can throw a long sleeve on. I hate it when it gets so cold that I have to add layers and can't move as freely just as much as I hate when it gets so hot you sweat standing still.   Right now the temperature is perfect for running.  I'm going to take full advantage of this and get as many runs in as I can before it gets ugly out!

Do you have a favorite piece of gear or time of year??

Renewing Passion:)

It has been more than three years since I started running!  My gosh the time has flown by!  The last year has been a little lack luster in the running department but I'm making up for it now.  A friend has been talking about starting running for a while but does not want to run with a group.  She does not want anyone to see her at this point.  I think she is nuts and should show off but she thinks different.  She has asked me more than once if I can "teach" her how to run and I keep telling her there is nothing really to teach but that I would be more than happy to.  Finally she has decided that it's time and in the wee hours of the morning before the sun and birds are up we are out there.  I have started her the way I started with just 10 minutes and adding two minutes at at time.  She will now be up to 14 minutes and is doing wonderfully.  

The bonus to doing this with her is that it has given me a renewed passion for running.  I have a purpose that isn't totally about me and it's great.  I have signed up for one race and plan to sign up for another if there is still space.  I am getting up half an hour earlier than I need to so that I can run before she gets here.  I am enjoying running fully again and it feels great!  I am excited about it again and can't wait to be back to where I was a year ago.  Next summer I am going to run another half marathon, maybe two!!!  I feel great:)

I haven't posted much over the last year because I felt like I fell off the wagon and didn't have anything much to post about.  I have found that more and more posts have been about the kids and anything but my journey.  All that is about to change:)  I think this blog is about to become more active again!

Adryanna's Heart Repair

On Tuesday August 6th Adryanna had her heart defect repaired:) I wanted to share her story but it took me until today to get it all written out:) On Monday we headed to Toronto to stay at Ronald McDonald House.  The one in Toronto is the largest one in Canada (perhaps the world).  It has 81 rooms and is the most welcoming and wonderful place I could imagine for people who are dealing with very stressful situations to stay.  We arrived and were greeted by a volunteer and shown around.  We completed some paperwork and were left to explore. We checked out our room and could see the CN Tower out our window!

On the way to Toronto!

Each room has a chalkboard beside the door that you can draw on!

 The first order of business was to get some dinner.  We were very close to Queen's Park so we walked past there and found a little restaurant across the street from the Royal Ontario Museum.  We then took the subway back.  Adryanna loves taking the subway so it was a must.  Once we were back she played Playstation with Adrian and found a Harry Potter game to play.  Then it was bedtime because we had a very early morning.

The CN Tower

Riding the Subway

Being silly at dinner

Playing video games

On Tuesday at 6:30am we arrived at the Hospital for Sick Children.  It is a wonderful hospital that people from around the world come to for treatment.  She was being cared for by the best of the best.  We had nothing but amazing care from the minute we arrived.  At 8am we went to the Cardiac Catheter lab for her procedure and were told that she was the doctors only case of the day and that it could be 2-6hrs before they were done depending on what they saw when they got in there.  Turns out they saw more than they expected but were done in less than 3hrs.  Her heart defect was much more involved than they expected and was quite large.  They were able to close off one end of it.  What they believe is that her defect (Aortico-Left Ventricle Tunnel) actually started out as her right coronary artery because she does not have one now.  They also found that her left coronary artery had grown all the way around to almost connect to her tunnel.  The end of it is completely blocked.  They have no concerns with that as many people have only one coronary artery and they are perfectly fine.  The concern they still have is that one end of the tunnel is still open and there is a little bit of flow still going into it when the heart pumps.  This is something they will still have to watch closely and may require repair later.  They thought about closing it off at the same time as the other end but this end is quite wide and the device they used may not be big enough.  They may have to do open heart to fix it when the time comes.  That's down the road though and not something to worry about now.

After the procedure Adryanna was quite sick.  She did not tolerate the anaesthetic well and spent most of the rest of the day throwing up and sleeping.  She doesn't remember much about Tuesday.  She took extra long to come out of the anaesthetic because they had to give her a little extra right at the end.  She was having some trouble breathing and they needed to help her out a little bit.  In the end she was okay though and after a few doses of anti nausea medications she started to turn around and by Wednesday morning she was ready to go home.  

Not feeling so well:(

Wednesday morning being silly:)

Before we could leave she had to have a chest xray and an echo done.  The echo was a bit of a surprise but that was because the doctor could hear a murmur again and wanted to make sure everything was the way it should be once that was done he was happy and sent us on our way.

We're free!!!

So now we are home and she is doing wonderful.  It was an up and down week but today is day 5 post repair and she is right back to herself.  She is eating and drinking and playing.  Tomorrow she can go back to soccer practise and get back to all her usual activities.  She is looking forward playing soccer this week and I'm happy to see her feeling better.  She will have three check ups in the next 6 months including echoes and chest xrays.  Two with her regular cardiologist at McMaster and then at the 6 month mark the third will be with the cardiologist that did her repair.  They work in collaboration so they will share everything they find.  It's going to be a busy time for her but one that is such an important part of who she is and who she will become.  She is a lucky little girl with a very special heart:)

Pass It On!!!

When I started running I had no idea how to properly fuel my body.  I relied on low calorie foods and getting the most food for my calories.  I was doing Weight Watchers and wanted the most food for my points.  I quickly came to realize that those foods were not going to fuel my runs and had to start doing some research.  I found out that the foods I needed to eat were not always going to be low calorie or low fat but were going to have lots of nutritional goodness that my body could use to keep going.  I asked a lot of questions and luckily had patient people in my life that didn't mind the multiple emails asking what to do next.  I figured out some great nutrient dense foods that would give me awesome energy.  I then started running further and longer and had to start looking at what my body needed before, during and after my runs.  I again asked a lot of questions and again was met with a lot of patience and great answers.  I was also given lots of little samples of things to try before I went out and spent a bunch of money on things I might not like.  I was and still am grateful for all of that.

Last night a friend who has started going to a boot camp class asked for some advice and I was so very happy to be able to share some of what I have learned.  I sent her some treats to try today and she liked them.  She jokingly said that she would pay me to make more of the little bars I sent.  I love helping people and love that I can finally be someone that people come to when they have exercise and nutrition questions.  I definitely don't know it all and need to practice more of what I preach but I have come a long way over the past 3 years and would certainly make the old Selena sit up and listen.  I think she would be very shocked and maybe even a little proud:)

Who Knew?

I think everyone knows I have struggled to find my motivation to work out over the past few months.  I have been better than my pre-running days but have slacked a lot and struggled to get back out there.  I knew I needed to change things up a bit and perhaps find a new exercise to throw into the mix.  I still really love running and the way I feel during and after but I'm having a hard time remembering that in the wee hours of the morning when I need to get up.  Add to that the fact that Adrian doesn't get home from work until 10:30pm most nights and I just haven't been getting out as much as I should.  Tonight I decided to get my running clothes on and run the track at the high school where Adryanna has her soccer practice.  She practiced, I ran, it was wonderful.

The thing that no one knew was that I might actually like swimming.  I really suck and have never been taught how to swim properly but how hard is it really?  Oh yeah, really hard.  Luckily the basic motions are not rocket science and I can get by.  I learned this weekend that swimming burns incredible amounts of calories and who can complain about an exercise that is in water and keeps you somewhat cooler.  I decided that through the summer I will play around with swimming lengths at my mother in law's house every chance I can get and in the fall I will look at lane swimming times at the YMCA.  We'll see where things go from there.  I have never aspired to be a swimmer and certainly don't envision myself doing crazy things like triathlons (you have to ride a bike for that, bikes and I don't really get along well).  For now I will enjoy my new activity and see where it takes me.

Our garden is doing very well still and we have started to get cherry tomatoes ripe enough to eat.  We cut down one bunch of celery but will wait a few more weeks for more.  The stalks aren't very thick yet but they taste good.  Our broccoli was delicious and there are a few baby heads of broccoli growing now.  Pretty soon I will be having toasted tomato sandwiches with homemade mayo(Adrian makes it so much better than the store) for lunch.  I'm super excited for that!!!

Gardener Extraordinaire!

Back in May we ordered a giant bag of black earth and went shopping for plants.  We have lived in our house for 5 years and every year I have planted a veggie garden.  Most years that garden has half succeeded.  This year I was determined that it was going to be awesome.  I did a bit of research but went mostly with the knowledge I have from my grandfather.  He lived three minutes from where we do now and he had the most beautiful gardens imaginable.  Armed with the memories of his gardens I decided what I wanted to plant and off we went.  I think I mentioned in a previous post what we planted but in case you missed it (or I am wrong) we planted: cucumbers, tomatoes, romaine lettuce, broccoli, celery, peppers, swiss chard, snow peas, yellow beans and left from previous years we have raspberry and blackberry bushes.  When we were finished we had teeny tiny little plants in the garden.

Teeny Tiny!

I've spent the last two months checking and watering those plants and tonight I am pleased to say everything has done quite well.  The only problem we have had are pests.  Something has eaten my snow peas to the point that they are not going to produce anything and something stole three out of our four broccoli plants.  Everything else is beautiful.  We will be eating most of our veggies from the garden for the next few weeks.  We had yellow beans yesterday and when I looked tonight there are enough for us to have them again on the weekend.  The broccoli that didn't get stolen is just about ready to pick and I understand we will get a little more from it once it's cut.  The celery is almost ready to start using it and I've had several salads from our lettuce.  Last night I made a swiss chard and quinoa dish to take for lunch today.   I'm looking forward to all the wonderful tomatoes to ripen.  This year I am going to can some and have Adrian make some sauce that we can use all winter long.  Of course several tomatoes will have to be used to make toasted tomato sandwiches!!!!

Here's the broccoli now:)

 I'm very happy with my gardening adventures and have learned a lot for next year.  The broccoli leaves got quite large so I will have to give them a bit more room next year and I planted my tomatoes a little to close together.  I learned that beans do much better at the back of my yard as opposed to the side where I have planted them in the past.  Usually they don't get very big and they get burnt.  This year with more shade they have beautiful green leaves and loads of beans.  The rest I'm growing for the first year and they have grown perfectly.  I often joke that my grandpa lives in my backyard guiding me while I do these things.  I suppose if you think about it most of what I know about gardening comes from spending time with him in the summers so even though he is no longer with us his knowledge lives on:)