My running wishlist

So, I'm officially back to *jogging* and nothing gets me motivated like new STUFF.  Especially since barely any of my old STUFF fits because I'm too gigantous for it.  So, if I had all the money in the world, this would be my wishlist of stuff to grab up to keep me back in the swing of things.

1.  Nike Air Pegasus+ 27 GTX

I have been wearing Pegasuses (Pegasi?) for over 5 years.  I love this shoe.  I have owned many many pair of both the regular runners and the trail runners, and I think it's time for a new pair.  Since I could only afford maximum one pair, and since fall/winter is upon us, I would opt for the trail runners which are water resistant and would be great for slush and slop. 

2.  Nike Anti-Blister running socks.
I like a thin sock.  And I'm not gonna lie, I haven't tried these particular socks, but I have two pair of similar Nike socks that have holes all through them cause I've worn the shit out of them.  And they are still my go-to socks.  Never give me blisters (unlike my evil regular cotton socks) and never bunch or wriggle.

3. Lululemon Run:Swiftly Longsleeve T.

Terrible photo, but you get the idea.  Again, fall is coming, so sleeves will be a must. I have one long-sleeve running T by Nike, but it's a bit thin for cool weather, and also a little ~ahem~ smallish at the moment. This one is recommended by Jenny so I'm willing to take her word for it and give it a go.

4.  New Headphones.

I currently use earbuds, which are just alright.  I hate the kind that you jam in your ear with the reverse-suction-cup type thingies, so those are out.  I'm thinking something like these:

Although I've never tried anything like them and they may or may not suck.  My very favorite headphones of all time were a pair of the old-school Sony Walkman sports ones - the kind with a headband that folded up for when you were "on the go".  Ya, I loved those.  I used them for probably ten years, until the wiring in one side died and I could only hear in one ear.  And still I wore them for a while before giving up and switching to earbuds.

So that's my wishlist. Running is great because the amount of equipment you need is minimal, but boy when you have great stuff it can really motivate you to get out there and USE it.  I will do another list of the stuff I already have and use every time I run as part of the CONDITIONS.

I smell obsession

I don't know why, maybe it was the cooler weather we had last week, but something put it in my head that I need to start baking bread. All kinds of bread. Yummy, warm, tasty, buttered bread.

I have a recipe that was my grandmother's, and I've made it a few times and it was great. But I wanted something more. So I googled and found some great websites full of artisan bread recipes and holy heck now I want to make bread every single day!

Since all great ideas need to start somewhere, I decided that the best place would be something close to home, but not plain old grandma loaf. I found this great recipe for a rustic Italian bread and away I went.

The recipe seems long, but it's really not a lot of work at all. It's mostly a lot of waiting and planning, but only maybe 20 minutes of actual labor. That's a good deal!

I began my loaves last night (SB asked I one point if I was still "not making bread" while I was waiting for the Biga to rise). I finished them about two hours ago, and I have to say they are delicious. Very nice crust, and a very moist and spongy middle. I am worried I may eat all of the bread before SB gets home tonight.

And, believe it or not, they are pretty too!

I like to Yog

With vacation over, the Running is back on.  Well, the Jogging is back on.  I can't really call it running.  Because I'm slow. 

I'm trying to read a lot of running blogs (I love this one) and I like to engage in conversations with people I know who are avid runners.  However they all run.  And I barely jog.  But I still find it motivating to hear about my friends' progress and successes. 

I'm on week 6 of the Couch to 5K program, which means with all the running and walking I'm traveling about 4km per workout at the moment.  And it's haaaaard.  I've never been so great at self-motivation, and now the kid is an extra good excuse to skip a run sometimes, but we try to run at least three times per week. Usually we don't.  But we try!

Does anyone out there know of any great running blogs from anyone just starting out?  Cause I would love to hear about them and read 'em!

Possibilities

We made it back from vacation!  So far the worst part is Double Baby Time Change, in which we changed an hour when we got there, then changed back 10 days later to come home.  We could also call it Baby Subaru-Lag, since we didn't fly there but it seems to have the same results.  General crankiness and sleep schedule disruptions all around, lasting approximately one day.  

Before vacation, we started nosing around the real estate listings thinking about the possibility of moving our little three ringed circus to a more comfortably-sized location.  The problem with this being that a more comfortably-sized location in our neighborhood would cost us approximately a kajillion dollars, and the sale of our condo plus our savings gives us about negative three dollars, approximately.  Just for comparison's sake.

So we widened our search radius, excluded neighborhoods that were tooooo francais (bitches need to find good anglo schools), too suburby (bitches like diversity), too old (bitches hate renovation), too new (bitches watch Mike Holmes).  And soon us bitches started having to consider things like "is it near a commuter train line" because, yup, that's how far away we ended up.

Long story short, there was a house we loved, but while we were busy hemming and hawing and calculating and re-calculating, and driving by and peeking in the windows someone else was buying that damn house.  But now we love that area, and now I'm stalking Realtors.ca ten times a day, especially on Monday, cause it seems everyone lists on a Monday. 

Maybe we'll move, maybe we won't.  More space would be great right now.  Commuting to work would be a bummer.  Tess would have a yard, and we could have a pool.  But no more walking down the street to the [Bilboquet/Frites Alors/Les Infideles/the grocery store/the SAQ/the toy store/the bank/etc]. 

The things we sacrifice for our kids, and our 100 pound dogs.  (Although while on vacation we discovered that when given the option of sleeping on one of two floors, Tess will choose the one that we are NOT sleeping on.  This makes me sad.)  

I'm tasty

Vacation is great so far.  We are eating far too much in the way of deep fried seafoods (at least we're going for an array this year instead of our staple, clams).  We are drinking too much, too often (last year I wasn't allowed to drink due to being knocked up, so this in itself is an improvement).  We are walking on the beach and making fires and playing crib and seeing friends and family.

The kid is semi-cooperative.  After her stellar performance on the ten hour drive to our destination, she has decided that she no longer tolerates car travel.  This is a major suck.  While the whole purpose of renting a cottage is so that we have a home base and people can come to us, we still do have to do some driving to get things like groceries and beer and emergency sweaters for the baby because we're horrible parents and only brought one.

Today we drove to Fundy National Park, and while the park itself is beautiful, the drive to get there is full of gorgeous farms, small craft shops, old barns, covered bridges etc etc.  I was dying to take some photos, but on the way there she slept (we CANNOT stop the car when she's sleeping) then woke up and promptly cranked.  So, there is always the way back, right?  Except it followed the exact same routine.  But our time in the park was fun, especially for Tess.

I will make a photo post at some point, but I mostly wanted to say that if I could sum up our trip it one word at the moment, it would be BUGS.  Bugs themselves don't bother me much, however it would appear that I am a particularly tasty person for mosquitoes, even when I apply various repellents liberally.  They swarm me, and either leave SB untouched totally, or else he's extremely un-allergic to them and just has zero reaction when they do bite him.  And I haven't notice any bites on the kid yet, but she is rarely outside during prime mosquito feast time (ie after dark.) 

So, I'm using a lot of AfterBite and trying not to scratch.  It makes me want to avoid the fun things like fires and beach walks sometimes, but I try not to always be the downer and take one for the team every once in a while. 

Moving Mama

I've realized that a lot of the talk over here is about things the average person probably doesn't give two hoots about.  Things like birth and boobs and baby caca.  So, I'm moving that whole mess to another site!  Just for you!

The new site can be found at Mama Urbana.  Whenever I have the hankering to go into too much detail about anything parenting related, that's where it will be posted.  But don't worry!  Ebb and Flow will still contain lovely pics and anecdotes about little M and all of our awkward and exciting times together. 

So if parenting stuff interests you, head on over there!  And if not, tell your friends!  And if they don't want to read it, then you can all shove it.