Run, Walk, Collapse

About three and a half years ago, a close friend of my sister's passed away the day after she gave birth to her daughter. Her husband had the unimaginable experience of becoming a father for the first time and then losing his wife directly thereafter. He's an incredibly strong man and appears to be doing a really excellent job of raising his little girl. He maintains a blog about their lives and also wrote a book about the experience, entitled Two Kisses for Maddy (buy it here).

In addition to all of that, he started the Liz Logelin Foundation, which provides grants to young families who have lost a spouse or life-partner. Like I said, he's an amazing guy. One of the events that has been designed to raise money for the foundation is an annual 5K run/walk here in Minneapolis (Matt and Liz are both originally from this area). I wanted to do the run last year but we'd just moved and were still getting settled in. I was determined to do it this year, and signed myself, Chris and our current visiting relative, Jane, up for the event.

Anyway, the big day was last Saturday morning, which dawned horribly grey and chilly. Not actually raining, but the temperature was hovering in the 40s (despite having been in the mid-80s the week prior). Chris had just gotten back from another business trip and was exhausted and not entirely excited (read: incredibly grumpy) about joining us. I threw everyone in the car with breakfast to go and we made our way to the event venue, a park about 30 minutes from here.

As soon as we got to the park, we discovered that the jogging stroller had a flat. We asked around, but no one had a tire pump we could use. We stood there for the next 20 minutes debating our best course of action. I will confess I tend to get a little stubborn in these situations and was determined to see it through. So, we made our way to the starting line, got ourselves lined up and sprinted off at a nice 8-minute-mile pace, kids grinning from ear to ear.

Oh, haha, as if. In reality, we'd spent so long deciding to go ahead with the race that it started before we even got to the line. Both kids refused to walk so much as a step, so we set off carrying them, as we would for the next 3.2 miles. Now, I have to interject here that had we had the stroller in working order, Brighton (and possibly Pacey) would have absolutely insisted upon walking. There would have been back-arching, screaming tantrums resulting in eventually giving in and letting them walk. Since we wanted them to walk? No dice.

Chris and I learned that day exactly how heavy 35- and 28-pounds can be when held as dead weights for approximately one hour. It was...not the most fun I have ever had. Still, we helped raise funds for a very good cause, got to see Matt and the lovely Maddy, and got our strength/endurance training in for the day (I'm pretty sure we came in dead last). Jane was an incredibly good sport about the whole thing and hey - things can only be better next year. It might take me a full 12 months to get the nerve up to sign up again though...

Keeping warm before the race

Can you see the enthusiasm radiating from my husband?

With about a mile to go

With Matt and Maddy