Hellyer Half Marathon

Steven and I just finished running our second half marathon this morning. As I write this, my throat hurts, my legs hurt, my stomach hurts, my knees hurt, my feet hurt... pretty much everything hurts right now! Yet.. we paid $100 to hurt this much and I will keep doing it even though it hurts. Running is so hard and so painful, but very rewarding when you meet your goals.

After our last half marathon, I knew that I wanted to do another one soon to improve our time. A big benchmark in half marathon times is finishing under two hours, and I wanted to reach that. I think we will keep getting faster, but at this point, two hours was our goal.

 And.. we finished in 1:57:00! That is an average time of 8:55 per mile for 13.1 miles. I was so happy to have finished under two hours.

We finished 119&120 out of 319 half marathon runners. There was also a 5k and a 10k race. Steven and I looked at those results after the race and decided we need to try a shorter race to boost morale. If we had run the 5k at the times we can right now, we would have finished 20/500 runners! All the hardcore people seem to have picked the half marathon. 

Training for this race was really hard for me. I honestly almost quit a few times. We just have so much going on right now. We trained through sickness, potty training, traveling, injury, building our house, getting ready to move, rain, darkness, and cold. Because of illness and injury, I honestly didn't even know if I was going to be able to run this race when I went to bed last night.

But, I'm so glad that I was doing it all with Steven because he kept me motivated and on track, even when I wanted to give up. I'm so glad that we are doing this together. I think he feels the same way :)

We went out with a goal pace of 8:50/mile. Except for the last mile (we slowed down... I kind of felt like I wanted to die) all of our splits were between 8:39 and 8:51 per mile. We were consistent, never stopped, and even managed to choke down our disgusting Gu's while keeping our pace.

And... we are done. Crossing the finish line is such an amazing feeling. Now, I want some ice cream!

The Next Step

The past couple of months have been a little crazy, and our family has some big changes ahead. But first a quick catch up...

Cora is potty-trained! We are officially a diaper-free household and I love it. She is barely two, but has taken to things pretty quickly. We gave Aubrey a treat as well every time Cora went potty and that helped us have a very enthusiastic training partner. We are still having some accidents, but I think we are well on our way.

My mom came to visit for a few days. I was pretty sick, but we managed to do a few fun things.

Horrible quality picture, but these girls love their Grandma. And their Elsa dresses.

We took them to a movie for the first time in over a year. I don't even want to admit how much popcorn they both ate.

Lots of fun with friends, play dates, and enjoying our warm California winters:

And we are definitely enjoying this warm California winter because it will be our last one.

We are moving!

We have absolutely loved spending the past four and a half years here in the Bay Area. This place has come to feel like home, and we have made many great friends. But, it is time to move on.

We were planning on moving sometime next year, but then on Christmas (nice people) our landlords told us that to renew our contract we would have a 25% price increase. That would be getting close to $3000 a month to live in a two-bedroom duplex. The cost of living here is crazy high and just keeps getting higher. In order for our family to have the kind of life we want to have, it just can't be here.

Steven talked to his bosses and he will be keeping his job at LinkedIn and working remotely. We feel incredibly blessed for that. We love his job and the opportunities for career growth it gives him.

So.... we are moving to Utah. We are building a house in Highland, Utah and we are really excited. We love the mountains, outdoor recreation, and central location that Utah will give us. Plus the area we are building in has top-rated schools, and we feel like it will be a great place for our family to hopefully settle. 

We will be leaving the Bay Area in April and spending some extended time with both sets of parents in Las Vegas and Canada before our house will be ready sometime in July.

Here are a couple of pictures of our lot...

We have a pretty sweet mountain view and a great, central location. Building a house is a lot of work, but I'm excited to finally have something that is ours to own. We are excited for the next step in our lives, and I'm trying to gear up for the craziness that the next few months will bring :)