a new season

My favorite seasons are as follows: Summer, Fall, Spring, then Winter. Maybe I'd feel differently if I wasn't born and raised by the beach, but in my mind you really can't beat summer. Bright sun, hot sand, pools and beaches. Riding bikes on the boardwalk, NO-AD Sunscreen and long days.
Fall is a close second. Pulling out my jeans makes me happier than it should. I get so excited for that first crisp fall day.

To me, fall means fire pits, Pumpkin Spice lattes, and camping at Big Meadows. Harvest beers are cracked open as the cheers of football games are in the background.

Up until this year I have struggled with the transition from summer to fall. While I get so excited about the great things about fall, I crave more summer. I have the best time wearing jeans one day, but when I wake up the next morning I'm so sad because I can't put my bathing suit on and go to the beach. I have to wait another 8 (if I'm lucky!) months! In the grand scheme of things it may seem like a small thing, but it's something I have struggled with for as long as I can remember. Until now.

It's funny how your life changes with kids. Every single aspect of your life. Because this year, fall is more exciting. For my family, it means less mosquito bites. It means pulling out Kate's old clothes to see what fits Summer. It means daily decision changes on what we will be for Halloween this year. It means trips to the pumpkin patch and apple orchards. And it means the sun goes down earlier. Have I ever been excited about that? NEVER! But I am right now! When it's dark outside, it's bedtime in the Fine house. And at this stage in our lives, bedtime is awesome.


Bedtime means adult conversations,finally finishing LOST on Netflix (we are losers, I know..), and cracking open that sammy octoberfest while sitting outside in front of our fire pit (and let's be honest...discussing conspiracy theories about LOST-again, losers...we know.).

I will still mourn summer. This year the girls learned to love the ocean, so trips to the beach meant less running around making sure they didn't eat sand or rub it in their eyes.
It instead meant building drip castles and jumping over waves. It meant seeing the sunrise on the boardwalk as I took Kate for a run when she woke up at 5:30am and couldn't get back to sleep (which I will, in some sort of odd way, miss).

It was the summer that Kate graduated from a float, to water wings to swimming on her own,
and that Summer starting walking! But it will come again. And we will be ready for it. Tutu bathing suits and all.

10 and done.

I competed in the Rock N Roll Half Marathon today. It was my 10th time. It's always Labor Day weekend. I came home from college to compete, I ran it when I was pregnant and then 3 months and 6 weeks (the relay, not the half!) after giving birth to my girls. So, I think you can safely say it has been a staple in my life. It's aaaaaaalways hot. Like, you are sticky just thinking about going outside hot. I have asked myself for a few years now why I still do it, because all I do is complain. I say I'm never going to do it again. But then I sign up for the next year. I think a lot of it is because of my family.

I have a bizarre, and wonderful family. We all run. We travel for races. I've gone to Richmond, D.C., Wilmington, Charleston, Nashville, Phoenix and even SoCal for races. But my family turns Labor Day weekend into something more than the last hurrah of the summer. We don't have time to go to the beach! Instead we wait for family to get in town. We head to the race expo and stock up on free samples of Snickers Marathon bars and tiny sips of MGD 64. We browse through the $10 running clothes and contemplate putting our name and address down for a chance to win a free meal at P.F. Changs. Then we have a wonderful, loud pre-race dinner together. The next morning, we wake up at a ridiculous hour and head to the start line. We always pick out that one person in a crazy outfit that we don't want to beat us (or at least I do that..) And we run. And run, and run and run (or walk, as some of my family does). Then, we all gather at my parents pool, cool off ourselves and rest and enjoy being done and enjoy being together. And it's one of my favorite times of the year. So why stop, right??

Last year, I had just given birth (literally, 6 weeks before) and I did the relay. It was amazing. To have to go out there and only do 6 miles on a day that I normally have to run 13.2? It. Was. Wonderful. I said I'd never do the 13.2 in Virginia Beach again with Rock N Roll. But then, I signed up for 2011. I put a caveat on it though. This is my last RNR. I told as many people as I could, in the hopes that would make me stick to my guns.

So...today came. But today was different. Today was in the 70s. And today we got a 10 minute head start! And today, I achieved something I never thought I'd do during this particular race. SUB 2 HOURS!!!!!! Granted we were 22 seconds shy of the 2 hour mark, but that is still sub 2! I am so stoked to have a personal best on this race. And you know what? I'm done. Granted, there is that competitive part of me that wants to keep going, sign up AGAIN for next year just to see what I can do. But I'm done. I won't say for good. I'm sure I'll run it again. But not next year. Next year I am going to volunteer. I'm going to be one of those people on the course in the bright blue VOLUNTEER shirt handing out water on the course, or giving out bananas at the end of the race. I've always wanted to do that but I'm so consumed with running the race, that I never volunteer. And you know what? Nothing about the weekend will really change, except I'll have more energy the afternoon after the race. And my family will still be there. And I'm sure I'll even still go to the expo. For the free beer, of course.

Here is a picture of our race today. My friend Michelle and I competed for Team Hoyt. More on that later. It's an awesome charity.