Yea!! He's finally here!!!!

Welcome to the family!

Alex Carter Smiley, born July 30, 2008 at around 9:20pm. He's 8 lbs 3 oz and approx 20.5 in. (Beth told me exact stuff but I didn't write it down).

Big Brother Max was showing us how it's done


Yea! I love babies!!
Brian being forced beyond his will to touch a baby. Apparently these things are contagious or something. Or Alex might poop on him.


In case anyone is wondering, the inspiration for Alex's middle name came from here. My sister met Brian's brother and his family at our wedding and decided they liked the name of their youngest. I guess by the time you get to your 3rd boy it gets harder to come up with stuff so you look to others who did a good job. :)


This is Beth and Brad the Friday before the baby was born. It was Beth's birthday on Saturday so we all met up for dinner at the Cracker Barrel. Grant and Max were loving the rocking chairs.
And to the reason I couldn't spend time with my sister on her actual birthday:

BEER FEST!! WOO HOO!!!
Brian with our good friends Josh and Chrissy
And... we just found out that Chrissy is pregnant!! She's about 4 weeks right now meaning she took her pregnancy test a day or so before going to beer fest. So this is Baby's 1st Beer Fest. Do you think they make scrapbooking stuff for that? Chrissy drank more water than anyone else there that day. And playing the pregnancy card got her free bottled water and a trip to the nice air conditioned clean potties inside the Hilton instead of having to use the hot nasty porta-potties. and Chrissy had the sheer joy of driving us around all evening. yea!



I'll hopefully have more pictures in the next week- Beth is going home tomorrow and I don't work again for a week. Plus!! I talked to the wedding photographer today and he said hopefully by Monday. I knew it was going to be a couple of months to get pictures back but I'm quite anxious to see how great they turned out. So I'm hoping to be posting some fancy wedding pictures soon.

It's been a while...

So I thought I'd say a few words.

The last week or 2 has been fairly eventful for the Olson household with some ups and downs. Brian had a very successful conference last week. He made a lot of good contacts and his work created a lot of buzz, he said. I'm so proud. :) He can tell more about all the good stuff that came from his conference in Tuscon, but I know so little about what he does. I think you need a PhD in EE to be able to understand because he really has to "dumb it down" when he tells me his work stuff. (he does get a bit green around the gills with baby stuff so it all works out) But he did bring me a home a tiny mp3 player for me to use if I ever get to run again. :) Yea!
My sweet girl I've been so attached to at work is finally with Jesus as of Friday July 11. That was very hard- I know it was what she needed but I miss her a lot. Work has not been quite the same without her. I guess for me it's a blessing right now that we have a below average number of babies, so people are being forced to stay at home. Well, for me, they aren't going to have to twist my arm very hard. I have plenty of vacation time, and I just don't want to be there. Fantasia isn't there. I just need a healthy happy baby I can hold and love on. So that means my sister Beth needs to get moving with the whole delivery thing. She's so close to having #3. I'm hoping by the end of the week. Really she needed to have it Wednesday so I could have called in sick and not felt guilty. Thursday will work too. But I'm off Friday and Saturday, and if my sister is going to give birth then I think I should get a day off for that. I think I really just need a few mental health days.
My Aunt Betty is still hanging on. I know my family with her are all hurting so much. In a recent email from another aunt, she said that Betty is asking "Is it time yet? Can I go? When will it be over?" The whole family is hurting. I always hate to pray for death. I feel so guilty, even though I know that death will be a release for the person hurting. No person should have to live through that. I felt that way with Fantasia. I know that she would have been saying the same thing that last night. I guess the guilt comes in knowing that the person is ready to go, but no matter what I don't want them to go. I don't want them to hurt, but I want to be selfish and keep the person I love around forever. These are not new emotions or thoughts, and maybe I should get a better grip on how I deal with death considering how often I deal with it at work. I think this time was harder considering how attached to Fantasia I was. And with Aunt Betty too. Maybe it's the double whammy that is making all this so much harder this time.
so if you can't tell, I've been a little down this week. Maybe it's why I painted our bathroom last week while Brian was gone. Did I do any laundry? nope. Did I clean up the kitty litter? nope! at least Brian did the kitty litter when he got home from Tuscon. and a little laundry has been done since then, but none of it's folded. oh and there's a pile of hand wash dishes that's probably attracted every ant in the neighborhood. I'm too scared to check at this point. I've been very glad that Brian is back at home. I think we were both a little surprised at how hard it was for us to be apart for a whole week. Considering I spend a few nights a week gone, there are times when works gets in full swing that we won't see each other for a day or so, but it's not the same as being a few states away, in another time zone. Yeah, it was a rough week.

Faulty

Tuesday I went to see a sports doc about the knee. diagnosed with IT band syndrome and patella/femoral pain (or the cartlidge in between those 2). Was told to get better arch support (which I did) and to start PT.

1st Physical Therapy session was today (Wednesday July9). I was then told they didn't think it was actually my IT Band but that the tendons attaching my hamstring to the knee area were weak, and my core muscles were too weak. So when I do things like walk or run up a hill, sit or stand, etc those weak muscles aren't doing enough and my hamstring begins to try to compensate. or something. We started off with the IT Band stretches and I thought this PT stuff was cake. I was going to breeze right through it. Then great discussions were had about what was actually wrong with me. I had a PT guy, but was dealing mostly with his special little helper (called himself an intern?). Special little helper and PT guy then proceeded to poke and prod. Turns out my right knee was swollen behind the knee (in the bend of the knee), and said there was a possibility of some fancy named cyst. If there was that, it would absorb and they usually don't drain those. Fantastic.... They starting looking at the hamstring. They push on it- everything is fine and then I have to resist against them as they push against the hamstring. That one makes me come off the table. So all that was to tell them that my hamstring wasn't sprained or strained but basically not working right and that was putting a strain on my knees. Then Special Little Helper starts in on the exercise I'm to do at home- I need to strengthen the hamstring and my core muscles but not so much the abs but the gluts. My ass just isn't strong enough apparently. That's just super.

So now I have exercises to do 2x a day and attend PT 2x a week. and PT guy laid down the law- no running for a month. A Month!! So Anna's original goals are on hold until further notice and to be sub'ed in are my new temporary goals of "Knee will no longer hurt" or "Will develop hot ass from exercises".
Brian said in his last post that he never thought he would have to get in shape to lose weight. Well I never thought I would have to rehab so that I can get in shape enough to start loosing weight. I'll admit that I'm pretty disappointed today. I'd been feeling so good running last week. Tuesday morning (before the doc visit) I attempted to run/walk for 30 min. I didn't get much running in because of the knee. I knew I could do more- I wasn't too tired but I couldn't push past the knee thing. I actually felt good that I knew I could do more. I knew that if I wanted to do this that the knee would have to be addressed, I'm just disappointed today that all of my planning and goals are on hold for so long. Brian and I were starting this together- he's going to be so much farther along than I am when I get to start back with the running. He had to run alone this morning and it was really hard watching him go alone. I really wanted to be there working hard with him.


So on to more news- I think that it must just be one of those days. It's even raining out right now. Last night we got the call that my Aunt Betty is in her final days. Mom wasn't sure she would make it through the night. She did but we are still "on alert". We are also on Baby Alert. Beth will be popping out #3 any minute which means any minute or next week.
We also got news from Brian's parents that the beloved Chablis passed away last night. She was more than just the family dog but a family member. We are all torn up over this, esp Brian. I haven't talked to Brian's parents but I know they are very torn up right now as well. With an empty nest, Chablis was their pride and joy.
And just to top it off- I got a call from work this morning that my sweet princess that I have been with for months has taken yet another turn for the worse. Each time I'm not sure she's going to make it and then she pulls through. How much can one child go through? I don't like seeing her suffer, but when she's doing well- then she looks amazing and will interact with you like a normal baby would... I work tomorrow night and I hope she's there when I get there.

Updates and complications

This weekend was my first time to be working since "The Program" started and I wasn't entirely sure how it would go. I knew that to keep my goal for 10 weeks, I am going to have to try to do something on the days that I work.

So this past Friday (July 4):
We ran for 2 min, walked for 1 for 15 min and then went back to run for 1 walk for 2 for 15 min. Total of 30 min. And I'm proud to say that we did great. I felt very proud that we did it. We ran for a total of 15 min. I didn't feel too bad after... well I felt like I had actually ran a marathon instead of just 15 min and more than likely about 1 mile. but I did my stretches, and had some cautionary icing of the shins/knees. I was exhausted that day and managed to sleep for most of the day. Good thing because Friday night was the first night back to work. Felt good that night- no problems but I stayed busy and thus was up a lot. By the time I got home (late), I was EXHAUSTED.

moving on to Saturday (July 5):
upon arriving home, late I might add, Saturday morning I was tired and hurting. My knees were not happy but I thought I could still do 30 min of walking and then crash for the day. I made it 20 min and I was limping horribly. My knees were not good, esp. the right one. Was it the running 2 days in a row? Was it the fact that I wore old shoes to work on Friday night? Did I do too much on my tired body? because I was limping all night Saturday night. I was pretty miserable. My knee didn't hurt when sitting or when standing but it felt very tight when sitting/standing/walking. It wasn't sharp pain, just a very uncomfortable tightness surrounding the knee cap area. I spent a good deal of time with my leg proped up getting other people to do my work. Sunday was a scheduled "rest" day and I slept like a rock.

Monday morning will be Brian's first day to it alone. Even if I was going to be doing something, I don't get home in time for Brian to run with me and make it to work at a reasonable hour. He's going to be running for 2, walking for 1 for the whole 30 min. Total run time=20 min. Pro- he won't have to slow himself down or shorten his stride in order to keep up with me. Con- he will have to get up on his own and run and be motivated on his own.

I think I am going to have to make all of my post work mornings "rest" days. Maybe once I get into better shape my body can handle 12 hrs of work to be followed up by 30 min of exercise. But where I am right now, I think I pushed myself too far when my body was tired. I should have listened to my body instead of going ahead. I really want to do this and I didn't want to be making excuses already. If I'm able, I need to do it. I think I am also going to consult a professional. I don't know sports injuries or ortho... I knew going into this that my knees were less than perfect. I don't want to ignore this and end up really hurting myself.

Let me know if you know any good sports/knee docs in Nashville.

Conquering Challenges

Us wanting to lose weight, isn't a recent development. There have been various attempts before, but none of them stuck. We've tried to stop drinking soda, but failed, we were able to compromise with ourselves and switch to "zero" versions. We've stopped having ice cream for desert, we've compromised with ourselves by switching to Skinny Cow Ice Cream Sandwhiches and some sort of frozen flavored ice (not popsicles, comes in a plastic cup). However, these diet changes haven't made impact because our diet is still dominated on other "unhealthy" food and beverage items that we are still unwillingly to change. Anna has worked on making her meal portions smaller. She had mild success before our wedding. However, it hasn't yet provided a significant sustained change in weight.

Obviously the other side to losing weight is exercise. A couple years ago we did Tae Kwon Doe. Unfortunately, we had to make a 20-30 minute commute to do so and weren't able to go on a consistent enough basis to see impact on our weights. We ended up quitting when wedding planning became too stressful. Now we are trying running. We can do it from home and on our own schedule, two big plusses. However it isn't nearly as entertaining, and provides many more physical and mental excuse options.

I'm sore, I hurt, I'm tired, I'm too exhausted to run for another minute, are obvious excuses that you'd expect to encounter.

One of the biggest challenges we're still fighting with is changing our sleep schedule. During the summer in Tennessee, the weather during the day is unbearable unless you are already in peak athletic condition. Heat and humidity are not a good combination. We have three options, run indoors, run in the late evening, or run in the morning. Running indoors means one of us would have to commute to Vandy since neither are there at the same time. Also running a small indoor track becomes very repetitious. Running in the evening doesn't really beat the heat during July and August, its still too hot and humid. So that leaves us running in the morning. It it really hard to set a new sleep routine. This past week we've woken at 6:30am and gone running at 6:45am. I'm so happy Anna has not worked this week, because she's been some of my only motivation I can find when I'm struggling to wake up. We are going to bed early, but the transition is still a work in progress. Half my body is dead tired when it gets to 10pm-10:30pm. However, there is still a part of me that is used to staying up longer and it hasn't gone away yet. I'll be much happier when we've successfully completed the routine change.

Unfortunately, running in the morning has made us more hungry in the time leading up to lunch. We haven't quite solve this one yet. Today, we ate eggs afterward for breakfast to fuel us with more protein than cereal. However, we also had bacon and a little mayo, and cheese (yummmm a tasty sandwich). This can't be a long term solution if our eventual goal is weight loss, maybe just eggs. Tomorrow we make our first true attempt at curbing the pre-lunch hunger. Our plan is to wake up even earlier, now at 6am. We'll have a piece of fruit 30 minutes before running, as the running plan actually suggests. Another bonus of waking up earlier we're also able to do a light walk before the workout to warm our legs up, also suggested by the running plan. I guess waking up earlier won't be too big of deal since our desired routine has yet to set.

Anna and I also face two difficult individual challenges in the upcoming weeks.

I will be going to a week-long conference the week after next. Will I be able to stay disciplined? It will require me to continue going to bed early, and waking up early. I'll be in a strange place, with different weather and different surroundings (Tuscon AZ in July... blah). I don't think it would be wise to not run that week. Not only would I lose a week of running, but I'd probably also have to repeat the previous week's workout just to regain the little running shape I had reached. Essentially I would push the 8 week goal to 10 weeks. Also, it will be the first time I've excused myself from running. To me, that first excuse is dangerous, because I know the next excuse will seem much more acceptable. It's a potential slippery slope I would like to avoid until exercising in the morning is second nature. How I handle this obstacle on our running goal is my first major obstacle.

Anna's obstacle is much more difficult, she works for the first time since we started running. If I don't run during the conference, I can still reach my goal. I may be 2 weeks behind my original target date and may have had to grapple with the excuse slippery slope early than I wanted, but I can still finish. For Anna, she will always work. For those who don't know, she works 12 hour night shifts. They are extremely exhausting especially when she's on her third in a row. The running plan we're working off of, has us doing some sort of exercise 6 of the 7 days of the week. That is not an option for Anna, because of work. We're already modifying it for her so she can finish in 9-10 weeks. Also, her schedule will always be different week to week, making it harder for her to set a routine. We know she'll be able to exercise in the morning before her first night of work. What we don't know is how much she's able to after a night of work. Exercising the morning after she gets off of work from the first night will be crucial if Anna's is going to complete her goal in any reasonable time frame. Exercising after she's worked two nights would be preferred if reaching a sustained 30 minute run goal is achievable in 10 weeks. However, this may not be possible. We've already accepted exercising after a third night of work is just not feasible. To successfully overcome this challenge, Anna will have to many times exercise on her own, accept that her sustained progress will be slower than we'd ideally like, not stay at a single workout schedule too long and continually push herself with tougher workouts each week. There isn't a running guide out there that Anna can use as a guide. With her negligible background of running she alone will have to keep setting small goals for improvement with no guide for advice. We'd be extremely happy if she's able to finish in 9-10 weeks, proud if she finishes within 12, and if it goes past that, we'll just have to keep working until she gets there. Regardless of how long, if we're still trying we'll make it to a sustained 30 minute run.

...then we can start setting weight loss goals.

I've never thought I'd have to get in shape in order to lose weight.

Onward!

Running update:

Yesterday (Wedensday, July 2) was a walking only day. It felt good to not have any running because my legs were quite sore. I had stretched on Tuesday after the run but it wasn't enough- my calf muscles were in mutiny Tuesday and Wednesday.

Today was an ok run day. We did a 1 min run and 2 min walk x 10 for a total of 30 min. This was the same as Tuesday. I think the thing that hurt me today was I didn't drink enough water before hand so I was hurting for some water during the run.

Tomorrow we are going to run again (2 days in a row!!... my calf muscles don't know what's up just yet). We are going to do a gradual increase in running time- run for 2 min, walk for 1 x5 for 15 min and then run for 1 min, walk for 2 x5= grand total of 30 min. This will bring our total time of running up to 15 min. In a way, that puts us half way to our goal of running for 30 min. It's just that the goal is really to run for 30 straight min with no stops for walking. So that means adding in that next 15 min will be quite difficult. But I got a little thrill when I realized that tomorrow I will be running for 15 minutes. That's not something I've ever been able to do before. I'm holding on to small victories.

Go For It!! Yeah!

This past weekend, while having dinner and a few drinks with some friends, the topic of recreational running came up. Our friends (Josh and Chrissy, Mary and Daniel) are all at various stages of running abilities and they were comparing running stories. Several drinks in, while they were talking about various marathons they were/have been training for, Brian and I began to say "Why aren't we doing something like this? We're so out of shape. We should do this to!"

The next day Josh says to us "You do realize you committed to running a half marathon this fall?"
umm.... maybe he doesn't realize that I get winded when I climb the stairs at my house?

But Brian and I need to do something, that much is very clear. I shouldn't get winded walking up the stairs. I'm not doing tae kwon do any longer for so many different reasons and I miss having that something for exercise. Brian was a runner in high school, and said this past year that he was going to start running again. But he never did, and now we are both quite out of shape.
So we really are going to start running. There are so many reasons for us to do this- we are out of shape, we need to lose weight, we need physical exercise, it's cheaper to do this than tae kwon do, our friends are doing it (peer pressure, right?), Brian's familiar with what all is involved in long distance running... I can keep going but the point is Brian and I have put together a running program. We're not thinking marathons, not even a 5K run. We're starting small and going to work our way up.

I found this on runnersworld.com and we are modifying it for my crazy night schedule. This is a program to get you to run for a full 30 min with no walking breaks in just 8 weeks. My goal is to do this in about 10 weeks. It gives you 1 day of rest each week, and there are some weeks where I'll need 2 because of my long shifts. It will be a work in progress and I'll be treading a fine line between an excuse of "I'm too tired!" and the safety concern of "I'm too tired". I don't want to fall off the sidewalk because I fell asleep while running.

We are trying to follow the pointers of this article- one thing we have done is to write out a schedule of when we are going to run. I know everyday I'm going to run from today to Labor Day (mostly...there could be some tweaking due to the aforementioned tiredness). The article also said that an easy 30 min run (approx 2 miles in 30 min) will maintain your weight, and maybe you'll start to loose. We know that motivation will be hard when we aren't going to be seeing many results weight wise until we have been running for 10 weeks. I'm hoping that by posting what we are doing that we will be held accountable for keeping up with the running.

So here goes:

Today we walked for 2 minutes and ran for 1, x 10 for a total of 30 mintues. I was proud that was able to do that but by the last 2 "runs" I was moving very very slow. I was moving my feet in such a way that I was "running" but could have been moving faster if I had still been walking still. It's progress!!