So, dear reader(s), I was reminded yesterday that it has been over two weeks since I posted anything and I know you are anxiously awaiting a wrap up of the trip to Florida, my hip and all of that other stuff. So without further ado...
When we last caught up with Princess Merida, she had a hip injury right before the race. I stayed away from running and all other forms of exercise until I got to Florida. Here's what I learned during that time. If I can't run or exercise, I shop. Hmm...there has to be a way to get around this. I mean, if I am out for three more months, my bank account may not recover.
The trip to Florida was fairly uneventful, although I was the last to arrive (fashionably late as always). I didn't hang out in the hotel too long, though. About three or four days before I went to Florida, my college roommate Shawna posted on Facebook that they were in Orlando. Well, of course, I had to find out if they were going to still be there when I got there and THEY WERE!! So Thursday when I arrived, Shawna came to the hotel and we went to Downtown Disney to have drinks and catch up on the last 15 years! Neither of us could beleive it had been that long. Where does the time go? It was so great to see her and it was just like old times. Lots of laughs! We both swore it won't be another 15 years so I'm thinking a trip out to Portland might be in order soon. Maybe there is a race there I could do at the same time...
Friday was the "Fit for a Princess" Expo. It was also Jess' (Belle) first expo because her first half-marathon didn't have an expo. And for those of you who have been to expos with me, you know how crazy they can get. If you went to the St. Jude one with me, multiply that by about 10,000 more runners. Yes, there were 26,000 runners in this race and apparently they all decided to go to the Expo Friday. It was chaos. You would think for as many of these races that Disney does each year, they would have the Expo part figured out. They fell terribly short this year. It was crowded. The vendors were packed in. No food was available. But...mom was gracious enough to spoil me :) And I got to meet Jeff Galloway.
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For those of you who don't know who Jeff Galloway is, he is like a running God. He developed the "run walk run" program and I used his half-marathon training program to prep for the St. Jude. It was so cool to meet him! Super nice guy!
After the expo, we went to Downtown Disney to eat and wander around. It was fun. We might have pigged out on a way yummy good Ghiradelli ice cream sundae. My oh my. Was it worth every calorie. Of course, we all were sick after it, but it was still worth it. It was a good day of mothers and daughters spending time together.
Saturday was the best way to spend the day before the race. Here's where I spent it...
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Yep. Every day before the race should be spent pool side with my mom and a good book. The cabana we rented (yes, we had to "pay" for it but turns out they never charged the room) came with several bottles of water which was great for hydrating pre-race. It was nice to just hang by the pool and relax. Jess and her family went to Universal that day. I don't know how she did it. They were there the majority of the day and then she had to wake up super early the next day for the race. But they had fun so that's the most important thing. I was in bed I think by 8:30 or 9 that night. And I'm okay with that!
So Sunday morning at the wee hours of the morning (ie: 2:30 am) my alarm goes off and I just groaned. But, it was race day!! After a year of planning, race day was FINALLY here!! So I hopped out of bed and into the shower (only because I was wearing my hair curly like Princess Merida and it had to be wet to do it) and got dressed into my costume. So mom and I were ready a few minutes before 3am (our designated leaving time) and I went to the living room and noticed Jess' light in her room was not on! So I knocked on the door and woke her up. Her phone had been acting up all weekend with the time zone and her alarm hadn't gone off!! Luckily, she and I are both Type A and had laid everything out the night before. So she and her mom, Bonnie, quickly got ready and away we went.
Now mind you, we tried a thousand different ways to get the hotel to shuttle us over to the race and they didn't want to have anything to do with that. So we had to drive. And, of course, neither mom volunteered to drive so I drove with Jess playing navigator. Which would have been fine if we weren't already stressed with pre-race jitters and getting there on time, etc. We had planned to get there by 3:30 so we would have time to eat, stretch, pee, etc before walking the 1/2 mile to the starting line. Yeah...that didn't happen. You know what they say about the best laid plans. The directions Disney provided were AWFUL and we got turned around several times and ended up getting to the race (Epcot parking lot) at almost 4am and we had to start walking to our corral by 4:30. It was a headache. We got our moms to drop us off so we could go get ready and luckily I had the foresight to bring some of my breakfast cookies because when we got to the "entrance" they had one, yes ONE, gate open for 26,000 racers to get through. Needless to say, it was a cluster. So we had our breakfast cookies and FINALLY got in to the staging area.
Jess and I (and our moms though they were not allowed in until the race started) had purchased the "Race Retreat" package which was really nice to have done. It allowed us to go into a heated tent (above picture) and stretch (if we had had time), get food (if we had had time), check our bag and use the port a john. We had expected our moms to meet us out front of the retreat to take our picture before we walked to the start but that didn't happen. I'm not really sure where they were so we got a random person to take a picture then we left for the starting line.
Luckily, we were in Corral C so we only had to wait about 10 minutes from the official start before we got to start. However, because there were 26,000 runners and probably at least 2,000 in our corral, it was slow starting and there were walkers everywhere. Now...I am all for walkers and more power to you. BUT IF YOU ARE IN AN EARLY CORRAL YOU ARE THERE BECAUSE YOU HAVE A FAST PACE WHICH MEANS YOU ARE NOT A WALKER!!! So it was a bit frustrating trying to get around the walkers. Unfortunately, it didn't matter after about mile 3 because my hip decided to start hurting again. And not just a little. It was worse than the pain in my right ever could have been. Jess was such an amazing supporter though and let us walk whenever I needed to. By the end, though, it hurt even to walk so we ran the last 1.1 miles because at that point, the damage/pain was already there.
As promised by Disney, there were characters along the route but the lines to have pictures taken were ridiculous. So we didn't do many of those but here are a few we did do.
And the song at the halfway point (voted on by the runners the week before the race) was "This Girl is on Fire"
Now...I am supposed to have pictures of us in front of Cinderella's castle BUT....that's right kids. Our moms were not there when we came through the castle. As we approached the castle to run in, Jess called her mom to tell them we were coming through and they had just gotten of the monorail. Seriously?? So we waited...and ended up having our picture taken by a woman taking photos for Cosmo, so maybe we will be in Cosmo!! Now here's the thing about our moms being in front of the castle. That was the ONLY place we asked them to be during the race. AND, they had paid for the platinum chEAR package that gave them special viewing areas. AND, we had them sit through the course overview lecture at the Expo so they knew where to go. AND, we had told them at least 5 times and written out instructions. It was like the freaking blind leading the blind. So I don't have pics of that to post. Sorry...
Anyhoo...we finished the race (YAY!) and I was in horrible pain but was so thrilled Jess and I did a half-marathon together! We met up with our moms at the Race Retreat and were so glad we had paid for that because they had a HOT breakfast buffet! It was great!
The afternoon, we relaxed and hung out to get ready for the P!nk concert that night. Kristi, Jess and I had not really discussed exactly what we were wearing to the concert but we ended up wearing the same color scheme. Kinda funny...
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The concert was EPIC!! We decided it was the perfect end to Girls' Weekend. Here's where our seats were...
.jpeg)
<
But it didn't matter. We had so much freaking fun! And I'm pretty sure we were the only ones in our entire section that knew EVERY song. She is such an amazing performer. And technology is wonderful because here is how my pics taken with my little camera on tele-phots and then blown up on my ipad turned out...
.jpeg)
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It's like we were right there! AMAZING!!!! I would totally go see her again!
So, dear readers, like the weekend, this blog entry is coming to a close. There are so many more stories from the weekend but I want to same some to share in person with you. And, of course, there are many more photos as well. But here's what I will leave you with. Despite Disney over-pricing everything and the chaos of running with 26,000 people, it was the best Girl's Weekend YET!! Oh, and we decided our next one is New York City in the Fall 2014. So mark your calendars!!
.jpeg)
Friday was the "Fit for a Princess" Expo. It was also Jess' (Belle) first expo because her first half-marathon didn't have an expo. And for those of you who have been to expos with me, you know how crazy they can get. If you went to the St. Jude one with me, multiply that by about 10,000 more runners. Yes, there were 26,000 runners in this race and apparently they all decided to go to the Expo Friday. It was chaos. You would think for as many of these races that Disney does each year, they would have the Expo part figured out. They fell terribly short this year. It was crowded. The vendors were packed in. No food was available. But...mom was gracious enough to spoil me :) And I got to meet Jeff Galloway.
.jpeg)
For those of you who don't know who Jeff Galloway is, he is like a running God. He developed the "run walk run" program and I used his half-marathon training program to prep for the St. Jude. It was so cool to meet him! Super nice guy!
After the expo, we went to Downtown Disney to eat and wander around. It was fun. We might have pigged out on a way yummy good Ghiradelli ice cream sundae. My oh my. Was it worth every calorie. Of course, we all were sick after it, but it was still worth it. It was a good day of mothers and daughters spending time together.
Saturday was the best way to spend the day before the race. Here's where I spent it...
.jpeg)
.jpeg)
Yep. Every day before the race should be spent pool side with my mom and a good book. The cabana we rented (yes, we had to "pay" for it but turns out they never charged the room) came with several bottles of water which was great for hydrating pre-race. It was nice to just hang by the pool and relax. Jess and her family went to Universal that day. I don't know how she did it. They were there the majority of the day and then she had to wake up super early the next day for the race. But they had fun so that's the most important thing. I was in bed I think by 8:30 or 9 that night. And I'm okay with that!
So Sunday morning at the wee hours of the morning (ie: 2:30 am) my alarm goes off and I just groaned. But, it was race day!! After a year of planning, race day was FINALLY here!! So I hopped out of bed and into the shower (only because I was wearing my hair curly like Princess Merida and it had to be wet to do it) and got dressed into my costume. So mom and I were ready a few minutes before 3am (our designated leaving time) and I went to the living room and noticed Jess' light in her room was not on! So I knocked on the door and woke her up. Her phone had been acting up all weekend with the time zone and her alarm hadn't gone off!! Luckily, she and I are both Type A and had laid everything out the night before. So she and her mom, Bonnie, quickly got ready and away we went.
Now mind you, we tried a thousand different ways to get the hotel to shuttle us over to the race and they didn't want to have anything to do with that. So we had to drive. And, of course, neither mom volunteered to drive so I drove with Jess playing navigator. Which would have been fine if we weren't already stressed with pre-race jitters and getting there on time, etc. We had planned to get there by 3:30 so we would have time to eat, stretch, pee, etc before walking the 1/2 mile to the starting line. Yeah...that didn't happen. You know what they say about the best laid plans. The directions Disney provided were AWFUL and we got turned around several times and ended up getting to the race (Epcot parking lot) at almost 4am and we had to start walking to our corral by 4:30. It was a headache. We got our moms to drop us off so we could go get ready and luckily I had the foresight to bring some of my breakfast cookies because when we got to the "entrance" they had one, yes ONE, gate open for 26,000 racers to get through. Needless to say, it was a cluster. So we had our breakfast cookies and FINALLY got in to the staging area.
Jess and I (and our moms though they were not allowed in until the race started) had purchased the "Race Retreat" package which was really nice to have done. It allowed us to go into a heated tent (above picture) and stretch (if we had had time), get food (if we had had time), check our bag and use the port a john. We had expected our moms to meet us out front of the retreat to take our picture before we walked to the start but that didn't happen. I'm not really sure where they were so we got a random person to take a picture then we left for the starting line.
Luckily, we were in Corral C so we only had to wait about 10 minutes from the official start before we got to start. However, because there were 26,000 runners and probably at least 2,000 in our corral, it was slow starting and there were walkers everywhere. Now...I am all for walkers and more power to you. BUT IF YOU ARE IN AN EARLY CORRAL YOU ARE THERE BECAUSE YOU HAVE A FAST PACE WHICH MEANS YOU ARE NOT A WALKER!!! So it was a bit frustrating trying to get around the walkers. Unfortunately, it didn't matter after about mile 3 because my hip decided to start hurting again. And not just a little. It was worse than the pain in my right ever could have been. Jess was such an amazing supporter though and let us walk whenever I needed to. By the end, though, it hurt even to walk so we ran the last 1.1 miles because at that point, the damage/pain was already there.
As promised by Disney, there were characters along the route but the lines to have pictures taken were ridiculous. So we didn't do many of those but here are a few we did do.
And the song at the halfway point (voted on by the runners the week before the race) was "This Girl is on Fire"
Now...I am supposed to have pictures of us in front of Cinderella's castle BUT....that's right kids. Our moms were not there when we came through the castle. As we approached the castle to run in, Jess called her mom to tell them we were coming through and they had just gotten of the monorail. Seriously?? So we waited...and ended up having our picture taken by a woman taking photos for Cosmo, so maybe we will be in Cosmo!! Now here's the thing about our moms being in front of the castle. That was the ONLY place we asked them to be during the race. AND, they had paid for the platinum chEAR package that gave them special viewing areas. AND, we had them sit through the course overview lecture at the Expo so they knew where to go. AND, we had told them at least 5 times and written out instructions. It was like the freaking blind leading the blind. So I don't have pics of that to post. Sorry...
Anyhoo...we finished the race (YAY!) and I was in horrible pain but was so thrilled Jess and I did a half-marathon together! We met up with our moms at the Race Retreat and were so glad we had paid for that because they had a HOT breakfast buffet! It was great!
The afternoon, we relaxed and hung out to get ready for the P!nk concert that night. Kristi, Jess and I had not really discussed exactly what we were wearing to the concert but we ended up wearing the same color scheme. Kinda funny...
.jpeg)
The concert was EPIC!! We decided it was the perfect end to Girls' Weekend. Here's where our seats were...
.jpeg)
<
But it didn't matter. We had so much freaking fun! And I'm pretty sure we were the only ones in our entire section that knew EVERY song. She is such an amazing performer. And technology is wonderful because here is how my pics taken with my little camera on tele-phots and then blown up on my ipad turned out...
.jpeg)
.jpeg)
It's like we were right there! AMAZING!!!! I would totally go see her again!
So, dear readers, like the weekend, this blog entry is coming to a close. There are so many more stories from the weekend but I want to same some to share in person with you. And, of course, there are many more photos as well. But here's what I will leave you with. Despite Disney over-pricing everything and the chaos of running with 26,000 people, it was the best Girl's Weekend YET!! Oh, and we decided our next one is New York City in the Fall 2014. So mark your calendars!!
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