Mickey & Minnie Royal Family 5K & Kids Races 2013



I know that this is a little late, but better late than never!

As you already know that my mission was to complete the Disney Coast to Coast Challenge, so this was the reason we were in Disneyworld this time. And again as I did with the Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend, I wanted to be part of as many events as possilbe, therefor I ran the Mickey and Minnie Royal Family 5K and my son ran two races, he did the Kids 200 meter dash and the Mickey Mile (one mile run).

I'll start with the 5K, I registered for this race in the stroller division, this way we got two medals, one for me and one for my son Chase. Unlike the Tinkerbell weekend where I wore the same costume, I wanted to have different one for this race because Chase wanted to dress up as Darth Vader and I thought that it would be really fun if I dressed up as Princess Leia. So I made both of our costumes and I think they turned out amazing, but you can be the judge of that :)

The race started at 5:45, I had put the alarm for 4:00 and I laid out our costumes and all of the stuff I needed for running the night before and waited until the absolute last minute to wake up Chase. I felt so bad, he was so tired, he was still asleep as I was putting his costume on and put him in the stroller. Once we were ready, I made my way down to the front of the hotel where the shuttles were leaving from and there were already so many people there. I was the only one with a stroller, so they let me on the bus first which was super nice, I did have to take him out of the stroller and carry him to the bus though, but he still did not wake up. Everybody loved my costume, they were all telling me how creative it was, unfortunately Chase was asleep, so they didn't get to see his cute costume.

Finally we got to the parking lot where the race started from, the stroller divison was the very last corral for safety reasons. They did come and had a little talk with us before the race. The main thing was that we weren't allowed to run with the strollers and we had to stay behind the rope the whole time. There were two guys who were going to be walking and holding the rope in front of us, so we just had to stay with them the whole time, they were going to walk the 16 minute mile pace.

We watched all the corrals go and finally it was our turn, Chase was still sleeping in the stroller and it was still super dark outside. We started walking to the starting line which was at the end of the parking lot and just a few minutes after we got there the fireworks went off and off we went. So it is impossible to walk the 16 minute a mile pace or so I found out anyway, because as the guys starting going, I could not keep up walking so a bunch of us just started running and nobody said anything even though it was prohibited. Just a short run later we made it to Epcot, countries around the world. The first picture stop was Mulan, I stopped, but Chase was still sleeping, but it was a cute picture nevertheless. The lines for the pictures got kind of long, it was mostly princess' like Snowhite and Dopey, Belle in her everyday outfit, one of the Aristocats, Jasmine and finally right before the Epcot ball it was Donald and Daisy dressed up as a king and a queen. The run was great, it was amazing running around the countries as everything was still closed and quiet. Chase did wake up right after the first picture stop with Mulan and got to enjoy the rest of the run. We both got our medals, took a finishers pictures and off we went to the Mickey mile race.

They packed these races super close together, so we barely had time to run over to the kids races and change bibs. The Mickey mile was cute, it ran past the Epcot ball and back finishing at the parking lot. This was hard for him, I did have to carry him part of the couse, I think partially too that he was still super tired, it stared at 8:45 I believe and then I was rushing to get his bib on and out of the stroller and he was getting a little crancky. We had fun during the run though and he finished strong at 16:47, I was so proud of him. Goofy was waiting for us at the finish line, we got high fives. Next we had to rush back to make it to the 200 meter dash by 9:15. My husband met us there and we all ran that one together. I managed to lose Chases bib for this race so we just kept the Mickey Mile one on and it worked. This one was very short, it was basically the last 200 meters of the Mickey Mile. I was kind of bummed that the medals were the same for the Mickey Mile and the Kids Races, but Chase didn't really care, he was just excited that he got more medals than I did. Love that kid to death, he is just so cute and cuddly.

That's kind of it, we ended up spending the rest of the day at Epcot since we were already there and really enjoyed Star Tours, again.

The weather was crazy hot, as you can see before 5:00AM it was already at 72 degrees, with a high of 90 degrees for the day. Crazy hot for us Seattlites :)

Disney Movie All-star Resort Review 2013

The reason I wanted to write a review on this Disney property is that I wanted you to know what kind of an experience we had and what my family and I thought about it.
We went to Walt Disneyworld is for the runDisney Princess Half Marathon. Because we were traveling all the way from Seattle and it's very costly, we wanted to stay at a Disney value resort to try to save as much money as possible.

As we were driving to the All-Star resort we realized that the Movies one is the farthest one back out of all the three All-Star resorts. So it takes that much longer to get to the parks. But okay, that's not so bad, right? As we were driving to check in, the front of the resort was very plane, just some huge stars on the building and that's about it, okay, I can handle that. As we walked in, It really took me by surprise, how cold and empty the lobby felt. The lobby was huge, they really could have done so much with it. Across from the check in area they had a little movie theater area set up, again they could have made this so awesome. Instead it had a few chairs with a small TV that was playing old Mickey cartoons. This is the Movie resort, the room themes were Toy Story, Fantasia,  101 Dalmatians etc, they should be playing those cartoons that fit the resort and that kids can have interest in. My four year old son watched it for a minute because didn't get it and then I had to keep him entertained for what seemed like forever while my husband was checking in.

Once we were all checked in, we drove to our building. I really wish I would have known that this was a MOTEL and not a hotel :( When they say "resort" I assume it going to be a nice place, well needless to say I was really disappointed. The room itself was small, the sink was located outside of the bathroom, so when I was getting ready for my races Saturday and Sunday morning at 3:00AM I had to do it in the dark as I would have woken up my husband and son, and a toddler who wakes up at 3:00AM would not have fun at the parks, do you agree?

The décor of the rooms was worse than a Motel 6, honestly it had a very 70's feel with the colors being orange and blue and it didn't feel very Disney. The only Disney things that I saw was that a towel was shaped into a Mickey Mouse shape on the bed and the border along the top of the wallpaper was Disney themed. The little shampoo bottles and soaps were also Mickey Mouse themed.
I just think that they could have done so many cool things with the theme and didn't really maximize the Disney theme. When I go to Disney, I want all Disney all the time. I can never get too much Disney and my son was all excited about being there, however when we were in our room it didn't feel like we were in Disneyworld. Also keep in mind since it is a MOTEL, there will be people walking by your door and windows way late into the night, no matter where your room is located at.

The beds were comfortable, but the room was really small, there was a table and chairs, but to be honest, they took up so much room, that I'd rather would have had more floor room, so my son could have played with his cars on the floor. Its hard to play with cars on the bed, but we made the best of it. Thankfully we didn't spend too much time at the room.

Our building was the Toy Story building, just outside is where they had a little play area that had a huge Woody and Buzz statues, which said no climbing. If you are going to put no climbing on those, you really need add other kinds of things to the play area where kids could climb on and have fun at. Don't get me wrong it was super cute, they had it look like Andy's room, with a huge door and everything, but other than look at the statues, there was nothing fun for kids.

The pool was nice, they did have a small kiddie pool off to the side as well that had warm water and plenty of room for the little ones to splash around. We went there in February and it was pretty cold, so the pool water was so cold, we did take a dip in it, for fun. I would imagine though that the kiddie pool would get super crowded during the summer time, since it is pretty small.

The food building was right next door by the pool, it was all cafeteria style, we only ate there for one breakfast and it was nice, the food was reasonable and there were things you could buy to bring into the parks with you.

Also, as we were in the parks and as part of the Disney Princess Half Marathon while we were waiting for the shuttles to come to take us to back to our resort, we realized that there were about three times as many shuttles going to the other resorts than to the All-Star Resorts. Also, all three All-Star Resorts got put together on the same shuttles most of the time, so it was always so full since there were two other resorts it was stopping at.

This is purely just my experience there, we spent four nights there, to give you an idea how long we were there for.

Let me know if you have any questions and hope you have a better experience :)

Keili

Tinkerbell Half Marathon 2013!!!

I know that this post is super late, but better late than never, right?
If you are interested, you can check out my other blogs from the Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend, so I'll start this one with the very early wake up call at 4:00am and I later realized this was too late, but more on that later.

I got ready, put my costume on and got my watch and fanny pack :) and off to the hotel lobby I went to wait for the shuttle. There were already a lot of people waiting, so I assumed that the bus was due any minute, but it took it forever to get there and time just kept going by. We thought that we were going to be late to the race, so some people started walking to the starting line. I really did not want to walk, so me and others still kept waiting. Finally the shuttle came, I was super happy, but then it ended up being the longest bus ride of my life. So this was the last shuttle of the morning and it was picking up from 4 different hotels and we were the first ones to be picked up. I guess the good thing is that we got seats on the bus, but it took probably another 20 minutes or so to actually get to Disneyland. We finally made it with 15 minutes to spare. I booked it to the staring line, and I mean I literally ran the whole way from the shuttle drop to corral "A" and I made it with 5 minutes to spare. I could not believe it. Needless to say I learned my lesson and did things a little different for the Princess Half. But wow, I could not believe I made it!

Finally off we went, the course itself was amazing at times, like when running through Sleeping Beauty's Castle and all through out Disneyland and California Adventure. Some of it was just okay, there was quite a bit of running through streets of Anaheim, some people were cheering us on in front of their houses, which was super nice and encouraging. I got a ton of pictures in the parks though, they were very nice at letting me use my own camera, they would actually have a cast member by the characters to just take pictures with your own camera and then a professional photographer. RunDisney thinks of everything, don't they?
I couldn't find anybody by the castle on Main street, so I just asked a guy with a baby stroller if he would take my picture and he totally did, so sweet! As I was coming around the castle to run through it I wanted to get a close up picture so I had my iPhone set on the front camera and was trying to take a picture of myself with the castle in the background and I saw another girl doing the same, so I just asked her if she wanted me to take picture of her and she could take a picture of me and she said "yes", that was awesome and super funny as we are both there trying to get decent pictures we could have just asked earlier :)

Unfortunately I didn't realize that the course ran right by our hotel, once I realized that I texted and called my husband to see if he could come down and cheer me on for a bit, but they were still sleeping and didn't get my message until it was too late. That was kind of a bummer, but nevertheless I kept going strong.

I did not see Mickey and Minnie around anywhere, I'm not sure if I just missed them or they weren't there altogether, oh well, I got some awesome pictures anyway. I had to take a picture of Lightning McQueen and Mater for my son Chase and he is super into Star Wars right now, so when I saw Darth Vader and the Storm trooper, that was another must picture for me. I think I stopped for all but one character picture and it was Princess Aurora and her Prince. I was super proud of my time for this race, considering that I stopped for about 9 or so characters for pictures and few for the castle and I actually stopped and asked an Anaheim police officer for a kids sticker (my son collects them) and it took them forever to find them. I finished with 2:28 I believe, you can check my "Race" page with all the details.

The finish was awesome, they had a marching band playing about a half a mile before the finish line, which got me super pumped up. The last of it was going around a parking lot, finishing with Donald, Mickey, Minnie and Goofy at the finish line. It was an amazing feeling to finish this race since this was why I started my running journey. Truly if I would have never found out about the runDisney races and if my husband would not have agreed to spend his vacation time on my runs, I would have never ever started running. I consider myself very lucky and fortunate to have had this opportunity and hope that my runDisney journey continues with many more runDisney races.

After the race they had runDisney foil blankets and the food boxes and lots of water, Gatorade and ice for you sore legs and knees.

I headed straight to the hotel since we were meeting one of our friends who is a Disney Cast member to let us into the park for FREE! I took a quick shower and got ready, put my much deserved medal on and off to California Adventure we went :)

XOXO
Keili

Neverland Family 5K and runDisney Kids Races 2013

I'm back with the runDisney Neverland Family 5K and Kids Races that took place in Disneyland and were part of the Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend races.

These were my first ever runDisney races and since I was planning on getting my Coast to Coast medal, I figured that I might as well take part of all the weekend races, since we were going to be there anyway. Check out my other blog posts about the Expo and my videos on YouTube!

Both of these races took place on Saturday, January 19th, 2013. The Neverland Family 5K was at 5:45AM, I had set my alarm for 4:30AM, but I had all of my stuff ready from the night before, so I put my costume on and I was ready to go. I used the same costume that I had planned on wearing for the Tinkerbell Half Marathon. Unfortunately I had only bought one blanket with me and I wanted to save that for the Half Marathon, so I ended up using the Tinkerbell half marathon tech shirt that came with registration. It worked out perfect since it was a long sleeve shirt and it was a bit chilly in the morning.

I made my way down to the hotel lobby by 4:45AM, I was the first one there, but there were more people who came as we waited for the shuttle bus. It was nice that they had free rides all through the weekend. The shuttles were running every 20 minutes, so once it came it was a short ride over to Disneyland. I should have given myself a little bit more time, I didn't know how long I would have to wait for the bus, I think I must have just missed it, so I did end up waiting for 20 minutes or so.
The starting line was right by the castle, which was beautiful. It was all lit up purple and later on they had swirly designs playfully scanning across the castle. They didn't really have corrals assigned in this race, although they were calling out corrals A, B and C, we didn't have anything on our bibs. I made my way up to the front though, I though i was going to run it in about a half an hour. There were a lot of kids and families running, and since it was a Family 5K they did not time it. As I waited there they had a stage set up in front of the castle and had a pirate themed hosts keeping us entertained. Once we were almost ready to start they walked us a bit father up to the side of the castle where I could see the actual starting line. Sean Astin was in the front row, running this race as well and then the fireworks started and I was off.

The course was very easy, they had characters on the side of the road, just like I had heard about. They did not however have professional photographers by the characters, so you had to bring your own camera if you wanted to take pictures. They did have them on the course, so I got some cute pictures from the race in addition to my own. At the very end just before the finish line they had Mickey and Minnie waiting for you, I got my picture and to the finish I went.

 

It was still dark when I finished, I got my medal and my food box. They did have a cute Peter Pan reusable bag that you could put your stuff in, which was super helpful. I walked back to the bus stop where the shuttle had dropped us off and there was nobody there. I happened to come across a bus driver who said that the shuttle did not start going back until 7:20 and I was done with my race by 6:15sh. I most certainly did not want to wait there for an hour. I was disappointed in that they did not plan that better, they should have had some sort of transportation going back to the hotels. Oh well, I was a little frazzled by that and didn't really know how to get back, so I put the hotels name on my phone, but it took me in the wrong direction. I walked so far out of my way before I realized that this was not right, so I turned back around and just walked back to Downtown Disney were I knew how to get back to my hotel. It took me probably an hour to finally get back. My husband and son were still sleeping, so I took a quick shower and by that time they were up and off to Disneyland we went.
The Happiest Place on Earth - TRUE STATEMENT!

runDisney Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend Expo 2013

I know this post is a little late, but being a Mom and having a full time job, doesn't really leave me much time for anything else. Here it is anyway, better late than never right.

We arrived in LA on Friday January 18, we live in Seattle so it was just a quick 2 hours flight or so. We flew into the John Wayne airport in Orange County which was wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy more convenient than LAX and it was much closer to Anaheim as well. Definitely recommend that if you are going to Disney. We got in about 10:00am and we had planned on spending some time at Newport beach and just hanging around that are for a little while. My little boy is a beach baby and he loves the water and the sand so much that he could spend all day playing in it and running around. The weather was beautiful and the sun was shining, so we spent a few hours at the beach and then rode the Ferris wheel and played some arcade games. After that we were ready to head for Disneyland.


We stayed at the Holiday Inn Anaheim, I thought the hotel was very nice and clean and much bigger than I thought. We got a great room with a Kings size bed and lots of room for Chase to play. We wanted to rest a bit, so we played some games and I unpacked a little and then I decided to go to the Tinkerbell Half Marathon Expo. My husband and son stayed behind, we were going to meet up at Downtown Disney and have dinner once I was done.

The hotel was walking distance to the Expo, which was held at the Disneyland Hotel. It was not at all crowded by the time I got there at about 4:00PM. I had to pick up my packets on Friday because I was running the Neverland Family 5K and my son was running the Kids races on Saturday morning before the expo opened. They had set everything up very conveniently, I walked downstairs first and that's where they had set up all of the packet pick ups. I picked up my Tinkerbell Half Marathon packet and shirt, then the Neverland Family 5K packet, then the Kids races packet and finally the ChEAR squad packet. That's where they also gave the pins and the necklaces if you had pre-ordered them, so I got all of my things and I headed upstairs. That's where they had the Official Merchandising area set up, the speakers and ton of other booths that sold all sorts of running related merchandise.

 

New Balance was there with their new runDisney running shoes, I wanted to buy them so bad, but they were kind of pricy at $125.00 and I just wanted to think about it and I figured since I was going to the Princess Expo a month later I would buy them from there if I still wanted them.

I looked around the booths, but nothing really stood out to me and I didn't want to spend too much money anyways, but I did want to get something from the official merchandise section. I ended up getting the Tinker Bell mug and the runDisney Mickey Vinylmation with the little Tinker Bell medal and the vinyl Mickey ears magnet.

Once I was ready to leave, right by the doors they had set up a little photo opportunity with the Tinkerbell Half Marathon background. They had cast members there taking your photo with your own camera, which was nice so you weren't forced to buy the photos, you can just use your own.

I had so many bags as I was leaving, I consolidated them all into one and off I went to meet my husband and my little boy. We had an awesome dinner at the House of Blues and went back to the hotel and crashed early. My race was at 5:45am the next day!!!!

 

Mercer Island Half Marathon Finished!

Last Sunday I finished the Mercer Island Half Marathon with a time of 2:21. Not too bad for me, since I had not trained for this since my last half in DisneyWorld 4 weeks ago. My tendon was just hurting me too much and I didn't want to irritate it even more.

Just a quick race recap:
I picked up the race packed at a small expo at the Mercer Island Community center the day before. They had some vendors selling shirts and local businesses and sponsors there. I didn't buy anything while I was there, but did pick up some freebies, like an emergency kit and some tote bags.

I was a little worried about race day transportation because parking on the Island is very limited and they started the half marathon walkers before the runners at 7:00, my race was at 9:00. I didn't think that there was going to be any parking available by the time I got there so I just decided to park at the closest Park and Ride and then take the bus from there. The buses were free for all the runners, which was super nice, so I didn't have to worry about carrying change on me or anything.

Once I got to Mercer Island it was just a short walk to the Community Center where the starting line was. They did offer gear check, but I try not to deal with that if I don't have to since the lines are always so long. They had bagels, oranges and bananas before and after race. Odwalla was a big sponsor, they had a tent set up with free samples and goodies. After that I made my way to the starting line, they didn't have corrals, just different colored flags to stand behind depending on what your pace was going to be. I stayed towards the front though.

Once the race started I was feeling great, I was blasting "This Girl is on Fire" by Alicia Keys on repeat for the first three miles to get me started and it really made get a good start, I think :)  I love that song, its really inspirational and makes me want to run faster and do better. I had brought two packets of energy gummies with me. I had the first pack at about mile 4 and was feeling good and the second pack at about mile 7. They had lots of water stations all thru the course and the best part was that we were running around an island that is mostly residential, a ton of the residence were out in front of their homes cheering us on. Some even had set up their own mini water stations and were handing out candy like twizzles and skittles. Two little girls set up a lemonade stand in front of their home. It was so sweet and it was amazing to see the support from our community.

At mile 8 is where I normally start crashing, I was actually feeling great. I was even thinking to myself, what am I doing different this race that I feel so good that this point, but I could not figure it out. Oh well, I was happy and just kept going, the course was quite hard, due to all the hills there. At mile 5, 8 and the finish were all steep uphill battles, but you always know what goes up, must come down, so there was always a reward of going downhill afterwards.

Overall I really enjoyed the race and I would do it again in a heartbeat. This was the 41st year of the Mercer Island Half!!

See you there next year :)

Oh, FYI they had major discounts for other races in the area after the finish, so I signed up for the Heroes Half in Everett at the end of April. We'll see how I do! I'm officially three for three for half marathons this year (one every month) and now I'm registered for the fourth.

New runDisney Dopey Challenge!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was checking Twitter this morning and yes I do follow runDisney, if you don't you absolutely should! They are awesome. Anyway, this is what they posted:

Today, runDisney reaches another milestone as we expand the 2014 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend presented by Cigna with the addition of the Walt Disney World 10K, the Dopey Challenge, new medals and the return of the popular Runner’s World Challenge.
In 2006, the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend had a big year. The races had become so popular, the half marathon and the full marathon now had to be held on two separate days. This race day bifurcation led to another interesting development. It was now theoretically possible for a runner to run both races, so the team decided that if someone was goofy enough to do that, they deserved a medal. And thus, Goofy’s Race and a Half Challenge was born with just over 2,300 runners receiving the first Goofy medal for their 39.3 mile accomplishment.
Through the years, “the Goofy” has been a favorite with our runners as well as a unique offering in the running industry. Well, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. This next year, runDisney is adding a 10K race to our Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend line-up, joining our already popular 5K, Half Marathon and Full Marathon. And you guessed it (we couldn’t help ourselves), we are now offering the Dopey Challenge to those runners who conquer ALL FOUR of our races. That’s right…completing the 5K, the 10K, the Half Marathon and the Full Marathon in the four consecutive days will earn you the Dopey Challenge Medal. That coveted piece of hardware will be clanging around the necks of our finishers with the Mickey Marathon medal, the Donald Half medal, the 5K Family Fun Run medal, the Goofy Challenge medal, and the new Minnie 10K medal.
Six medals for 48.6 miles over four days. I think I am just Dopey enough to do it. Come join me!

Ahhhhhhh, yes, of course I want to do this, this sounds amazing and what an experience it would be. Hard, of course, fun, of course, Dopey and Goofy, absolutely!!!!!!!!!!!! Yes, please sign me up, I couldn't ask for a cooler weekend to spend in Disneyworld. I know this may seem crazy if you hate running, but it truly would be a dream for me, this one definitely goes on my bucket list!
I think its so fun that they are coming up with new things all the time and adding new challenges to existing events, for people who have been running Disney for year, I'm sure its a nice change. But for me and all the runDisney newbies, its cool to see who much they care about running and that they keep going every year, year after year.

Registration opens on April 9th, 2013!!!!!!!!!! This is two and a half weeks away, crazy. I bet it will sell out in the first couple of months as well. If you are a runner and like me where you are up for trying anything at least once, I think this is a dream come true. I really am curious how many people will do it, we'll see I guess.

If you are reading this and have a lot of money and have nothing to do with it, I have an idea, you can just sponsor me to go there and take this challenge on ;)

Comment below if this is something you would ever consider doing or if you are ready to get signed up.

Keep on running and maybe, just maybe I'll see you there,

Keili

Fun in Seattle!

I had taken a couple of days off work since there was no school for my son. I had asked what he wanted to do during that time and he wanted to go to Seattle. I should say that when people ask me where I'm from I always say Seattle, but technically we do live on the Eastside. I think most people do that when they live in the suburbs. But anyway it takes us about 20 minutes to drive to Downtown Seattle. We hardly ever used to go there until my son was born. We have gone out to explore more of Seattle since then. Now that he is old enough and really into all sorts of vehicle he really enjoys riding on the Seattle Monorail, so we'll go down there just to ride the Monorail back and forth. The drivers always ask us where we are from, I think only tourist ride it, they always think its funny that we go there just to ride it. It makes my son happy and that's all that matters.

So anyway after that long introduction, we went to Seattle for a day of fun. We got there about 11:00am and the first thing we did is got on the Monorail, we always have to sit in the front of course, that's the best view and the drivers always let him honk the horn two times. The best part about riding it back and forth is that you are guaranteed to get a front row seat on the way back, because most people get off at the end and we just walk to the other side of the monorail and get our seats.

After the monorail ride Chase really wanted to go to LUSH. If you are not familiar with the store, its an amazing bath stuff store. That's what I call it anyway, they have the best bath bombs and Chase really wanted to go there to pick out a few things. Since we are running low on them anyway I had him pick out a few things. He really wanted the rocket ship bath bomb, but they were all out, so he ended up choosing the robot, the three in one Easter egg and the Saturn bath bombs. This made him super happy.

After LUSH we stumbled across this really cool games store (not video games, my husband is a huge gamer so that's where my mind automatically goes :)). They had all sorts of board games and fun stuff and Chase loves to play games, they had a bunch of them out to try. I think we spent over an hour at that store and the clerk was super nice and showed us how to play all the games. We ended up buying a very cute penguin game I'd never seen before which was exciting. Chase couldn't wait to go home and show Daddy how to play, so on our way we went.

Next we went back to the car we drove to the other side of the city to go to Uwajimaya, its an Asian grocery store. We always leave with a lot more than we came for.
There was a Travel Channel episode about best places to eat or something like that and a pastry shop located inside Uwajimaya was featured in it and my husband really wanted to try it. Its called Bearded Papas and they have the most amazing cream puffs there. I would recommend the chocolate filled cream puffs, those were my favorites, they do run out of that one the fastest, so go early.

After that is was time for some lunch and Chase was ready to go home anyway. We had yummy deli sandwiches and headed home.

It was a much fun filled day, we accomplished everything we wanted to and had fun playing the new game once we got home.

Hope you had fun reading about our adventure for the day. Comment below if you know any awesome places around the Seattle area we should check out, food, play, parks or otherwise.


Keili and Chase

Mercer Island Half Marathon, March 24, 2013

I'm excited to announce that I have signed up for my third half marathon this year!! So far I'm three for three, one half marathon a month so far this year :)

I only have a week and a half to train from here on, I've been really good, but have not ran any long runs since my Princess Half marathon. I'm planning on a 10 miler on Sunday, so I'll let you know how I feel and how it goes. This week I still have to do two more short runs and then next week is the Mercer Island Half. I've never ran this race before, I've read some reviews and people have said that the course is really hard and when I looked at the elevation chart, it looks like its all uphill, with two minor downhill sections. This makes me a little scared, I was going to try for a PR, but now I don't know. I will still train my best and do my best during the run.


The weather should be good, not too cold, not too hot, maybe even raining, which I actually enjoy. I know I'm weird like that, but somehow it makes me be faster and better, probably because I just want to get out of the rain :) I think on the long runs it just feels good when you get hot during your run to feel the rain on your face.

Thankfully this race is close to my house, but the parking will be limited, it is an island with mostly residential areas after all. So what I thought about doing is driving to a park and ride and then catching a bus to Mercer Island. They did post on their website http://www.mercerislandhalf.com that the buses and trains will be free if you wear your bib, which is awesome that they support the race that way.

I'll let you know how it goes and hopefully I'll see you there!!!

Run For Your Lives 2012

I decided to do this run last summer because it looks different from all the other races and it looked really fun. All the zombies were already sold out so I just registered for the race.

For those of you who don't know what this race is about I'll tell you a little bit about it.
There are three things that you can register for, one is to be a spectator and yes you have to pay to be a spectator in this race, second is a zombie, they go all out and have professional make up artists who make you look like a "real" zombie (they really do an amazing job) and third you can be the runner. The race is 5K, ours was about 2 and a half hours south of Seattle on a dirt bike track. It happened to be one of the hottest weekends in Seattle, I think during my waive at 4:30PM it was about 90 degrees out. This race is not about the obstacles, but about not getting your flags taken by zombies.

When I got there I checked in, they gave me a belt with three red long flags on it (think flag football), they were attached to the belt with Velcro. You put the belt around your waist and you can adjust the flags however you want, back, sides, front, wherever. The rules are that you cannot tuck them in your pants or shirt, they have to be visible, otherwise you will be "disqualified" and won't get an official finishing time. I think you still get a medal though. then they had three staring lines: slowest, faster and fastest. I went into the fastest line since I was going to finish at a decent time. They let each of the lines go separately, so we got to go first. So they had the zombies right out of the gate and I got my first flag taken right away, I was bummed. I did face plant as I was trying to run away, pretty embarrassing, but I didn't know any of these people so I just kept running :). I lost both of my last flags as we were running thru the trees. There was even a zombie sitting in a tree. I finished the race, however I DID NOT SURVIVE :(
I got a medal anyway though. For 2013 they will have two separate medals, one for the survivors and one for the "dead".

It was a fun race, I don't if I would go down there again this year, it was such a long drive and the course itself was pretty boring, it was lots of sandy hills and some woodsy areas. I think the course used to be and old motorcycle rally area or something like that. I don't know. I was also disappointed in how many zombies there were, well its subjective I guess, it was cool seeing the costumes and make-up and all that, but truly unless you ran in a huge group where everybody else can protect one person it was impossible to not loose your flags.

We'll see, I'll keep you posted if I will run it or not.

Keili