Running, Sam, and Books

I signed up for the St. Jude Half Marathon (13.1 miles) on Dec. 6th. I have been training for 4 weeks now. I had two main concerns when deciding whether to try this or not--1: my knees, 2: what to do with Leah and Sam during my weekly long runs. So far, neither concern has been an issue. I am running very slowly, and I am increasing my weekly mileage very slowly too, adding 1-2 miles each week. Saturday morning Jimmy kept the children while I left at 6:00 a.m. to meet a running group in town. I ran 6 miles that morning. Tomorrow I plan to do my long run for this week, 7 miles, at the park. I have a baby sitter coming to play with Sam on the playground, Leah will be at a birthday party, and the older three will be at the same park having cross country practice. The reason I am running my long run for this week on a Tuesday instead of a Saturday leads me to the next thing on my mind...

I am leaving Sam overnight for the first time in his life (he will be 3 in January) this Friday night. I will be gone a little over 24 hours. Lynn and I are going to a Christian Women's Retreat about 1.5 hours away from home. Sam has never gone to sleep at bedtime without me and my hair. I can count on one hand the times he has not gotten in our bed during the night. He wakes up calling, "Mama, Mama!" I get him, he grabs my hair, and he is back asleep within a minute. I am not sure that I can sleep without his little hands pulling my hair! We'll see!

While shopping for a birthday gift today, I saw Karen Kingsbury's newest and last book in the beloved Baxter family series. I bought it! I want to stay up all night and read the whole thing (I won't)! But I am still reading two other books. I am going to make myself finish the other books, and then read this last book, Sunset at a slow, enjoyable pace. I have never read a book without skipping ahead to see what happens. I am going to TRY to read this book, page by page, in order!