This week’s Tuesday Topic is a FREE topic.  Feel free to post any running related blog post.  Remember to link up with Kim and Zenaida!  Visit at least two of the other linked posts – the more the merrier!  Remember to come back for later linkers!

My word for 2021 was Joy.  As much as we were all looking forward to 2020, it did not turn out to be like we expected.  Now that it is 2022, will it be better?  Who knows but like everyone else, I am tired.  Simply tired of Covid and all of its variants (how many can there be?) and the effects on everyone.  I thought 2021 was a bit better but not all great either.  Still, I looked for joy in it.  While it wasn’t easy I did find it.

My health.  Luckily I did not encounter any health issues.  I am grateful that I managed to stay away from the doctor or hospital (I did go for my annual physical exam and mammogram).

My students.  It was a ROUGH year and I hated it.  I started off the year teaching in a semi-empty classroom to having 22 students in my room.  I did get frustrated many times but also had many fun moments.  No matter what, they’re still kids.  

My running.  The beginning of 2021 was nonstop with snow and I hated it.  However, I managed to still run everyday for my run streak.  Running is what got me started in the morning.  I love the solitude and being able to “forget” what was happening in the world.

Spending more time with my mom.  Growing up we weren’t close.  I never had that mother/daughter relationship that most people have.  However, it has been different ever since her stroke.  She is no longer independent and relies on her daughters to help her in many aspects.  We spent HOURS listening to music while enjoying the warm days of Summer, we also watched TV, and cooked a lot.  She now tells me that since I know how to cook, that I can get married.  🤣 🤣

My friends. Unfortunately, I did not spend too much time with them.  However, I was still happy to get a message here and there knowing they were doing well.

My coworkers.  I don’t know what I would do without them.  They are always there for me.  The 2nd grade team works very well together and we tackled many difficult tasks last year.  2021 was rough for many teachers but my coworkers sure made it a bit better.  We talked and laughed a lot and made the best of it.

My cats.  My fur babies!!  They are the best.  Too bad Lola and Mateo still do not get along.  They’re both very different.  Lola is more serious and loves following me around.  Mateo is the trouble maker but still makes me laugh.

My iMac.  It was the best thing I purchased for remote learning in 2020.  I hate the small screen on my work computer.  Last year I used it mostly to catch up on work.  Now I have it in my classroom and hope I don’t get in trouble.  No where does it say we cannot take our own devices but administrators like to make their own rules.

My Brooks shoes.  I spent HOURS running in my Brooks shoes.  I was done with my  run streak in August so I ran everyday in them for almost 8 months.

My Oiselle long roga shorts.  I love running in shorts and wear long rogas on all of my runs.  I also ran many miles in these beautiful shorts.  Another great pair are the Oiselle pocket joggers.  They’re great for also storing my small water bottles.  I’ve lost count but I think I have almost 30 pairs of the long rogas.

My MAC patent polish lip pencil in Ruby.  These were discontinued in 2020 and I bought a whole bunch of them hoping to wear them in 2021.  Unfortunately I didn’t because I rarely went anywhere and when I did I had a mask.  My lip pencils are still in two boxes (yes I bought that many) and hopefully soon I can wear them.

Cooking with my mom.  I’ve learned so much from her.  We spent hours together and cooked many meals together.  I do regret not doing this sooner but am glad I am doing this now.

My new car.  I still miss my old car but I do love my new one.  Now, if I only I can get it to stay clean.  One of these days I will take it to get detailed.  There is absolutely no reason why it isn’t clean inside.  The best thing about my car is the remote starter.  Though I did confess that I didn’t find out about it till months later.  Haha, better late than never.

My running playlist.  I love running with music.  My playlist consists of Spanish and English music.  Definitely a great combo!  I use Amazon Music for my playlist and like adding new songs to it.

Making apple martinis.  My favorite drink.  I honestly do not know why I did not make them more last year.  I did have a lot of wine.  

My pens and highlighters.  Ha, I have way too many pens but I use them a lot every day.  It depends on my mood but sometimes I use black ink, then switch to purple, red, or blue.  Oh, I also have those with glitter and those with a fruity scent.  

Working with my coach.  He is truly the best.  Very patient with me.  He has always been there for me when I have great and bad runs.  He was also very supportive during my run streak.  

My blogger friends.  They’re truly the best group of running friends.  Even though I haven’t met everyone (yet), I am so lucky they’re my friends. THANK YOU!

My family.  I am grateful for the great times we had together.  We ate.  We laughed.  We talked.  We celebrated birthdays, anniversaries, and graduations.  Hopefully we can continue to do that this year.

Topic for next week – What’s on your Winter bucket list?  Feel free to write about this or any running related topic.  We hope you’ll link up with us!

This week’s Tuesday Topic is: What’s your plan to achieve your 2022 goals?  You can write about this topic or feel free to post any running related blog post.  Remember to link up with Kim and Zenaida!  Visit at least two of the other linked posts – the more the merrier!  Remember to come back for later linkers!

In December I wrote about my 2022 goals.  Let me tell you how I plan to achieve these goals.

✅ Stay injury free.  Being injured is no fun.  The two worst ones I’ve had were a calf strain and plantar fasciitis.  But I can say that the latter one was more painful.  The first time I experienced this (that I can remember) was during the Missoula Half Marathon in 2019.  I was miserable towards the end because my feet were hurting.  It wasn’t until a month later that I got an official diagnosis.  Anyway, my plan is to do more cross training, use my massage gun, and my mom’s foot and calf massager.  Any other suggestions?

✅ Buy a house.  Besides looking, I need to expand my search area.  Right now I am looking at a specific area and nothing.  Well, there have been a few but either someone else makes an offer before me or they make an offer way more than I am willing to spend.  It is ridiculous how expensive it is.  Something else I am doing is looking for a house with an unfinished or semi-finished basement.  At least with that option I can customize it and hopefully more available to buy.

✅ Travel.  I have a new passport.  I am ready to go.  I guess I don’t really need to travel internationally.  🙂 My sister is planning to visit from Mexico in May.  Then the plan is for me to go for 2-3 weeks there in the Summer.  I don’t want to go during Spring Break for just one week.  To me it isn’t worth it.  I want to go for a longer period of time.  But before I can travel I need to make sure my siblings can stay with my cats.  A tentative trip I am also planning is to Fargo for the Fargo Half Marathon.  I still need to run in 8 states for my 50+1 state goal.

✅ Continue to be patient at work and at home.   Pick my battles, step away, and not keep quiet.  I think I am doing OK with it.  I remind myself that sometimes it isn’t worth getting all frustrated and annoyed.  I don’t have access to my work email on my phone and that has helped.  I also think about things that make me happy like coffee, my family, my cats, etc.  Watching TV has also helped me relax.

✅ PR in my 50k.  Just run and follow the plan?  I may have to switch my race because I’ve missed a lot of runs due to the weather.  Yesterday was my first time running in 2 weeks.  It ran 2 miles and it felt hard!  By picking a race later in the year will give me more time to train and hopefully get a PR.

✅ Run 1,200 miles.  In order to do this I need to run an average of 100 miles each month.  I am not starting off the year correctly because for this month I have 7 miles.  Hopefully once it clears up then I can bump up the mileage.  Plus I know training for a 50k will add lots of miles there too.

✅ Complete 300 Peloton rides.  I started off the year with 136 Peloton rides.  Yep, I was slacking.  Now I’ve done 157 rides and need 143 to meet my goal.  With 11 months left in the year, I will need an average of 14 rides a month, 3-4 per week.  It is hard to fit in a bike class while running 6 days a week but thinking of doing a 20 minute ride in the evening on the days I do a hard run.  I will need to talk to my coach and see what he thinks.  

Topic for next week – FREE topic .  Feel free to write about this or any running related topic.  We hope you’ll link up with us!

This week’s Tuesday Topic is:  What’s one fun running related thing you did over the holidays?  You can write about this topic or feel free to post any running related blog post.  Remember to link up with Kim and Zenaida!  Visit at least two of the other linked posts – the more the merrier!  Remember to come back for later linkers!

Yesterday was my first day back at work after being off for 2 1/2 weeks.  It was great to be off but I was looking forward to being back at work.  Weird, right?  In December I wrote about the 5 things I was looking forward to during Winter Break.  I will update you on that and then tell you other fun things I did during that time.

☃️ Not be out running in the dark.  I ran one week and then didn’t run last week because of the weather.  

☃️ Not drive to school or anywhere else.  I drove once to the gym, to the store, and to take my mother to the doctor.  That’s it.

☃️ Watch TV.  Yep, every single day.  I finished watching “Castle”.  I was sad to see it end but was happy with how it ended.

☃️ Read.  Started reading “Such a quiet place” but haven’t finished it.  Luckily the library renews it automatically for me and no one else has requested it.  I did not watch “A Star is Born” because I couldn’t get the DVD player to work.  I am not sure why since I bought last year.

☃️ Teach a Winter Break Boot Camp to my students.  It was actually fun.  My students enjoyed it too.  Glad I did it.

Other things I did:

✔️ Spent a lot of time with my cats.  Lola followed me everywhere.  For some reason I cannot upload a recent photo of my cats.  Below is one from a few weeks ago.

✔️ Made mole with my mother for Christmas.  That was the 3rd time I made it.  I see now it isn’t that complicated.  I like cooking with her and learning how to make traditional Mexican food.  I am getting good at it.  Now she just observes and supervises me.  😀

✔️ Upgraded to the iPhone 13.  I had to wait about 45 minutes for an agent and then the whole upgrade took about 3 hours.  I haven’t noticed that much difference from the iPhone X.  The T-Mobile agent told me I needed a different charger which prompted me to go to Target to buy new ones for my house, school, and my car (it had to be plugged in the cigarette lighter and in my new car I had no idea where it was).  It turns out that I could still use iPhone X phone charger.  

✔️ Ran 1,000 miles.  What a great day!

✔️ Began using the Peloton bike again.  No running so the bike it is.  I LOVE Camila.  Yesterday I took a 30 minute class and almost got a PR.  I missed it by 6 points.  Tonight I am planning to take her live class at 7pm.  I am looking forward to it.

Topic for next week – What’s your plan to achieve your 2022 goals?  Feel free to write about this or any running related topic.  We hope you’ll link up with us!

Welcome to the first edition of Tuesday Topics for 2022!  Kim and I have lots of fun topics for this year and are excited for you to join us every week.  We decided that the last Tuesday of every month will be a FREE Topic.  Also, we’re looking for cool, new topics to highlight for the rest of 2022.  If you have any topics that you would like to add, please let me know in the comments section!

This week’s Tuesday Topic is:  Your word for 2022.  You can write about this topic or feel free to post any running related blog post.  Remember to link up with Kim and Zenaida!  Visit at least two of the other linked posts – the more the merrier!  Remember to come back for later linkers!

Last year my word was “Joy”.  It wasn’t easy but I did find joy last year.  I am working on a post and will have it ready by the end of the month.  For 2022 I decided my word to be “Patience”.  I started it working on it last year (well, all of the time but more last year) but want to do better this year.

Patience: : the ability to remain calm and not become annoyed when dealing with problems or with difficult people.

1: Patience for my mother
I have said before and I will say it again but she is an amazing and wonderful woman.  It’s been rough these past couple of years but at the same time I’ve had a great time with her.  She is older and requires extra help.  As stressful as it is, I am glad to be one of her daughters taking care of her.  I’d rather do that than have her be in a nursing home.

2: Patience for my students
No matter what they say or do or don’t do, they’re kids.  They wear me out and leave me exhausted at the end of the day.  However, I still love seeing them laugh and smile.  They make me smile too.  It’s been a rough time for us but we are doing the best we can.  Yesterday during the winter break boot camp a few students told me that they’re ready to go back to school.  

3: Patience for my students’ parent
I am not a parent so I don’t know what it is like to be one.  However, it drives me crazy when they don’t do more or not enough for their child.  I don’t think they realize that I also want the best for them but we have to work together.  Yes, they spend 5-6 hours with me each day but they’re their first teacher.

4: Patience for others
I am not perfect.  No one is.  I pick my battles and some things are just not worth getting upset about.  Well, maybe I do for a little bit and then move on. 

5: Patience for myself
I also need to take care of myself.  I have to take it easy and slow down.  Life is short.  I have to enjoy it now while I can.  Plus I work but and am still human.  I will make mistakes and not everything will go as planned.

Topic for next week – What’s one fun related thing you did over the holidays?  Feel free to write about this or any running related topic. We hope you’ll link up with us!

This week’s Tuesday Topic is:  What are your goals for 2022?  You can write about this topic or feel free to post any running related blog post.  Remember to link up with Kim and Zenaida!  Visit at least two of the other linked posts – the more the merrier!  Remember to come back for later linkers!

I can’t believe 2021 is almost over.  Wow, time to start thinking about next year.  Last year I wrote my goals for 2021 and, unfortunately, did not reach all of them.  I will be including them again in this post for next year.  

✅ Stay injury free.  This year I had a minor calf strain and plantar fasciitis in the Summer but it wasn’t serious that I had to stop running for weeks or months.  I try to use everyday my massage gun and my mother’s foot and calf massager.

✅ Buy a house.  Yep, still on my list.  Still looking.  I am giving myself till the Summer to move.  I don’t want to move in the middle of the year (especially while training for my race), but if I have to then I will.

✅ Travel.  This year I traveled to work, to the laundromat, and to the store.  Hopefully next year I will at least leave the state.  At least I did leave the city.  🤣

✅ Continue to be patient at work and at home.  I noticed a change towards the end of the year.  I wasn’t as angry as I would usually get.  At work I pick my battles and mainly focused on the things that I can control (mainly in my classroom).  I do need to work on being more patient with parents.  Ugh, sometimes they drive me crazy with the things they do and/or don’t do for their child.

✅ PR in my 50k.  My PR is 6:20:55 from 2012.  That is a 12:14 pace.  😮

✅ Run 1,200 miles.  I was planning to run that this year but unfortunately had to change it to 1,000 miles.  

✅ Complete 300 Peloton rides.  I’ve been slacking with my bike.  Running has been taking a lot of my time, but I know that if I plan it correctly, I can fit in a bike ride after work.