Crazylegs Classic 8K

The full marathon is only about six months away and it was time for my next training race. Crazylegs Classic is HUGE in Madison and, since in goes on part of the marathon course, it seemed like the perfect choice. It is an 8K (about 5 miles) and I don’t think it is a very common distance. Most races are 5K or 10K, so I don’t really know why it is as long as it is, but carrying on…

The weather was perfect! Sunny and in the mid-50s, which is the most exquisite running weather. The last race I ran was why-the-f**k-am-I-outside cold and windy, so this was a nice change.

My friend Allie came to cheer me on and we got there kind of early, so we got coffee and stayed in the coffee shop until it was time to line up, which allowed me to use an actual bathroom instead of the alternative. Porta-Potties are an essential part of race day and I see why they are important in managing the bathroom needs of such a large crowd of people, but the truth is that a small piece of my soul dies every time I have to use one. Eww.

I was super excited to line up for the race start at 10. Here we go! But, wait! Just kidding! I think some 20,000 runners do Crazylegs every year, and so they had us leaving in waves. My wave didn’t even reach the starting line until about 10:40. We just marched around the Capital Square behind a guy carrying our wave banner like some spandex wearing military troop for what felt like forever, and then we were really off!

The run was beautiful! We went along the coast of Lake Mendota in Madison, which is always gorgeous to see. There was an absolutely killer hill about a mile in, but after that the course was mostly downhill and flat. At this point in my running career, I’m not really that focused on beating my previous times. I like to enjoy myself on race day and view it as being a celebration of all the training and hard work I have put in to prepare. I ran at a comfortable pace and conserved my energy.

Then, at about mile 4, something incredible happened. I thought I had experienced a runner’s high before, but never quite to this extreme. I don’t know if it was the fact that I was so close to the end or that I was surrounded by all of these other amazing runners, but all of a sudden my legs stopped hurting. Actually, it was more like they felt weightless. And I started to run fast. I was passing people left and right, ducking in between groups. I have no way of knowing just how fast I ran the last mile, but I know I felt amazing doing it, almost like I floated over the finish line, which was on the turf in Camp Randall stadium, the pride and joy of the UW Football team.

Amazing race! So fun! Can’t wait until next time! My next race is the Madison Twilight 10K in about a month, which I am very much looking forward to.

Hope you had a marvelous weekend!

Sandy Cardigan

Spring has finally started to make an appearance in my little corner of the world. The grass seemed to go from dormant brown to brilliant green in a matter of hours. The birds are chirping and building nests, which is driving my cat berserk. I officially swapped out my winter coat for a light jacket. Summer is coming.

My BlueSand Cardigan is also coming along, and fairly quickly considering the small amount of time I have had to work on it. School is back in session after a much needed spring break and my training runs keep getting longer and longer, which leaves just a few sparse moments at the end of the day to add a couple more rows. Thank goodness for the weekend where time is slightly more abundant.

The thing I like most about this cardigan is that it is striped. I haven’t knitted a lot of striped things in the past, but this time around I am realizing that stripes make everything go faster. They are like little mile markers along the length of the sweater. Instead of busting out the measuring tape every five seconds (which I usually do, along with irrational thoughts that maybe, just maybe, that one row I just knit magically added the three inches I need to get to the next step in my pattern) I can visually see the progress I’m making. It is just lovely.

Hopefully I find some good quality knitting time this weekend, but there is quite a bit going on during my two day sabbatical from work. Saturday, I am running in the Crazylegs Classic 8K in Madison, which I hope to write a race recap for in the next few days. Then I have to hustle home to bathe my sweaty self and get presentable and pretty for my friend’s wedding shower, of which I am a bridesmaid for. It is going to be a tight time crunch between these two events and I’m a tad bit concerned about being late for the shower. I briefly considered just going to the shower (the wedding kind) in my race clothes. I know my friend, who is the most lovely person in the world, wouldn’t mind at all, but I could just imagine getting the stink eye from some middle-aged aunt. I’ll shower (the water kind) and put on a dress and blow dry my hair and potentially risk being late. Sunday, I’m going to church, which usually results in going out to lunch with friends at an alarming frequency, and then sitting down to grade the massive pile of tests my Algebra 2 students took this week. Deciphering the chicken scratches of teenagers is not my favorite part of the job. Oh, and Game of Thrones is on. We can’t forget that.

Have a happy weekend!

A Change of Pace

Dear Readers,

I have cracked. My yarn diet lasted six months and it came to a train wreck of a stop last week. I purchased quite a bit of yarn for five projects, four of which are sweaters. I feel no remorse or regret. I am so very happy with my purchases, piled here on my bed for all the world to see.

One project I decided to cast on right away is the BlueSand Cardigan. I know, I know, yet another cast on project to add to my million other started projects, but I could not stop myself. BlueSand is big and striped and I kept reading that the pattern was deceptively elaborate, so I had to take a whack at it. I am also in love with my color scheme. The main color is this amazing grey-blue color, with light pink and pure white being my contrast colors. I almost died of happiness seeing all the yarn together, which is Cascade Ultra Pima, by the way. I also justified starting this cardigan because it is made of cotton, meaning that if the weather aligns itself just right and there happens to be a decently cool summer night at some point during the next few months, I might be able to wear it relatively soon, versus my wool sweaters which, let’s get real, won’t see the light of day until the temperature majorly drops next fall.

Which brings me to a kind of unrelated topic. I started this blog about knitting a little over six months ago. In my research on how to start an effective blog, I read over and over that you should pick some sort of niche or overarching topic to stick to when writing. I love knitting and it is something I have a lot to say about, so it seemed like an obvious solution. At that time, I was still recovering from my injury and not spending a whole lot of time participating in my other favorite hobby, running and fitness. Over the last few months, as I have healed and started training again, all I want to do some days is write about running. I find it a touch silly that I have these two hobbies that are so drastically different from each other, and they definitely don’t fit together in a nice and neat “niche.” The reality is that my training takes absolute priority over my knitting, but I don’t write about it as much because it doesn’t fit my blog theme. I have spent a lot of time thinking to myself, “But wait a minute, this is a blog about knitting. I can’t write about that!” I am here today to tell you that I have decided to say, “Screw the niche!”

I am going to start writing about running more. It is something I love and care deeply about and I want to write about it regularly. I will of course still be writing about knitting, but I have decided that this is my blog and I want to write about my life and experiences, which more often than not doesn’t include a ball of yarn and a pair of needles. I hope this is all right with you. There are some people who I know read this blog regularly (I won’t fool myself into saying it is a lot of people, but there are a few) and I so greatly appreciate all of your visits and comments. The knitting niche will be met, but I hope there is room for much more in the future!

Yours truly,

Emily

P.S. – On a random note (But hey! I’m doing that a little more now), I got a dress for my friend’s wedding I am in next month and I love it! I got to pick my own dress and she wanted me to wear cream, which I feel weird about doing at someone else’s wedding, but she insisted and I am so excited. Here is the front! The back has this plunging keyhole opening that is on the verge of scandalous, but she said that I am her most sassy bridesmaid and that it is only fitting 😉 Yay!

Spring Fever

It is a dark and rainy Sunday morning here, but it really doesn’t bother me because I am on spring break! It was super late this year and my students were going absolutely stir crazy by the end. I love my job, but it’s always nice to get away for a little while and not have to be anyone’s teacher. Just for a smidge of time. As you can imagine, I am taking this week to knit like it is going out of style. Knit like there is no tomorrow. Knit like it is 1999. I’m sure you understand what I mean.

I’ve had a few projects on the needles that I have been alternating between. I’m having trouble sticking to just one thing these days. The first one is my hexipuffs. It has been a while since I’ve worked on these little cuties and I knit about five this week out of leftover yarn from my Hiro sweater. I think I have decided that I will be making puffs for the rest of my life. Literally. I have no immediate plans to ever see it finished and I think it would be cool to continuously add to it with yarn leftovers from other projects. Almost like a knitting scrapbook. I like using up all of the yarn I buy and this is a great way to do so. Does anyone know of any other blanket projects that use up scrap yarn nicely?

Vinnie got a little nosey during my puff photo shoot.

This last week I made significant gains on my Still Light Tunic. I am about halfway done with the body and that is no small feat. Since this is essentially a dress made out of fingering weight yarn, and it is almost all stockinette, it has been quite a long haul. It is a little boring and it grows at a very slow pace. It is definitely one of those projects where I want the finished item in my wardrobe, but I’m not super thrilled about the idea of putting in the time to make it. The saving grace on this project is the yarn. It is Wildwood 70/30 (since discontinued) and it is a dream! The yarn was a gift from my aunt, who sews and beads and definitely appreciates textile arts. I want it to be done so I have something to show her, but I need to put it down for a little while.

Lastly this week, I cast on for Burrard. It is a nicely wooly, cabley cardigan, just about as un-perfect for summertime ware as you can get. Oh well. I was dreaming of cables. I just needed to knit them. Cables are definitely my favorite knitting technique and all the stockinette I was doing left me needing some texture in my life. I’m knitting it out of Wool of the Andes Superwash, a gift from my mother who also quilts, bead, and loves all things fabric (my mom and my aunt are identical twins and they kind of share a brain. It is so wonderful when the people in your life really “get it”, you know). I don’t have a great picture, though, at this point in time. I got about six inches into one of the sides and I realized I had done the wrong cable motif. I stop working, went and saw Captain America with my sister, and debated the whole time on whether I could get away with trying to make my mistake work out. I decided that I could get away with it, but it would drive me crazy every time I looked at this sweater. I went home and frogged it. I started again, but this time on the back piece. I’ll go back to those pesky fronts later. I have a pretty lofty goal of finishing the whole back of the sweater by the time my break is over. I think I can!

P.S. – After a six-month yarn diet, I binged. Hard. Stay tuned later in the week for a run down of all the beautiful new yarns I purchased!

A Finished Sweater (Finally)!

I have finished another sweater and I am head over heels in love! It is my Hiro sweater, also known as my Olympic Ski Sweater, and it is absolutely fantastic! I even wore it to school today and shamelessly told my students that I had knit my sweater with my own two hands. They were very impressed and they ooh’ed and ahh’ed like good little teenagers, and then proceeded to ask me if I had a house full of cats and a rocking chair to go with it. And friends… they asked me if I have friends. Knitting stereotypes kill me sometimes. I don’t care. This sweater is beautiful!

I hope you all have a fantastic weekend! I will be getting in some training runs and going to a wedding for one of my dear friends. Yes, I do have them.