summer series 5K #1 results

Well guys, I've got my work cut out for me this summer. I ran a 8:09 mile pace on Saturday! So much for pushing for the 8:30 pace this summer. I haven't been running with a watch lately which is why my estimate was so far off; I just judge the quality of my runs by how I feel. Guess I'm feeling better than I thought...and I think those spin classes are paying off too. I'm not positive but I think this is my 5K PR.

My pace was such a surprise to me because (of course) I forgot my watch on Saturday and the only clock at the race was at the start/finish line. When I crossed and saw my time I was really excited...and then thought, "Dang! I have to get faster?!" I definitely felt the pace though. I was tired afterwards and had pain in my shins for the next two days. Luckily no knee pain though! Yoga and icing will remain on my agenda.

The next race is June 10 so not that far away. Before then I'd love to fit in a couple of speed workouts, which I never do, but I think I'll need it! My goal remains to improve my pace, even if by a tiny bit. And I'd love to move up in the overall standings and within my age group. Bring it females age 24-29!

gearing up for summer running

I’m not sure of the exact cause but I’ve gone from needing lots of motivation to go for a run to seriously looking forward to running. I’m running 2-3 times per week now, about 3 miles per run. It’s a very welcome change. It probably has to do with the longer days (I hate running in the dark), lack of IT band pain, my rockin’ iPod playlist, and being able to get into a more consistent routine now that Chris isn’t so busy. Whatever the cause, I’m hoping to stick with it.

To keep me motivated through the hot summer months I signed up for a 5K Summer Series, a total of 5-5Ks throughout the summer (although I can only run 4 since we’ll be in Missoula for the last one). To challenge myself, my goal is to get progressively faster at each race, even if by a tiny bit. My first 5K is tomorrow so I’ll set my baseline and hopefully get faster from there! I usually run about a 9:30 mile but I’d love to push it closer to 8:30 over the course of the summer. Watch out Olympics 2016!

As I’ve been running, spinning, and yoga-ing consistently I’m digging to the bottom of my drawer to make use of my full workout clothes stash. Which has reminded me that it's been awhile since I've bought any new workout clothes. I always find it hard to fork over the $40/$50/$60 for workout clothes! But I do wear the heck out of them and want pieces that can keep me cool and chaff-free. So I think it’s time to retire some old pieces and bring a few new ones into the mix.

Here’s what I’m thinking will be good additions as I gear up for summer running:

Sports bra

Shorts

Top

Wicking visor

To summer running!

dreaming of mid-century modern

There are so many things that I really love about where we live. I love our house, with its tall ceilings and room for huge art work…

our open kitchen/great room... 

the natural light... 

and our cute backyard. 

We also have awesome neighbors! Ok, not those neighbors. But we know two other awesome young couples on our street (including fellow blogger Erica, who lives next door. Hey neighbor!). They’d never threaten us with the hell’s angels! We also have other couple friends who are distant-neighbors; they live just down the road.

Plus, our neighborhood is safe and quiet. We feel comfortable leaving the door unlocked when we walk Drew and when we’ve accidentally left our garage door open all night our stuff is where it should be in the morning. There are two big parks at the end of our street where we can let Drew run around and where I can totally see our kids playing one day. I grew up with a huge, wooded backyard so having an open space for our kids to run around in is so important to me…and it can be hard to find in the suburbs. 

Just down the road the Riparian Preserve is a true gem where I love to admire the birds and desert plants and where Drew loves to sniff. Our beautiful library is right on a pond at the Riparian Preserve, it’s one of the most beautiful public libraries I’ve seen and I make good use of it.

There’s our beloved Coffee Shop right down the road too; they make the BEST cupcakes and vegan cupcakes. And downtown Gilbert is so cute and is getting cooler every year: there’s Liberty Market, the newly open Postino (yay!), the Gilbert Farmers’ Market, Hale Theater, and Art Intersection.

And yet…somedays we dream of moving. Mostly it’s on days when the traffic is terrible and the drive home takes awhile. (Although now that I have my Prius with an HOV plate I can always drive in the HOV lane, which has cut my commute time down by 10-15 minutes!) Or after we spend an evening in Phoenix or Scottsdale and wish we lived closer to everything going on there. Now that I have a job I love (yay!) and know that I’ll be based in Tempe and Chris in downtown Phoenix, it could make sense to be closer to work. 

And while I love our house, I also dream of living in a house with more character, something built in the 50s or 60s, mid-century modern, and in a neighborhood where our house is unique. Something similar (although more affordable!) than the homes we saw on the Modern Phoenix Home Tour a year ago: 

Oooo, and maybe a pool! For all those 100 degree+ days (there are a lot of them).

As of this summer we’ll have owned our house for three years (three!) and we’ll be free and clear of the $8,000 tax credit that we received. (If we were to sell before three years, we’d have to pay back the $8,000). So technically we’re “free” to sell our house as early as this summer…not that it would be a good financial move. We bought our house for $200,000 and Zillow currently values it at ~$175,000. Not too bad considering what the market has gone through but obviously we’d like to walk away from the house with at least the $20,000 down payment that we put down, ideally with a bit more.

Time is on our side though. Although our commutes aren’t ideal we still love living in Gilbert and in our house so we’re in no hurry. Plus moving would likely mean living in an older and/or more expensive home so that's a big consideration. After Chris gets tenure in 2014 (fingers crossed y’all!!) we’ll probably evaluate our situation and see what makes sense for us. But actually just looking at pictures of our house and thinking about all the people and places I love nearby makes me want to stay put! If we do move I’ll definitely need to figure out how to get our friends to relocate with us…. 

natural deodorant

Since the weather is heating up here, it seems like an appropriate time to talk about…deodorant (if there’s ever an appropriate time). 

Lately I’ve been trying to transition to as many natural body care and home cleaning products as necessary. I have no idea why it took me so long but I’ve finally discovered all the amazing natural body care products out there. Given my vegetarian/vegan eating habits, commitment to composting, and buying local and organic it seems like I would be just the type of person to be using natural care products. I was thinking about this and realized that all of the commercials and print ads that I see are for the non-natural products – so maybe I’m drawn to what I’ve heard/seen?

Anyway, I finally clued in and started paying attention to the ingredients list – and the “cruelty-free/no animal ingredients or testing” labels. That is a big one for me. There are some natural products that I can find at Trader Joe’s (where we do the weekly grocery shopping) and I also make trips to Sprouts and Whole Foods for additional items. Even Walgreens has a small selection. So far, I’m loving my Jason Shampoo and Conditioner, Jason Body Wash, Kiss My Face shave cream (LOVE this product), Earth Science Almond-Aloe moisturizer with SPF, and Hugo style gel. Oh, and Tom’s toothpaste – love.

What I am less happy with is natural deodorant. Natural deodorants do not contain antiperspirant, which comes in the form of aluminum. I definitely don’t like the idea of smearing aluminum on myself every day. But I've tried two types of Tom’s natural deodorant and one type of Nature's Gate deodorant and they are just not cutting it. I definitely don’t have the feeling that those girls on the Sure commercials did - I’m not confidently raising my hand for a taxi or pointing broadly in a big important meeting in front of clients. And this is just on normal days, when I’m sitting in my air conditioned office. 

Side note: also, can we talk about the fact that Tom's deodorant comes in a “Beautiful Earth” scent? As in, my underarms are supposed to smell like beautiful earth? I don’t even know what that’s supposed to smell like! But it really made me laugh so I had to buy it. If ever there was a natural, hippie product to be parodied it must be Beautiful Earth deodorant.

So for now I’m rotating days between a regular antiperspirant/deodorant and Beautiful Earth which seems to be OK. I’d like to only use the natural but with even hotter days on the horizon I’m just not convinced. When I run and take spin classes I really need my deodorant to be there for me. I'm all for natural products and I'm even willing to pay more for them. But they have to work!

Maybe I need to switch brands - ? Do you have a brand that you love? Or maybe natural deodorant is just going to be a product that falls short of its synthetic, animal-tested equivalent. Sad face.

blog spotlight: filling the tank

Recently I received this sweet email from a reader, Jen, who blogs at Filling the Tank:

Kelsey, 

After reading your blog and seeing how open and honest you are with your family's financials and budget, I posted an in-depth look at our "getting out of debt" story on my own blog. It includes information on our finances and our budget. Thank you for giving me the courage to do this! 

I think it is amazing when people can be open with each other and share experiences. I posted our information in hopes that it will inspire others to live debt-free. 

I'm so impressed that Jen and her husband were able to pay off their debt and were willing to share the story. Check out her post about it here. Congrats Jen and George and thanks so much for sharing and encouraging open discussions about finances and budgets!

P.S. If you post about personal finances on your blog I'd love to do a spotlight on rising/shining as a way to encourage conversations about personal finances. Or even if you don't have a blog and would like to write a post about personal finances, please get in touch! Write me at hello{at}risingshining.com

I bought a Prius!!!

And it is awesome. 

So funny, I wrote about how badly I wanted a Prius almost exactly a year ago. And I'd been dreaming of owning a Prius for a few years before that. I even found a dark grey one, like the picture in that post! Thank you for enduring all my posts about wanting a Prius and saving up!

I ended up buying a 2008 Prius with 85,000 miles for $15,500 from a colleague of Chris's. It's so nice, it feels like a spaceship compared to the Volvo! I think we got a good price and it was great buying from someone we know; he was able to provide all the service records and answer all the questions I had. I know that buying used cars can be unpleasant but in this scenario it was quite pleasant! To buy the car I used $7,000 of my own savings and borrowed $8,500. I hope to pay back the $8,500 within 2 years.

I've gone back and forth on what to do with the Volvo. One the one hand I could probably get $500+ for it and that would be helpful to pay back the money I've borrowed. But in the end I've decided to go with what I wanted to do all along, I'm going to donate it to my local NPR station! I love NPR so much and I'm so happy that they can benefit from my old car. I'm not sure when I'll next make a $500+ donation so I think I'll take the opportunity while I have it! I'm almost as excited about this as owning a Prius. Almost. ;)

financials update

It’s been awhile since I first gave a run-down of our financial info. Since then, I’ve started a new job and we’ve been able to sock away some more money into savings. I’ve updated all the information in the original post so check it out!

watermelon salsa

Now that Chris is on summer break (yay!) and the hot weather is rolling in, it’s really feeling like summer. [Note: I wrote this post this weekend but just yesterday we had a fabulous thunderstorm that really cooled things off. Crazy spring weather!]

So this past weekend I dusted off one my new(ish) favorite recipes: watermelon salsa. I had this at a friend’s house last summer and was immediately in love with the sweet and spicy flavors and surprised at how well watermelon makes a salsa. This recipe is so easy and perfect for your first summer potluck.

Watermelon Salsa
Attributed to Everyday Food

(Quantities are approximate, but it’s hard to mess up.)

2.5 cups watermelon, cubed
1/3 cup onion (scallions, white or red onion), chopped
1/2 cup bell pepper, chopped
1 jalapeno, chopped
handful of cilantro, chopped
juice of ½ a lime
Salt and pepper to taste

Combine all ingredients. Salt and pepper to taste. Enjoy!

a craft date

This weekend I hosted a morning of crafting at my house with two lovely girl friends. We each worked on a different project – knitting, sewing, and recipe organizing! For snacks I made a vegan version of Smitten Kitchen’s Perfect Blueberry Muffins (by using vanilla soy yogurt and adding a bit of almond milk instead of the egg). Holy cow, SO GOOD. And they didn’t betray their vegan-ness at all, they were just plain good. If you need a go-to weekend muffin recipe, this is it! For something to sip on, I used the leftover rosemary syrup that I made for our $10K cocktails and mixed it into grapefruit juice soda. I think I'll be stuck on that flavor combo for the foreseeable future...

My crafting project was another tag blankie. This one is for a co-worker who is very pregnant and should be off on maternity leave in the next couple of weeks! I made the ribbon loops a bit longer this time, maybe a bit too long, but oh well. I also forgot to trim the seams before I turned it right-side out - ugh. It’s always something! Luckily, this project is so forgiving and quick to whip up. I found the fabric at Joann’s, isn’t it great? I bought some extra because I think I might want to use it to make some cloth napkins or maybe even attempt a shirt (what?!).

I loved having a set time to dedicate to a crafting project and it was fun to see what my friends were working on….plus we got to catch up and I had an excuse to bake. Craft date = win-win-win.

dreaming of a redesign

Guys, the blog design workshop I'm taking is amazing! If you currently use Typepad or would consider moving to Typepad I cannot recommend it enough. And Katie Price, you were right! I'm totally geeking out on coding and love it. It's like a fun math puzzle where the answers make pretty pictures. I love being able to customize to my heart's content. 

And you may have caught the hint, since the blog design course I'm taking is only for Typepad blogs rising/shining will (eventually) be moving! And I'm so excited. Right now I'm using Squarespace for my blog and although it's very customizable I'm just not finding it as easy to use as Typepad for the level of coding, etc that I understand. Just one day messing around with a Typepad blog and I was sold! 

Right now I'm hoping to work on the redesign through the summer and "move into" my new blog space in the fall. My photoshop class this summer could not come at a better time. But now that I have the redesign on my mind I feel so antsy. I'm having a lot of fun playing around with ideas and I'm just ready for a change up. I think the new space will reflect my personality even better than my current site and I also think it will be easier for you lovely readers to navigate.

Very excited to bring you a new look in the fall...stay tuned!