Get Your Rear In Gear

Saturday March 10th was my first 5k. It was, Get Your Rear In Gear for Colon Cancer. Walker and I went to Gastonia that Friday. When I go home I have certain things I ask my mom to cook...each time different...ok other than her fried chicken, I LOVE her fried chicken! This time it was spaghetti. As hard as I try I cannot make it like my mom does, and what better to eat the night before a race other than pasta. My grandmother was in town also so it was nice to be able to visit with her! I miss not seeing my grandparents as often as I did when I lived in Greensboro. I was so excited to go to Gastonia, I hadn't been since Christmas! 

Saturday morning we got up early and headed for Charlotte. My mom, Brittany, Walker, and I went first. My dad and grandmother came right as the race was starting. I had never been in a 5k before so this was all a new experience for me. I absolutely loved the atmosphere. Its a lot easier to run with a big group of excited people at 8 in the morning than by yourself! Unfortunately the Thursday before I came down with a cold so I wasn't feeling wonderful. (Not that I would have ran the whole thing anyways). We wanted to finish in under 40 minutes. Britt set her watch when we started. We saw mile marker one and were excited..until we noticed the downhill turned into uphill. There was a water station at a mile and a half. We came up on that, what seemed pretty quickly, and kept on going...and going... and going, A little while later I asked Britt what our time was... she said 25 minutes... I was baffled, if we hadn't met mile marker 2 yet we should be there very shortly. I shortly started to notice people running or walking back to meet people. All of a sudden we saw mile marker 3. So exciting! This gave us a burst of excitement and we picked up the pace. Mom, Dad, and Walker were there cheering us on as we neared the finish line. We went through at 40:52. In all the excitement we forgot to look at Britt's watch to see what time we actually finished in (we were towards the back at the start so we figured we did actually make it under 40...Rookie Mistake. I'm ok with that though, because next time we will easily beat it!)

After the race we went to get breakfast then to visit my uncle. Before Thanksgiving they discovered an aggressive tumor that had engulfed my uncle's kidney. He has gone through months of rigorous chemotherapy and the Monday before the race they took his kidney out. It has been heartbreaking to see him have to go through this but also inspiring to see how well he and his family have dealt with it. We didn't stay long but I couldn't bear the thought of being in Charlotte and not stopping by. 

Saturday afternoon my moms parents came to visit.  It was so awesome to be able to see so much family in one weekend!

Saturday night (the night before the time changed), my dad, my two sisters, and I went to hike crowders at dusk. The gate now doesn't close until 8 but it still got dark before that (for one more night at least). We wanted to go watch the lights come on over Charlotte. Besides my huge fear of someone falling off in the dark, it was really pretty. It was also a lot of fun to spend time with them. We used to hike crowders ALL the time growing up. My mom stayed home with Walker. I was nervous he would want to eat while we were gone and he has only taken a bottle once. We walked in to this...

She is basically a pro!

Everyone was convinced Walker was going to crawl that weekend. He was getting up on all 4's and rocking back and forth. He had a bunch of cheerleaders!

When they came to terms with they fact he wasn't quite ready, they knew he would be on the go before they came down for the bridge run on March 31st. The next Tuesday, March 13th, Walker officially became a crawler.

Sunday I was going back to Columbia. It was nice to be going to see more family, but also sad to be leaving. Peter was ready for me to get back to him but was so sweet and told me to stay and watch the ACC championship with my dad. They lost:-( but it was still nice to watch it with UNC fans!

LOVE!

We got back to Columbia Sunday evening and decided to stay until the next morning. That is the nice thing about Peter having afternoon classes. We called the Carlisle's and had them come over. Norah and Kinsley were born about 5 months before Walker so they are getting to the age to really enjoy each others presence. It was so fun to watch them play and to visit with friends!