And then I blinked and my babies tripled in size.

In July I sat down to write a post about the "lovey wars" that take place in our house during our sleep routine.  Three times a day, I would sit in the rocking chair in the nursery with Beckett and Kiernan on my lap and feed them their bottles before putting them to bed.  The peace and stillness of the room at that time was only ever disturbed by the battle of the lovies, arms flying around while little hands grabbed at pieces of fleece and satin.

But just 3 months later, times have changed.  There isn't much snuggling that goes on before nap time anymore. In fact, it's really just a bit less chaotic than the rest of the day.  The 3 of us walk to their room, hand-in-hand.  I sit in the rocking chair and pull Beckett onto my lap as Kiernan goes to pick out a book for us to read.  I read as much of each page as they'll allow, before someone turns the page.  We point to things on the page, name colors and animals, and when we finish a book, Kiernan slides off of my lap to choose another one.  Three times a day, we settle down for sleep by using this routine.  It's certainly not as calm and peaceful as our pre-sleep routine used to be, but it still feels good to have a lap full of my sweet boys.

Running in the rain.

I had another one of "those days" today.  And I have to admit that I didn't fare so well.  When Brian walked in the door at 6:30, I wanted to run for the nearest coffee shop with my laptop and a big huge nonfat pumpkin spice latte.

But I had an hour and a half run that needed to be attended to and Brian looked at me and said "Baby, you have to do this" so I just went.

I wasn't very happy about it.  It was raining, getting dark, and I was just plain not in the mood to run.  But halfway into that first mile, a switch flipped in my brain.  The rain felt good on my skin and smelled amazing.  I love the rain.  It's calming.  Relaxing.  Serene.

Where the wild things are.

One of the things I love about where we live is how close we are to a big, giant park.  It has beautiful trails, a few ponds, a disc golf course, and a playground, among other things.  On Sunday we decided to get the boys out of the house and into the fresh air to try to air out some of their nasty head/chest cold germs.

See this?  Only picture you'll see of Brennan less than 5 feet away from the camera.  He has NO time for pictures when he's at the park.  It's all business.

4:07 a.m.

"Mommy.  Psssst Mommy."

I started to open my eyes and found myself nose-to-nose with a sweet little face.

"Mommy, wake up.  You need to help me go pee-pee!"

"Okay kiddo" I said as I fumbled for my glasses, grumbling a bit and lamenting the fact that I decided to put away the potty chair and make him get used to going on his seat on the big potty ... which of course he needs help with 75% of the time.

As I climbed out of bed I glanced at the clock -- 4:07 a.m.

I smiled.

How ironic.

The terrible, horrible, no good, completely suck-ass day.

That's the title of that kid's book, right?  Yeah, that's what I thought.

If you follow me on Instagram (@imflyingsouth), you had the pleasure of seeing this gem the other day:

Honest to God, it was one of the craziest days I've had in awhile.  The kind of day that 9 months ago, before therapy and Paxil, would have left me crying in the corner with a beer in my hand, on the phone with Brian begging him to come home.  Can we just pause for a moment and celebrate the fact that now when I have one of those days you can find me in the middle of it all, laughing (and wishing I had a beer in my hand, but I'm off the booze til after my race ... sue me, I like my beer), on the phone with Brian telling him that it's no problem that his boss wants him to stay late?  Yeah, I've come a long way.

Running in the dark: A paranoid girl's PSA.

OK, this is just a little PSA for all of the women runners out there.

I've been doing a lot more running outside lately and I've noticed something that kinda bothers me.  Alright, not kinda.  It totally makes me cringe and want to stop these girls and shake them ... but that would probably be frowned upon.

It's amazing to me the amount of women who run in the dusk/dark ... by themselves ... with headphones in their ears.  I mean, are you asking to get assaulted/abducted/raped/murdered????

Look, I get it.  We live in Florida where it's hot as balls during the day.  I run in the morning and evening to avoid these temps too.  But I try to make sure that the sun will either rise while I'm running, or set while I'm running, so that my whole run isn't in the dark.  And if it's going to be dark at any point during my run, I take one of the dogs with me ... usually Cooper, because he might look friendly, but I've seen him take down some fairly large animals before and he is NO JOKE when he's upset with something.

Just run.

I have less than a month before my race.  ::cold sweat::

I'm behind on my training.  Not because I can't physically do it, but because some days I have just a big giant mental block when it comes to getting out there and getting it done.  I doubt my ability to run well outside.  I doubt my ability to keep going.  I doubt my ability to run faster.  I doubt my ability to ever become a "runner".

But yesterday I had a moment of clarity.  I was 1.5 miles into a 4 mile run.  Feeling intimidated, frustrated, and uncomfortable.  I stopped to let a little girl pet Cooper and walked for a bit.  Then kept walking.  I knew I should have been running, and I wasn't sure why I wasn't.  I just couldn't bring myself to start up again.  I felt heavy.