Vermont Trip/Baby Shower

Thursday
This past Thursday Sean and I flew to Vermont to visit my family and friends and for my Baby Shower that my mom had planned for me.

I was really excited to escape the 100+ Virginia weather, and loved flying into 65 degree weather on Thursday.

My mom picked us up at the airport since we rented a car from a place close to her home (it was half the price of the airport car rental). This was her first time seeing me since I was pregnant, ok since I told her I was pregnant. (I was home in February for a funeral and was pregnant but hadn't shared the news since I hadn't been to the doctor to confirm pregnancy).

We decided to spend Thursday with my Dad, so we drove down to Leicester, VT and enjoyed being out on the lake.

Dad and I

Even though it was a bit cool outside we decided to take advantage of the Kayaks my dad has and went on a small lake tour. Of course as soon as we got on the water it started raining. It didn't last though and the sun peaked few a few times.

I forgot how nice it was to be out on the water, and quickly wished I had a lake in my backyard.

Friday
Friday was Mom and Stacy day. We decided to all meet for breakfast at Dunkin Donuts. Stacy had to work half a day so we met her and two of the boys she nannies for and than she met back up with us in the afternoon.

Mom, Sean and I walked around Church Street in Burlington and just enjoyed each others company. It was really great to be in Burlington again. I was telling mom about how the night before I had been feeling something different with the baby and maybe it was hiccups, since it was rhythmic movement. She put her hand on my belly and as soon as she did that the baby kicked her. She was the first to feel the baby!

We went back to the house and napped on the couches since we did a lot of walking and I'm tiring easier these days. Stacy joined us early afternoon and I told her how I had read that you may be able to hear the baby's heart beat if you put your ear to the belly. She wanted to test it out, so she put her head on my belly and the baby kicked her ear. She jumped pretty quick and didn't think that was very nice. It did make her laugh though.

Friday night we all went and saw the third Twilight movie. It was pretty good but I was checking my watch a few times, probably because I was ready for bed.

Saturday
Saturday was Baby Shower day! My two college friends Kerry and Maria both made the trip to Vermont! I hadn't seen Kerry since my wedding last May and although I saw Maria earlier this year it was before I had told her I was pregnant.

Before the girls arrive Sean and I take a walk outside and enjoy the beautiful Vermont landscape

Once the girls (and Kevin) arrived, we had a few hours before we had to be at the shower so we went to Dakin Farms for the free samples, and than Magic Hat for the free beer samples. I miss Magic Hat beer. I got to be the pregnant girl smelling all the free samples and not able to taste them.

Kerry, me and Maria at the Magic Hat Brewery

My mom held the shower at UVM since she had access to a large room. It worked out perfect.

We were spoiled so much stuff for Baby Murphy

My mom had this sign outside the building. I love this picture more because of Stacy's face, it makes me laugh every time I see it.

The delicious cake! The booties is actually a Christmas ornament that you can write the weight, height and date of birth of the baby.

Stacy knit this blanket...I love it!

She also got her niece/nephew some super cute clothes. This was a crab sweatshirt, because she knows we love our Maryland Crabs!

I shouldn't have been surprised that Kerry got Baby Murphy something Cookie Monster related.

Grammy (my mom) got her grandchild it's first Orioles outfit. She also got him/her an Orioles board book with lots of facts so the baby can be prepared to be an Orioles fan.

Homemade sweater made by my mom. I couldn't believe she made this. I didn't know she could knit anything besides a blanket. I think this was her first project.

We got a ton of frog stuff. I hope the baby likes frogs as much as I do. This is the cutest frog bathrobe ever!

While I opened presents Kerry collected the ribbons and we were able to make my belly stand out even more than normal!

Baby time! All of these babies belong to my childhood neighbors. I can't believe everyone is growing up and having babies.

Cake time!

This was my first time meeting my cousin Laura's daughter Michaela. She was too cute. She kept coming up to me and asking "Are you Tricia? Are you having 4 babies?" I had to keep telling her, Yes I'm Tricia, and no I'm only having one baby.

Crosby cousins. We're missing Mindy and Melinda, they couldn't make it. Hopefully I get to see both of them soon.

Delibac family

Sean gets a turn holding Nyham. He was our youngest baby attending the shower at 3 weeks.
Sean did pretty well, he didn't make the baby cry at all.

The shower was so much fun and I think we probably had 20+ in attendance. I don't get to see family and friends enough so it was so much fun seeing everyone. We ended up getting so much great stuff for our little baby and we literally got enough books to fill a rolling suitcase (great idea by mom and Stacy to request books in place of a card). Good thing we could carry-on the suitcase because it would have been over the weight limit.

The rest of Saturday was spent walking around Burlington with Kerry, Maria and Kevin and than watching the Burlington fireworks.

The SMC Cow (Cows Come Home art show throughout the city)

There were thousands of people down at the waterfront to watch the fireworks and since we hadn't gotten there early enough we were in standing room only. I did pretty well standing for awhile, but my legs and back started bothering me so I sat down in the middle of everyone. It wasn't really a place to sit, but I was "protected" by my friends and I could still enjoy the fireworks.

Sunday
Sunday morning we went back to Church Street with the gang. It was hot and I was sick of walking but I enjoyed hanging with my friends. We eventually stopped walking around and sat down at a restaurant to enjoy some drinks and just chat.

I treated myself to a "virgin" Strawberry Daiquiri!

Kerry, Kevin and Maria all took off around 1:30 or so and Sean and I headed back to my mom's house to relax and visit with her and Stacy.

You know how I mentioned loving the cool VT weather earlier in this post, well it changed to hot temps like Virginia, so Stacy and Jacques decided to treat themselves to A/C. This isn't standard in Vermont. So we got to relax with the cool air blowing on us.

Stacy and Jacques left to visit a friend and Mom and Vern left to get groceries. This gave Sean and I time for a nice nap! I am finding that I need a nap everyday to function, is this bad? We took about a 45 minute nap and than it was time to head to Aunt Valerie's for a 4th of July BBQ.

We had a great time visiting with family at the BBQ and it was so nice catching up with everyone. Most of them I hadn't seen since my wedding over a year ago!

Sean and I lasted until about 10:30 and I especially was crashing so we said our goodbyes and headed back to the hotel to get some sleep.

Back at the hotel Sean FINALLY felt the baby kick. Ever since my mom and Stacy felt the baby move (2 days earlier) Sean has been trying to feel some movement, but every time he put his hand on my belly the baby would go still. Sean was convinced he has a calming effect on the baby. I think he was thrilled to finally feel the baby move, either that or thrilled that I stopped making him keep trying to feel.

Monday
Monday we didn't have a ton of time before we caught our 1:40 pm flight. We made sure to get up early since we hadn't packed ahead of time and we had to figure out how we were getting all of Baby Murphy's gifts home. We had packed fairly light on the way down so we ended up getting the majority of our gifts in our luggage.

We then decided to skip the free continental breakfast and had a nice delicious breakfast at a local bagel shop, dropped off our rental car and than back to Mom and Stacy's to do some last minute visiting. We only had a few hours before it was time to be dropped off at the airport and back home to Virginia.

It was hard saying goodbye to everyone. Next time I see everyone I'll be a mom with a little baby!

I still can't believe in less than 15 weeks I'll be a mom!

I Love the Tavern Triathlon

On Sunday I raced in my third triathlon of the year, which was also my 10th race I've participated in pregnant!

We were up at 3:30 am and out the door before 4:30 am so we could drive up to Richmond and be there in plenty of time to set up our transition area and be ready for a 7 am start time.

I'm still able to squeeze myself into these same tri shorts, probably because they sit below my belly. I had Sean write on my stomach "Baby's 3rd Tri 24 Weeks".

We were lucky that at this race the transition area was in alphabetical order so we were next to each other and our friend Brian was also on our rack.

Got to show off the belly one more time.

I had a few people comment to me before the race started asking how many tris the baby was going to do before being born and encouraging me to have a good race. It helped psych me up to start the race.

Swim:
Distance: 500 meters
Time: 13:41
Pace: 2:44/100 meters (or 2:17/100 meters if it was 600 meters)
(Sean's Time: 12:57)

The swim was a 500 meter river swim in the James River, although rumor has it the swim was a little long, maybe closer to 600 meters, I think this is more accurate when looking at my per 100/meter rate. With water temperatures 86 or 87 degrees it was like swimming in a bath tub. Sean started in the second wave and I started in the fourth wave, 10 minutes behind him.

I decided to start at the back of my wave. I didn't want to get trampled since I know I'm not a strong swimmer and I figured I would just take it easy. The swim felt nice and easy and I stayed close to the buoys. It was amazing to see that I didn't stray far away and I was always about one person away from the buoy.

This was only our second open water swim triathlon and I definitely prefer this over the pool swim. I ended up passing a ton of people in the water, even at my slow pace. It made me feel awesome even though I wasn't out to race and I was just taking it easy.

Sean hasn't always been the stronger swimmer between the two of us, but once he got the hang of his breathing he always seems to be much faster than me.

Getting out of the water wasn't too bad, but we had to go up a steep staircase. I made sure to walk up it and take it easy. I had to remember, I wasn't out to race, just to complete and have fun.

T1:
Time: 3:21
(Sean's time: 1:04)

I took my time in the transition area. I drank water, opened up my Gel Chomps so I could enjoy them on the bike ride, put my HR monitor on, race belt (so I wouldn't have to worry about putting this on for the run), shirt, helmet, sunglasses, socks and sneakers. This was the first tri that I've done where I had to actually tie my shoes. Previously I've either had my bike shoes or my racing flats with my Yankz. I meant to bring a 5-gallon bucket to sit on to change my shoes, but ended up doing just fine without the bucket.

My transition was VERY slow. But I felt great and that was what I was trying to achieve.

Bike:
Distance: 18.8 miles (Garmin had 18.86)
Time: 1:27:17
Avg Speed: 13 mph
Avg HR: 142 bpm
Max HR: 173 bpm
(Sean's time: 53:34, yes he beat me by 34 minutes!)

I left the transition area and got on my bike. The bike was an 18.8 mile ride. I was told the first half was a bit hilly, with a fairly large hill at the turnaround but than the second half was mostly downhill. I used this to get through the ride. I felt good, but slow until about mile 8 and than I started to get round ligament pain in my lower right ab area. I tried talking to the baby and telling the baby to move. Sometimes I wonder if it's just the baby "hanging out" in this area of my body that makes the pain.

I got to the big hill and a ton of people were walking up it. I rode half way up the hill and than decided to walk it as well, no reason to try and pedal slower than 4 mph. Walking was probably the best thing I could do because once I got back on the bike my RLP was gone.

The first part of the ride back was down the big hill, I didn't want to ride too fast but looking at my Garmin I got up to 33.1 mph. I ended up braking most of the way down, I didn't want to lose control and risk falling.

The rest of the ride went well and I even ended up passing a few people on the ride back. There was some shade during the ride and even at my average 13 mph speed there was a little breeze so I never got too hot.

I also had my special "racing" shirt on so I had a ton of people complementing me on exercising, telling me they liked my shirt, and saying "Go Mama!" It really helped me through the ride.

Because I love looking at the stats on my Garmin I figured I'd share my stats below, on bike mode I have the Garmin set to Lap every 2 miles.

Lap 1
Avg Speed: 12.8 mph
Avg HR: 148 bpm

Lap 2
Avg Speed: 11.5 mph
Avg HR: 143 bpm

Lap 3
Avg Speed: 13.0 mph
Avg HR: 135 bpm

Lap 4
Avg Speed: 12.3 mph
Avg HR: 136 bpm

Lap 5
Avg Speed: 9.1 mph (this included the portion where I walked up the hill, but ironically also included the downhill, with the max of 33.1 and it's still super slow)
Avg HR: 139 bpm

Lap 6
Avg Speed: 17.1 mph
Avg HR: 139 bpm

Lap 7
Avg Speed: 14.8 mph
Avg HR: 143 bpm

Lap 8
Avg Speed: 14.8 mph
Avg HR: 141 bpm

Lap 9
Avg Speed: 13.5 mph
Avg HR: 151 bpm

Lap 10
Avg Speed: 19.0 mph (this was the last .8 miles of the ride so I think I was glad to be done)
Avg HR: 148 bpm

T2:
Time: 1:01
(Sean's Time: 1:09)

Yeah I actually beat Sean at one part of the tri, wahoo!!! The only reason I beat him was because I already had my race belt on, I put it on during T1, and I didn't have to change my shoes since I was wearing the same shoes on the run that I biked with, but I still had 7 seconds on him.

Sean finished the entire race before I had even finished the bike. This meant he got to be my personal photographer. He captures me here entering T2.

Grabbing my Garmin off the bike so I can put it on my wrist.

Staying hydrated! This was very important since the high for the day was 106. Not sure what the temp was at this time. It was still before 9 am so probably 90 degrees.

I gave Sean a kiss and left T2 with one thing left I had to do, run a 5K!!

Run:
Time: 36:24

Distance: 5K
Pace: 11:45 min/mile
Avg HR: 161 bpm
Max HR: 179 bpm
(Sean's Time: 32:40, he would have been faster but he tripped on a branch and fell in the woods.)

The run was my absolute favorite. The majority of the run was nestled on the trails shaded in the woods. I felt good and they had 4 spots to get water so I stay hydrated. By the time I hit the trail there were a ton of people walking so I passed at least 10+ people. This was motivating especially since A. I'm pregnant, and B. I was jogging at a 12 min/mile pace.

I never realized you could actually jog this slow. I'm sure this is ignorant on my part, and even though I'm not an elite athlete I used to find it hard to believe that someone could run THIS slow. Now I have a lot more respect for those that get out and run regardless of their pace.

As I ran I felt better and better. I encouraged other runners as I ran and was able to jog the entire way. At each water stop I did walk to make sure I drank the entire cup of water and at least twice poured an additional cup on my head. It was hot and I wanted to make sure I didn't overheat.

I did have to pee, but not really really bad, which is interesting since I had been on the go for over 2 hours, and normally I pee every 20 minutes.

I didn't have any pain and my body felt strong. I kept an eye on my HR and it was higher than I like it to be. My exertion level is the more important thing to monitor, therefore I was making sure to talk to others to make sure that I wasn't short on breath and that I could maintain a conversation. I was able to do both and therefore I was fine where my HR was.

The run seemed to go by really quickly and soon enough I peaked out of the woods and had my own cheering squad at the finish cheering my name. I guess that's the good thing about finishing last. Everyone is there to cheer for you!

I passed Sean, held my hands up, smiled and than ran through to the finish.

I was excited to see that I had negative splits on the run. According to my Garmin my splits were:

Mile 1:
Pace: 12:17 min/mile
Avg HR: 157 bpm

Mile 2:
Pace: 11:52 min/mile
Avg HR: 159 bpm

Mile 3:
Pace: 11:19 min/mile
Avg HR: 167 bpm

Last 0.10:
Pace: 9:31 min/mile
Avg HR: 177 (I know this is high, but it was only for 0.10 mile and I was excited to see everyone).

I finished feeling strong, and not even slightly short of breath. My official time was 2:21:42. Sean Finished with an official time of 1:41:22. I'm so proud of him!

Besides finishing feeling strong my other goal was to not finish last. I didn't think this would be a problem since there are seriously every level of athletes that participate in these type of races, there was even a 77 year old man that did this race, unfortunately for me he beat me by almost 30 minutes. I ended up beating one person in my age group (ok officially two, but one person didn't finish the race so I don't actually count them) and a total of 24 people in the race. Not too bad for being 24 weeks pregnant!

Good friends!

The best part of the triathlon, besides racing, is the friends you share the experience with. I'm so glad to have such a great group of friends that enjoy the sport that I love so much.

Amie visits!!!

For the first time ever Amie came to visit me in Williamsburg. We've lived here almost 4 years, so she was LONG overdue to come and visit me.

She arrived Friday evening and after picking her up from the airport we went straight to dinner. I brought her to GreenLeafe which is a local bar and grille type restaurant.

We both wanted to get our cameras out. She beat me to it while I was still looking for mine.

Mozzarella Sticks for an appetizer were delicious. Amie liked to just eat the sauce, nasty.

We decided to share this pasta dinner. It was delicious. Shrimp, sausage, chicken, zucchini, mushrooms, etc. Amie made sure that no shrimp were touching her plate. Apparently the texture reminds her of cartilage. She doesn't know what she's missing.

After dinner we stopped at the grocery store to get dessert.

We decided on a brownie mix that has a cookie topping. It was so good. We had Ben & Jerry's ice cream on the side, (Brownie Cheesecake & Cinnamon Bun).

Saturday morning we woke up fairly early had our Lucky Charms, (Crosby Tradition) and got ready to go to the beach. Since Amie lives in Phoenix one of her requests was a beach day. We went to Yorktown since it's still a nice beach and not as far or as busy as Virginia Beach.

We packed a cooler with water and snacks (apples, pears, oranges and goldfish) and walked down to the water. The parking garage I usually park in wouldn't allow beach visitors to park in it so we had to park a little further, which normally wouldn't be a big deal, but this cooler kept tipping back and forth and was super annoying to pull.

We got our spot on the beach and we were so glad we were near the water since it was really hot out.

We loved watching the people, catching up and watching the boats on the water.

I love my sister!

We lasted less than three hours, since it was so hot, and we were starting to get hungry so we decided to call it a day and head back home. Amie had cooler duty on the way back to the car.

On the way home Amie wanted to stop at Barnes & Noble so we went and she wanted us to pick out a book for Baby Murphy! It was so sweet of her. She didn't know what books we already had, and neither did I (so many saved from when we were kids) but we were able to find something good. We decided on There was an Old Lady who Swallowed a Fly, and than a plane board book since Aunt Amie and Uncle Jay both love airplanes. This was an unexpected yet fun surprise, thanks Amers!

We than stopped and picked up sandwiches for us and Sean to bring back to the house. It felt so good being inside with the A/C.

Amie than surprised us once again with a homemade quilt for Baby Murphy.

I couldn't believe the detail, this quilt was amazing. I love it so much, and I know Baby Murphy will too.

Sean and I show off our new quilt. I love the frogs!

Now showing off the back of the quilt.

After present time we had nap time! I'm glad Amie likes naps as much as Sean and I. After nap time we got dressed and ready to go out to dinner.

Amie's only request for dinner was not a chain and she really wanted to branch out and try some seafood. We decided on going to The Kingsmill Marina.

We definitely enjoyed the nice weather, while it lasted.

Dinner came and I was excited about my shrimp and corn!

and than the storm came

They boxed up our food and shut down.

Boo!

Amie was however very excited for a mini thunderstorm. A thunderstorm was yet another request of hers. It blew flew pretty quick, but we had already packed up our food and the restaurant had already closed down so we went home.

We decided it would be fun to play some wii so we stopped at our friend's house on the way home to borrow a wii controller.

We started out playing Smarty Pants. I was doing the Double Points Dance.

The last game Amie finally won, and was so proud of herself. I've never won, I'm awful at trivia.
We played a little Super Mario Bros and Mario Kart and than called it a night.

Sunday morning we woke up and had our Lucky Charms again and than decided to head down to Colonial Williamsburg.

The best part of CW is The Peanut Shop, unfortunately with Amie's allergies it would have been a REALLY bad idea to venture inside, unless we wanted to spend another weekend at the ER.

Amie expresses her love for The Peanut Shop

My favorite part of CW, besides the Peanut Shop is walking around looking at the animals.

This pretty horse was out in the awful heat.

He really wanted a sip of Amie's ice coffee.

We took a break from walking around and sweated in the heat.

Posing in front of the Governor's Palace with my Amie Leigh

Come on, I dare you to throw tomatoes at us

We continued walking around and enjoyed every bit of shade that we could find.


After walking around we decided to share some ice cream, Grape & Apple Sherbet with popping candy. It's delicious.

Just part of my nasty sweat from the day.

After getting back to the house we took more photos of the quilt.

And than it was nap time. Amie and I crashed and took a nice long nap, and we woke up feel rejuvenated.

The next item on our list was teaching me to sew. I know I won't ever be able to make stuff as cool as Amie, but I did want to learn as much as I could.



I think I did pretty well and I'm excited to practice and make something I can show off. Hopefully there will be a blog entry in the near future with an awesome sewing project.

After sewing we decided to go out yet again. We don't normally go out for every meal, but it was just easier so we didn't have to cook.

We decided on going to our favorite restaurant, Bonefish. We made Amie try our favorite appetizer Bang Bang Shrimp. I wish I had taken a photo of her face. She was so scared to try it, and she psyched herself out so she didn't like it. Maybe she would have liked it if she had given it a try, or maybe it just tastes like "cartilage."

Right before leaving we had the waitress snap our photo since we hadn't taken a photo of the three of us.

We went home stuffed and finished off the ice cream and rented a movie on Demand, Leap Year. All three of us snuggled on the couch and eventually we had to go to bed which meant the weekend was over.

Amie's flight left at 7 this morning, so her and Sean left the house around 5 am. I woke up to say goodbye, and I was thankful that Sean was able to drop her off. I went back to bed for another hour and a half and when I woke up my sister was gone.

Although the weekend was short, Amie and I had so much fun. It was great seeing her and spending quality time together since we don't get to see each other very often at all.

I love her and I can't wait to see her again. I hope you had fun Amie Leigh!