Get out of car! and other running mama tales

I kind of wish I had a recorder that was always running. I'd set it up in my house and never miss some of the cute things my kids say, as 4 and 2-year-olds do.

In the car, on the way to daycare and preschool dropoff:

C-girl: Bebe?
Me, driviing: Uh oh, did Daddy forget to give you your car binky?
C-girl: Bebe?
Me: Sorry, sweetie. I can't get it now, I'm driving the car.
M-man: Mommy, if you smash your car the buildings will fall down! (M-man loves to say stuff like this)
C-girl: Bebe?
Me: Um, right, buddy. C-girl, I'm sorry, I can't get it right now. Silly Daddy!
C-girl: Bebe?
C-girl: Bebe?
C-girl: Bebe?
C-girl: Bebe?
Me: Let's sing a song?
C-girl. growing louder: Bebe!
Me: I can't get it now because mommy has to drive the car! We're almost to school. You're going to make it, C-girl.
C-girl: Get out of car!

***
At bathtime, both kids in the tub:

M-man farts in the tub: (Giggle)
C-girl: Mahee farr-ed! (Giggle)
M-man: We don't poop in the tub.
C-girl: Poop in the tub!
M-man: No, C-girl, we DON'T poop in the tub!
C-girl, grinning: Poop in the tub!
M-man, getting mad: NO we DON'T poop in the tub!
C-girl: Poop in the tub!!
Me, growing slightly alarmed, though I'm *pretty* sure she's kidding: C-girl, do you have to poop? We don't poop in the tub!
C-girl smiles at me, rather devilishly. (She did not, thank goodness).

***
(This is a conversation I missed, sadly, so it's paraphrased from what Daddy told me. C-girl is having a fit about something)

M-man: What's wrong with her?
Daddy says whatever he says.
M-man: C-girl, here's the Happy book and the Angry book (I wish I could find links for these books, my kids love them and they are awesome). Now you can go cool down.

I could just eat them up, every day.

Running report:

Last week I took a break from running, nervous about twinges in my left ankle and calf following a long run about a week and a half ago. I did a long run, 10 miles, this last Saturday to see if rest did the trick.

The first couple of miles were great, no problem. As we ran across the North Avenue bridge, I felt a quick, sharp pain on the top of my left foot that made me yelp. As we continued south past Navy Pier, my calf began growling and joining the ankle -- no outright pain, thank goodness, but not how things should feel.

After our turnaround at the five-mile point things were aching pretty good and I was feeling pretty discouraged. Rats. Was I going to have to quit running for longer this time? Go to physical therapy? None of that was appealing.

The last couple of miles my IT band was growling but strangely, some of the noise in the lower part of my leg quieted down. Odd, but I took it as a good sign. Maybe my gait has just been thrown off by some tightness in my hips.

For a lot of runners, me included, tight IT bands usually are the culprit. Tightness in the IT bands manifest themselves as knee pain, or ankle pain. For me, it's because I'm not stretching enough and maybe I'm slacking on my yoga (which isn't the case this time around). I have been foam rolling every day in the last week or two to loosen them up as well.

It can also signal some weakness in the core that's putting extra pressure on other parts of the lower body. Physical therapists, massage therapists, etc usually have the same advice: strengthen your core. Which drives me nuts because I do work on my core! (Somewhere my friend Shaun is reading this and laughing. It's the kind of thing I rant about on our runs sometimes. Yes, I am a joy to run with.) Maybe I don't do a *lot* of core work, but I do *some* - mommy's post-winter muffin-top aside. *whistle*

Since I am a smart runner mom and know all this, I didn't wait for this advice and just figured I'll just solve my problem myself! Feeling pleased with myself about my self-diagnosis, during my week off from running I threw myself into core and strength work for the whole body, everything from one-legged squats to pushups and even more yoga. It felt really good, hard but good.

I also got a brutal massage a few days ago that worked out some kinks. I'm still whimpering.

Monday was a tough day at work. I didn't get home until about 20 minutes before the kids were supposed to go to bed. I always feel guilty that the hub is doing all the heavy-lifting in the evenings, plus I'm so excited to see the kids by the time I get home, so I usually just throw my coat off and throw myself into bath/PJs/playtime.

I was squatting down next to M-man in his room, playing something. I stood up suddenly and felt in my right hip something like a charley horse. Holy crap it hurt, bad. I thought it was just a muscle cramp deep in the hip.

Yesterday it hurt to walk -- the muscle/muscles deep around the hip socket into my upper hip ached. Going up stairs was brutal. Yes, I think I pulled a butt muscle. Yay. What in the heck?

Good news is today it feels better. I will be running again by the end of the week. There's running injuries and then there's mama injuries. The half marathon is two weeks from Sunday -- hopefully I can avoid all of them between now and then!