This was my motto before making my way to North Carolina, then up to Washington DC for the marathon. I know many people run marathons, but this was a nerve-racking thing for me as I had to sit the bench twice during my training due to injuries.

These photos were worth documenting and noting.  This is my brother's garage (aka man cave)

As you can see, it looks like a Chicago basement underground bar where chunky men in sunglasses eat chicken wings and smoke cigars.

But turn your focus over here.

Now it is beginning to look like Aunty La's house.

Collecting, treasuring and showcasing old junk is hereditary.

Tell me... what wet bar wouldn't be complete without a fish net, life size Jason (from Friday the movie), antique signs and a talking fish?

My brother and Carrie interrogating each other over which one invited us to stay.

#awckward

Kelli made herself a little spot at the bottom of Uncle Gus's stairs each night to watch her shows and wind down while the rest of us visited and watched our shows.

I captured this one of my parents (we were all at my brother's that weekend) before they drove home to celebrate their 47th anniversary!

Erik & Super Bella.

She will turn you into sand with her laser eyeballs.

We drove down to Beaufort NC (by the ocean) to walk around and dig inside the antique shops, look at the boats and eat together.  Erik had to stay home and study.  Kelli was wiped out!

She soon regained her energy when we sat down to eat (go figure) and had a blast feeding the seagulls.  Now every time she sees a bird she says "Look! A see-goal!"

Kelli loved Bella, which is odd because she is usually very intimidated by dogs.  But she and Bella become friends pretty quickly.  Albeit a short conflict in which Kelli stepped barefoot into some of her fresh, steaming poo.  

On the 3rd day I took Kelli to the North Carolina Aquarium while my brother and Carrie worked.  Sydney was almost this exact age when I took her there during a trip to visit my brother.

Sydney's picture with the crab had her smiling though.  Kelli doesn't like to pose.

One thing she does like, though, is ocean life.  She is fascinated by fish.

It was hard to get her to leave.  In fact, we spent about an hour in there with her walking around in only ONE shoe without noticing.  She really didn't care she was missing a shoe because she was so focused on the marine life.  Finally someone pointed it out to me and it turned out it flipped off her foot when she made a dash out of the stroller at the entrance.

We saw THIS on the way home with a sign up the road saying "Public Beach".

Screeeeeeech!!!! I pulled over right away.

Other than some fishermen, we had the entire beach to ourselves!  She wasn't too impressed with the water, but she WAS going a little crazy with the sea shells.  And I'll admit, I've never been to a beach with so many sea shells!  And good ones, not even broken!  There were millions of them. (and I think we brought every single one home with us)

Two weeks later and back in Texas, she still plays with her sea shells everyday.

She takes them out of her bucket and sorts them on the stairs.

I love this picture!

The next day I took Kelli for a run around Erik & Carrie's neighborhood.

She spotted some pie-cones and needed to make a family of them for her Uncle.

Afterwards I took her to a local park to run off some energy, and she had a BLAST.

I met a Marine wife there with her kids and we had a good chat.  She confided in me that her husband (like my brother) was going into medical retirement by the Marines and they were terrified about life as civilians.  It's something I could never understand fully, but the scope of going from Marine life to a desk job and very uncertain future?  Our military deserve better.

This slide was steep and she flew off the bottom every time, but she went back for more and more!

I said a sad goodbye, and drove up to DC with Kelli the next day.  It was an 8 hour drive!  She did very well and we got to make several stops.  Unfortunately, the only stops along the way were McDonalds and gas stations.  But we reached Fredericksburg VA and I wanted to pull in and drive down memory lane.  We lived there when I was 6-9 years old.  Not too long, but I loved living there!  My brother and I would run around downtown touring the battle grounds, cemeteries and antique stores.  My dad had an office in the middle of downtown and my sister Wendy worked at the ice cream shop.  We never ran out of things to do there.  I fell in love with history living there.

We FINALLY made it to the hotel in Crystal City around 4pm on Thursday.  We didn't leave once until the next day.  We were WIPED OUT from driving.  We fancied ourselves with room service and tv shows and cuddled. It was fun.  (and so begins the transition from crib to bed... right here)

We picked up Andy and Sydney at the Baltimore airport the next day!  Kelli was beyond (way beyond) excited to see her sister!  We stopped by Daddy's office on our way to eat and they were so tickled by the "real" Fall leaves, they kept making bouquets out of them.

Texas deprives my girls.

I insisted we stop at Allen Pond Park for "old timey sake".  I used to walk to this park from our house with Sydney in the stroller.  From the time she was 9 months old to almost 2.  She loved this park and always fed the ducks and found older girls to play with.

 Sydney and Kelli made a mad dash through all the colors to get to the park.

I was freezing my BEHIND off!!!

They are so cute.  I hope they NEVER change.

As you can see, we had to stop at Old Navy to get some warmer gear.  I was completely unprepared.

We met some old friends for pizza up the road in northern Virginia and all the girls had a blast together.  They even had gluten free pizza and gluten free beer.  Thank you Sara & Justin for suggesting that place!  It rocked!

Kelli was grabbing my hand and dragging me to the door at the restaurant saying "goooo. all done. goodbyeeeeee" so we took the hint.  She wanted to go back to the hotel.

Turns out she was pretty tired.  I undressed her, changed her diaper, put on her jammies and tucked her into bed without her blinking an eye.  She was DONE.

It was rainy and yucky on Saturday.  It was snowing and sleeting off/on and SO COLD.  We had to go to the armory to get my race gear and that was a mess.  A complete, unorganized, ridiculous mess.  Turned out I had to stand outside in the freezing rain without an umbrella for about 30 minutes.  Waited in that line and finally go in.  Was directed to another line for marathoners and waited in THAT line for about 15 minutes, got to the front and was promptly (and rudely) told I need my bib to go and get my race bag. HUH???  I was told this WAS the line for our bibs (and why is that seperate anyway?) so I had to go back outside, across the street, in a ten and stand in another line to get my bib.  After 10 minutes of that, I got my bib and went back across the street, but as it turns out I had to stand in that long line again to get back INSIDE and that was about another 30-40 minutes.  In the freezing rain.  No umbrella.  Meanwhile Andy is driving around DC with the girls in the car.

#awesome

 I was soaking wet and cold but really wanted to take the girls to the museums, so we went.  Kelli was fascinated by the dinosaurs.

Back at the hotel... it actually begins snowing.  Legitimately and hard! I promised Syd that if it snowed, I'd take her out to taste it.

I asked what it tastes like: "it tastes like nothing"

that was fun.

lasted 4 seconds.

I made these brown rice pastas and veggies while in North Carolina and brought them with me, then got an extra GF beer from the restaurant the night before: this was my pre-race carb-loading.  

It was BUTT A _ _ COLD that morning.  35 degrees and I could not get enough layers on.  I froze.  But did manage to make to the start line and in the correct "corral" just in time to watch the Marine jumpers.

The sun began to peek in at us just before the gun went off.

And slowly by surely, the race began.

Santa working off his cookies!

I finished at 4:33.  Slower than I would have LIKED, but faster than I PREDICTED, ha!

I had to walk back to the hotel, which was right at mile 24, and I saw Santa!  He took a picture with me and gave me a special gift for Sydney.  Rock on Santa!

Got into the hotel, showered, dressed, packed up and we checked out.  Immediately we drove up to Baltimore where we were staying that night and had a celebratory dinner at Rusty Scuppers. YUM!

I love that view.

Sydney got to see a pirate ship go by.

I nomzed on my filet and veggies while Kelli, apparently tired from the marathon, rested.

I took her to David's Market the next day for some yummies and once again she was thrilled about all the colorful trees.

 I took the girls to Columbia Mall to ride the carousel and play at the indoor play pad (still cold outside!) and I scored at H&M!

Finally.  The moment we were all waiting for!  (because the marathon was just a small side show to Halloween).

Back at Mona's I seperated all the gluten free candy from the bad and Kelli inspected her big score.

It sucked we didn't get to spend more time with Mona.

Sydney was pretty sad to leave.

After changing back in our jammies and having hot apple cider, the girls volunteered to hand out candy to all the lingering trick or treaters.  Kelli loved this part.

Back at Jim's house on the water, I enjoyed the view the next morning.  His place was awesome!  And totally humble.

#5storieswithelevator

The girls were very excited to get home!