Running the Marine Corps Marathon virtually has to be one of the most challenging things I've done. Regular marathons, with spectators and aid stations, are hard. A virtual race, where it's just you and all the little demons in your head, is kind of brutal. 

I woke up Saturday morning nervous but also kind of excited about attempting this race. I did all my usual pre-race prep. Toast and peanut butter. Lots of water. About a million trips to the bathroom because of nerves. 

And then I walked outside to drive to where I was starting and got whacked in the face with humidity. It was only 62 degrees, but it was 95% humidity, so even though there was a slight chill, the air felt very heavy. 

I had planned a route that would largely eliminate many hills and would let me loop past my friends and family a couple of times so I could restock my water and fuel.

I set off down along the water with my first loop of Hains Point. There were tons of other runners out, and I think many of them were doing the same thing I was. My plan was to start off slow and steady and try to maintain something around 10:30 per mile for as long as possible, and then just basically gut my way through the rest. 

I was also planning to use my trusty run one mile, walk one minute race plan. 

The first few miles were fine, but because of the humidity I was draining my water bottle a lot faster than I expected. I had planned to refill around mile 8, but I knew there was no way I was going to make it that long. 

I passed my friends around mile five, took my first Gu, and set off up Rock Creek Parkway. I had an out and back planned along this stretch, and it was a familiar path that I used to run all the time when I lived in DuPont Circle. 

I refilled my water somewhere around mile 6.5 and took my first sips of Gatorade just past the turn around point around 8.5. I had another Gu at mile 10.

I got stuck at a traffic light around mile 12, and honestly, I was so grateful for the pause. I was not feeling good. In fact, I distinctly remember thinking I hadn't expected to feel quite that bad until closer to mile 17. 

Mentally, this is where things started to fall apart a little bit. It's not so great when that happens before the half way point of a very long race.

I passed another friend just beyond mile 12, and seeing her put a smile on my face and gave me a small motivational boost. Thank you for being there Emily!

The next stretch along the Mall was by far the worst part of the run for me. I just couldn't shake the negative mental thoughts about how hard this was and how bad I was feeling already. As I looped past the Capitol, I started sneaking in a couple more walk breaks trying to get my head back in the game. I took another Gu and some more Gatorade, hoping maybe some more fuel would give me more energy.

By mile 15, I was pretty sure I wasn't going to finish. 

At mile 16, I knew there was no way I could run 10 more miles. 

I was falling apart. 

Me and my t-rex arm in the deep dark pits of running despair

I knew I was going to see Emily again sometime around mile 17, so I trudged on, walking even more than I had been. Seeing her again gave me a little bit of a second wind, and the boost I needed to get to mile 18 where the rest of my friends and family were. 

I almost cried when I saw them. I felt so crappy, and they were cheering and clapping and waving signs. 

At that point, I had single digital mileage remaining, and I was determined I was going to somehow grit out that last eight miles. I took my second to last Gu and set in for my final loop around Hains Point. 

In some ways, this loop felt easier than the first one. I changed up my strategy and I was running half a mile and walking a minute, and that seemed to be working for me both mentally and physically. 

I passed my friends and family one more time around mile 23. I stopped for some Gatorade and I knew I was so close. Just one last out and back stretch.

I just kept putting one foot in front of the other. Slowly, really slowly and with plenty of walking when I needed it, but I hit the turn around point and knew I could make it back to my people even if I had to crawl.

The kind of crazy part is that even though I felt terrible my form was pretty great. This video clip is me at mile 25.

I slightly miscalculated where I needed to turn around so I over shot my friends, had to run a little more, turn around and run back again to get the full 26.2, but I did it. 

My final Garmin time was 4:49:00. But that can hardly be considered a real race time. I stopped my watch at traffic lights. I stopped it when I needed to get more Gatorade or refill my water bottle. Basically, any time where I was forced to deal with something that I wouldn't have dealt with in a typical race situation. 

I'm glad that time isn't a PR for me or I would have had mixed feelings for the rest of my life talking about my marathon PR.

This race was ugly. And if it hadn't been for my friends and family, I'm honestly not sure I would have finished. But I did, and I'm really proud of that.

I cannot say enough thanks to my friends and family who came out to cheer me on. To my family, and Emily, Emily, Emily, and Erin, you are the best. (Also, I have a lot of friends named Emily...)

This weekend I'm going to attempt to run a virtual marathon. Basically that means I'm going to go out and run 26.2 miles without the help of regular aid stations, police closing the roads, and the cheers of spectators that typically pack the Marine Corps Marathon course.

The 2019 MCM course, what I wish I were running.

I'm nervous, and a little stressed out about all the logistics involved in trying to figure out how to best recreate a race experience.

My biggest concern is the lack of aid stations. In a normal race, I rely on them really heavily -- especially for Gatorade. I normally run with a handheld water bottle and then grab Gatorade at the aid stations, until the water runs out and then I alternate what I grab.

That won't be an option this weekend, and since we're in the middle of a pandemic, the water fountains where I'll be running are turned off too.

So when planning out my course, I knew I was going to need to plan to run a bunch of loops past a fixed point where my husband is going to hang out with a cooler of Gatorade and water, and where some very dear friends are going to be as my morale support.

I'm also trying to eliminate my need to stop running at a whole bunch of intersections, and since I have some control over the course, I'm trying to keep the hills to a minimum.

So my plan is to head down the Mall nice and early on Saturday morning and do my race among the monuments. It's a nice added perk that a good chunk of the course I planned out would have been part of the actual MCM course.

The other thing I'm a little nervous about is Saturday's weather forecast. We've been having a hot and humid spell in DC this week, which normally I'd be loving. But it's not the weather I want to be running a marathon in. As I've been stalking the weather for Saturday, I'm most nervous about the humidity, since that's what completely ruined my 18- miler during training.

Technically, I could pick a different day to run the race to try to get better weather (the beauty of a virtual race I guess), but at this point, I'm just ready to do it. I've trained really hard all summer. I've tapered decently, and I don't think I could stand another day of anticipation. I've had too many sleepless nights this week worrying about if my plan is going to work. I just need to go out and run and see what happens.

No time goal for this "race." I just want to finish.

After I finished the big bathroom project in the spring, I took a step back from house projects for a while. 

But over the last couple of weeks, we've knocked out a few of the projects that have been on our list since we moved in back in March. So I thought I'd pull together a little round-up of before and afters.

Installing Kitchen Hardware

This is the project I was the most excited about getting finished. The previous owners of our home did a really nice job remodeling the kitchen. New flooring, backsplash and counters, plus refinished cabinets made the kitchen super bright and airy. 

But the cabinets didn't have any knobs or drawer pulls, and this drove me nuts every time I tried to open them.

I figured installing the hardware was going to be a pretty easy process. Drill some holes, screw in the knobs, call it a day. 

But silly me, nothing is that easy, and this project basically turned into a giant comedy of errors. 

First, I couldn't get the drill bit to go through our cabinets. (Turns out I was using the dry wall drill bit, not the one made for wood. Insert face palm emoji).

Then the screws that came with the knobs weren't long enough to actually fit through the width of our cabinets. So I ran off to the hardware store to buy new screws. But the width of the drawers was bigger than the width of the cabinets so it was back to the hardware store for even more screws.

And then when I finally had all the right parts, I still couldn't drill through the cabinets because I kept hitting the metal joint in the corner holding the wooden pieces together. My husband got home from work one night to find me in the kitchen cursing at our drill. Clearly a very proud moment for me. Luckily he was able to figure out the issue with the metal joint and managed to get all the holes drilled so that I could finish installing the knobs. 

And it was definitely worth it. I love the look of the cabinets with the knobs installed, and I really love how much easier it is to get the cabinets to open. 

Bedroom Window Treatments

When we moved in, two of the bedrooms in our house had those old gross metal blinds, and the third bedroom didn't have any window covering at all. So updating the window treatments was pretty high on my list of things to tackle. 

Blinds in the master bedroom

After spending months analyzing the pros and cons of different options and the various price points, I finally settled on a reasonably priced set of cordless blinds from Home Depot.

I tried them out first in the master bedroom because the old blinds in that room were not in the best shape -- lots of bent and broken pieces and very badly discolored. 

The new white blinds look so fresh and clean. I loved them right away, and quickly ordered the necessary blinds for the office and the guest bedroom. 

The window in the office is pretty small, and those blinds were easy to install.

The guest bedroom has a massive window, which is great for letting in lots of light, but makes it a lot harder to install new blinds. I actually opted to install two sets of blinds in this room to make it easier to adjust the amount of light in the room. Plus I thought it did something nicer visually than the previous super long blinds. 

Living Room Window Treatments

We are lucky that we have so many big windows in our house. We get so much natural light during the day. But there were some funky window treatments leftover when we moved in. 

Our living room for example had this really ancient-looking track for blinds to cover our sliding glass door. It was suspended from the ceiling and then anchored down into the wall by the fireplace. 

It obviously had to go. 

So we ripped it out and installed a regular curtain rod and some curtains. 

Hat tip to my mom for hemming the curtains for us. I had planned to use the no-sew hem tape, but my mom came to the rescue with her actual sewing machine. 

New Closet Shelves

We have a fairly large closet (by DC standards) that is home to our hot water heater. This space quickly became our bike storage room, and we realized by adding some shelves on the walls, we could maximize our storage space.

Now this closet stores our bikes and all the many tools and home improvement supplies we've acquired in six short months of home ownership.

Finally Getting a Headboard

I've never been in a rush to get a headboard because it always just seemed like one more annoying thing to take apart whenever I moved. But now that I'm a homeowner (and hopefully not moving again for a while), I suddenly felt a very strong desire to feel like a real grown-up and get a headboard. 

I initially planned to DIY it, but then I got lazy and I just ordered one online to install. 

My husband's lamp looks like the little Pixar lamp.

I think that's just about all the smaller projects we've tackled over the last couple of weeks. We're also in the middle of one big project that we called in the professionals for! I'll share more on that when it's finished. It's about 95% there, we are just waiting for one last part that's on super backorder because of the pandemic.