Shamrock Race

Kylie and I participated in this year's Shamrock Race! Kylie signed up to participate with her school and went to practice in the afternoons for several weeks.

The night before the race we went to the Expo to pick up our race packets!

I had to be at the Oceanfront at 7am to get ready for my race! I was running a 8K [which is about 5 miles]!

I finished in 1:03, not too bad. Last October I finished the 10K in 1:17.

Jacob brought Kylie down there around 10am and we got her ready to run the "Final Mile" with her school! We found out that Kylie's school won 1st place for the most kids participating- 400 kids!!! 

Getting ready to go! I really wasn't up for running another mile but we pushed thru!

Kylie's PE Instructor recommended that parents didn't run with their child because there was just so many people running. At first, I was thinking that would be fine and I wasn't going to run with her. They assured us there would be plenty of volunteers to help out.

Once we got running, I couldn't have imagined NOT running with her. A mile is a long time for a kid her age and anything can happen. In fact, I saw a little girl on the side crying because she had fallen and some stranger was helping her. You just never know what could happen. Plus once they're done there were a ton of people everywhere and if I was a little 5 year old I would probably be scared not seeing anyone I knew.

So back to the race... after we had ran a little bit Kylie said her legs hurt and she wanted to stop. We kept walking and I kept telling her we were almost finished but she kept complaining about her legs hurting and said she wanted to stop. Finally we got to where we could see the finish line and they had flags lined up til you got to the finish line. Once she saw this, she started hauling butt and ran as fast as she could [it was even hard for me to keep up as my hips were hurting from running my race]. It was so cool seeing her give her all and she was so excited to cross over the finish line! 

Once she crossed over the finish line, she put her arms up in the air and said "I did it! I'm so proud of myself!" It was SO cute!

My medal!

Kylie's medal!

There are people set up along the racing course and they take pictures of everyone as they run. There were a lot of good ones of Kylie and I can't wait to get one printed. She's got a big smile in almost everyone!