Arizona Wildlife Week

I've had an awesome week! First of all, I've had the week off for spring break, and was able to put in some more runs and miles than usual. Secondly, those runs were fantastic!

This week has taken on a wildlife theme. It all started with my long run last Saturday when I saw a little bunny run across the dirt road I was on.

Monday, I took my youngest daughter out in the stroller for an unscheduled easy run. We saw a tiny hummingbird floating up and down over a puddle in the grass. We watched for a while, but couldn't tell what it was doing. We tried telling it to come over to our house and try out our new bird feeder that I got for Christmas. I don't think it listened, though.

Tuesday, I had planned to do some Yasso 800s on the trails through the neighborhood. I was aiming for 3:00 each, but felt good going faster than that. I did five with an average time of 2:48. Before my last 800, I found a turtle sitting on the sidewalk. I don't know if it was a wild turtle or somebody's lost pet. Thought about taking it home as a pet, but decided against it. Instead, I just put it by a puddle of water. We also went hiking this day and saw huge swarm of bees buzz by about 20 feet overhead, and on the hike, we saw a cute little chipmunk hiding out in the rocks.

Wednesday, I took my youngest out for another unscheduled run. Unfortunately, we didn't see any animals other than the usual dogs barking at us through fences. My daughter ended up falling asleep, though, and had a much needed nap.

Thursday, I had an excellent 5 mile tempo run. It was so good I wrote a post about it. Again, I didn't see any animals, but later on throughout the day, we were able to see some hummingbirds drop by the bird feeder for a snack. That was fun.

Friday, I took the day off. We were planning on taking the kids to the zoo (plenty of wildlife there) after we took my brother out to lunch for his birthday, but it ended up getting too late, so we decided to just come back home.

Saturday, I headed over to South Mountain for 17 miles. This was a really great run. I ran 7 miles up to the top and then back down to where I started, and added another 3 three miles. I felt really strong the entire way. It was another big confidence booster for me. All three of my scheduled runs this week were all awesome, which is kind of weird considering I put in so many more miles than usual. I'm usually a pretty firm believer in the "less is more" idea, quality over quantity, but this week is making me question that a little. I may just have to throw in an extra run next week if I can.

Oh, by the way, I saw a bunch of bunnies on the mountain (must be Easter or something), a squashed centipede on the road (that thing was probably about 6 inches long), and a snake sitting on the side of the road.

It's been an excellent week. I love spring break!