Marathon Weekend Details (Have I drug it out long enough?)

When we pulled into Falmouth, Massachusetts on Thursday night and found out that we were staying here:

I knew we were in for a delightful time, no matter how bad my nerves got. When we woke up the next morning and it looked even cuter, I was ready to see the rest of the sights of Cape Cod!It was all so quaint; really, everything I imagined.We ate our first dinner at this little gem...The Glass Onion. With glass lanterns (onion shaped, get it :)) hanging all around.We took a morning ferry ride over to Martha's Vineyard (Does anybody else feel like the Anne of Avonlea theme song should be playing in the background of this picture?)And docked to find this site awaiting us...I'll take that large white house in the middle, thank you very much.Dr. Bonantz had some friends who live on the island and they graciously spent their morning driving us around to the must-sees (Unfortunately it was drizzling, and there are only so many times you can ask strangers who are already being so kind, to please stop the car so that you can get out in the downpour and take a tourist shot. But here are a couple I did manage :))And they still treated us to lunch at one of their favorite spots by the water.We took the ferry back from extreme paradise, to normal paradise, and picked up our bib numbers. Here we are, posing in front of our sponsor truck :) Is this odd to anyone else? "Eat our doughnuts, then you better run like heck!"We did some shopping around the square.

And a little of my kind of shopping :)We carb-loaded the night before the run at an amazing Italian restaurant. That laugh you see is the result of Dr. Bonantz taking THREE shots of me before finally screaming, "Abby, could you just stop eating for ONE second so that I can get you in a picture for your blog!"I prepared and laid out all my little items the night before. I hope you notice the water-proof mascara that we made an urgent trip to the drugstore to buy (for Ashley and me). They (the boys) gave us such a hard time, but we were going to be sweating and wanted to give ourselves all the help we could in those marathon pictures :)We woke up and each ate our particular little ritual breakfastes (nice word). And then it was off to the race!

Four pictures in a row on my camera of me stretching with my butt in the air...I was so worried about those 'ol aching hamstrings.

This picture was taken just after the half marathon mark. "I could do this all day!" I am thinking and just look at that innocent smile :) No sign of those aching hamstrings. I was loving Jesus, loving y'all, and loving every little supporter on the side of the road.Don't forget how beautiful the scenery was either.Then sweet Jeremiah joined me at mile 15. Then around mile 20, those hamstrings and hips started reminding me that I was not, indeed as healthy as Jesus had led me to believe a few miles back :). This picture is around mile 25...no more smiling (and I'm glad I was too tired to look over and see that little half smile on Jeremiah's face ;)).Finally, the money shot! There's no ticker tape, but this is us just as we're crossing the finish line. Dr. Bonantz has already joined us and left us, and that smile I'm wearing is from just passing the rest of our group standing on the sidewalk and cheering like crazy. That was the. most. exhilarating. moment I can remember. Seeing them and the finish line and knowing I'd. done. it. Ohhhh. I can still feel a little shadow of that rush.And then we celebrated the rewards of marathon running. With a steak dinner here:A little of this:
And a lot of that:

Whew! Can you possibly imagine why I want to do another one? As Laura Kezar (a wife in our group who was there to support her running husband and daughter) enthusiastically said as we dined for the hundredth time, "I LOVE marathons!"

*A special thanks to George at http://photo-chambers.com/ for the three running shots. I annoyed the heck out of him to get digital copies of those, early. He was very kind to me, even though he asked if I used face cream to get rid of my blog spot, hehehe. George, don't think I didn't notice that you save these files as "theannoyingblogger1" 2 and 3! :)