For the last 11 years, I've closed out my running for the year with the St. Jude Memphis Marathon weekend. Every year I have ran the marathon, except for one, in which I ran the half with my daughter. My mom started going with me around the 3rd year of me going and she walks the 5K. We've made it a girls weekend for several years. We often go visit Graceland because my mom is a die hard Elvis fan. 😍 I love our time spent together each year. This year we decided to venture over to Shelby Farms on Thursday when we arrived to the drive through Christmas lights in the park. Even though it was raining slightly the whole time, we had a great time. The lights were so pretty. It was not crowded at all... probably due to the rain.
We ran by the Expo Thursday night also real quick and picked up our race swag.
On Friday we ventured over to Graceland Crossing where there are some shops. We just happen to end up at a "Snow Village" show display. The sign said it was the worlds largest display and I believe it. There were 100s of villages. The display took you through time showing villages that were created in each year going back to like 1960. It was amazing! They even had Halloween villages! I was thinking it would just be Christmas, but it was much more. Besides Christmas, they had Disney, Halloween, and even villages that were made just like places like the Buckingham Palace. It was pretty cool and mom LOVED it. They even had one that was Graceland. We thought about buying it, but it was $300! I was like wow! They had several others for sale too and they were ALL expensive. These were the real collector items.
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| At the gate of Graceland looking up to the huge Nativity scene |
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| Shopping at Graceland Crossing |
Friday evening we meet up with Felicia and Penny to go to the St. Jude Hero Pasta dinner. Felicia had never been and I wanted her to experience it. I had bragged and bragged on it. I was VERY disappointed in the dinner! Not the speakers. They were amazing, but I was terribly disappointed in the food. It was nothing like years past and tasted awful. None of us at our table was real happy with the food. The speakers made up for my disappointment however. We heard from Tyler West a St. Jude patient that was planning on running his 1st marathon the next day! He's a senior in high school now. And guess what he completed that marathon in 4 hours 18 minutes the next day! We also heard from some parents of a child that had passed away in 2019. Both talked about what St. Jude meant to them. We were all in tears by the end of the night and ready to run that 26.2 miles the next day. I'm always amazed at how upbeat these families are even after a lose. How blessed am I to be able to run with for them.
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| Tyler West |
Saturday morning -- RACE day.. Temp was around 41. It was perfect running temp for me. It was calling for no sun and complete clouds..... however, the sun came out about half way into the race and it warmed up fast! By the time we finished I was sweating and ready to be done. Four of us started together, Penny, Felicia, Me & Tammy. Joe, Richard, Nestor, and the others all started in other places. I only saw Nestor as we split for the half and full marathon. Joe finished is 100th marathon! He started his journey in 2012. I think this year alone he ran like 10 marathons just to get to 100 by St. Jude race day! 😵 I've been honored to have him on our team raising money for St. Jude for the last several years. Plus he's a good kid. I call him kid just because he's around my daughters age. 😁 Richard got himself a PR! He's gotten really fast lately!
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| Meeting up in the hotel Lobby for pics |
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| Tammy, Joe, Penny, Felicia, Me and Richard |
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| Sunshine walked the 5K with mom 💗 |
For us girls, the first half started out really well. We all felt really good. Penny and I had to keep telling each other to pull back and save some energy for the 2nd half. 😀 We tend to feed off each other in a race. 😅 Felicia and Tammy hung close behind us the whole first half. By mile 10 ..... you guessed it!..... the bathroom hit me! Mom and I were actually both sick Friday night. We think it was something we ate that day. Anyway, my stomach was not feeling too good at all. I finally told Penny to go on because she was running so good, I knew she could sub 5 the race. As for me, I ended up stopping 6 times for the porta potty! oh and I forgot to mention that within the first 2 miles of the race a lady fell in front of us and hit her head pretty hard. We all stopped to check on her and let Tammy, who is a nurse, really get a good look at her. Another lady offered to call for help and stay with her that was not running but was just cheering on the sidelines so we went on. I told Penny and them Saturday night that if that had not happened and I had not stopped 6 times for the bathroom... I MAY of had a good run time. However, a PR was not in the books for me. I'm thrilled I finished with all the stomach issues! And a 5:15 marathon time is not too shabby for this old woman. 😀 We all had dinner together and then ended up going back to our rooms early. We were all pretty tired and my stomach was still bothering me. Mom and I ended up in bed watching a Hallmark Christmas movie till 11pm. 😇😂😇
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| He did it! finished 100 marathons! and of course one of his twins jumped in the picture. 💗 |
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| Us 3 have been on many journeys in 2023 and I'm looking forward to more "runcations" with them in 2024! They inspire me everyday. |
As for the race course.... it was NEW this year! We didn't run through the St. Jude Campus until around mile 9. We didn't have to make that awful double loop through that lonely park area.... but we DID Have to run hill after hill. I think they found all the hills in Memphis for the new course. 😂 and I enjoyed the new course! Close to $15 million was raised for St. Jude. Over 25,000 runners were present. It was another great race weekend. 🙏💓 Finish pics.
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| Me and my mom 😍 |
I'm going to take the rest of December to recover and build back up. We've got the Chevron marathon coming up in January. 😍
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