Another great paddleboarding experience! Coldest and windiest (ie: toughest) day so far. Still great, as always. I arranged this time: three girls from lululemon (including one with bunny ears, in honor of Halloween week), my roomie Sarah and friend Tracy (who is pregnant with a baby boy! i am thrilled for her!). Not pictured: the donuts we enjoyed just before paddling out. I had a Vietnamese Coffee Donut from a new hipster coffee shop just down the street, and it was magical.

Downer news now: my runner's knees are not getting better. Still constantly sore and making weird cracking noises (and have been since August). My doctor thinks it's cartilage damage, and I'm going in for x-rays in a few days to confirm this. Hopefully it is indeed the cartilage, so I can go to physical therapy and then start running again. I really, really miss running. And I'm really tired of having sore knees all the time. Fingers are crossed it's found to be fixable.

I just love this guy. He is so supportive of me in everything that i do. Here he is in his favorite shirt.

Kaitlin is visiting from Portland this week, and we've been busy busy busy! She's in town through Tuesday-- that's a 9-day trip-- so we've had lots of time to sightsee, work out and relax together. She happened to come during fall break (Thursday & Friday of this past week) so it's worked out perfectly. I've been so happy to take some time away from work & school and do some exploring! We've done a lot of the mandatory tourist stuff: French Quarter tour, plantation tour, Audubon and City Park, and, of course, lots and lots of eating. I've also been taking Kaitlin to spin classes, yoga & my favorite coffee shops. She's been a great houseguest, and we're happy just soaking up the sun & reading too.

We went to see a brass band, the Brass-a-holics, play a few nights ago. They put on a great show. (Also: please notice that for the first time in my life, I am the Tall Friend. These girls are so tiny that I'm actually bending down here)

Paddleboarding on Lake Pontchartrain! I feel like an old hand at paddleboarding at this point-- but paddling on the Lake was much harder than paddling on the Bayou! Here we are at the harbor:

We also went pedal boating at City Park! This one's been on my NOLA bucket list for a long time.

 And here we are at Audubon Park! It's been absolutely perfect weather this week, 75 degrees & breezy with no humidity.

And at the Plantation! It's fun to be in these pictures, because I'm usually the one one taking them :)

That's it for now! We're going to the Seafood Festival later today to hear some good music & get some more good stuff to eat!

I went to my first Youth Run NOLA event a few weeks ago! It was AMAZING to see the coaches, volunteers and kids that I worked with, for, and heard about all summer long. The event was the Tipitina's Foundation 5K, and it benefitted the Foundation, which in turn supports marching bands in New Orleans. Because of that, we had marching bands all along the route, cheering us along the way. We started at the Rouse's Market / Tipitina's Uptown, ran back down Tchopitoulous (basically back to my house), and then turned around and ended at Tipitina's. It was an evening race, so it was HOT HOT HOT.

The kids did great, I ran for the first time in almost 2 months and iced my knees for the next three days.

I was included in the most recent Tulane School of Public Health & Tropical Medicine newsletter! It's all about my work with Youth Run NOLA this past summer. Check me out:

http://prc.tulane.edu/news/detail/54813/Youth-empowerment-group-focuses-on-evaluation-with-Tulane-grad-students-help

We've been up to lots of fun stuff at lululemon lately. Here's the whole team after a tough circuit workout that we did in this crazy garage gym in the LGD. Yes, it included hitting those giant tires with those huge hammers. I really love this crew of jocks! Never thought I would say that in my life. I'm a little hard to spot, I'm in the back :)

We were all ready for Hurricane Karen last weekend-- bought lots of bottled water & food, filled the car with gas, etc. The whole city was on high alert, with some areas evacuated. But luckily she was downgraded to a tropical storm, and then ended up dissipating before she did any damage. We just got a little sprinkling of rain after all that. Weathering the storm!

Girls on the Run is back again! I'm coaching at the International School once again, for some of the same girls as last season. They're so sweet-- and wild too! :)