The Sisterhood of One Travelling Sister

My sister will be studying in England for the year, which is quite far away from her island home of Hawaii.  She stayed with us for a few days, which was awesome beyond awesome.  I don't see her often, so this chance to hang out and be all goofy-sistery together was so incredible beyond words.  She left this afternoon and I already miss her, but Iʻm so excited for her upcoming adventures.  Speaking of adventures, we had a bit of our own while she was here.

Let's start from the beginning: I knew my mileage would be low this week since we'd be busy doing touristy stuff, so I wanted to get a good run in before she arrived.  I did a quick 7-mile run on Tuesday, running around Lake A. and on a paved trail that has gotten a bit of a makeover:

Lake A.

The trail now has blue lines!

It was a beeeyoooootiful day -- sunny with just a touch of chill -- but I think my body was still tired from FitBloggin' because my legs felt dead the whole way.  I managed to finish in just over an hour at 8:40 m/m.  I was a little bummed with that time, but oh well.  It was still a good run.

My sister arrived later that day, and Nugget was not the best welcoming party.  In fact, he screamed when he first saw her and cried every time she looked at him.  Over the week, he slowly warmed up to her, and when she boarded the plane today, he was sincerely sad to see her go.    

Item one on our list: shopping!  We wanted to get her a pair of knee-high boots, which are so awesome to wear but completely impractical in Hawaii.  We found her a pair, as well as a few cute outfits.  The Ann Taylor outlet was having an awesome sale!

Item two: workout together.  My sister is a fitness fiend, so I was a bit nervous about this.  I like to run, that's about it.  Occasionally I will do standard push-ups or lunges or a simple plank, but dive bomber burpees?  WTH is that?  My sister had to explain and demonstrate each move to me, and of course, she made them look so easy.  She came up with 16 body weight exercises for us to do, for 30 seconds each, with 10 second rest in between.  We did each set twice.  I. was. dying.  

Three Pulsating Squats with Tuck Jump
(aka Levitating Bartender)

Crab Walk with Dancing Crab
(aka Inflexible Much?)

   

Push-up with Knee to Opposite Elbow

Push-up with Knee to Opposite Elbow
(aka FACEPLANT)

My sister and her list of torture
(Don't let her cute smile fool you, she's intense!)

And because my sister is the nicest person in the world, she agreed to go on a run with me after our workout.  One of the great things about living in DC is being able to run on the National Mall and visit the monuments, so we stopped by a few sites that my sister had not seen.

FDR Memorial

Jefferson Memorial

National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden

I was wearing my Reebok Poly Play Dry Tank that I got at FitBloggin.  Can you believe this is the first Reebok item that I have ever owned?  I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it.  So comfy and so incredibly light, it kept me feeling dry and fresh the whole afternoon.  Definitely will be getting more of these.

We ran about 3 miles before we realized that weʻd parked in 2 hour parking over 2 hours ago.  We were about 2 miles from our car, so we booked it back and...car was still there, no ticket.  Whew!  We scarfed down a few bananas, and mixed up a Fit Frappe Protein Drink (yes, sample compliments of FitBloggin.  You need to sign up for 2013!)

Remembering to be a good blogger and
 take pictures of EVERYTHING.

Shakey-Shakey!

The package said 20g of protein, less than 1g of sugar, and 130 calories.  I said, "Deeeeeelicious!" in my best British accent.  My sister agreed.  "Refreshing!  Hits the spot!" she said in her best British accent, which is far superior to mine.  We tried the Vanilla Latte flavor.  Highly recommend.

Then we got stuck in traffic for 2 hours because this is DC, one of the top 10 worst traffic cities in the country (Honolulu holds the honor of being the worst).  In our classic sisterly fashion, we turned our car into a karaoke lounge, minus the alcohol but complete with loud music and really horrendous singing (from yours truly, of course).  I got chills when itunes played Honolulu/Waikiki Medley by Makaha Sons and we both sang along like it was the most natural thing in the world to be singing about old Hawaiʻi while sitting in traffic on the congested DC beltway.  This was one of my grandmotherʻs favorite songs, and it made me miss her so much.

We picked up Nugget from daycare and arrived home to DJ Researchʻs spread of fried tofu and grilled vegetables.  Super yums. 

He also produced a bottle of Schramsberg that he had procured from the neighborhood wine store.  Good bubbly=happy ʻAma.

The next day we hit up the National Zoo for Nuggetʻs sake, but frankly, he didnʻt really seem interested.  He wasnʻt very impressed by the exotic tigers or the elephants, but he did enjoy petting the donkey.  Oh, and he was very impressed by the little girl who could scream as loud as he could.

I kept thanking this donkey for being
so patient with my son,
and for not biting our fingers off.

Little people make LOUD screamers

After such an exciting week, we spent the morning lounging around while my sister repacked all her stuff.  We left for the airport early, expecting a long line, but there was no line at all, and once my sister checked in we realized we had almost 2 hours to kill.  So we bonded like any 21-century family would.  Which is to say, we played on our iphones.

Nugget taking a picture of me while I take a picture of them.

Dad, look at this ridiculous picture I took of Mom!

OMG, I have to post this to Facebook.

It was an awesome week.  Not only was it great to have her around, but it meant a lot to be a part of each otherʻs active lifestyle.  I remember when she really committed herself to fitness and Iʻm so proud of how far she has come.  Iʻm so excited for my sister, and so happy that she was able to visit before heading to England.  Love you sis!!

RAR!