Sunday I ran on a relay team in the White Rock Marathon. The relay team was made up of five members. The first leg Jamie, ran 6.2 miles.....but he went ahead and ran the second leg with Erin who ran 4 miles. The baton was then passed on to Courtney who ran a 5 mile leg on the north side of the lake. I ran the 4th leg, which was another 5 mile leg on the lake and into Lakewood. We were anchored by Phil who took us home with a combined 26.2 mile time of 4:16. We finished 99th out of 263 teams in the Mixed Open Division. It was really a fun time. We all loaded up in the car and drove each other to the next exchange zone and picked up the previous runner. I think I am hooked. I would love to do this again next year. Fives miles was the longest distance that I had ever run and it felt pretty good. Afterwards we all celebrated at the Old Monk in Dallas with some import drafts. The picture above shows you what I had in my pocket when I got home.

Who would have thought we would have made it this far. One year ago, on December 10th, 2008 the Junky Trinkets blog was born. This has been a great experience and fun to do. I've met so many interesting and creative people along the way. I look forward to keeping Junky Trinkets alive for another year.....stay tuned. Below is my first post ever.....how boring...what a rookie!

Well I thought I'd kick this blog off with one of my favorite recent paintings. I actually hated the first sky that I put in, so after about 2 years I used my artistic license and changed it. Now I am at peace with myself. It is a 24" x 24" acrylic on canvas. I'm really happy with how the colors came out.

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In current news: I'm working on some new paintings but can't share them with y'all since they are gifts. I'll post pictures after Christmas. I am also running the White Rock Marathon relay on Sunday morning. My leg is 5 miles (mile 15-20 on the east side White Rock Lake in Dallas) I've never run 5 miles but I've been training at 4 for weeks now. Wish me luck!

Today was the race I have been semi training for over the last few months. The recent early morning storms and wind have put a damper on my training consistency over the last 3 weeks. Anyway, I ran the Gary Burns Fun Run here in Frisco this morning. It is a huge race with tons of participants. The weather was beautiful and crisp. Perfect running weather! I set a goal of running it under 26 minutes. Mission accomplished! My time: 25:57. I even did it wearing the ridiculous outfit above. The wig got a little hot towards the end. There were many people that didn't quite know what to think of me. Perfect! I was playing head games to psyche them out. I had a great time. My next race is December 13th, when I run a five mile leg on a relay team in the Dallas White Rock Marathon. I've never run more than 3.5 miles. This should be interesting.

PS. The fu manchu was real. The star hand tat...sharpie art. Oh, and I placed 2nd in the jean shorts division. My friend Seth beat me by a couple of minutes.

I ran a 5K this morning in McKinney, Texas. I finished 181st out of like 700. My time was 26:36 which I am happy about. The course had a few more hills than I was expecting but overall it wasn't too bad. Above is where I am at with the new painting. We will see where it goes from here. Tonight I will be at an opening for the Visual Arts Guild of Frisco members show. I've got a couple of paintings in the show. The reception is tonight from 6-8. The show will run through August. It's always fun to visit with local artists and see everyone's stuff.

Wow the 201st post! Who said Junky Trinkets wouldn't make it past 50 posts? Above is my background for my new painting I am working on. I am going to incorporate a lot of the background into the design of the painting. I have the silhouette of the Frisco water tower drawn in and will probably leave it open to the background. I've got some creative ideas planned for the paint around the tower. I'm kind of going to be loosening up a little and try some new things. I have really been inspired by some paintings I saw in the galleries in New York City. I'm very excited about the possibilities for this painting. I'll keep you posted on the progress.

I'll be running a 5K in the morning and I'm looking to beat my time of 27:58 which I ran in my last 5K back in March. I'm feeling good about it, so we will see.

Well, I'm still here. Saturday was a beautiful morning for a 5K in the Metromess. I met my goal of under 28 minutes and felt great afterwards. My Ipod - Nike + reading had the race length at 3.3 miles instead of 3.1. I need to recalibrate that thing.....when I looked at it during the race I thought I was going to shatter my goal....but I guess my readings were off.

Official results: 27:52 - 135 out of 531 - 6th place in my age category......out of 12! hahaha

I ran my first 5K in November with little training and ran a 30:14.....so there is improvement.

Now I'll search for my next area race and set some new goals.

P.S. Happy Anniversary Carrie! It's been a great 12 years!