Weekend Fun

I hope everyone had a nice Christmas!  I had a great long stretch of a weekend with friends and family.  I wish every day could be like those days.  I was ridiculously happy, couldn't stop smiling like a weirdo and saying Merry Christmas to anyone that was there...facebook, text messages, emails, in person.  I guess the Christmas spirit really took hold of me this year!  Haha!

My Christmas weekend started on Thursday (even though I still had to work on Friday).  I had taken the week off of running (5 days) to rest my hip (trying to be proactive and not let a hip pain get worse), so I didn't participate in my normal Thursday run group.  It happened to be the day of "winter storm Draco"...and even though we weren't going to be hit hard, it was windy and I was kind of glad I wasn't running anyway.  But there were a few brave souls that showed up.  Afterwards, we had a holiday party with my run group, the F'N Runners.  It was a great turnout and we had a gift exchange.

Behold...the F'N Runners

Kelly, Maggie, Derek, me...part of the Thursday night run crowd!

Friday was uneventful.  Saturday, I had the Sugar Cookie Shuffle fun run with the F'N Runners.... We went to the hilly trails of Hickory Creek Forest Preserve (Schmuhl School) and I did 5 miles.  Some of them did more and started earlier but I didn't want to push too much since I took the whole week off of running.  After the run, we headed to Starbucks for a cookie exchange.  Saturday afternoon/evening, I had a family party with some extended family.

Sugar Cookie Shuffle

Sunday I took my nephew for a workout at the gym.  He said he wants a six-pack by summer but he only does crunches/situps.  I showed him plenty of ab moves and thoroughly kicked his ass.  It was fun!  Afterwards, I tried to finish off Christmas shopping, but ended up buying gift cards.  Sunday night, I had a date and it went very well, which was nice for a change.  I was all smiles afterwards, which carried into the next day.

The next day was Christmas Eve.  I went out for a solo run and just ran "easy".  I was going to do speedwork that day and only do 3 miles but opted for a peaceful run with some thinking and decided to do 5 miles instead.  I didn't want it to be a "stressful" speed run. lol.  But I did do a 9:30 avg pace for 5 miles, which was pretty good for "easy".  Christmas Eve was our big family party at my Aunt and Uncles house.  Lots of good food involved.  Sunday was a small family party with just my parents, me, my nephew and my goddaughter.  We went to see The Hobbit and had dinner.  It was very nice.

I got a few new running things like knuckle lights since I run in the dark, a moji massager which will be great on my IT band/hip area right now (among other things), some running shorts, running pants, money (for running stuff??)...anyway, I made out like a bandit.  :-)

That just about sums up my holiday!  I love spending Christmas with the family and the couple of little kids we have in our family.  In fact, kind of funny.  My 11 year old cousin got a cell phone and entered in my number.  Later that night I got a text that simply said..."I lov u".  It caught me off guard since I didn't have that number programmed in my phone.  Then I realized who it probably was and yes, it was my little cousin. lol.  Glad I don't have an overprotective jealous boyfriend or something!

I will be trying a cross fit class this week and I'm pretty excited about that.  Other than that...just trying to figure out what I'm doing on New Years Eve since I was invited a few different places.

How was everyone's Christmas?