Hi Friends,

I decided/had to take yesterday off from blogging to defend my own sanity.

Like I have mentioned 185729301 times before, Christmas is not my favorite time of the year. I’m a pretty positive person throughout the majority of the year, but I have trouble just feeling happy at Christmas time. I’ve written a bit about my remedies for the Christmas blues; for me it helps to stay active, follow my normal routine as much as possible, and take some alone time to recharge. And I tried to put those remedies in place as best I could.

But ALAS! Mother nature got in the way! My Saturday long run was cancelled due to an ice storm, so I ended up doing my 10-miler on Sunday, which meant I needed to keep it low impact on Monday/Christmas day. So I signed up for an 8 am workout class on Christmas morning, which I attended, but it literally started blizzarding while I was in class and I had to drive through white-out conditions to get back home after class. The snow threw off my whole Christmas-calming plan, so admittedly I just wasn’t my best self.

I deal with bad days the same way I deal with bad runs; I try not to give them too much power over me. For, me, it’s important that I don’t let one rough day or one failed long run damage how I see myself as a whole. Like many, many women, I sometimes beat myself up over little failures and disappointments. If I don’t give 110% or endless positivity or constant, relentless effort, I can get really down on myself. This is a line of thinking that has held me back for a long, long time, and working to correct it had been the biggest project of my adult life. And I feel like I need to be open about this because um, no one else is. So I hope for someone else out there reading this is helpful or relatable or something like that!

Leading into the holiday, though, I did follow through with my routines all week, and managed to log a nice number of miles.

• Monday: 3 mile run + Leg Lift
• Tuesday: 30 minutes swimming
• Wednesday: 4 mile run
• Thursday: 3 mile Run
• Friday: 30 minutes swimming
• Saturday: Spin class
• Sunday: 10.5 mile run
• Monday:  Barre Class
  • Total Weekly Milage: 20.5

Super exciting to be back in the double digits for my long runs, and back in the 20’s for my weekly milage. I am hoping to stick at about 20 miles this week, then start building a little more in January.

I also wanted to share my very exciting running-related christmas gifts with you! My older brothers did a nice job gifting me some running accessories that I am super excited to put to good use this training cycle!

Firstly, this super cool massage roller and foot massaging ball! I already tried them out and they feel SO GOOD. 

Then there’s these natural-ish energy gels in really yummy flavors. My brother bought me a whole box, and they look awesome, so i am hoping that they work for me!!

Also a new deluxe heating pad. I am a heating pad addict, just FYI.

And last but not least…another bottle of calcium+vitamin supplements so I can keep fighting the good fight against further bone injuries.

I hope everyone out there had a very Merry Christmas! I’ll be posting a little let then normal this week, as i believe that vacation should be VACATION!!

Now You Tell Me…

• Favorite gift this year?
• Anyone struggling to train with this crazy winter weather?!? 
• Any other perfectionists out there? Tips? Strategies?