Weekly Wrap: Ready for the Holidays

Happy Christmas Eve Eve!

I’m just getting in from a walk with the pup – he needed to burn off some energy and I needed a break from all the holiday-prepping. So before I dive into wrapping gifts, I thought I’d quickly join Wendy and Holly for the Weekly Wrap. Be sure to stop by and show both of these great ladies some blog love!

Monday – The day was all about ticking as much off my work to do list as possible. I did manage to squeeze in a quick mile walk to keep my Holiday Challenge streak going.

Tuesday – 4-mile run. There was a wind advisory – it was brutal so yeah this run was finished on the mill. I also had another session with the acupuncturist.

Wednesday – A nice change of pace at work had me out scouting a location for a charity race. 6-miles of trails done!

Thursday – The weather was picture perfect as I met up with Coach Marc for a 5 miler. We ran a beautiful rolling course which gave us a chance to work on hill technique.

Friday – After a brief check-in at work, my vacation officially began!  I logged a quick mile walk before meeting a friend for lunch and shopping.

Saturday – I was up and out early with my husband for 5 miles before a full day of cleaning and cooking.

Including today’s trek with the pup, I logged 23.25 miles this week and reached Day 32 of the Holiday Challenge!

Given how hectic this week was, I’m really pretty pleased with how the workouts went. Today is also my last day of the 6-week FASTer Way to Fat Loss program, so I’ll be sharing some final thoughts on the program in an upcoming post.

For now, I am really looking forward to Christmas and some time off with my family. With the hopefully slower pace of the days ahead, I’ll get a chance to get back to the strength training that’s been missing for the past couple of weeks, in addition to continuing to log some miles. And catch up on some sleep…yes, sleep would be good!

To everyone who celebrates, I wish you a very Merry Christmas!

signature

Chicago-bound!

The sprint to the finish of 2018 continues – I swear someone has flipped the switch into overdrive!

This past week was busy on all fronts, but there were lots of highlights!

Work kept me hopping – but I was super productive and, with now just a few loose ends to wrap up, I should be in great shape to take the Christmas week off! Both of my boys started their school breaks, so we really kicked things into the Christmas spirit, picking up our tree and decorating the house. We’ll start making cookies later today.

On the workout front, it was a pretty solid week:

Monday – 3-mile run
Tuesday – 1.25-mile power walk
Wednesday – 3.5-mile run – this one was ugly!
Thursday – Another power walk followed by a strength work.
Friday – 2-mile run and some much needed yoga. Also had another acupuncture session.
Saturday – 5-mile run. For as bad as Wednesday’s run felt, this one felt great!


Sunday – Today was basically a rest day, I did get an early morning 1.25-mile walk with my husband and pup to get the day started followed by another session with the acupuncturist.

17.25 miles for the Holiday Challenge!

And, if you follow me on social media, then you know this was my biggest highlight of the week!

I was beyond excited to see this notice in my email! Chicago-bound for 2019!

I’m joining Holly and Wendy for the Weekly Wrap.


What was a highlight from your week?

signature

A few goals to wrap up the year

With all the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, I can already feel that this month is going to go by in the blink of an eye. Here it is the 10th of the month already and I have yet to post my monthly goals. But first, a quick recap on the week that was:

50 degrees – Perfect running weather!

Monday – 3-mile run
Tuesday – 2-mile night run
Wednesday – 4-mile guided run with Coach Marc
Thursday – 1.25 mi power walk plus strength work
Friday – 1-mile walk and yoga
Saturday – 4 miles
Sunday – 1.25 mi power walk with the pup

Total 16.5 miles

Thank goodness for this Holiday Challenge! While the week started off with a beautiful 50+ degree morning, the nice weather was very short-lived. There were a couple of times I could have easily chosen to hideout from the nonsense Mother N was dishing out, but I was determined not to miss a day of this Challenge. So far, so good.

I had my first guided run with Coach Marc on Wednesday where he took me through a series of body sensing drills. It was a great refresher for me on many of the Chi Running principles. We ran on some great rolling country roads with almost no traffic, which was perfect to focus and practice without dodging cars. I know I must have been pretty absorbed in all Marc was sharing with me because I realized afterward it never occurred to me to once pull out my phone to take pictures. A “blogger fail” perhaps, but it was great to be wholly concentrating in the moment.

December Goals

While I hadn’t gotten around to posting them yet, I did set some goals for the month. I like to have monthly goals to keep myself on track, and especially at this time of year with so many demands on time, it can be pretty easy to let things slide.

My main goal for November was consistency – whether it was running or cross-training, and I think I did a pretty solid job at that. I kept the running short and easy and gave my nagging injuries a chance to heal.

So for December:

  • Finish the final 3 weeks of FASTer Way to Fat Loss
  • Start incorporating Chi Running focuses into my runs and run with Coach Marc at least twice
  • Pre-hab with PT exercises 3x’s/week
  • Complete the 40-day Holiday Challenge I started on Thanksgiving (today marks Day 19!)
  • Continue with regular acupuncture treatments – (I had two this past week and felt so good afterward!)
  • Return to kickboxing classes

Hopefully, these goals will keep me on track and building momentum for a strong kick off to 2019!

I’m joining Holly and Wendy for the Weekly Wrap.

And, with ErikaMarcia, and Patty for Tuesdays on the Run.

Have you set any goals to close out the year? Have you started planning for 2019 yet?

signature

Wrapping Up Thanksgiving Week

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!

For the first time in a long time, we weren’t on the road for the holiday. We stayed local and my brother hosted an awesome meal! My oldest son was home from school for the week, and it was nice to have a few days to just kick back and chill with the family.

My workouts for this week were pretty low-key too – here’s a quick recap of how things went down:

Monday:  Yoga
Tuesday: T25 Cardio
Wednesday: Run evaluation with Coach Marc, followed by a 3-mile run
Thursday:  3-mile run

14 degrees with a feel like of 3 – Brrrr!

Friday:  1.25 power walk
Saturday: 4.5-mile run
Sunday: 1-mile walk plus yoga

Runner’s Revamp

The highlight of my workout week was meeting up with Coach Marc for a run evaluation. For these sessions, Marc works in partnership with a chiropractor Dr. Kelly for what they call “Holistic Injury Prevention & Runner’s Revamp” (HIPRR). After a warm-up run with Marc, they filmed and observed me running at various paces and then we spent quite a bit of time breaking down the film. Let me just say that watching yourself run in slow-motion is an eye-opening experience! Having each of them providing input from their different perspectives was so helpful, and I could have easily sat around talking about running all morning with them. My head was spinning by the end and thankfully they’ll be sending me all of their evaluations, along with next steps as Marc starts to build my new training plan.

Taking on the Holiday Challenge

For a little added motivation, I signed up for Race Cancer’s Holiday Challenge – the goal is to run or walk at least 1 mile each day from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Eve (outdoors mileage gets you Winter Warrior status). It’s the first leg of the Charity Challenge Trifecta, which includes the Winter Challenge (January 1 – 31) and Winter Challenge Overtime (Feb 1 – March 31). I did the Winter Challenge last January as part of the Black Girls Run! Boston team. I love that they added the Holiday and Overtime components for this year – I don’t know if I’ll end up doing all 3 components, but it is a great way to keep moving during the winter months. I also love that the challenge has a “3 strikes, you’re out” rule, so you can miss 2 days and still remain in the challenge – cause well…life happens, right? Holiday Challenge registration is open until 11:59 p.m on Monday if you want to join me 😉

So tell me, how was your week? Did you travel for Thanksgiving?

I’m joining Holly and Wendy for the Weekly Wrap.

signature