Hello hello! I hope everyone had a lovely weekend and is feeling all festive and what not.

I’m pretty sure everyone I talked to said they had 57 holiday parties to go to this weekend. I only had four, and only made it to one thanks to champagne, whiskey, and coffee tequila (that’s a thing?!) all consumed for far too long and far too fast. But it was wonderful.

Jim and Kate had their annual (can I say annual? ok great) Christmas Open House this weekend. It was a wonderful mix of family and friends, food and booze, christmas music and movies, and … whiskey. All day. The apartment looked beautiful and the company was even better. In between listening to clutch Christmas songs was spanish sing-a-longs (navidad navidad hoy es havidad) and a live performance of “Deck the Halls” on violin (thanks Laura!). We ate peter pan donuts and fancy chex mix and HAM and sweet potatoes and curry dip. We watched Elf and Muppet  Christmas Carol and Love Actually and a Charlie Brown Christmas. We danced to gangam style (unclear). I think I’m still hungover. I love Christmas and Family and Friends!

On a different note, I’m baaaack in the running world, and so far so freaking good. In the past week or so I’ve never felt so great running — both mentally and physically. I’ve been mainly sticking to 5-6 mile runs,  keeping the pace right around or under 8 min/mile. I went for a 10K “tempo” run at 7:40ish pace and felt smooth. I’m still yoga’ing and lifting (a little) too, really trying to dedicate time to stretches and strength exercises that will keep me injury-free. I am also really enjoying running in the cold weather — except for pacing up and down my block at 7am waiting for my Garmin to get signal.

So yeah…all smiles on the running front. Which is especially good, since marathon training starts soon. And then it’s goodbye real life and hello Saturday morning long runs and doing laundry all the time. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t stoked.