Hello! How hard is this week? I was back at work Thursday and Friday last week but it didn’t feel ‘proper’ if you know what I mean… What with the horrendous weather, RUBBISH commutes and just general fog of depression hanging over everyone it really does feel a bit gloomy round these parts.
I missed out on doing my Christmas recap due to not blogging over the festive period. And if I’m honest, I don’t really fancy doing such a late recap now. It’s a bit depressing. But I’ll do a quick version…
Ben holding the bean bag looking like Father Christmas
My parents and Ben’s parents came to ours. We had a traditional British Christmas dinner. My parents cooked the turkey that we’d bought from M&S as our oven was too small. So all we had to cover were snacks, drinks and all the trimmings and carving.
Nothing too crazy. Honey roasted carrots and parsnips, sprouts, broad beans (my favourite!), runner beans, sausage stuffing, apple and sage stuffing, roasted potatoes, red cabbage, cranberry sauce, gravy. Heaven.
Afterwards there were profiteroles, Christmas pudding and mince pies. I enjoyed a lovely heated mince pie. I forgot to take a photo but it was an unusual puff pastry one. I quite liked the change from the usual thick pastry ones. I love Christmas cake but I find Christmas pudding very rich.
Obviously I had Christmas cake later for supper 😉 It’s my favourite part of Christmas (well, favourite food part).
We spent time opening presents, listening to Christmas music and playing board games. Good fun all round. Apart from my dad not feeling well and then subsequently passing it to Ben and me. Merry Christmas to us.
Lovely little photo of me ill in bed. Thanks Ben!
Anywho, despite being ill we had a lovely Christmas and had lots of lovely presents. I must mention these as I am SO excited to try them.
My parents got me these popcorn flavour toppers. I have popcorn every day with my lunch at work that I pop myself from plain kernels. I sprinkle salt and pepper over it. My dad found these in Lakeland and got them for me as a stocking filler. AMAZING.
And, though I do say so myself, I love this present I got Ben.
Along the side it has markers and half way says “13.1” and then at the top it says “26.2” and along the markings “Pacing yourself is everything”. Ben loves his wine and I just thought this was a perfect way to mark his achievement. Especially because he gave up alcohol for a portion of his training!
I did my first workout at the gym on New Year’s Day as we had a quiet evening in the night before. I felt raring to go and ready to get back into things. My physio had OK’ed spin so I was happy to not have to motivate myself on a machine! Honestly though it was hard work.
In terms of running – ahh the saga of my life. I’m up to 2 miles. Good Lord, I’ll have to start carb loading and properly fuelling myself soon 😉 I’m not trying to belittle anyone’s running efforts but personally for me this is such a change from the mileage of last year. I just hope I won’t have lost too much when I’m fully back into it. But at this point, as long as I can run without issue I DON’T CARE.
My knee seems to be calming down with the intense ultra sounding that’s going on and the little runs are helping in a weird way to ‘break it down’ to build it back up again stronger. It’s a cautious and slow approach but it’s what I need.
My decision about the Paris marathon will happen in about two weeks. My ultra sound will have ended and I hope the runs increased a bit. If I’m still struggling with the knee and it needs longer time off (come on, seriously??) then Paris is a no-go. Ben has agreed he won’t do it either (bless his socks). But if all things are OK…then I’ll have 10 weeks to train. Obviously this is not enough in the ideal marathon training world BUT I think I can do something with it. I won’t pre-empt things by going into more detail yet though!
What’s your on your plate at Christmas?
What’s your favourite Christmas dessert/treat? It’s all about the Christmas cake for me.
What was your favourite Christmas pressie?
Ben’s present to you basically kicks butt. Where on earth did he find the glass at? Or did he buy it online? I’m sorry to hear that running really isn’t happening yet… soon enough though dear.. soon enough. One tip advice I can give is dont try to rush back into yor mileage and speed. You’ll work back into it.. I promise, your body wont let you down!
It wasn’t Ben’s present to me, it was my present to Ben. But yes it did kick butt!!
Such a cool wine glass haha! Well done for staying patient with running. Your Christmas dinner has got me hungry for another!
I know, I could eat Christmas dinner every day. But I guess it’s a good thing we don’t have it that often so I love it even more!
What a great gift for Ben! That Christmas lunch looks really delicious, oh I could just have another one now 🙂 My fave Christmas pressie is hard to pick as I got some lovely things, maybe the owl pencil holder I got from my sister that has pride of place on my desk 🙂
I love all the owl stuff out at the moment. One of my favourite necklaces is an owl.
Love the wineglass, what a fab idea!
At least you are running now, even though just short distances- and there will be marathons for years to come so if you have to make that decision then there will always be more.
Andy got us tickets to see Book of Mormen which I am so excited about- we were meant to see it in New York but that was the holiday we cancelled as I was in hospital so it has been a long time coming!
PS look forward to rivalling you- although I am not running much further than you either at the moment!
Exactly, marathons and races will come and go. I just need to be patient and sensible.
Hehe well we’ll see going forward won’t we? I’m sure we’ll both be back on track soon!
That wine glass is amazing and sorry you were sick! Also I’ve never heard of runner beans but since we have the same taste buds I bet I’d like them :).
You’ve never heard of runner beans? Is that a British term? Maybe – they’re like beans in pods?
That is such a cool glass! And your Christmas dinner looks yum, yum, yum! Christmas dinner is one of my favourite meals of the year, we have beef in our house as no one is too fussed about turkey (we have turkey at my stepsisters house on Boxing Day). On my plate I had beef, Yorkshire pudding, sage and onion stuffing, sausage in bacon, roast potatoes, carrots, runner beans and cauliflower cheese. Yummy in my tummy!! After all that I didn’t have pudding, we’re not that big on dessert as my dad can’t have them. Hope the knee continues to improve, I have my fingers crossed for Paris 🙂
Yeah I’ve seen quite a few people having beef at Christmas which I find odd – but I guess it’s just preference and what you know! Ahh cauliflower cheese! What a great addition.
We never have dessert after Christmas dinner, although we did share a mini Vegan christmas pudding a few days later- it was yum! Good news about the running, your definitely taking the right approach, and running will come back to you quickly as you’ve built up mileage in the past.
Yeah it is tough to fit in a pudding after Christmas dinner…but I managed after a little break hehe 😉
Even though I was sick over the holidays too, I hate hearing that others suffered the same fate 🙁 I hope all of the sickness has gone and you can fully enjoy the new year Anna! 🙂
I must say that your holiday table of food was much more veggie-centric than my family’s. Haha. Other than a green kale salad that one of my cousins brought out of the blue randomly, there wasn’t another green vegetable in sight!
Those popcorn toppings sound yummy. As a kid we used to air pop our popcorn and top it with this white cheddar stuff called “Molly McButter.” Lol. It was delicious. And we actually have kettle corn and nacho cheese toppings in our cupboard right now.
Yay for running! No matter how little, that’s still great news.
I cooked the dinner so I made sure there were lots of veggies hehe!
Your popcorn toppers sound amazing. These are the first toppings I’ve seen being sold which is both great and a bit sad – we need more!!
The food looks amazing!!! Great gifts too!! Ben’s wine glass is awesome haha!
He loves it 🙂 Especially when there’s wine in it haha.