Christmas, Christmas everywhere!

Running

Tis the season to be running Christmas runs!! I've really enjoyed the numerous Christmas-themed runs I've done this week!  I first wore my santa hat whilst running at last Sunday's cross country with my second claim club and have since worn it to my first claim club's annual Santa's Sherry Stumble, yesterday's parkrun and today's Christmas Handicap race.  My Christmas socks had their first airing today too!

Santa's Sherry Stumble is a 4.5 mile run of 2 laps.  It works like this: dressing in Christmas outfits is optional and there were people dressed as santa and elves and, whilst we were running, some drivers beeped their horns at us, either to acknowledge we were doing a santa run or that we looked a bit silly!!  Firstly, we estimated how long we expected to run this distance and we aren't allowed to use a watch to time ourselves, so it's basically down to pacing at what we think is the correct minute miling to reach our estimated time.  No mean feat for a girl who looks at her minute miling regularly throughout a race!!  After the first lap, we stop for a sherry and then run the second lap.  The sherry can slow us down and impair our judgement.  At the end of the run we get another sherry and a hot mince pie. I'm pleased to say that I completed the course 15 seconds quicker than I'd anticipated and I won a prize for this!  Whoop whoop :D

parkrun is a weekly, free 5k timed run which takes place in parks worldwide.  I love my local parkrun and the people who run and organise this are so friendly.  At this week's parkrun, people dressed in similar costumes to those worn on the sherry stumble, plus somebody dressed as a Christmas tree and a Christmas female sumo wrestler!  The conditions were windy so the sumo wrestler got blown around a little, but completed the route well considering!  I wore my santa hat and my Christmas present earrings!  I have a range of Christmas earrings now, as I buy them every year!

Today's Christmas Handicap run was a 4 mile run.  Runners are sent out in waves so slower runners start before quicker runners and the aim is that all runners complete the run at around the same time.  It gives slower runners the chance to race quicker runners and my friend did just that!  Well done to my friend, M, on getting in before her running coach, M, even though he was determined to finish before her :)  I wore my Christmas socks for the first time, my snowflake earrings and santa hat today :D

Festivities

This week, I had my work's Christmas meal at a local college's training restaurant.  The trainees create the menu, cook the food and serve the meal. I'm not a huge turkey fan so I opted for a fish dish and this was cooked perfectly.  I was disappointed by the dessert though - Chocolate lollipops with winter dusting.  Whilst it was 'what it said on the tin' I wished I'd chosen another dessert!!  This is how it looked:

What do you think?

After the Sherry Stumble, my running club had it's Christmas social!  We had the usual pizza and raffle, and also mince pies and Christmas cake!  I was late getting to the social, but my friend, A, had got me some pizza and raffle tickets and I won a raffle prize (more chocolates!)  Whoop whoop!

My friend, C, and I went for Christmas drinks at a nearby city.  We work together and are also good friends, so it was nice for us to have some downtime away from the pressures of work.  The atmosphere in that city is far better than the atmosphere in my home town and we had a great night!  I wore a santa hat headband!  I'm starting to collect Christmas headwear too!!

Taking stock

I'm getting to the time of year when I start to take stock of successes of the past year and my goals for next year.  But more on that in my next blog!

Happy Sunday everyone and, if I don't post beforehand, have a great Christmas!