holiday traditions | Fitness is Sweet

8 holiday traditions.

Hey guys! Sorry this post is going up a little late. My blog was down for some unknown reason last night-I hope that did not cause anyone problems!

Also-does anyone mind that I’m not linking the other 7 days? It was starting to get really tedious in terms of posting but also with the link backs. So without further ado, let’s get into some of the holiday traditions I/my family do every year! Here’s last year’s!

1. Every year my family goes to Napa over Thanksgiving-whether it be for the day or just around Thanksgiving. I can’t remember the last time we didn’t go. This year we went for Thanksgiving day and the day after.

2. Every year I pull out my peppermint body spray from Bath and Body Works. I got this at least 5 years ago, and the smell just reminds me of the holidays! Plus, it’s sparkly!

3. Every year on Christmas Eve, my family loads into the car with the dog and drives around looking at Christmas lights.

(I totally almost used the same picture as I did last year…)

4. Every Christmas Eve my family goes to Benihana’s, a Japanese steakhouse where they cook food in front of you.

5. Every year my best friends and I get together and make Christmas cookies. They’re just basic sugar cookies, but the fun part is decorating! This one started out because as middle schoolers we were obsessed with plaid things, and wanted to make plaid cookies.

6. Shopping in the city. Every year around the holidays, the same friends and I go up to San Francisco to go shopping and walk around. And see the kittens in the window at Macy’s.

7. Christmas movies. These happen every year as well, although the only one that we seem to see EVERY year is Emmet Otter’s Jugband Christmas. That’s my dad’s favorite-not sure how he manages to get that on the list every year! It does seem to have some good life lessons though. My favorite is The Year Without a Santa Claus.

8. Decorations. This is one of the best parts! A simple bow can make everything more festive. We always get a real tree. We used to go to tree lots, but found Whole Foods has the best and cheapest trees!

How does your family celebrate the holidays?

8 holiday traditions!

Before I get into today’s day of Christmas, I want to talk about fitness for a moment, since I haven’t gotten much chance to since starting 12 days.

I may have mentioned this before, but my feet have been trying to murder me in a new and interesting way as of late. My arches have been KILLING-the worst was the night of the turkey trot, when I was stuck on my feet for hours Black Friday shopping, but they’ve been bad for about a month. I’m pretty sure it’s related to my Achilles tendon-I’ve had tendonitis there in the past, and I think the problems with my Achilles are pulling on whatever connects to the arch of my feet. It’s been bad-earlier this week I was limping something fierce-it hasn’t been a huge issue for my running because it feels much better in the morning than later in the day, and I can stretch and make it feel better. The good news is it’s been getting way better this week, and I finally may have a cure. I FINALLY made it out to yoga tonight-I thought that all the stretching would loosen up my Achilles and make it feel better. However, I think I discovered the real cause-all the little muscles in my ankle and lower calf/Achilles area have gotten insanely weak-when we did balances on one foot, I was shaking like crazy and my muscles were painfully exhausted. This shouldn’t be that big of a surprise I guess-we all know how many times I rolled my ankles during half training!

Anyways, this was kind of a big reminder to me-I’ve gotten kind of stuck into my routine of running, Crossfit, and spin. Which isn’t a bad mix, but I really think I need to do more agility type workouts to strengthen the little muscles-I never had any weird injury type things when I played softball and moved in so many more ways!

Also-I just have to mention how cold it’s been here (all you East Coasters-feel free to laugh) Today was a low of TWENTY EIGHT. So naturally I woke up at 6am for a dark track workout. (It actually wasn’t that bad-gloves are amazing and saved my butt).

I survived!

And that called for an upgrade-a MEDIUM cappuccino. Well, that and the 5 hours of sleep…

And for your enjoyment-this is what I wore to yoga.

ANWAYS.

8 Holiday Traditions!

1. Go to Benihuana’s on Christmas Eve. We’ve done this for YEARS now-and I love it! Believe it or not, I’m pretty sure I had a weight lifting session with my trainer the past two years on Chrsitmas EVE before Benihuana’s…

2011

2010

2009

2. Making and decorating sugar cookies with my crazy friends.

Gingerbread house turned murder scene…

3. Making Spritz cookies with my family (sensing a theme here?)

4. My dad’s company Christmas party. I think I actually enjoy this-I feel like every year either my mom or my sister gets out of this, and it’s just me and my dad-but I’ve gone every year for a LONG time nonetheless!