Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

I've been thinking about goals a lot recently.  I know that I've said so many times that January 1st is just another day and my goals don't have to start there, but I do get caught up in all that "new year new start" crap that I really don't believe in.  The issues that I've had in 2017 aren't going to magically disappear on midnight New Year's Eve. 

The biggest issue that I've had actually has only been since August when Chris had his stroke.  I've had other struggles throughout the year, mostly in my personal life, but the biggest one was when Chris had his stroke and changed our financial situation significantly.  And that's not going away.  He's not magically going to get better suddenly.  It's going to still be a wait and hope thing. 

With all that said, I am still working on goals for 2018.  There are things I would like to do differently, I touched on them last week, but I'm still thinking about specifics.  I don't know if I will get all of it down and out of my head, but I'm going to continue with them.  I think the majority of my desire is to "fix" my financial situation, and without getting a new job, I don't know if that's going to be possible . . . unless Chris does magically get better.

My running has been less than mediocre.  I did go for a really nice run in eastern WA when we were over there for Christmas.  It snowed, and for whatever reason (maybe because I live in an area where it rarely snows and never sticks around long) I always have the desire to go for a run in the snow.  My parents live on a hilly road, one way is a gradual downhill for a half mile and then a steep up hill and steep downhill and steep uphill again before reaching the 1 mile point (if I continued past the 1 mile point it would continue to be a steep uphill for another half mile).  All other directions are all up and down constantly.  With my recent knee problem, I am trying to avoid running downhill as that seems to aggravate it the most, so I decided the gradual downhill followed by the steep hills . . . but that meant I would have a half mile of gradual incline to get back to my parents house and I still would have to figure out another mile (to make 3 miles). 

Well, as I was descending the steep downhill I thought that running through the abandoned gravel pit at the bottom of the hill might be fun.  I hadn't wandered through it since it was active in my teenage years.  And it turned out very interesting, I found all sorts of things.  And it added the extra mile I needed.

Anybody want lunch?

A shooting range?  Not my parents, someone is trespassing.

rocks, just because

Tires, yes, I tried to flip one, it was cemented to the ground.

I was able to flip this one. ; )

The view back to my parents house.

And just me

We had a good, if very short Christmas with my family and with Chris's family. 

And we were back over the mountains and home on Christmas Eve.

I went for a run on Christmas day after opening our presents.  I was planning on 8 miles, but my knee started really bothering me, so I cut it short and ended up only running 5.5 miles.  I'm really hoping my knee will hold up for my last half marathon on Sunday.  I have to run it in order to get my series medal . . . well, I may end up walking a lot of it.  It's going to be a slow one.

I have been stretching but I need to also work on my butt and hip muscles.  I think that will be my biggest 2018 fitness goal, increase hip strength and flexibility, butt strength, and overall flexibility.  I'm tired of the aches that have plagued me this year, so I think that will help a lot. (I hope.)

I hope you all had a great Christmas and are safe on the New Year.  We have nothing planned, so it will be a quiet evening at home, I think. =)