My Christmas Week of Walks and Hikes

How was your Christmas? Mine was lovely. I spent a week in Marin County, just north of San Francisco, with my family. We played poker a couple nights (I won $40), went on family outings, made big dinners together (I was in charge of vegetables), and… I met a bear!

When I wasn’t doing those other things, or just relaxing, I was walking. I’m still recovering from a year of racing, but I wanted to stay active, so I made a point of going on a nice long walk every single day.

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Bean Soup with Ham and Lots of Veggies

Do you celebrate the holidays with a spiral-cut ham? This post is for you! 

I brought home a delicious spiral-cut ham a few weeks ago. It was huge – much bigger than was needed for three people – and we ended up feasting on ham for the better part of a week. My parents then went out of town, and I set out to make one of my mom’s favorite things using spiral-cut ham… soup.

As you may know from reading this blog, I’m not the sort that follows a recipe blindly. And that worked out well, because my mom didn’t leave me a recipe. So

POLL: Do You Dip Apple Slices in Hummus?

My friend Josh texted me, asking if I was a fan of dipping apples in hummus. He enjoyed it, but his wife and teenager thought it was gross. I had never considered such a combination, and I told him that, and then expressed my excitement in trying it.

And now I’ve tried it. What did I think?

Two Healthy Swaps, One Holiday Party Dish

I went to a holiday party last night, and contributed a dish, since it was a potluck. I’m not going to take credit and say I invented anything, but I did take a recipe that only had four ingredients and swapped two of them for healthier items. That’s 50%, y’all! It all started with a package.

This is the Pineapple Pecan Cheesespread Mix by Country Home Creations, a local dip mix company that’s

The Post-Race Blues

There’s been a lot of excitement in my life recently. I finished my 40th and final race of the year a few weeks ago, had a great Thanksgiving in Colorado, and reveled in some incredible #40years40races statistics. And now that all that’s done and over with, I find myself struggling with some depression.

Depression, like obesity, will likely be something I

Two New Ways To Eat Healthy… And One is an Oddly-Colored Vegetable!

I experience an extraordinary, borderline silly amount of joy whenever I see oddly-colored vegetables. Years back, when this blog was much younger, I had a streak where I was finding oddly-colored vegetables all over the place. In the years that have passed, some of them have become more widely available, like rainbow carrots and orange and purple cauliflower. Others are still rare and exciting when I see them, like purple asparagus and purple Brussels sprouts – and I don’t see them that often.

Check out what I found when I was in Colorado for Thanksgiving:

STRIPED BELL PEPPERS! 

I Crunched the Numbers, and My #40years40races Challenge Statistics are Jaw-Dropping!

The biggest fitness challenge of my life is over. A couple weeks ago, I completed my #40years40races challenge. It wore me down, and wore me out, but I am so incredibly proud. Proud doesn’t begin to cover it. I raced more in 2019 than I did in 2018 and 2017 combined. In fact, 1/3rd of all the races I’ve done in my adult life (since 2011) were raced as part of this challenge. I’ve done things I’ve never done before, and set all sorts of personal records. Plus, I finished my challenge on November 23rd, with over a month to spare before the end of the year!

Those are all the medals I earned this year. 31 of them! (Not every race has medals.) They look even better all spread out on the table.