I love well designed for a purpose clothing. I love when there is just enough pockets and tabs to suit needs without being excessive. I often find my running clothes to be lacking in certain departments. Most notably the ability to carry my keys while out.

I’ve often resorted to wearing my vest. It’s reflective and I can put puppy bags in the pockets. I sometimes worry about my keys falling out while I’m rooting around in there. And I tend to carry too many items when I have the room.

So I love the new sweater my in-laws bought me for Christmas.

Not only is it fleecy warm and of my favorite color.

It has the perfect pocket on the sleeve. See the little zipper tab.

Just big enough to fit a set of keys. Perfect and safe.

My new favorite winter layer in just one trip!

For anyone looking to get one of their own it’s EMS brand. If you want more specifics leave me a comment and I’ll dig it out of the wash to get a model number off the garment.

When I was at my in-laws house for Christmas day, I started taking some pictures of my Mother-in-law’s more unique Christmas decorations. I warned her that I would be making a blog post about them. She declared “Oh they’ve all been making fun of my decorations for years, so I don’t mind”.

I have no intention of making fun of the ornaments and statues. And if I do, its in very good nature. I love that some of these ornaments are not something you would find walking into any home in America. That some of them actually leave you wondering “what the…” These ornaments are part of what makes Christmas special to her. That each one reminds her of where she bought it, comments made on it and jabs about how weird it is made by her children.

So without further ado, here are some of my favorite of the strange and wonderful ornaments.

A pretty basic glittery horse, nothing too unusual here.

A cat in a hat and suit, just reminds me of something old style.

I love this pine cone.

Just a kid dressed in a star costume for his Christmas recital I guess. Note the giant shoes.

How about someone caroling in a giant bell costume. The only thing that really bothers me about this one is the certain kind of doll expression on the ornament’s face.

Oh no that fairy is stealing the moon.

Keep the kids away, far, far away.

I know it’s supposed to be the moon, but it somewhat looks like a banana to me.

This turtle has shoes, and lipstick, and weird things sticking out of it’s head. I think it’s part of a series.

This one’s not that strange, an elf dog trick or treating with a hat? Yet again, giant shoes.

This is without a doubt the sculpture that I would call the “piece de resistance”. It’s some sort of fluffy long legged horse (wearing green leggings no less) with bright red shoes. It’s probably from the same series as the other ornaments with major shoes on, but it’s still extra special.

As I mentioned on Monday, I’ve been running again. I’ve been sticking to it quite well. There’s a few factors that seem to have helped me this time around.

First is the support of friends. I’ve made a few friends who want to join me in races and training and for that I am very grateful. Your encouragement has been so valuable to me.

Second is my high energy fool of a dog. Cooper needs the exercise and can be quite “vocal” about his need for speed.

Third is the tracking I’ve been doing. There are several internet resources I have found that have helped me keep track of my training and keep me motivated to keep going further and faster. Here’s a few of the sites I’ve been using lately.

1. SparkPeople - This is pretty much a diet and exercise community. It has food, weight and exercise tracking programs as well as wonderful support communities, diet and exercise plans and plenty of hints and tips.
2. RunningAhead – I find this to be a very powerful program. You can modify it to include pretty much any sport in any category you would like. So you could ad a horseback riding category and have sub-categories for Cross-Country, Jumping and Dressage. It’s a little hard to start off with, but I love it now that I know how to use it. The reports section is great.
3. Active.com – I think an important part of staying motivated is having fitness goals. This is why I keep signing up for small races. I mostly use Active to find races to look forward to, but they have lots of training tips and articles too.
4. CoolRunning.com – Another site with excellent race info. They are the originators of the Couch-To-5K running plan. An excellent training plan if you’ve never run before.

When Adam asked me, the only thing I could think of that I wanted was a pair of trail runners so I could extend my running to trails and deal with the lovely mess that are Manchester’s sidewalks during the winter. Adam has a pair of red trail shoes that I love because they are so distinctive.

So I was thrilled when I opened the box and found these Teal beauties.

I’m almost afraid to wear them and get them all dirty. But not getting them dirty would be cruelty to the running shoes.

No matter what you believe in, I would like to extend my wishes for a wonderful and happy holiday season.

And I’m posting this on Christmas Eve because it was traditionally when we celebrated Christmas when I was a kid.

While I was home I had the opportunity to visit two friends who are about to welcome the newest member of their family in January. Their current child, a black lab mix named Cinder, is feeling a little left out lately. So we brought Cooper over so they could play and burn off some energy.

When we brought them in, we had to put them into down stays so that they wouldn’t damage anything. Well Cooper’s idea of a good location to do a down stay was glued right up to Cinder. I think Cinder was a little embarrassed to be seen with a pup with a funny haircut wearing clothes.

Since mid-October, I’ve been running. Well at first it was more walking than running. I would go back to a walk as soon as the pain in my feet got bad. And I started being very carful with what I ate too. I was under a lot of stress so I was careful to make sure what I was putting in my body was valuable to my body.

Now two months later, I’m running 6 mile training runs. I still have a lot to go to be even considered a recreational athlete, but I’m making progress.

I’ve even been racing a bit. I never raced other than elementary and middle school track and field and cross country. So I’m finding my goals easier to find. It’s not like rowing where I feel a need to return to personal records. Every distance run is a personal record because I never kept tabs when I ran to cross train in college.

My first 5k that mattered was the sunapee turkey trot on Thanksgiving day. Jes joined me for a killer course. I would like to apologize to Jes yet again for the hill climb within the first 1/4 mile, I had no idea. I managed to run the whole distance and finished in just over 10 minute miles.

So when I wanted to visit my parents in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, I felt a need to find a race and bring my brother along. So I actually planned my trip home on the weekend of the Buffalo Freezer 5k this last Sunday.

Costumes were encouraged so my brother wore a set of flannel pajamas with scotty dogs I bought him the day before. And my little brother actually stuck with me while I ran 9 minute miles for more than half the race. I eventually was fed up of a slapfooted runner in front of me so I took off.

I was very proud of myself when I finished the race in just under 9 minute miles. I was very proud of Mike for finishing in under 30 minutes on his very first running race ever that he hadn’t even trained for.

Mike did get a fair bit of attention for his running attire. He kept being recognized and/or cheered on as “pajama man”.

Cooper was so upset with me for having left him behind while I ran, but he was relatively well behaved as a spectator with my parents.

After a lunch with my family I drove straight across New York and Massachusetts to find myself back home. But I was certainly glad to have taken the time and energy to get some exercise in before that long trip.

I hope some people still read my blog. And to those people thank you. I’ve had quite the chaotic last few months and my life is still in turmoil. But I hope to start posting in a blog again soon when my classes wrap up in a couple weeks (which is by far the smaller part of my problems).

I’m also hoping to move the blog to a new domain eventually. I don’t really want my town’s name in the title anymore because it’s a small town with a very uncommon name.

So hopefully soon, parts of my life will calm down and I’ll be able to post about my adventures.  Because despite all the drama, the stress and the uncertainty I still try to live my life and have a good time when I can.

In the meantime my husband wrote up a trip report for the trip he did that I posted pictures of in my Wordless Wednesday last week.  So please feel free to visit his rarely updated blog to get the climber’s perspective on the trip.

So I’m probably going to eventually move my personal blog over to this domain. So consider this to be a placeholder.  While this will be a personal blog, it’s title is related to my blonde (cream coloured) Standard Poodle Cooper. So I hope I’ll get this up and running quickly but until then, visit us at our old domain http://candiacrew.com