All The Holiday Things

We are squarely in the middle of that weird week between Christmas and New Year’s where schedules and routines have completely gone by the wayside and time doesn’t seem to make any sense. And I’m loving it. As Buddy the Elf would say, “I thought maybe we could make ginger bread houses, and eat cookie dough, and go ice skating, and maybe even hold hands.”

A few weeks ago I decided that I was going to take a very laid back approach to this week. We switched up our parenting schedule a bit for the holidays so I ended up having Finn most of this week. Since he’s out of school and many of my personal training clients are also all over the place, I opted to forgo lining up a bunch of babysitters in favor of taking time off of work and spending as much QT with Finn as possible.

I’ll go in reverse order for this post and start you with our post-christmas days and backtrack to pre-holiday.

TODAY

Finn slept until 8:30a (we’ve been sleeping champions on this break) so I loaded him up in his (new Hanna Anderson!) PJs to accompany me to Charlotte Yoga to teach my 9:30a. Class was sold out and the energy was off the charts.

We came home and I got showered, dressed and made us lunch before we took off on our next adventure…

URBAN AIR! Finn lives for trampoline parks and after two days of rain and being stuck in the house – I wanted to get him out and moving. Note for my local readers, I cannot tell you how much I prefer Urban Air in Mint Hill over Big Air off Independence. I get so much anxiety at Big Air and Urban Air always feels so much more manageable, less crowded, safer and SUPER CLEAN!

He played for two straight hours and left drenched in sweat. We stopped at home for Finn to get showered and changed and then headed out for a movie date.

We’ve wanted to see Migration since seeing the previews for it when we saw Wish over Thanksgiving. We saw it in 3D and Finn thought it was the coolest to wear the glasses. Migration was cute but if I were to rank the three movies we’ve seen between Thanksgiving and Christmas it would be…

1. Wish
2. Trolls Band Together
3. Migration

But all three were totally worth seeing in the theater. Another recommendation for my local readers – the Cinemark Bistro on Monroe has upgraded their recliner chairs and they’re super fresh and have seat heaters! Can’t beat a heating pad feel on your back while you watch a movie. 🙂

TUESDAY

Tuesday was the laziest day. We slept until 9:30a and it was incredible. I think we both needed a sleep in after the build up to Christmas and Christmas Day. Once we got moving I made cinnamon rolls for breakfast and we stayed in our PJs until 2p. Finn had WAY too much screen time through the course of the day as I worked to get the house clean and back in order. My parents gave him a new Amazon Fire HD Kids 10 Pro tablet and it was a very needed upgrade from his last 8″ tablet that I ordered back in 2020 that was getting a little to slow/limited.

Around 5p I left Finn with our favorite high school babysitter and headed over to the studio to teach the 5:45p and take the 7p. (Only sitter of the week.) It felt great to get out of the house to teach after the holiday and to stay and sweat in the class after on such a rainy, gloomy day. I showered and got myself in cozy clothes after class so that I was ready to get Finn to bed when I got home.

CHRISTMAS DAY

I spent Christmas morning on the couch watching Elf and getting my Christmas Crusher workouts live on my blog. I’d posted them on Instagram in the days prior but couldn’t miss the 10 year anniversary of sharing them here!

The moment I hit publish on those posts, I set out on a 5 mile trail/greenway run. I was so surprised by how busy the greenway was. So many people out and moving on Christmas – and so many with their pups.

Immediately after my run I got to pick this cutie up. We spent the rest of the day opening presents, playing, relaxing and watching Home Alone. It had been years since I watched it and not sure it’s 100% the most appropriate for a 5-year-old but we did it anyway.

I didn’t have a lot of cooking inspiration this Christmas due to it being small and away from my fam but I did put together a steak dinner on Christmas night. I had been craving a filet for a while so this was a great time to make it happen. I seasoned the filet with kosher salt and freshly ground pepper and then seared it in a hot cast iron skillet on one side until it was nice and golden brown. I flipped it over and transferred it to a 400 degree oven where it cooked until it registered about 130 degrees. I pulled it out and put the steak on a plate with a pat of salted butter and let it rest for about 5 minutes before serving.

On the side was balsamic glazed roasted brussel sprouts, sautéed mushrooms with shallots and garlic and a baked potato.

While I really missed seeing my family this Christmas, it was truly a gift to get to have Finn with me Christmas afternoon. Sharing/splitting holidays is an especially difficult part of co-parenting but I think we do a really good job on both sides with making the most of it – and I’m very, very grateful for that.

CHRISTMAS EVE

Finn was with his dad on Christmas Eve so I took my friend Ian’s class at Khali at 8:30a. It was absolutely the best way to start the day. I changed clothes at the studio and headed straight out to Walmart and Harris Teeter to finish up last minute gift and food shopping.

I got home shortly after noon and showered, ate lunch and did some work around the house. It was 65 and sunny on Christmas Eve so I leashed up the dogs and got them out on a nice long walk while I listened to a Mel Robbins podcast about 6 questions to ask yourself to make 2024 a great year. While this podcast gave me some good things to noodle on, I almost turned it off multiple times because Mel Robbins can drive me a little crazy. She’s a lot sometimes.

I was going to meet Virginia for Christmas Eve church but wasn’t feeling 100% so I ended up ordering Thai takeout, watching Christmas vacation and wrapping presents instead.

Call me crazy but I absolutely love to wrap on Christmas Eve. Nothing is more festive for me than to put a Christmas movie or music on and get everything all ready for Christmas Day.

PRE-CHRISTMAS WEEK

Here are a few highlights from the week before Christmas!

Finn had a birthday party for one of his BFFs at Playland on the Wednesday before Christmas and I thought it was a genius move to plan a party for a weekday when the kids are out on break.

We spent an afternoon moving a ton of yoga equipment to our new yoga studio space at MOTION. More on that to come soon!

We started a cookie decorating tradition last year and OMG we had an absolute blast this year. Finn helped me choose the cookie cutters and cut them out and then we spent over an hour totally immersed in cookie decorating once they were baked and cooled.

I truly give him free rein on the cookie decorating and it makes my heart so happy to see him layering the icing on thick and dumping ALL the sprinkles on the cookies. He was so proud of the ones he decorated.

We also baked oatmeal gingerbread cookies and chocolate chip cookies. We packaged up a few plates of cookies to send to his dad’s for their big Christmas dinner and then took two other plates to neighbor friends. Finn was so sweet in his enthusiasm over sharing our cookies.

We had our annual Santa date night in a very impromptu fashion this year. We planned to go see Santa one night but Finn fell when we were out on a walk with Virginia a few hours before and scraped his knee. He wanted to cancel Santa since he “couldn’t walk” so we compromised on driving around to look at Christmas lights. Once we got in the car and he settled down a bit he told me, “I guess we can go see Santa.”

I drove the car straight to the mall and while he definitely wasn’t in his typical Santa outfit, it was a memory I won’t forget and he had a great time – which is all that matters really.

I’ll wrap up this post with this very fitting holiday photo. Finn rocking out in his holiday PJs while the rest of us are just ready for night night! 🙂

We have one more fun day planned tomorrow before Finn goes back to his dad for New Year’s weekend. I’ll report back on our activity – it’s a good one (big hint in the Buddy the Elf quote at the beginning of the post)!

QUESTIONS

What kind of Christmas did you have this year? Big family? Quiet? Somewhere in between? 

What are you doing this week between Christmas and New Year’s?

Best movie you’ve seen lately?