Hello! Hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. Jeremy and I went up to Santa Barbara to spend time with my family, and it was really great. It was about 80 degrees and I spent lots of time at the beach.

Anyway, I got a new job and I started a couple weeks ago, so adjusting to that and moving into our new apartment has been… a lot. But everything is good and exciting and moving to a new city is SO FUN. I highly recommend it. My job is downtown L.A., which is not too far from where we live (I was worried about a one-hour commute at least if I got a job anywhere on the west side of the city), and it’s fun to be downtown around lots of cool bars and restaurants and old buildings.

My running has felt a little lackluster lately, especially last week. I was on a good run of workout weeks, but last week I slacked. I did five miles in Santa Barbara on Friday that felt good, but I think that was one of two runs last week… oops. My main focus right now is building a good base to start marathon training on January 5th (!!!!!). I’ve enlisted the help of Lauren from The Foodie Runner as my coach for marathon training, and I’m so excited to get started. I am really looking forward to having a training plan, and especially one that’s specifically made for me. I think having someone to keep me accountable and encourage me is going to be so beneficial. I’ve been exploring our new neighborhood a good bit on foot, and am really glad the Silver Lake Reservoir is nearby, it makes for a nice loop. There are also lots of super steep roads around, which will come in handy if I have any hill workouts to do. I’ve been getting a little bit faster, most of my runs are now under 9:30 minutes/mile, so at least there’s that.

Jeremy and I have also been exploring the restaurants and bars in walking distance to us – this was a really important factor when choosing an apartment. Los Angeles is not known for its walkability, but we can venture out easily and find lots of places to visit within a two-mile radius.

I’ve still been going to November Project every Wednesday morning, and I’m so excited because starting this Friday, it’s being held at Echo Park Lake, which is a 5-10 minute drive from me. I need that cross-training!

There’s also a studio nearby that’s called YAS Fitness Center, which is half spinning classes half yoga for athlete classes (one class is thirty minutes of one then switches to the other), and they are having a special right now so I think I’ll buy some classes. I haven’t done yoga in a long time (or stretched much) and I know spinning is a great cross-training exercise. Otherwise, I’m going to keep working on my base, hopefully running 20-25 miles a week until January 5th. I keep getting butterflies when I think about marathon training; I know I have to strengthen my mental game for the race too, I’m feeling pretty scared of the distance at the moment.

A few more pictures for good measure.

Hope everyone has a really great last month of 2014!