The Weekend Before Christmas

Hey there friends! Happy Monday! Today feels like those warm, fuzzy Mondays where work doesn’t really matter because everyone is on holiday. I, personally, don’t celebrate Christmas itself, but I do enjoy the festivities that come along with the day and am looking forward to a nice dinner with Luis’ fam tonight. They always put out a big spread, so there should be some goodies there! Before then, I have a few things to get done including writing this post and couple others, cleaning Manu’s tank (the fish), making a cookie cake, updating my website, posting to Instagram, going for my daily walk, and teaching on VIPKID. Tonight I am contributing a couple things, the aforementioned cookie cake, and I made this new chocolate cake, which has no flour, eggs, oil, butter, or sugar. Sounds gross, I know, but it’s not 😉

If you’re wondering how I got such beautiful photos, here’s the behind the scenes!

Let’s dive into the weekend, shall we?!

Friday

Friday was a good day! I don’t have class on Friday’s, so I have plenty of time to get things done. I had quite a few orders from Luis’ coworkers, so I ended up making those items and then running to his office to drop them off.

Then I went on the hunt for a gift for Luis since his birthday is on Wednesday! He has been wanting a LARGE cactus for a long time, so I had written in my phone: “cactus for Luis”. The only problem is that large cacti are a teeny bit out of my price range…. about 550€, so, I stuck with four smaller ones for him and they are SO COOL!

I also got his Mom a little plant in a small, wooden box. I spent about an hour in the store just browsing and touching the plants and getting thorns stuck in my fingers…

I worked a little bit on Vipkid on Friday afternoon, and then made another cookie for another coworker who wanted something to bring to Christmas lunch this week, but they ended up eating the cookie on Saturday and wrote to Luis that it was amazing!! Made me so happy.

On Friday night, Sarah came over and then we went to the Matadero for the International Food and Stuff festival… not the official name, but it should be.

We shared this yummy chicken tamale from the Peruvian stand, and shared a couple glasses of warm wine.

Luis was supposed to meet us, but ended up not being able to make it which was a bummer. Instead, he and I went out for drinks when I got home. There is probably nothing I love more than a good Spanish bar that gives wine pours like THIS and a generous plate of cheese with crackers.

Saturday

Saturday began the same way most Saturdays begin around here- with breakfast and a workout. I ran for 20 minutes while Luis lolly-gagged around the gym and then we did Nike Training Club together. It was a tough one and very heavy on leg work!

After the workout and showers, we headed to Luis’ parent’s house for lunch (we had vegetable chick-pea soup to start and mini meatballs in tomato sauce and wild rice for second plates. There were also pinxos with tomato, olive oil, and smoked salmon, and sardines in oil).

Once we finished dinner, Luis drove me to the center because I had an appointment for the jolliest time of year!

Nothing I love more than killing those curls!!!

Not only was I happy to have smooth hair again, but I also enjoyed the appointment because I felt like it was the first time in 3.5 years that I could sit and chat with the hairdresser and have a full conversation. She told me about her recent trip to Miami, but before that she had been to LA once and told me that her favorite thing about going to the US (specifically LA) is that you can be whoever you are and (in a few more words) no one gives a crap. This woman is extremely tall, over 6 feet, and she said that in LA, it didn’t even turn heads and it felt so nice to just be her. I felt proud of the US, haha.

Saturday night, we went back and forth, back and forth about whether or not to go out and then just decided not to. Besides, we had plans for Sunday….

Sunday

On Sunday, we did one of my favorite things! We made brunch plans at Roll, which is a place we’ve been wanting to try (to see how their bagels are), but instead of driving, we ran there. We ran for about 30 minutes and arrived all sweaty, which I’m sure the staff was thrilled about 😉

Unfortunately, this didn’t have any bagels (second time this has happened at a place that supposedly offers bagels), so we settled for the pastrami eggs Benedict (served on a waffle, which wasn’t my favorite) and the black and bleu burger, which was a burger with bleu cheese… which you may have guessed).