Hello, and Season’s Greetings!
I hope everyone had a great few day’s of holidays no matter what you’re celebrating! Here in the Maker household we recognized 4 straight days of holidays! Starting us out on the 23rd was Tibb’s Eve, followed by Christmas Eve, Christmas, and Boxing Day. Haha lets be honest, Ray is so focused that it was simply me having a party of one on Tibbs Eve! Anyways, happy holidays, and if you’re still on holidays, I have more holiday banter for you below in the “The Girl” section.
**** Before we get too into blog tech talk, please note that Ray has opened the annual “You Didn’t Get What You Wanted $500 Gadget Giveaway”. It will remain open until Friday night 11:59 US Eastern Time. Good Luck to all! ****
Now if you DID get what you wanted for Christmas, but maybe don’t know how to use it, or perhaps you have had too much eggnog to read the instructions, check out Ray’s Gadget Tips Round Up to get you started!
Onwards!
On Saturday we kicked off our Inaugural “DCR Santa Fun Run”. I only gave you guys about a 10 day heads-up, Ray gave the blog about 48 hours heads-up, and being the Saturday two day’s before Christmas we didn’t expect a big crowd. Have no fear, it was a lot of fun. Next year, I hope we can drag a few more of you out in your finest festive attire (with a bit more notice). Going forward, I think it was a great start to what I hope will be a tradition for the DCR reader family.
Sticking with the Holiday Theme, Ray posted our Annual Christmas Tree Via Bike Adventure: 2018 Edition.
Life as expats has been an unexpected journey for me. And this time of year, I can easily find myself missing family and friends from home. Honoring traditions and hosting the same party crowd year after year, as my family does, proves difficult over here as we are a transient bunch. Friends from this year aren’t guaranteed to be there the next. So this Annual Christmas Tree exploit is something Ray and I really get excited about, as it was our 6th Christmas Tree by Bike Adventure.
Last newsletter I mentioned that we packed up the kiddos and headed for the North Pole. But Ray had not posted his 5 Random Things he did in Finland yet. He goes into much more detail about the whole trip in that post.
Again, I have to tip my hat to Finland. The whole experience from the Airlines to Santa Lines, was enjoyable. Really a great place to visit with kids!! Or without, your choice! We were lucky to travel with a family who had an au pair come too... which equaled couples night out for us!
With all of that family time, Ray of course, needed some balance in his life. So deep into the tech-gadgetry he went. The In-Depth Review of the Tacx NEO 2 Smart Trainer hit the headlines just before Christmas.
Last but not least, we have the Week in Review post. If you haven’t heard of or seen the footage of the lady completing an open water swim with the Orcas, then definitely check this out. While I love the idea of swimming with Orcas, I personally would have had a heart attack and died had this been me. Normally my open water swim times were exceptionally fast in comparison to my pool training, simply due to my extreme desire to get the hell out of the water already. God forbid I hit a patch of seaweed or some other swimmer accidently hit my foot in the swim pack. Kudos to this lady for enjoying what I am sure was a rare wildlife phenomenon.
YouTube
As always, if you think reading is faux-pas and audio-visual is more your style, be sure to check out the DC Rainmaker YouTube Channel and click subscribe! By doing so you will be “in the know” for future new videos by Ray.
· Got New Gadgets? 11 Quick Sports Tech Tips
· Which Data Fields do I Use for Running and Cycling
That’s the round up from this past week. Now if you have time, keep it moving to below the fold for the “In-Depth Thoughts from The Girl”.
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