BORDER CROSSING BLOG BIRTHDAY RUN!

It's your birthday, it's your birthday, we gon party like it's yo birthday.
Well as it is Maid In Cornwall's birthday I celebrated in style - by going out for a wonderfully sunny long run today. The weather could not have been better, clear skies, slight chill in the air and a lovely 13 mile loop planned to take in the amazing countryside.
It has to be said I did not pick a flat route but when can you when you live in these parts?! At 4.5 miles the altitude changed from 150ft through to 500ft within 1.5 miles. Think these mud runs are helping my training so much as I just kept ploughing on up, neither wanting or needing to rest up.
I went along country roads, only saw 1 cyclist and no runners whatsoever. I did however go right past Avril's home @eightsmd and stopped for a quick chinwag! Then off up the mighty hill.
Views along the route were amazing:

No iPod, no running buddy, no distractions and I have to say I enjoyed it. This time of year is somewhat prominent for me as 9 years ago I grew from being what I can only describe as "the old Lara" to "the new Lara". A heart wrenching experience had to help me along the way and yesterday's anniversary never gets forgotten. It helped me to grow as an individual and helped me to understand alot about myself and my relationships with others. Basically it sent me back to my core, it was hard, so very hard.

Day's like today make you feel the simple joys, the joy of your body getting stronger, your mind overpowering those thoughts of stopping as you incline a tough hill and for the ultimate pleasure of just being. I have my family who give me so much love, support and joy. Two boys I am privileged to share my life with and a man who continues to encourage and support me in all that I do without stifling me. Friends who "get me", as well as a sister, nieces, nephews, in laws, mother, father & extended family members all near.
Blessed - me, yes I think so.

PILATES...NOW PIZZA DAY 13 JANATHON

Friday's are my pilates day when my core gets a fantastic leap back into life, although I have to say since going off road more my core muscles are feeling it more!!

We have an hours session where my glutes and core are worked with quality over quantity being the aim of the session. I come away feeling strong from the inside out.

Tonight I am enhancing my core workout with an evening of pizza and alcohol, no I know not the best thing but a much needed catch up with "the ladies" is called for. We may well be having a viewing of Bridesmaids, which I have seen, but am happy to watch again as thought it was brilliant.

The only other thing to say about today is that I got the most lovely card and book from Mrs D for no other reason than she is delightful.
Don't you just love the book - my 7 year old read it after tea and said "that is a really good book mummy, there are lots of them in the series. I think we should get them all!" I think we may be hard pushed JT but what a lovely thought.

Thank you Mrs D!!

Wishing you all a wonderful Friday 13th!!!

SEA SKIN

Don’t you just love the feeling on your skin of a day at the beach? I do, I call it sea skin. It has a noticeable colouring around my nose and cheeks ( mostly red!) whilst smelling of the mixture of salt and seaweed. We have been very lucky to have had the first week of the Easter school holidays basking in sunshine, not always tropical, even so those UV rays have been making their way through the alabaster skin tone to help incorporate a slightly red, freckly look!!

Spent the best part of the day on the beach the other day with friends, children were racing away from the incoming sea, paddling and having a great time.

SPONTANEOUS SPLENDIDNESS

The lack of blog posting is very much due to it having been the most gorgeous weather here lately and we have been soaking it up whenever the time allows. It is not only my blog that has been abandoned lately it is also the ironing, the cleaning and to some extent the cooking. Quick suppers have been very much the supper of choice here at present, thank goodness for batch cooking earlier in the month when the grey days were still amongst us!!!

When the weather is such as it is here at the moment, clear skies, no coats needed, we are very lucky to live where we do. We are 10 minutes from the beach and we have the most fantastic, safe, play park in the village, as well as having friend’s within the village who are down the road or a short walking / scooter distance away from us.

These last few weeks have seen the children playing with a hose and a plastic sheet, making a water slide which then turned into a mass of mud, by which point we had 4 naked children having the time of their lives, seeing JT and Jamie playing on the street earning money from passer’s by outside Jamie’s house telling jokes from a joke set that Auntie Tania bought JT for Xmas. They earnt themselves £1 each and were as proud as punch. It is the weather for spontaneousness, friend’s with their children coming over for a play which then turns into lunch and having to stop purely because the after school pick up moves ever closer, I love it when that happens. Afternoons spent playing on the beach after a morning of getting presents for birthday’s, not fussing about getting back too early, just soaking up that sunshine and enjoying where we live.

This also benefits my running schedule as the morning’s are getting much lighter and I feel alive as I get my training  plan achieved before the school run, admittedly getting up earlier than I would like to but once out, the benefits outweigh the lie in. Running towards a rising sun on the home straight in a speedwork session is a vision of joy as it means a sunny day awaits us all and a big bowl of porridge awaits me ( courtesy of Mr T, chief porridge maker).

Friday night saw a Quiz night at The Tree Inn, http://www.treeinn.co.uk/ for the Bude Sharks Swimming Club  http://www.budesharks.co.uk/ which was a great night. We had a great team of lovely ladies gathered, all in fine form ( at the beginning of the evening, at least) who had prepared eagerly that day by digesting an encyclopedia or two!! Team name: Maids in Cornwall!!! Position on board at end of the evening: SECOND!!! Couldn’t quite believe it as the questions were pretty tough but I am thankful to Hayley, Helen, Katie, Avril, Hilary and Jane for answering most of the questions, I believe I did manage one or two right answers and managed to agree with other’s right answers as well!!! All in all a great evening, in great company raising £350 for a local swim club. Proper job as them maids in Cornwall would say!

A WEEK CAN BE 7 DAYS OR A LIFETIME, WHEN IT’S HALF TERM WEEK

I am glad to report that 7 days it is here as we come to the end of the half term holiday. Started off well and continued along that route with a few diverted dead ends along the way.  Nothing which a packet of Percy Pigs and Lego mini figures couldn’t put back on course so how did we survive?

Monday looked promising with a meet with Hilary, Avril and children at The Castle grounds.  A tank, an army man, two action men and an army quad vehicle joined us, in miniature form I might add. There is a wonderful huge hill ( I know it as Teletubbie Hill) where the children send the vehicles and said army and action men flying to their demise and can spend anything up to 2 hours roaming the hill. Meanwhile Hil, Ave and myself get to grips with the latest news and put the world to rights around various topics whilst enjoying a wonderful coffee and biscotti from The Castle Restaurant – perfick.

Tuesday involved swimming and roller skating – yes all in one day!! Supported beforehand by a mass intrusion on Filter Through coffee shop in Holsworthy, there were 5 adults and 6 children. We went with my mum, sister, brother in law, Karen ( sister’s friend) and our range of children – oldest 9 years, youngest 2 years. Swimming is very much a given to our children, since the day they were born ( well almost) my boys have shared a wonderful Sunday morning ritual with their cousins. Sunday is our morning where we all congregate in the local pool, my mum and Mike included. Mike has been an integral part of my boys swimming achievements. Not only has he infinite amounts of patience ( of which I don’t possess when it comes to my children) but he is an extremely strong swimmer. He has been instrumental in both the boys being so confident in the water. Thanks Mike x

Roller skating was great, JT started off very wobbly and spent most of the first 15 minutes on the floor or making his way there from standing. After the 2 hour session he was creating some funky moves whilst moving along on the skates and made me want to burst with pride for him.

Wednesday was a very memorable day for JT. Jamie ( his best friend) , Hayley, or Mrs Ayres as those who have read Birthday Bonanza post will know her as, myself and JT all went to Plymouth’s Theatre Royal to watch an evening performance of Goodnight Mr Tom. What a wonderful afternoon / evening. Took the boys to have a pre theatre meal before enjoying a very emotional and thought provoking play. Hayley and I were in tears at various points throughout and JT seemed to grasp the story well and was moved by it. The best part from his point of view was spending time with his best friend and being “ a grown up” Love him x  http://www.goodnightmistertom.co.uk/

Thursday saw Mr T taking a day off work to spend time with the boys and we had a fairly lazy morning at home where pens and paper were exhausted and the cardboard TV came into use again. Geocaching was the name of the game in the afternoon, we decided to start close to home at Kilkhampton Castle but unfortunately found no cache, boys loved it though and I must admit to liking the fact that it gave the walk some added purpose ( calling it a treasure hunt got the boy’s interest also!). http://www.geocaching.com/   Don't you think the tree looks like a face??

Friday was the day earmarked for Geocaching with friends, Avril, Jane, Toshi and Suzanne were there at the ready with GPS phones and in total 12 children were present. We decided to head to Holsworthy Woods as there were 4 caches and a bonus one to find, thought we would work our way round and see how far we got. Well, we missed cache 1, I believe that was due to the mum’s chatting too much to notice, whilst cache 2 proved too much. Who would have thought that the determined nature of us mum’s enabled us to continue searching for up to 45 minutes whilst the children played wolves, cowboys and whatever else they needed to do to keep themselves amused while we could not and would not give up! Rain stopped play after about 2 hours of being there, the boys were head to toe covered in clay/mud and we felt it was time to call it quits at that point. The children loved just running wild in the woods with each other and at points it was very reminiscent of the wild rumpus that ensues in Where The Wild Things Are.

I’m sure that’s why I chose to watch that DVD in the afternoon, we were all warm and dry now and all 3 of us snuggled under a blanket and watched Max and his very own wild rumpus. JT and I were in tears at the end when he left on the boat but I love a good cry – don’t you?

That in a nutshell was a wonderful half term, spent with friends and family, enjoying each other’s company and feeling like I get to know JT again. School seems to distance him slightly from us, it doesn’t take long for the wonderful, inquisitive, engaging boy to return and I so enjoy the time we have together. Both boys fill me with love and pride.