Happy as a pig in ....

One of Maisie's favourite things when we visited last time, was going to Chatsworth farm adventure playground. Last weekend was the first weekend it was open for the season, so despite the rain, along we went. The pigs were very cute, the chickens were a bit damp, as was everything else.

Oink oink

Before, during and after

We did it! We ran a whole mile! Well, almost, small stop for an asthma attack (Alex), fixed by our support team (Leanne found and old inhaler at the bottom of her handbag). It was quite good fun actually, and a relief to realise I’d over trained, I only needed to run for around 12 minutes, not the 20 I’d built up to - what a waste of time that was, I could have been eating chocolate.

Even the dog joined in. He wore his medal with pride.

We had an ice cream and a nice sit down to celebrate, then it was off to collect Maisie from Ripley who had been participating in a Rolls Royce design challenge. A couple of teams from her school had entered the annual design competition. This year they had to design ship lifts. Sounded really difficult to me, but they had done an amazing job of making models of their designs, including lights!

Rising to the challenge

Well, it’s been a long week - according to Maisie at least. She’s been Guiding, having extra classes, and a visit to the South Yorkshire Air Museum as part of their science week. She now knows all there is to know about aircraft. She came home with a model airplane, a balloon helicopter, and showed us how to make a hovercraft from an old CD, bluetac, a bottle top, and a balloon. Impressive stuff.

Leanne has been looking into Open University courses. Whilst I have spent the week looking for a job, making linocuts, and jogging. The jogging is going well, I managed to keep going for 20 minutes without stopping, I wasn’t going fast, but I was going, I think I’m mile ready for Sunday. Sport relief is mad on the TV, with every celebrity you can think of cycling, or running up and down the country to support it. So far £29,323,818 has been raised! Pretty amazing, and appears to be doing some important work.

Running a mile

I had a eccentric moment and decided to do a sponsored run for sport relief: sport relief , training has been going....

Well, I've been for a run five times now and it seems to be getting harder, can that be right? It maybe because of all the mud that has collected on my once pristine trainers.

I've been running with the dog by the river, which is very lovely, we have to stop for a pee every 3 minutes (the dog not me). I down loaded a pedometer for my phone, but I suspect it's not that accurate, I ran for 10 minutes and it said I'd done 6 steps. How many miles does that translate to - not enough no doubt. I think I'll down load Eye of the Tiger next week and have it on a loop whilst I'm running.

I had a rest day for Mothering Sunday, and ate loads of chocolate, that will help no doubt. We went to Chester this weekend (grandmother out of hospital) then Colwyn Bay to see my Dad, them back to Chester, four mothers in one house, poor Maisie.

When we told Nana Gran Erika it was mother's day she said "I've never heard of it!" she managed to eat half a cheese cake to make up for 2 weeks of hospital food. Go Nana!

Frozen delights

For those warmer days, post bbq, you can treat yourself with a 'Nobbly Bobbly', fresh from the freezer section of the supermarket.

If you are vegetarian...look away now

In the Great British spirit, today - the 7th March, we had a bbq!

It was such a beautiful sunny day, after we had walked the dog on Froggatt Edge, we worked up quite an appetite. Mum had been tidying up the garden in preparation for spring, and suggested a BBQ. Unlike NZ when you can fire up the gas barbie in a matter of minutes, ours involved coaxing damp sticks into producing fire, and what seemed like hours later, a lovely smoky charcoalie heat was emanating. The dog was transfixed throughout the whole precess of cooking and eating.

Back to reality, it's going to be -6 tonight, we have lit the fire inside, got the central heating cranked up, and I've put an extra jumper on! The dog has taken up position next to the radiator.

Hospital Drama

Well we soon came down after the birthday high, with Nana Gran Erika being taken to hospital. A quick visit to Chester was arranged, hospital visited, chocolate profiteroles and pears delivered to bed side. They have kept her in for observation for a week, she has a couple of infections. Visitors are now being discouraged due to an infection going round the hospital, reduced to getting all the news by phone.

On the bright side, the weather has been bright! We have has beautiful sunny but frosty days, with fabulous light in the early evenings. The days are getting noticeably longer, there are loads of snow drops around, a few crocuses, and daffodils are going to be plentiful.

Lady Gaga postponed until June, boo. Maisie putting on a brave face, and also has more time to come up with a great outfit!