10 things

•        Olivia lost her Oyster card, which she needs to travel home from school by herself on the tube.  It is the third time she's lost it since the beginning of term.

•        I lost my patience.  "Just. Stop. Losing. Stuff!" I yelled.

•         How do you teach a child to be less scatty and forgetful?  I'm not sure you can.

•         When her replacement card came through I really just wanted to staple it onto her in some way so she won't ever lose it again.  What I actually did was make a long ribbon lanyard to attach it to her school bag instead.  While not completely Olivia-proof, I am hoping it will make it harder to lose again.  Her house keys are already attached to a long ribbon lanyard in her bag.  If she carries on losing things, then eventually everything that is important will be attached to her with ribbons.

•         We are friends again now.  She raided my button jar the other night and made this delicious bracelet.  Her mind is more often on aesthetic pleasures such as ballet, drawing, making and reading, rather than on practical things like Not. Losing. Stuff.

•         I bought a Nike running skirt, after months of the wanties.  I ran for the first time in it yesterday, and loved it.  I hate getting hot when I run, and the knee length running tights I was wearing before were far too hot.  The skirt looks cute, and I feel much faster and more free when I'm wearing it.

•         I made a white chocolate and orange loaf cake from a recipe I found on this blog by Ruby, one of the contestants in this year's Great British Bake Off.  It is utterly divine.

 

•      I am essay writing again.  Paper everywhere, and my head full of statistics and policies and care plans. I am distracting myself by thinking up cakes to bake.

•         When I am not reading NICE Clinical Guidelines, I am reading Bring Up The Bodies by Hilary Mantel, which is amazing but harrowing.  She gave a fascinating interview on Radio 4's Book Club this week.

•         I went to Sweatshop, they measured my feet, analysed my gait and I chose my free pair of running shoes.  They are bright blue.  I love them.

Our weekend of sport

Well, there is no doubt this is a very big sporting weekend for us.  No, not the Canadian Grand Prix.  Not the tennis championship, at Queen's Club, either.  Not even one of those football matches happening in South Africa at the moment (Graham claimed it was totally necessary that he watch the tantalising match that was France v Uruguay last night, and then fell asleep on the sofa after 10 minutes.  I felt horribly righteous.).

No; for us, this big sporting weekend is all about running and triathlons. 

A while ago Graham and I found out about the parkrun organisation, and last month Graham went along to their inaugural run at Hackney Marshes, on the edge of the Olympic site, just a mile or so from where we live.  Parkrun is a wonderful organisation that arranges and hosts free, timed 5km runs every Saturday morning around the country (you can find your closest one here).  The races are truly open to everybody of all ages and abilities, from complete beginners to Olympians, and everyone in between.

This morning Cam ran his first ever 5km race at the third Hackney Marshes parkrun.  He is not a fan of PE at school, and hates football with a passion, but has been hankering after doing something sporty out of school for a while.  He asked if he could have a go at this after hearing G and I talking about it. 

So Graham bought him some proper running shoes.

And he had a little practise in the sitting room, wearing his pyjamas.

I printed off his race barcode and laminated it.  The barcode is effectively your entry ticket and it enables you to get an official time for your race.

And that was all the preparation we needed to do. 

This morning we all headed over to Hackney Marshes. Graham to help out with the marshalling, me, Livvy and Uncle David to be cheerleaders, and Cam to race.  Cam borrowed Graham's sat nav watch, so that he cold see how far he'd gone at any point and how fast he was running.  It looked so big on his skinny little ten-year old wrist!

There was a quick briefing from the race organiser, and off they all went.  Uncle David and I looked at each other with a little trepidation and wondered how Cam would get on.  How far can 10 year olds run? we wondered, not entirely sure.  Hopefully at least 5km.

Pre-race briefing; Cam at the back wearing a red top, blue shorts & looking very small.

And of course, as is always the case when children decide for themselves that they are ready to do something, it all turned out very well indeed.  Cam ran the race in just under 35 minutes, much faster than he expected to.  He had a great time, he didn't get lost, he didn't get a stitch, and he finished ahead of several of the adults.  He didn't even mind me squealing with excitement as he came up to the finish line.

You'd think after all that early morning activity we'd all head back home and have a nice cup of tea and a sit down.  But instead our race excitement then switched to Graham who left from the parkrun to drive to Snowdonia, where he is competing in a half ironman triathlon tomorrow morning.  In all the understandable excitement about Cam's first race, we've all completely taken for granted Graham's entry into only his second ever half-ironman race (you can see photos of his first one here).

And we really shouldn't be taking such a ridiculously long, involved race for granted.  Apart from anything else, just look at all the clobber he has to take with him.

Here are just some of the things he packed:

• running shoes
• wetsuit
• trisuit
• bike shoes
• bike
• spare inner tubes (lightweight - makes all the difference)
• bike pump
• a great deal of carb and protein laden food
• posh sunglasses
• a woolly hat
• at least three water bottles
• a blanket to keep the bike snug while it is in the back of the car

He will start off with a 2km swim in Bala lake, then a 90km bike ride through the foothills of Snowdonia, and then finish with a half-marathon run (21km) back to Bala.  He is aiming to do the whole race in around five and a half hours.  I won't be there to squeal with excitement when he finishes, as I did for Cam's race, but I've promised Graham that as a gesture of solidarity I'll be up tomorrow morning by the time he starts on the bike section of the race.  Abut 10am.  And I'm planning on baking him some coffee and walnut buns for when he gets back on Monday.

I think both of them have earned a few slices of cake this weekend.

After Cam finished his race. Very proud Dad, very tired son.

A week in my shoes :: Day 7

You will be able to deduce from the shoes and tights I wore today, that I wear much fancier clothes to work than I do at home.

On the way to the tube station this morning.
.

On the tube (the man next to me was asleep so I didn't feel too weird leaning over to photograph my (and his) feet).

.

Coming up the v..e..r..y.. long escalator at St Paul's station.

.

.

Sitting at my desk. The shoes in the distance belong to my colleague who sits opposite me, the lovely Mrs H. Mrs H is very sensible and wears trainers to work, only changing into heels once she gets there. I've never been able to bring myself to do that, so when I buy a new pair of heels I spend a long time in the shop trying them on and making sure they're going to be comfortable.

.

.

Thank you all for your kind comments this past week. I am don't know whether to be slightly worried or deeply impressed that so many of you can spot a Boden coat from a tiny glimpse in the corner of a photograph!

.

I hope your shoes have taken you to nice places this past week.

A week in my shoes :: Day 3

In haste this morning, I jammed on the first pair of shoes that came into my hand as I rummaged. These lovely pale green pumps with a short, 4cm, heel. They are over five years old and I still love them but don't wear them very often. I need to be in a pale green mood.

See how beautifully they match the lichen on the pavement!

.

However, they were the wrong shoes. By the time I got home from the morning school run my feet were like blocks of ice. I put on these amazingly beautiful and warm socks (knitted by my mother from Kaffe Fasset Regia yarn), and did not remove them for the rest of the day.

.

This afternoon's school run was done in trainers.

A week in my shoes :: Day 1

It was trainers all day today as I was having a pleasantly busy, walking-around kind of day.

In the playground at school.

On my bike as I came back from picking up a parcel from the sorting office.

Walking down Oxford Street on the way to meet my mother.

In John Lewis trying on boots with my mother.

A week in my shoes :: prologue

Tomorrow I am starting a week of short, daily posts about where I’ve been and what footwear I wore to get there.

If you would like to join in - even if just for one day - then please do. Just leave a comment here so that we can all go and admire your footwear and find out what you've been doing!


Tonight, at the end of a day at work, its thick tights and slippers for me, as I sit in front of the TV and sew. There is even a snippet of thread on one of my feet already. They get everywhere!

New Year's Day

Even when I was a 20-nothing person who went clubbing and on wild nights out involving cocktails and handsome men, I hated New Year's Eve.
.
Anywhere I would usually go would be twice as expensive and four times as busy for that night only. There always seemed to be a forced jolliness and a rather grim determination to see the New Year in with style, that usually left me with a flat feeling of failed expectations the next morning. Or a hangover.
.

During 1999, millennium madness gripped the country and I remember people planning their New Year's Eve for pretty much the whole year in advance. Whoever you spoke to would ask where you were going to see in the millennium - on Sydney Harbour bridge? Up the Eiffel Tower? In a Gothic Scottish Castle? In Central London at the biggest rave ever imagined? No plan was too elaborate or ambitious.
.

But by October 1999 I was a mother for the first time, and in a dark fog of utter exhaustion and bad post-natal depression. I could barely put a sentence together, let alone take my millennium baby to an all-night, alcohol fuelled party of dance and excitement.
.

Then G had a wonderful idea. He suggested that as we were waking before dawn every morning anyhow, why didn't we get up when C woke, and take him up to Hampstead Heath where we would watch the dawn come up on the new year, century and millennium, looking down over London.

So that is what we did. I had expected it to be peaceful but in fact half of London had also headed up to Hampstead Heath after their night out, to watch the sun rise. G and I were the only sober people up there. I remember people cooing over C in his pushchair and toasting him with cans of beer. "Its a baby!!!" exclaimed one young woman. The picture above was taken that morning - he looks fairly bewildered by it all!

.
G and I sat on a bench with C and all three of us rather blearily watched the dawn of the new millennium. London looked beautiful, crisp and clean in the morning light (and from such a distance!). We went home and invited all our friends over for some champagne to ease their New Year's Day hangovers. I was the happiest I had been in months, and so pleased that at last I had realised the best way to celebrate a new year, is on January 1st rather than December 31st.

.

Today I continued my tradition and celebrated the start of 2008 by going shoe shopping with O to get her these fabulous party shoes, and then going on to see The Nutcracker at the Royal Opera House together with O, my mother-in-law and sister-in-law.

.

Thank you J, A and O for a really lovely start to my year.

A list to lift my mood

As it is Monday, I've spent all day thinking my blog tonight would be a list called Things That Really Pissed Me Off At Work Today but as I walked out of the office two things lifted my mood. The first thing was plugging in my iPod and listening to a playlist of all the new songs I have bought from iTunes recently.

A mood lifting playlist

• What goes around.../...comes around by Justin Timberlake - this has the bonus of sounding as if Justin is whispering sweet nothings in your ear, and the sentiment is rather zen and laid-back so perfect for diffusing work rage.
• Soul Bossa Nova by Quincy Jones - this is upbeat, uplifting and ever so slightly mad. It makes you want to dance along the street.
• Epoca by The Gotan Project - another song that makes you want to dance. Its a moody tango - satisfyingly aggressive.
• That's The Way I've Always Heard It Should Be by Carly Simon - this is a real piece of 70s vocal and guitar. Carly Simon has a beautiful, slightly melancholy voice.
• Older by George Michael - another melancholy song, but it didn't send me into a Monday depression as it is so well produced and a bit dreamy. Good for when there are seven minutes to wait until the next train and the platform is already full.
• If There's Any Justice by Lemar - just gorgeous. The song and Lemar.
• Its a Man's, Man's, Man's World by James Brown - after a day of being the only skirt in a roomful of suits this one really cheered me up. Great saxophone sounds too.
• Together by William Shatner and Lemonjelly - yes really. But it is fantastic. Weird but fantastic.
• Stan by Eminem - well, my day wasn't as bad as his.

The other thing that cheered me up was the sun finally breaking through the clouds and shining on my utterly lovely new pair of red shoes.