Whatever the weather

Last weekend's early morning walk through Epping Forest: sunshine, blue skies, Cam and Olivia for company.

This weekend's early morning walk through Epping Forest: rain, grey skies, Graham for company.

 

Both very different, but both very good.

Surprises

There is so much about my running that is surprising; but still the biggest surprise for me is how much I love it.  

I've been running since May, so only five months, but it's now difficult to imagine my life without it.  I can now confidently and consistently run 5k in under 30 minutes and the longest runs I do now are about 7k.  Back in May the 60 seconds of running followed by 90 seconds of walking, which the Couch to 5k podcast begins with, were more than enough for me.  I guess a part of me is still surprised that I can run at all.

The nicest and most exciting surprise lately has been winning the September parkrunner of the month prize from my local parkrun in Hackney.  This means that I win a free pair of running shoes from Sweatshop - one of the sponsors of parkrun - which is incredible.  I have gotten so much from parkrun over the past five months that I feel like I should be the one giving a prize to them, not the other way round.  

Parkruns are free, timed, 5k runs that take place in parks all around the UK, and abroad, at 9am every Saturday.  They are entirely run by volunteers and welcome people of absolutely any age and running ability - the Hackney one which I go to each week has the fastest runners finishing in around 16 minutes, and the slowest between 35 and 40 minutes.  Everyone is welcomed over the finish line with applause and smiles from the volunteers and other runners.  Plenty of new runners run-walk the course, as Olivia and I did at first.  I try to run as fast as I can at parkrun now, because I love running fast, and I like the challenge of trying to get a new PB, but not everyone is a speed freak.

The exhilaration I get from running as fast as I can is another surprise to me.  I don't have any desire to run long distances like half marathons or marathons - I just want to be able to run a 5k as fast as I possibly can - eventually in 25 minutes I hope (at the moment my PB is 28:09, so 25 minutes is still quite some way off).  Mo Farah runs 5k in 12:53....

I am trying to do interval training once a week, where I alternate a few minutes of very fast running with a couple of minutes slow jogging.  It should make me faster, generally, and is also so much fun.  Thanks to the Couch to 5k Plus podcasts (designed for people who have finished the original Couch to 5k podcasts and who want to carry on improving) I have become much better at running to a beat.  I found that incredibly difficult at first, but it gets easier each time I do it.  I can now waste hours at a time compiling and fine-tuning interval training playlists that alternate songs of about 155bpm and 175bpm.  There are programmes you can download that will analyse the bpm on your entire iTunes library, but I just use a free metronome app on my phone and check the bpm of my favourite songs when they come up on shuffle.

I think what it all comes back to though, is not the music, or the speed, or even the friendships I've made at parkrun.  It's that I live so close to Epping Forest, which is a fantastic place to run.  Even though I enjoy it so much, running usually feels hard for me - yet what never fails to lift my spirits are the glorious expanses of skies and trees in this part of East London.

10 things

• I am in denial about the fact that Cam goes back to school tomorrow and Olivia on Thursday.  I don't want this summer holiday with them to end.  I'm used to hanging out with them; I miss them when they're at school.

Cam, volunteering at parkrun in Hackney last week

• However, at the same time I am VERY excited to find myself in September.  I love September, and I love the autumn - it is definitely my favourite time of year.
• My early morning runs in Epping Forest are heart-breakingly beautiful at the moment: mist, herons flying overhead, cobwebs covered with dew, the trees just on the turn from green to gold.  I find myself energised by both the run and the spectacular scenery.

Dawn in the forest

Epping Forest during a dawn run this morning

• I have a smartphone for the first time ever, and my eyes have been opened to the wonders of Instagram (where I am thelistwriter) and this Relaxing Sounds of Nature app. I play the nature sounds in the middle of the night when I am awake and reading my Kindle, while I am cooking breakfast if Radio 4 gets too argumentative, and while I am folding washing or paying bills.  It makes everything just much nicer.
• While I was setting up my phone I also reviewed all the podcasts I subscribe to.  I took off a few that I'd stopped listening to, and added on some new ones: Seven Ages of Science, 1913: The Year Before, UK Confidential and Inside the Ethics Committee.  If The Reunion was a podcast I'd have subscribed to that too, but it isn't so you have to remember to catch up on iPlayer.
• I've had such a long holiday from University, that I've started to forget that I'm actually a student nurse.  When the children go back to school, my studying resumes too.  I'm easing myself back in by spending the day with a friend at the newly refubished Royal College of Nursing library and heritage centre, just off Oxford Street.  There will be some studying and much catching up about our summer holidays.
• I need to squeeze in another blackberrying trip or two over the next few weeks.  The brambles in Epping Forest are still groaning with sweet fruit.
•  The lawnmower has broken, my beloved Kindle is misbehaving and may be broken and I have just handed over what feels like my entire income for September to Clarks, M&S school uniform department and the local optician.  This the other downside of the end of the school summer holidays - the children are each a shoe size and a half bigger than they were in the summer term, and at least two clothing sizes bigger.  I'm not even exaggerating - they are gowing like weeds at the moment.
• Graham went camping with his triathlon club at the weekend, and I realised that this has been the only camping trip by our family this summer.  How did I let that happen?
• I have another baby niece on the way, and am stalking Ravelry looking for inspiration.  She will be my seventh niece/nephew, and the excitement does not diminish in the slightest with each new arrival - who will she be? what will she look like?  So exciting to have another little person in the family.

Geraniums - instagrammed by Cam on my phone

 

Abundance

We went to the PYO farm and picked redcurrants, blackcurrants, and raspberries.  Oh, those raspberries!

Just some of the fruit we came back from the PYO with

Then we went to the forest and picked blackberries.  So many blackberries!

Stewed apple and blackberries

It has been a incredible year for fruit in London.  I think the combination of wet spring and hot summer have suited the berries very well.

One of the great joys of going berry picking is the speculation about what you will do with your berries when you get home.  So far this summer I have made:

• apple and redcurrant crumble (at least three of these)
• raspberry and apple crumble
• raspberry crumble (two of these)
• raspberry and almond cake (using this failsafe recipe here)
• raspberry and vanilla cake
• blackcurrant and almond cake (same recipe as above)
• raspberry coulis
• stewed apple and blackberries
• lemon and blackberry loaf cake

Raspberry and almond cake

We have also stirred handfuls of berries into porridge, bircher muesli and plain yogurt for breakfast.  I am particularly partial to ryvita spread with cream cheese and then topped with raspberries or blackberries and a drizzle of honey.  We've had so many berries that I don't even mind Olivia standing in front of the open fridge eating great handfuls of them straight from the punnet.  

There is a generous abundance this year.

About half of what we picked during a stroll through Epping Forest

Influences

I often don't realise the level of influence I have over my children.  On a quiet afternoon this week, Olivia pottered into the kitchen with her arms full of fabric scraps and said in her typically quiet way, "I thought I'd make some bunting for my room - can you show me how?"

 

On the other hand, when Moss Stitch and I took all our children on a longish walk in Epping Forest a few days later, we had to bribe them into participating with moderate enthusiasm and not moaning, by lugging along heavy bags full of chocolate biscuits and flasks of mocha coffee in order to keep them stoked up with sugar and caffeine at all times.

 

My love of long walks and being in amongst the trees has clearly not had as much influence on them as my love of fabric and cake.  

When we got back home, I said to Olivia, "You know, in years to come I bet you take your children on walks like that."  She looked me straight in the eye and replied, "I would never be so cruel."

 

Embracing autumn

It's my very favourite time of year, but this time round I've barely been outside to enjoy it.  This weekend I fixed that, and headed out with Graham early on Sunday morning for a brisk walk through Epping Forest.

 

The colours, the wind, the chill, the colours, the damp smells, the leaves, the colours - they're all still there.

 

 

I breathed deeply, turned my face towards the sky and my camera towards the colours.

 

 

I came back home and knit a few more rows of my autumn hurricane hat.  Then without realising it, the hat was finished.  I feel like this hat knitted itself without me really noticing.  Surely the sign of a good pattern?

 

This means I now need to go back to the forest and photograph my hat (and my autumnal scarf) amongst the leaves.  Maybe this weekend.  Autumn's nearly over, and I've barely noticed it.

Blackberry hunting

We had to search very hard indeed  just to find this paltry amount of teeny-tiny blackberries in Epping Forest today.  The weird weather this year has not suited the blackberries.

The sun is HOT here right now - it has been nudging 30 degrees for the last few days - and Epping Forest did at least provide plenty of shade this morning while we foraged for our berries.

 

 

I think we've gathered just enough for a crumble, if I bulk it out with the apples from the fruit bowl too.  There won't be enough for blackberry jam, though, which is a great sadness.

Epic Epping

Epping Forest is massive.  The trees are giants and their roots curl up from the forest floor like pythons; it is London's largest public open space and I still get lost in it on a regular basis.  I love the size of Epping Forest and the feeling that I am only a small being within it.

Today, though, my eyes were drawn to things far smaller than me.  I saw tiny curls of bracken unfurling.

We walked over crispy carpets of empty beech nuts.

And I marvelled at a strange knot hole which looked just like rising yeasty dough.

There was even a tiny little dormouse, crawling through some brambles.  It was smaller than my thumb, and had tiny little round ears.  It ran away, looking very purposeful and busy, before I could focus my camera lens on it.

Epping Forest is both epic in its size, and in its abundance of tiny details.  And of course, this is why I love it so.

 

The perfect setting

I sat in the woods as the sun set, listening to the wind rustling the tops of the trees and marvelling at the changing light.  I had a plastic mug of very nice wine in my hand, and a campfire to toast my feet over.  I felt utterly content and took a self portrait.

Just two nights camping with friends was an idyllic break from everyday life.  These short trips usually seem to pan out like this, and it occured to me that over my many years of camping we - and our friends too - have acquired a great deal of experience.  It's a slick operation these days; we bring everything down from the loft, check it off our list, and stuff quilts and pillows into compression sacks.

Compressed quilts, sleeping bag and pillows



Decompressed quilt, pillows and sleeping bag

We stayed at Forgewood Campsite, in Kent, close to the Sussex border.  It is a delightful site which manages to create the perfect blend of wild camping (no electicity, no caravans, campfires permitted and acres of ancient woodland to pitch in) with helpful facilities (plenty of clean showers and toilets, purpose built washing up areas and a farm shop).  When we are camping with friends we want a campsite that lets us pitch our tents together, build a fire to sit round and cook over, and has woods for the children to run free in.  Forgewood had all of this.

Olivia, coming back to camp for food

We all brought great quantities of food - both to feed our own family and to share.  On Friday night we shared vegetable curries, made at home the day before by my friend, Cathy, and reheated over the campfire.  We mopped them up with breads we had all brought with us. On the Saturday we ate salads, also made at home and brought with us, fruit, slabs of homemade cake and endless cups of tea made on the Trangias and gas stove (of the three families camping one favoured a Coleman gas stove, one favoured Trangia with a gas bottle adapter, and one favoured Trangia with the meths burner - they all work brilliantly).  That night we barbecued sausages over the campfire, and ate them with garlic bread that Cathy made.  The children then toasted marshmallows later in the evening. 

Camp kitchen

We feasted like kings all weekend - good food is a non-negotiable element of a camping trip for me.  The only thing that can improve sitting in the sunshine, drinking beer with good friends, is when there's a perfectly cooked, juicy, pork sausage (or two) to eat at the same time.

The weather is something you can't control when you're camping - you just have to prepare for it.  The whole point of camping is to get outside and ground yourself in nature - whether that may be sun, rain, warmth or a cold breeze - but there's no denying that warm sunshine is what we're all after, really.  We pitched on Friday as the rain clouds started to clear from the skies.  It was extremely windy, and we were glad to be in the shelter of the woods.  The ground was very damp, but not too muddy because of the leaf litter on the forest floor.

My and Graham's tent, with added jubilee bunting

Over the evening the clouds moved further and further away, and by the time I crawled into my tent at about midnight, there were stars all over the sky.  It stayed dry for the whole weekend, and only started to rain as we brought the last of the bags in from the car, back in London on Sunday afternoon.

No wonder I look happy in that photo - I had good friends, good food, plenty of wine and beer, and I was sitting beneath green beech trees listening to them whispering.  The weather was incredible and our dirty children were running around in the woods jumping into ditches and plotting adventures. 

Every minute of packing, driving, pitching, unpacking, putting away and washing is entirely worth it for weekends like these.