Reasons to be Cheerful: Blog Love and Blipping! #R2BC

I am oh so late joining the lovely Jo at Ojo's World with reasons to be cheerful! Life is just far too busy and I haven't blogged over a week... Any way my reasons to be cheerful are:

1) Blog love

Seeing my much neglected blog pop back into the "Tots 100" top 200 at 186! 

April 2015

2679

186

14

I know that is because I may not post much on the blog but when I do it is good quality. I also engage with people on social media and my photos recently on Instagram have been extremely popular recently. 

2) Blipfoto

Hard to believe I have been on Blipfoto for 5 years! It has honed my photography and I have made new friends. These are my most popular photos over the years:

3) Running

Its been quite a week running wise. My daughter finally got the running bug and joined him in a fun run:

Then I ran the 10 k St George's Day race! 

And the next day my daughter and I did the colour dash in Kendal:

No wonder I haven't had time to blog!

#SilentSunday

#SilentSunday

Reasons to be Cheerful: Back to School #R2BC

The lovely Jo is still hosting the linky this month so please go and say hello on her blog! I have a few reasons to be cheerful now school is back:

1) Teaching

I have been enjoying my first week on my final teaching practice. Teaching the life cycle of butterflies with pasta:

Lots of fun with English too re-enacting the Bad-Tempered Ladybird and being inventive with sentence openers.

2) Fell Running

My son's running training restarted this week and its now up on The Helm near Oxenholme. It was a glorious evening up there and I was glad to be a parent helper. In fact I enjoyed it so much I have now signed up myself so I can alternate between running and helping:

3) Migration

My daughter was involved in a Migration arts project with her school. They made dolls who all had migration stories. Tonight the project was put on display with other parts from schools in Kendal at the Brewery Arts Centre. My daughter and I went to the special preview with other families. She was so proud of her work and was very good at explaining it to people there:

#CountryKids Newquay and Mawgan Porth

After our Karting we headed up to Newquay in search of some beach fun and lunch. It was an amazing coastal drive but the town itself was too commercial and frantic for us. So we grabbed some pasties and I snapped the main beach before we left:

A Google search revealed a dog friendly beach back along the coast at Mawgan Porth so we all headed that way. It was worth the drive:

The children were soon in wet suits and took the very long walk to the sea (it was low tide):

#CountryKid Karting at St Eval

The one big treat of the holiday the children agreed on was Karting so we tracked down the circuit that allowed all three of them to race together. It was a bit of a trek up to St Eval but it looked amazing when we got there. My son changed his mind after the safety blurb but his sister was keen to get kitted up and be a petrol head:

As my brother and sister in law decided to go themselves my son and I were put in charge of the gorgeous Gemma:

My son is dog phobic after an incident as a toddler but he grew to love Gemma on this trip and even took her for a walk (or rather she took him!). The others had two turns at racing around the track. It was hard to work who was who but I have been told this was my daughter:

#SilentSunday

#CountryKids at Polkerris and Megavissey

You can't go to Cornwall and not try out as many beaches as possible. So we headed along the coast to Polkerris. It felt like proper Cornwall to have to walk down a single track lane to find the sea:

Then you get a glimpse of the sea between the old lifeboat station and the pub:

It was a lovely quiet beach with sand and rock pools:

#CountryKids at Lanydrock

Before we went to Cornwall I had checked out the nearest Parkrun and discovered it was at Lanhydrock. I persuaded my brother to pack his running gear so that my son had someone fast to run with! We all got up bright and early and drove the 30 minutes from our holiday accommodation to join in with what turned out to be a record breaking Parkrun for the location:

It was a lovely route and for a section of it I ran alongside a regular. Then my stinking cold stopped me breathing through my nose so I had to walk a while through the woods:

There were a few photographers around and they caught us all on camera:

My daughter met me near the finish and ran with me after I had recovered the long up hill! Not my finest 5k to date but my son was 3rd in the under 10 boys category. We had to recover with cake in the cafe before looking around the house and garden.

Reasons to be Cheerful: Cornish Edition #R2BC

The hop is back over to Jo for April so we are in a safe pair of hands! Hopefully I will have more time to visit and comment on people's blogs this month.. Here are my reasons to be cheerful with a Cornish twist!

1) Prize Holiday

We are just back from my Cornish prize holiday at Natural Retreats near St Austell:

It was an amazing experience living in luxury for a week with our neighbours driving Audis and BMWs! Having my brother, sister-in-law, nephew and their dog with us and my parents nearby was extra special.

2) Meeting Friends

After chatting online for nearly 5 years I finally met the lovely Fiona at Coombe Mill. She is as wonderful in real life as on social media! Great to meet some of her children too and see the farm for real.

3) So much fun

I have already blogged about Castle Drogo, Pentewan Sands and Tintagel Castle but there was so much fun to be had as well as sunshine! Watch this space for more about the fun we had:

#CountryKids at Tintagel Castle

After our morning at Coombe Mill we headed to the coast to Tintagel Castle legendary birthplace of King Arthur. It has to be one of the most well hidden of English Heritage's portfolio but its worth the hike. However you need not to be afraid of heights and fairly fit to fully appreciate it, I would recommend going on a day when the wind wasn't as strong as we had:

The castle is now just ruins in two parts with the first perched high on the mainland and the second on an island on accessible via a bridge:

#CountryKids at Coombe Mill

We couldn't come to the county of Cornwall without visiting the home of Country Kids at Coombe Mill. Fiona invited us to join the feed run so we had a mad dash along country lanes to get there just about in time for the 9 AM start. We had to follow behind the trailer as it went across the river to the animal enclosures:

The first stop was to the birds and my daughter was lucky to find one of the fresh hen eggs that had been laid on the farm:

We used to have a few chickens ourselves so she loved being able to hand feed the ones on the farm:

#SilentSunday

#CountryKids at Pentewan Sands

There is no way you can come on holiday near the sea side with children and not go to the beach even if the weather is not beach friendly! So we jumped in the cars and headed a few miles from our accommodation to Pentewan Sands. The beach is in private hands but the car park was reasonably priced. Unfortunately its a dog free beach so the canine member of the family had to be returned to our house. It was a beautiful if chilly setting:

My daughter wanted to get into the sea so decided to change in to her swim kit and ran off to the water:

Rather rapidly she came back seeking her wet suit:

Once the children were kitted out properly they headed for the sea:

#CountryKids at Castle Drogo

When travelling we often pause at a National Trust property for refreshment and to stretch our legs and explore. This time we had a chance to visit Castle Drogo which has recently been featured on TV due to the major restoration. After coffee and cake we paid for the children's trail and headed off into the grounds:

The whereabouts of the answers to the quiz were clearly marked on the map. My daughter had the version requiring written answers and her brother had the stamp only version:

The builders have a bigger puzzle to solve with parts of the castle removed and labelled whilst the leaking roof is fixed: