Reasons to be Cheerful: Carnival and Cross Country #R2BC

 
Life has just been so ram jammed that I am only just posting so sorry! Things may be changing over this linky so please watch this space... Meanwhile, despite still being full of cold, these are the things making me cheerful this week:
1) Kendal Torchlight Carnival  

It was time for our annual Torchlight Carnival. We had a parade through our streets with lights, music and amazing costumes:

If you want to see more checkout the video:

2) Proud Mum

My daughter was taking part in the parade with her art group Space2Create. She had an amazing time escorting a model of Moby Dick and collecting money: 

3) Filming Cross Country

Reasons to be Cheerful: Glorious Cumbria #R2BC

 
We had an impromptu camping trip on Friday night, had to make most of the weather, so I am once again posting in the evening. There has been plenty to make me smile this week:
1) A good training run
It was such a relief to get out and run my required 9 mile run on Sunday and enjoy virtually all of it! Not only that but a decent time bearing in mind it was rather hilly. Made for a big smile at the end of it:  

It's just as well things are going well as its getting so close to race day that my number turned up this week:

2) Skiddaw

The impromptu camping trip meant that my view last night looked like this:

I really want to get up this mountain before this time next year!

3) Quality Time

Great Westmorland Trail Race 2019

This weekend I had the pleasure of filming at the annual Great Westmorland Trail Race, sponsored by Sean Robinson. For the first time there was a Canicross event. There were 20 runners who had either 1 or 2 dogs. These dogs were of all shapes and sizes as well as a range of abilities. It made for an exciting race:

For some runners it seemed like a very serious event:

There was also lots of friendly rivalry:

Reasons to be Cheerful: Mud, mud, glorious mud #R2BC

 
Oops been so busy out filming that I haven't had a chance to post the host post this week! So very quickly here are some of the things that have made me smile this week:
1) Proud Mum
My son ran for his club in a road relay for the first time. He helped them move up 3 positions to finish in 11th place out of 37 teams. The video of his race is here.  

2) Mud!


We had a lot of muddy fun at the County Show:

3) Arty Farty

Westmorland County Show 2019

I was lucky to be able to go to school today as a member of staff on a school trip. So lucky to get to go on a school day, but of course not able to enjoy it as much being responsible for children! It took us nearly an hour to get there in a coach due to the usual show congestion so once we got there we were raring to go...

First up we went in the Country Pursuits tent. My colleague beat a strategic retreat leaving me to be volunteered to hold this rather gorgeous owl:

The boys then voted to see the sheep so we headed through the mud to the sheep pens. An amazing variety of sheep breeds and good to get up close to some of them:

Then we wandered past the cattle tent before stopping to watch the carriage driving:

Reasons to be cheerful: Back to School #R2BC

 
It's September which means back to school for many of us and the hosting of Reasons to be Cheerful comes back to me from Michelle! So glad that so many familiar faces are joining in and I look forward to reading and sharing your posts. I've just come back from an 8.5 mile run and the happy endorphins are flowing so here are just a few of the things that have made me smile this week:
1) House sorting
It is still a work in progress but lots of things have got better. I swapped a chest of drawers with a book case in my bedroom so my bed feels less enclosed. My dad fixed the Algot shelving in the cupboard of doom so I can be much more organised. We had a patch of damp in the lounge and this has now been fixed and patched up. Just have to decorate once all the works in the lounge have been done: 

2) Walking to work

I have missed my daily commute across the River Kent. It lifts the spirits taking in the water and sky:

3) Into Year 8

My son went back to school and he is now in Year 8. He had to stand one step down for the annual in front of the door photo as he has grown so much this year:

#FitB4Fifty End of Summer Update

Diet

I have just realised that I haven't done an update on my Fit before 50 campaign since June when I started the Mediterranean diet! Since the school holidays started at the end of July my diet went back to being a lot less healthy and I've been away quite a bit so my weight crept back up so I am trying to get back on the healthier eating again with school starting back tomorrow.

I will be dusting off the Blood Sugar Diet book (affiliate link) again  I've already lost some of the holiday gain so hope that getting more veg and fish in my diet again like this will help:

Manchester Half Training 

Before going to Wales for a fortnight I had managed to increase my long run to 7.5 miles:

Reasons to be Cheerful: End of Summer #R2BC

 
I am joining in a bit late again this week with Michelle for her last hosting of the linky as its now September (so I need to be more organised to host!). The end of the summer holidays and preparing to go back to school is whizzing by really fast but I have plenty of reasons to be cheerful:
1) Parkrun milestone
I was very pleased to be able to capture the moment one of the Fell Foot parkrun stalwarts Conrad completed his 200th parkrun. Despite being in his 80s he is there almost every week and often tail walks. Well done Conrad and here's to the next 200:

2) Fun Night

My daughter's support group had its annual BBQ and we both had a brilliant evening. Lots of fun and games and she helped a new member to feel very welcome. I nearly got banned from Pictionary for being too quick to get it right (it did help that I was sober as driving!):

3) A-pen-dectomy

My printer hadn't been working since the great room reshuffle and I was beginning to think I would have to fork out for a new one! Luckily with my dad's help I managed to get the printer apart and then discovered that a biro had wedged in the feed mechanism. As my dad said I had to perform an a-pen-dectomy with the tweezers to get the pen out: