The kids are excited – tomorrow being Easter and all that brings with it school holidays and the promise of chocolate. For some reason despite constantly referencing the Easter Bunny they don’t seem to believe in his/her/ its power to steal Easter eggs as well as deliver them! Predictably as soon as the holidays began the weather changed from glorious sunshine to cloudy with occasional showers, worsening to deep snow depending how far North you were!
Despite that the holidays began quietly, filled with boring but necessary tasks such as dental check-ups all run, (thank goodness none of us had any problems!), opticians for Hpops and the confirmation that she is slightly long sighted and then a visit to the hairdressers for all so that they could be tidied up! The big two enjoyed a craft and cooking day at Bake it Make it, a business run by local mums. The kids made cornflake nests, chocolate thins, easter bunny pegs and easter wreaths which have been proudly hung on bedroom door handles and have certainly brightened the place up. Not only did they get all this with a break for lunch fitted in but the two ladies running it seemed unruffled when we collected the children and unlike my house when any kind of craft work is carried out it did not look as if a pillow had just exploded or the entire contents of the cooking cupboards spilt all over the floor!
On Thursday I aged another year – I celebrated by taking the children to Pizza Hut and then bowling where they wasted no time in absolutely thrashing me! I did redeem myself by winning an angry birds pig teddy from one of those coin hungry arcade machines, the fact that I could probably have bought the thing for about half of what we put in it was lost on the children, all that they cared about was that money went in and a teddy came out! In the evening we had a movie night and I was delighted when all three of them sat and watched the first Harry Potter film. Copious amounts of popcorn probably held but Elf really seemed engrossed in the film and even Hpops acknowledged that it was OK!
Yesterday was yet more errands and preparing for Mr T’s birthday – he celebrates today and to be honest after Elf’s football, in the cold with no cafe serving hot drinks, we’ve done very little. Watched the boat race which turned out to be very dramatic, football focus, read a little, played with the kids a little and will soon be blowing candles out from atop a muppets birthday cake – chosen by the kids of course because this year we couldn’t repeat the feat of the football cake from last year.
Marathon training is now tapering and at last the end seems to be in sight, just over two weeks to go. Last week I managed just over 20 miles and still felt relatively OK! It is nice to think that most of the hard training is done and dusted now although I am still trying to raise money for the charities I am supporting.
http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/melsmarathonmadness
Tomorrow is a half marathon and then lots of chocolate. This week I have been doing other preparation in terms of trying to work out how to get to the start line on race day! My initial plan to walk five minutes down the road, jump on a train to Liverpool street then switch to the tube and so on has now been disrupted due to the fact that upon checking the train timetable it appears there are engineering works taking place! After a brief panic and the discovery that all the marathon coach/breakfast packages had been booked I decided that what will have to happen is a journey into Dartford, this will take me straight into Blackheath – hopefully in plenty of time. My first goal is to offload my kitbag and get to the starting point on time rather than still be queueing for the toilet when I am supposed to be at the start, which is what happened to me at the Brentwood half a couple of weeks ago, it didn’t particularly compromise my race but had to start from the back.
The nerves are beginning to kick in as I look at the route and read all the information in the official magazine which describes what happens at the expo that has to be attended, work out what I need to take with me and even worry about who is going to stand where and try to ensure I remember all of it so I don’t just jog past and ignore them. I am hoping my GPS app will still work but knowing how many people are going to be around this is not guaranteed.
Wishing everyone a happy chocolate filled Easter!
