Coasting

I was so convinced that the baby was going to be late, I hadn’t even put my OOO on when contractions started, the day before his due date. I was certain that I still had time to wrap up the final lingering items on my to do list and enjoy a couple of weeks of maternity leave before the big event.

It’s Friday morning as I’m writing this and I’m in Ingleton, in the Yorkshire Dales, where I’ve tagged along on my parents’ holiday for a few days. We always joke that my mum is cursed when it comes to weather and, after weeks of relentless heatwave further south and mostly just pleasant weather here in Cumbria, a storm seems to have followed them up the M6.

One of my many swims in July It’s Tuesday morning, the sun is very much out and there’s a man downstairs doing some tiling and listening to country music. The time is creeping towards midday and I’m wondering what the etiquette is around making your lunch when somebody is doing work in the kitchen? I’m thinking that the only real option is to decide that you deserve a treat and go out for lunch. Whether I actually deserve a treat or not is debatable.

I come from a long line of gardeners. A veg-growing nepo baby, if you will. My great-great-grandfather, James, was Head Gardener for huge posh houses in Hampstead at the end of the 19th century. According to my dad “he actually knew what he was doing”, looking after collections of kitchen gardens, ornamental gardens, glasshouses - the whole lot. His son, Reginald, followed in his footsteps.

Adventures without running My year got off to a good start, running-wise. I spent Christmas and New Year travelling around New Zealand on a big, once-in-a-lifetime sort of trip. We were outside pretty much every waking moment, and doing as much exploring on two feet as possible. Having been injured through the autumn and DNSing a couple of races I was really excited about, it was just so nice to be able to take advantage of everything New Zealand had to offer.

How can half the year be gone already? Excuse the cliche but it really does feel like yesterday that I rang in the new year in a grotty club in New Zealand. On New Year’s Day we ran through the sulphur springs and went to a spa and ate dumplings. Then I blinked, and now it’s the end of June, and by the time another six months has passed it’ll be nearly 2027 and I’ll have a three month old baby.

Earlier this year, I went to Malta for the marathon weekend. We were only there for a couple of days and the trip was dominated by as much sitting down and carb loading as possible before the race, and plenty of sitting down and celebrating after the race. I absolutely loved Malta though. I liked the food, the coastline, the dose of February sunshine, the whole vibe. So when it came to booking a summer holiday with my mum, I suggested we go back.

Articles and everything else The To Do list never ends Aldeburgh beach, when Grandma came to visit during my run around the coast The last time I saw my grandma, we’d gone round for an advent calendar party. In April. She’d bought one of those expensive beauty calendars in the sales after Christmas, so we’d all taken it in turns to open a door and then swap the items inside, eating tea and cake and cheese at the same time. I came away with some muscle rub and a bath oil.

Articles and everything else A day out at the Staveley Half Marathon On the first weekend of May, my Dad drove up to the Lake District to run a half marathon with me. And when I say ‘with me’ - it was Dad’s race really. Perhaps his third favourite hobby - after falling asleep on the sofa and drinking cups of tea in the garden when it’s not quite warm enough - is researching holidays to go on and activities to do.

Baby’s first half marathon (in Malta, back in February) When I wrote my last post, back in January, I didn’t expect it to be three months before I clicked publish again. Then a lot of life happened, winter became spring, I kept pausing paid subscriptions and now - here we are. The fifth month of the year already. My last two posts before the break involved me big time struggling on an 8-mile run around Buttermere and wanting to just stay in and eat biscuits.