Tag: running

Children, Exercise, Families, Family Life, Fitness, Food, Gym, Large Families, Learning, Memories, Outdoor Play, Parents, School, Siblings, Sport, teenagers

Celebrating The Small Things:Week Twenty

by thejoyoffiveLeave a Comment on Celebrating The Small Things:Week Twenty

This week has been as manic as usual and we’ve all been rushing here there and everywhere but we have had had plenty of small things to celebrate.

When Children Never Cease To Amaze – My eldest son has always been the quiet one, the one that is the hardest to work out and the one that I wish I could shove a fire cracker up his backside most of the time.
It has been the same conversation for the past few years with his teaches – “he is an extremely talented boy who needs to apply himself”. I find this so frustrating as it is so hard to get him engaged and believe me I’ve tried. So when he walked through the door the other day and announced he was putting himself forward for head boy I nearly dropped to the floor. Im really hoping something has finally clicked and he’s going to make the most of his last few years of school.

My Regained Fitness Is Paying Off – Even at my fittest running has never been something I have enjoyed. I find it boring and after suffering with terrible shin splints over the years I pretty much always avoid any kind of distance running.
This weekend I challenged this by taking part in a 5km obstacle run with Izzy and some good friends.
Although running is not my thing my competitive edge took over and I found myself running ahead and trying to complete the course in a good time, I did feel a little bad for leaving Izzy behind!
I completed the course, faced my terrible fear of heights and thoroughly enjoyed every minute.

Sushi In The Sun – After a trip to the shops with Oscar the other day I was quietly laughing to myself about his choice of sushi for lunch.
At the mere age of four it would have been a cheese sandwich and packet of crisps for me and I actually relish the fact that my children have a love of such a wide variety of different foods.

Children, Exercise, Families, Fish, Fitness, Parks, Pregnancy

The Sun Was Shining On The Baby Race

by thejoyoffive7 Comments on The Sun Was Shining On The Baby Race

I felt terrible this morning as I woke the house up at 6am on a Sunday to make our way to Bluewater for me to take part in Tommys Baby Race again this year.  It was a wonderfully sunny morning and the promise of a trip to the playground and the Lego shop at Bluewater was enough for them to forgive me.

This will be my third year of competing in this race and I love every minute of it.

We arrived to the lovely ladies from Baby Sensory putting on a warm up for the toddlers.  Number four was to interested in the balloon man to take part but number five loved the bubbles and beach ball throwing!!
      

To warm up the Mums and Dads the super energetic Buggfit leader took to the stage and gave us all an upbeat, fun warm up, and my husband and children always find their massively uncoordinated mother hilarious to watch!


Once the warm up was complete it was time to make our way over to the start line.  The route had changed this year and it was to complete six laps of the beautiful lake.  This was better for the children as there were bubble machines and music on the way round plus lots of ducks to spot.  I also found it an easier course too,  which can’t be bad.


I’m not sure how long it took me to complete the course as I was trying to keep number four from getting in the way of the start as we set off but I was over the moon to come in second place and receive a much appreciated goodie bag, voucher for my place to spend at Bluewater and best of all a much needed complementary bottle of water.


I take part in this race for so many reasons.  Firstly as it is for a wonderful  charity that brings hope to so many families out there. I like to hope that the money I raise each year will go to helping more people during times that I can’t even begin to imagine being in.  It is a real day out for all the family and whilst I am taking part the children can play in the playground and take a walk around the lake looking for fish and feeding the ducks.  My husbands favourite part of the day is going into the fantastic shopping centre and getting a big breakfast which is his reward for the early start!


           I would like to thank everyone that has taken the time to sponsor me this year and if anybody is still wanting to donate to my Just Giving page it will still be open for another few months.

There are still several Baby Races being put on by Tommys across the county this year if anyone feels like joining in after reading this post, or I would be more than happy for some company when I take part again next year.