Yummy Dinners Chilling and Getting Lost
YUMMY DINNERS AND FUN NIGHTS OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Getting stuck in a rut! This happens so much for us with food! We routinely go to the shop and buy the same old food produce every week! Meals can get dull and unexciting especially when life is so busy around meal times! We decided that changing everything in one go is a bit crazy - but maybe we could try one new variation a week! Week 1 saw us attempt one of Garry's favs! He has wanted to make home made burgers for ages! I had always been reluctant - although no idea why! These were so simple to make and really tasty! We picked some simple ingredients for our first attempt - spring onion, chilli and cheddar! All we had to do was mix these together with some mince and egg before forming small patties! Whalaaaa home made burgers! We are already plotting what can go into our next versions....! We also decided to make an elaborate lunch over the weekend and made some brie, avocado toasties! YUMMY!
I also got to visit one of my favourite restaurants this week! Milsoms at Dedham. It used to be a regular haunt for me back in the day, but now it is a rare treat to visit. It was lovely therefore to have a girly catch up during the week. You unfortunately cannot pre-book here so if you are planning on visiting its key to get there early. Dinner was divine as always and was finished off with the perfect brownie - pictures above. Although it looks small it was rich and a perfect end to an enjoyable meal filled with laughter and gossip.
It really was a week of visiting old haunts as Friday night also saw the return of a Mannings Adventure! These used to be a regular event with friends from work but as we have all grown up and taken on more responsibilities its led to them being few and far between. Mannings is basically an old mans pub and I have no real understanding as to why we love it so much. We have just been going there for over 10 years and the tradition has stuck! We had a fantastic night catching up with old friends, sharing stories and drinking copious amounts of gin and beer! We all agreed that we must have more of these in 2017!!!!!
CHILLING - For most people this would consist of a night in, a bit of TV, few drinks and an early night. For me however chilling and de-stressing is about hitting the road, having a relaxing swim or stretching at Pilates or punching the hell out of invisible people at body combat. This week has been a full mix of all of the above and I have felt full of energy and super chilled all at the same time. Have found that having a combination of activities is in fact helping my running improve! Wednesday morning saw one of my quickest five mile runs in ages and this weeks coffee run was our fastest run since April 2016 as we are starting to get a number of miles under 9 minutes! I will never be fast, but slowly but surely I am getting a little quicker! Now if I actually did some scheduled training I might actually start finding it easier!
Swimming is one of the highlights of my week though! It is an hour away from everyone and everything. Although I love socialising and company - it is good to have some time out! Swimming offers me an escape from everything! I am not quick and slowly bob up and down the lengths in the pool, but it is a period of time where nobody can ask me a question and my brain can switch off completely. Pure bliss! So if you ever see me stressing out throw me in a pool and I will come out like a mellow pussy cat!
Now a week wouldn't be a week without some crazy running activity taking place! So this weeks edition is all about GETTING LOST!!!! We had been hitting the trails lots lately and our road running had taken a bit of a hit. With three half marathons and a twenty mile road race all scheduled in before the 12th March we needed to get a long road run in to help with our training. We thought it would be easier to be dropped off a way from home so we only had to run back! With help of route planners we worked out the village of HOO was around 15 miles away from home! We were therefore kicked out the car at this point and hoped our map and directions would get us back before nightfall kicked in!
The route meandered through village after village. To document our route while checking our directions we started to take pictures as we reached each village! Some of them were not the best pictures of us so I have had to used some cartooning filters to save them!
Everything was going to plan to start with. Our route was matching up with the mileage on our watches, but then suddenly we realised we were really off course. We did a comparison once we had got home and you will see below that we did an extra few turns which took us slightly away from our intended route. Left is actual and right is predicted!!! OPPSSSS
The route was extremely hilly to start with and it took a while for us to get fully into our run. We had lots of good distractions though with the views of the Suffolk countryside. We also saw a whole herd of deer in one of these fields - unfortunately they were too far away to get any pictures - but it was amazing to see them wild in the countryside.
We didn't appreciate that navigating through unknown countryside would add so much time on to our trip and the sun started to set on us. We had a number of miles still to go after our diversion (getting lost) and we were starting to worry about getting plunged into darkness without head torches or day glow outfits available.
After appreciating the stunning sunset as we approached Bealings we decided that we needed an evacuation plan before we couldn't see where we were running or froze to death as the temperature started to plummet.
We finished our route at Playford Village Hall where my lovely Hubby came to pick us up. We made it there just as the final light disappeared. It was disappointing to not complete the full 15 miles we had planned, but we still managed to run half a marathon. We would put this down to experience and next time certainly leave a little bit earlier or take more supplies out with us. All in all it was quite an adventure!