Monday morning mix tape- 68 days to go

Nina Simone- feeling good

Pixies- here comes your man

Friendly fires- live those days tonight

THE Bangles- manic Monday

The cure- lovesong

Django django- waveform

Elton John- benny and the jets

David Bowie- kooks

Warpaint- Billie Holliday

phantogram- mouthful of diamonds

Rod Stewart- Maggie may

Here aresome of the songs I've been listening to lately that make me feel summery.Quite a few oldies but also some newer ones too. enjoy!

Nicci

xoxo

Not a morning person- 69 days to go!

I had to pull myself out of bed this morning using Jedi mind power to go for a run. I am definitely not a morning person. I admit that once I was out there it was quite nice, beautiful weather, lovely and quiet and not too warm yet. But it's so traumatic getting to that point!!

I powered myself up with some chia seeds in apple juice, which look and taste fairly disguting, but provide a little shot of energy first thing without giving me a stitch. I can't face eating anything much more substantial that early.

Here's my little map of my run, it's a lovely squiggly route today. I find my morning runs are always slower than my evening ones. I did try a little tempo running this morning which was quite good, but my tempos seemed to be more slow ones than fast. Something to work on...

Nicci
xoxo

Weekend Round up- 70 days to go

Firstly I would like to start off by thanking everyone who has sponored me so far. I've now raised £165 for MIND which is fantastic! I'm now more than half way to my target of £300. Thank you so much everyone!!

So this weekend has been fabulous really, but has involved no running unfortunately. We went up to Kettering to visit Ed's family and some friends. I had great intentions of running this evening when I got home, but it had been so nice to spend time with Ed's family that we stayed a bit later than planned and I was pretty exhausted when we finally got back to London.

Here a some photos from my weekend, we went to Skegness on the Saturday which was so much fun! There's something about the English seaside that I just love, the donkeys they penny slot machines, candy floss, fish and chips. So much fun!!

 

We ate so much seaside food! There was also a bag of candy floss which I'm still working on getting through, and an ice cream. When you're at the seaside you just have to go all out!

We went to visit the lifeboat museum as so many of Ed's ancestors were in the Skegness lifeboat team, his surname is Grunill which makes him something of a celebrity in Skeggy! We also played some crazy golf, I was en fuego for this! I was the overall winner as well as winner of a free round of golf for managing to pot the lucky hole! We also visited the most adorable minature village, I've been visiting these ever since I was a kid and they always make me feel so nostalgic and also like a giant!

Finally we went on a little boat trip to Natureland which is a seal sanctuary and does really great work taking in injured seals and getting them back to health and releasing them again. They also have other animals including crocodiles, repltiles and meerkats. I hand fed some sheep which was the strangest feeling! They were very gentle but I was still a bit scared.

We had a little night out in Kettering when we get home which I won't share the photos of as it got a little messy! Ended up with me, Ed and one of his friends singing Fleetwood Mac, Go Your Own Way, for Karaoke. We were fantastic!

The rest of the weekend was more relaxed, we had a lovely sunday lunch and visited Ed's grandparents. All in all a great weekend. Tomorrow morning I am back on the training though I promise!! 

Hope you all had a great weekend too!

Nicci

xoxo

Back on it- 73 days to go

This is a little round up of the last two days, we've just been doing so many activites I haven't had time to post! The weather in London has been gorgeous lately so we decided to make the most of it while it lasts.

On Wednesday after work Ed came to meet me and we went to check out the Lido near my work. It was so nice after a day in the office to be swimming in the open air. The centre also had a little sun deck on the roof so it felt a little bit like being back on holiday. I forgot to take a photo but it looked like this, only busier and less blury!

Afterwards I cycled home and made it back just a few minutes after Ed, proof that cycling is just as quick as the tube and much nicer! I was planning on making a mini triathalon of it by going out for a run but was so tired that I settled on a glass of wine instead. A wise choice I think!

On Thursday it was another scorcher so we decided to head back down to Clissold park and try to bag that ping pong table. We had better luck this time and got straight on, but it soon became apparent we are both pretty terrible at ping pong (Ammendment- Ed wanted me to put that he has far more prowess at ping pong than me. He did beat me 2 games to 1 but I think I had more panache)!! It was so much fun though and surprisingly good exercise (mostly running after the ball when we missed it and dodging the people playing basketball next to us!). Afterwards we ate salted caramel ice cream in the sunshine it was so good!!

When I got home I psyched myself up and went out for a run, it had cooled down a bit by then so it was actually quite a nice running temperature. I managed half an hour and my knees held up this time, I kept the pace pretty steady and only stopped when I got a ridiculous stitch half way round- that would be the ice cream then! It felt good to get round without any knee issues and in fairly decent time as well I think. Still lots of room for improvement though!

I need to start getting my distance up pretty soon, but find it hard to motivate myself to keep running when I'm out on my own. I've persuaded my friend Ulli (who's training for an actual full marathon) to go running on Monday before work with me. Sweaty Betty, the shop, are organising free guided runs around London and we're going to get involved. It means a 6am start for me, but there's a free goody bag at the end!! We're going to be brave and attempt the 10km circuit around the royal parks, I figure it's perfect training for my Royal Parks half! I'll let you know how I get on.

Nicci
xoxo

Just chillin- 75 days to go

So today I had a bit of a rest day, don't want to overdo it after all! I did attempt to get up early for a run, but after watching Batman last night I think I must have been having nightmares or something because I was so tired this morning!! It was an absolutely epic film, but I did spend most of it hiding behind Ed or covering my ears from the explosions, lame! I'm just not cut out for all the excitement.

It's been absolutely amazing weather here in London and I was practically melting in my office all day so as soon as I recovered from my bike ride home I wanted to head out to the park. The plan was to play some ping pong on the free table in Clissold park, but it took us so long to find it that by the time we got there some other people had just started playing. There was a brief flirtation with the idea of playing real tennis but the heat got the better of us! So we just had a lovely walk round the park and saw the ducklings bobbing around on the lake, so cute!

When we got home we decided to make pasta for dinner which was delicious!! Anything with bacon, wine and garlic in it is bound to be good though. I'm telling myself I'm carb loading for training, really I'm just greedy, I finished this whole plate!!

Now I'm relaxing with a glass of wine watching New Girl, I'm a little obsessed! Perfect evening! I'm heading off for an early night now, back on the training bright and early tomorrow, hoping to get a run in before work and maybe a cheeky swim in the Lido at lunch, lovely!

xoxo

Day 1, or 76 days to go

This is going to be a sort of training diary to prove to all of you who may sponsor me (please do!!) that I am actually doing some training! I am running the Royal Parks Half marathon in October on behalf of MIND, who are a great chairty who provide advice and support for people with mental health problems. Well worth supporting I think.

This is the longest running event I've ever entered, I managed the 5km race for life last year and actually thought I was about to die when I crossed the finish line! So I'm trying to make sure I properly train for this one (Not just making it round the park once and thinking that will do!) My boyfriend Ed has already told me won't carry me to A&E afterwards so how's that for motivation?

Anyway today I actually woke up early and dragged myself out of bed for a run before work, this is utterly unheard of for me! I think the combination of sunshine and the fear that I haven't really done any training for the last fortnight is what spurred me on! I was doing quite well with training averaging a few runs a week until about a fortnight ago when for no real reason I just stopped. I have definitely undone all good I did by drinking far too much beer and eating so much while on holiday so I am back at square one really.

This morning was seriously painful, I had to walk a good part of it because my knee was playing up. Still I managed a 30 minute run/walk and covered 4km so not too bad. Here's a little picture of where I went and how long it took me.

I'm off for Japanese food tonight and then going to see The Dark Knight Rises, beyond excited about this!! Hope it's as good as everyone is saying. Planning on having sweet and salty popcorn to go along with this so glad I got in a run this morning at least, it sort of balances out the un-healthyness!

Nicci x