And the hours tick down!

That’s right, on my last day before holidayyyyys…!

And some bummer news, I no longer have a jump trainer 😦 I knew this day was coming, and fair enough: She now has to travel a great distance due to owning a farm up island. I was kind of surprised she lasted this long~ but with the increasingly bad weather making travel on the Malahat a dangerous proposition, combined with a lot of her students either not riding due to lame horses or varying schedules…I totally get it.

Just a bummer, overall but a very fair reason.

Here’s to the many years we shared- it was great! 🙂

And a video from our last real jump lesson- it was very fun. As I step Oats down from most of our competition jump lessons, it’s nice to look back at the great things we’ve done. I love our partnership and how it has grown and progressed over the years, much like my relationship with my now-former jump trainer.

VIRA Cedar 12k Race Recap!

To start off with, I don’t think my time or effort was bad during this race, it just felt… tough. And I fully accept responsibility for that, as I had kind of run a lot in the two weeks prior and didn’t exercise the discipline I needed for rest days (an ongoing struggle for me). I like running and working out! So…That’s what I did. And my legs were definitely a bit flat. Sometimes I can rally and really give it, or not. And this was more of a ‘not’…

You can see the strain in my neck. Photo courtesy of Lois D’Ell. 

The course changed last year for the better! Gone are the two mega hills and the slow, demoralizing trudge through the elementary school field to the finish. Was this a fast race for me? Nope, not really. It was quite cold out, and this year I am really having to manage severe asthma, particularly during cold weather where it flares up badly. I can manage it, but it’s not really optimal.

At the start. Photo courtesy of Lois D’Ell. 

At least I don’t feel like I am going to die!

I can actually see the strain it puts on my chest, neck and lungs in the photos, compared with my racing at Cobble Hill. I am straining as hard as I can through a tight chest, compared with smooth, flowing runs. Interesting! Just something to note.

Everyone started very fast for this race, I started ok-fast for me, but I knew I could NOT rally like the other runners. They started fast, and held it. I sure didn’t. I know my abilities right now and they aren’t there.

Levitating! I like these pix a bit better, though I had QUITE the unibrow in them (shadows). Photo courtesy of Bastion Run Club. 

I held on for a bit, and kind of just didn’t bother looking at my watch. There is a GPS dead zone, so I knew it would be off anyways.

I kind of struggled with the rolling hills on the way out, and on the way back, perfected my patented ‘pick them off one by one’ move. Note I didn’t really step up my pace, it was just easier on the way back and I could hold it better.

And across to the finish! Photo courtesy of Bastion Run Club. 

The finish was ok, and my time was ok. It was like, ‘eh’ alright, rather than my really jubilant and triumphant race at Cobble Hill. You truly can’t win them all! My time was ok, 53:19 though I felt it was a lot of effort again for an ‘ok’ time. That is just what I am dealing with this year. Last year my time was 52:49? and felt better too. Good for 4th in my AG and 10th woman finisher.

As always, the food was good- lots of chips! Yummy! The volunteers were excellent despite managing a lot of traffic on a busy, extremely busy main road and parking lots. Keeping us safe 🙂

 

Happy Halloween!

 

We carved it last night! 

 

Workplace fun! 

Harvest season at Mile End Farm

Harvest moon hanging high
Watching us Gods ancient eye
Poets write you distant cold
While i observe your core
Behold i see a heart of gold

Gidget is helpful!

Although the end of summer is BY FAR my least favourite part of summer, I do love the opportunity to reap the harvest at my in-laws farm. They have a really lovely farm and have all sorts of things in the garden (currently- squash, zucchini, tomatoes, blueberries, garlic and grapes) and fruit trees (shiro plums, damson plums (none this year though!) Italian prune plums, apple trees, a pear tree, and a quince tree).

We went up this weekend when I got home from my deployment (early!!!) and harvested a whole bunch of things. I shared some with a friend and colleagues, and my husband processed a bunch over the weekend too. Yes!!

A fruit salad I made- 100% fruit we picked ourselves! 

Run recap in photos from Cedar 12k

I found a whole bunch more photos, courtesy of some runners at Cedar 12k. Annd…thought I’d do a wrap up of the photos, as a sort of reminisce from my crazy-insane season of 6 races in six weeks, culminating in 10 races for the season total. The distances ranged from 5k to a half marathon, trail to road, and BOY was it a challenge this year.

Yeeahhh a solid 9th place finish for me. HA.

Right now, I’m on a race hiatus which feels pretty nice actually. (sort of a lie right now because I did inadvertently sign up for a trail 29k on the Sunshine Coast and then forgot I signed up for it, and found out we got in on Sunday…and it’s this weekend so I had to cancel.

But I did finish in 5th place overall for the series!

The reality is Mexico+booze+holidays+sun+home renos+back to work+decompressing from the insane stress of months and months= no go for me. Sorry Marathon Shuffle, I will try next year! I bet it’s fun!

Looking sharp

Our stairs and bedroom look great though, so the home reno thing is going nicely.

Had to miss my Tuesday dressage lesson to pick up family from the ferries, so rescheduled that for next week but I still have my jump lesson tonight to look forward to!

A fun bonus- this is from the Comox half marathon.

Oats on the other hand, has been enjoying his vacay from me a bit too much and came back into work on Sunday a tad grudgingly. Ha.

At the turnaround. I have never had so many photos from one race!

Fall is harvest season

I was grouching about fall yesterday when I showed up for my lesson and was feeling cold, the sky was blah and grey and it got dark during our lesson. Wahhh summer is ending…

Fall bounty

I don’t hate all of fall though. A big part of our fall family tradition is helping harvest at the farm (read, picking everything at my in-laws farm).

Over the past few weekends, we have picked:

• plums- both Italian Prune Plums and Damson, and very few Shiro
• grapes
• apples
• quince- yeah only two. Quince is a hard fruit to like…
• pears
• rhubarb- still!
• blackberries
• squash. So many squash.
• kale
• broccoli
• lettuce
• basil
• hot peppers- that seem to be getting hotter every time we pick them, ouch.
• onions
• garlic
• tomatoes

Pick everything!

It’s crazy, isn’t it! I love fall harvest season. It’s a true joy to be able to pick and enjoy this much from their farm. The only thing I don’t like is the number of spiders in the trees and in the squash plants, and also I pulled down an apple and a bunch of earwigs flew out of it…onto my head. EEEEEK.

A wheelbarrow full of random squashes.

So far we have enjoyed chocolate plum cake, crumble, muffins galore, dried apple chips with cinnamon, applesauce, squash loaf with chocolate chips, rhubarb and ginger syrup, blackberry syrup and now I am contemplating making some fruit leather. Yummmy!!

So, one good use for fall- harvest ALL the things!!

July, July!

I’ve always felt a particular resonance to songs that had the title of ‘July’ for some reason. Maybe it’s because it is my birth month, and I love summer?

• July, July by the Decemberists is one of my first loves
• And of course more recently, July by Youth Lagoon
• We can’t forget the band July Talk, and their excellent song: Guns + Ammunition

So many great bands/songs, such a good month. I hope July has been good to everyone. It’s the month of summer, for me. The days are long, they’re hot, and everything has such potential.

Even if July is sometimes disappointing (cold, rainy, I get too hungover to enjoy my own birthday..) I still love it.

And for a little Oats update: Took Wednesday off because I was tired and a bit worn-down from the weekend (yes it took me that long to really recover haha) so hopefully I was ready & fresh for my lesson with Nicole on Thurs.

Rode in the indoor because even though it was sunny…It was also blastingly windy. I couldn’t hear anything, blah.

We worked on leg yields, two-point, and then trot to canter leg-yields. It was interesting and kept me challenged. I had a hard time not jamming or pulling or getting unprepared into the leg-yield. Go figure! haha

We then worked over a small grid- x-rail to a small oxer, and then over a few small fences. They were small enough that even though I WANTED to get worked up over it…I couldn’t! haha.

I didn’t even want to stop, which is basically a first for me. I ALWAYS want to stop. I felt pretty zen, actually. That is also a first.

I’m usually the one who’s like, oh the course went fine, I don’t want to do it again & screw it up, or expose more problems! We’re good! But this time, I was like, let’s try it out. I’m feeling chill (well, chill enough for me.)

Oh, and the artist featured in today’s image is the extremely talented Robert Montgomery. You can find his works at robertmontgomery.org