Extreme Knitting Redhead: Festive sheep and my last run of 2013

Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Festive sheep and my last run of 2013

Sheepiness

To end the year I thought I'd just show a few sheep things I spotted over Christmas:

Paper hankies I bought from a garden centre, just because they are so cute

A stripey sheep Christmas card - love her leg warmers!

A fun sheep waistcoat I spotted last time I was in London

My last run of 2013

The weather has been vile yet again with strong winds and rain, rain and more rain. As I wasn't in a hurry this morning I waited until the rain had abated before I headed out for my run through the village.

En-route I looked down into the valley and thought how different the flood water looked on a dark and dismal day. Not at all sparkly as before and the sky just looked brooding and menacing.

For some reason I felt the need to go down into the valley to experience the flooding again and I'm glad I did as the little steam train was just pulling into the station.

One of the volunteers was waiting to open the gates but told me he hadn't got a key so was hoping that the guard had a set!

As I ran over the crossing I stopped to take a photo and did a big wave to people looking out of the windows and got several waves back. It always takes me back to my childhood as our rail line was one of the last to be electrified and as a child it was such a thrill to wave to the train drivers and passengers.

Phew, he did have a set of keys

Full steam ahead

They don't look very friendly do they!

The rain managed to hold off until I got home so I was very pleased.

So that was 6 miles done and dusted bringing my total for 2013 to 1811 miles. I didn't do as many marathons this year (only 2!) so I didn't need to cut back my mileage as much plus I did my 111 running streak which helped to bump up my total.

Next year, however, is another matter with 7 marathons and a 5 month running streak. Yikes!

2 comments:

Unknown said...: Wow, had a lovely little time reading through you blog, keen crocheter and have just taken up running, also all for charity, would love to be able to combine the two, [although not really marathon standard as yet] well done on all your fundraising as well, your an inspiration! helen
http://myscrambledlegs.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/scrabled-legs.html; February 5, 2014 at 2:28:00 AM PST
Susie Hewer said...: Hi Helen and thanks for leaving a comment! Great to hear you've taken up running and fund-raising (I started out with a Race4Life 5k in memory of a friend who died of cancer). Crochet is one of my favourite things too :-); February 5, 2014 at 2:36:00 AM PST

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Mum's Story

In 1997 my mother, then aged 81, had a series of minor strokes. Shortly after that we started to notice behavioural changes notably memory loss and confusion over everyday items. We thought it was just old age finally catching up with her. Then she started wandering and had violent mood swings. Although she already lived with us it became obvious that she couldn't be left alone for long and so I left my job to care for her. The next few years saw a gradual decline into the blackness that is 'vascular dementia'. My normally placid mum became violent and aggressive. She had psychotic incidents where she would see imaginary people (children hiding in her wardrobe, Russians sitting on the stairs, women stealing her clothes) and she would shout at them and sometimes throw things too. She was so convincing that we used to go and check that there wasn't anyone there! When my sister died mum did not know who Judy was or that she was her daughter. There came a point when I suddenly realised she no longer knew that I was her daughter and this was a terrible time for me. In the last 2 years that she lived with us, life for us all became almost unbearable as she needed 24 hour care - she couldn't be left alone at all because she would either wander off or hurt herself, she never slept for more than 30 minutes at a time during the night, she became incontinent and incapable of doing anything for herself. Finally my husband and I realised that we could no longer provide her with the care that she needed and she went to live in a special care home where the team did a splendid job caring for her in the last few months of her life. There she lived a zombified existence unaware of who she was, what she was or where she was. It was heartbreaking. She died in March 2005, the day after her 89th birthday.

Thank you for taking the time to read mum's story and I hope you'll dig deep and sponsor me using the link below to help find a way of beating this destructive disease.