"Accept the challenges so that you can feel the exhilaration of victory."

I'd purposely not weighed myself in over a year because I'm disappointed with myself for letting my exercise come to a stand still. I still get out walking with the boys and play a lot of Hockey with them but I used to go out walking and sometimes running and it was part of the reason I lost over 3st a couple of years back. It's so easy to let things slide and although I've said in the past 'I don't have time'  and 'I just want to relax of an evening ', I am the only one to blame for the weight that I have put back on.

When I received a surprise package just before Christmas and was also told that one of the main aims for micro scooters during 2017 was fitness, I knew it was time to make a change. It's no shock to anyone that I love scooting, if you are local to us you probably see me and the boys whizzing about the streets and we can regularly be seen adventuring around the streets of London, museum hopping. I've never really pushed myself on the scooter to use it for proper workouts, but 4 weeks ago that changed.

It all started one evening when I had nothing to do. It was dry outside and I'd picked up some lights so I thought 'what the heck I'll go for a scoot'. There is something so therapeutic about scooting, just me, the wheels and some great music to keep me motivated. I scooted 6 miles that night and although I tackled some pretty steep hills and had been out of breath a few times, the last leg back home had 10 minutes of flat, making it the perfect wind down, which meant that I was completely relaxed by the time I reached my front door.

It's safe to say that I was hooked from that moment and my evening scoots have become a regular thing. After arriving back home after the 6 miles I realised that I could have actually scooted a lot longer. So when I went out again I changed my route and added a little longer to the journey, coming in at just under 9 miles. This was then extended to a 10.7 miles route and then to 13 miles.

So this is what I've stuck with as it's the perfect route with a great variety of up hill, down hill and flat. Sometimes my route is a little shortened depending on how brave I am feeling as there is 0.5 miles of unlit road in a quiet area and sometimes I just don't feel like chancing it. Other times though I find myself with a little more time in the evening if I have started out early, so I scoot for longer. My top distance so far has been 15.3 miles and what is really interesting is that even after that I probably could have carried on, because scooting doesn't put the same strain on your legs as running.

 

This solo scooting fitness adventure started on the 5th of January. I weighed myself that morning and I was pretty disappointed by the fact that I had put on 2.2st over the last year or so. It was all the motivation I needed to make this change.

I weighed myself last week and was shocked to see that my evening scoots have taken 9lbs off of my weight which is a pretty amazing start I think. I cant wait to weigh myself in a few weeks to see if there is much change again. The great thing about this exercise is that I love scooting, so it's not a burden and I'm not having to force myself out of the house of an evening. Scooting with the boys on our home-schooling adventures has been a huge thing for us over the last few years and now these solo evenings are something to look forward to with a weight loss goal that is getting closer with each evening scoot.

Searching for bugs and wildlife at Attingham park.

I try and write about things as soon as they happen, sometimes though i half write posts and then get wrapped up in other things, my bad. Last week we all had a morning out at Attingham park, our friend Chris had stopped at ours the night before and we managed to kidnap him for the morning and took him along with us which the boys were very excited about. Mrs M had been before but even though its not far from ours I had not been. We managed to get out of the house at a reasonable time, even if Chris did have a lie in (lie ins are unheard of in our house).

We arrived at our destination and after flashing our new National trust memberships we headed on to our adventure. The grounds were beautiful and although there was a chill in the air and Mrs M needed my shirt to keep warm, the sun was shining and was desperately trying to warm the place up. The boys were in their usual excited mood, laughing and running about.

There was a 'searching for bugs and insects' activity on which the boys couldn't wait to join in with so armed with a magnifying glass, tray and sheets with pictures of wildlife to search for, off we went turning over rocks, rummaging through bushes and checking the skies.

It wasn't long before we made it to the orchard which I think was what kicked off the last two weeks of apple scrumping (which I will write about very soon). The walled garden around the fruit and veg being grown was like Mrs M's personal heaven and she walked round in awe of all the crops and was even more excited when she saw the beehives (one day we'll have that self sustaining life that she dreams of).

The flowers there were stunning too...

Seth was desperate to get to the play area and I was parched so we headed there next. Clearly the boys had even more energy to burn off and who were we to deny them that. The play area was great, lots of climbing things handcrafted from wood and long dark tunnels built into hills, great fun for any inquisitive child, although the tunnels were slightly to small for grown ups and me and Chris ended up with neck cramp.

And then it was time to head back for lunch and i suppose we needed to let our hostage go back to his wife. So we headed back to the car. It was a great way to spend a couple of hours before Lunch the adventure got me wondering where our next National Trust adventure will be, any ideas?

"Celebrate the happiness that friends are always giving, make every day a holiday and celebrate just living!"

We had been looking forward to the August bank holiday for quite sometime, we didn't have anything huge planned but the fact that Mrs M was off for a three day weekend was reason enough to be excited. Sadly Friday came and due to unforeseen circumstances Mrs M ended up quite ill and basically sofa bound. Obviously she was well looked after with no shortage of foot rubs, i made sure her nails were painted and eyebrows were plucked as i know this is the best way to get her relaxed. (I know how to treat my girl like the princess she is).

We had arranged to see our friend Chris (gingerjamphoto.com) on bank holiday Monday and Seth had picked somewhere fun for us all to go, but Mrs M still wasn't feeling great and the thought of a long car journey really wasn't appealing, so we decided to venture somewhere a little more local. Unfortunately after driving most of the way there we had to turn round and find a different route due to a serious road accident.

Some bad navigating from the back seat and a couple of bad turns and our journey ended up a two hour stretch, not what Mrs M had hoped for being wedged between two car seats. Chris kept us occupied though with a barrage of terrible jokes that I can only describe as awful 'dad humour' (god help any children he may have in the future).

After our epic journey we finally arrived at our destination, desperate to get out and stretch our legs. The temperature had risen substantially since the morning so I was a sweaty mess. Seth was desperate to show Chris the dry sledging and Chris proved to us once more that he's as big a kid as all of us. The new gym mat/sledge has certainly been getting some use since being given to us by our friend Gareth (he's yet to come and join In the fun though). We all had a great time apart from a few near misses with the gravel at the bottom of the hill.

After a good few rides of the valley we headed back to the car to get the boys wellies on and go splashing. I don't know what it is about splashing in streams but Seth loves it.

Spending time with Chris is always a lot of fun and the boys love him to bits. Being a photographer he comes with the added bonus of taking great photos of the four of us together. Although we're always out together visiting nice places, one of us is always behind the camera so we actually don't have that many of us all together.

It was soon moving towards tea time and I think tummies were beginning to rumble so we decided to head home. It was a great afternoon, topped off with some yummy food, cups of tea and a few games of countdown on the boys blackboard courtesy of Seth Vorderman. All in all a great bank holiday Monday was had by all. Thanks Chris, for the photographs, TERRIBLE jokes and of course the great company.

"Knox in box. Fox in socks. Knox on fox in socks in box"

Do you remember the time when things were this simple?

Being able to chose whatever vehicle you wished to travel in and jetting off to whatever secluded and glamorous location you liked, not even been confined to this planet. Long distance travel wasn't an issue because you could go in to hyper speed or even teleport if you wanted to. There was no need to moan about the price of fuel going up because your transport ran off Orange squash, or Lego and as you can see from the photo above accessorising your outfit to go with your ride was a breeze (its like a cardboard fast and the furious).

Its amazing how much entertainment the boys can get out of cardboard. We've been attempting to de-clutter again so have been listing our unwanted items on eBay and filling up our local charity shops. Mrs M kindly brought home some boxes for packaging up but as i expected most of them didn't make it that far because big boxes in our house are like gold dust and on sight the boys are all over them.

The boys spent most of the afternoon playing in their new cardboard creations, one minute they were in rockets, then a motorbike with a side car. With the help of a coat hanger being attached to the front Seth's became a racing car and right before we left to pick Mrs M up from work they were on a boat that had hit an iceberg and they were desperately trying to rescue all of their toys from the dangerous currents of a violent sea. I couldn't help but think 'i wish we had a boat big enough for me.'

As the boxes had become flavour of the day and the sun was out we asked the boys if they wanted to take their new custom vehicles outdoor racing down some hills, I'm quite sure you can guess what their response was...

It was a lovely evening so we took a slow drive down to somewhere hilly to make the most of the cardboard super cars. On the way Seth reminded us of a snowman hedge that he had spotted the last time we had passed through so Mrs M jumped out to take a picture.

Sadly on arrival the boxes barely even got a look in as Mrs M's PT Gareth donated a very slippy Gym mat to the cause and it soon became the favoured hill sliding companion. As soon as the boys got on it the boxes were a thing of the past. It was early evening when we headed out so it was quiet and we made the most of our dry slope sledging activity. Even Mrs M got in on the action.

 

We left our sledging escapades in high spirits and were all having a great chuckle on the way home so just before getting back to ours i drove to somewhere that had made me laugh the day before. A house we had driven past a few times had given their already tacky lions at the end of their path a touch up. Orange and Red? really? i honestly don't know what possessed them but Mrs M found it equally as funny.

It was another great mini adventure for me and the troops and ive really enjoyed the making the most of our time after Mrs M being at work. Its been a great de-stresser for her too. I feel so lucky to have a great family and with next week being the last full week that Seth has off for the holiday we have a lot of cramming of fun stuff to do.

"After climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb."

If someone had have told me four years ago that in four years time you will be signing up to be a member of the national trust I'd have laughed in their face. I was a party boy through and through and I would never have been found traipsing around a stately home or castle ruins. Just goes to show how much my life has changed and as we sat in a valley coffee shop filling out our application i had a little chuckle to myself.

These days I've traded in the alcohol, late night partying and waking up and not knowing where I am for quality time with the three people I love the most. We asked Seth what he wanted to do yesterday and he told us he wanted to splash around in a stream with his wellies on so I packed the car and we headed on our way. Thankfully the weather was great, warm and with a sun that was shining bright. As soon as we had reached our destination, used the facilities and filled out our application it was wellie time and as soon as Opeie had got his famous and very glamorous pink sparkly Peppa Pig wellies on we were being pulled over to the nearest hole with water in it.

I'm not a huge fan of stomping through streams and turning over rocks but if it makes the boys smile then I'm happy to pop my wellies on and get wet. The stream was pretty shallow compared to our last visit, so Seth's plans at catching fish with his bare hands was soon shattered. Opeie soon got bored of looking down at clear water with nothing going on and dragged me to the foot of the valley where there was a rope climb and informed me he wanted to go up. Excellent i thought, my boy is going to be a climber, that's exactly how I was when I was young, always climbing trees and tall hills. It worked out quite well as while me and Opeie went climbing Mrs M and Seth continued their nature hunt.

It was a steep walk but surprisingly apart from steadying himself on my shorts for balance a couple of times he managed the hike by himself. A huge change from the boy a year ago who could only roll to get about. He was more interested in saying "Be careful daddy" every ten steps (i guess he knows first hand how accident prone i am). When we reached the top Opeie let out a loud 'yeah we did it daddy', looking very proud of himself.

Opeie spotted Seth and Mrs M from way up high and gave them a shout which echoed through the valley. They looked up and waved so we took a photo, not a great one but that's them smack bang in the middle of the picture.

After Seth had finished splashing around and me and Opeie had made our way down we went for a gentle stroll as Seth's legs were starting to hurt. Me and Mrs M being the grown ups that we are took it in turns to sprint up the steep hills while being timed to see who won (I'll let you decide for yourselves who you think was fastest). 

It was so nice being out in the middle of nowhere for the afternoon and spending quality time together. Although Seth Struggles to walk to far,pottering about was lots of fun. The only sad part of the day was the amount of dead bees that we saw. We're always reviving bee's at home with honey and our trip out as made us realise that we need a utility belt with a honey dispenser on it. We did spot one interesting bug though that was happily strolling about.

Well i guess being part of the National Trust now we better take advantage of all the beautiful places in the UK. We will definitely making the most of it over the next year and have already spotted some interesting looking places so stay tuned of the coming weeks.