What's Next?: Back-to-Back and Some Farm Fun

Sunday, February 23, 2014

Back-to-Back and Some Farm Fun

Woke up with my legs feeling a little stiff and beat up from yesterday, but after a bit of stretching, I headed out for run #2 of the weekend. The plan was for 8 miles, so to keep things simple and to give my legs a bit of a break, I ran from our house on the roads. It was Sunday morning so things were relatively quiet, but as the temperature was right at 32 degrees, the bike lanes and edges of the roads were a bit tricky in spots. Ran the Meadow Cross Loop, which I haven't done in a while. The first mile is on Rt. 201, which means pretty meh, but the middle 4.5 miles are out on some winding, rolling country roads and are very nice. Lots of open fields. Heard a lot of birds singing, and caught a good look at a pair of Hairy Woodpeckers pecking on a huge old tree at the edge of an old apple orchard - very cool. The first mile was slow but I picked up the pace as I went along, and even managed to get down around 8:30 pace in the last 2.5 miles, because, well, by that point you're running along the wide shoulder of Rt. 196 and there's just no use not trying to just get it done ;) Overall, happy with the effort and happy to have been able to get out to get in the miles. Hoping I can keep up the back-to-backs as we move through March.

After Ryan got in his run and we had some lunch, we headed over to Wolfe's Neck to check out the new baby lambs. They are just so cute! We also fed Sam the horse and the goats, as well as saw the beginning stages of labor with one of the mama sheep. Her water broke while we were there, and the placenta came out (She ate it. Who knew? Learn something new every day, but seriously, ew!), but no baby before we left. We also got out on the trails for a walk. Sam was not really into the idea when we left home, so we didn't pack snowpants or snowshoes or anything, which meant she did a fair amount of slipping around and falling down in the soft snow as we walked along, even though it was moderately packed, but she had a great time and was very happy to be out in the woods. I guess the inertia thing holds true even for little ones. It's often hard to get her out the door, but once we do, she always has fun!