Monday: Busy day at work at the kitchen table and frankly neither Sam or I were feeling like getting outside in the late afternoon, so we gave in to our laziness and just stayed inside all day. Some days it is nice to have a true zero day, although I know physical activity is important! Sam did finish up her lego set of Hagrid's Hut. With a fireplace that lights up and everything. Fun!
Tuesday: Up and out early for a road run around town. Humid but not super warm, and I finished only feeling sweaty, not entirely soaked, so I will take it! 😉 Pretty morning light along the Androscoggin. (6.0 miles)
Rain started later in the morning and continued into the evening, so it was another no walking day.
Wednesday: Another early morning run, this time on the cart paths. A lot of excitement in six miles! One red eft, one snowshoe hare, bullfrogs croaking, wood lilies blooming, blueberries and raspberries to eat, and mushrooms galore! Cooler but still humid. (6.1 miles)
It was such a beautiful day that when we headed out for an afternoon walk - Sam's first time out of the house since Sunday afternoon and first time actually getting officially dressed in two days too 😂 - we decided to take advantage! We walked further down the powerlines to pick raspberries, stopping to eat the blueberries closer to home too of course, and admiring the wood lilies and the Swallowtails flitting about. So nice to be out and not sweating or too hot! And so many raspberries! A fun family walk. (3.5 miles walked)
Eastern Swallowtail on Wood Lily
So beautiful!
Mom, stop taking pictures! 😝
Yum!
Thursday: Off for the day but up and out early to get in the run to get it done 😃 Fairly cool out, felt so nice! Can't resist the pull of berries and wood lilies at this time of year so set off down the powerlines. Dozens of wood lilies out in amongst the low bush blueberries and scrub towards the end of the powerlines, and some wonderfully sweet and ripe raspberries to eat too. Apparently I didn't eat enough of them on Wednesday afternoon's walk 😉 Legs felt a bit flat, but a beautiful morning to be out! (8.0 miles)
Came home and started in on tackling the to-do list: grocery shopping and Target runs, bringing recycling to the transfer station (which is finally back to accepting recycling - YAY!), getting a few books from the library (which is back open again!), doing laundry, emptying the dishwasher, cleaning up the kitchen and doing a quick clean of the house. Whew. With all of that done, Sam and I headed down to Harpswell for a bit of low tide exploration at Potts Point mid-afternoon. Couldn't have asked for a better day! There was a nice breeze, the sun was shining, temps were in the mid 60s down at the coast and we timed it perfectly and hit the point at low tide. Really lovely down there, and a fun meander along the rocks with the kiddo 💗 (1.5 miles walked)
💗
Love this kid! 💕
Friday: Five of the past six years, I've been headed to Vermont this Friday for the Vermont 100. I think all of us are thinking of the race this weekend. I've never run the race myself, but having crewed there 5 times, once for John, once for Amy and three times for Ryan, the atmosphere and nature of the race seeps into your being, and it holds a special place in my heart.
But alas, like many things this year, VT was cancelled and will have to wait until 2021, and I think it will be even more meaningful to those running, crewing, and spectating when there is the chance to race and support and be together again.
TMR put in a group order of Patagonia shirts back in the spring, and we had never gotten around to picking ours up from Val, so I messaged her to see if she wanted to meet up on Friday at Brad for a run and so that we could remove our bag of shirts from the back of her car. Looking back at my running log, I hadn't run at Brad since the middle of February, and hadn't run with another person since A Bad Idea at HVNC the first weekend of March. Crazy!
I headed over a bit early to get in some additional miles, running up to the summit and meandering around on the mountain side for 4 miles before returning to the lot at 10:00 to pick up Val. As always, it is a joy to follow Val around on whatever route she choose, and it was great to have a chance to catch up in person! Thanks, Val! (10.1 miles)
High bush blueberries along the back of the Boundary Trail
I had done most of the chores on Thursday, so after lunch, I sat with Sam and read my book while she finished book #7 of the Harry Potter series. It's been fun watching her get so into the series that I have enjoyed so much myself! 😀 Once she was done, we headed across the street for a walk while Ryan got in his run. It was breezy and rather cool and we were both comfortable in our fleeces as we walked along. We did the school road loop, which yielded a very interesting find. I mean why wouldn't there be a taupe high heel along the roadside?! There has to be a good story there... (2.1 miles walked)
Saturday: Headed out early in an attempt to beat the predicted heat for the day. It was fairly cool but very muggy. Ran the cart paths and around the Heath before I set off down the powerlines to run out on the Riverside trails and then on some of the Gone Fishing mountain bike trails. So many raspberries, and I simply could not resist stopping multiple times to grab handfuls of berries. So good! Many mushrooms emerging after all the recent rains, wood lilies popping up in the midst of the greenery, and the summer wildflowers blooming. Nice morning to be out, and felt decent. Finished soaked 💦💦 (15.0 miles)
Ryan went out later in the morning and practically melted. Still, I wanted to get Sam out for a bit of exercise so I convinced them that we should head out for a short walk around 3:00 pm. We drove over to the end of the bike path along the Connector to cut off some road walking, and then connected up with the Highlands trail system. It really was quite toasty out, and we got fairly sweaty even though we were meandering along slowly. Ryan was not very pleased with me for dragging them out but I like this short little loop out in the woods, the trail meandering along the stream that snakes through the valley, and it's always good to get out for a walk together! 😁😑😀 (1.3 miles walked)
I think this is a variegated fritillary butterfly on the thistle. So pretty!
Sunday: We had originally planned to get in a longer day hike today, so I scheduled my runs for the week so that I wouldn't need to run this morning. But with the high temps predicted, we decided it probably wouldn't be the most pleasant day for that, and as such, I slept in, sat downstairs in the quiet drinking my coffee and had a rather lazy start to the day. Ahhh. I am not super good at relaxing, but sometimes it is quite nice 😂😂
However, I will admit that a full day inside is not something I do well so I was kinda cranky mid-day... sorry, Ryan! I just really prefer to be doing something! And sitting around on a weekend day is just not right. Ugh. But it really was way too hot out. Hopefully this heat will abate a little bit at least, so that reasonable outside activities can resume without all of us melting!
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