Every morning (except Sunday’s) since mid April, the girls and I have been jogging a minimum of four laps of this field.

I have five very active, challenging, intelligent and excitable daughters. At the beginning of lockdown we tried to participate in the PE with Joe Wicks every morning. And the girls did really well for about 2-3 weeks, but then the bickering started; “she stood there yesterday, it’s my turn”, “she’s too close and stinks of garlic”, “she keeps trumping and it stinks”, “I have no space now”, “she kicked me”, “she’s not doing it properly”, “how come she doesn’t have to do it, but I do”….. on and on it went.

Then one morning, Daddy had had enough and said fine, we’ll go for a run around the field. And so because our socially distant runners. Family sometimes joins us, they meet us on the field and join us on our laps.

The girls have rules to stick to, they must do a minimum of 4 laps (each lap is 0.4km). Of each lap, they must run the two side lengths or three sides. They are not allowed to leave the field at any time. They are not allowed to go near or in the stream. Other than that, they are free to do as they wish while those that carry on doing more than the four laps are doing so.

We missed the run this morning, to take Auntie G out for breakfast to say thank you for looking after Myla for us last week.

By the time we got home, the sun was high and it was just too hot to go for a run. As the afternoon cooled slightly, we took a bike ride to the next village to see friends and their new baby goats ❤️

While the girls got ready for bed, it dawned on me that Kylo, our border collie, has not had his long walk today (far too hot earlier in the day). It’s then I decided just me and the boy could go for a run around the field and it was bliss. I had my headphones on, my can of spray (should the boy get distracted by the cars) and we just ran! It was great 😍 I managed to clock 3km in 24 minutes.

I am always telling myself as I start running that I’ll do my four laps and then go home, then my Fitbit sometimes looses track and the 1.6km doesn’t register until I’m 1/4 of the way through my 5th lap, and then I want to finish on 2.0km, but while my body is screaming that’s enough! My brain is saying nah, we can take it to the next km!

Honestly, it’s like a full on character sketch in my mind as I’m running, my inner beings are goading each other, “I’m tired, that’s enough”, “one more won’t hurt”, “you can do it, keep going”, “seriously, stop now, you’re going to be sick”, “just keep going, you’re nearly there”, “oh look, your favourite song has come on”, “finish this song and then stop, please for the sake of your legs”, “you can’t stop now, it’s not a round number”, “just get to the next km” and so on, and so on.

But tonight, without the distraction of the girls in the field, but with the distraction of the collie who likes to chase cars and roll in fox poo 🤢, I managed my 3km and actually really enjoyed it.

Who’d have thunk it? At the beginning of March, I could find a million excuses to not go to the gym, but now, I’ll happily go for a few laps around the field and it genuinely helps lift my mood 😊 and we’ve noticed it helps with the girls moods too.