Friends, Food, Beer and heat!

Its been a busy week catching up with friends. We invited a friend over and cooked a meal on the Wednesday,It was great to catch up as we've not seen her for a while. Then on Friday we were invited over for a meal that was scrummy, we were treated to a Mediterranean open pie and home made garlic bread followed by home made strawberry ice cream.We also left with home made cherry jam, and last night we were drinking with friends down Mansfield road in Notts  Its years since we have done that and my how the pubs have changed . Favorite pub still has to be the Peacock and a great pint of Old Peculiar. Amazingly neither of us were drunk bearing in mind we drink so little now days.
We also managed to have a look at some of the artists displaying their talents at the Derbyshire Open Arts weekend - the Shed 2 Studio, a local gallery come workshop in Ilkeston which has  some very innovative work, and also an amateur artists display in Hartington.
We also spent some time researching  multifuel stoves  - they're pretty amazing; heat your water, boil your kettles, heat your casseroles....  I think you could pretty much just live in one room and have everything you need - Impressive!  - whats that saying - the old ways are the best!
Colin and Jackie

Hilly 100

Todays Hilly 100 race was more like Windy 100.  It's the first time I've taken part in this relay race, but Ilkeston Running club have put several teams in for this race over the years.  I had a really early start this morning to travel down to the Cotswolds for leg 3 of this race.  The race is aptly named, as well as being hilly it was really windy too; the wind was in my face or on my side, but never behind me; I'd hoped to race tactically and run down the hills quickly, but the winds made that pretty impossible.  I had a time of just over 62 minutes for my 10 mile leg, and handed over to Darren who had an even hillier 10 mile leg; he ran well and quickly and came in at just over 1 hour.  We were pleased that over our combine 20 miles to  reduce the gap between team Ilkeston and the lead runners from 15 minutes to just under 2 minutes.  The race is still underway at the current time of 3pm, and so leg 6 should probably be just finishing.  Its a long day, especially for Captain Rob Sharratt who has been up since 3 am, ran the first lap, and then between him and Mrs S doing a mixture of cycling alongside us and handing out water (well when he can keep up anyway, his cycling up hills leaves a lot to be desired; at one point he'd thought I'd got lost, the truth is that I was on course and quite a few miles ahead of him and desperate for a drink of water that he was supposed to be providing.)
Colin 

A quiet run in the countryside.

My plan to have a nice quite run over to Strelley Village didn't go quite as planned today; I got caught up in a sponsored walk and horse time trials.  I'm hoping that Colin's "Hilly 100" (a relay in the Cotwolds) is going better than my run.
Yesterday's Embroiderers guild was all about the Elizabethan Wardrobe, and was really interesting, did you know that the word wardrobe came about because ward is another name for room, and so was a room for robes.
Jackie

Sirens

I've just about finished making the corset for my assignment.  It's inspired by the sirens of Greek mythology: half bird and half woman, they would sing and play beautiful enchanting music to sailors, with the aim of luring them to shipwreck on the rocky coast of the island where the lived.
According to legend, Odysseus saved himself and his sailors from temptation by blocking the sailors' ears with wax and tying himself to the mast so that he could not steer towards the music.
Jackie

Friendly Fire

We had a good bank holiday catching up with our friends from the Antarctica. It was Gills 60th and she put on a good night with a talented band which included her daughter. We were all in Black tie and evening gowns ( no pictures thankfully have surfaced).

On the way home on the Sunday we pulled over to offer help as a veichel had caught fire . Luckily every one was OK ,but all their possessions were lost to the fire which soon took hold .

Hope they are alright and got to Harogate where they were going to look after their Granddaughter.

Colin