Walk Three Hundred and Sixty-Three – Fairshot Court garden

Today, Robin hooked up the child trailer to the tandem and we cycled Xavier to morning nursery and picked him up at lunchtime to take him to afternoon nursery. We haven’t done much tandem cycling for a couple of years, so I’m hoping that we’ll do quite a bit more, now that I won’t have to try Robin’s patience by stopping and sketching. We’re also planning to do the St Albans 40 mile charity ride on May 13th so I’ll need to get in a bit of practice in for that. I also walked in the evening and sketched this lovely garden. For those of you that have asked, I will definitely leave this blog up for as long as Blogger will let me. I’ll also keep up almost daily drawing and will post those pictures on my other blog.

I do have an idea for another year-long challenge, but I’m in the throes of finding out all about publishing, ISBN numbers, cost-effective print-on-demand, distribution etc, so that I can put together a book for anyone who is interested in having a momento of this year, so that will keep me busy for a little while. However I don’t want to lose you all (I know we’re all so fickle when a blogger doesn’t give us a reason to keep coming back) so I’ll probably have to reveal and start the next challenge fairly pronto.

You have all been so wonderful and so supportive during this year. I’m sure that many of you have been dying to ask but were too polite to – but have you lost any weight? Well as Alison has pointed out a mile walking and then stopping to sketch and then a mile back is not a really hard workout. So when I started the challenge, in my mind, I fully intended to walk faster and further distances as the year progressed. However this plan didn’t allow for six months of deep depression following the death of my mother a few months into the challenge. Many days it was difficult to get out of bed, but I had to for the children, and many days it was difficult to force myself out of the house when quite honestly I would have rather sat down, eaten the contents of the fridge, and felt sorry for myself, but I had to at least do that mile because I knew you were all there cheering me on. And so, apart from all the things I really couldn’t avoid doing, however depressed I felt, I also had this one daily task. And I really think it healed me. Exercise, nature and sketching – a magic potion for soothing the soul. So although there was a big black cloud hanging over me, sketchercise stopped me becoming completely engulfed, and one morning, after Christmas, I realised the depression had gone. Now isn’t that a recommendation!

Come back tomorrow for more thoughts on my year.

340mm x 195mm pen and watercolour on Arches HP