Snowdon!

This was the perfect weekend away.....no traffic hold ups, great company, beautiful weather, a fantastic walk with amazing views!

Some time back, a few of our fundraising group decided it would be nice to take on a personal challenge, a step away from our community fundraising, and something different to Race for Life which we'd all done a few times.  So, we settled on Mount Snowdon, and after months of planning and training walks we set off for Wales on Friday 7th September.

After a little deliberation on the friday night, a look at the weather forecast and some advice from a friendly local, we decided to take the Pyg track up the mountain - "the most rugged and challenging of the 6 paths up Snowdon" - quote from Snowdonia park website, I'm not making it up ;-)

I still can't quite believe how lucky we were with the weather.....there's not much I can say about this hike so I'll let the photos speak for themselves.....

I would like to thank my lovely friends for making it a weekend I'll never forget, and also all the fantastic people who sponsored us - in particular the many people who sponsored me some of whom I've never even met and only know through twitter, I really appreciate the support.  Altogether the team raised over £1300, which is more than double our target!!

Nx

Scafell Pike....almost

This post is way overdue, and I was actually about to write about my latest adventure when I realised I hadn't written about my Scafell Pike trip....or as it turned out, my non-Scafell Pike trip!

So, having hiked up Ben Nevis last year, my aim this year was to try to do Scafell Pike and Snowdon - I would then have done all 3 of Britain's highest peaks, and would consider doing the 3 Peaks Challenge in the future.

My friend Helen convinced me to sign up to the Scafell Pike challenge for Marie Curie Cancer Care and after I convinced my friend Amanda to come along (in turn she convinced her friend, Donna) we were raring to go.  Now, you may remember June was a pretty wet month.....well, after being on the road up to the Lake District for about 6 hours, we got the message that the event had to be cancelled due to flooding at what was meant to be the start of the walk.

Disappointed, was not the word.  Amanda, Donna and I had meticulously planned time off work and childcare to take this trip - it's not something busy mums can just do at the drop of a hat, we weren't going to get the chance again any time soon.  We decided to make the best of the weekend and pressed on to our hostel.

After much discussion with the very friendly and helpful staff at the hostel, we decided against trying to do Scafell Pike without a guide - the weather was set to be extremely wet and windy and 3 birds on a mountain with no map-reading skills wouldn't have been wise!!  So we settled on Skiddaw instead.

Wet and windy doesn't really describe our day - on our way up, nearly everyone we met coming down said we wouldn't make it to the top, it was just too windy.  And they were right...visibility was poor, and when you have to crouch down on the ground for fear of being blown over, you know it's time to head back!  We weren't far from the top, another 100m or so and we'd have been there... very frustrating, but we were happy we'd made the decision to do something, even if it wasn't our intended challenge.

 We were delighted to receive our medals from Marie Curie even though we didn't do the planned event - we felt we'd deserved them :)

I would dearly love to return to the Lake District to explore more of its beauty - but in better weather!!Nx

Klout Pout....

There are a few things which I find irritating on twitter....hundreds of meaningless #ff lists, twitlonger, people who don't reply....but one thing which beats them all is Klout.

For those not familiar with Klout, it's a measure of online influence, calculated daily based on some algorithm no one seems to understand.  So things like follower count, retweets and engagement contribute - but funnily enough interactions with people who have a low or 0 Klout score actually count against you!

Don't get me wrong, if you choose to sign up to Klout and play that game (which is essentially what it is), that's up to you - but what irritates me is the spam in my twitter timeline:

I gave X a +K in Y.....or I received a +K in Y from X....or thank you X for giving me a +K in Y.....or my pet hate: please give me a +K in Y!!!!  The odd one or two are fine, but some seem inclined to reel off 10-20 tweets at a time!

I likened this the other day to playing Words with Friends, which is something I enjoy doing....but I don't feel is necessary to tweet out every time I win a game, or get a particularly good score - that stays in the game, and people interested in playing see that.  Surely people can see who has given/received what from within Klout? So why clutter up twitter with it, unless it's purely to gain attention of other Klouters...which is pretty sad....

Now, someone has tried to explain to me that often a person's Klout score is used by potential employers to decide whether that person even gets an interview - personally, I'd rather be able to explain to a potential employer, my reasons for not using Klout and hope they value the fact that I don't follow the crowd.  If someone wants to employ people based on a dubiously calculated online score, rather than my ability to do the job, do I want to work for them anyway?

I don't have many twitter followers compared to a lot of the people who play Klout....I like to follow and interact with people I have something in common with.  People who have a genuine interest in what I do on twitter, which is raising awareness of the cancer charity I volunteer for.  Of course, I have other interests too,  kids, travel and anything community related, so I tweet about that too.  My aim isn't to 'influence' people as such, but if I can encourage someone to sign up to volunteer for something, or tweet something which raises awareness of an issue, I consider my time here well spent.

Anyway, those are my feelings on Klout....please don't try to tell me I don't understand it, quite frankly, I don't want to :-)

#rantover ;-)

Nx

Running for Harry.....

I'm no runner....in fact until yesterday I'd have said I hate running... but yesterday I completed my first half marathon and can honestly say I loved every minute!!

So, what makes a non-runner sign up to a half marathon?

In October last year, I attended the funeral of someone I'd never even met...some may think that strange, but he was someone who had captured my heart via twitter, Harry Moseley was one special boy.  To see the numbers of people who came to pay their respects to Harry, showed me just how many lives he had touched, and I felt then that what he had started would continue for a long time to come.

When I discovered @runningforHarry on twitter I was only too keen to help spread the word about the event - but firmly sitting on my hands for some time, as I'm usually very eager to put my hand up for anything for charity!!  I hated running, I did not want to run a half marathon - but then I thought that lots of people do things they don't want to do every day, including carrying on with life without their loved ones, like Harry's family.

And so, here I am the day after the event with very mixed emotions - I won't bore you with a mile-by-mile account, but here are my highs and lows of the day.....

Highs
Spotting team mate @nataliepeperell at the 3 mile relay point :-)
Running past a school band playing 'We are the champions' half way up a hill :-)
The fabulous Reading community cheering all the way along the route :-)
Kids giving high-fives and jelly babies :-)
Seeing Harry's mum and sister at the 9 mile relay point, and being spurred on remembering why I was there!
Running into the Madejski Stadium and feeling very very pleased with myself :-)
Meeting up with team Running for Harry in the bar :D

Lows
Getting to the top of a hill just past 7 miles and feeling like I had nothing left - stopped to walk and felt like my legs were going to collapse underneath me!
Getting to the 11 mile marker and being gutted I had a whole 2 miles left....
A phone call from my son saying they couldn't find parking, and realising my family wouldn't be there to see me at the finish :-(

Overall, it was a fantastic experience, I was very proud to be a part of Running for Harry - thanks to my lovely friend Claire for our training sessions and for letting me gently persuade her into taking part ;-)

Sadly, after all the elation of the day and much happy tweeting in the early evening, the day ended on a massive low point.  I read a tweet that someone had died after collapsing at the finish line, and later found out that it was @12pmclub who I had met just a few weeks before.  Absolutely tragic, and my heart goes out to his family and our good friend @theramblingduck - RIP @12pmclub xxx

thanks for reading... if you would like to support team Running for Harry by making a donation, you can do so here: http://www.justgiving.com/runningforharrymoseley

Nx

Missing....

Most parents have had that feeling of panic when they lose sight of their child for a moment, and felt the huge relief that comes with spotting them....but what about families for whom that moment turns into minutes, hours, days and years?


Imagine saying goodbye to your partner as they leave for work, or waving off your child to school.....and never seeing them again, with no clue as to why or what happened to them....

When we lose a loved one to disease, or if they are tragically killed in an accident, this is traumatic enough, but when a person goes missing their family are subjected to unimaginable anguish, sometimes never finding out the truth about what happened.

Missing People offers a lifeline to families searching for a loved one, giving specialised support and advice around the clock.  They also help families with publicity appeals and use social media to highlight missing people cases.

Today I volunteered at Miles for Missing People in Regent's Park in London - the main event is a 10k run, but what made this event so special was that it was accessible to the whole family as there was a children's run, and a fun run, so not everyone needed to be able to manage 10k!

I was handing out water with a lady whose nephew disappeared when he was 21 - he's been missing for 19 years!  Madeleine McCann is of course a very high profile case, and both her parents were taking part in the event.  People can be as judgemental as they like about the circumstances surrounding Madeleine's disappearance, but the fact remains she was just 3 years old and no family deserves to go through what they have.

There are many ways to support the fantastic work of Missing People - if you can't donate or volunteer your time, please be sure to follow them on twitter and facebook and share their appeals.  Just one tweet or facebook post could reunite a missing person with their family.

Nx

Little Legs for Life

Little Legs for Life is a fantastic opportunity for children to take part in a fun event, and support Cancer Research UK!  Children of all ages can take part, and they can run or walk as far as they can manage.

Little Legs for Life events are organised by volunteers, but your local contact at Cancer Research UK will support you every step of the way. The beauty of the event is that you can make it completely unique - it can be as big or as small, as simple or as grand as you want to make it!

Here are 10 basic steps to a successful event:

1. Get a group of friends together to help you and make contact with your CR-UK Area Volunteer Manager
2. Find a venue - school or sports club ideal
3. Seek support from local schools and community groups
4. Promotion - go into schools and speak to children.  Leaflets & posters, local press, social media
5. Registration - as many options as possible: online, registration sessions at schools, by post
6. Contact your participants with event details and fundraising info (encourage just giving)
7. Apply to local businesses for support - sponsorship or raffle/auction prizes
8. Must Haves - first aid cover (speak to your local SJA) risk assessment (get form from your AVM)
9. Optional - t-shirts, stalls, raffle, medals, extra volunteers
10. On the day - set up the course, put your volunteers and participants in place and have fun!!

These photos are from the events held in Walton-On-Thames in Surrey - in 3 years, our LLFL events have raised over £50k!!

For more information email LLFL@hotmail.co.uk
follow @Littlelegs4life on twitter
join the LLFL Community facebook group

#CRUKchatter

Hi all


#CRUKchatter will debut on Tuesday 6th March at 8:30 pm and will be a weekly chat for anyone supporting @CR_UK on twitter - this can be anyone: community based committees; fundraising teams/individuals; campaigns ambassadors; staff or volunteers! Even if you're just considering supporting CR-UK, you're welcome to join in too :-)

The idea behind #CRUKchatter is to try to get some conversation going around what people are doing to support CR-UK.  This could be sharing ideas/experiences or what your next project is!

How it will work

From 8:30pm each tuesday, I'll start off the chat with a couple of questions - and hopefully get some responses!! 
So from 8:30pm, either look out for my tweets, or do a search on the #CRUKchatter hashtag - probably doing a search is the best as you'll see everyone's responses and hopefully make some new friends :-)

For example
@CRUKWalton
Q1. how do you currently support @CR_UK #crukchatter
then people tweet a reply....either directly to me, or just an open tweet, but don't forget to include #crukchatter!
@otheruser @crukwalton I'm a campaigns ambassador and meet with my MP to make sure they're aware of CR_UK's latest campaigns #crukchatter
@otheruser2
I have been part of a community fundraising group for 2 years and also take part in sponsored events like #raceforlife. #crukchatter

I hope all that makes sense!
Just to repeat from my previous post....it's just half an hour and not everyone needs to take part every week!  @CR_UK are happy with this idea and may join in occasionally but it will be very much a supporter 'thing'!

thanks
Nancy