Irish dancing

image found in my 'clip art' folder, unfortunately I have no idea where it came from

A friend has recently started an irish dance school. My youngest son is a bit of a mover so I thought that it would be good to introduce him to a different kind of dance. It hasn't grabbed him but I keep dragging him in to watch the lessons whilst I dance instead.

20 miles in January

Do you remember this post Health: Walk! My plan was to cover 20 miles in the month. I knew that it wasn't going to be easy to find the time, what I wasn't expected was a month of floods! I didn't succeed but I'm not beating myself up about it either. I achieved almost 16 miles which I think wasn't bad considering how limited my options have been for getting out and about. The land is still saturated so I'm going to let this one fall by the wayside for now and consider another challenge for February.

Feeling frustrated

Muddy, claggy field

I'm doing okay with my 20 miles in January goal... but I wish that I was doing better. This is not down to me for a change but due to the saturated landscape. There is a limit as to where I can walk from the house, at the moment each route I take is pretty much identical and I'm beginning to get bored with looking at the river, wonderful though it is. But I'm not ready to give up, just wishing that the land would get a chance to dry for a week or two. Fingers are crossed.

Health: Walk!

I've got to lose weight. And get fit again. The easiest way to do this is to set myself a goal but not of weight to lose but of something I can more easily control.

This January I am going to walk 20 miles. I know, this doesn't sound like much and in the past I would have easily completed this in one week. But the problem with January is that, thanks to meeting up with lots of different people over Christmas, colds and bugs are continually passed around. I want to make my goal achieveable and if I go over it I won't be upset!

This year I have the bonus that I can be more flexible with my own time. I don't need to be constantly supervising the boys though I dare not leave them alone for too long either!

I hope that I succeed.

It's interesting to read over old posts from this time last year. This one seems quite apt and reminds me of how far I have come: January mission

Feeling bleurgh!

Ginger and lemon infusion

I've been hit by a cold again. I gave myself a gentle day expecting it to be gone swiftly. Then, instead of the good nights sleep that my body needed, I have had three nights of not enough rest. Thank you boys! It is now a lingering cold and a massive cold-sore has appeared for good measure. I am definitely run down.

I am also out of my favourite cordial. Not feeling up to making more I came up with a simple solution: whizz up the ginger with some squeezed lemon juice in my mini chopper (you could grate the ginger instead) and store in a jar in the fridge. It is working well! I steep one teaspoon of the mix in boiling water for a few minutes and add sugar to taste. A tea strainer is essential unless you enjoy munching on raw ginger.

Fantastic.

Not feeling well

Wouldn't it be nice if all of those nasty bugs would just blast off into space.

Light therapy?

I have been exploring different ideas to improve my motivation throughout autumn. I've had a good look at Seasonal Affective Disorder and how to cope with this. Do I have SAD? I'm not sure but it certainly seems like a good place to start.

Health: stretch

Honesty - stretching for the light!

Flexibility has been raising it's head around here again. As in J and I are losing it! Me, I'm just not active enough. J lives in a world designed for shorter people and has always had back issues as a result but these are made worse thanks to long hours spent driving.

I don't have his excuse but for the last few months I have been finding it uncomfortable to get up in the mornings. I always used to be a fidget in bed but now I seem to stay in the same position and I can really feel it when I wake, my body is so stiff. I'm only in my 30's so I really ought to do something about this!

I have lots of books and fancy routines I could follow but back to this years plan of 'just do it' I'm ignoring the research and using common sense. Every time I want to watch the TV I stretch. Starting with a full body stretch I work my way down the different parts of the body. Slowly I'm becoming more mobile.

I enjoy stretching and I love how it makes me feel when I have finished. Yet again I have to ask myself, why did I ever stop?

Turning the lawn over to my boys

A few days ago I found some old tennis court posts hidden in a corner. So when I stumbled across some line spray at a local shop (whilst hunting for spray varnish) I impulsively purchased it. At just under £10 it was pricey but I'm glad that I did as it gave me the inspiration to create a tennis court. Lots of mowing later, lines marked out and a few tree limbs lopped, we were ready to play.

 

It's not full size, whilst the lawn area is large it isn't flat and the trees get in the way. But it's big enough for us to enjoy a volley. It's been fun reintroducing my boys to this sport. 

 

When planning what to do in the garden I sometimes forget that it isn't just for me. My boys need space too and, let's face it, there is plenty of room at the moment! The photo above is of what we call the middle lawn. We currently have two trampolines (one is only used for lounging as it has a hole) and a slackline too (seen in the far left). This is all visible from the house but far enough away for the children not to feel as if they are under constant supervision.

 

I'm happy to say that we're enjoying the tennis.

 

Weight loss notes April - May

• Monday 15th April, first day - 14stone 13lbs.
• Monday 22nd April - 14st 8.5lbs => 4.5lbs lost
• Monday 29th April - 14st 4.5lbs => 4lbs lost, 8.5lbs overall
• Monday 6th May - 14st 7.25lbs => 2.75lbs gained,  5.25 lost overall
• Monday 13th May - 14st 3.5lbs => 3.75lbs lost, 9.25 lost overall

I've not written much about trying to lose weight because I generally find weight loss blogs boring. I tried to write one myself in the past but keeping it inspiring was hard work especially on a bad week. I want all my effort to go into losing weight, not creating blog posts around what becomes very narrow subject of have I lost or gained.

We all know how to lose weight, eat less and do more. You don't need me to tell you how to do that. What I can say is how I succeeded this last month. The first two weeks I followed a meal replacement plan. The third week I tried to just eat sensibly which I found pretty hard. With hindsight I think that this happened to collide with pmt kicking in which didn't help (pmt was mild this month so I didn't realise at the time). I'm now back on the meal replacement plan though it varies as to whether I use this for one or two meals each day. The weekends I have been on real food for all meals and less strict but not stupid. I've not done any extra exercise but I have been doing heavy gardening almost daily, my muscles can definitely feel it.

So far I have managed to lose 9lbs. I haven't yet noticed any significant difference in how my clothes fit but hopefully next month I will. Fingers crossed that I can keep this up!

A time for doing

Three weeks ago, fed up with waiting for it to warm up, I treated myself to some large thick socks and two pairs of thin leggings for layering under my jeans. The idea was that I would stop lamenting about how cold it is and start doing stuff again because I am ready to do stuff again. As is the way of these things they have been used for less than a week thanks to the return (finally!) of our usual, mild weather.

I also made another decision, with me feeling warmer it is time to tackle my weight. I have successfully lost weight twice in the past (weight loss story can be found here) and, when everything is going well, it is actually not hard at all. But trying to lose weight when I'm stressed, being pulled in many directions at once or even just feeling a bit low does not work. My life is not perfect now but neither is it bad. The small changes that I've been making over the past few months have given me a better sense of worth and I feel pride in what I have achieved.

There are many diets to choose from, I know from experience that I will hop and change ideas from time to time, the trick is not to get bored.

Wish me luck!

January mission

I have my usual new year wish list, and right at the top is wanting to lose weight. However, wanting doesn't mean that it happens. This year instead of diving into the new year starvation diet I've decided to wait until spring before cutting back. I have several reasons for this:

• When I'm cold I feel hungry (it's winter at the moment)
• I find it hard to stay motivated when the days are short
• I'm still surrounded by left over Christmas temptations - I cannot afford to bin food
• I don't want to spread myself too thin (weight loss requires perseverance)
• I don't feel ready

I have successfully lost weight twice before. By successful I mean that the weight stayed off for several years and this was because I made lifestyle changes that I could maintain. The first time I was in my early twenties and had put on weight due to working in an office. The biggest change I made here was that I started to walk home from work, about 4 miles. This also helped me mentally as I was able to de-stress on my way and got home feeling refreshed and ready to do stuff rather than collapse on the sofa. My weight would fluctuate (I'm never going to be slim) but I felt healthy.

I put on a large amount of weight after having my first baby. This was eventually lost through walking, again. I walked everywhere, my pushchair went through 5 sets of wheels during this period! Things ground to a halt with my second baby which coincided with my first having to walk alongside us. Suddenly my 4-5 mile treks weren't very practical with a 3yr old walking too.

I have tried running in the past, and enjoyed it, but personally I feel that walking is what succeeds for me, but this takes up a lot of time. Building this into my life at the moment is hard especially as I don't want to be dragging my boys along with me. I like walking on my own, I don't like dealing with whining especially on a cold wet morning when I'd rather be staying in the house too.

My January mission is to get up early in the mornings 3 days a week to go for a short walk before my partner heads off to work. The walk is short because I don't enjoy being out in the dark. As the days get longer I anticipate being out for longer, I'm quite looking forward to it. But dieting is on the back burner until I feel stronger in myself.

A wet walk

Wet, grey and windy 

Wow, you can tell that this is a new blog, second post just a day after the first.

We've had a lovely gentle Christmas but I have felt somewhat trapped in the house. Every time I've looked out of the window I've been greeted with the sight of grey dreariness and the reminder that walking across the garden is like tip toeing across a wet sponge. But today I was drawn outside so on went the coat, hat and wellies. I walked up to our local river and just stood on the bridge, staring for a while at the twisting of the water whilst battered by the rain. On the way back, walking on a foot path around a field (image above) I recorded how I was feeling - I love the gadgets on my phone. Below is an edited transcript:

What a miserable day. What a vibrant day. It is cold, wet and windy and I'm going for a walk. I feel alive, I feel real. I'm looking forward to sitting by a fire with a cup of hot chocolate snuggled up with my boys, making soup for lunch and knitting socks. It's cold, the wind is blowing the rain across this flat landscape in flat sheets. I can feel my trousers sticking to my skin like icicles. The open skies are wonderful, it's bleak but... there's promise. There's promise of life, promise of light, that we have come out of dark winter and away from the SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder). Coming into the new year and refreshment, time to reassess, a fantastic time of year. Not a time to turn myself into a new person with false promises but a time to assess things and to think through what I really want and to appreciate what I already have.

Okay, I'm sludging through the puddles, each step is a slurp. It's a pity I'm wearing a hat really as I want to feel really open to the elements. Let me take my hat off, it's not raining too bad right now. Ahh, incredible. Even though it is still slightly raining I couldn't feel anymore alive, I feel refreshed, I feel washed, not quite renewed but on my way there. Energy refilled. With my hat on [it has a brim] it was like being in a cave and looking out. Now I feel open to the world, to the sky. I feel as if my hair has taken on it's own life and is reaching for the air to become one with it. My feet don't feel the same thing with the earth but that's probably because it's too muddy and cold for that.

Here my monologue ended and I took the above photograph. Not a great image with the rain on my camera but it does show the moodiness of the sky. I really enjoyed doing this, not an exercise I planned but the words help me to recall the moment.

I didn't have hot chocolate when home but I have had a snuggle with my boys and enjoyed a big pot of homemade mushroom soup with crusty bread. A good day, I may yet start on knitting the second sock.