Walk on by ...

Grrrr ... never good to start with a grrr but I will end with a hurrah!! Have been motivated through various means, people & “life wheels” (yes, yes I know) to get off my butt & start making changes to the things I want to change in my life. Spent the morning at the optician & have another key health check lined up. But amusing as it was (eyebrow raising more than belly laugh), if I’m honest, the WeightWatchers recipes episode got to me. I AM overweight these days, and by quite a lot. But as I am rubbish at diets, I need to do the ‘move more’ (obviously along with some ‘eat less’) However I have been in the wars lately & frankly unable to move more. Post the March stress fracture fiasco, my attempts to fix things did not go well. My brush with a ‘Gait Specialist’ was not a good one. Aside from the fact that every time I went for my hideously expensive (BUPA – phew!) appointment (and I was each time very much ON TIME) she would keep me waiting for at least 25 if not 30 minutes and I just got cross & so lost the will. To both listen to her & also use the hideously uncomfortable and expensive (think a pair of Emma Hope loafers ...) orthotic things I got given. So I have been half heartedly stuffing them into boots & walking for 45 mins & coming home in crippled agony as my hip was being pushed out of joint. Not surprisingly I have pretty much given up with them. But I really need to get out and move a lot more – and as I don’t want to either bugger my back OR break my foot again, I need a workable solution. So today I went to our local running shop “Run to Live” (big plug) and told my sorry story to an incredibly kind, patient & intelligent woman who helped me big time. She did all the things – and more - the gait person had charged me over £200 for, for FREE. And also gave me some brilliant common sense advice. She watched me walk with shoes, without shoes. With trainers on their own (amazingly comfortable) and with trainers with orthotic things in. Amazingly uncomfortable but her view was they did make me walk better. Hey ho. And she sat me down & told me – you are NOT as fit as you were 3 years ago. You have to go down 300 notches and start small & slow!! Like just walk to the post-box in your new trainers with hideous things in, i.e. walk for 5 mins. But do it every day till it feels OK. Then increase and ... yeah yeah I know. Fitness for dummies - hurrah!

Ooh baby baby!

Well well. What a year this is proving to be already. If I was a knitter I would be busy unravelling balls of lemon & cream wool as I have just had news reach me of a SIXTH (yes – 6!) brand new person planning to make an entrance in 2011, the year of the Yin Metal Rabbit, and to turn my friends (their new parents!) lives upside down! However as I am not really a knitter, but have recently taken delivery of a brand new, self threading (oh yes no more poking about like Mr Magoo), 22 stitch embroidery capable sewing machine, I will be scouring the shops for cashmere blankets to customise! If I’ve got my times / dates right, the first baby to arrive will be the Vegas baby so that blankie will obviously need a sequinned showgirl / Elvis theme; the next (I think) will be born to a very successful, strong & fashionable woman so maybe Jimmy Choos? Or a Birkin Bag? The other four are right now somewhat less defined but I’m sure I will be able to find a theme. The only annoying thing about all this joyful news however is that hubby is getting all soppy – no, no god forbid he doesn’t want a baby, he wants a puppy ... specifically an American Beagle ... Woof what? says the KC ...

Welcome to 2011!

Hope this is the year dreams come true for everyone. The great debate in our house over the holidays has been is this merely a New Year or a whole brand new decade? I thought 2010 heralded the new decade but contrary views abound. Anyway whatever we want to call it, it’s new & shiny & holds vast potential. The plans we have for the wreck - sorry house - are really coming together (but why is it that every time we fix one thing, another thing breaks? Fix windows, get water dripping through light socket that kind of thing) and I have checked my yearly horoscope and all is good apparently - even my Chinese prediction is positive. As a Wood Dragon I will fare well in the year of the Metal Rabbit (which doesn't begin until 3rd February) as long as I take care around knives & cars (thank goodness I discovered that as normally I would practice knife throwing whilst driving at 90mph; maybe this year I won't...) Naturally I have my ongoing resolution of “eat less, move more” (kind of A-level obvious) but a conversation with my best friend gave me further food for thought. She said she had decided to ditch the resolution this year & instead had identified 3 key 'watchwords' for her life in 2011. The words are ‘Cherish, Create & Explore’ which I thought was a wonderful idea & naturally I began pondering what mine would be. So after exhausting chats with the KC as she stalked Robins from the comfort of an inside window ledge (hey it’s cold!) here they are – ‘Nurture, Challenge & Trust’. Nurturing myself, those around me plus my house & my garden on every level; challenging myself intellectually & physically (just to be clear, not combative challenging of others!) and trusting the process more, letting go a little (control freak? Moi?!) trusting others & trusting life to unfold as it should. What would yours be?