This was the last day of the Heart Foundation's Healthy Heart Challenge, which I started six weeks ago.
You can see my results here.
I'm pleased with what I've done over the last six weeks. Apart from two days last weekend when I was feeling extremely miserable and stressed (which is probably the time I needed to exercise the most), and one day when I fell five minutes short of my target, I met the goals that I'd set. That's 39.83 out of 42 days. I think that's a pass.
I've also lost close to 7 kg since February.
I didn't set any huge life-changing exercise goals. The point for me was to try and establish some habits that I can carry forward. I think I've done that, and I intend to keep going on the path I'm on. I'm comfortable with it, it's something I know I can do within my current commitments, and it's working for me.
This makes me happy.
Sunday, July 15, 2012
Friday, July 13, 2012
a tale of two chocolates
Juniordwarf has a lot of teddies. (The teddies are his vast
collection of soft toys, ranging from my old panda through many different
species including tigers, a frog and several actual teddies. This is as opposed
to the animals, which are all his plastic animals.)
Different ones have been his favourites at different times,
and their names have changed over the years as well.
He has a teddy called Chocolate-the-Girl and a teddy called
Chocolate-the-Boy. I don’t know where these names came from, or why he thought
Chocolate was a unisex name – or even a name at all – but those names have
stuck.
Chocolate-the-Boy came from one of those grabby prize
machines that they have in pubs. Juniordwarf somehow managed to win it when he
and Slabs went to the pub for a meal one night when I was away. Slabs says he
didn’t even see Juniordwarf do it (but he’s since repeated the performance in
another machine and we still have no idea how he managed it other than pure
fluke).
Chocolate-the-Girl’s origin is a mystery. We think one of
Slabs’ cousins gave her to us for Juniordwarf when he was a baby. She is
actually Zoe from Sesame Street http://www.sesamestreet.org/muppets/zoe
, but Juniordwarf hasn’t watched much Sesame Street and doesn’t know the
characters. When he found out she was Zoe, he said that must be her nickname.
I think he is particularly fond of Chocolate-the-Girl
because she has long hair that he can twist around and put up (just like he
tries to do with mine). Ever since he’s been very young he’s been completely
hung up on particular women we know, and obsessed about whether their hair is
up or down. The most important thing he reports back on each day at school is
what his teacher was wearing in her hair that day.
I’m just glad he doesn’t know about those old Barbie
hairstyling sets that were popular when I was younger.
Earlier in the year, when lots of his classmates were taking
their teddies to school, Chocolate-the-Girl was the one Juniordwarf took to
school every day. A couple of months ago he told me that Chocolate-the-Girl
would be staying home with me on my work from home day. So I got into the
spirit of this, and took some photos of her to show him what she did during the
day. He thought it was great.
A couple of days later, Juniordwarf wanted me to take Chocolate-the-Boy to
work, so I did the same thing for him.
After that, Chocolate-the-Girl became a regular visitor to
my workplace, and Chocolate-the-Boy started to accompany Slabs.
Yesterday Chocolate-the-Boy was supposed to go to work with
Slabs. Slabs told Juniordwarf to leave him on his bag. He didn’t, and
Chocolate-the-Boy got left at home.
When Slabs picked Juniordwarf up, he’d been trying to think
of a story to explain why Chocolate-the-Boy wasn’t with him. Last week, my
reason for Chocolate-the-Girl having been left at home already being at
home when we got there was that she’d got a headache at my work and had to come
home early, on the bus. He was fine with that.
Juniordwarf saved Slabs the trouble of coming up with an
equally plausible explanation. He said that Chocolate-the-Boy had gone to the
moon and he wouldn’t be back until Monday. Problem solved.
Today Chocolate-the-Girl was meant to come to work with me.
I decided to put her in the drink holder of my bag so she could see where we
were going while I was walking to work.
This was all very well until I was almost at work and
discovered her missing.
The absolute gut-wrenching horror that fell upon me at that
moment is indescribable.
My reaction was sheer and utter panic.
All I could think about was how devastated my little boy was
going to be when I told him Chocolate-the-Girl had gone and really wasn’t
coming back, and how betrayed he’d feel that he’d entrusted me with his teddy
and I’d lost her.
I was almost in tears as I started retracing my steps. I was
hoping that she hadn’t fallen out on the road and been run over, or that
someone hadn’t found her and decided to keep her for their kids.
It was an unbearable walk. I was getting more and more frantic
as I scanned the street and the road for any sign on Chocolate-the-Girl. It
brought to mind this blog post I read recently about a small girl who had lost
her beloved toy dog, http://www.handsfreemama.com/2011/10/18/a-well-loved-child/
and the impact that had on her mother, as she realised that a day would come
that her daughter wouldn’t need her teddy any more, wouldn’t want to hold her
hand any more . . .
But I digress.
I was imagining what I was going to say to Juniordwarf,
where I was going to go for coffee to calm myself down before I went into work,
whether I’d even be able to handle going to work knowing I’d made this terrible
mistake, and indeed, even trying to explain why I was so upset about losing a
teddy bear, and why on earth I was bringing my child’s teddy to work in the
first place, I mean who does that? Really?
I was on the last leg of the return trip when I saw a flash
of orange. It was Chocolate-the-Girl. She was sitting on the ground propped up
against a fence, so someone had obviously found her, seen (by the fact that
Juniordwarf’s name was written on her tag) that she did belong to someone,
realised that the owner would probably be back as soon as they realised she was
gone, and moved her out of the way so she didn’t get wrecked.
I was totally relieved. Beyond relieved. There must be a
word to describe the relief. It was the exact opposite feeling I’d had when I
discovered her missing.
I picked her up and gave her a hug.
Yes, I actually hugged a small soft toy.
I was so grateful to whoever found her and left her there
for me to find. I thanked them on Twitter and I thank them again here. They
will most likely never read this, but I’m sending them positive thoughts,
thanks and well wishes for their honesty. It made my day.
The only other good thing to come out of this is that I
covered so much ground, my day’s walking was done before I even got to work.
I didn’t let Chocolate-the-Girl out of my sight for the rest
of the day. This included her sitting in on our staff meeting and coming
shopping with me at lunchtime, much to the amusement of my colleagues.
When Juniordwarf asked what Chocolate-the-Girl had done
today I decided not to mention her escapade. He was just happy knowing she’d
been with me.
Sunday, July 8, 2012
the boy and the flower
I finished off a couple more layouts this weekend. Both of them, I can quite proudly say, involved using all products I already had at home, other than one sheet of cardboard.
The first one is a photo of Juniordwarf when he was at the height of his "don't take any more photos of me, Mum" period. He actually asked me to take a photo of him. I was happy to oblige.
I really love these papers for boy layouts. This is a good thing, because I have a lot of them.
The second one relates back to a blog post I did last year.
After I'd finished the layout I realised I needed to tell the story of why this flower gets its own layout. I was lucky enough to find a small folder that matched the colours of the layout that I could hide the story in - the story is the same as last year's blog post (you need to scroll past the Hipstamatic stuff to read the story there).
And I think this might be the first layout I've done that hasn't included any photos.
The first one is a photo of Juniordwarf when he was at the height of his "don't take any more photos of me, Mum" period. He actually asked me to take a photo of him. I was happy to oblige.
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| Kaisercraft "Rewind" Collection |
The second one relates back to a blog post I did last year.
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| Basic Grey "Infuse Collection" |
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| One of the die cuts from "Infuse" |
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| K & Co mini folder to hold the journalling |
After I'd finished the layout I realised I needed to tell the story of why this flower gets its own layout. I was lucky enough to find a small folder that matched the colours of the layout that I could hide the story in - the story is the same as last year's blog post (you need to scroll past the Hipstamatic stuff to read the story there).
And I think this might be the first layout I've done that hasn't included any photos.
Saturday, June 30, 2012
finishing some layouts
To prove that I do actually finish things, here are some of my recent layouts.
The first two have been sitting around half finished in the good old "in progress" file for longer than I care to admit.
This is a direct scraplift of a layout I saw in a book I borrowed from the library a couple of years ago. I can't remember the name of the book, but the designer of the layout is Tracey Odachowski. Take a look at the fancy cutting out there.
The third layout has also been sitting in the "in progress" file for a while, but only because I found the toilet training scrapbooking paper (yes, there is such a thing!) in my local shop and wanted to make sure I remembered to use it. I wasn't going to use any photos, just the chart. Then I saw a Becky Fleck sketch that had a large photo with some small round photos/embellishments and thought it would look good to use some small photos as well to tell the story of our toilet training experience. The journalling is hidden behind the chart - the blue tab at the top is where you can pull it out.
And two more just because I finished them:
Using some very old s.e.i papers.
I saw the pre-cut title for this page and knew it would be perfect for these photos, which were taken on Mothers Day this year. It's based on a sketch from Creating Keepsakes magazine.
The first two have been sitting around half finished in the good old "in progress" file for longer than I care to admit.
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| Autumn Leaves at the Botanical Gardens June 2010 |
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| Upside Down May 2010 |
This is a direct scraplift of a layout I saw in a book I borrowed from the library a couple of years ago. I can't remember the name of the book, but the designer of the layout is Tracey Odachowski. Take a look at the fancy cutting out there.
The third layout has also been sitting in the "in progress" file for a while, but only because I found the toilet training scrapbooking paper (yes, there is such a thing!) in my local shop and wanted to make sure I remembered to use it. I wasn't going to use any photos, just the chart. Then I saw a Becky Fleck sketch that had a large photo with some small round photos/embellishments and thought it would look good to use some small photos as well to tell the story of our toilet training experience. The journalling is hidden behind the chart - the blue tab at the top is where you can pull it out.
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| Toilet Training April 2010 |
And two more just because I finished them:
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| Santa 2011 |
Using some very old s.e.i papers.
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| I can read May 2012 |
I saw the pre-cut title for this page and knew it would be perfect for these photos, which were taken on Mothers Day this year. It's based on a sketch from Creating Keepsakes magazine.
Sunday, June 10, 2012
healthy heart - week 1
I've now completed Week 1 of the Healthy Heart Challenge.
At the start of the week, I set my goal for the week: to walk for 10 minutes each day. My aim was to start working out the best time or times of each day when it might be possible for me to incorporate exercise.
I was rather pleased with my efforts:
Monday: 2 x 15 minute walks
Tuesday: 2 x 10 minute walks
Wednesday: 1 x 15 minute walk and 1 x 25 minute walk
Thursday: 2 x 20 minute walks
Friday: 1 x 15 minute walk
Saturday: 1 x 25 minute walk and 1 x 20 minute walk
Sunday: 1 x 40 minute walk
That's well above that I set out to do.
This week I'm on holidays, so the opportunities for exercise will be different than on my normal working weeks. With this in mind, my target for this week is to walk for 20 minutes each day, either in two 10 minute blocks or one 20 minute walk - depending on the day, where I am and what I'm doing.
I don't think this will be a big stretch - I already achieved that almost every day this week - but as I explained, I'm trying to build the habit at this stage, not to rush into an exercise program that I can't maintain over the long term.
So far, so good.
At the start of the week, I set my goal for the week: to walk for 10 minutes each day. My aim was to start working out the best time or times of each day when it might be possible for me to incorporate exercise.
I was rather pleased with my efforts:
Monday: 2 x 15 minute walks
Tuesday: 2 x 10 minute walks
Wednesday: 1 x 15 minute walk and 1 x 25 minute walk
Thursday: 2 x 20 minute walks
Friday: 1 x 15 minute walk
Saturday: 1 x 25 minute walk and 1 x 20 minute walk
Sunday: 1 x 40 minute walk
That's well above that I set out to do.
This week I'm on holidays, so the opportunities for exercise will be different than on my normal working weeks. With this in mind, my target for this week is to walk for 20 minutes each day, either in two 10 minute blocks or one 20 minute walk - depending on the day, where I am and what I'm doing.
I don't think this will be a big stretch - I already achieved that almost every day this week - but as I explained, I'm trying to build the habit at this stage, not to rush into an exercise program that I can't maintain over the long term.
So far, so good.
Monday, June 4, 2012
Healthy Heart
A couple of weeks ago I signed up for the Heart Foundation's Healthy Heart Challenge, which is part of the "Go Red for Women" campaign to raise awareness about heart disease in women.
It's an online challenge that starts today and runs for six weeks. Participants select an area they would like to focus on (being active, healthy eating, cholesterol or blood pressure) and set goals each week to improve in the area of their choice.
I've chosen exercise as my goal.
After my miserable attempt at reintroducing running into my life late last year, I've been fairly inactive and that worries me. The fact that I needed to do something became very clear a few months ago when I stepped onto the scales for the first time in months and discovered to my horror that I was very close to weighing the heaviest I'd ever been.
At that point I decided things had to change.
I'd got rid of a lot of clothes that became too big for me after I lost about 15 kg seven years ago (before I got pregnant and stacked most of it back on again), and I really didn't want to see myself going out and buying more clothes in those sizes.
I actually weighed a lot less back when Juniordwarf was a baby but since then the weight has steadily crept back on, in that sneaky way that weight does when you aren't paying attention. I really don't think I can use the excuse of baby weight when the "baby" is in Prep.
After that horrifying realisation, I started to make a few changes to my diet. I've lost about three kilos over three months, but I know I need to do more, especially in terms of exercising. When I heard about this challenge I thought it would be the perfect way to gradually start to exercise again, doing a little bit more each week, with the intention of cementing some new habits into my life.
With that in mind, I've set myself a very low goal for the first week: to walk for 10 minutes a day. It doesn't matter when or where. Just getting out and doing it is all I want to do at this stage.
Because I have a different schedule almost every day, I find it hard to fit in a regular time for exercise. Then I tend to give up altogether because I miss a session or two that I'm supposed to be doing but where the time isn't convenient for that particular day. So my aim over the next six weeks is to work out the best time or times each day to get moving, and then to actually do it at those times. And to stick with it.
Progress so far: 1/1.
It's an online challenge that starts today and runs for six weeks. Participants select an area they would like to focus on (being active, healthy eating, cholesterol or blood pressure) and set goals each week to improve in the area of their choice.
I've chosen exercise as my goal.
After my miserable attempt at reintroducing running into my life late last year, I've been fairly inactive and that worries me. The fact that I needed to do something became very clear a few months ago when I stepped onto the scales for the first time in months and discovered to my horror that I was very close to weighing the heaviest I'd ever been.
At that point I decided things had to change.
I'd got rid of a lot of clothes that became too big for me after I lost about 15 kg seven years ago (before I got pregnant and stacked most of it back on again), and I really didn't want to see myself going out and buying more clothes in those sizes.
I actually weighed a lot less back when Juniordwarf was a baby but since then the weight has steadily crept back on, in that sneaky way that weight does when you aren't paying attention. I really don't think I can use the excuse of baby weight when the "baby" is in Prep.
After that horrifying realisation, I started to make a few changes to my diet. I've lost about three kilos over three months, but I know I need to do more, especially in terms of exercising. When I heard about this challenge I thought it would be the perfect way to gradually start to exercise again, doing a little bit more each week, with the intention of cementing some new habits into my life.
With that in mind, I've set myself a very low goal for the first week: to walk for 10 minutes a day. It doesn't matter when or where. Just getting out and doing it is all I want to do at this stage.
Because I have a different schedule almost every day, I find it hard to fit in a regular time for exercise. Then I tend to give up altogether because I miss a session or two that I'm supposed to be doing but where the time isn't convenient for that particular day. So my aim over the next six weeks is to work out the best time or times each day to get moving, and then to actually do it at those times. And to stick with it.
Progress so far: 1/1.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Trout Weekend
We went for the Inland Fisheries' annual Trout Weekend, which is held at IFS' Field Station, near Great Lake. We decided that rather than drive up and back in a day, we'd stay up there overnight, so it was a nice weekend getaway.
Among the things to see and do was the angling pool, where kids could catch trout; watching trout being stripped of eggs (a very strange thing to see); and helicopter rides, which we decided at the last minute to do, because it's not an opportunity that you get every day.
It was a fun weekend and, although it was cold and there was some snow on the ground, it wasn't as freezing as we'd expected. Today was a beautiful, clear sunny day, perfect for our helicopter ride.
Juniordwarf was very excited to catch a fish from the trout pool, and was even more excited when he got a certificate (he's highly motivated by certificates at the moment). He thought it was great to catch a fish that he could eat for dinner - only once it was on his plate, he said he didn't like it and filled up on carrots instead.
For the record, the trout was 35 cm long and weighed 600 grams. Not a huge trophy fish, but perfect for the three of us.
On the way home, we stopped to have a look at the Steppes Stones, which are some wonderful sculptures by Stephen Walker in the middle of the bush.
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| Great Lake at Miena - trying out the AutoStitch Panorama app on my phone |
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| Great Lake at Miena |
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| Great Lake Hotel, where we stayed |
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| Juniordwarf was fascinated by the egg stripping |
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| IFS officer talking about egg stripping |
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| Juniordwarf and his fish |
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| Near Liawenee |
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| Helicopter ride |
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| Helicopter ride |
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| View of Great Lake from the helicopter |
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| Helicopter ride |
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| We stopped to look at the fantastic Steppes Stones on the way home |
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| The Steppes Stones by Stephen Walker |
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| The Steppes Stones |
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| Country road, take me home . . . (outside Bothwell) |
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