I'm back!

Monday, May 02, 2011

Isn't it something when your best laid plans and intentions are turned upside down by real life? My "I know what I want to do" resolutions were postponed while I had to go to Florida again. This time I helped my father sort through his house and decide what he wanted to bring north and then pack everything and drive him back with me. It's been a tough challenge ending with two days driving 12 hour shifts.

To my Sparks friends in Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia...what beautiful landscape you have! I want to return with Bill and Buddy and take our time on a painting trip.
We drove back north through the daisies, iris and poppies to a chilly early spring filled here with daffodils and tulips in my yard. I love it all!

I missed you all more than I can say! No computer was tough to deal with because it's awfully hard "to get by" without a little help from our friends.

Now the good news is that I didn't gain any weight down there, despite the stress. I may even be down a half a pound. The heat and humidity and especially the amount of work packing, kept me from my daily walks. But the packing and lifting must have helped some. Best of all,
I'm back and I'm excited to revisit my Sparks goals and especially to catch up on what my friends have all been up to! I pray you're doing well and enjoying the journey!

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I know what I want to do!

Friday, April 01, 2011

This blog was almost titled, "what I need to do", but that puts the motivation outside myself and I want it here, inside this mind and body. Setting the bar low in order to inch my way back into my program has given me limited success. It's been close enough to my old habits that it's too easy to backslide. I feel like I'm hanging in here by my fingernails!

Emotionally, our 4 legged friends Buddy and Pongo have helped me regain my optimism, as well as my daily walks. So that's in place. I know that I can do regular strength training, because I have my previous streaks and the completion of several bootcamps to prove it. I have incredible role models here on this site. So back up goes my bar. My goal is 1 exercise video per day...bootcamp style. Here I come, Coach Nicole. I'll post my progress here every couple of days. Spring is coming and it's time for all of us to BLOOM! We can do it!

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Challenges

Sunday, March 27, 2011

It's a sunny wintery day here in Northeastern PA. We just got back from a lovely walk at our favorite farm, the one where they're making maple syrup right now. The sunshine promises that spring is coming, despite the chilly wind and the snow that remains in the fields.

My personal spring seems to be just as long in coming. I've been struggling and losing the fight in eating healhfully this past week. I've been trying both to put the brakes on as well as understand why I feel compelled to eat too much of the wrong things, when I know it's not contributing to my health. I don't like admitting this failure to myself or to you. I read the blogs of so many wonderful, committed successful members and that's where I long to be and where I felt like I was heading before I lost my way during these last two months of TOUGH life challenges. When things kept coming at me like breakers in the ocean, my new found good habits didn't seem to hold.

But I didn't lose them all at once or even lose them all. I'm still here, online and looking to my favorite mentors. I'm still walking every day and twice a day as often as I can. I'm realizing just how much more difficult is is to sooth myself with food. I'm wearing my pedometer today and looking for those steps.There's a voice inside myself that believes that I can do this thing, especially with a little help from my friends.

I want and need to plan my meals better, so I'm not at work without good food I can eat. I need to hang up the phone when a phone call becomes too much to listen to. I need to take care of the big things that need doing to make time for listening to my heart for new delights. I'm happy to say that one of these is spending time with this new canine pal, Buddy. And his sparring partner, Pongo the cat. They makes me laugh!
I'm going to prune some of my Sparks teams and concentrate on getting back to basics. I'll be back when I know I have time to be a better team member. And I'll continue to support and celebrate all of my great Spark friends who inspire me and help me go forward, one step at a time. Have a great week everyone! We can do it!

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Spring Thaw

Saturday, March 19, 2011

What a difference a month can make. It's early days here, but spring is coming. We have incredible amounts of work to do in our yard and garden. The seed pods we left for the birds look bedraggled and we've lost evergreens that we planted just last year. But the pond is thawed and our fish are swimming. We're looking for the wonderful mud puppy newts in our pond. We see them best at night with the flashlight. They look prehistoric and beautiful.
Tonight the moon is supposed to be amazing...closer and larger than it's been in a very long time. It's magic to feel the rebirth, to look for the frog and fish eggs and the shoots of new bulbs pushing up through the decaying leaves from last year. We have snowdrops and crocus announcing the arrival of spring.

Our hearts are beginning to heal too. We will never forget the great love and unique gifts our dear heart Honey shared with us every single day. In some mysterious way, we feel she helped us find Buddy Rufus. He wasn't the cutest dog in the hundreds of dogs I searched on Petfinder. We were approved for several adoptions. But once we met him, we couldn't leave him there at the shelter.

Our new 2 year old pup is just a wonderful boy...I think you understand the feeling of coming out of the mind numbing pain into the light of healing. This amazing boy languished in a kennel for over a year and I can't describe the joy we feel as he wakes up every day and realizes again that he has his own people, a home, a routine to look forward to. And for us, the blessing of being part of this is just bringing us both back to life.

So spring is unfolding and we feel profoundly grateful. More great walks, great companionship and a full house here with our cat Pongo and new pal Buddy. Life is good!

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New Walking Pal

Thursday, March 17, 2011

We welcome "Buddy Rufus", formerly Dale, to our family. He spent more than half of his short life at a place called Animal Care Sanctuary. Even though they're an amazing facility who cares for these deserving animals all their lives if they can't find homes, these beautiful dogs, cats, & horses long for their own people and forever homes. Please consider adopting and/or supporting these wonderful rescues! www.animalcaresanctuary.org/

PS Buddy is great...he's finding his inner puppy again! And I have my 10,000 steps already today. I know Honey would approve!

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