Fitness, Neighbours and Some Stitching

Considering I planned on losing about 3 stones this year I can safely say I am nowhere near to achieving it. Injuring my back at the start of the year certainly knocked me back two months but for the last two months I have been seriously lacking in the motivation required to get out of bed and down to the pool or gym first thing most mornings. I've also found that I'm even lacking the inspiration to hit the hills which has meant I have kept going in a downward spiral.

Two weeks ago I finally dragged myself down to the pool and just about made my way through 40 lengths or 1 km. Given that 50 lengths is my normal easy swim this is not good, even worse I ached all over the next day. As the first step is always the hardest last week I made it down to the pool twice and managed 50 lengths each time but I can definitely say it's going to be a long haul before I'm back to where I was this time last year.

When I'm getting over a back injury I also try to make a walk part of my daily routine. As I live in a hilly part of town I can make this easy or hard by varying the route to include as many hills as I want. Today I finally managed to get myself out for a walk so that's another step in the right direction. Two months later than it should of been but I'll let myself off that one as I have been doing a lot of walking anyway delivering flyers for Husband. Once I've got my swim up to a decent distance I'll head back to the gym which is the real test for my back and level of fitness.

I thought I'd share with you these roses, which aren't from Husband put a thank you from one of my neighbours.

I spent 5 hours on Saturday painting/staining the fence at the side of her house. As we share part of the fence with her I felt it was only right that we painted our part of the fence. As she didn't like the first colour she had already put on half of the fence I actually ended up doing all of the fence and not just the bit we shared with her but as it was a glorious day I didn't mind and I certainly wasn't expecting anything for it.

I have started a new stitching project, but I can't show you it as its a gift for a reader of my blog.

As promised here is a picture of Celtic Autumn which is the major cause of my lack of sewing this month.

She now needs to go onto a scroll frame but I just can't bring myself to do it even though I know I must if I don't want to end up crushing the metallic threads.

I've also made one small addition to my stash. Its a new Lizzie Kate design which I just had to get as nearly everyone of them is made for my shopaholic, shoe, bag, clothes and make-up loving Daughter. My idea of hell her idea of a great time.