No doubt about it, I'm an Autumn Baby. With a birthday is in September (You know I'll start celebrating the whole month in just a few days) and, of course, I live in the south - in the muggy buggy sleepy swampy coastal land of Virginia. Secretly ... well, not really all that secretly ... I am proud that I can endure a tidewater Virginia summer. But most of all I have always been glad to see those mosquitoey days draw to a close. I can't wait for the crisp bite of a north wind, the clear blue of a humidity free sky - I even like the song of the cricket - so long as he stays outside to do his wooing.
It has always been a mystery, why so many of my friends (including ThePrince) prefer the summer and sigh wistfully at it's closing. Till this year. This year we have had AIR CONDITIONING! I have only spent one summer in my life living in a place that was air conditioned and I had a sore throat all that summer. So I have always been a little suspicious of living and especially sleeping in air conditioning. Instead, I've known what the weather is like out there. I have felt the stifling heat of a second floor bedroom, gasping beneath a wet washcloth on my chest as I waited for sleep to take me away from the hotness. I have kicked off the sheet in my sleep. I've gotten the ice pack out of the freezer and wrapped it in a towel so that I could lie on it till my chilled blood circulated through my body to cool it down.
Not This Year.
This has been a summer of closed windows, clean floors, bug-less sills. This year there have been no stuck dresser drawers, no mildew spores creeping across leather shoes and no no-see-ums whining in my ear. But this has felt like the year without a summer. This year, since I haven't "felt" summer, I can't really feel like there has even *been* a summer. I know. It's a Right Brain Thing.
And here we are, facing the last weekend of it. (you might think summer lasts till the 21st of September, but ask any 4th grader and she will tell you it's over on the first day of school) I feel like I've been caught off guard.
And what does this girl do when she is caught off guard?
She pulls out her Notebook and Starts A New List!
First I listed all the wonderful things that have filled the past 10 weeks. Then I wrote down everything I could think of that I want right now. And then I started the list of steps I need to take to get the things I want right now.
And number one on the list - no duh - is to drop the added lbs that an air conditioned summer has allowed to creep back onto this body.
ooooo. Notice how I found SOMETHING ELSE to blame for the weight gain?
No - just joking. The weight gain came from choices made over and over and over again. One more bite; an extra ice cream bar; wine AND dessert at the same meal - two days in a row. Hel-OH-oh.
But there is nothing like a new month, a BIRTHDAY month - heralding in a New Season - to inspire a girl to revamp her could-be-more-healthy lifestyle. First on the agenda is to do a new assessment with my WW ActiveLink activity monitor. I started that on Sunday. The initial assessment was done at a time when I was lifting weights with a personal trainer. I haven't done that since my shoulder problems flared up in December. I can plug my little monitor in to the website and it will assess my daily activity and suggest ways to improve it. I'm ready for a fresh start and new challenge.
Second will be to commit to eating in the weight-loss zone. I know what that needs to be. Time to be like Nike and Just Do It.
Between those two choices runs the golden path to the body I really do want; the body with the energy to do all the other Fresh Start Things on my Autumn 2014 list.
And as a reward for hitting my goal weight I will cast on a new project - no. I will buy yarn!!! and then cast on a new project - in spite of the whining and sighing of all the UFOs tucked here and there about the house. I have chosen Amy Herzog's Telluride Aran pullover:
And since I am as in love with the color as I am with the design I will log onto Webbs and see if its available.
There are some Other Things on my New Things List that I'll share soon but this is my pumped up post for a Thursday morning - at the tail end of August in my Year Without a Summer.
It has always been a mystery, why so many of my friends (including ThePrince) prefer the summer and sigh wistfully at it's closing. Till this year. This year we have had AIR CONDITIONING! I have only spent one summer in my life living in a place that was air conditioned and I had a sore throat all that summer. So I have always been a little suspicious of living and especially sleeping in air conditioning. Instead, I've known what the weather is like out there. I have felt the stifling heat of a second floor bedroom, gasping beneath a wet washcloth on my chest as I waited for sleep to take me away from the hotness. I have kicked off the sheet in my sleep. I've gotten the ice pack out of the freezer and wrapped it in a towel so that I could lie on it till my chilled blood circulated through my body to cool it down.
Not This Year.
This has been a summer of closed windows, clean floors, bug-less sills. This year there have been no stuck dresser drawers, no mildew spores creeping across leather shoes and no no-see-ums whining in my ear. But this has felt like the year without a summer. This year, since I haven't "felt" summer, I can't really feel like there has even *been* a summer. I know. It's a Right Brain Thing.
And here we are, facing the last weekend of it. (you might think summer lasts till the 21st of September, but ask any 4th grader and she will tell you it's over on the first day of school) I feel like I've been caught off guard.
And what does this girl do when she is caught off guard?
She pulls out her Notebook and Starts A New List!
First I listed all the wonderful things that have filled the past 10 weeks. Then I wrote down everything I could think of that I want right now. And then I started the list of steps I need to take to get the things I want right now.
And number one on the list - no duh - is to drop the added lbs that an air conditioned summer has allowed to creep back onto this body.
ooooo. Notice how I found SOMETHING ELSE to blame for the weight gain?
No - just joking. The weight gain came from choices made over and over and over again. One more bite; an extra ice cream bar; wine AND dessert at the same meal - two days in a row. Hel-OH-oh.
But there is nothing like a new month, a BIRTHDAY month - heralding in a New Season - to inspire a girl to revamp her could-be-more-healthy lifestyle. First on the agenda is to do a new assessment with my WW ActiveLink activity monitor. I started that on Sunday. The initial assessment was done at a time when I was lifting weights with a personal trainer. I haven't done that since my shoulder problems flared up in December. I can plug my little monitor in to the website and it will assess my daily activity and suggest ways to improve it. I'm ready for a fresh start and new challenge.
Second will be to commit to eating in the weight-loss zone. I know what that needs to be. Time to be like Nike and Just Do It.
Between those two choices runs the golden path to the body I really do want; the body with the energy to do all the other Fresh Start Things on my Autumn 2014 list.
And as a reward for hitting my goal weight I will cast on a new project - no. I will buy yarn!!! and then cast on a new project - in spite of the whining and sighing of all the UFOs tucked here and there about the house. I have chosen Amy Herzog's Telluride Aran pullover:
And since I am as in love with the color as I am with the design I will log onto Webbs and see if its available.
There are some Other Things on my New Things List that I'll share soon but this is my pumped up post for a Thursday morning - at the tail end of August in my Year Without a Summer.
Glad to see you're digging the needles out -- though with AC I'd have thought you'd have been cool enough during your "non-summer" to get in a few rows here and there already! Lovely sweater selection -- classic and classy -- like you, my friend! :-)
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