Rolling stool

Look at this, 2 days of blogging in a row! This one is a therapy update.

Who would ever think that an innocent thing like this simple rolling stool...

 

Source

 ... could become an instrument of torture! Ok, I might be exaggerating a little, but honestly my newest therapy exercise is the hardest one so far. I have to put my good leg on one of the wheel legs and wheel myself around the carpeted therapy room with my bad leg... for 3 minutes. It doesn't sound that hard, but seeing as it's been just 2 1/2 months since my ACL reconstruction, and I have to use my hamstring muscle (which they took the graft for the ACL from) it is not fun. I knew it was coming, because it was one of the exercises I had to do before therapy.

I also graduated from the exercise bike to the elliptical machine last Friday. I go backwards on it. The first day it was a little hard, but today was not bad at all. It is the nicest elliptical I've ever seen; it even has a fan underneath the display to keep the exerciser cool!

Summer Photo Challenge (Second last one)

Well, this is the second last challenge and this one was particularly difficult for me It is a bokeh- something I knew absolutely nothing about. So I looked it up and it is basically where part of the image is artistically blurry. I am still not sure I did it right, but the resulting image is pretty so, here goes.

The flower is a Rose of Sharon, or a Hibiscus syriacus. We have several of these in our back yard, and they are quickly becoming one of my favorite flowers. All the ones we have are purpley- pink. My mom transplanted this one for me from the side of our shed to its current location, next to the deck stairs. This pretty flower greets me every time I open the back door to let Finn out.

The last photo for the challenge will go up later this week, close to the official end of summer. I think I am going to find a challenge for Fall. Or maybe I will make up my own.

Post-post (hehe) edit... My flowers color coordinates well with my summer blog background.

Summer

Well, seeing as this Monday is Labor Day (already!?), and the unofficial end of summer, this is the perfect time for this post. My summertime guilty pleasures. This was my post from the blog swap, so you may have already seen it here, but for everyone else, here it is!

This summer has been very different then normal. At the end of June I had knee surgery, and I thought this summer was going to be boring. I was wrong. Instead of; working at the daycare (playing with the kids in the water, trying to hide from the sun in that little bit of shade that we have in the play area, enjoying the fresh air but not the heat) going to fairs and festivals with my family, and swimming when I can, I've been; sitting on the couch, icing my knee, watching TV or playing on the computer, learning how to loom knit, going to therapy, and best of all, bonding with Finn (our 18 month old goofy puppy), and hanging out with my mom!

So even though I haven't been able to do the same things as usual, there are some things I can't get through a summer without. These are a few of my summertime guilty pleasures:

Campfires with my family and friends: For me, there is nothing more fun and relaxing then hanging out, sharing laughs, and making s'mores over the fire. They are usually pretty impromptu events, someone suggesting "Let's have a fire tonight (or this weekend)!" and then we just run with it. We haven't had many fires this year, due to the heat, but the ones we've had were definitely bright spots of the summer, especially the early days of my recovery. My dad even borrowed an outdoor chaise lounge chair from their next door neighbors so that I could sit somewhere and have my leg straight.



Summertime reality TV: Mainly Big Brother, and America's Got Talent. I am usually not a big reality TV person. I don't watch Survivor, Jersey Shore, the Bachelor, etc., but as soon as the weather starts to get hot, I start looking for information on Big Brother. My sister got me hooked on Big Brother a few seasons ago because she never missed an episode, and I wanted to know what was so interesting. My parents watch it too, as does my husband (sometimes), so it gives us something else to discuss. I like America's Got Talent, because some of the talents the contestants display are just astonishing. I still find it amusing that the judges are from the UK and Canada though.



Kettle Corn: Summer is fair and festival season, and that means one thing, kettle corn! I love the sweet/salty combination, and most of the time it comes warm, straight from the kettle. I can't get enough of the stuff, so unless I am sharing, I try not to get the biggest bag. I'm not always successful though, especially since I learned that to keep it from going stale, all I have to do is stick it in the freezer. If it makes it that far.



So even though this summer has been different, it's been great!