Hormonal Hannah has lost a few fights!

Step one of stress control: Face your fears; be more active; watch what you drink. Sorry bloggees, but Baggy has been so focussed on these that she ran out of day again yesterday! The other one being to "keep busy", which definitely helps Baggy to keep Hormonal Hannah at bay. So she's combined them. One of Baggy's biggest fears over the last nine years, has been letting Grotty Groom ride her beloved Boy Wessles. A perfectly logical fear after her fall that nearly killed her, if he's being sharp, spooky and difficult, but 98% of the time he isn't - he's an extremely well-behaved, chilled out Boy who is a pleasure to ride. Difficult sometimes, but a pleasure nonetheless. But still Baggy's self-preservation "flight" instincts kick in regularly when Grotty wants to ride and she uses any excuse not to get on him. However, since Baggy's first Stress Management Course last Wednesday, Grotty had a lesson on Thursday, schooled Wessles on her own on Friday, schooled him with Calum and Joey in the positively terrifying dressage arena on Saturday, then hacked out yesterday with Cal and Joe in strong winds, wearing her brand new boots and jodphurs (which felt completely different and therefore made Hormonal Hannah panic).

Interestingly, once Grotty had ridden a few hundred yards with Hannah telling Baggy that the new boots were really hurting her (they weren't), Clever Bird had a realisation. Baggy's left leg always flaps about like a demented sparrow when Grotty rides. She just can't seem to control it - the toes, that should be pointing forward, stick out at a 45-degree angle away from Wesley. Probably because her pelvis is always "out" due to her lack of the main core muscle ( yeah thanks for that Lawrence!). Since her surgery, it's been even worse than normal. But in the new boots, when Baggy looked down, her foot was a) not flapping and b) pointing forwards! Grotty was rather chuffed and Clever Bird realised that it's because the new boots are "proper" stiff leather dressage boots, whereas the boots she's been riding in for the last nine years or so, are beautiful soft, floppy leather, that you can't really even feel and therefore provide no support to the ankle at all. Plus her "missing" muscle is finally beginning to work since her physiotherapy exercises, and Grotty has been riding Wesley instead of just sitting on him. So Grotty decided to canter Wesley up the hill. Yee-hah!

Today, after Furry Mama had taken Minty Mutt on a ninety-minute walk and The Domestic Goddess had done some major catching up, Gloria Gardener decided to water all the pots - cue the rain. So The Goddess decided to vacuum, then the sun reappeared, so Creative Clara decided that Baggy would be better out than in. As Gloria couldn't mow a wet lawn, she decided to start painting sheds instead.  To say they needed it would be an understatement - the before photo.......

Much shower-hopping went on as the weather couldn't make its mind up, so six hours later, the main shed had one coat on......

and the little shed had one coat on the front.....

As the sheds are literally slurping the paint up, Clara will need to take Baggy to buy more of it! It says to put on two or three coats, so Gloria has her work cut out! She also has another tiny shed to paint and the summer house (now re-named Baggy's woman-cave), so busy, busy, busy physical activity will keep Hannah out of the way nicely, hopefully. As the next downpour commenced, Baggy was locking the shed when Furry Mama realised that the Hinge cat had decided to be the "curious" cat......

Yep bloggees Baggy's next physical activity will be to attempt to "reclaim" the shed, by re-cluttering the house. No, of course you're right bloggees, Clever Bird might need to have a bit of a rethink - throw stuff away you say? Now let's not get carried away........