Happy New Year everyone! Just sitting here reflecting on the evening ahead and the memories from the past year. What’s ahead for us is a dinner with family then home to care for our American Staffordshire/Lab mix, Tucker, who is terrified of fireworks. Our Gracie doesn’t love them either, but Tucker needs a Thundershirt and a sedative to get through the night. We try to always be home for him on evenings like this.
We’ve gone the party route for New Year’s Eve, but for the past five years or more we have stayed home. As pet owners we are responsible for the mental and physical wellbeing of our babies and that includes Tucker’s phobia.
All that aside, I am looking forward to 2019 – not as a do over, but as an opportunity to better the commitments I made for 2018. This year, I recognized my pattern of healthy eating and exercise which I commit to every year and only lasts until April at the longest. Knowing this is my habit will help me fight against this trend in 2019. I’m nothing if not competitive even if it is besting myself! I love eating well, but I also love to eat things that are rich, sugary, fatty and empty of nutrients. Go figure. I love to go to the gym and workout. Our local gym closed earlier this year and I’ve been working out (rarely) at a sister gym that is growing on me. I love it when I get into the gym. With my headphones tuned to Pandora’s Latin Workout Radio, I hit the treadmill to get my 10,500-step Fitbit goal, then do upper body, leg, abs (or all three) workouts. My biggest problem is getting there. With freelance writing, photography, volunteer commitments, bible study class, fostering dogs and more, it can seem like a big commitment to take a chunk of two to three days a week to visit the gym. I wish I was one of those people who could do yoga with a TV show, but I need community. I do walk my pups, but that is really all the working out I get by myself.
So, it’s to the gym for me much more regularly this year, healthier eating through out the year (which includes avoiding preservatives as much as possible) and reasonable portion control.
What are your plans for a healthy new year? Do you have a pup who suffers anxiety from fireworks and thunderstorms? How do you deal with it?
Have to go now. Our three seven-week-old foster pups are calling!
Happy Holidays,
Cathy fff ffffffff
