Ordinarily Extraordinary Anna

Everyday thoughts, discoveries and projects from an ordinary life

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I've never seen this before. A nest of ants have moved their eggs onto my kitchen window for safekeeping. It's fascinating to watch them. We've had quite a bit of rain over the past few days, so perhaps their nest flooded.

When your birthday starts like this, it's gotta be a great year, right?! This is my local beach, pristine, uncrowded and beautiful. It's about 2.5km from my front door, a 5 minute drive or 15 minute bike ride, yet I've been there a handful of times in the three years we've lived here. I'm not a 'beachy' person; my ultra pale skin ensures that. Yet I love to walk along the beach. Seeing the ocean, dipping my toes into the water, smelling the salt air, feeling the wet sand between my toes all make me happy. I've always lived within 1.5 hrs of the beach, but never this close before. This year I am determined to make the time and effort to walk along the beach at least once a week. It's one of my physical goals for 2020 but will also benefit me in other areas. This morning, I dragged my husband out of bed ('cos it's my birthday, so he couldn't say no 😉) and we cycled to the local farmers market to buy breakfast, continued to the beach to eat breakfast before walking along the beach then cycling back home.

Here I am, at the start of the first full week of a brand new year, smiling, happy, feeling strong (although rather tired and out of breath) at the end of an 8km team row at my gym yesterday. (Yep, that's me on the left, the pale sweaty one.😅) When I heard this was our challenge, I had a moment of fear, I wanted to leave, but I didn't. I stuck around, I played my part, I gave it my best. Our team broke this intimidating task down and we all took our turns, eventually rowing 2kms each in manageable 250m chunks. It took a while (you can see our time on the paper) but we did it, together. I couldn't have done it alone and couldn't even have done my part in one go. That's the beauty of teamwork. I love the way every day and every session is different @ufit_australia. I love the way Ryan and April gently nudge me out of my comfort zone and keep me on track. I love the way everyone is so supportive and encouraging. We are all different ages, have different fitness levels, health issues, limitations and goals, yet we work together and get the job done. We get fitter, stronger and healthier together, whatever our starting point. Group personal training works for me, and at Ufit, the emphasis is always on personal. You just don't get this at a big franchised gym. I know because I've been there and done that. I started this year fitter than last year and look forward to another great year of training and progress in 2020. I wonder what today's session will bring. 🤔🙂 (Just so you know, this is in no way a sponsored post.)

SMUG Mexican feast for dinner at our place tonight. Fish tacos, Mexibeans, Red Rice, Guacamole, Pickled Cabbage and this A-mazing Fancy Pants Corn. A bit more effort than I'm used to but this corn is truly next level! Thanks @smugcookingschool for the delicious menu and recipes.

What better time to begin a new habit than the first Saturday of the year? This morning I was awake early, so visited @kawanawatersfarmersmarkets and filled my @hamlinfistula market basket with locally grown, freshly picked green goodness. I bought myself this basket for Christmas and it's the perfect size for a weekly market shop for 2. Although only a 5 minute drive from home, I haven't been to these markets for years, and they've grown. My old favourites are still there, along with lots of new-to-me stalls. Now I just need to work out how to carry my basket home on my bike to add exercise to the mix and eliminate parking issues.

These days, it's rare to get the family together and even rarer to get a photo. The kids have moved out, they're studying, have partners. I like to get a photo of the four of us each Christmas and was lucky enough to get grudging cooperation again this year. (It's a Mum thing at Christmas, right?) This year has been an interesting one for me and I'm hoping next year will be better. Sending love from our family to yours, hoping your Christmas was merry and bright and that 2020 will be an amazing year for us all.

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