Thursday 12 August 2010

Our playground

The lovely big patch of grass with surrounding woods that I wrote about in "Saturday morning nature fix" has become our new playground. We head there two or three times a week to....play!

We've been getting pretty good with our tree climbing so a few days ago I took along my iphone to film us in our nifty action. In my head, I was not unlike a ninja, jumping and twisting through the trees with gymnastic prowess. So, OHHH, how disappointing when David filmed me and I watched the playback. More granny-style than ninja-style, my leaps were more like tentative hops and I actually looked like I was stuck in the tree rather than smoothly negotiating myself through it. David, of course, only needed the head gear and could easily have pulled off being an actual ninja.

The good thing is, once I got over the horror of my ungainliness (if that's a word - it should be, I personify it when I climb trees), because I'd seen how I was moving, I was able to change it. There's nothing more informative than seeing yourself on film, excrutiating though it is. I began to move faster through the trees and the resulting film footage was far more promising.

What I'm also finding - which I predicted - is that I'm getting stronger using this as a method of strength training but not suffering the same tightness in my chest/shoulders that I've had using dumbbells and doing more traditional work. And you can start at any level - I have a "pull up branch" that I use but it's low to the ground so I can have my feet on the floor. There are higher ones for proper pull ups too, so anyone can benefit from this method. And it's outside and smells like fresh air and grass, not inside a gym that smells of sweaty people....

Not going to post any of the film footage here yet until I look like someone to aspire to rather than laugh at......

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