This post has been well and truly overdue.

I’m a big fan or social media, it has it place and sometimes it’s used well and sometimes it’s not. One example of social media working well is the Adelaide City Council’s

Splash Adelaide pop up events program. Marketed as a creating a vibrant city.

I’ve been a follower of Sprout Cooking for a while now and also of Splash Adelaide

Picnic Lane came up on my feed as a pop up event which turned the lane way aside of the new Harris Scarf building into a lane-way with fake grass and a place to sit and eat lunch with produce from the Adelaide Central Market.

The Sprout team hand picked the two lunch box choices which at $10 including juice was a bargain.

As part of the setup I noticed some Apple Crates with a sort of boxed garden setup. We’d always planned to put in raised (boxed) garden beds in the house when it was built an established nearly 5 years ago but never got around to it. The apple creates do look a bit different and “funky” and they caught my eye.

Picnic Lane – photo via @TPGCo

Looked up the company behind the apple crates which is The Productive Garden Co a local family business. Nick came out within a couple of days to quote and I shared my history and vision for what I wanted to achieve.

Within a week Nick came in and created what was a ready to plant garden. I was off work initially but was at work when the garden was created. At the last minute I asked Nick to take some photos which is did quite willingly. Was great to get some “before, during and hey presto! all finished” pics.

I hadn’t actually given much thought about what we’d actually plant, I just wanted to make sure I had plenty of options. With 4 apple crates there was plenty of options. Nick referred me to Bickleigh Vale Farm at the Adelaide Showground Farmers Market, they carry Greenseed organic seedlings.

Diana is the lady behind Bickleigh and she was just brilliant. Could’t meet a nicer person, so helpful with advise and obviously passionate and loves what she does.

Picked up quite a variety of seedlings:- Green Pearl Parsley, Sugar Bon Snap Peas, Rocket, Bay Meadows Broccoli, Asian Green Mix (BOK CHOY green & pruple MIZUNA green & red Asian Mustard) well that’s what the tag says and I’m sticking to it!

Planting was a bit interesting, I’ve not planted anything for over 20 years so there is an element of being careful and suck it and see. Thankfully almost every planting took really well. I’ve somehow ended up with some snow peas on the ground (I didn’t drop any) so not sure what the deal is there.

Within a week things were looking good, week two we had some flowering and now week three, wow it’s really starting to take shape.

Looking forward to the first harvest!

Before

RIn and ready to plant

Ready to plant

Planted

We have flowering!

Even More 🙂

Salad box off to a strong start!

Thanks to everyone who contributed to this project. Nick from TPGC was excellent in helping me design and implement my concept and Diane for helping me pick an amazing variety of seedlings. My father was astounded at the quality and variety I ended out planting. The finished product looks amazing, the creates look brilliant and every seedling has taken.

It’s amazing how catching up for lunch in a lane way off Rundle Mall can have a lasting impact.

it’s amazing what taking control of your health care can do for you.

I’m battling a number of issues on the health front and despite that I pride myself in being an informed consumer or in this case informed patient.

It’s natural and healthy to be curious about things, but as a good friend once pointed out you also don’t want to over analyse things! It’s getting the balance right which is the trick.

My Physio is a great one for promoting evidence bases therapy/ approach / treatment.

Turns out it’s a really great way to investigate the situation and it’s good to know particularly when I fact check that I know people have been here before.

Had a comment made to me today by one of my health care team that another member of that team is getting better in sending letters more timely as they are aware that there is close followup done by others and well as me.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I’m really fortunate to have access to some of the most amazing, skilled,  dedicated people in helping support me as my life journey continues.

The collaboration between them all is awesome, a “synergy” if you like.

While ultimately it’s up to me and my determination and dedication in how I comply with directives. This journey is one that can’t be done alone on many levels.

So yesterday was kind of a big deal for me.

Surgery was a  little over 6 weeks ago and the requirement to be in a post op shoe when weight bearing was lifted.

I no longer had to think about getting up and putting my foot on the ground. I didn’t have to put a shoe on to go anywhere. I could just stand on my two feet and start to walk.

Well that was the idea anyway!

Caught up with my podiatrist and I’ve started gait training, gait is basically what you do when you walk. It’s how you step/move.

For the second time in just over a year i’m having to learn to walk again. It might not sound like a really simple thing to do, but for me ,my anatomy has changed and so my body has to lean how to cope with the change (one that will be permanent) and I have to make sure I teach by body good habits so that in time I actually walk like I should.

Right now that’s actually really hard to do as when I push off on my right foot I generally get a fairly severe pain response.

This brings me back to the pool where I can literally take most of the weight off, slow it down, break it down and nit pick like hell. Take a moment to focus on what I’ve been shown and learn how to develop that over time.

Progress is slow and at times very frustrating. When you consider a week ago I hadn’t been in a pool for 5 weeks I’m actually doing quite well. the trick is to push enough but not over do it.

This week I’ve spent roughly about 4 hours in the pool. I’m really lucky to have a great pool at work and it does make rehab a lot more easily accessible.

At the end of the day I have to focus on these basic things as sadly I’ve learnt again how reliant we are on out feet and if you don’t have “happy feet” then quite literally it can throw out the rest of your body.

This hopefully will only be a short term thing, but while still focused and determined I must admit there is still a lot of frustration.

The pool at work is proving to be a great bonus for me right now.

It’s not open on Sunday but so far I’ve been every other day since Saturday and the aim is to continue that.

On Thursday this week I get cleared to walk without the post OP shoes, first time in 6 weeks.

In preparing for this, each day I’m trying to walk in the pool.

Again it sounds simple but in recovery it’s quite a challenge. For me balance, stability and RH forefront push off are real issues. The pool gives you the benefit of reduced load bearing and to some degree some safety (if you fall in the pool the only thing your going to hurt is your pride)

I’m well accessorised for this little adventure! 3 pool noodles (one is cut into quarters ) kick board, pool buoy, prescription swim goggles, fins (currently not in use) ear & nose plugs. Snorkle (again not currently in use) and a water running belt.

I personal train tomorrow night so i needed to give my upper body a bit of a rest today.

For me to stabilise in the pool to walk I had the water running belt on and a noodle out in front. The trick with most things is to start of small and slow.

The pool I’m using has three depth’s the shallow end at around 1.1m the middle deep section at 2M (perfect for full leg extension water running) and the “shallow  {deep}) ” end at 1.4M.

Over all it’s a brilliant facility to have access to onsite at work.

The water is a little cool for rehab but for lap swimming ( I’ve actually managed to pump out about 200M in arms only swimming) it’s almost spot on (could be a couple of degrees warmer)

Challenge for me tonight is to get to bed early and rise early enough to rehab tomorrow am and PT in the afternoon.

I’m really keen to do as much “walking” practice in the pool I can. Thursday afternoon is going to be quite the challenge and the better developed I am in water, the better I will cope on land.

Still got a few muscle cramp issues going on, the frozen golf ball is doing wonders!

What impressed me so much tonight, is for the first time post OP I’ve come away with muscular soreness in my legs for the right reasons!

First session water running, but even with almost no resistance and literally no impact it’s great for cardio!

Was brilliant tonight, worked well within my exercise limits (although I did push them) and I can feel the benefits already both physical and mental!