Product Review - Strider Balance Bike

Here in Australia summer is just around the corner, and along with it comes the perfect weather for bike riding. I just recently upgraded Miss K's bike, and now she and her cousin Lexi love tearing around the footpaths on their bikes. The last time I took the girls outside to ride together my poor nephew Jacob had to be left out as he's only 2, so he's too little for the bikes I have here, and until recently he's been too little for his own bike. So when Velogear contacted me offering one of their Strider balance bikes for review I jumped at the chance.

Balance bikes are similar to ordinary two-wheeled bikes however they have no pedals, and they are designed to help train children to balance on a bike, hopefully eliminating the need for training wheels when children get to the point that they are ready for a pedal powered bike. By getting used to having to use your upper body to keep a bike upright from the beginning, and learning the way normal bikes move when not stabilised by training wheels early on in life, you can bypass a lot of the fear and frustration a lot of kids feel when they are learning to ride unassisted. Balance bikes are also a lot lighter and less unwieldy as traditional tricycles or two-wheeled bikes with training wheels attached.

Strider brand balance bikes are particularly good because they are so lightweight and generally simple to assemble. The clamp I received for the handlebars was a bit tight, and my brother ended up having to pry it open to get it to fit on the bike, but I had a look online, and no one else had that complaint, so I'm going to put that one down to a manufacturing issue. In the end we got it on the bike and it held the handlebars tight so all's well.

The bike even comes partially assembled, making your first job of putting it together even easier.

All that was left to do once the bike was assembled was let Jakey take it for a test ride. Because Jacob is naturally fearless, I knew he'd take to this bike like a duck to water, and I was right. He couldn't wait to hop on and start hooning around like his big cousins. Jacob got the feel for pushing himself around with his feet fairly quickly, and as he gets more confident he'll figure out how to get some momentum going and lift his feet up for a real rush. The bike even comes with grips on the foot rests to give some friction and reduce the risk of little feet slipping off the smooth metal.

We noticed at first that the steering was a little tight, but some quick research showed that this was an intentional design feature, included to keep the steering a little bit more controlled while children are still learning how to manoeuvre the bike. With use the steering column does loosen up, so the more confident the kids become, the more they will be able to control the way the bike steers.

We set the steering and seat height to the lowest settings at first, and they ended up being the perfect height for my very short nephew (Hopefully he'll be as tall as his dad when he grows up, but right now he's just a tiny tacker.) The Strider balance bike comes with EVC tyres that will never go flat, eliminating the need to do puncture repairs or continuously fill them with air. The 12" bike is suitable for kids aged 18 months to 5 years, and comes with an extra long pole to  raise the seat high enough to accommodate taller children.

The Strider balance bike is an excellent first bike for any child, so if any of you know a little one who is in need of a first set of wheels, check them out at Velogear today.

With Christmas right around the corner, now is the perfect time to check out the range of bikes and accessories available at Velogear. They offer free shipping on all orders with no minimum spend amount, and they have some of the cheapest prices in Australia. They ship to both Australia and New Zealand, so check them out today and see the amazing range they offer.

**Disclosure**
I received free products for the purpose of this review. All opinions given here are my own and have in no way been influenced by Strider or anyone else. Searching for Sanity is not affiliated with Velogear.com or Strider Sports International in any way.

Fighting fat (or the nine steps to a new you)

I'm trying to type very quietly today as mum is attempting to have a nanna nap on the couch next to me right now, but I have something I have to get off my chest right now so it can't wait till she's up and getting ready for work.

Anyone who has been a regular reader of mine would know that I try to eat a healthy and balanced diet, and I attempt during the warmer months to do some form of semi regular exercise. Well recently I discovered a support group on Facebook for people trying to lose weight, and I joined up to see if they would be able to keep me motivated in my own winter slump. Interestingly enough, the girl who started up the page is actually a neighbour of mine, but we didn't realise we lived so close to each other until after I joined her group. We now chat on an almost daily basis, and I think I can safely say I have made a new friend which is wonderful.

As for the group itself, while it is wonderful to see so many like minded people from all over the world joining together to support each other in our quests to get healthy, it is sad to see so many people who are incredibly misinformed about the route to good health, and who are also riddled with so much self hatred because of how they look. Now as I have mentioned in an earlier post here, before I had Miss K, I was in exactly the same boat and filled with the same hatred of my body for becoming a lumpy mass of tubbiness, but once I became pregnant and realised what a miracle the human body can be, I learned to accept that I will never look like the photoshopped models on the front of all the magazines and love my body for the incredible machine it is. That doesn't mean that I don't still want to be healthy and fit, it just means that I am more forgiving of the various lumps and bumps that have shown up as I got older, and instead of just being depressed that I am what the health profession considers obese (but I just consider overweight) I have decided to accept what I cannot change, change the things I can, and love all of it no matter what.

So with that in mind, I have decided to share with you my wonderful readers some of the steps I have had to take in the past to get to where I am today, still not perfect, and still trying to lose weight, but not filled with self loathing and pity.

1. Love yourself warts and all

I was always told that no one can love you until you love yourself, and I believe this with all of my heart. Love has to come from within yourself before it can come from anywhere else. If you are unhappy with your appearance, sure make the changes you feel are necessary to fix this, but make sure it is for the right reason. If you are doing it so that you feel better about yourself and to be healthier for yourself then this is good. If you are doing it so that other people will like you, then this is bad. You could be the skinniest person in the world, but if you think that you are worthless, then that is what everyone else is going to think about you too.

2. Treat your body like the wonder it is

The human body is truly a work of wonder. We have so many different mechanisms, all which have a specific function which is necessary to operate on a daily basis. Your body is working 24/7 in ways that sometimes you aren't even aware of. Things we don't even think about like the way your skin absorbs vitamin d from the sun, which is necessary for a healthy skin, organs and immune system. Then there is the wonder of thinks like reproduction which is just mind boggling, the fact that we need our bodies to propagate the species and avoid extinction. All of this makes for one awesome machine which should be respected and loved. I used to treat my body less as a temple and more like a three car garage before I got healthy, and I paid for it big time. No energy, unhealthy skin, digestion problems and all other kinds of nasty ailments have plagued me for years. I still get a nasty reminder of what my life was like if I relax my eating and sleep habits too much, and it is a very effective motivator to get back to the healthy lifestyle which make me feel so much better.

3. Learn about the foods you are putting into your body

In order to learn exactly how much fat I was eating on a daily basis, I started to use an online food diary which not only tracked what I was eating, but exactly how many calories was in each piece of food I put in my mouth, as well as the vitamins and minerals I was getting on a daily basis. This was an incredible eye opener for me, I couldn't believe that if I had one bad day and ate take away for dinner instead of cooking something at home, my calorie intake would sky rocket out of control. Given that there are calories in absolutely everything we eat, and the human body needs on average only 1200 calories a day in order to function, this was proof positive that I needed to make big changes to my diet. But that hasn't meant that I can't eat all the foods I still love, just that they have now become sometimes foods instead of every day foods. And I have actually found that after a while I don't enjoy my take away meals like I used too. Being aware of their incredibly high fat content tends to keep me away a lot more than it used to. For anyone looking for a good food diary, as well as an exercise diary, check out www.myfitnesspal.com. It even tells you exactly how many calories you need to burn a day in order to lose weight, as well as how much calories you do burn when you exercise.

4. Take all the help you can get

It is incredibly hard to stay motivated when you are on your own. There were times that the only reason I went out and played tennis with my little sister is because she was the one who called me every weekend to remind me to come get her and go out for a run around. And at the end of the day I was grateful that she had hauled me off my lazy butt for 45 minutes of sweating and panting because I felt great. I used to live with a friend from high school, and she would make me put on my walking shoes every night and we would go for a walk around town, even in the freezing cold of winter. Again I hated her while I was putting on my shoes, but I always felt so refreshed when we finally got home, our noses pink and numb from the cold air. Mum and I are each other's cheerleader this time, and even though neither of us can motivate ourselves to work harder, we are happy to support each other and give pep talks whenever they are needed. It is much harder to go easy on yourself when others are watching you, and sometimes that is all the motivation you need.

5. Stop caring what every one else thinks

This one was a big deal for me, because I spent the first twenty years of my life caring about what everyone else thought, and completely ignoring my own opinions, or changing my opinions just so that they fit in with everyone else's. But all that meant was that I was a complete doormat, and not really being true to myself. At the end of the day, the only person you spend 24 hours a day with is yourself. The only person who can hear all the little voices in your head is yourself, so why would you listen to the voices in someone else's head before your own? Learn to own the voice inside your head and listen to what it is saying about you. If you don't like what you hear, either change the track or change what you don't like about yourself.

6. Become more selfish

This doesn't mean always take more for yourself before giving to other people, this means start taking care of yourself before you do anything else. For any of my readers who are mums, you will know how hard this one is because our job description means that we put our kids before absolutely everything else. Our hunger, our appearance, our bladders always come out second to the children. But at the end of the day if you want anything for yourself, you are going to have to be the one who does it. I'm lucky because my child is still at an age where she needs 14 hours of sleep a day, so I only need to put her first for 10 hours a day. And when she is in bed, or happily amusing herself with the contents of our plastic cupboard, that gives me plenty of time to stop and have a coffee, or read the pull outs from the Sunday newspaper. And sometimes being selfish can mean refusing to listen to someone's constant criticisms or complaints, or something as simple as making sure you get a good night's rest.

7. Don't take life too seriously

Laughter really is the best medicine in the world. Nothing gets me out of a slump like having a giggle with Miss K. Sometimes it is hard to find the humour in a situation, but if you can learn to laugh at yourself then life gets a whole lot easier. It is too easy to become stressed these days, people work longer hours, women have more things to juggle on a daily basis, the news broadcasters are hell bent on trying to convince us that the world is coming to an end. Sometimes I find myself becoming too focused on unimportant details and stressing myself out, and when I do, I have to take a step back and tell myself to chill out and relax because at the end of the day is it really important that everything is perfect? or is it more important to be happy and calm?

8. Stop beating yourself up

This is a big one for people who are trying to diet. Every day someone in my weight loss support group posts that they have fallen off the wagon and totally hate themselves for being weak willed. I keep telling them over and over again that everyone deserves a treat, otherwise being good is too hard. But every day there is someone else who needs to be told to go easy on themselves. We seem to forget that we are all human, and as a whole, the human race is flawed. There is no one out there who is perfect, and convincing yourself that the only way to prove that you have succeeded is that you can go the rest of your life without eating a chocolate bar, or you are the absolute best at whatever it is you are good at is only setting yourself up to fail. If there are two things that you need to remember to survive in this world, they are that everyone needs chocolate, and no matter how good you are at something, there will always be someone who is better at it than you. This may sound completely depressing, but it can also be incredibly freeing. It doesn't mean never try to be good at anything, just that you need to learn to be the best that YOU can be, not the best that someone else can be. Sure if you have done something absolutely reprehensible like had sex with Mickey Rourke, or head-butted a small child to get to the last biscuit in the pack, then beat yourself up, but otherwise, go easy on yourself.

9. Accept that there are no quick fixes

This one makes me angry. Everyone is looking for the short-cut in life. The get rich quick scheme, the lose weight fast scheme, the learn a new skill in a day scheme. The short answer is there is no such thing. Anything worth doing in this life takes time and effort, and if you really want to be proud of yourself at the end of the day, the only way to do it is the hard way. The sooner you accept this, the sooner you can get on your way to mastering whatever it is you want to do.

Well I'll get off my soapbox for now, but I hope that there is something here that you my wonderful readers can take away from my lecture today. If anyone else has a secret to success that has helped them, I'd love to hear it.

Learning to love your body

Hello again wonderful readers, I hope this post finds you all well and warm. It is freezing cold here right now, and has been raining almost constantly for two days. I'm rugged up in my pyjama pants and a men's XL jumper as I type this as it's too cold to wear my normal blogging bikini. (I'll let you sit with that image for just a second)

The truth is I've worn a bikini once in my entire life, and even then I wore it under a t-shirt and a pair of shorts and I never let it see the light of day. I bought the bikini on a cruise ship (I can't remember why I needed a bathing suit, given that I should have packed beach suitable wear and that usually means togs), but only because none of the stores sold anything bigger than a two piece and I refuse to let that much skin show in public. This modesty was bought on more by the fact that I was a very curvy size 18 - 20 at the time than any sense of decency and I hated my body greatly at this time. I had actually gone on a diet in preparation for the cruise (my first and only attempt at dieting) which consisted of eating something like minestrone soup and very little else for several months. I lasted 3 days before the sugar withdrawals sent me crazy and my mum insisted I eat something else. I have battled for a long time with my body image, my first memories of hating my body being at about age 16. The funny thing is I look back at photos of myself at this time and there was nothing wrong with me. I was quite skinny and very pretty and could wear figure hugging clothes easily, but for some reason when I looked in the mirror all I could see was a fat person. I could kick myself knowing how much time I wasted wishing I was skinnier when the truth was I was healthy and perfectly fine exactly how I was. 

By the time I was 17 things had changed for me. I had stopped caring about myself since I thought I was so ugly so I put all kinds of nasty into my body. I used to drink 2 litres of coke a day and eat anything I felt like. I also did zero exercise and when I wasn't at school I was either sleeping or on the internet. And I felt huge. I probably wasn't more than a size 16 at the time but I might as well have been a size 22. I started wearing huge baggy clothing to hide my shape and hating myself even more. It went on and on like this for the next couple of years, I did the one minestrone diet which was a spectacular failure, but any other time I wanted to lose weight I'd walk to try and lose the flab. And it would work, until I got bored with walking or distracted by something else or winter came and then I'd stop. I joined gyms which was always a terrible waste of hundreds of dollars because I never had the motivation, and I hate exercising in public. I hated going clothes shopping because the dressing room mirrors were never gentle with my flaws and made my thighs look like chicken drumsticks. There was also the problem that I could never find any clothing in my size that I felt pretty in or that wasn't covered in huge floral prints. (Why do clothing designers think fat women want to look like walking flower beds?) I was miserable and felt powerless and hideous. None of my boyfriends could ever convince me that I was pretty or sexy or worthy of happiness, no matter how much they tried. 

I can look back at this part of my life and talk about it now as if it was such a long time ago, but I can't tell you exactly when I stopped hating my body. I think it was such a gradual thing I didn't even realise at the time what was happening. It probably started with accepting that this is the body I was given, and I really should be happy that I have a whole, fully functioning body that serves its purpose as it is meant to. Then I learned how to dress like I actually like myself and the confidence started coming back. Then I fell pregnant with Miss K and I couldn't hate the stretch marks or the lumps and bumps any more because they all served a greater purpose than all of my complaining combined. And after Miss K was born mum had her heart attack and a whole set of diet and lifestyle changes were brought on which helped us all gain healthier slightly smaller bodies. I think that really brought home the fact that I should be happy with what I have been given because there are so many more important things to think about than how I look in a bikini.

So I'm still not the perfect size, in fact I'm still classed as obese even though I don't feel it these days. But I'm truly happy with my body, as without it, I wouldn't have been able to have Miss K, and she is totally worth the stretch marks and bulgy tummy I carry around under my t-shirt these days.

Treadmills and giraffe hats

Hi guys, I know it's been a couple of days but since I can't afford a secretary to write these blogs for me (or to do my daily walk on my new treadmill) then you guys will have to be patient in waiting for each exciting instalment in this blog.

Life around here is hectic as always, today was my dad's birthday so we had a visit from him this afternoon for coffee, and so that Miss K could give him his present. Apparently my father has been complaining to my big sister that he has no photos of Miss K so we rectified this today by giving him a beautiful photo that was taken at her birthday party, of him and Miss K reading a book. (No one can accuse my dad of not being the life of the party.) I then had to go up the street to have a thickshake with my little sister and to buy some wool.

Why do you need wool I don't hear you ask as you're reading this well after I've gone to bed for the evening, and also I'm not sitting next to you while you read this as that would be creepy. Well for months now I have been searching for an incredibly elusive free pattern for a giraffe hat for babies. This is the latest must have accessory for baby photography and parents who love to humiliate their children by bringing out embarrassing photos of them in ridiculous hats and very little else taken at a time when they were unable to fend for themselves. The problem is that a lot of people are very protective of the work that goes into creating a pattern, and as such charge a fee for the privilege of using said patterns. Given that I am a single mother, and also a self confessed tight arse, I refuse to pay for this privilege and must wait for an incredibly generous person who is prepared to give away their pattern. As luck would happen, one such person has just appeared out of the blue and I have swooped on this incredibly rare opportunity and started making a giraffe hat. The happy dance I did when I found the pattern was worthy of a million hits on you tube, unfortunately as I cannot afford to hire a camera crew to follow me around on a daily basis to film me on the off chance that I do something hilarious, you can only take my word for it. For anyone who can read a crochet pattern and has also been looking for a giraffe hat pattern, please feel free to visit this wonderful angel here and check out her blog to find the pattern. Just a note you cannot republish this pattern, nor can you claim it as your own or sell it. She has already been a victim of piracy once thanks to her generosity, and I would hate to think that any of my wonderful readers could be capable of such sneakiness.

The other thing that has been keeping me busy is my ongoing quest to get healthy. My aches and pains from my attempts at tennis last week are all but gone despite the fact that mum refused to rub Deep Heat into my pulled groin muscle (I can't understand why). I mentioned in my last post that I was on the lookout for a cheap treadmill, and once again the gods were smiling upon me as I managed to snag one on eBay on the weekend. It only took me an hour and a half to travel to and from the seller to pick it up, plus I had to try and fit almost 6 feet of exercise machine in my 6 and a half foot long car which was interesting to say the least, but I am now the proud owner of a piece of machinery that will hopefully help shed the last of the mummy tummy I currently have stored underneath my t-shirt. My whole plan was almost derailed on Monday when I stepped on my trusty scales and found despite my full week of living healthy, I had actually gained weight. I had planned to use denial or blame water retention for this in order to cope, until I reminded myself the ultimate goal here is not actually to lose weight, but to extend life. The stepping on the scales is really just a unit of measurement for me and not the finish line as weight is easy to gain, but extra years are not.

One last thing that has been occupying my time and attention is Pinterest. A friend of mine called me on Monday and told me I absolutely HAD to sign up to this website as it was better than Google, plus most of the rest of the world is already on it and I would be a caveman if I didn't sign up NOW. The only problem with this, for any of my fellow cavemen who have never visited the website, is that you have to ask to be invited to sign up. A bit like in high school when you had to ask the cool kids to be invited to their parties, only this time instead of having to go through a slew of humiliating tasks only to have the cool kids laugh in your face and turn you away, all you have to do is wait for an email. As easy as this sounds, it is an incredibly long and frustrating wait. A bit like in school when you used to send notes to the cute boy in class asking if he liked you with the three options to pick from, yes, no and for the love of god if you don't stop sending me these letters I'm going to get a restraining order. (I was a very progressive stalker, and I always liked to give my victims a way out. It tends to relax them I find.) So I sent my request on Monday, and to date there has been no response, no matter how many times a day I check my inbox.

So for now I remain the nerdy kid in the corner desperately hoping for the day that one of the cool kids invite me to sit at their table at lunch time so I can bask in their warming awesomeness. And as soon as they invite me, I'm going to start pinning things onto them. With thumb tacks.

Until then, stay wonderful my dear readers, and also don't be afraid to drop me a line in my comments box. I'd love to know who is reading my posts, I know there has to be a couple of you out there as my counter is steadily rising up, and it's not just because I keep hitting the refresh button.

Peace out!!!

Game, Set, Match?

So once again I haven't posted in a while but things are of course really busy here. Between taking Miss K to play group, barely keeping up with the housework and lying in the corner in the foetal position I barely have time to scratch myself. The other thing stopping me from being able to scratch myself today is the searing pain that I get every time I move a single muscle, and I must blame my agony on tennis.

I have recently come to the decision that I don't take enough care of myself and am taking steps to rectify this. Step one of this plan was to start tracking all of the food that I eat and how much exercise I get each day and make sure my body is healthy. This part was made a lot easier by a wonderful website www.myfitnesspal.com which takes all of the guesswork out of the boring stuff like counting calories. Through this website I was also able to see that my diet was dangerously low on a lot of essential vitamins and minerals like iron (a result of having no cardiac arrest causing red meat in the house any more) so I have been able to re-jig my current eating habits to get rid of more of the bad stuff and take in more of the good stuff.

While the website does take the mystery away from the food that I am eating, this doesn't come without some sacrifice and hard work on my part, especially because a Hungry Jacks has just opened up in my town and the temptation to visit them every day has been hard to deal with. But just because I have started eating healthier doesn't mean I'm about to start spouting lectures about the benefits of chick peas and alfalfa sprouts. Nor am I about to denounce chocolate as evil. I still eat pretty much the way I did before, I just have to restrain myself from having tim tams for breakfast (something which I have done more than once in the past).

The second step in this plan was to actually exercise instead of using the walk from my front door to the car as my excuse for working out. I am in the process of sourcing a treadmill so that I can go for walks in the comfort of my own home, an important feature as it is almost winter here and neither Miss K or I relish the thought of going for long walks in the rain. But while I wait for a cheap treadmill to find it's way to me I bough myself a tennis racquet, and yesterday my mum, my sister and I went to the tennis courts near our house to attempt a game of tennis. For anyone who wants to know what I would look like while playing tennis, this picture here is a pretty close bet for how I looked yesterday. The difference between me and these players is I don't get paid millions of dollars a year to look that special. I do however get aches and pains in places I didn't think it was possible to hurt in. I literally had to lift my leg in and out of the car with my hands last night when I went shopping, which was not good for the pains that go shooting across my ribs whenever I lift anything.

So while I'm not ready for the professional leagues yet, I'm not giving away my racquet just yet. And who knows, within a couple of months I might be ready to take on Karen Krantzcke in a match. Granted she's been dead since 1977 but that may just make it a fairer game.

Well Miss K is currently yelling at a plastic hot dog (don't ask) so I'm going to go have a tea party with her. Granted the tea pot is not too heavy for me to lift.