I've fallen, and I CAN get up...

...so far anyway!

Okay, we're all getting older and if you're like me not being able to get back up after falling is a growing concern. I cared for my father through much of his decline (alzheimer's) and I am still caring for my 96 year old mother. Mom has had heart attacks and strokes over the last few years and that has affected her strength, endurance and especially her balance. Most tragically, it's also been part of what has caused a decline in her cognition and memory, but back to falls.

So, Mom falls every now and then and she hasn't been able to get up without help for the last few years.  If someone is not around to help her get back up she just stays there and that isn't good for either of us. Yes, I have various done things to prevent falls, but as long as she is mobile...with her walker now mostly...she is going to be in danger of losing her balance and going down. There isn't much more I can do to change this for her, I don't think, but I worry about it happening to me...

...I really want to avoid this!

I exercise daily. I walk, getting in 10,000 steps between walks and moving around almost every day, but I don't do much else in the way of exercise. I've started to think about my strength, flexibility, and balance. Thing is I'm not enthused about doing lots of reps of all sorts of exercises. Isn't there something that would be useful for SFB (strength, flexibility and balance) that is an all in one exercise?

Hum? Well, I'm worried about not being able to get up from the floor, so why don't I practice that?

Here we go! I knew I wasn't nuts, getting down and then getting up really is a good exercise.  I hate to say it, but getting down flat on the floor and then getting back up is already tough for me. I clearly need to start doing this daily and building up reps until I can do it easily.

Maybe once I'm comfortable doing this I'll be comfortable trying more serious routines.

Dilly, dilly!

I'm sure you've seen and heard the pharse "dilly, dilly" a lot lately. So, where did it come from?

"That's a dilly of a question!" :) Yes, "dilly of a" can be a synonym for excellent and perhaps delightful, and it has been used that way since at least the early 1930's, but dilly is older than that.

Lavender Blue is the rhyme or song that introduced me to dilly, dilly. The first version I heard was back in the mid-50's, but the lyric goes back to, at least, the early 1700's. What does it mean in this lyric? Well, it looks like excellent, delightful, wonderful, pretty would all fit in there in place of dilly, dilly doesn't it?

And then there's the lullaby:

Lavender's Blue (Dilly Dilly)

Lavender's blue, dilly dilly,
Lavender's green
When you are king, dilly dilly,
I shall be queen

Who told you so, dilly dilly,
Who told you so?
'Twas my own heart, dilly dilly,
That told me so

Call up your friends, dilly, dilly
Set them to work
Some to the plough, dilly dilly,
Some to the fork

Some to the hay, dilly dilly,
Some to thresh corn
Whilst you and I, dilly dilly,
Keep ourselves warm

Lavender's blue, dilly dilly,
Lavender's green
When you are king, dilly dilly,
I shall be queen

Who told you so, dilly dilly,
Who told you so?
'Twas my own heart, dilly dilly,
That told me so.

By the way, I dug around and dilly is used in Australia as a combination of daft and silly...and that makes sense...but daft and silly in an entertaining, delightful way.

So!  Have a dilly, dilly day!