Fun, Fabulous, and what being Fifty means to me!

What the “F” means to me!!!

For those of you who know me, you know I don’t have a “potty mouth” so when I say What the “F” means to me, you know that no profanity will be used! LOL!

Here are a few (not really🤪) F words to describe what the F means to me: Fit, Funny (I may be my biggest fan but who cares 😁), Fasted, Faithful, Friendly, Fabulous, Fantastic, Fun-Loving, Ferocious (the Scorpion/red head in me!), Flirty, Flourishing, Forgiving, Fortunate, Fulfilled.

I thought a few years ago that turning the big 5..0.. was going to be tough for me; turning 40 was, so I figured turning 50 would be even worse. Well, the past 10 years I have been through many changes and I have become a very different person in many ways. The last 2 years especially have been very eye-opening and I have really learned to love life and appreciate those people and things that mean the most to me. I have really figured a lot of things out about who my friends are, who I love, and who loves me, and most importantly how to love myself.

Life is what you make it! A truer statement there never was! Life is all about choices and attitude. Stuff happens and it is up to us how it affects us.

Entering into this new decade of life brings excitement and joy to me. I find myself reflecting on life lately and realizing that my 50 years on this earth have been nothing short of FABULOUS. Sure, life has had its ups and downs, but choosing to see those as growth moments has helped me to live my best life.

I smiled this morning thinking about what I have accomplished in my 50 years, and I am feeling nothing short of blessed and grateful. I have THE BEST husband in the world! Yes, I am biased, but meeting, marrying him, and creating the life we have together was by far the best decision I have made in my life; HANDS DOWN! I know I tend to go on about how he is the best human being in the world for me and how life with him is how my life needs to be lived, but it’s true! Thank you ,❤️Shawn❤️ for being, well, YOU!

So, besides having Shawn, I have THE BEST children. (& Dog Finley🐶) a mom could ever ask for! I love my girls more and more each day and I know they are who they are in large part because of the life we have given them, but I could not be more proud and thankful for the adults they have become. I feel so blessed to be their Mom every moment of every day. Thank you Megan and Amy for being who you are!

I live in THE BEST HOUSE in THE BEST neighbourhood! Seriously, I do! I love our house! I love the size, the design, the yard, the proximity to the lake, the neighbours, and everything that comes with it! Now, for those who know me well, you all know that, funnily enough, I live on the same street that I grew up on!!!!!!! Funny eh?!?!/Well, Shawn and I moved our family back to the street I grew up on 14 years ago and I am so, so, so, very happy that we made that decision and we will be here for the remainder of our days or as far as I can tell into the future! In other words, we aren’t going anywhere as who could ask for more than living on a street where we are surrounded by incredible neighbours, lots of old, big trees, and live .5 of a km away from a beautifully kept waterfront path where I spend a great deal of time running, walking, and biking! Thank you neighbours, and lake for all that you give us!

I truly love my good friends who are always there for me to listen, talk, and help in any way they can. True friends are hard to find and I definitely have some gems in my life thankfully❤️Thank you to those friends who know to check in on me when I’m quiet, who send a quick text to say “Hi!” and who not only tolerate (lol), but enjoy spending time with me💛☀️🥰

I love my job and work environment at JSOD! Who could have predicted that I would do 5 years of Post-Graduate Studies, work 15 years as a Communicative Disorders Assistant (Speech and Language Therapist) at a clinic with an amazing, caring boss, then move into this current life working part-time as a Receptionist/Office Organizer/Front Desk Manager for the past 6 or so years?!?!? I couldn’t be happier for the choices I’ve made to land me where I am today! I am so happy and feel so blessed to have had all the opportunities to bring me to this happy life at 50! My work at the dance studio fulfills me in a way I didn’t realize I needed until I embraced it and fell in love with the children, the families, and the fellow employees I surround myself with 5 days a week. I love how loved and appreciated I am by the kids, families, and people I work with! Thank you to those of you at JSOD who support, love, appreciate me for who I am and what I bring to the Dance studio life!

I have THE BEST family and extended family a girl could ask for! My parents raised a happy, content girl, who became a thankful, fun-loving happy adult, and they did a great job I believe! I have terrific brothers (including in- laws), sisters (including in- laws) and parents (including in-laws) and I am grateful for being surrounded by such a supportive, caring group of people every day! I have an incredible sister in law that I have always been super close with who I am very thankful for and who deserves a big shout out for being an incredible friend, and the hands-down best aunt to our girls that ever did live! Seriously Emma! You rock!!!

Seriously friends, loyal supporters, and family who reads my blogs, I am so thankful, blessed, happy and tickled pink by the love I feel every day!

I must also mention here that my dream of owning a Yellow VW Beetle came true last year as well! I had always hoped it would happen, and it DID!!! I smile EVERY time I’m in it and TRULY love it more than you can even imagine💛❤️😍🥰

I love life sincerely appreciate the slow-living, non-busy, way that I have chosen to embrace it! Nothing pressing that leads me to rush anymore! I used to feel that I was defined by what I accomplished, by showing how busy I was, and how many things I could multi-task into a day/week/month/year, but not anymore! Now I live life slowly, appreciating my loved ones, loving moments the way I never have before. I have chosen to surround myself with people who I care about, who care about me, and who make me feel good. I concentrate on being happy, content, and taking time for myself. Does this mean I don’t have less than stellar moments/days/weeks?? Absolutely not! I just don’t dwell and expect things to be perfect anymore. Perfection does not exist and I don’t believe in it!

I started this blog saying it, so I will end it the same way:

Life is a series of choices; you can chose to dance in the rain or wallow in your own self pity when things aren’t perfect!

Me? I choose to dance in the rain and run in the snow!

Living my best life at 50!

Your Simply Susan Fabulous, facts about turning Fifty!!!!💛🥰

Life is good!

I am in a very good place in my life right now, so I decided I would spread the joy around.

Realizing and acknowledging the good things in your life helps you so much. So many people are negative about life and live to complain and focus on the bad in everything. Sure, we all have bad stuff going on in our life, but do you know what? It is up to you to change your way of thinking and not dwell on things that bring you down. Thoughts are like magnets; if you think of a few good things in your life they will bring forth more good thoughts and memories. The same goes for bad thoughts. I find I can spiral downward once I have a few things go wrong and end up in a deep, dark place that is quiet a challenge to dig myself out of.

I have a few helpful tips that will make your days happy if you follow them:

Smile at and say “Hi” to a stranger today! Pick your person wisely, but while you are out for your walk or walking to the GO train or whatever, smile and say “Hi!” to someone. It will surprise you how this simple thing can make both yours and someone else’s day!

Take time to give a genuine compliment to someone each day. Making someone feel good about themself will also make you feel happy.

Greet people with a smile and a Hi whenever you can. I am fortunate enough to be surrounded by a fabulous family, great friends, and a job working with people I love. I truly believe that greeting people with a big smile and a nice hello can put people at ease and make mostly all situations better!

Someone once told me a long time ago that every night when you are going to bed think of 5 things you are thankful for. This was one of the best tips I have ever received! When you remind yourself right before dozing off to sleep of things you are thankful for, that puts your mind in a good place and helps you fall asleep.

Please give these a try, you’ll be glad you did, trust me!

Remember….You can’t always control what happens, you can ONLY control how you react to what happens.❤️

Your Simply Susan quick and dirty tip of the day! 😊💛

“SQ” Products

Thank you for checking out my SQ product line!!!!!

For our family I am making a ton of products, but I have chosen to start slowly so am  currently selling 4 of them:

Body Butter:  Olive oil, Coconut oil, Shea butter, Beeswax, essential oils (optional) (Can be made scented or scent free upon request)

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Lip Balm: Beeswax, Shea butter, coconut oil, essential oil (optional)

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Reusable Wax sheets (use instead of zip-top bags, and/or plastic wrap) Cotton squares ( various sizes available) with melted oil and beeswax.  These are eco-friendly, re-usable (wiped with soap and/or cold water) anti-microbial, anti-bacterial, and can be used to wrap any food (except raw meat) from sandwiches, to cut fruit. Or you can cover your bowls etc. as you would have done with plastic wrap (terrible for the environment!)

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Toilet Bombs: These “bombs” can be used weekly to keep your toilet clean and fresh! Just drop them into the toilet water, allow 5-10 minutes for it to dissolve and then use your toilet brush as usual and then flush away. Septic system safe, and eco-friendly!

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Just an FYI here are some of the other products I have been experimenting with and using regularly in our home:

Liquid Laundry Detergent

All-Purpose cleaner

Foaming Hand Soap

Liquid Dish Soap

Facial and Body Scrubs (different types)

Deodorant

Dry Shampoo (dark and light hair varieties ) wet, and dry applications

Eye Cream

Anti-Bacterial Hand Sprays

SO….as I said, I am REALLY enjoying this and love making and using these products!!! I feel so much better using these and promoting these as what we put ON our body and what we breath in and clean our houses with is extremely important to living a healthy life!

Price List for products currently available:  (These are my initial prices, so they may change)

Body Butter $8/6oz, $4/3 oz

Lip Balm $2/8.5g, $4/25g

Toilet Bombs 10 tabs for $5

Wax covers/squares: small (6×6″ square) $2, medium (10×10″ square) $4, Large (15×10″) $6

Please contact me by email if you would like to order any of the above! My email is fit2borganized.wordpress@gmail.com

Thank you all for your support on this new endeavour!!
SQ🧘💞💛🌞

Suzy Sunshine 🌞

For those of you who know me personally, would you believe me if I told you that I struggle with depression? Even to my faithful blog readers it’s likely not something you would have figured out, since I like to keep my blogs positive and happy.

With Bell’s Let’s Talk Campaign approaching us, I want to bring awareness to Depression and Mental Illness and encourage people to recognize the signs and symptoms and I thought I would start by telling you about myself.

That’s right, I am one of the many people who deal with this on a daily basis and have learned to hide it very, very well. Not only that, but I have also learned to cope with it and also learned who truly loves me and accepts me for who I am.

I know this likely comes as quite a shock to many of you who think that I seem like the opposite of someone who suffers from depression; I mostly always have a huge smile on my face, I laugh A LOT, and I always have something positive to say to people! I am often referred to as “Suzy Sunshine”! The thing is, I treat others the way I want, and hope, people will treat me and others. It’s as simple as that. I want to feel good, and I know that when people greet me with a smile and a friendly hello, it can instantly make me feel good. I like to spread the joy and it truly makes me a happier, better person.

I feel the need to bring this out there and deal with it head on as I feel like there needs to be so much more awareness and acceptance out there about mental illness.

I came to terms with it only about 5 years ago now, but know definitely that it is something that I have hidden, struggled with, denied, and coped with since my teen years at least. Depression can be brought on by traumatic life events such as sickness or death of loved ones, or, as in my case, genetics. Because depression is a mental illness, people in older generations have difficulty accepting and admitting to having it as they see it as “psychotic” or “mentally disturbed” among other things. It is not accepted by them as easily. I have tried to educate and show my family member that they also suffer from it and could benefit from treatment, but this was not well received, and in fact it was adamantly denied. I can easily trace it back 2 generations and in my case, it is genetic. Thankfully, my children are now fully aware of it and we have many open discussions with each other and our doctor.

It is such a very hard thing to come to grips with and accept. For me, I totally recognize that I have a great life; an amazing, loving, supportive husband, 2 incredible, supportive children, a wonderful home, a job I love…..so when I was suffering daily, crying, feeling hopeless, feeling so sad that I thought life would be better for everyone without me, I knew that this was not right. For too long I suffered in silence thinking I just couldn’t handle the stresses of daily life because I was weak. I put myself down, had daily battles with myself, and faked it, faked it, faked it to those who knew me quite well. I truly thought that if I told people, that they would judge me, think I was making excuses and think I was weak. So, I hid it and suffered in silence as so many do.

Once I hit rock bottom…..everything in my life was going very well, yet when I was using one of my best coping strategies (running it out) I was crying uncontrollably and decided that enough was enough, I got home and immediately made an appointment to see my family doctor. She knows me very well, and has helped me very much over the years.

Now I know many people are against taking medication to help them deal with depression. They worry that it will change them or that they will be on it for life and be dependent on it. If you had diabetes and required medication to stabilize your blood sugar would you take it? Of course you would. So why, when you have a chemical imbalance in your brain that can be regulated with medication would you not take it? Medication can definitely help, but is not for everyone. There are so many treatments available to you, you just have to first accept that you need help then speak with someone you trust to see what is out there.

One thing people don’t understand about depression is that just “thinking about happy times” “thinking about all I have, the great life I lead and all I have going for me” or ” watching comedies” doesn’t get me out of my downward spirals. Boy do I wish it were as easy as that! That would be the life! Thinking of those things actually makes me worse because I realize that I have no tangible reason to be feeling as bad as I am feeling and I feel I must have everything wrong with my brain if I feel uncontrollably sad when I have no real reasons to be. I hated myself for feeling the way I would feel and felt so weak and like such a loser.

Negative thoughts are like magnets that attract each other and get heavier and heavier eventually weighing you down so far you feel as though you are in a deep hole that you’ll never get out of. You get a sort of tunnel vision and you just want to bury yourself in a hole and never emerge. Thankfully I am starting to recognize when I am spiraling down and reach out to close friends and my family for help. Now that I have opened up to some people that I knew would not judge me, I am able to get out of my spirals sooner and feel better more quickly than in the past.

I don’t have a tried and tested way for getting myself up and out of these downward spirals, but I THANKFULLY have some very special people in my life who really help me and love me no matter what. It is these people (and my dog Finely of course!!) as well as other factors that get me up and out of the hole I am. Sometimes though I still feel like such a burden that I try to hide it so as not to bring others down with me. I still feel weak a lot of the time for letting things get to me and not being able to cope but am learning to accept it for what it is an not over analyze it as much.

I accept that this is a lifelong struggle I will have, but with acceptance comes happiness…eventually!

WHOA! That was a lot to unload.

I do not want you to think that I, or anyone struggling with depression, uses this as an excuse for being grumpy, cold, moody, or short-tempered, I just want everyone to be aware that things and people aren’t always as they seem. I have become a “master of disguise” and it certainly has fooled others because those who I have shared my suffering with truly had no idea. One of my favourite comedians always comes to mind when I think of people having depression and hiding it well, r.i.p. Robin Williams.

My advice to anyone else out there who thinks they may also suffer with depression? Be honest with yourself and talk! That’s the best advice, talk, be open, accept yourself for who you are, and get some help.

Feel free to comment or send me a personal message. This was a big step for me to admit this in such a big way, but hopefully by reading this I will help at least one person and hopefully many more.

Your Simply Susan truth of the day!

Keep positive and smile on! You know I will.

Look good, work hard, feel great!

“I look jacked!!!”😃😄At least that’s what my husband said to me when he got home from the gym the other day.

Now he was only half kidding, but what he was referring to was that he saw himself in the mirror in the changeroom after his workout and thought to himself “I look jacked!”.

Now truth is, he probably didn’t look much different after his workout than he did an hour earlier before his workout, but I think this is important to share because he felt good. Just working out made him feel better about himself, and that’s my message.

Whether it’s a walk through the neighbourhood, a training run for a 5 km race, a zumba class, or a Crossfit WOD, it’s amazing how a little activity or exercise can make you feel better about yourself!

So get out there, and get active, you’ll better doing it.

Your Simply Susan Quick Tip of the day!😆