This is the year I get up off my fat arse and get my life back on track!
I’ve signed up to The Big Life Upgrade by Louise Presley Turner at The Game of Life, something I ummed and ahhed about all last January and then spent the next 11 months kicking myself for procrastinating and therefore missing out on. By the end of the year I knew it was something I really wanted to do, so I took a deep breath and signed up
Each month I’ll be posting some of my progress to keep me on track and remind myself how far I’ve come
On the last night of 2018 I was really excited to receive my first email with the link to the first module; it is all about taking stock and also looking forward
One of the things to do in January was to create a vision board. Oddly enough, late last year some friends and I were talking about this and as none of us had ever done one before we decided to get together for an afternoon of fun, cake and creating
Yesterday, we had a lovely, chilled, creative afternoon. One thing we all agreed on, was that if we had been making a vision board alone, we’d probably have rushed through it, but being together with relaxing music in the background, we all took our time enjoying the whole reflective process
No matter how fat I may or may not be, socks will always fit!
Some time ago I read somewhere, that wearing socks in bed helped with better sleeping. So, in the interests of science and all that, I thought I’d give it a whirl. Now, as a menopausal, middle-aged old bat, I tend to overheat quite often at night, but honestly, I have to admit, sleeping with fluffy socks on does seem to give me a better night’s sleep. Most odd!
I still get hot at night and have to throw the covers off now and again, but the quality of my sleep has definitely improved
My top tips for choosing the right socks (see photo for perfect examples) are:
Not too tight – don’t go for sport socks or ones that are very snug
Get lightweight fluffy ones
Make sure they aren’t too small or loose; it gets annoying if they start to slip off during the night
Choose pretty ones; not because it helps me sleep, but because they make me smile
Xmas Eve my chum and I had a lovely evening drinking (slightly alcoholic) hot chocolate and watching Oliver!, a classic Christmas film from my childhood
We fell asleep near the end of Cabaret though… #GettingOld
Well, I for one was very happy to say goodbye to 2018… basically it sucked balls from spring to late autumn. December got a lot better though, especially when I got to go to my first gig to see the amazing Bowling for Soup, I even got to meet the band thanks to my awesome son surprising me with a VIP ticket. How fucking brilliant is that?
I’m 2nd right, snuggled up to Jaret. (My t-shirt courtesy of beloved son’s enormous collection)
Looking back…
Weight: Meh. I lost 1 stone 2lbs in total, although at my lightest I’d lost almost 2 stone by mid-summer, but life shit got lairy and I went off track
Finances: Crap. Don’t even ask. Circumstances happened and I didn’t cope very well
Sweary: Ha! Still swearing like a trooper, but I’m not planning on changing that!
So… on to 2019 and I have plans so cunning you could pin a tail on them and call them weasels…
Weight: I’ve got a whole shiny new spreadsheet to track my weight, complete with charts, goals and trend-lines. Bliss; I do love my spreadsheets
I’ve also dug out my beloved Michael Mosley books and will be getting back to simpler homemade food, which I know from last year makes me feel better. It is also a cheaper way to eat, which brings me nicely on to…
Finances: Surprise, surprise, I made another spreadsheet! This one is for budgeting and tracking what I spend and on what
I have set up my budget and will be living more frugally to stick to it. The budget does include ‘treats’, but healthy ones like an 80’s night at the end of January – last time I danced for 3 1/2 non-stop, so that’s got to be good for me!
Sweary: Yep, still gonna swear plenty
In general I am busy planning and have some goals and intentions (I don’t like the word resolution as it has too many connotations of the old try/fail cycle for me):
[These will be revised and refined as the year goes on]
Get my life coaching qualification
Get on top of my finances
Stop procrastinating
Exercise
Declutter my flat
Organise my little room so it’s set up nicely for crafting and studying
What I’m not going to do:
Be negative
Worry about things outside my control
Procrastinate
Sit on my arse every evening after work mindlessly surfing the net and watching movies
To help me in my goals I’ve signed up to what looks to be a great year long course, The Big Life Upgrade, with the fantastic Louise Presley Turner* and I am going to do the 5 Days to Flow with EAM*
* These are not affiliate links – I won’t get anything if you click them, Louise and Yvette both really resonate with me; I just linked to them in case they do with you too
Happy new year and here’s to 2019 being a sodding sight better than 2018! That said, even though it was a shit year, I was absolutely fabulous as always darlings!
How is it very nearly almost August? How did that happen?
It’s been a hectic few months over here at Chateau de Fat Skint & Sweary to say the least; lots of issues cropping up and my cunning plans have been put on the back burner, but finally I have chiselled out a little time for me
The past few months have had me feeling like this adulting thing is hard work. This pretty sums my feelings of late up…
Quick update:
Weight – going down nicely I have lost just over a stone and a half this year… hurrah! Still a good way to go, but now that I have really got in to the habit, I am enjoying eating fresh, home-cooked food. Added bonus is, it is cheaper than processed food!
Finances – don’t ask! But I have a PLAN! And it’s all on a spreadsheet
Sorry I’m a tad late this week… I have been hibernating! This cold weather has not been pleasant has it?
Rather than shelling out on putting the heating on for long in the evenings this week, I have been going to bed early with a pile of books and some extra blankets, plus my electric under-blanket; at only a penny a night to run it is one of my best ever birthday presents!
Normally my bed looks like this:
Please excuse the mess under the bed – i’ts a small flat with minimal storage!
Or this…
This week however…
The Michael Palin Diaries are signed by the wonderful man himself 🙂
It’s a tad on the chilly side at the moment and as I had a coupe of chums for dinner over the weekend I rustled up a lovely warming low cooker beef stew with herby dumplings, followed by a homemade rice pudding made with soy milk as one has milk intolerance
It was a great success, they both had seconds! Unfortunately we were enjoying ourselves so much I forgot to take a photo of any of it, so you’ll just have to take my word about how yummy it was
There was sufficient for me to have leftovers again tonight; especially as I forgot to serve the mash I’d made to go with it
This week I shall be eating more of my homemade soup as it really does warm me up on a cold day
In lieu of a foodie photo, have this instead… it is representative of how I looked most of yesterday (I’ve found recovering from a late night with wine takes a lot longer these days!)
There are some things I am pernickety about; the top two are loo roll and Lurpak
When my son was small, I was on a really tight budget and couldn’t afford to buy ‘posh’ things like Lurpak or decent loo roll
One of my biggest annoyances and worries was that I’d run out of loo roll, so in recent years I have a tendency to stockpile it; having at least one multi-pack in a cupboard makes me feel safe
So now, whenever Lurpak, or Sainsbury’s Supersoft (my favourite loo roll – I love the narrow tube in the centre) are on offer, if I can get them without using a credit card I tend go a tad overboard
Tonight I had 3 packs of 16 loo rolls in my Sainsbury’s delivery… it will be a challenge finding somewhere to put them all discreetly away in my tiny flat, but I don’t care; bulk buying saves me money and makes happy!
I can’t help loving Aldi – super 6 veg, sachets of quinoa, rice, couscous… all at a fraction of the cost of other supermarkets
No matter how hard I try and how many people try to teach me, I just cannot cook rice! Luckily my lovely son introduced me to the miracle of sachets of microwavable rice. Light, fluffy well cooked rice in just 2 minutes… hurrah!
All I have to do is to avoid the central aisles of temptation when I nip in for my groceries
Tonight I’m trying a new to me quinoa with some random UFO (Unidentified Frozen Object) that could be chicken or it could be fish… life is an adventure chez moi!
I have always been a bit of mad cat lady, having had one up until a few years ago. I miss having a cat, but they aren’t exactly cheap t run when you are on a frugal budget
I am also very fussy about hairdressers… iIn all my 50 odd years I have only found about 3 hairdressers I really trust, and my most recent one only went and had a baby. Whilst the baby is cute and I am really happy for her, I have been miffed that my hair doesn’t look as good as it did a year and half ago
Back in October, the hairdresser who had the baby posted on Facebook asking for cattery recommendations. Three years ago her cat went missing and against all the odds had been found! The only snag was in the intervening time my hairdresser had moved to a property where she can’t have any pets. As she is moving in to a new house in February where she can have pets she was going to have to put Ringo in to a cattery
I asked if Ringo was an indoor or outdoor cat, as although I adore cats I live in a first floor flat, so couldn’t be having an outdoor one. Luckily Ringo is an indoor cat, so for the last few months I have had a lovely, fluffy, purry houseguest, with no outlay as Ringo’s mum pays for the food and litter
An added bonus is that Ringo’s mum pops over for an afternoon every few weeks for ‘access visits’ and whilst here, she cuts my hair
Ringo will be back to her mum tonight and whilst I will miss her, I really won’t miss the litter tray having only had outdoor cats previously! This experience has cured me of wanting an indoor cat permanently, but at least I shall see her again as I shall be her holiday home whenever her mum goes on vacation
I had only wanted to help a friend with the added bonus of having cat for a while and I get free haircuts to boot! So, the moral of my story is bartering is great and a kindness often repaid more than you might first think
As you can see Ringo has been pretty spoiled while living here…
I don’t thik I’ll ever get the hang of proper meal planning for the week. I see other people’s blogs on meal planning and it all looks so delicious, enticing and varied
Me? I go through phases of eating the same thing over and over until get bored, same for films actually
So, my apologies for dull meal planning posts
As I’m still (yes, still) trying to eat everything in the freezer there are a couple of haddock fillets left so I chucked them in a wok with some chopped peppers, fry it up and wolf it all down with a sachet of microwave rice
The freezer eating will continue for another week: homemade soups, bol sauce with various sides. I have bought some fresh veg, including a big bag of fresh spinach, which although it look enormous I know will wilt down to almost nothing!
The good thing is it is all healthy and frugal. Bonus points for this year: I have lost over half a stone so far, which means my plan to be a size 12 next Christmas is on track. Half a stone loss a month, size 16 be the end of April, a 14 by end of August and a 12 just in time for the festivities!
