Eating Diamonds

Spring has sprung?

2012-03-01T15:25:00.001Z

Seems like every blog in the universe is posting a "Spring has sprung" post right about now and as much as I like to go against the grain, I can't help but also want to sing it from the roof tops as well!

It's honestly like a Summer's day today - I have the back sliding doors onto the balcony wide open and I just sat outside with my coffee watching a hot air balloon go floating over. Bristol is very much a "ballooning city" and I live right next door to the spot where they all take off, hence why I'm alway tweeting like a mad woman when I spot them go up. Ten years I've lived in this apartment and the novelty still hasn't worn off.

The last week or so seems to have been a real turning point for me. Possibly it's the weather - as I noticeably feel like I've emerged from a 3 hibernation but also possibly it's because the reality of my wedding being less than 4 months away has finally kicked in. My scales are confirming that I have very much been in winter hibernation mode. The novelty of not working has been such that when it's been freezing cold and dreary outside and I've not had to get up and do anything, it has meant that well... I didn't get up or do anything! Second helpings of porridge in bed with Jezza Kyle on the TV til 10.30am...? Wee trundle to the shops for coffee and cake? Don't mind if I do!

Anyway, all this has changed as on a whim I signed up to a block of 10 personal training sessions in the gym, to be taken intensively three a week. I just needed to get my butt kicked into shape so I can work off these extra Winter pounds. I'm in serious pain today having been to the gym 4 times in 5 days, one of which was my first PT session. She had me doing some really amazing exercises that worked muscles I never even knew I had. I think that's the beauty of paying for PT which is the training is entirely tailored to your needs. I have said I need to lose inches form my tummy and thighs and to tone my upper body for my wedding dress. I've also set myself the goal of being able to do a full press-up as currently I can't even do one on my knees and it's always bothered me. I have 9 hours of training left to achieve my goal.

I know I'm pretty disciplined when I want to be (a quick read of this blog from about a year ago confirms this!) but when I fall out of the habit it's so bloody hard to get back in to it - especially without the routine of a full time job. So it's back to my healthy diet, bye bye to all those "cos I'm worth it" moments and wedding dress here I come!

113 days to go.

New baby

2012-02-24T14:30:00.000Z

Usually if something is all over the fashion blogs, I will almost certainly hate it - case in point: Jeffrey Campbell Litas. I just don't understand why anyone would want their feet to look like that?

So for ages when I saw every blogger and her dog with a Cambridge Satchel I immediately dismissed as something I wouldn't want...but over time I've really started to lust over them, especially the brightly coloured ones which appeal to me as a great way to add a flash of colour to an outfit.

May I present:

This is the 11 inch version from ASOS and the colour is an ASOS exclusive. I was very tempted to get a purple one (as a slightly less in your face option, but still a nice colour) and have actually ordered a purple directly from Cambridge Satchel Company which hasn't arrived yet, but as soon as this one arrived I fell head over heels with it and so basically, the decision is made.

As I am essentially on a complete spending ban now until I get a new job, I will add that this is a present from Ed for coming into his office and training his staff on excel and pimping up their spreadsheets. Well worth it I say!

For £85 I think they are excellent value. They are handmade and made of sturdy leather. I am generally not a "handbag person" and so I wouldn't spend more than £100 on one (until the day I own a Chanel 2.55) so this is perfect for me as I will use it every day and I'm convinced it will probably never ever wear out. I'll be wearing it with my bright red lippie and my rows and rows of peals when I'm 75, just like these amazing women:

For sh*ts and giggles...

2012-02-24T13:35:00.001Z

Thought I'd transport myself back to the heady days of 2009 and write a blog post about makeup.

I'm having a love affair with my makeup again at the moment - because I'm not working (i.e. not in a professional environment) I've been wearing all kinds of outlandish makeup, just for the hell of it. It's been a real soul tonic being able to be "me" everyday, not just at weekends.

I tend to have a makeup bag on the go that comes into the bathroom with me every day which consists of:

the regulars
new things
things that I'm determined to use up
random things I've forgotten I had and need some love.

Every now and again I rotate what's in there. Currently on rotation we have:

Clockwise from top left:

Avon Supershock gel liner in Shimmering Sapphire...which is utterly rubbish. Only still in my makeup bag as wanted to see if I could find a use for it as an eyeshadow base as it's so woeful as a liner. Really dry so it drags and not pigmented at all.
MAC eyeshadow palettes. The bottom one is just in there because I wanted to wear Stars N Rockets today but the top one which consists of Parfait Amour, Smoke & Diamonds, Vex and Print is my usual one to grab for travelling or just for an everyday eye.
Benefit Moonbeam. Love this. It's probably my 4th bottle? Had this one for ages and thought it was high time I used it up
Rimmel Wake me Up Foundation in 103 True Ivory. Bought yesterday. Used properly for the first time today and really like it. A little thicker in consistency than the Bourjois and a little heavier coverage. Once on the skin, the finish is almost identical. Jury's still out on how long it lasts for.
Bourjois Healthy Mix Serum in 53 Light Beige. Nearly all gone now but is probably the best foundation I've ever tried. Glides on like a dream, just the right amount of coverage for me and looks really natural. Lasts about 8 hours.
Shu Uemura eyelash curlers
Lily Lolo kabuki - I've had this for the longest time but I absolutely love it! A really dense, synthetic brush that I've been using to put my foundation on with for ages. I'm tempted to buy the Real Techniques buffing brush but in all honesty I can't really see how it can be much different to this?
Mac Factor Masterpiece Max mascara - bought this yesterday as my beloved MUFE Smoky Lash is dried up beyond use now. This was my go-to mascara back in the day before Smoky Lash stole my heart about 3 years ago. It's a great mascara but not a patch on smoky lash unfortunately. So looks like I'm going to have to shell out on the real deal pretty soon.
MUFE Smoky Lash. Old and dried up now. *weeps*
Korres lengthening mascara in 04 Blue Black. Absolutely love this as an alternative to a black mascara. Looks good with a copper toned eyeshadow, believe it or not.
MAC Blusher in Mocha. Again, my ultimate favourite back in the day before I amassed such a ridiculous collection. I'm back full circle with this one now. I should have just stuck with it to be honest.
Shu Uemura Blusher in P Red 14. Catchy name huh? I've had this for about 2 or 3 years and used it regularly and I've barely worn away the etching on the powder, it's that pigmented! It's a great one for a slightly stronger cheek - I reach for this if I'm doing winged liner and no lip colour.
Pout blusher brush. Got a pot full of expensive MAC brushes, but this is the best one I have for diffusing blusher onto my cheeks and blending out really well with no scratching.
GOSH eyeliner in Black Ink. I used to be a massive fan of these liners. I have loads of them. The black one is a decent black kohl liner but not the greatest on the waterline
Urban Decay 24/7 liner in zero. Only a teeny bit of this left. This is my go-to for the waterline.
MAC Penultimate liner in Black Russian. Black liner with silver flecks - I use for night times as it catches the light nicely.
Collection 2000 concealer in 3 medium. Best concealer ever for under eyes! And cheap as chips too. Have a drawer full of expensive MAC, Bobbi Brown and Laura Mercier concealers that don't get a look-in now this is on the scene.
MAC lipstick in Girl About Town. One of my all time favourites. Considering it for The Big Day.
GOSH pencil brush
MAC 224. Sheds like a motherf*cker. Think it's only in here because I needed a blending brush and my 217 was dirty.
MAC 239 x 2. Need a wash.
Mascara brush for brows
MAC brow pencil in Fling. Been through about 30 of these. I buy them 3 at a time. They do the job perfectly and if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Touche Eclat. Just need to use this up. Never really understood the hype? I use on my cheek bones as a highlighter.
MAC eyeshadow in Omega. Originally bought for brows but I'm not a fan of powders for brows as I love my Fling pencil so much so it's just languishing in my makeup bag quite unloved really. Doesn't really show up on the lids. Poor unloved Omega :(
MAC eyeshadow in Strike a Pose. A really old limited edition shadow that I thought could do with some love.
Clinique cream liner in 02 True Black. I'm not sure if I like this better than fluid line or the Bobbi Brown one? It's a lovely black black and I think the creamy consistency does make it a little easier to apply - but once it's on it the same as all the rest really, they are all much of a muchness.

In the bathroom is my lipgloss of choice - Lancome Colour Fever in 208 Honey I Love You (might as well just chuck away the 20 or 30 others I own as this is really the only one I ever wear) and a random eyeshadow base that I'm trying to get through.

So there we go. If you're still reading this then bravo!

Oh and while I remember that I actually have a blog...

2012-02-23T20:16:00.000Z

https://instagr.am/p/HWR3iUDcpZ/

1. I've had Instagram for ages but randomly decided to start using it today and shot this picture.
2. The fur jacket is ASOS (absolute bargain, £85 down to £38)
3. The ring is from my favourite Native American shop Rainmaker and it is "me" summed up in a piece of jewellery.
4. Nails are this, which I forgot I had. That's always nice isn't it?

IN OTHER NEWS.... I have been sucked into the hype of the Rimmel Wake Me Up foundation. In my defence my Bourjois Healthy Mix Serum is nearly done so I did need some new foundation. I slapped a bit on with my fingers after my swim this afternoon and it feel very similar to the Healthy Mix Serum which is great. However the colour selection is quite limited. I went for True Ivory, which is a little more apricot toned than the number 53 shade that I have in the Bourjois. I will report back.

Onwards and upwards

2012-02-23T18:46:00.001Z

So in a nutshell - didn't get the job. I'm really gutted, actually genuinely upset about it. The interview went really well, I really bonded with the interviewer and it became one of those dream scenarios where it turned into a bit of a nice chat and not really much grilling. She sent in the other member of the team to meet me who was lovely and as I was leaving told me then and there she really liked me and would love to see me again so that I could present to the MD. I left the interview absolutely buzzing and really starting to visualise myself in a great new job with the friendly people I'd met in the interview.

The next day they sent through a topic (it was all about how how mobile technology is changing brands' relationships with consumers) which was pretty much my dream topic as its something I'm super interested in and have plenty of access to experts in the field via various friends. So I spent probably about 10 hours in total putting together a presentation. If I do say so myself, I'm a bit of a ninja in Powerpoint and standing up in front of people to talk on a subject does not phase me in the slightest, so, knowing that they liked me from my first interview off I went again, optimistic for a positive outcome.

Cutting a long story short - the presentation went great. The questions after were a little tougher and I kicked myself that I wasn't better prepared at relating the subject matte to the specific industry for the client I would be working on (A baby milk brand) but managed to do an alright job. They told me that had one other person to see the day day (Friday) but that they would call me on Monday with a decision. Monday at 5pm I got a call from the recruitment agency to say that my presentation had been excellent and had been thoroughly complimented but that I'd missed out on this job as the other candidate is already working agency-side (I've been client-side for the last 6 years).

100% gutted. My experience is the only thing I cant change! They didn't give me any indication in the interview they this was an issue, if they had then maybe I could have done something to gain their confidence? They did however say that as they like me so much there was potentially another vacancy at the company coming up soon as so their door is still open to me. I guess this is good news, but I can't really rely on that and will have to keep looking which is gutting because I genuinely could see myself being happy at that company.

Anyway - lesson for the future is don't think anything is a done deal until it really is! After the first interview I went off on a bit of a mini clothes shopping spree (I guess just thinking it would only be a matter of time before I was earning a wage again) and so now I'm still not working, another months bills have come out of my account and there's a large clothes, shoes and handbag sized hole in my dwindling bank balance. Oops.

So...

2012-02-09T16:49:00.000Z

I have a job interview on Monday. On paper the job ticks all of my boxes. It's literally exactly what I'm looking for. At first I was a little reticent. It's been really great being off work the last 2 or so months. In fact, Ed has been working 80 hour weeks getting his new business set up and if it hadn't been for the fact that I've been around to support him (i.e. do all the cooking, washing, housework, errand running etc...) then I don't think he would have got through the last month. Plus wedding planning is more or less a full time job at the moment and I have to make a few trips up to the site over the next couple of weeks to meet with marquee people and caterers. Ed and I had even discussed the possibility of just biting the bullet money-wise and had done our sums and worked out that if I literally do not spend a single penny on anything unnecessary then I could stay off work until the wedding if needed. But this job has come up and so I thought hey, I'm just going to see what happens.

I realised today that I don't in fact have any office appropriate clothes whatsoever. I threw away everything when I left my old job because everything was worn to death and I just symbolically wanted to make a fresh start whenever the time came to work in an office again. So off I went into town this afternoon on a mission to buy something to wear for the interview.

The company is a creative/communications agency. I've worked for agencies in the past and it's a very different atmosphere to the corporate/financial services environment I've been in for the last 6 years. People aren't afraid to show their personalities for a start. In fact, it's a positive pre-requisite. So I knew I didn't want to go down the black suit, white blouse route. I've been an interviewer before and there's a lot to be said for how you come across in terms of your dress and personality, as from that, the interviewer can visualise if you're going to fit in in their team.

It was a really successful shopping trip! I started by buying myself a coffee and then I went to get s Shellac manicure. A couple of hours later, an interview outfit had turned into an entire new work wardrobe - 2 blouses, 2 jackets, a dress, a pair of skinny jeans and a skirt. Oops. But what it made me realise is that I think I actually really want to work again! I really enjoyed putting together proper outfits - not just hoodies and leggings combos that I've been living in. I actually feel I'm ready to become part of the working world again. This little break has done me the power of good - I'm totally revitalised, fired up and looking forward to a new challenge, new faces, a new routine and most of all - having my own independent money again. Ed is going to be working from his new office as of Monday instead of at home and the timing just feels right. Sure I have a tonne of wedding planning to do - but that's what lunch breaks are for, right?

I've Officially Become THAT Person

2012-02-07T10:26:00.000Z

...the person I never though I would be: The bride to be getting down and dirty with DIY projects and all the tiny little details.

I always said that my wedding reception would be simple wooden trestle tables, wild flowers in jam jars, tea lights form Ikea, place-names printed off from the home computer printer. No fuss and certainly no scissors/glue/sewing involved!

So how did it get to the stage where I can't find the exact type of bunting I want so I'm making arrangements to borrow a sewing machine to make my own? I've got not one but two cake toppers on order just so I can be sure it's the perfect one. I'm shopping for bespoke gimmicks for the top table because they will look cool in a photo and I'm even considering the ultimate DIY project of making my own headpiece because I've got such a specific idea in my head of what I want that I'm not even sure my very talented friend who is a trained milliner will make it exactly how I want it.

How did this happen? One word: Pinterest! And I'm loving it. You get sucked into that site for hours and hours, piecing together little fragments and morsels of inspiration and slowly the basis of an plan comes together in your head. Now I completely understand why people miss wedding planning after the big day. I'm loving it - when else in your life do you get to plan a day that is a complete reflection of everything you stand for and love; to share with the people in the world that matter the most to you?

Only 137 days to go :)

If you're Pinterested in following my wedding planning journey...

2012-02-03T10:42:00.001Z

This week has been a pretty slow week, all round. I went out dancing last weekend with my friends. It was my first "proper" night out dancing til the wee small hours for absolutely ages and I had a blast. Unfortunately those sweat boxes called nightclubs are harbingers of all sorts of yucky germs and I've been snivelling, sneezing and coughing all week. I've not been sleeping well because of the blocked nose and constant coughing so I've decided I stay in bed today - what a luxury!

Wedding planning has also ground to a near halt this week too. We were all on track to hand over a large amount of money to a friend who runs a very large corporate events company who has put together our dream wedding package for us. Unfortunately the corporate suppliers he usually uses don't really cater for people with rural back garden wedding budgets and so we've had to have a bit of a re-think. We still want to go with the same basic package but I'm now having to source all the elements myself using local, more affordable suppliers. So this week has been a week of email enquiries and quote gathering from marquee companies, generator companies and caterers as well as florists and crockery hire places.

To take my mind away from these boring (but unfortunately highly critical) elements I've been madly uploading all my picture files that have been gathering up on my laptop onto Pinterest. It's been wonderful to see Loveaudrey's boards post-wedding to see all her inspiration materialise into the actual event. I've decided that I won't be revealing too many details on here so the closest you'll get to any sneak previews will be to follow my Pinterest boards to see the ideas hatching in my brain. You'll see that this week has been consumed mostly with bride and bridesmaids flowers, bridal accessories and also reception styling. You'll see I have a bit of a thing for peacock feathers, jam jars and bunting!

Today

2012-01-26T19:11:00.003Z

Today I:

Made a lovely beetroot and carrot salad....but managed to stain the entire kitchen and myself in bright pink beetroot juice
Had a flurry of activity on Pinterest
Floated around town listening to Lana De Ray on my iPod
Did that thing again, where I enjoyed a cup of coffee out in town on my own whilst reading a trashy magazine and watching the world go by
Cut my finger on the bunch of forms I picked up from Bristol Register Office for the "legal bit" of the wedding (aka the boring formality) Hmmm, omen?
Baulked at the price of wedding accessories in Debenhams - £135 for a crystal tiara that looks like it was bought from Claire's Accessories? No ta.
Bought a pair of wedding shoes, on a whim. I was convinced I was going to wear a pair I already own but when I spotted these they were just perfect and its nice to have a pair that will be debuted on the day
Lusted after two evening wedding dresses that I now can't stop thinking about... had decided not to change for evening but now am considering it again
Got the full quote through from the wedding planners which if I said was eye-wateringly expensive and well over budget would be an understatement :( Currently going through it to see what we can prune off and bring back down to a saner level. Or it'll be back to the drawing board. Bugger.
Wanted to cry when I snuck on the scales on a non-weigh in day to see I've not lost any weight since Christmas despite trying really hard for the last 3 weeks.
Wondered if every day for the next 5 months will be consumed with wedding related thoughts, as today has been??

60 Things

2012-01-25T11:30:00.000Z

1. How old are you in five years? 36
2. Who did you spend at least two hours with today? Just me and Ed at home at the moment
3. How tall are you? 5 feet 6 inches
4. What is the last movie you saw? Warhorse - cried like a baby nearly all the way through
5. Who called you last? My friend Kara last night to say to meet me at our friend's house for dinner instead of meeting at mine
6. Who did you call last? Ed
7. What was the last text message you received? My friend Danie to say yes I had left my scarf at hers
8. Do you prefer calling or texting? Texting as it's less intrusive
9. Are your parents married or divorced? Married
10. When did you last see your mother? 2 weeks before Christmas
11. What color eyes do you have? Blue
12. When did you wake up today? Just after 9am. But I went to bed at past 1am. The joys of not working or having kids!
13. What is your favorite Christmas song? Fairytale of New York
14. What is your favorite place? Black Rock City, Nevada
15. What place do you prefer the least? I grew to despise my former place of work that it gave me panic attacks just walking in the door.
16. Where do you think you will find yourself in ten years? With my husband living in a lovely 3 or 4 bedroomed house with a comfortable income and 2 happy and healthy children
17. What scared you about the night as a child? I was never really scared of the night, unless it was at my Nan's because she had creaky floorboards
18. What made you really laugh last? A girls' night at my friend's last night - regaling tales of our younger selves as hot messes!
19. How big is your bed? Double, would love a bigger one but our room isn't wide enough
20. Do you have desktop or laptop computer? Macbook laptop that is on its last legs. Buying a new one soon. Considering a Macbook Air.
21. Do you sleep with or without clothes on you? Clothes on - I'm a big pyjama fan - I struggle to get out of them!
22. How many pillows do you have in bed? One each
23. How many provinces have you lived in? I grew up in Oxfordshire and have lived in Bristol for 14 years
24. Which cities have you lived in? As above
25. Do you prefer shoes, socks or bare feet? Bare feet, not a big sock fan. I wear very attractive slippers in the house as I hate cold feet.
26. Are you social? Very, but I also love my own company too.
27. What is your favorite ice cream? Haagen Daaz Baileys flavour
28. What is your favorite dessert? Banoffee pie
29. Do you like Chinese food? A lot! Soft shell crab, prawns with spring onion and ginger.... yum!
30. Do you like coffee? Yes but I don't drink it every day, only special occasions
31. What do you have for breakfast? Porridge mainly, sometimes egg based at weekends. Love eggs florentine!
32. Do you sleep on a particular side? Always on my right side
33. Can you play poker? No, I hate card games
34. Do you like to cuddle / snuggle? Oh yes.
35. Are you a dependent person? Fiercely independent
36. Do you know anyone with the same birthday as you? Nope
37. Do you have children? Not yet
38. Do you know any other languages than English? Sadly not.
39. Have you ever driven an ambulance? What a strange question
40. Do you prefer the ocean or a pool? Pool. I hate sand.
41. What do you spend any money on? Food, hair appointments
42. Do you have precious jewellery? yes I have lots of lovely pieces of native indian jewellery given to me by Ed and of course my beautiful 4 diamond engagement ring
43. What are your favorite shows on TV? Gossip Girl and am loving New Girl at the moment
44. Can you roll your tongue? No
45. Who is the funniest person you know? All my friends are funny
46. Do you sleep with stuffed animals: No
47. What is your ringtone? I've never had a ringtone other than classis Ring Ring. Hate them.
48. Do you still have clothes from when you were little? No
49. What are you closest to you right now that is red? Some red in my cushion covers - they are mexican sugar skull print
50. Do you flirt much? Probably without realising it
51. Can you change the oil on the car: not a chance
52. Have you received speeding ticket ever: never
53. What was the last book you read? If God was a Rabbit
54. Do you read a newspaper? Online I read the Guardian and Telegraph most days
55. Subscribe to a magazine: Jamie magazine - it was a gift
56. Are you dancing in the car: Not really?
57. Which radio station did you listen to you last? Radio 4 in the car, sometimes in the bath too
58. What was the last thing you scribbled down on paper? A shopping list - ciabatta, sour cream, bunch of flowers, mangoes
59. When were you at church last? Probably a wedding a new years ago
60. Are you happy? Superficially I'm very happy as I'm not working and I'm enjoying a precious period of total freedom but its weighing heavily on me that I need to make a decision soon about what comes next. Reality can't be put on hold forever!

The imaginary list

2012-01-18T15:36:00.000Z

Today I crossed off one of the things on my imaginary "things to do while not working list". After going to a lunch time spinning class and enjoying a lovely long hot shower afterwards (which was also on the list) I took myself across the road, ordered a large soya latte and sat in the window leafing through a magazine and glancing upwards to watch the hustle and bustle of the people on the street go by.

It sounds like a such a small thing but to me it was bliss. When I was in the office prison every day, I'd gaze outside and see people going about their daily business and wonder what their story was - why weren't they also trapped in an office staring blankly at a spreadsheet? Were they unemployed, a student, off sick or a shift worker? How come they were outside and I was stuck inside?

I know this can't last forever so I am savouring every last second of this period in my life where I can be "on the other side" for once. I think today may have been the first day that I have truly felt like I've not thought about work, either past or future. This really is a fleeting period in my life as I have to earn a living eventually, but I am so thankful for this little break in the rat race. All those little symptoms of stress that I just accepted as the norm (not sleeping well, lethargy, short temperedness, poor concentration) have all lifted and I feel on top of the world. If I could bottle this feeling, I would. I will almost certainly need some of it in the future!

Catching up

2012-01-17T11:23:00.000Z

I'm having a lovely leisurely morning today - yes I know everyone in the world hates me for saying that! But I had a really long day yesterday - driving all the way to Hereford to the place we are getting married to measure up for the marquees that we need and survey the surrounding fields to decide where to place everything - the camping, the parking, the toilets etc... It's all getting very exciting now and starting to feel very real. Next steps are to decide if we can fit in our desired number of guests and fingers crossed the specific type of tent we want is available - then get it all booked. Then on to food, drinks, decor etc... the list is literally endless. Who knew putting on a big party in a field could be so complicated?

I'm getting a bit stressed about the fact that I've stupidly piled on the pounds since I bought my dress but I've been impeccable with my diet for the last couple of weeks and I've been busting my balls in the gym and have shed 2lb since my Christmas peak so things are improving, slowly.

The bridesmaids are all busily choosing their dresses and I have to admit that its nice to not really have to worry about that particular job. I know they will all look stunning in their dresses and not only look stunning but feel stunning too, because they'll all be in a style of their own choosing. I'm considering asking one more friend to be a bridesmaid - it has been playing on my mind ever since I asked them all, that there is one friend who I would have quite liked to ask but for some reason didn't; and it just feels weird with her not being one. My friends are so important to me that I want to have all my closest friends right by my side on the day. I know six is rather a lot but...well!

I've had weddings on the brain since the weekend - when I had butterflies in my stomach knowing that Franky was enjoying her magical day. So I spent most of Sunday trawling the internet for inspiration for how I'm going to style myself. I've decided I'm going to style it for day and then completely differently for night (makeup, accessories). Originally I was going to buy a second dress for the evening but I've decided to save the money and not do that. So much to think about really, I could do with putting the dress on and reminding myself what it looks like on, but I just don't want to put myself through the torture of knowing the extent of how much it doesn't actually fit. *weeps*

I better go - I have a list of errands and housework and I'm meeting a friend I've not seen for ages for lunch. How does anyone ever fit in a full time job? (Joke!).

Blogger's Block

2012-01-10T18:21:00.003Z

I had planned to blog a lot during this glorious period of freedom from work that I'm in. But oddly I've found that I just can't bring myself to do it.

The thing is, I'm feeling rather negative towards "blogging" in general due to the amount of "what the hell?" moments I keep having when going through my feed.

Blogging has come a long way since I first started my original blog back in 2008. Bloggers are so self-aware now for one. Blogging has gone mainstream and everyone knows it takes barely 10 minutes to sign yourself up for an account and any old dribble can be published to the world wide web in no time at all.

The bar seems to be incredibly low content-wise for bloggers to gain a significant following - reviews of their entire bathroom cabinet, numerous "outfits of the day" consisting of the same Primark blouse and skirt in every single colour way imaginable, dodgy craft projects that a 6 year old could do. But people are lapping this stuff up!

And then there are the "established" blogggers, the "elite" who are so savvy now they are semi-experts in SEO and Social Media - and are clearly using their little piece of the web to springboard themselves into a career in journalism or Social Media. It's so transparent it makes me wince. There's nothing wrong with it per se, its just so obvious. Where's the charm, the passion gone?

There are bloggers who I can tell are passionate about blogging but then they ruin it with the constant apologetic posts about not posting enough or the blatant filler posts just so they don't "let their audience down". Newsflash - the audience will survice without an Instagram of what you had for dinner. You're only letting yourselves down.

And the other thing that makes me twitch are blog posts about blogging. The constant posts to lay down opinions about whatever drama or spat is doing the rounds on Twitter that day - like blogger awards, or over use of giveways or whatever. Stop blogging about blogging and come up with some interesting content! Now I've lowered myself to blogging about bloggers that blog about blogging.

I know this is a massive moan. I just wanted to put it out there. It's kind of the reason I'm not blogging at the moment. I'm really just trying to decide if I have a place in the world of blogging. Because, actually, if this is what blogging has come to then "I'm out".

My new Year's Resolutions

2012-01-05T13:35:00.000Z

I think I've posted before, that actually I never really feel like January is te start of my year - to me it feels like Autumn is the start of a new year after I pack away all my summer clothes and get ready for another cold Winter.

However, I have to say I'm not quite on track at the moment, like I was this time last year having spend most of the Autumn this year stressing out about leaving my job and all the emotions that came with quitting a "sensible" corporate job that I'd been in for six years. So I am going to take this opportunity to wipe the slate clean and continue as I mean to go on.

1. Be less bothered about money
This year it is highly likely that I won't be working full time that much. Currently I'm enjoying a few weeks off any kind of work before I start to plug away at whatever my future holds for me. I have 5 weddings including my own to attend this year and that includes 4 hen weekends. I also have my heart set on a month away for honeymoon so I'm going to need to fit that little lot between contracting/freelancing so I know that my income is going to be intermittent. I'm totally cool with this! For too long I've been a massive wage slave and from now on I vow to be less money obsessed which means less bothered about earning it, and less bothered about spending it!

2. Gym at least 3 times a week
This is my realistic target - my ideal target is 5 times a week but I'm not going to beat myself up if I go 4 times in a week. I need to lose a stone before my wedding and that is the ultimate motivation as far as I'm concerned! I was motivated enough to lose the weight when I knew I had to spend a week in Dubai with 4 skinny friends so I know I can do this. So far this week I've been a bit ill with a sore throat so I've not been at all but I'm going to go this afternoon and then tomorrow and Saturday so this week will be ticked off. Next week I can hit the ground running.

3. Enjoy life
I guess this is a bit of an odd resolution but for ages I've been miserable in a job I didn't want to do and it permeated into all aspects of my life. My home life and my social life suffered because I was always down in the dumps. I vow to life life to the full this year - life is not a dress rehearsal!

Happy New Year

2012-01-04T12:43:00.000Z

Or at least it bloody well should be. I'm officially a lady of leisure right now and I was looking forward to bounding out of the flat everyday for daytime personal training sessions and bikram and seeing my Chrimbo weight gain melt away in no time.

But instead, I'm dosed up on lemsip and under a blanket on my sofa with a sore throat and snotty nose. But I'm reminding myself that I've been able to sleep in and stay warm in my flat rather than treck out to work and soldior on through regardless, because everyone knows you can't call in sick to an office job on January 3rd! The slightly irritating flip side of this is that I feel annoyed that I'm wasting my OWN time being ill instead of being off sick and being paid for it.

Anyway! I am not complaining about my situation. It's just a small set back. I couldn't be happier to be starting 2012, the year of my wedding with total freedom and a completely clean slate. Its exciting. A little scary actually. But most of all, what happens next is all down to me :)

I know every single other blogger in the universe has already done it but I will probably write a bit about some New Year's resolutions a bit later on.

How's your return to normality after the festive break been?

A good day!

2011-12-09T20:58:00.000Z

I haven't posted in a few days. Sometimes I really can't be arsed, plus I hate writing about my life when I feel really down in the dumps. My food and exercise are all over the shop still. I literally have no will power at all and its really depressing. I'm really beating myself up over it. I think I'm still finding not having work every day to be a massive novelty and the fact that I don't have to get dressed or leave the house every day has meant I literally haven't got dressed or left the house. Because I can. Ha! But then I feel like a massive slob and I get all down and weird about it. I know I've been itching to leave my job and now I (almost) have I'm still moaning, right? Massive life changes are always going to throw you off course, even if they are what you wanted. I just feel really out of sorts at the moment.

So anyway enough of my wallowing. For some reason I woke up today and I just felt amazingly energised. The sun was streaming into the living room when I got up and it put me in a really smily mood.

I went to spinning class at the gym at lunch time and totally smashed it and it felt amazing. When I got home I ate lunch and I really felt like I deserved it rather than just eating food out of habit because it was 1pm.

After lunch I went to meet a friend and had a lovely catch up over a pot of tea at a really cute new tea room in Clifton Village called Cordial and Grace. I will definitely go back and eat there another time, its super cute and really kitsch.

Wedding planning took a massive turn for the better today. We have enlisted the help of a really old friend of ours that has worked in events for years to help. We're not totally outsourcing the whole event to him but he is going to help put together a package for us and help to execute it. Because we're not having it at a venue it's really too overwhelming to have to co-ordinate all the individual elements and try to make a coherent event that we actually enjoy ourselves. He had loads of really good ideas like contingency plans in case it rains etc... so I feel SOOO much better about the whole thing now. Like its in safe hands!

We bought a Christmas tree this afternoon. Its not decorated yet, that's tonight's task. Decorating will be accompanied by a Christmas Spotify playlist, a massive chunk of cheese and chutney and a glass or three of Port.

The moon looks beautiful today, its full tomorrow. I have really special memories from the last full moon on 11.11.11 when I was getting super cosmic at the yoga retreat. I'm sure my energy has come from the moon today so I'm really looking forward to the full moon tomorrow.

Food Diary #2

2011-12-02T22:00:00.000Z

I woke up with a cracking headache today. I don't know where these headaches keep coming from, I've had one almost every day this week. I have a history of headaches but I haven't had them for ages and now they are almost every day.

I try to ride them out but I had to cave in and take a couple of painkillers and go for a lie-down. After that I was so wiped out I didn't have the energy to go to the gym as I really wanted to. Day = ruined.

Anyway here's what I ate:

Breakfast:
Porridge with pecans and honey
Cup of tea

Lunch:
2 x Ryvitas with Philadelphia and a bowl of quinoa salad from this recipe (I substituted wild rice for quinoa)

Snacks:
Satsuma
Some dried mango

Dinner:
Lamb shank in a spiced sauce
Coconut creamed savoy cabbage & rice

I went to bed with a massive food baby and horrid tummy cramps. I should have known, but I keep wanting to believe that it's going to be fine to eat a little bit of meat occasionally. For now at least though...wrong!

What I ate today

2011-12-01T19:00:00.002Z

Oh god I used to love these exercise and diet posts. They are probably supremely boring for anyone else to read but for weeks (months even?) documenting my food kept me on the straight and narrow. And since I currently own a wedding dress that does not do up - the straight and narrow is what I need right now. Indulge me.

Breakfast:
Porridge (just plain old oats and water is how I make it) with some cashew nuts and a dollop of St Dalfour Apricot jam (love this stuff it contains 100% fruit, no sugar and uses grape juice to sweeten)
Cup of tea with rice milk. Still getting used to the taste of rice milk having made the switch from soya recently. Apparently its bad for you m'kay?

Exercise:
Body Pump class... in which I got asked by the instructor if I was an instructor because my technique was so good. *smug face*

Lunch:
Waitrose chilli bean wrap
Banana
Nakd Cocoa Orange bar (obsessed with these right now)
Cup of Fennel tea (another obsession, so warming and wintery)

Snacks:
A satsuma
A mini pot of pineapple slices

Dinner:
Jerk marinated salmon with rice, grilled pepper & steamed green beans

Tonight I have a Christmas party organised by the Agencies that we work with - a buffet and a free bar apparently. I've even heard talk of a vodka luge. I'm hoping to stay away from the snacks and stick to only a few Gin & Slimlines....

An 80% Vegan?

2011-12-01T11:53:00.003Z

Ordinarily I'm not a girl who likes to do things by halves but recently I've found myself in a position where I'd probably say that I've become (by default more than anything) an "almost-Vegan".

A few weeks ago I went on a yoga/healing retreat with some friends. I've never done anything like it before but I had some holiday days to use up before I leave my job at the end of the year and thought, why the hell not? Don't knock anything until you've tried it right? (Except incest and Morris dancing, so the saying goes).

The preparation notes sent out by the organisers suggested purifying our minds and bodies by avoiding eating any animal products for 5-7 days either side of the retreat. Now I'm not a massive meat eater anyway and I don't eat a lot of dairy (I try avoid dairy milk/cream/yoghurt and limit my cheese intake because it aggravates my Asthma) so I didn't find this too hard whatsoever. In fact I threw myself into it with gusto, pouring over Vegan food blogs such as Oh She Glows and I even bought Veganomicon from Amazon. I've been suffering from a pretty bad flare up of IBS symptoms recently. I guess I'm pretty stressed with one thing and another and this diet was amazing. I had no gripes or bloating and felt light and energetic.

I really enjoyed the yoga retreat itself, it was very enlightening and a good bonding experience for me and the friends I went with. I won't go into the fine details of it because its not really everyone's cup of tea. When I came back, I was really surprised that I felt no compulsion or even desire, to start eating meat and dairy again. I really missed eggs I have to admit, so scrambled eggs with mushrooms and tomatoes for breakfast the day after I got home was heaven on a plate.

The first time I ate meat, I admit it was part of an enormous Thanksgiving feast with my American friends and it was piles of roast Turkey and coca-cola glazed Ham so I wasn't entirely surprised when I suffered from massive bloating and other unpleasant symptoms that dont really need to be spelled out on the internet. What did flummox me was the second time I ate meat - some roast lamb as part of a Sunday lunch (y'all know how much I love a Sunday roast) when the the same thing happened again. Really badly. Grrrrr. Annoying.com.

So I here I am, back to my diet of no meat or dairy and I'm actually really enjoying it! My cooking is healthier, cheaper and far more creative. I'm eating a lot of grains, pulses and nuts as well as gorgeous, tasty vegetable dishes. My IBS symptoms are back under control, I'm eating a few eggs here and there and also a bit of fish. I don't believe its necessary to have cut and dried labels like "vegetarian" or "vegan" (unless of course, you have an ethical reason for not eating animal products which I do not). What's wrong with a Pick n Mix diet? (Mmm, strawberry laces and marshmallow flumps.....).

I do feel a bit bummed that I can't tolerate meat at the moment but when things calm down a little then maybe my insides can handle it a bit better? I've no intention of cutting it out permanently from my diet. Meat is ingrained into my life too much but just as Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has found out, a diet with less meat and more veg is actually pretty rad.

Up / Down

2011-11-19T19:46:00.000Z

UP:

Rosehip tea
Soup
Strawberry milkshake hair
Rice Milk
Florence & The Machine - Ceremonials
Grand Designs
Ankle boots
Mulled wine scented candle
Swishing though leaves

DOWN

Working until the end of the year
People not having the courtesy to even get back to you, having been for a job interview
Bad skin
Tootsies in dire need of a pedi
Gym neglect

This month's Hello magazine p.107

2011-10-20T19:37:00.000+01:00

Congratulations Kath and Thopa! Can you spot me in the crowd with the other bridesmaids?

This weekend I...

2011-09-25T22:54:00.000+01:00

1. Had an epic lie in. I really needed it. It's been my first weekend at home in 4 weeks and my first weekend off from packing, planning and generally being being stupid busy in about 6 or 7 weeks. Plus both Ed and I have been ill the last week with a rankling cough and general fluey bug.

2. Made delicious brunch "tacos" with mini tortilla, guacamole, tomato salsa and scrambled egg whites with a dash of Tabasco. After America I have a new found obsession with Mexican food. Infact I've bought a new cookbook Mexican Food Made Simple and I'm planning on making some dishes from it next week.

3. Continued with my most hated task of the year - packing away all my summer and festival clothes for the winter to make room for winter jumpers - waaah! Although now I'm hearing that next week is going to be a heatwave. FML. I'm not getting it all back out.

Bye bye sequin hotpants, see you next summer

3. Went back to the new Strip waxing bar in Harvey Nichols. I don't want to overshare but I'm a total convert to their Brazilian waxing. It's the best thing ever and literally does. not. hurt. I'm booked back in in a month and am pretty much accepting that this is a new part of my regular grooming budget - there's no going back now! By the way if anyone wants a 20% off card for any treatment at Strip in Bristol Harvey Nicks then let me know.

4. Popped into the terrace party at the Blue Mountain club where my friends Dan and Amos were DJing at an outdoor day time party. I had my bike with no lights so I had to duck out before it got dark, plus it started to drizzle. Yuck.

5. Called into Magic Roll on the way home to pick up my favourite local fast food. A magic roll consists of a flatbread with chicken (or beef, lamb or halloumi) with your choice of hummus, tabbouleh and a selection of other yummy salads. Delicious, and I like to think its quite healthy (well, compared to a kebab or a burger anyway).

6. Said goodbye to Ed who's off to Ibiza to work until Thursday so I'll be on my own this week :(

7. Decided to go down to my friends' house who live just down the road from me with a bottle of wine to have a natter and catch up (and a little swoon over Gary Barlow on X Factor) having not seen them for ages.

8. Ended up having to climb into my kitchen window when I got home because I forgot to take my keys with me - d'oh! Good job the none of the neighbours spotted my friend giving me a leg up and me shimmying through the window in a most un-ladylike fashion otherwise the police would have turned up.

9. Felt about 50x worse this morning after just a couple of glasses of red wine than I did last Sunday after umpteen massive gin and tonics at the wedding in Madrid. Why does this happen??

10. Spent/wasted the day mooching about feeling sorry for myself in my PJs when I had big plans to go and do a grocery shop. Am going to have to do that tomorrow now as even Old Mother Hubbord would be embarrassed at the state of my cupboards.

11. Watched one of my favourite documentary movies Paris is Burning, followed by Downton Abbey and then brand new TOWIE. Love when Sunday night TV is so ace.

12. This has been on heavy rotation on my ipod:

Autumn Equinox - new beginnings

2011-09-23T15:39:00.001+01:00

For some reason today felt like a good enough day to start writing shit down again, having taken a break over the summer. I always knew that a day would arrive when I felt like blogging again and well, here it is.

Coincidentally today is the official start of Autumn. I always find the transition from summer to Autumn/Winter quite a challenge, not least because for the last three years my summer has ended in the crescendo of the Burning Man festival. Coming home from Burning Man and adjusting to "normal life" is hard enough, without having to pack away the feather head-dresses, sequin capes, sparkly lycra leotards and catsuits and other outfits away for another year and brace ourselves for 8 or 9 months of cold, wet and grey.

Just a week after touching back down in the UK, I travelled to be a bridesmaid at my dear friend Kath's wedding in Madrid and so it's been a whirlwind few weeks of travelling and its only now, as I sit here feeling like death with a cough and sore throat that I'm really starting to get my head around the fact that the summer is truly over and to start to embrace the next chapter.

There are definitely a lot of exciting times ahead for me - getting in shape... I certainly put on a few pounds in America eating yummy American food - lots of In n Out cheeseburgers, steaks and booze have definitely taken their toll. And the of course the biggie: wedding planning....we have a date (June 23rd), a venue (Ed's uncle's house in Herefordshire), a dress (top secret!) and plenty of ideas of basically creating our own mini festival to celebrate our marriage with a few hundred of our closest friends.

Fringed housecoat - vintage
Swimsuit - Black Milk

Thanks for not forgetting about me. Stick around, it's going to be an exciting next few months.

Two weeks time

2011-06-07T21:06:00.001+01:00

This is about the time of year that I start gettting obsessed with scouring eBay and vintage shops for special pieces to wear to festivals. This year I’m planning 3 in the UK – Glastonbury, Secret Garden Party and The Big Chill and of course what has become the annual pilgrimage out to the the Nevada desert for Burning Man.

I recently wrote a guest blog on Rebecca’s blog sharing some of my thoughts on Festivals in terms of beauty, fashion and food. My festival experience is probably different to a lot of others – I’m not really into bands. I never spend the day going from stage to stage keeping to a regimiated timescale with a laminated programme dangling from my neck. I’ll probably watch the headliner each evening at Glastonbury if I’m lucky. For the most part I’ll either be sleeping in the day time (if my tent isn't hotter than the gates of Hades), hanging out with friends at the Stone Circle (the best place ever for hilarious people watching) mooching round the markets looking for clothes or jewellery or seeking out interesting food. After dark I’m usually getting up to no good in the late night dens of iniquity like Arcadia or Shangri-la which is where all the best weirdness happens – this is where I had the inpromptu hot tub and got really tipsy on Champagne couple of years ago – that was certianly a festival first!

I just love being so far removed from every day life. My life does tend to become rather regimented with a 9-5 job and trying to keep to a gym schedule so when I get to a festival I allow myself to completely lose myself – and that goes especially for clothes. I feel like I want to “shed” the uniform of the outside world and I almost take on a different persona – except it’s not really a persona, it’s actually the real me coming out. In the bumf they send out in the post with all the info on Burning Man they always refer to it as "home" and then after it finishes you return to the "default world" - I can definitely relate to that.

So after going out for a roast on last Sunday I put my post-roast coma to good use and got on eBay to look for some festival treasures. Here's what I acquired:

90s sequinned crop top

Topshop sequinned high waisted hotpants

80s Picasso print bomber jacket

Last year we were very spoilt as both Glastonbury and Secret Garden Party were gloriously sunny the entire time and I came back from both as brown as a nut. Because of last year I'm definitely visualising wall to wall sunshine again so I've been looking for tiny tops and hotpants - they will be perfect for the desert but I think I might need to looking for some back-up plans because if the weather is anything like it has been this week then Glastonbury could well be quite muddy and windy; especially since I've killed two of my favourite vintage mohair cardigans by accidentally washing them on hot washes. D'oh.

I'll keep you posted on any future purchases - I have got a watch list full of oddities and shiny things as long as my arm. Plus, since I've discovered GoofBay (thanks for the tip Christina) I'm a lot better at winning auctions than I used to be (I used to stick to Buy It Nows).

*Edit* This perfectly sums up my feelings

Picking myself up and carrying on

2011-06-02T08:21:00.000+01:00

It's really hard when you write about diets and exercise and losing weight on a blog because as everyone knows it's a journey and there are ups and downs. I'm especially reluctant to let it all out on my blog because I am quite a private person but also because I'm acutely aware that most people are not going to be that sympathetic of my struggles to lose 8-10lb as I'm obviously not fat or overweight and I'm just looking to become the best version of "me" that I can be. For me that means being confident in shorts or a bikini, not just skinny jeans that pull everything in and hide a multitude of sins.

I do struggle with my state of mind sometimes and maintaining a healthy lifestyle and self confidence through body confidence is so important to me - I've never been happier than back in Feb when I went on holiday with my girlfriends - tanned and toned! I think I'm nearly half a stone heavier now.

I haven't been posting a lot lately because frankly I've been a bit down in the dumps. I'm not really enjoying my job so much and my other half has started a new business and is working all the hours to get that up and running. Low self esteem + loneliness = me binge and comfort eating and old habits creeping back in without me even noticing. Again. My gym schedule is struggling at once a week at the moment and I'm using tiredness as an excuse. I truly am tired, that's not an excuse as such but obviously I know that going to the gym will help me sleep better and will break the late night/coffee/late night/coffee cycle that I'm in. Again arrrgh!

I think I've caught this before it becomes a real issue but my goal of being at my absolute peak of fitness and toned body for Burning Man is in serious jeopardy if I don't fix up NOW!

I was SO inspired to see that my friend Arlene has reached her target weight and also Kelly has decided to run a half marathon so I'm taking today as the start of a new day. I'm working from home so I have no excuse to be drinking Grande Lattes, nipping to the vending machine for a Twix, eating baguettes for lunch or any of that stupid behaviour I've allowed myself to start doing again.

Right, I'm off for a shower and then I'll have a bowl of porridge. Gym later. Ed us home tomorrow so I'm going to clean the house to a sparkle and fill the fridge with delicious healthy foods. Oh and the sun is out too - always helps.

Look how far I've come!

2011-05-26T19:07:00.001+01:00

As Amsterdam was only a fleeting visit I travelled hand luggage only. Only a couple of years ago the thought of travelling hand luggage only would have struck fear into my heart, but not now.

Here's what I took:

Makeup bag:

Synthetic kabuki brush
Eyelash curlers
Urban decay 24/7 black eyeliner pencil
Brushes - MAC 272, 217
Eyebrow pencil (MAC lingering) & mascara spoolie for combing through brows
Lily Lolo Star Dust sample pot (cheek & brow highlight)
MAC coco pigment sample pot (night time eye shadow)
ELF "Girly" mineral eyeshadow (day time)

In my clear bag:

Bourjois Healthy Mix foundation & concealer (am in LOVE with these, can't believe how good they are for a high street brand)
Makeup Forever Smoky Lash mascara (haven't used anything else for 2 years now - holy grail)
Bobbi Brown pot rouge - pink raspberry (apply with fingers)
Superdrug Natural High Radiance balm (day cream)
Liz Earle moisturiser, travel sized tube (night cream)
E45 lipbalm
Lipsticks - MAC Lollipop Loving & Fun n Sexy (old LE collections - oldies but goodies)
Lancome Colourfever Ligloss in 208 - Honey (favourite ever lipgloss)
Travel sized Simple facial wash
Travel sized Palmolive shower creme
Travel sized toothpaste
Clarins handcream (literally can't be without a tube of this, I have them dotted everywhere)

Actually it looks quite a lot all listed out, but it felt like I was travelling with practically nothing! Anyway, a far cry from the literal shoebox sized amounts I used to lug around with me. Go me.

Weekend in Amsterdam

2011-05-25T22:42:00.002+01:00

This weekend we popped over to Amsterdam. I had to get up at 4.15am on Friday morning to make my 7am flight. It was all a bit hectic because I thought my flight was actually 7pm that evening so good job I checked the confirmation email before I travelled (I didn’t book the flight by the way, that was Ed). So I had to take a last minute day off from work, luckily my work are pretty cool with things like that and I didn’t have any hard deadlines that day but I had to work like a beast Thursday to tie up loose ends before I could take a long weekend. So I was totally shattered at 4.15am Friday morning!

We’d gone over to Amsterdam to celebrate a double birthday of some Dutch friends of ours and also to see a friend who’s just had a baby – he’s two weeks old. I got to have a little cuddle – he was sooo tiny. Ed likes to usher me out and change the subject as soon as possible if we ever go and visit newborns…he knows what I’m like.

We spent most of Friday mooching around the centre of Amsterdam. It was beautiful and sunny over there – a lot nicer than the UK by all accounts. After visiting Krissy and baby Kyle we headed out to meet our friends at Trouw which is a night club / restaurant in the old printing press building of Holland’s Trouw newspaper.

After dinner the music starts off really softly in the club working up to proper party music which went on until 5am. The Djs for the night were our good friends Seth, Ryan and Lee of Visionquest (also partly the reason we went over). We spent the next day chilling with our friends at their house in the East of the city sunbathing on beanbags on the roof of their apartment – 4 floors up so we had a great view of the city below.

Can you guess where the party was?

We checked into a hotel Saturday night which was really lovely (this one, if you're interested) – we ordered room service (which for once wasn’t extortionate). We got dim sum, Caesar salad and mojitos and chilled in bed watching TV. I think Aljazeera was the only English speaking channel so I pretty much fell asleep straight away.

We got a late check out to 1pm and then made our way straight to Schipol for our flight home making sure we picked up a massive hunk of Gouda with cumin from the airport. We got home about 4pm UK time so it was quite civillised really. I was so sleepy when I got home but I didn’t want to nap to I busied myself by knocking up a load of salads using whatever I had left in the fridge – 4 bean & grain salad, beetroot & Carrot salad, potato salad, some falafals and some roasted chicken breast. We munched on that and then had an early night. So I even managed to take leftovers to work for a packed lunch which was miraculous seeing as I'd been away all weekend.

The A-Z of me

2011-05-25T07:45:00.001+01:00

Age: The wrong side of 30!

Bed Size: Double with Tempur matress and duck down duvet. In Winter an electric over-blanket too. Bedding is something I believe you should not scrimp on. We would have a bigger bed but our bedroom isn't big enough.

Dogs: None, I’m pretty much scared of most dogs. If they’re small and cute then I’m not scared but I’d defintely not have one as a pet. In general I don’t do pets.

Essential start of your day: Cup of English Breakfast Tea with soya milk, half an hour in front of the BBC news to wake up and a hearty breakfast – cereal based in the week, usually something like scrambled or poached egg and smoked salmon at the weekend.

Favourite Colour: The colour palette that I like best would include grey, pink and teal

Gold or Silver: Well my engagement ring is platinum so I tend to stick to silver jewellery in general but I love gold costume jewellery too and have no issues with mixing the two

Height: 5’6”

Instruments I play: None really. Used to play the recorder and violin at school but I was never very good.

Job Title: Marketing Manager (v. boring)

Kids: Soon

Live: Bristol

Mum's name: Mummy

Nickname: Bish, Bishy, Fish, Fishface, Fish head and others not mentionable on the internet

Pet Peeve: Toilet roll facing towards the back and lateness

Quote from a movie: “If you want the ultimate, you've got to be willing to pay the ultimate price. It's not tragic to die doing what you love.” – Bodhi from Point Break. My ultimate favourite movie.

Right or left handed: Right.

Siblings: One of each, both younger

Time you wake up: 7am in the week. About 8 hours after I go to bed at weekends. Usually up by about 9 at the latest though.

Underwear: I’m not one of those girls who insists on matching sets or expensive underwear. Usually just plain black knickers and plain black bras. I like wearing non-wired ones a lot of the time as they’re more comfortable,

Vegetables you dislike: Brussels Sprouts

What makes you run late: I’m pretty punctual. The only times I run late are when I basically don’t want to go somewhere and then I procrastinate.

X-rays you've had done: Teeth and lots of chest x-rays over the years for Asthma

Yummy food you make: I like to make roasts, brunches, thai curries and I love to make interesting salads.

Zoo animal: Monkeys or Penguins.

Things I have learnt recently

2011-05-18T20:19:00.001+01:00

1. Wearing heels in the office gets me noticed more and makes me feel so much more confident.

2. No matter how hard I try to give up dairy, I just can't give up cheese. What's a life if it doesn't include Stilton, Feta, Halloumi or Brie for gods sake??

3. Life is a lot easier in general after a good night's sleep

4. My hair is really enjoying it's little daliance with L'Oreal Elvive Conditioner. But shhhh, don't tell my hairdresser.

5. I'm totally buying into the Pippa Middleton hype

6. Dorset Cereal Marmalade Granola is yummy. But at 500+ calories per 100g it definitely won't become a regular breakfast staple.

7. Quinoa is my friend

8. That a regular sized makeup bag of products is more than enough to keep me looking reem on a daily basis. I do not need a chest of drawers full of makeup.

9. That the odd compliment or bit of positive feedback makes all the difference.

10. There's a strong chance that if Chuck Bass asked me out I'd say yes. But it's ok because I'm allowing Ed to leave me for Pixie Lott.

New Shoesies

2011-05-18T18:38:00.000+01:00

I squarely blame Franky of Loveaudrey for the purchase of these shoes as she Twitpic'd (that's a valid verb now right?) some shoes she was thinking of buying from Dune and it got me browsing the Dune website....and well one thing led to another.

Not the greatest photo of them soz....I'm still umming and ahhing over whether to keep them because let's face it, they're entirely impractical what with them being made of Satin. I will inevitably scuff the crap out of them the second I put one foot over my frontdoor threshold. Not to mention the fact that I am supposed to be saving my money at the moment for the small matter of Burning Man (108 days til the man burns) and the wedding fund but.... come on.....look how amazoid they are!!

There's absolutely no point in asking if I should keep them or not because I know you're all enablers.

Maybe I'll just wear them around the house and enjoy them for one evening? Or maybe not. Waaaaah!

Chuck and Blair

2011-05-18T07:42:00.000+01:00

One of my guilty pleasures is my weekly download of Gossip Girl from American TV.

Last night I watched the last in the series of season 4 - which as always ended on a number of different cliff hangers. This season did go through some rocky patches but the last couple of episodes have been brilliant.

I have to admit one of the main reasons I love this show is Ed Westwick AKA Chuck Bass. Big time crush alert! The on-off relationship with Blair Waldorf is toe curlingly gripping... will they, won't they arrrgh!!???

In the last episode there was SUCH a good scene involving these two set to Adele's Rolling in the Deep (the soundtracks to Gossip Girl are always spot on) that I got a bit glassy eyed watching it. I won't give it away because if people are watching it on UK TV then they won't have seen the episode yet. I did a search for it on You Tube this morning to see of anyone had uploaded it as I wanted to see it again. I couldn't find it, but I found another little montage video of some classic Chuck and Blair moments set to the same music so I thought I'd post this instead.

I can't wait for it to come back in the Autumn.

My weekend

2011-05-15T21:07:00.002+01:00

* Went for dinner on Friday night with 5 girls from work and had a complete hoot. I have always avoided socialising with colleagues but we have a lovely little girly group at work at the moment and this is the first time in nearly 6 years of working for my company that I have actually felt like I wanted to spend my own time with colleagues on a night out. They are genuinely my friends now and it's really nice.

* After a lovely dinner at Goldbrick House followed by cocktails at Hyde & Co I slept like a baby and didn't wake up until 10.45am on Saturday morning (no hangover either - score!) which for me is unheard of. I must have really badly needed to catch up on my sleep after a week of not sleeping well last week. However it left me feeling out of sorts for the rest of the day because I kept thinking it was 3 hours earlier than it actually was.

* I woke up to breakfast in bed of tea and croissants and jam from my almost-husband....which is a total luxury and a rarity for me as I'm always the earliest riser so I usually cave and make myself breakfast, which he then gets in bed. Yes even on weekdays. I'm such a good wife :)

* I went for a mosey up to Clifton Village which is the nearest shopping area to where I live. It's a very well to do area and is full of cute little boutiques and lovely delis. I bought sandwiches from the best deli ever - Arch House Deli and had a browse in my favourite vintage costume jewellery shop Bees and Graves in the Clifton Arcade which always puts me into a complete rhinestone trance. One of my fab friends bought me a brooch from there for my birthday:

* I decided to do yet another big makeup clear-out to sell to try to boost the wedding fund a bit more. I have SOOOO much makeup that just sits gathering dust from my crazy makeup addict days and I hope that someone else can give it a good home. I will probably do another blog post about my remaining collection and also what makeup I have on my current rotation. I still love makeup just as much as ever, but I have all bases more than covered of products that suit me and that I know work for me so I don't feel the need to waste all my money on infinite amounts of essentially the same thing.

* Saturday ended with me sitting on the sofa about 8pm thinking I felt a bit tired...the next thing I knew it was Sunday morning. Apparently I fell asleep and was put to bed about 11pm. I don't remember any of it! I woke up at 8.30am this morning...so a full 12 hours sleep. I'm astounded at how much I've slept this weekend but I must have needed it. It was probably a good thing, as I was only planning on watching the Eurovision song contest anyway!

* I was adamant I was going to go to the gym today but was enjoying mooching around in my PJs too much this morning so I decided not to beat myself up over it and just go with it.

* So I spent the morning enjoying nice banter on Twitter and Googling for local bridal dressmakers to see if I can get something similar to "the one" that I can't stop thinking about that's more in my comfortable price range. I've emailed the picture to Mummy and she loves it as well, so even though I'm still going to try a few more on just so I can rule out other styles, I think it's a fairly good sign that I'm still obsessing over this one and mentally planning shoes and accessories to go for it.

* I finally did a big grocery shop. Because I've been feeling so rubbish the last week through lack of sleep and a nasty migraine last Monday set the week off to a bad start I've been putting this off. Finally the cupboards and freezer were completely bare so I could put it off no longer. I find it so much easier to be healthy when I have the right foods in the house rather than open myself up to temptation by eating "pay as you go".

* This afternoon we had a roast at home for two. I can't remember the last time we did this as we usually have a roast out somewhere with friends but it was lovely to just do something cosy and chilled at home.

* I have just made a selection of salads for next weeks lunch boxes. A quinoa and bean salad, a tomato and red onion salad and some roasted vegetables to help ourselves to and pick at. My other half is a night owl and has a tendency to raid the fridge at all hours of the night so this is my plan to stop him eating other food earmarked for dinners.

* So now I'm snuggled up on the sofa with lots of candles lit watching a Kardashian marathon. I know I say this every week but this week I literally canno believe the weekend has gone so quickly - I feel like all I've done is sleep. Here's hoping that next week is a bit better than last week which where I was just a tired, grumpy zombie all week!

I'm having a makeup blogsale

2011-05-14T17:49:00.000+01:00

As you know I LOVE MAKEUP - therefore it upsets me when my little precious treasures lie unloved and gathering dust.

I am also trying to save for the wedding dress of my dreams which is why I've decided to part with some makeup that has been neglected of late

I've done it on a separate blog - it's here if you're interested :)

I knew this was going to happen...

2011-05-09T19:43:00.000+01:00

Having spent a year being engaged and not giving the whole wedding thing literally a second thought, having been to one dress shop I appear to have become obsessed with wedding dresses - I have been googling like a beast and even dreamt about wedding dresses last night.

What has happened to me?? This needs to stop.

What I did this weekend

2011-05-08T18:18:00.001+01:00

- Met my friend Kara for brunch at my favourite Rosemarino where I had the house special -"Tommy's one pan wonder" It's a delight - Bacon, onions, mushrooms & potatoes fried in 1 pan with 2 eggs cracked on top & melted cheese, served with toast.

- We then went wedding dress shopping for the very first time to Mews. Kara is also engaged (we are bridesmaids for each other and our other halves are also best men for each other) so it was nice to go and look and try on together. We know each other's styles really well. Despite the shop telling us they don't like joint appointments incase brides end up squabbling over the same dresses, we were the prefect team, ending up with totally different dresses to try on. It was so exciting and fun to try on a wedding dress for the first time in my life. It felt very surreal. Predictably my thoughts of a simple, non structured, non corseted plain dress went right out of the window as soon as I tried on some different styles. I fell in love with a dress that is very unique and something I never thought I'd go for. It's a little (well, a lot) pricey so I'm trying to put it out of my mind, but if I try on 50 more dresses and don't like another one as much, then I guess I'm going to be parting with the cash. Kara said she got a little teary when she saw me in it, which is a good sign...I'm really trying not to get obsessed with it though as it's only the first shop we've been to.

- Afterwards we went for a G&T to debrief on the dress shopping and then I popped down to St Nicholas Market to buy things for a little craft project we've had planned for a while - we bought a glue gun and bunch of shiny rhinestones to pimp up the sunglasses we sourced from eBay. I'm super excited to create some bespoke frames festival wear, especially Burning Man. So spent the evening vajazzling these sunnies....

- Today 12 of my nearest and dearest went for a lovely lunch at Rockfish. I've blogged about this place before, it's probably my favourite restaurant in Bristol. We started with Scallops and Oysters then I had Cuttlefish with broad beans and roast rib of beef for my main course. I was going to have Monksfish but the last one got ordered just before we put our order in.

- As it was my birthday last Tuesday, this was my slightly belated birthday celebration with my friends. I didn't think that after 11 days off work that many people would be up for doing anything on the day so we decided on a Sunday lunch instead seeing as it's such an institution in our group. My friends bought some some lovely presents which was such a surprise as I'd almost forgotten that my birthday was the reason we arranged the lunch - Kara and Amos bought me this gorgeous scarf:

A lovely weekend. I'm now fighting a food coma and getting that sinking Sunday evening feeling :(

Hola!

2011-05-04T20:52:00.000+01:00

So it was back to reality yesterday after the lovely extended break. Man did I need that break as I really wasn’t feeling too good about life beforehand. I have to say – just getting some distance between me and the routine drudgery has done me the power of good. I woken up yesterday and today with a plan of action and renewed sense of motivation.

Glastonbury is only 8 weeks away so I will be on pre-Dubai levels of military style commitment to healthy eating and exercise to get trim and toned so that if the weather is boiling like it was last year (fingers crossed!) that I can feel confident to strut around in the clothes I want to wear to make me feel fabulous rather than the usual crisis of self-confidence every time thighs need to be exposed.

It was my birthday yesterday. I tried to play it down somewhat as it feels like a bit of an anti-climax after last year's flurry of getting engaged, surprise 30^th birthday party and then being whisked away to New York for a week. I think the sum total of any “celebration” this year will be a nice Sunday roast somewhere with a small group of friends. I don’t feel much like drinking or partying right now as I want to be really focussed on getting myself back into a good place after being a bit off kilter of late.

I decided that I needed a bit of a work wardrobe makeover – I’ve always on principle never really spent that much money or put that much effort into buying work clothes as I prefer to spend my money on clothes to wear at home. However recently, I’ve increasingly felt dowdy and frumpy at work and realised that everyday when I put on my plain jane uniform of boring black trousers and sgraggy old jersey top that it’s like putting on the uniform of a plain jane person – so today I’ve decided to try and dress a little bit more "me" at work. Here's what I wore today:

Tailored peg-leg trousers - £40 ASOS

Deena & Ozzy clog platforms - £85 Urban Outfitters

Blazer £24.99 H&M

I've been back on the old regime the last couple of days and it feels so good after completely letting it all go out of the window for a little bit!

A food diary for today:

Breakfast: porridge with half a banana, pecans and maple syrup

Lunch: cherry tomato, garlic and rocket wholewheat spaghetti

Supper: salmon on a bed of quinoa, edamame & aduki beans with beetroot, rocket and cherry toms.

I favourite trick of mine lately is to mix:

...and then dress with soy sauce and a little tobasco to give it a bit of umph. This makes the perfect base for a salad.

Must go - have a new episode of Gossip Girl to watch cuddled up on the sofa :)

Royal Wedding Day

2011-04-29T22:52:00.000+01:00

What a special day. I'm 100% a royalist and I've been stupidly excited about this day ever since the engagement was announced last year.

I spent most of this morning from 8am weeping into tissues watching the wedding on TV in my PJs on the sofa drinking tea.

After I'd watched every last second of live coverage, right up to the royal couple driving to Clarence House in the Aston Martin I went out to a mahoosive Royal Wedding rave-up right in the middle of Bristol in a park. My friends who organised it had kept the location secret, only communicating it through Facebook - it was an amazing party, fair play to them for pulling off such an amazing party right in the middle of a city.

There's an after party in a club but I don't want to ruin the buzz I'm on at the moment from this afternoon and partying in the open air by going to a sweaty, dark club and then writing tomorrow off. Plus I definitely want be up early tomorrow to buy all the newspapers of the wedding for my collection.

I think a trip to the gym is in order too - I dread to think how much weight has crept on over the last couple of weeks. Some big changes are afoot in my life right now and my routine has somewhat gone out of the window whilst I try to get my head round some big decisions. I can't say quite yet what, but I will soon ;)

You don't mind the fall till your face hits the ground

2011-04-18T18:52:00.000+01:00

I just wanted to say, thank you so much for all the lovely comments on my last post.

I'm sorry I have to be so cryptic, I can't really go into the details publicly but I just wanted to reassure everyone that there's no real massive crisis happening with me - I'm totally fine and healthy, I'm just going through the whole "OMG what am I doing with my life??" thing for about the 76354583 trillionth time. But this time might actually do something about it and it's scaring the shit out of me, basically.

I often read back my old posts on here and I am such an up down person! I realise I'm constantly either on top of the world or I'm scraping myself off the floor, I find it very hard to maintain equilibrium. I need to work on that.

Totally hating myself right now because I keep falling off the wagon and binge eating for comfort and then not going to the gym (because eating crap makes me lethargic) it's such a vicious circle. I've put on a couple of pounds and my natural reaction is to sulk about it and curl up on the sofa with a cuppa instead of hit the gym and purge the kitchen of cakes.

Looking forward to the Bank Holiday break - 11 days off work, boy do I need it.

P.S I totally stole the whole lyrics thing from Kelanjo

Bit quiet around here?

2011-04-13T18:00:00.000+01:00

Yup.

I try to be a positive upbeat blogger these days so if I haven't got anything positive and upbeat to share then I'll keep schtum. Which is why I haven't written a thing on here for a while.... things are a little...."trying" around here at the moment let's just say. Nothing major, just a combination of niggly things that are dragging me down.

Basically I need a holiday (yeah another one!).

Roll on festival season - I need to roll around in grass with a pint of warm cider in a paper cup in my hand and the dull thud of non-descript music in the background. That's what I need.

What I did this weekend

2011-04-03T16:51:00.001+01:00

Fought to keep my eyes open past 9pm on Friday after a mega hectic day at work
Made poached eggs and smoked salmon for breakfast and drank endless cups of tea on the sofa in my PJs all morning
Decided I couldn't muster the energy to go into town to get a pedicure so did my own toenails - I never do my own toes normally as I always make a pigs ear of it. I didn't do too badly but I could still do with some proper tootsie TLC like only those Vietnamese girls in the nail place know.
Painted my fingernails Black. Appropriate for Spring I think. If I see the words "Spring" and "pastels" in the same sentence again I'm going to puke.
Picked up my Jessica Simpson Danys from the Post Office. I luuuurve them but they are sooooo ludicrously high that I feel precarious on them and I really don't know if I'm going to keep them. I can't send them back to the seller so I'd have to list them in eBay so if anyone wants to buy a tan pair in a US size 8 (EU38) then let me know!
I've been loving my new Office wedges however, they are super comfy and easy to walk in. Maybe it's a tad excessive having the Dany platforms when I have these?
Got a green finger from my new Swarowski ring. Not impressed about that - it's supposed to be silver inside so I'm not exactly sure why I've gone green.
Had a barbecue at my friend Rhys's. Was a tad chilly outside, but hey we're British and if it gets above 15 degrees that warrants a BBQ! Was lovely to hang out with all my friends but I had to leave them to it about 8pm as I was really tired and didn't want to get drawn into a massive drinking session.
Struggled to stay awake past 9pm again!
Decided to order this shirt from ASOS that I keep swooning over. I still want the Stylestalker one from my last post but I think I'm going to have to see if I'm still as in to it after next pay day as at £105 it's not a cheap purchase.
My new obsession is this blazer from Zara in bright green.
Decided that I need to fix up and look smart next week with regards to gym and healthy eating as I've been really slack the last few weeks. Especially last week when Ed wasn't here my routine has been all over the place. So next week expect some food diaries and gym reports as I find documenting everything helps keep me on the straight and narrow. I still want to get more toned and potentially lose a few more pounds. I'm also petrified of getting too cosy and putting it all back on again.
Spent the whole of Sunday vegging out and resting. Feel so wiped out at the moment, almost like I'm coming down ill or something. So decided a sofa-day was in order.
Went to the shops to pick up muesli and porridge for next week and came back with wet feet and blueberry muffins. Fail.
Spent the entire afternoon watching an adorably cute reality show about a family with sextuplets

Fantasy Shopping

2011-03-25T14:45:00.001Z

I love fantasy shopping...you know, if money were no object what would you buy?

American Apparel Disco Shorts - my aim is to wear these at Burning Man this year!

Black turban - so glam

Gyspy headchain from Etsy

The perfect boot for stomping around a festival - Kurt Geiger Carvela Scorpio

Swarowski Nirvana ring - always need more sparkles

Stylestalker oversize snakeprint shirt from ASOS - need!

See by Chloe shoes from Urban Outfitters

Sparkle and Fade dress from Urban Outfitters

Pretty Polly suspender tights

Pendleton meets Opening Ceremony skirt

I have bought three of these things....can you guess which?

Loving:

2011-03-23T16:27:00.001Z

Juicing - this is spinach, parsley, mint, fennel, lemon, ginger and apple. You get such an energy boost from fresh juice, I can't live without it.

My new ring - I just got this back from being re-sized today. I bought it from this seller on eBay. It's a vintage Navajo turquoise ring. I love Native Indian jewellery and I love turquoise. I can't stop gazing at it.

Beth Ditto - I wrote the book. Perfect turned up loud on a sunny Spring day :)

My new Primark midi-dress (£11) - wasn't sure about the length at first but now I really like it. I wore with flat moccasins. I think it would look good with a little cropped leather jacket. A perfect transition piece. I don't wear dresses ordinarily but I'm really trying to get more into them and this is very "me". You'll never see me in a floral dress or a tea dress or anything like that - far too girly.

Grocery Shopping #2

2011-03-22T16:39:00.001Z

Ed's away next week in Miami for the annual industry music back slapathon and general excuse for anyone who works in dance music to convene for a week in the sunshine and show-off their new toys (i.e. new music they've made). I went with him the last two years but I'm going to sit it out from now on I think - I'm a bit over flying half way round the world just to listen to all my favourite London DJs play at parties.

Ocean Drive, Miami Beach - actually not even that nice to be fair.

Anyway, with him away that leaves me free to get back super focussed on being healthy and eating a bit better. It was his birthday at the weekend (I'll blog about that later) and as a knock-on effect of not getting enough sleep and drinking far too much I've been a little "off routine" and again, eating too much junk food and slacking off the gym. I'm feeing the need to reign things in again. The fact that I keep having to reign myself in really just proves my point that the occasional slip offs the wagon have become a bit too frequent for my liking - I don't want to see that weight creep back on so I'm going back to being super strict.

So yesterday I went and did a big food shop so that I can do some proper cooking while he's away and I've got a fridge full of wholesome food.

Squeezy honey, for cereal
Dorset cereal - my favourite one "fantastically fruity - roasted and toasted"
Alpro soya yoghurts
Dried dates, for a quick after dinner bit of sweetness
Sweet potatoes
Chicken breasts
Red onions / red / yellow peppers for Fajitas
Be good to yourself Guacamole also for tonight's Fajitas
Tortilla wraps
Soya milk...thought I'd stock up as it's when I stop by to pick up the odd carton from a supermarket that I'm tempted to buy other stuff!
Quorn mince - thought I'd give it a whirl
Cauldron vegetarian pate
Cauldron tofu pieces
Cauldron falafel
Be good to yourself Humous (should I just buy the regular stuff?)
Linda McCartney veggie sausages
Sainsbury's pepper and goat's cheese bakes....lots of vegetarian food, really trying to avoid meat to go easy on my digestive system at the moment
Rice - thai jasmine, white basmati and brown basmati - they always run out at the same time
Wholewheat penne pasta and wholewheat spaghetti
Red chillies
Rocket
Purple spouting Broccoli
Vogals Sunflower and Barley bread - I rarely eat bread so if I do I want it to be nice
Clipper green tea with ginseng and raspberry - I'm addicted to this stuff at the moment
Low fat feta. I do generally avoid dairy but a little bit of feta in a salad doesn't seem to have a negative effect if it's only occasionally.
Spinach, parsley, lemons, apples, fennel - for juicing
Clementines
A roasted vegetable pizza - for the freezer, a get out of jail free card option

So I feel like I've now got some good healthy choices and I won't be tempted to sit and nibble through an entire bag of tortilla chips or a large grab bag of maltesers...not that I've done that recently *side eye*.

Mega ramble....

2011-03-16T18:01:00.002Z

I’ve had a pretty horrible week this week. Just some annoying stuff going on at work, nothing major but enough to make me feel heavy hearted about the daily grind of spending 8 hours a day stuck in the office, especially when it’s so beautiful and Spring like outside. Well, I say that but it’s actually been rather grey and horrible the last few days but the start of the week was glorious.

The first tree in my road to blossom, so pretty

I always find it always a bit of an anti-climax when the dust settles on a holiday, it’s almost like it never happened. Immediately I have to start planning when my next break from work will be. I was one of the first at work to cotton on to the fact that if I booked the three days in between the Easter and May bank holidays that I’d get a bumper 11 day break from work. Of course now everyone wants it and there’s a bit of a bun fight for it. I’m actually reallty excited about the Royal Wedding, I even had a dream I went to the royal wedding this week – I adore the royal family! I know some people think they are pointless in this day and age but for me, I think they’re magical and quirky and part of our national identity. Plus, they make far more money for the country in tourism than they actually cost the taxpayer. After watching it on TV my friends are organising a royal wedding garden party rave-up, can't wait!

I did manage to squeeze one last drop of excitement out of my holiday, picking up our disposable camera from Boots. At the waterpark we bought a waterproof disposable camera to take pictures of ourselves sploshing around on the rides – they are pretty funny. Of course a load of them were blurry and out of focus, just like in the old days of taking film to be developed and not knowing what the pictures looked like beforehand.

The Black Milk Artoo swimsuit makes another appearence

The wave pool - soooo much fun!

It’s that barren period for me, right before payday when I have no money in the bank to treat myself with to perk myself up and nothing in the cupboards either, so dinners have been raiding the freezer for batches of previously cooked meals. I defrosted what I thought was beef stew the other day and prepared cabbage and purple sprouting broccolli to go with it , only to find it was actually bolognese. FAIL. To add insult to injury, it really didn’t agree with my very sensitive tummy and so I am now thinking that I really am going to have to start avoiding red meat. To be honest I would rather avoid red meat at home and just go out for a decent steak every couple of months and deal with the consequences. I’m going to try Quorn mince as it’s much lower in fat – I wonder if the other half will notice if I covertly feed him Quorn?

I did manage an ASOS order this week. I ordered two pairs of shoes – the “Peaches” platform court and the “Party on” perspex heeled platform peeptoe. I loved the perspex heel so much in the picture but in reality they were just too high. I’d be constantly worrying about falling off them and breaking an ankle. If anyone knows of a lower heeled/platformed version of a perpex heeled shoe please let me know. However, I’m chuffed with the other pair, you can’t go wrong with a comfy pair of classic court heels – they go with everything from pencil skirts to dressing up a pair of skinny jeans. And at £28 a pair I think they are a major bargain.

I love the Peaches shoes so much that I actually ordered another pair in the nude colour. Of course I couldn’t just order the shoes so I ordered a pair of Cheap Monday peg leg jeans as well. With ASOS’s free delivery and free returns there’s no harm in ordering them just to try them on. I loathe traipsing around the high street and getting flustered in changing rooms – so the luxury of trying things on in the comfort of my own home suits me down the ground.

Payday is this Friday and I’m really trying to continue to slowly buy a whole new summer wardrobe. I haven’t bought summer clothes for years so the ones I have are not only too big now, but they are really shabby and dated. I struggle to buy clothes that are outside my comfort zone – I want to wear feminine dresses and skirts but I always shy away and just buy plain basic tops and skinny jeans (or leggings and baggy tops in the last few years) mainly because I get impatient when I have to try things on so I stick with what I know. I’m obsessed with these shoes from Kurt Geiger, but I really don’t need another pair of wedges and that £180 could buy me a lot of other clothes that I need much more so I’m going to be good and resist them. *Locks credit card away*

Last week was a bit hectic as we had house guests all week and weekend so this week is the first chance that Ed and I have had to just flop on the sofa and do nothing. We finally got around to starting to watch Boardwalk Empire and I love it. It seriously makes me wish I was born at the turn of the last century so I could be part of that era – I adore the 20s and 30s fashions so much. The Prohibition party they have in episode one just looks amazing. I can’t wait to watch the rest of the episodes – I love getting stuck into a really great TV series. I definitely prefer a series to a movie.

Last night we watched “From Riches to Rags” on Channel 4 which documents my friend Sarah and her sister Lily Allen’s journey from popstar to going into partnership together to set up Lucy in Disguise. I have hardly seen Sarah over the last year because she has been totally dedicated to launching Lucy – she even had to miss Burning Man and the wedding of two really close friends because it fell on the same weekend the shop opened which I know she was totally gutted about. It was really interesting for me to watch, knowing Sarah, because Channel 4 obviously have a very definite agenda in terms of editing the footage to create a compelling storyline for television. Even Lily said on Twitter "I'm inclined to ask you not to watch it ‘cause quite frankly I'm embarrassed. On the other hand I want you all to watch it so you can see how the press coverage has been totally sensationalised and quotes taken out of context. It was meant to be a show about two sisters starting a business". I think episode one was deliberately supposed to show them looking a bit clueless and chaotic so wasn’t particularly complimentary to either of them. I’m hoping that it will develop over the next two episodes and show just how dedicated and professional they are and what a runaway success the brand has been. I have been meaning to take her up on her offer of coming in for a little tour of the shop for ages.

The last time we got to properly hang out was at the hen party of the wedding that she ended up having to miss. Sarah is wearing a vintage Ossie Clark trouser suit. Rebecca Ferguson went on to wear it on X Factor.

And lastly… I always cringe when I see other bloggers make a feature of how many follwers they’ve got, but anyway I’m going to go there.... I’m chuffed to have reached 50 given that I don't really promote this blog at all. If you’re a new follower do say hello and if you’re reading but not following, why not click to follow?

Powerplate Induction

2011-03-13T21:14:00.000Z

I've been wanting to try the Powerplate for absolutely ages - one of my besties has one in her kitchen and never bloody uses it but she says that whenever she uses it, within a matter of days she sees noticeable results.

The Powerplate is a vibrating platform that you use as the base for toning and stretching exercises. You do anything from standing on it for squats to doing planks and press ups on it.

Your muscles usually contract once or twice a second but by performing the exercise on the Powerplate your muscles contract 30-50 times a second, meaning that a 10 minute workout can be as effective as a much longer conventional workout.

It's a very odd sensation - the vibrations go right up through your body. The instructor took me through a load of basic exercises and stretches and then I pretty much just had a play around. At my gym there's a massive wall chart right next to the machine with loads of diagrams so it's easy to get ideas of what positions to use to get a good workout. I've also been YouTubing some more ideas as I think you can really be quite innovative with it.

I am aching all over today, in places I never normally do! I absolutely can't wait to start seeing results from using the Powerplate regularly - I'm going to try to use it for 10-15 minutes every time I go into the gym.

This weekend I...

2011-03-13T18:50:00.003Z

...have mainly been:

Looking after a house full of boys
Going for a goodbye Hendrick's and Tonic with Annabel who's off to live in London at Hyde & Co speakeasy bar
Going out for a big Chinese meal at the Mayflower

Morning glory - yum

Falling asleep after drinking red wine and Fanta
Having lie ins
Having poached eggs and freshly juiced carrot, apple, orange and ginger juice for brunch
Watching the rest of the back episodes of Secret Diary of a Call Girl - it goes downhill - season 4 is awful.
Wishing I owned more clothes that fitted
....that weren't black
Lusting after turbans and head wraps on eBay
Finally getting the wedding fund off £0.00
Having a Powerplate induction
Getting a new abs routine in the gym using a 3kg medicine ball
Using intervals to run for 40 minutes at speed 10 on the treadmill in the gym
Having a sun bed - yes I know they're bad but I wear minimum factor 30 in the real sun and it really clears up my spots.
Trying out Nivea My Silhouette gel - will report back in 4 weeks.
Going for a roast Aqua after deciding amongst my friends that it's the best roast in Bristol
Painting my nails in OPI Lincoln Park After Dark

Tracy Anderson

2011-03-12T15:05:00.000Z

I'm kind of obesssed with Tracy Anderson at the moment ever since I got introduced to her Mat Workout DVD on holiday by Kara.

I packed my gym clothes, which I always knew was fairly optimistic...and obviously they never saw the light of day but we did do the arms and abs sequences from the Mat Workout DVD. It's a lot harder than it looks!

As an ex-ballerina her "method" is all around achieving the body of a dancer, rather than of a gymnast. It focuses on using your own bodyweight as resistance and doing lots and lots of reps.

It's really clicked with me because I feel that I've hammered the cardio and weights for the last 5 months in the gym to quite aggressively burn calories and lose fat and although there's still some more of that I want to do, I am looking to change what I'm doing now and start to focus on toning and fine tuning. I know I should probably do yoga or Pilates but I always feel as though it's a wasted session - which is stupid I know because when I did regularly do Pilates I always used to feel well exercised the next day!

Plus I find her a lot more likeable than Gillian Michaels!

Cellulite

2011-03-12T10:33:00.001Z

Most of us have it.

Yup, even Kate Moss

But that doesn't stop me absolutely despising mine and desperately trying to do everything I can to reduce it. The photo I posted in my Dubai photo blog makes my legs looks really smooth and lovely - just the way I want them in fact! But in reality I do suffer from the dreaded lumpy thighs and it's one of my most hated afflictions. So I thought I'd share a few tips because I think I have reduced mine quite a lot.

First off - what is cellulite? It basically occurs when the connective tissue that joins fat to muscle pulls in the opposite direction creating an uneven appearance. Your skin has a liquid drainage system that makes cellulite look worse when toxins start to collect due to the body not flushing waste products through efficiently.

1: Hydration
Drinking enough water will have a two fold effect on the appearance of cellulite. First helps your body flush through toxins effectively but also it simply makes your skin appear plumper and healthier. So this is an easy, quick win.
There are many benefits to drinking 2 litres of water a day, I'm quite evangelical about it really.

2: Diet
Obviously the less fat you eat the less fatty deposits will collect in your tissue - so avoid saturated fat like the plague. Also avoid processed food which contains loads of salt and chemicals and eat as naturally as possible. Foods high in anti-oxidants such as leafy greens, bananas, oily fish and avocados are supposed to be good anti-cellulite foods.

I also take Chlorella which is a superfood. It's the highest known source of chlorophyll which has cleansing and cell rejuvenating properties and Cod Liver Oil for omega 3 fatty acids. Ordinarily I don't advocate dietary supplements because I think you should just get your nutrients from food but it would be almost impossible to get the level of nutrients from these two from food alone as they are so rich.

3: Caffeine
Caffeine has a negative effect on the lymphatic system and blood circulation, as it causes blood vessels to constrict. This reduces the flow of oxygen and nutrients to the tissues and skin and may inhibit cell metabolism, resulting in a build-up of waste products.
I drink one or two "normal" teas in the morning and then stick to green tea in the day. I used to be addicted to coffee at work, getting through probably three grande cappuccinos a day and then more tea when I got home. I'm also quite evangelical about the negative effects of caffeine and the fact the the UK is almost mass addicted to it. But that's another blog post.

4: Dry Body Brushing
Brushing your skin with a natural bristled brush stimulates blood flow, bringing oxygen and nutrients up to the dermis (upper layer of skin) and encourages lymphatic drainage. It also exfoliates, so it gets rid of dead skin cells and makes your skin look healthier. I do this religiously every morning now before slathering myself in cocoa butter (unscented, I hate the sickly smell).

5: Exercise
I've put this last, but obviously it's the most important thing you can do to reduce cellulite, it's pretty much a no-brainer really. Burn off that fat and, get the blood flowing and improve muscle tone. Sweating also detoxifies the skin so work out up a good sweat. Bikram yoga is great, but I just can't afford to do enough Bikram to make it worthwhile as well as the gym. Not to mention the cost!

I've also read that the Powerplate is great for reducing cellulite so I am off to the gym this afternoon for a 30 minute induction.

Also it's worth noting that having a bit of a tan does seem to disguise it a bit. I hate fake tan as the smell makes me feel sick so I don't use it but whenever I have a bit of natural colour I always think it makes my legs look smoother and more toned.

American Apparel Double Layer Sheer Skirt

2011-03-11T18:41:00.000Z

Anyone got any bright ideas how to not make it look shit?

Dubai Snaps

2011-03-09T23:14:00.000Z

Our apartment

View from the balcony by day

View from the balcony by night

Me, Kara and Danie....drinking

Snazzy palm trees in the Souk Madinat

View out towards Atlantis from Jumeirah Beach

Camels on Jumeirah Beach

Wild Wadi Waterpark!

Burj Al-Arab from the waterpark

Bab Al Shams desert spa resort

65 spinning classes and a lot of will power.....

My vintage Cazal sunglasses - I love them!

Clubbing at Chi

The morning after the night before - ugh.

Ski slope the Mall of the Emirates

Posh tea and macaroons in the Mall of the Emirates

The view up to the top of the Burj Khalifa from the 124th floor viewing platform

Kate Moss - Marc Jacobs for Louis Vuitton at Paris Fashion Week

2011-03-09T19:21:00.001Z

Up / Down

2011-03-09T08:36:00.000Z

Ups:

- Spinning last night was not quite as bad as I thought it was going to be. I did think I might be sick at one point but I gave it my all and I felt great afterwards.

- Gin. I always thought I hated gin but after drinking G&Ts almost constantly on holiday it's my new favourite drink. The bottle of Bombay Sapphire I bought in Duty Free is going down by the day, oops!

- Vegetarian food. I would never, never go fully vegetarian because I love meat and could never give up Sunday roasts or chicken salads. Sadly meat does not love me and for want of not over sharing all I'll say is that meat makes me digestion very sluggish. On holiday we had 2 vegetarians and a white meat eater only so I found myself eating an almost vegetarian diet and I loved it! Halloumi especially is something that I was introduced to that I now can't get enough of. I even had a veggie breakfast in Heathrow before we left and realised that the mushrooms, beans, hash browns and egg are my favourite bits of a cooked breakfast and I can take or leave bacon and sausages.

- Mornings. I don't know when this happened but I am becoming a morning person. I get up at 7am everyday and spend a good 45 minutes on my own watching the news, catching up on blogs and having a cuppa. It's almost my favourite time of the day, so peaceful and fresh. I could get up later but I love a relaxed morning routine. Also I can't sleep for longer than 8 hours these days unless I'm really tired so most mornings I wake up before my alarm anyway and gone are the days of sleeping in to midday at weekends.

- Spring has almost sprung! I can't tell you how thankful I am that it's been sunny and clear since I got back from holiday. There's nothing worse than coming back from a hot country to wall to wall grey skies and drizzle. Some of the trees by me are already blossoming and the daffs are out in full force. I love the anticipation of summer!

- Being a bridesmaid for Kath and Kara. They are both bridesmaid for me and I am so touched and honoured to have been asked by both to be part of their special days also. Kath has written about our dresses here. I guess I am going to have to start thinking about a wedding dress soon - it's creeping up on me.

Down:

- Bruising easily and falling off my bike. I came off my bike yesterday. It wasn't bad, more embarrassing but I have really badly bruised and gashed my leg. It looks horrible, but worse than it really is to be fair. I constantly have bruises on my legs and thighs from my bike pedals and brushing past the corners of desks at work.

- A small re-lapse back to being unhealthy due to being off-guard after the holiday. I'm sure I've got this under control now but I'm disappointed in myself that I still don't have the will power thing nailed down. It seems I have to actually digust myself with my gluttony before I wake up and smell the coffee. I want to get to a place where I can turn it on and off easily and know I can let my guard down for holidays and then get back into a routine.

- My Nan and her husband having a car accident. A lorry pulled out of a junction in front of them and wrote their car off. They are ok, only cracked ribs and bruising but I wish vehicles would look where they are going and then less people would get hurt and killed on the roads!!

Oops.

2011-03-08T21:40:00.000Z

After my post entitled “A new normal” I’m kind of annoyed that I’m writing this post today.

I look back on that post and I feel a bit embarassed that it might have come across as a tad santimonious – so just to prove that I am not some perfect preachy Gywnneth Paltrow type that has this whole healthy eating and fitness thing nailed, I wanted to let you know what I did yesterday and how it made me feel.

Ok so the day started off ok – at about 8.30am I ate my usual porridge for breakfast and at that point I was intending to go into work a tiny bit late. Then I decided to hell with it, I’d take a ½ day and go in at lunch time to give myself a bit more chill time since I’d only had a couple of hours after I got in from the airport befoore I ended up falling asleep.

So I went back to bed with a coffee – I never drink coffee in the week anymore. Then I decided to reach for the large bag of chilli flavoured crisps I happened to have in my hand luggage that I’d scooped up from the apartment as we left in case we needed nibbles on the flight. I ate the whole of that. Then I also ate the rest of a baf of pretzals I had in my bag. Then I had another coffee with two all butter shortbreads. Oh dear.

So I went to work in the afternoon feeling a bit sheepish. I had an enourmous bar of Lindt chocolate in my bag as is the tradition of bringing sweets into the office after holidays. Usually it’s a blanket ban of eating any of those by me, but no – I unwrapped the bar and ate a whole row.

After work I went home to an empty house and ate some instant chicken noodles (WTF?), a whole sloppy guiseppe pizza express pizza, 4 slices of bread with chilli oil and ½ a tub of haagen daaz strawberry cheescake ice cream. When Ed arrived home I’d hidden the wrappers for all of that and when he presented with me with a chicken magic roll I wolfed that down, almost as it I’d had no supper.

I went to bed feeling so awful, not just physically but emotionally too – I thought I’d broken the habit of these secret food binges. Honestly, I felt as though if I could have stuck my fingers down my throat and made myself sick I would have. Luckily I have never been able to make myself sick. Must not have a very good gag reflex (reminds me of that scene in Glee season 1 where Emma tells Rachel she’ll be glad of not having a gag reflex one day teehee).

I woke up feeling guilt ridden this morning but also determined not to let today be another bad day.

So far I’ve eaten my breakfast and lunch and I’ve had green tea and water. I’ve had one square of chocolate – I’m kind of annoyed I ate that, not that one square makes a difference to anything but it’s more a will power thing – I should have said no.

I went to the gym this evening and had Waitrose Pad Thai for dinner. I nibbled on a bit of halloumi that I grilled to make a wrap for lunch tomorrow. I'm having a G&T at the moment, but I need to can that little habit too - holiday is over!

What an idiot I am.

So here's some "anti-inspiration" since I've been such a glutton the last few days. It's my former style inspiration and cool girl I always thought I'd have loved to be friends with (in a non stalker-ish kind of way) Sarah Harding looking rough with her dark hair. Back to blonde Sarah and sort those lips out!!

Trout pout - ewww.

سأعود (I'm back)

2011-03-07T11:03:00.000Z

So, back from my hols. Predictably it whizzed past and I can't quite believe it's over.

I decided to take a half day from work today just to get a bit of a lie in and finish the unpacking and washing. I've had a lovely lazy morning catching up on Gossip Girl and drinking coffee in bed. Don't really want to go to the office this afternoon but have got to face the music eventually I guess.

We had a great holiday - I will blog about what we did each day later when my friends upload their pictures - I didn't have a my own camera so I've only got a few iPhone snaps. We were only there for 6 days and out of the 6 days only 2 and a half were actually sunny. It was cloudy the rest of the days so I've not really got much of a tan. I guess you could tell that I've been in the sun but that's about it.

Dubai is a very weird place - I'm not sure I would want to go back there. I found it very odd that everything is linked by enormous dual carriage way roads, you can't walk anywhere. Also that ordinary public beaches are pretty horrible with no nice places to eat or get drinks and (not to be snobby but this is a fact) full of poor people - anyone with money goes to private beaches where you pay money for loungers and towels. We only really worked this out after spending a day on a local beach where the only place to eat was a disgusting burger joint and pervy men just kept filming us and taking photos of us.

Also because of the fact you can't buy alcohol over there we bought a ridiculous amount in duty free and proceeded to plough through it over the course of the week - 20 bottles of wine and 4.5 litres of spirits. I was hungover basically every day as we got back to our beautiful apartment late afternoons and started drinking G&Ts and the moved on to wine before going out for dinner and then straight back for more drinks!

We ate quite healthily to start with but the last three days were a bit of a carb and dairy fest so I feel a bit bloated and need to get back to normal with eating ASAP.

One amazing piece of news is that my friend Kara who is one of my bridesmaids has asked me to be a bridesmaid for her which was just so touching. Our respective other halves are both best men for each other too.

I loved being away with the girls and I think we could have a good time anywhere in the world to be honest! I think we'll definitely do more girls holidays while we still can, before sprogs arrive on the scene. I think we'd probably go for 10 days and bite the bullet and go somewhere like Goa next time where it's a bit less built up and more guaranteed sunny weather.

A new normal

2011-03-01T06:55:00.002Z

A comment in my previous post was what prompted me to make this post.

Basically I've decided to stop posting about losing weight and food diaries. The reason for this is because I feel like I'm at the weight and size I want to be now. Personally I'm going to keep cracking on because I want to be more toned, but what woman over the age of 30 doesn't?

Eating healthy food and being disciplined about going to the gym is my new normal - There's no going back. I'm not on a "health kick", this is a permanent lifestyle choice now.

I don't claim to an expert by any stretch of the imagination but here are the lessons I've learnt on my journey:

1: You can't make an omlette without breaking some eggs - you will have to get your butt in the gym (or wherever you choose to exercise) and sweat. Not just once, but almost every day. Get used to it - it gets easier.

2: Just eat real food. No need for fads or processed low-fat versions of normal food. That goes for low-fat cakes and low-fat ice cream too - get your head around not eating that type of food on a regular basis. You can't go wrong with fruit, vegetables, wholegrain rice/pasta, lean meat and fish.

3: Don't self medicate with food. We all have crap days and all those days where you convince yourself that you 'deserve" a 4pm trip to the vending machine for chocolate or come home from work and eat 10 chocolate digestives and 2 slices of cheese on toast are the reason you're not happy with your body.

4: If it all goes tits up then tomorrow is a new day. Just dust yourself off and start afresh the next day.

5 Your weight fluctuates - don't do your own head in by weighing yourself everyday expecting to see that dial go down and down. My weight stayed the same for ages and then took a half stone nose dive, then stayed the same for a few weeks and nose dived again. It had stayed the same for a few weeks and I just noticed another couple of pounds had come off before I went away.

So I probably will post about fitness if I've got anything new to say, but in general I'm drawing a line under the last 4 months and declaring it a success.

And relax!

2011-02-26T08:49:00.000Z

Yesterday was predictably hectic all day at work - frantically trying to get my work to a place where I could hand over to my boss for the week. I barely came up for air all day, but actually when I pull my finger out I'm quite efficient. I even managed a quick dash to town in lunch to exchange the jeans I bought yesterday. They are just that tiny bit too roomy for my liking and since they are supposed to super skinny I thought I'd try the smaller size. I hesitantly squeezed my arse into a size 8 and behold - they feel great! *Happy Dance* I now own a pair of size 8 jeans! They're quite stretchy so I wouldn't say I was actually a size 8 yet but I'm over the moon because at least I can say I'm a small 10 which is what I was for the best part of 10 years before I got massively lazy.

I'm in a weird limbo with clothes where almost everything I own is either too small or too big - really old things are still a bit snug but a lot of the newer things I've bought are too big where I've lost weight. My wardrobe is a mish mash of 8s, 10s and 12s - it really needs a sort out.

Anyway, I managed to get everything done at work by about 4.30pm so I even managed to knock off a bit early. There's nothing quite like that feeling of putting your out of office on and walking out of the building knowing that you won't be back for over a week. Pure elation!

I didn't go to the gym after work, I knew I wouldn't want to - I was too excited about being officially on holiday so I came home and flopped on the sofa. I decided to start my packing since I had piles of clothes strewn all over the bedroom. It ended up being quite enjoyable, knowing that I wasn't under any time pressure. When I sorted all my clothes into piles - daywear, evening wear, swimwear etc... I realised that I've blatantly got enough clothes for about a month in Dubai - even though I was whining I had hardly anything. I'm now almost packed, I just need to pack my makeup and toiletries and hand luggage.

I'm just off to the hairdressers now to finally get this awful mop cut into a style after 12 weeks of growing out time - I'm hoping it will be long enough for a really sharp jaw length bob. I think I'll book in my next appointment for about 8 weeks and get re-bleached. I can't cope with seeing my natural dishwater blonde poking through so much, I hate it. After that I'm getting threaded and waxed - I love holiday preparation.

Here's what I ate yesterday:

Breakfast: porridge with nuts/blueberries (same as normal)
Lunch: tomato pasta with salad and feta
Snack: apple
After work: some nuts and 2 fingers of shortbread with a cup of earl grey (naughty!)
Supper: more tomato pasta (think it's finally all gone now) with pancetta and salad with feta (think that's finally all gone to)
1/2 bottle of red wine

I've just read that one of my favourite models Lara Stone is fronting a new CK One ad:

God I wish I had boobs.

Phew!

2011-02-24T19:22:00.002Z

Thought I'd quickly do today's food diary while I've got a minute spare. Like last Thursday I got up at 6am this morning and went to the early spinning class. It's really not that hard to get up early and although it's a bit of a rush to come home and shower, dress and have breakfast at home before work it's totally do-able and I actually really enjoyed this morning.

I also managed to recruit Ed to his first ever spin class as well which was quite an achievement. He did great but I don't think he quite realised how tough the class is - from afar it does just look like pootling along on an exercise bike.

Work was horrible today - so stressed trying to get next week's work done this week arrgh! I think tomorrow will be one of those classic pre-holiday manic days - but I'll deal with that tomorrow.

After work I headed into Cabot's Circus to whiz round a few shops. I loathe high street shopping with an absolute passion. Everything is flowery, shapeless and made out of polyester. If anyone sparked a lighter in TopShop the whole place would combust! I did manage to acquire three maxi dresses, a pair of 7/8ths length black skinny jeans and a couple of slouchy jersey tops from H&M. I'm sure I can pull together enough clothes for a week with those plus what I already have, plus the girls have said we'll all end up sharing clothes anyway. Thankfully I'll now fit into their clothes!

So here's what I've eaten today:

6am: cup of tea and half an apple
Breakfast: porridge with pecans, almonds, blueberries and honey. Cup of tea
Lunch: A box of assorted leftovers from my fridge: tomato pasta from last night with some feta, salad and a bit of cous cous.
Snack: an aple
Dinner: a chicken fajita burrito from Mission Burrito which was probably about 9 million calories but it was soooooo good and definitely not a regular occurrence. A little bit of what you fancy and all that.

Exercise: 35 minutes spinning + a lot of uphill cycling today on the way home from town.

A bit of Christina Aguilera today for inspiration - I've always admired her body and her style:

Yesterday's Food

2011-02-24T06:40:00.003Z

Getting so close to my holiday now - my brain is really on sunshine and cocktails and laying out by the pool definitely not on budget month-end and marketing campaigns at work - only 2 more work days to go!

Last night we had an old friend over for some food and Ed cooked again. I decided not to go to the gym in the end because I'm really not a fan of the Wednesday BodyPump instructer and his faux American accent and his insistance on singing along to each track. It's really off putting. So I came straight home from work to help tidy the house and be soux chef in the kitchen.

Here's what I ate yesterday:

Breakfast: Porridge with blueberries, pecans and almonds. (a new type of porridge - highly recommend Waitrose 4 grain porridge. It was really yummy - really nutty and not at all gloopy). Cup of tea x 2
Lunch: Veg and bean chilli and an Alpro soya yoghurt
Snack: Apple and a few mixed nuts
After work snack: I never usually eat after work because I'm always in the gym but I came home from work at 5pm and polished off a small bag of lime and ginger flavour salted nuts. Also a couple of fork fulls of coleslaw
Dinner: starter was mushrooms in a creamy thyme sauce on toasted bread. Main course was tomato and vodka pasta with olives (I picked mine out) and Feta with salad. Dessert, we made the Jamie Oliver black forest affogato again, as we had all the ingredients already but we used bluerries instead of cherries and I just ate blueberries.

Exercise: rest day

So not the greatest day food-wise but not the worst either. We had a team meeting at work and there were two boxes of krispy kreme doughnuts on offer and I managed to not eat a single one - I was pretty pleased with my will power!

Today's inspirational picture is Lily - we all know how she's struggled with her weight. I think she looks so hot here:

A friend of mine wore this exact bodysuit at Burning Man last year,
I asked her where she got it from and this was her answer!

If she can look this good then so can I!

Probably a dull read...

2011-02-22T20:06:00.002Z

...but honestly, it's working for me and that's all that matters. It really is nice to read back over the day's food intake and know that I made good, wholesome choices.

I got a good night's sleep last night but still woke up feeling absolutely shattered - it was definitely a two brew morning. Soooooo in need of this holiday now- only 5 days to go. Coach is booked to Heathrow, nearly everything is ready now. I just need to nip into town and try and buy a couple of maxi dresses and a few tops. Is is too early to start packing already?

Breakfast: porridge with pecans, almonds and blueberries with honey. Cup of tea x 2.
Lunch: Vegetable and bean chill and an Alpro soya yoghurt
Snack: apple
Dinner: avocado and prawn salad with Moroccan cous cous
Snack: 3 figs and 3 dates. OMG these taste SO amazing when you don't eat any other sugary things. I chewed and chewed them and savoured the sweetness of them. Yum.
Drinks: 2 litres of water, 3 jasmine green teas and a decaf tea

Exercise: 45 minutes spinning

I thought we'd have a Katy Perry inspirational picture today - she's right up there on my girl crush list and her body is probably the one I envy the most:

Swit swoooo! - love that 50s swimsuit vibe.

Also, I came across this blog entry with some great words on motivation and I thought I'd share it since it sums up exactly how I feel.

Sunday....Monday

2011-02-21T20:52:00.005Z

After the complete write off that was Saturday I was determined to have a much more productive day yesterday. I had a really early night Saturday so I woke up feeling lovely and refreshed and human again. We had breakfast, did a bit of flat tidying and then went to the gym for a swim and sauna. On the way home we popped to Waitrose to pick up some wine and dessert to take round to our friend’s house for a roast dinner.

I mananged not to touch a drop of alcohol all afternoon which I was very pleased about. Ed and I volunteered to do the dessert so we did a re-run of the Jamie Oliver black forest affogato that I made on Valentines night - although this time I actually skipped it and just ate some cherries and a square of chocolate even though the white choclate ice cream we bought for it looked divine.

So here’s yesterday’s food diary:

Breakfast: Dorset cereal with extra pecans/flaked almonds & blueberries. Cup of tea

Late lunch/dinner: Roast lamb with roast potatoes, parsnips, carrots, peas, yorkshire pud, gravy & mint sauce

Drinks: a litre of sparkling ginger and lemongrass drink and about 4 glasses of water. 1 decaf black coffee

Exercise: 30 minutes swimming (about 40 lengths, I never count)

After I got home from having a roast I decided to make another big batch of vegetable and bean chilli and then divided into containers for the week's lunches - go me!

Red onion, green and red chilli, courgette, sweet potato, red and green pepper,
aubergine, edamame beans, kidney beans, cannellini beans, chopped tomatoes,
sundried tomato puree....yum.

Today's Food Diary:

Breakfast: porridge (made with water) with pecans, blueberries and a drizzle of honey. Cup of tea
Lunch: vegetable and bean chilli with an Alpro soya yoghurt
Snack: a banana
Dinner: Waitrose Thai red curry with wild rice, pak choi and green beans
Snack: a dried fig and three dried dates, cup of decaf tea
Drinks: 2 litres water, an earl grey and 2 cups of jasmine tea

Exercise: 45 minutes spinning

I am now laid out on the sofa in my pink one piece, absolutely zombified watching some horrendous thing on Channel 4 about hospital food. Absolutely shocking! Thank God for BUPA.

The Big Fat Truth About Low Fat Food

2011-02-20T12:10:00.001Z

I watched a shocking documentary on iPlayer this week that was originally shown on BBC3 which was all about how bad for you so called low-fat "diet food" is.

Zoe Salmon went on a diet of processed low fat food for a month to demonstrate how bad for your body it is and how it actually contributes to making you feel more hungry overall. She ended up feeling tired, bloated and constipated from a lack of fibre. She also ended up putting on 3lb in weight!

I kind of knew all of this anyway but it was still shocking to see the scientific facts about how things like diet drinks actually make you eat more because your body is programmed to think that if it tastes sweetness that it will receive energy (sugar) but with artificially sweetened foods all it then does is overcompensate by increasing your appetite to get the energy.

It was so interesting to watch - one woman in it was addicted to eating Special K - she's been on the "Special K Diet" for 7 years! She was so obsessed with Special K that her husband said there were three people in their marriage and she can't go anywhere without taking boxes of Special K in the boot of her car just in case she can't get any!

Special K is literally packed with sugar and I can't see how it would fill you up for longer than about an hour since it's just puffed wheat with additives and sugar! Give me a large bowl of muesli with loads of delicious nuts and fruit anyday - it may have more calories but it's all natural food packed with fibre and protein from the nuts to keep you full up until lunch time.

It has really confirmed to me that the best way to go about losing weight is not to be on a any "diet" but just to eat proper, real food cooked from scratch with as little added salt as possible. Obviously go for the naturally lower fat choices e.g lean meat but avoid all that processed stuff and definitely avoid diet soda - go for sparkling water with a slice of lime if you really can't wean yourself off the bubbles.

A definite "must see" Watch here

Hangover Central

2011-02-19T22:54:00.004Z

Definitely the worst hangover for a couple of years I'd say - banging headache and the frustrating inability to keep any liquid down when you know full well that all you really need to do to start feeling better is to re-hydrate!

I haven't moved from the sofa all day and have been vegging out to Come Dine with Me all afternoon. Food-wise I've just been grazing really but I think I've eaten:

2 slices Vogals soya and linseed toast with spread
Handful salt and pepper pretzals dipped in the last bit of my satay sauce
1 finger of shortbread
Small bowl veg and bean chilli with a mini pitta
Drinks - as much water as I could stomach once I could keep it down! Numerous cups of tea. 2 glasses of freshly squeezed orange juice and a berocca

Err, yeah that's it pretty much. I never have an appetite when I'm hungover. The thought of a full English makes me want to heave.

An early night for me tonight for definite!

This is today's inspirational picture - Since I got my summer clothes out of storage to think about packing for Dubai it;s got me thinking about this summer. I really can't wait for this summer because I feel that I'm going to have the confidence to wear shorts and cropped tops and all the kinds of clothes that I've been wanting to wear but haven't had the confidence to - I've been mentally planning outfits for Burning Man that I would never have dreamed of wearing last year or the year before. Bring it!

Not feeling too clever today

2011-02-19T16:50:00.004Z

Last night was my girls night - I had 5 girls (and one gay) over for food and copious amounts of wine - I can count 8 empty bottles in the recycling. After the wine finished we started drinking toffee vodka (eww) rum and ginger beer - we finally crashed out about 7am.

Ugh.

I woke up about midday with the mother of all hangovers but surprisingly I'd managed to tidy the house before I went to bed. I don't even remember doing that but I'm so glad I did. Nothing worse than waking up feeling like death and then having to clear up the remnants of a party.

I've had a proper disgusting hangover - you know the type...one sip of water....about a pint of liquid puked up. Repeat. Ugh.

I've finally started to feel a bit better but I can't see myself doing much at all for the rest of the day!

Here's yesterday's food diary:

Breakfast: Dorset cereal with extra pecans and almonds and a handful of blueberries. Cup of tea
Lunch: vegetable and bean chilli and an alpro soya yoghurt
Snacks: I ate a fair few salt and pepper pretzals while I was preparing the food for the girls.
Dinner: chicken satay, a slice of home made vegetable quiche
Drinks: 2 litres of water and 2 cups of tea, a black coffee and a sparkling water in the pub at lunch time. (plus about a bottle and a half of wine and 2 rum and gingers)

Exercise: rest day

Inspirational photo - I thought we'd have a bit of Kate Moss today, she's modelling Agent Provocateur

A thick layer of smug

2011-02-17T20:04:00.002Z

Today I joined the ranks of the smug early morning gym people. Ed's away working at the moment so I was able to get up at a frankly uncivilised time and not have to worry about creeping around quietly in the dark trying not to wake him up.

It was a quick 35 minute spin class from 7.15am to 7.50am so I was able to do the class and cycle home, shower and dress for work, eat breakfast and still leave for work at 8.45am as normal (by the skin of my teeth).

I've been absolutely buzzing all day and it's a really nice feeling to know I could come straight home from work at 5pm, totally guilt free. I'm going to try and see if I can do one morning session a week. Thursdays is good because there aren't really any classes on in the evening at a time I want to go to so it means I get a spin class in on a Thursday and can have Fridays as a rest day. I'm feeling a bit achy from 3 spin classes and a Bodypump this week so tomorrow will be a well deserved rest day and I think I'm going to swim at the weekend.

I've just got in from doing some food shopping at Waitrose. God that place is expensive but full of amazing food. I've got 5 girls coming round tomorrow evening for food, wine and a natter. I'm going to be super organised and make most of the food this evening so that al I have to worry about tomorrow is getting myself ready and making sure the house is presentable.

Anyway here's today's food diary:

6am: cup of tea and a banana
Proper breakfast: Dorset cereal with blackberries and raspberries but I also pimped it up with a handful of pecans and some flaked almonds. This is probably my ultimate favourite breakfast.
Lunch: Pret No Bread Crayfish and Avacado salad and an Alpro soya yoghurt
After work: cup of earl grey tea and a couple of dried figs
Dinner: Waitrose slow cooked beef with chargrilled sweet potato, peppers and spicy pinto bean sauce
Drinks: 2 litres water, 3 cups jasmine green tea

Exercise: 35 minute spinning (but because it was a shorter class I absolutely went for it!

I haven't done very much cooking this week - I will rectify tomorrow and over the weekend.

Today's inspirational picture:

Bar Rafaeli you absolute goddess!

A two-brew morning

2011-02-16T20:39:00.001Z

I don't know who coined the term, but it was someone on Twitter....we all have those mornings where one cuppa is just not enough and today was one of those days. I just couldn't get myself going.

I'm feeling much more in the zone today, having had two really good days this week. The gym is still feeling a lot harder than it should but I just need to suck it up and keep pushing myself.

Here is today's food diary:

Breakfast: Dorset cereal with blackberries and raspberries with soya milk. Two cups of tea.
Snack: an apple
Lunch: Boots Shapers Thai Red Curry chicken wrap and a 98 calorie chocolate caramel bar.
Dinner: Waitrose prawn and scallop paella, one dried fig and 4 black cherries to take the edge off my sweet craving
Drinks: 2 litres water, bottle Pellegrino, 3 cups jasmine green tea, one cup decaf tea

Exercise: 45 minute BodyPump class.

Wow I drank a lot of tea today!

Here is today's inspirational picture:

Loving: Ashley Simpson's pixie crop

2011-02-16T08:45:00.001Z

I'm loving the new hair cut that Ashley Simpson has been sporting since last December. I have a thing for short platinum blonde styles and i think this looks amazing on her and really emphasises her features. Love her smoky makeup too - another look I'm really digging at the moment.

I'm currently growing my hair down in length a bit because I can't afford to keep up with the 4-5 weekly cuts and root maintenance that my old style required, not while I'm (supposedly) saving for the wedding. Plus I think I'd like to keep my options open for the wedding. But I'm hating the inbetweenyness of my hair at the moment and I really miss my full-on blonde. I'm just having some highlights through my parting at the moment while it grows down because it's really hard to blend the roots in when the re-growth gets past 8 or so weeks between cuts. So I'm totally envious of Ashley and her amazing hair right now!

Getting my motivation back

2011-02-16T07:43:00.002Z

I’ve big time lost my motivation in the last couple of weeks. Since I had my last chest infection and couldn’t exercise I just can’t seem to get back fully into the swing of things…and the knock on effect is that I’ve not been making very sensible food choices. The result? A definite loss of the flat tummy I had going on and about 2lb back onto the scales.

I know I want to get back in the zone and get back to feeling how I was feeling a 3 or 4 weeks ago but I just keep making excuses for not going to the gym and excuses for having seconds helpings and “a little bit” of cake etc… I have a bad habit of justifying every missed gym session or unhealthy treat with an excuse. Excuses need to stop!

So I decided to Google motivational tips to see if there was anything I could do to help myself.

Here are a couple I thought I'd try:

1: Put an inspirational picture up somewhere where it will be seen. Any Victoria’s secret model should do the trick! I also came across this old picture of me from about 2006 – wowzers. I want to be that skinny again!

Skinny minnie!

2: Write everything down. Ok so it might be boring to read, but I’m going to do daily exercise and food journals for the next two weeks while I get back on track. I actually really enjoy reading other people’s versions of these as it gives me inspiration and also a benchmark.

Monday:

Breakfast: Dorset Cereal with raspberries and blackberries & soya milk. Cup of tea

Snack: Apple

Lunch: leftover rice and jerk chicken with alfafa sprouts and an Alpro Soya yoghurt

Dinner: prawn and chicken jambalya with Jamie Oliver’s black forrest affagato for desert.

Drinks: 1½ litres water, 3 cups of jasmine green tea and a Corona.

Exercise: 45 minutes spinning

Tuesday

Breakfast: Porridge (made with water) and drizzle of honey. Cup of tea.

Snack: Apple

Lunch: Be Good To Yourself Tuna with tomato & bean, grains/salad and an apple

Dinner: Leftover jerk chicken and rice

Drinks: 1½ litres water, 3 cups of jasmine green tea

Exercise: 45 minutes spinning

A (belated) Valentines Weekend Post

2011-02-16T07:36:00.002Z

This weekend I got whisked away to our little getaway in the country... ok so it's not really ours but we’re lucky enough to always be welcome at my boyfriend’s parents in the Wye Valley for a bit of R&R if we ever fancy a change of scenery.

I had planned on going up to stay with a friend in Leeds but he had secretly arranged everything behind my back to take me there for the weekend and cook for me. Bearing in mind he’s only cooked for me twice in nearly 11 years now – it’s pretty amazing that he’s recently decided to take a keen interest in cooking.

I had a lovely relaxing weekend doing not a lot other than lazing around watching The Hills and The Human Plant and painting my nails by the open fire while it absolutely poured down with rain outside. I ate far too much of his delicious food and none of it was vaguely healthy. He made me what was essentially deep fried eggy bread with mozzarella for breakfast - heart attack on a plate anyone?? We even found a large box of chocolates that we'd stashed from Christmas when we spent it there.

Monday was officially Valentines day. There are a lot of Valentines haters out there who argue that it’s all become commercialised and that you shouldn’t wait for that one day to come round to make a romantic gesture. Well I can definitely say there’s a lot of romance in my house 365 days a year. Valentines day is certainly not the only day where I’m bought flowers. We are both quite sentimental and I’ve kept every Valentines card he’s ever bought me. I made him breakfast in bed (to be fair I do this most days anyway!) and I came home to a beautiful bunch of roses. We ate Waitrose Chicken and Prawn Jambalaya to give me a night off cooking and then I made the Black Forest Affogato dessert from the Jamie Oliver 30 Minute Meals book. It's essentially crumbled shortbread, black cherries, ice cream, shaved chocolate and then as you serve it you pour on shots of hot espresso (I just used strong instant decaf coffee as I can't have caffeine that late).

I fell asleep on the sofa and had to be proodded awake to move to bed at about 11pm – how romantic! I then woke up coughing and gasping for breath at 1am with a stonking headache – I think it was a little reaction to the dairy ice cream that I ate since I haven't eaten dairy for months now. I initially cut it out because it's known to contribute to an over production of mucous in the throat and lungs and exasperate Asthma symptoms. I think when you cut something out altogether you notice the negative effect it has on you a lot more if you eat it again. Gutted to know that proper ice cream is now definitely permanently off the menu for me.

Up / Down

2011-02-10T21:09:00.000Z

Going UP:

* My One Piece. I look like a pink flump but it's soooooo amazingly comfy to change into when I fall through the door after the gym. Strictly not for anyone else's eyes though.
* Scented candles - I absolutely love candles and we always have loads burning in our house. I used to be quite averse to anything scented but now I love the subtle ambience of a subtle scented candle burning. My favourite is this Diptyque candle. It smells of rose with a hint of blackcurrant and is relaxing without being overpowering or cloying.

* Green Tea - proven to raise your metabolism so I've been drinking 2-3 cups a day and taking a green tea capsule in the hope that it will raise my metabolism. Who knows if it has but it's definitely a refreshing drink to have in the day and I definitely think it curbs my appetite somewhat.
* Adele - 21 - Must have listened to this about 50 times. No joke. I love it and I have a feeling that this album is going to become a gold-plated classic on the scale of Back to Black.
* Lighter nights. I even managed to get home in what was almost daylight the other night. Spring is around the corner!
* Our Jerk Chicken - we have been honing our Jerk Chicken recipe and I think we've hit the jackpot. We made an enormous tray on Tuesday night for friends and I made traditional Jamaican Rice & Peas and a mango salad to go with it. Caribbean food is my favourite!

Going DOWN:

* I don't know where it's gone but I've really lost my willpower this week. Twice I've talked myself out of going to the gym and on more than one occasion I've been totally gluttonous. I know a little of what you fancy is good for you, but this is more than that! I need to reign it back in or my hard work will start to unwind.
* Being an absolute idiot and not unscrewing the valve when pumping up my bike tyre and then inadvertently ripping the value off when unlatching the pump. Annoying as I now need a new inner tube and will have to replace it. It's the second bloody time I've done it and I hate not being able to zip around on my bike. Walking is too slow :(
* Realising how pale I am. The foundation I've been wearing for ages (Bourjois Healthy Mix in Beige) is starting to look a bit orange. I had a sort through my foundations to see what I have in a paler shade and the only thing I've got that matches is Nars Sheer Glow in Deauville. I've decided that I'm not keen on this foundation anymore (I used to adore it) as it clings to the little downy hairs on my face. I think I might order a bottle of MAC Face and Body. I came across a bottle in shade N5 I wore this and loved it last summer. I can't believe how dark it is though...wow I was so tanned!

Mojo oh mojo, wherefore art thou..?

2011-02-07T22:10:00.000Z

Really not had much to say for myself since last week. I’ve written and then not posted about 3 blogs but decided they were just too moany and self-pitying to bother posting.

I’m feeling very grey and uninspired at the moment, having just spent Thursday-Saturday stuck at home feeling rubbish. I just about ventured outside in the gale force winds yesterday to go for a roast in a pub just down the road but came straight home to snuggle up on the sofa with an Earl Grey to watch The Human Planet on BBc Iplayer – how very rock n roll of me.

I went back to the gym today for the first time since last Tuesday. Last Tuesday was probably my best ever Spin class, I absolutely smashed it. Tonight after nearly a week off, it felt horrible and my legs were like jelly. So that has put me in a bad mood as well.

It’s so very grey and blustery outside and I’m starting to remember how much I despise February. Janaury gets bad press – February is the real evil one.

Roll on Dubai. 20 days and counting.

On a lighter note

2011-02-02T18:59:00.004Z

Joanna from Lila Loves was sweet enough to award me the: You're One Awesome Blog Award

Here are the rules:
Post about the award and copy the rules
Link to the person who gave you the award
Choose 3-5 blogs you would like to give the award to and link them
Leave a comment on their blog to let them know
Write 7 things about yourself

I love reading these blog award posts because it's a great way to discover new blogs but I have to admit I'm not very good at passing the awards on to others.

Joanna is such a loyal reader of my inane ramblings, even managing to track me down in my new reincarnation after I wound up my old blog and then went AWOL from the blogging world for a bit.

I think it's fair to say I've had some mixed experiences with blogging since I started in 2008 but overall it's been positive and it's mainly down to the core of lovely, supportive and loyal readers that I've got which is why I guess I'm still here...still over-sharing....still taking rubbish dark blurred pictures of non-events in my life which others bizarrely seem to enjoy reading.

I am recommending the following bloggers who have stuck with me over the last couple of years and still continue to read and comment on my blogs and generally make me smile and feel happy and grateful that they are in my (virtual) life:

Arlene from All Picture No Sound
Kelly from Kelanjo
Katy from MissisG
Frankie from LoveAudrey
Laura from Romantic Dreaming
And of course Joanna from Lila Loves

The great thing about no longer writing about the differences between 48 identical bright pink lipsticks like my life depends on it...is that I'm no longer embarrassed to let my real life friends know about my blog. Please check out my blog roll where you'll find a lot of my real life friends' blogs that are well worth checking out - especially Kath's blog. She's a writer by trade so her posts are always beautifully crafted and a joy to read. We are both planning weddings and are both bridesmaids for each other - so exciting times ahead for us both.

7 Things About Myself:

I hate Olives but I regularly try them just in case my taste buds have changed. I love the smell of them and desperately want to like them. They look so appetising but they taste like ear wax to me.
I'm mildly OCD and have a very set routine for getting up and getting ready in the morning - I do precisely the same thing every day, down to the minute. This is also true for the gym - I undress and pack my locker in a specific order and even have favourite locker that I use every time. I get a bit upset if it's taken.
I'm in my element at a festival. I'm a hippie at heart.
My boyfriend and I collect Newspapers. This started on 9/11 when we decided to buy a selection of newspapers the next day to keep for posterity (if that's the right word for such a terrible thing?). Since then we've bought local and national newspapers whenever anything particularly momentous happens for the last 10 years e.g. elections, royal engagement, Michael Jackson's death etc... We have boxes and boxes of them in storage.
Linked the the above...when we put new plasterboard walls in my flat, my boyfriend and I wrote a note to the future inhabitants of our flat and encased a copy of the newspaper the day after Barack Obama won the presidency in America. In 30 years we might get an email from the new owners... that is, if email still exists?
I grew up in Witney, which is David Cameron's constituency.
I'm terrified of parallel parking and plan my journeys around never having to do it. Ever.

Girls Cinema Night...

2011-02-02T18:15:00.001Z

...hasn't gone according to plan. My niggling sore throat has gotten worse and worse over the course of the day and now I'm sneezing and spluttering and feeling quite under the weather. I just cycled home from work in the pouring rain and got absolutely soaked (even with snazzy new rain cape) and then slid on a curb and hurt my shin on a pedal.

I'm feeling pretty sorry for myself so I've had to cancel and instead I'm settling for a hot bath and new episode of Gossip Girl in bed. I've got my little bag of yogurt covered almonds and crystalised ginger and my carton of Coconut Water with Acai berry that I bought especially for the cinema to keep me away from the Haagen Daaz, Revels and buckets of Sprite.

At least I don't have to share now....every cloud ;)

With my healthy diet, good physical fitness and daily Echinacea and Garlic capsules I can't lie, it really pisses me off that I can't seem to go more than a month without some sort of virus or bug so I'm refusing to let this beat me. Am hoping an early night will be enough to sort me out.

Hoping my other half will take pity on me and take me to see Black Swan next week instead.

Maybe next week?

30 Day Shred - Day 1

2011-01-30T13:51:00.002Z

A tummy like that? Yes please!

I don't intend to do a daily running commentary on the 30 Day Shred programme because I'm sure there will be days I don't do it, but I'm going to try to do it as much as I can before my holiday.

I did it for the first time today. I don't really know what I was expecting but WOAH, it's hard. And that was just level 1. I think I'm pretty fit these days, yesterday I nailed an hour spin class no problem but this workout is intense and I was properly sweating at the end!

Jillian Michaels is really motivating , continually reminding you that it's only 30 minutes so there are no recoveries, it's 30 minutes straight through of strength, cardio and ab intervals so you have to make each set of exercise count. It's over before it's begun really, but you get a seriously good workout. I really think that if you did this every day for 30 days you'd see results. God knows how hard the level 3 part is!

I feel great now - I'm starting to get slightly addicted to the endorphin buzz of cardio workouts... it always takes me a few minutes to get into the zone mentally when I'm doing any kind of cardio. I always have the feeling of not wanting to do the exercise when I first start and mentally I'm trying to find some excuse to stop, but then I relax into it and afterwards I feel amazing and want to go again.

Two new things

2011-01-29T13:31:00.000Z

1. My hand weight set:

I really need to step up the ab/core work of my fitness programme. My Bodypump class on Wednesdays is only 45 minutes (instead of the full hour), so they tend to cut the lunge track and the ab track out which means I’m not really doing anything for the abs or the core.... and I still haven’t managed to get myself to a Pilates or a Body Balance session.

I’ve heard great things about the Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred so I thought I'd give it a bash now that I have weights at home. 30 minutes a day for 30 days sounds do-able. Hopefully my abs will start start to get a bit of definition, whilst I keep plugging away at the cardio to burn off that pesky layer of fat that still covers them. No matter how many million crunches or planks you do, you’ll never have a washboard tummy if you’ve got a wobbly layer of fat covering your abs.

2. My Kenwood mini chopper:

Like about a million other people, I got the Jamie Oliver 30 Minute Meals book for Christmas. I absolutely loathed Jamie Oliver back in his obnoxious Naked Chef days but I’m now a big fan of what he does. His work in schools is so inspiring, especially what he’s trying to do in America.

I love his style of cooking, where everything is a bit slap dash and doesn't have to be perfect. The 30 Minute Meal concept really appealed to me because I like to go to the gym in the evenings and so don’t get home until after 7pm, by which time I’m usually starving and want food, like now….but something wholesome and home cooked.

Having only flicked through the book so far I noticed that pretty much most of the recipes require a food processor, which I don’t have. I don’t have the counter or the cupboard space for one either so I was a bit disappointed, until I discovered the world of compact food processors – hoorah! So now I’m super excited to start cooking some of the meals. They blatantly take longer than 30 minutes to cook and they’re certainly not cheap either. The jerk chicken and the preggo pasta are first on my hit list.

Weddings, weddings, WEDDINGS!

2011-01-27T19:16:00.001Z

Last night I dreamt it was my wedding day. I was wearing the most perfect dress ever. My hair and makeup was perfect, my bridesmaids were in the perfect dresses. The food was prefect, the flowers were perfect. Everything was unique and quirky and "me".....then I woke up and couldn't remember anything about it at all. Typical.

I must have weddings on the brain....

This week I was asked by my dear friend Kath to be a bridesmaid at her wedding in September in Madrid and then out of the blue (well note quite) my two best friends in the world got engaged, after a mere 11 years together. The only couple I know that have been together longer then me and my other half before getting engaged or wed. What a week!

We have still not really thought about actually starting to organise our wedding, but as my Mum reminded me last Sunday (the 23rd) it is exactly 17 months away....well her words were it's only 17 months to go....

Mother of the....

Big Fat Gypsy Weddings

2011-01-26T07:53:00.002Z

Tuesday, 9pm, Channel 4. Big Fat Gypsy Weddings. Utterly genius TV that has become an unmissable weekly show after the mega success of the pilot last year.

Twitter is always totally buzzing with comments and it's one of those real "water cooler" shows where the next day everyone in the office is buzzing with their favourite bits and quotes from the show.

What has got everyone's knickers in a knot from this week's show is the sight of the 6 year old girls taking their first communion for which one 6 year old gets her first spray tan and the Mum is seen dousing them all in glitter spray. Afterwards they are then seen dressed in skimpy cropped tops and tight mini skirts, grinding and dancing provocatively at their after party.

I was as shocked as the next gal to see these little girls acting in such a sexualised way and it seems to have sparked a lot of shocked comments on Twitter and Facebook from people deeming this to be "so wrong" etc...

Sure, I wouldn't want to see my six or eight year old acting and dressing in that way but we have to remember that this is a fly on the wall documentary about a closed community with very, very different moral and social norms to ours.

As we'e already seen, in contrast to non gypsy girls who might have their hair in ribbons and be playing with Barbie dolls at age six but grow up to be under age drinkers fooling around with boys in cars from age 14 (come on, admit it....) these girls aren't allowed to touch alcohol and aren't allowed on non-chaperoned dates until they get married. They certainly don't get divorced either. It's a completely different world for these girls and they don't know any different. We shouldn't be quite to quick to judge them based on our standards.

I can't wait for next week's episode where we see what it's really like to be a gypsy woman who are destined to be housewives and wait on their husband hand and foot for life. Now that will be an interesting dabate!

I couldn't do a blog about Gypsy weddings without a picture of the dress of the show....

A beauty right?

Movie Night

2011-01-25T07:45:00.000Z

It was movie night last night in our house. We snuggled up on the sofa with a Thali and were all ready to watch Toy Story 3 which is what we currently have rented from Lovefilm but as we flicked through the TV channels one of our favourite films ever Layercake was just starting.

It reminded me how totally stunning and gorgeous Sienna Miller is in it, and it's motivated me even more to get the body she has in it (and the hair, and the complexion).

As I've just been reminded by Kirsten from http://saskiathesalsafairy.blogspot.com/... Dubai + Willpower = Sienna. Exactly.

Grocery Shopping

2011-01-23T15:16:00.002Z

So to prevent the weekend being a complete failure in terms of getting anything constructive done I thought I'd nip to Sainsbury's and buy some bits to keep us going for the week. Having healthy food choices at my finger tips make it so much easier not to resort to calorie laden processed crap.

I know sharing your grocery shopping is bordering on over sharing but I actually really like reading these blog posts from other bloggers a) because I'm nosy and b) because it can give me inspiration for new things to try.

My freezer is quite well stocked with meat and fish at the moment and a few batches of frozen pre-cooked meals so this is quite a small shop (well, for us).

Ok so here goes:

Fruit - oranges for juicing, bananas, pears and cherries

Breakfast: chunky porridge oats, bluberries for eating with muesli and runny honey in the squeezy bottle. One carton of UHT unsweetened soya milk for tea and cereal.

Snacks: Carrots, Be Good to Yourself sweet potato and harissa dip. I usually buy low fat houmus but I'm a bit maxxed out on it so I thought I'd try something new. Pistachios (perfect TV snack)

Lunches: For him: fresh soups and stonebaked bread rolls from the bakery. For me: grains (to go with tuna, pesto and green salad that I already have). Alpro Soya yoghurts

Dinners: sweet potatoes for baking, lamb steaks, pork steaks. The lamb I'm going to have this afternoon with roasted sweet potato and butternut squash wedges and broccoli in the absence of a Sunday roast. I think everyone is recovering from last night and no one has made any plans this week!

The pork I usually marinade in chilli, ginger, garlic and soy sauce, grill, cut into strips and have in a Chinese style salad with bean shoots etc...

Frozen vegetable crispbakes - I like to keep a fall-back veggie option as although I love my meat, I don't like to eat meat every day as it messes up my digestion.

Beef stock, chopped tomatoes, red chills and red cooking wine are to make a big pot of chilli in the slow-cooker over night tonight to eat tomorrow for supper and then freeze a batch. I bought low fat guacamole as well to have with this.

Two singapore noodles are my one "get out of jail free" card for a no-fuss dinner one night this week when I can't be bothered to make anything. They are great - really healthy, only 360 calories per pack.

This weekend I...

2011-01-23T14:54:00.004Z

This weekend has been a bit of a fail for me in some respects. My plans to go to the gym and then meet friends for coffee kind of fell apart as I was enjoying lazing around in my dressing gown drinking tea too much on Saturday morning and a few of my girlfriends had their heads down the loo from the night before so I ended up just having a nice hot bath and doing my nails.

Last night I went out to a little party that my boyfriend and three friends promote called The Breakfast Club. Maya Jane Coles is a super up and coming young DJ and producer. It was really intimate little party of only 140. It was hot and sweaty and we all had a great time getting down to her unique brand of bassy, groovy, sexy deep house. I was exhausted at the end and reckon I probably burnt off at least as many calories as a gym session. If you're interested in hearing her music then I really recommend her RA241 podcast here

I went back to my friend's house after the party for a quick night cap and then came home to bed. I think I finally dropped off about 6am. I woke up at midday feeling a bit foggy and gave Maya and her girlfriend a lift to the train station as they stayed at ours after the party.

So although I had a lovely night last night I feel like I haven't accomplished much this weekend, well compared to the last few anyway.

Joanna Yeates RIP

2011-01-23T12:49:00.003Z

I haven't blogged about this before because I didn't want to be seen to be revelling in the macabre.

I live a few hundred metres from Canynge Road in Clifton where she lived. I know people that knew her. When she went missing before Christmas, there were Facebook status updates begging people to let the police know if they knew of her whereabouts and "missing" posters up everywhere.

Whenever I see any local residents for any crime being interviewed by the media for TV and see them getting all het up, I always think "pull yourself together, you didn't even know her" but now I have experienced the feeling of knowing that someone only a few years younger than me be murdered and the CCT footage of her in local shops that I go into everyday, I can understand.

I was dreading having to watch the Crimewatch reconstruction of her last steps, up Park Street, into the waitrose (that is my daily route to the gym and the Waitrose the building next door) and then she walked to Clifton Village and went to the "bargain booze" which has been my local newsagent for the last 12 years. I am on first name terms with the owners.

My friends and I have all felt the shockwaves of this - it could have been us. Clifton is a affluent, safe area. I have never ever once been afraid to walk around at night on my own but now we're all thinking twice about where we go on our own after dark.

It's been very weird to see such familiar local streets in the national news every night. The area has been swarming with police and TV crews, especially the last week since they arrested her next door neighbour. I found out last night that he has now been charged with her murder. Of course he is innocent until proven guilty but I understand that they have got DNA evidence on him so it is looking like justice will be done. I hope that will bring her family some peace. R.I.P.

Today's Outfit

2011-01-22T18:01:00.001Z

Really crappy picture I know, I just snapped it on the Macbook quickly. I promise not to commit this arch blogging sin again and either take my pictures in daylight or on a decent camera from now on.

I said in my New Year's Resolutions post that I wanted to start buying some new clothes regularly and update my wardrobe which I have let slip whilst I've been hiding under baggy tops and living in stretchy leggings.

Now that I've started to notice my clothes becoming too big and because I got paid this week I thought I'd venture into town and treat myself to some new jeans. This is usually a pretty traumatic experience and as such I haven't really worn jeans since my favourite Sass and Bide Misfits (size 27 *sob*) stopped going past my thighs well over a year ago.

I picked up this dark blue pair and also the cropped knitted top from H&M. You can't really see in the picture unfortunately but it's a bronzy colour with little gold bobbles on it. It's great to be able to wear short tops again and I'm absolutely chuffed to be back in jeans without the unsightly muffin tops. When I can fit into a size 27 again I'll be treating myself to some J-Brands I think :)

Also in the picture, I'm wearing my new FitFlop boots. I've finally decided it was time to retire my beloved Ugg boots that have served me well and kept my feet toasty warm for six winters - money well spent I say! I got these for £85 in the sale down from £130. They're so comfy to walk in, much more so than Uggs, which actually aren't that great for walking distances in as they have no support for the arches.

I will try to go clothes shopping at least once a fortnight now that I'm finding it less depressing. I'm going to try to focus on summer clothes though from now on for Dubai and beyond.

Still got it...

2011-01-22T09:56:00.000Z

Kate Moss.

I've realised what the key to my success is...

2011-01-20T21:01:00.000Z

SLEEP.

I don't want't to bore the world with the trivialities so I won't go into the details but I've had two late nights this week and have generally not slept very well at all. The resulting tiredness has led to two nights not going to the gym, petty arguments with the boyfriend (we never argue normally!) and more than one incident of a food judgement fail.

I am getting an early night tonight and getting this show back on the road tomorrow. No use having a meltdown over it but this week has been rubbish and tiredness is the culprit.

It's getting there.

2011-01-19T07:36:00.001Z

Last night was the first evening that when I left work at 5pm that I noticed the sky was not entirely pitch black....yes there was a definite lighter blue tinge to the western skies - I can't tell you how happy that makes me.

I literally cannot wait for the days to get longer and to be able to leave work in the daylight. Bring it.

Source

Anyone got a safety pin?

2011-01-18T08:34:00.003Z

Burning Man 2011 - Rites of Passage

2011-01-17T21:17:00.000Z

..the build up starts here.

Flights BOOKED
RV BOOKED

Tickets go on sale 19th January

This weekend I...

2011-01-16T21:29:00.003Z

Went to bed super early (10pm) on Friday night
So woke up at 8.30am Saturday morning, feeling good!
Ran errands...
...posted a birthday card to my bff, sent my lil sister a mercy package of makeup and returned a bunch of stuff I ordered online from Matalan for work that was too big/small/horrible
Gave myself a pedicure and manicure. First for ages - Essie Sexy Divide. Lovely.
This inspired me to finally purchase OPI Lincoln Park After Dark from eBay which I have wanted forever
Watched make up videos on YouTube for the first time in about 6 months. Nothing new. Probably won't watch any more for another six months
Ate really healthily all weekend - muesli with blueberries for breakfast, baked sweet potato with salmon and salad for dinner.
Made a smoky chicken and choritzo stew in the slow-cooker to have in the week, and froze a batch too.
Finished tidying the drawers in my bedside cabinet and my dreaded sock drawer full of odd socks that I didn't have time to do last weekend

Browsed the internet (Tumblr etc..) for summer clothes and made a list of things to look out for when I get paid and when the shops finally stop resembling a jumble sale.
Did some shopping for vintage cocktail rings on eBay. Bought this Amber ring and have my eye on a Navajo turquoise one, an aquamarine one and a black onyx one. Watch this space. I do love that YSL ring that the world and his wife own but I much prefer a a bit of originality.

Caught up on last week's Shameless on 4OD - so funny!
Started to watch Jamie's American Food Revolution on 4OD and got very emotional over it.
Had another big roast dinner with friends - plenty of red wine and sticky toffee pudding for afters. So much love for my friends it's unreal. So excited for my girly holiday, I'm sure it's all I'm going to be talking about for the next 6 weeks, sorry!
Hardcore spinning sesh at the gym Sunday morning - pushed myself SOOOO hard.
Wore ~~fitted into~~ skinny jeans for the first time in about 10 months - weighed myself and I've lost 10lb.
Early to bed Sunday too. Totally ready for another week - Let's HAVE IT!

I just had a little cry

2011-01-15T12:05:00.001Z

...because my Mum reminded me (I had remembered) that it's the 20 year anniversary of my Grandad, her Father passing away.

I was 10 when he died and I remember it vivdly. I remember my Mum telling me that he was gone and I remember being so upset at school and my teacher giving me a lovely cuddle to comfort me.

As the eldest grandchild I'm pretty much the only one that really properly remembers him. I spent so much of my childhood at my Nan and Grandads - they idolised me. I was their first grandchild and was always the favourite. He never got to meet all his grandchildren and he's got three great-grandchildren now as well.

I don't know why I feel so emotional? Maybe because I'm only a year younger than my Mum was at the time now? Or maybe because he was only 2 years older than my own Dad is now?

I don't know...but all I do know is that we should all very, very grateful for our loved ones. Cherish them and spend as much time with them as you can.

I know he'd be so proud of us all now.

iCals = Synched

2011-01-14T07:57:00.002Z

Thursday is the day when there are no classes that I fancy doing at the gym at the time I'm usually there so I either go swimming or have a night off depending on how I feel.

Getting home at 5.30pm puts me in the snacking danger zone which is why going to the gym is a double win for me because not only am I exercising but I'm not eating toast, cheese & biscuits and chocolate etc... before dinner.

It is important to have rest days though otherwise you can risk injury and as my muscles were pretty achy from BodyPump I decided to come home and test my will power, even though I was tempted to go swimming to remove that temptation (operation bikini = 6 weeks!)

So I got home (rain soaked, again) and put my snuggly One-Piece on, made myself a cuppa and decided to finally get around to doing a job I've been wanting to do forever - sort out my iCal and sync it with my boyfriend's.

We always have the issue of double booking social events and I knew that it must be possible for us to somehow sync our iCals as in the office where I work all of our Outlook Calendars are networked and that is how I organise my working life.

I don't use iCal on my phone that much I usually scribble on bits of paper and use my work calendar. There's been much chatter on Twitter of girls getting obsessed with Filofaxes which I think is a bit random in this day and age of technology so I decided that I was going to endeavour to organise my personal life in my iCal and added all my appointments and birthdays and set up alerts for each.

A quick Google search led me to this site where there are really easy instructions for how you can publish your calendar and subscribe to someone else's.

So now I have both his work and home diary synched to mine and I can finally start to arrange things without always having to consult him first, which I always hate doing as it makes me look like I have to ask his permission first, which isn't true... we just have a bad habit of double booking ourselves.

Job done :)

It's ON

2011-01-13T18:48:00.004Z

Yesterday was one of those days where it rained persistantly and without let-up from the minute I woke up. I’ve been telling myself to get some decent waterproofs for ages (I even blogged about it) but I didn't ever actually get around ordering it so I was in for another almighty soaking yesterday. So much so that my coat, hat and gloves were even a little bit wet still this morning ewwww and the rain has made my bike lights go all weird and they won’t turn on and off properly now. Great. The first thing I did this morning was get online and order a waterproof cape.

I was back at the Doctors yesterday to get an Asthma check-up. I blew 390 on the peak flow metre which puts me nearly in the normal zone yay!. I just need to go back once again and if I can blow over 400 then I don’t need to go back for 6 months which is great news. I knew it would be a big improvement as I can really feel that my chest and breathing are so much better. I still have a bit of a cough/slight throatyness in the gym but she told me to take a puff on the blue inhaler beforehand to prevent that.

After the doctors I was soaking wet and seriously considered cycling straight home but I decided that I’d feel really guilty if I missed BodyPump. I got to the gym early (got soaked. Again) so I ran on the treadmill for 10 minutes before my class. I still really hate running. No matter how fit I am, I still can’t seem to get into the rhythm of running, it’s always a struggle. Last week I didn’t have a great class and I wasn’t sure about the new release but this week I enjoyed it much more. It got me thinking about some goals that I’d like to set for myself in the gym.

Run for 30 minutes.
Do 10 “proper” push-ups (another thing I literally cannot do, I can’t seem to support my own bodyweight at all)
Hold a “proper” plank for a minute (I have like, no core strength)

In other news – I'm making this girls holiday to Dubai happen. I’ve been saying for years “next year I will definitely go on a winter sun holiday” and I never do it. I can just about scrape the money together so why the hell not? – we only live once. A crack team of flight and apartment Google searchers are currently doing their best to find us something nice and within budget. I’m very excited and it as it’s only 6 weeks away it gives me a goal for the gym to get my body bikini ready – especially as my friends are all size 8 hotties.

Source : We Heart It

I’m now desperate for the shops to start getting their summer ranges in so that I can buy myself a few bits to take. Maybe this year will be the year I actually buy myself some decent summer clothes? I'm terrible with summer clothes – for the last few years I have simply avoided buying summer clothes as I just hate how they look on me. Consequently my summer “wardrobe” consists of a few shabby American Apparel vest tops and a couple of pairs of denim cut-offs. I’d love some floaty dresses and some more chic options.

Bondi Rescue

2011-01-13T18:02:00.000Z

I came across this reality TV show all about the lifeguards on Bondi Beach the other weekend whilst flicking through the channels and it's become a bit of a guilty pleasure. It's shown at random times on CBS Reality, embarrassingly I've set it to record the whole series on V+ ha!

I just LOVE this photo!

2011-01-11T22:26:00.002Z

Taken in the hot-tub on New Year's Day:

I'm wearing my Artoo swimsuit from Black Milk

I'm obsessed with this company - I should really blog about the ridiculous amount of their leggings designs that I own - I am a total leggings addict.

The week so far...

2011-01-11T22:17:00.003Z

This week is shaping up to be a good’un. I feel so motivated and organised after the weekend. I think for the first time ever I actually sat down yesterday and planned out all the meals I want to make to last us for the next 10 days or so and wrote myself a shopping list. After a pretty amazing spin class (I love the latest release!) after work I cycled home in the driving rain and wind (which was not the one) and then had to turn on my heels and head off back out to Sainsbury’s. It’s always a drag to waste an evening doing a grocery shop but it’s the quietest time and I am prone to a bit of trolley rage so quiet and chilled suits me fine. I love the feeling of having a well stocked fridge as it stops me from wasting money on convenience food and ultimately saves money.

This morning I got up early and prepared cidered pork with leek and sage in the slow cooker and also a healthy packed lunch of organic grains, tuna, pesto and some fresh basil. The little pouches of organic grains are my new secret weapon.

Each pouch is enough for 2 servings and contain wholewheat, red quinoa, toasted soya flakes and lentils ready to eat. You can microwave them but I eat them as they are most of the time. They’re pretty tasty on their own with just a bit of salt and pepper and a light drizzle of olive oil or you could have them as part of a meal with something like a herb salad and a salmon fillet. They are amazingly good for you and really filling. I just love the convenience of them for a lunch. I was absolutely stuffed all afternoon from it - a total winner.

Cidered Pork Slow Cooker Recipe:

750g Diced Pork. (Recipe said shoulder but I could only find leg in the supermarket)

Sunflower oil

½ pint dry cider

½ pint chicken stock

2 tablespoons plain flour

1 cooking apple cored and sliced

2 leeks

½ onion

2 stems chopped sage

2 carrots finely diced

· Brown the pork off in the oil and spoon into the slow cooker with a slotted spoon

· Gently fry the onion and leek until soft

· Add the flour and stir

· Add the stock and cider gently and stir through

· Add the apple and the sage and pour onto the pork

· Stir through and cook on low for 9-11 hours

· Add carrots 3 hours before serving. (Recipe actually says add at the start with the apple but I prefer carrots to retain some colour and shape so I like to add them later. My other half works from home so he is around to do this.)

It was absolutely delicious - I served with roast potatoes and peas and froze half of it for a later date.

My first ever proper bra fitting

2011-01-11T22:13:00.002Z

Last week I went for my first ever proper bra fitting. I got a bunch of Debenhams vouchers for Xmas and I thought I’d use some of them to buy myself a decent bra set. I say decent because I usually just grab my bras from Primark. I’m only a 34B and priamrk T-shirt bras are great – I don’t need very much support and I find them really comfortable.

But comfort wasn’t what I was looking for – I was looking for sexy. I grabbed a gorgeous teal/black lace bra/knickers set from Ultimo in the gel range in my size and decided not to bother trying on because of the huge queues. I was gutted when I got home to find it wasn’t that comfortable and didn’t seem to fit that well.

This is the set I bought (this is not me in case you were wondering

Because I’ve been buying the same bra size forever I did wonder whether my size could possibly have changed or maybe I was just wearing the wrong size in the first place? So I decided to and get measured up properly.

The lady was really helpful and knowledgeable and made me feel really at ease. She fitted the bra over the top of the bra I was wearing then I slipped the bra off underneath so at no point are you ever really fully exposing yourself. She confirmed I was in the right size (wooohoo) as I was half expecting her to tell me I needed a 30D or something instead of a 34B. She showed me how to remove the gel pads from the bra that I’d bought and fitted the straps properly for me and I ended up keeping it because once it had been fitted properly it looked great. She also recommended a couple of ranges that she thought would work well for my shape – Atlantis and Ultimate and I tried a few of those. I will definitely be going back at some point not in a lunch hour to buy a couple more.

All in all a worthwhile experience – I would really recommend to anyone who’s never been fitted properly to go and do so because even if you are in the right size, different ranges are cut differently and you'd be surprised at what a bit of professional advice could do for you.

Some thoughts on "detoxes"

2011-01-11T22:07:00.001Z

This time last year my boyfriend and I embarked on a 21 detox programme – we did the Dr Joshi Holistic Detox. It was pretty hellish spending the first 3 weeks of the New Year not being able to eat meat, dairy, fruit, caffeine and whole heap of other things. I remember walking to work on the first day back in January in thick snow and actually bursting into tears with the sheer misery of it all. I felt pretty good afterwards but in all fairness I’m not sure that pain of doing the detox was really worth it in the long run?

Quite a few of my friends are doing detoxes at the moment and there loads of status updates flying about on FB and Twitter from miserable detoxees. As I was eating roast beef and enjoying a few glasses of red wine with friends (having been to the gym in the morning) on Sunday, it got me thinking....I feel absolutely great at the moment – healthy, energetic and motivated. So what really is the point of making yourself miserable by denying yourself the simple pleasures in life, just to prove a point?

It’s always nice to know that put under pressure you can give up these things and I know that I do have pretty good will power when I put my mind to it but I can honestly say that getting fit has done way more for my general wellbeing than any elimination diet or detox I’ve ever tried. I think it’s all about listening to your body and doing what needs to be done on a permanent basis rather than 100% denying yourself the simple pleasures in life for a short period.

So let’s raise a glass to exercise and eating whatever you want, in moderation :)

"Spring" Cleaning

2011-01-11T22:02:00.000Z

Last weekend was mainly spent giving the flat an almighty Spring clean. It started off quite low-key on Saturday morning I decided to take everything off the kitchen surfaces and give them a proper wipe, rather than my usual “wipe around”. That then turned into me cleaning the grubby fingerprints off the outside of the cupboards….which then turned into taking everything out of the cupboards and cleaning inside and then rearranging the contents….that then turned into cleaning the inside of the fridge….which turned into cleaning the mircowave…culminating in me decanting all the rice, pasta, flour etc.. into jars and labelling them all with a marker pen. It all got a bit Bree Van Der Kamp there for a while.

I stopped for lunch and then in the afternoon decided that the bathroom could probably do with a similar level of attention. So everything was hauled out of the cabinet and the toilet, bath, shower and floor were all scrubbed to a sparkle.

I was so exhausted from all the elbow grease expended I went to bed pretty early as I had a Health MOT at the gym pretty early on Sunday morning. One of the main plus points that swung it for me to pay out the money I do on my particular gym is that as part of the Nuffield Health brand they have a strong emphasis on your actual health and fitness rather than on your outward looks. Instead of beauticians and tanning beds, my gym offers free health and fitness checks and then incentivise you to improve your levels with free months of membership if you can improve on your fitness.

It was the first one I’d had, as I had to cancel the one I had booked when I first joined in the summer because I was ill, so I was intrigued to find out what my levels would be. Firstly I was absolutely chuffed tio find out my offical proper weight and realise that my home scales are 4lb out – so I’m actually 4lb lighter than I thought I was, which psychologically has given me a massive boost. I’m going to actually throw the bloody thing away now and just weigh myself at the gym every once in a while.

There was also a measure called VO₂ Max which measures how efficiently your body takes up and utilises the oxygen in your blood, so essentially a measure of your aerobic fitness. I was flabberglasted to be placed near the top of the scale – woohoo! I’m officially fit. Now that I have reached a decent level of fitness I think I might start to include something like Pilates or Body Balance into my programme to really start to work on my core…washboard tummy you will be mine.

My readings were:

BMI - 21.9
Waist to hip ratio - 0.79
Blood pressure 125/82
VO₂ Max - 56 ml/kg/min (considered "excellent" on the scale)
Resting heart rate 84 bpm (a bit high but I'd just cycled up a massive hill to get to the gym)
Cholesterol 4.32 mmol.l
Blood glucose 4.2 mmol/l
Overall "health score" = 78 (in the top 30% for my age)

When I got home from the gym we got a call to invite us round to one of our best friend’s houses who lives just 5 minutes walk away for a big roast with a bunch of other friends. He cooked an amazing roast beef with all the trimmings and apple crumble for afters. The red wine was really flowing and I had such a lovely afternoon. At one point the girls and I were reminiscing about the outfits we used to go clubbing in back in the day – Miss Sixty flares and Buffalo boots were practically our uniform back in ‘99-2000 – with belly chains and cropped tops. I can’t imagine walking out of the door in a cropped top now eeeek!

After the best part of a bottle of wine I was on fine form to go home and finish the spring cleaning by blitzing the bedroom and having a ruthless clear-out of my wardrobe. I managed to get rid of 2 black binliners of clothes – one for charity and one for storage. I was definitely more gung-ho than had I done it completely sober which is probably for the best because I needed to make space for new things now that I’ve got my fashion mojo back after being in the wilderness for a bit. The half stone I’ve shed is starting to be more outwardly noticeable and I’m more or less back in my size 10s now – got to keep working hard as I’ve promised myself I’ll buy myself some new jeans when I can fit back in my original waist size (not quite there yet). I’ve deliberately not bought any expensive clothes while I’ve been in a bigger size and I always aspired to lose the weight. Now I have space in my wardrobe I’m even more motivated to keep working hard – new body, new wardrobe.

Up / Down

2011-01-07T21:14:00.000Z

I thought I'd revive an old blogging favourite of mine - in my previous incarnation I did this every day for about a year. It's one of my favourite types of blog to read and definitely one of my favourite to write. So here goes, hopefully the first of many:

Going UP:

Predictable, but the GYM. It makes me feel good about myself and my body is changing for the better. It's a win-win really. Sod dieting, counting calories and being hungry. I'm just eating reasonable portions of properly balanced nutritious meals. Nothing processed and plenty of fresh fruit and veg. It's the exercise that really makes the difference not the diets.
My new electric blanket. Best. Xmas. Present. Ever.
Friends - I love my friends, I really do. There's been so much love on Facebook since our epic New Year's cottage adventure.
Being motivated - I went through quite a long phase of having absolutely no motivation to do anything EVER, and put off anything I could until the last minute. I'm sure it's linked to the gym but thankfully I'm back to my bouncy old, organised self.
Comedy shows on TV- Live at the Apollo, Have I Got News for You, the Big Fat Quiz of the Year etc... My faves are Michael McIntyre, Jon Bishop, Rich Hall, Reginald Hunter, Sarah Millican, Noel Fielding, Russell Brand. You can't beat a good belly laugh.
RA 240: Mathew Jonson podcast - love, love, love! So dreamy.
Finally getting around to watching Upstairs, Downstairs that was shown over Christmas. I love period drama and this is right up my street because it's set in the 30s which is one of my favourite eras for fashion.
New clothes - in keeping with my new year's resolution to start updating my wardrobe I ordered a few bits online. Maybe do some show and tells when they arrive.
Possible girly holiday to Dubai at the end of February. I say possible because I am supposed to be clearing debts and saving for the wedding but I really want to get away somewhere and see some sunshine, and can you believe I have NEVER been on an all-girls holiday??

Going DOWN

Overworked boyfriend :( Hardly get to see him as he's working so hard on his new business venture. But we have to support our menfolk don't we?
Out of control wardrobe. Seriously needs a massive clear out but it's so daunting. And probably 80% of it could be got rid of. I tend wear the same few things over and over again and ignore the piles of things clogging it up because nothing is organised. Also I think my tastes have changed recently - over all I'm a little more conservative and dare I say sophisticated than I was a couple of years ago. There's a fair few things that I know I just won't ever wear again. Same goes for makeup. My days of wearing brights 7 days a week are all but over.
January skintness. Always the same after an early December payday and Christmas shopping extravagance.
Jan Moir - horrid, horrid woman.
Some stupid douchbag on Twitter promoting very disturbing pro-anorexia messages. The worst thing was everyone constantly @replying him and getting him into the trending topics. Playing right into his hands!
Pine needles

Is Abbey Clancy the most gorgeous pregnant woman you've ever seen or what??

2011-01-07T20:22:00.000Z