Keeping up appearances.......

HappyNow

Time to list some targets for January. I'm feeling very motivated and I absolutely WILL keep to them.

1) Take better care of my body and health. I've become very sloppy with my diet and general fitness, and at my age (61 soon) I really do need to get a grip. So I'm handing myself over to my Fitbit for the entire month. I'll use it to record weight, calories in & out, quality of diet, water intake, exercise done and sleep. It's going to be a busy little machine!

2) Sixteen alcohol free days in January. I don't drink loads but over the holidays I don't think there's been a single day when I haven't had at least one drink.

3) Pay at least £700 off the unsecured debt. Recently I've been content making just minimum payments, but at that rate it will drag on forever. Mr H has arthritis in his hands, and it's been particularly bad this winter. He's finding his self-employed work more and more difficult because it requires nimble fingers. The lower we can get the debt, the less disastrous it would be if he needs to give up work.

Seasidegal58

I've made my big resolution for 2020 (and actually the next eighteen months!). Happy has already popped over to my diary and seen it but I'll post it here as well:

2020 MSE RESOLUTION

I've been mulling over the run-up to my retirement which is April 2021, and have decided it would be a good thing to start to live on the equivalent of my retirement income to prepare me for the inevitable. It won't be the exact amount as (a) I won't be able to obtain an exact figure of my final salary income yet, (b) who knows whether the government will play around with my State Pension income, and (c) I havent decided yet whether I'll put my DC pension into an annuity or open a SIPP on retirement.

I've worked out an estimate and the spare cash left over in my monthly salary will be added to my monthly pension transfer cash.

This means taking a good, hard look at my outgoings again and adjusting my pots on YNAB.

I'm conscious that I'm still frittering away on certain things because I can afford it at the moment, but feel it's time to try and pull in my horns more. For example, one of my worst frittering is coffees and eats out. Also books (either on kindle or paper books).

So I'll be starting in earnest from the end of the month, but will monitor the rest of this month as well to try and scrimp more.

OTHER RESOLUTIONS

I'm not going to bother too much here - just making an effort to carry on with the plant based diet and try to exercise more!

So this will be my mantra for the year. I'm sure the odd other things will pop up on the way as well!

Seasidegal58

Honey - all good intentions here. Good luck with them! As Happy has mentioned, have you got a special date like retirement in the next couple of years?

Happy - good thinking on the debt, especially with poor Mr Happy suffering with his hands. Good luck with he alcohol free days. You can do it!:D

Dolphin - looking forward to hearing about your new resolutions!

Milann - I know you'll be back soon!

:hello: to Muddy Walker and EchoB

HappyNow

Hi SSG I agree it's a really good idea to check you'll manage when you've retired. All the same, the things you mention cutting back on sound like the good stuff in life (coffee, eating out, books) so hopefully you'll be able to find the right balance.

OK, my update for yesterday (1st). It's all going very well so far.

1) Take better care of my body and health.
Weight - 8st 12lb so 5lb to lose and then I'll review it.
Calories - in 1310, out 1685. Fitbit thought I'd under-eaten but it felt fine.
Food - all healthy except 30g of chocolate.
Water - 6 glasses drunk
Exercise - 10020 steps including some VERY poor dancercise to Youtube. Definitely won't be doing that unless I'm alone!
Sleep - the bad news . I really struggled to nod off but luckily I could sleep in so managed 5 hrs 23 mins.

2) Sixteen alcohol free days in January. No booze yesterday and I didn't miss it.

3) Pay at least £700 off the unsecured debt. Yesterday was a no-spend day and I balanced my YNAB.

So off to a flying start, but of course it was only Day 1!

HappyNow

Yesterday was another good day. Today has been too, but I won't record that until tomorrow.

1) Take better care of my body and health.
Weight - Forgot to weigh myself.
Calories - In the 'blue' zone, which means Fitbit thinks I under-ate again based on the exercise I did. The options are blue (too few calories), red (too many calories) or green (the ideal calorie zone).
Food - all healthy except an ameretto biscuit.
Water - 6 glasses drunk
Exercise - 10241 steps. No dancercise today, all walking.
Sleep - Not much better than yesterday, 5 hrs 30 mins.

2) Sixteen alcohol free days in January. Another tick for yesterday.

3) Pay at least £700 off the unsecured debt. Didn't leave the house so no spending done. YNAB balanced.

Muddy_Walker

Hi!
House is very clean mostly (I clean really well in a temper) and sulking that a magazine I ordered hasn’t come is now finished after I spent time on FB and cried my eyes out over the articles and pictures of koalas.....
Australia is going through hell so why am I stropping over a magazine????
So a stern talking to later and I am just about ready to walk the dogs......
Extra hugs,
MW xx

Honey_Bear

I'm still being hopeless because:

1. I am not a girly swot;
2. My new year doesn't start until 7 January, the day after OH's birthday.

There's no point trying to be faintly saintly when I've got to join in the celebrations, is there?

However, in view of the fact that today is our lovely Happy Now's birthday, I just popped by to say:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HAPPY!

:bdaycake::bdaycake::bdaycake::bdaycake::bdaycake:

milann

Birthday wishes from me too Happy:bdaycake:
My New Year starts on 7th January too but that’s because it’s my statement date and there’s always food and treats around straight after New Year so no point setting myself up to fail unnecessarily

My January targets are pretty boring and I’ll do them a week at a time again.
January week 1
- Get back on track with SW
- Use gym membership 3 times
- Crack on knitting cardigans for gks
- Use food from home rather than buying more
- Tidy as I go rather than letting it mount up

Nothing earth shattering but improve life in the long run.

HappyNow

MW. Yes, the situation in Australia does put a lot of our mini-problems into perspective. Awful.

Honey and Milann Thanks for the birthday wishes, and Happy Birthday to Mr HB for tomorrow. I suppose it would have made sense for me to start the new year after my birthday. I'll try and remember next year.

I've spent most of the day with Little Miss H, including lunch at Frankie & Bennies. I kept it sensible with goat cheese salad and no pudding and drank fizzy water. Last night I went for a pre-birthday meal with a close friend and that was NOT low calorie, and neither was the bottle of wine I drank with it. So it's a mixed update for the two days.

1) Take better care of my body and health.
Weight - Haven't weighed myself since 1st Jan.
Calories - Friday was a Green day (good) and Saturday was a red day (bad).
Food - pretty good apart from last night's mousaka.
Water - 6 glasses drunk both days
Exercise - More than 10000 steps each day.
Sleep - rubbish on Friday, Saturday was better but that was probably the wine.

2) Sixteen alcohol free days in January. Three so far

3) Pay at least £700 off the unsecured debt. The meal out with my friend cost £42!! Today's Frankie & Bennie trip was Little Miss H's treat and I found a Vouchercloud voucher so it only cost her £18.80. My only spend today was £4.99 on a new eyeliner which probably won't be very good for that price.

HappyNow

Hmm, I've not been that great at daily posting, but I HAVE been doing unusually well with my goals for the month.

1) Take better care of my body and health.
Weight - Weighed in at 8st 10lb this morning so that's a couple of lb off.
Calories - Over the last three days there've been two blues (under calorie) and one red (over calorie), but even the red day shows me having used more than I ate so I'm good with that.
Food - Doing well here and not even particularly hungry so far.
Water - 6 glasses drunk EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. Go me.
Exercise - More than 10000 steps each day, but I'm letting myself off today because I've got a headache. I'll probably still manage 7000 though.
Sleep - Last night was terrible. I think it was because I knew I had to get up at 6am for my first day back at work since before Christmas. Hence the headache.

2) Sixteen alcohol free days in January. Four so far and tonight is looking promising.

3) Pay at least £700 off the unsecured debt. I've spent odd bits in Tesco but it's all been important and HEALTHY stuff. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I've got an unopened box of Thorntons Continental left over from Christmas. I don't think that's ever happened to me before.