Living life in HD technicolour

MuffinTops

Thank you Tilly. Due to the free listing weekend I'm going to add as much as I can to eBay in the hope of clearing another pile out of the way and adding to the coffers.

MuffinTops

My plans to blitz the house have been postponed until next weekend. My Mum sent me a text asking if she could take me out for a lovely birthday meal in a really top place giving me a massive budget for where I chose!!!! Neither of us are what you could call foodies though and I'm vegetarian so don't necessarily get the best menu choice in restaurants so I asked if we could have a day out on that money instead, which she jumped at, so we went to Brighton for the day.

Although it was cold and a little miserable we did have a lovely day. We had a fairly light lunch in a nice place and decided we'd pop into the choccywoccydoodah cafe for a dessert when we fancied it. I've given up chocolate for Lent and they don't serve anything at all without chocolate on it (I should have known!!!) so we went back to the place we'd had lunch and had carrot cake and coffee each. Mum insisted on paying for everything (with that no nonsence voice she has when I'm told to put my purse away! ) Wandering outside around all the beautiful shops was lovely and I only spent £3 all day!!!!

I love being in Brighton during the day. All those beautiful and unique shops that are outside rather than crammed inside a mall and the view of the sea around most corners is fantastic. It felt too cold to have a wander along the seafront so I drove home that way instead.

So, today I'm off to get my nails and eyebrows done shortly and I've decided to do general housework and clear out my spare room as an exercise space. I don't want to just lose weight, I really want to tone up and feel proud of how I look so I've decided to do weights exercises as well as some cardio work and having a room to do that in will be ideal - whatever the weather. So that's my main task this afternoon along with eBaying and general housework.

Then I'm off for my birthday trip tomorrow. I love birthday weeks!

macpumpkin

Hey Miss Tops

Happy New Diary and Happy Birthday for Tuesday. I hope you have a fab trip, are you going to Bruges?

I used to go to a lot of TV recordings, I really love Have I Got News For You and have seen it being recorded a few times. Here is the link to register for free tickets:

http://www.hattrick.co.uk/ticketing/recordings/?seriesId=443&id=4

The other place I think is amazing for veggie food in London is Tibits (http://www.tibits.co.uk/e/) it is just off Regent's Street and the food is amazing and also very good value they weigh your plate and that is all you pay for it usually works out at less than 10 pounds.

Emzilla

MuffinTops wrote: »

with that no nonsense voice she has when I'm told to put my purse away!

That made me laugh :rotfl:. My mum has that exact same voice!

I'm glad you had a lovely day and happy birthday for Tuesday .

Emz xx

MuffinTops

Hello macpumpkin,

I'm off to Dublin. There's a castle along the seafront which is beautiful. I've stayed there a few times before. I used to travel to Bruges a lot, but I haven't been there for years. There's a particular chocolate shop in Bruges where I got to know the owners, so would be lethal for me to go during Lent! Their chocolate never tasted factory made and you could watch them making things through the back window. Oh, I really miss seeing them now!

Thank you for the links. I'll check those out in a little while. I'm really enjoying the research into how to make a fab life on a budget.

A great veggie place in Central London is definitely worth checking out. I'm likely to take my Mum into London on Mother's day so I'll pop in there.

MTx

MuffinTops

Thank you Emz! x

MuffinTops

Well, today has been quite productive. My nails are all pink and polished and my eyebrows are very Max Wall right now with the dye! I forgot they looked so bad and popped into Tesco on the way home. I just thought everyone was particularly friendly today with the amount of smiles I was getting!!!!!! I also have my euros now so am almost set to go tomorrow.

Since becoming vegetarian I really struggle to find protein sources that I like. I really don't like the texture of meat - particularly chicken. So quorn is still a struggle for me. But I decided to work on that today and make a bit of a casserole to hide the quorn bits. I found that I ate around the quorn, so more work is needed. I think I served up too much which gave me the luxury of picking out the bits I preferred so smaller portions next time.

All of my washing and ironing is now finished and general housework is all done! I have a clear area for exercise now too and have put my weights in that area. So I need to write up a plan of what to work on each day and I'll get that done on Wednesday when I get home ready to go full force from Thursday.

Today I was determined to put some things up for sale on eBay and I've managed to get 13 listings up. Phew! I forgot how time consuming that is, but all proceeds will be put onto the mortgage so very pleased that I've started that up again. Even better when areas start clearing again.

Shop and scan has also been sent with receipts so I'm feeling like I've earned a sit down now.

I hope everyone has had a great weekend and have a good week coming up.

MTx

MuffinTops

I'm home already! The time went so fast! Dublin was fantastic and I had a brilliant birthday. The Castle we stayed in is such luxury but so affordable and we made the most of yesterday by wandering into town and seeing all the sights etc.

We had a spot of lunch (cake and coffee!!!) in Brown Thomas which is a lovely department store in Dublin town centre. They have a Jo Malone outlet in there and on telling the woman we can't buy anything due to having hand luggage only she gave us some free mini sample size perfumes to take with us! It felt like another birthday gift and great to have a mini perfume to keep in my travel toiletry bag.

I feel like I've had a real luxury break but only spent 50 Euros which included dinner for 2 nights.

So, now the hard work begins to start looking a bit fab now. I've set out my weights and found some motivating music so I'm about to sit down and decide on what upper body exercises to do and what lower body ones too and I'll do alternate days on each for 6 days each week. Cardio will be added but I find that easy to incorporate once I'm in an exercise regime as I love cycling so much.

I'm not back to work until next Tuesday so I have a great chance to get into the swing of things.

I get paid tomorrow so I'll log onto my internet banking and get the bills paid. My mortgage payment goes out on 1st of the month and the interest is added on, so at that point I can pay my standard overpayment to get it down by another thousand. Seeing a drop in a main number each month is so motivating.:D

My eBay items have lots of watchers and no bids yet. I've had a message asking if I'll combine postage, but as I put minimum postage on items I need to know what items are to be combined and see if there's any discount to be given. I also need to find more items to put up this weekend.

I hope everyone's having a great week. x

MuffinTops

Oh what a week since I got back from Dublin! I've got another stinking head cold, which is the second this year so far! As soon as I started exercising it came out, which I'm hoping is a detox effect, although am still looking at ways I can get healthier.

This has scuppered some plans, but not my resolution to sort things out so as soon my energy levels pick up I'll be back on track.

Today I logged onto my bank account and sent my mortgage overpayment which clears another full £1K off the balance.

My eBay items haven't done great, but I'll just keep adding them on until they sell. Whatever I get is an OP payment so other than wanting the clutter out I don't mind how long it takes as long as it all goes eventually.

With mortgage OP's in mind I've logged into all of my unexpected income areas. Surveys, mystery shops etc and I'll get those pushed up again as they don't take much time to sort out if I'm organised.

This weekend has been a bit of a washout, but I have managed to start a deep clean on the oven and did some food shopping this morning. I've also taken lots more ebay fodder pictures and those will be put up shortly along with anything 99p and under which didn't sell from last week. I also had my hair coloured on Friday which cost me half of what it usually does and I'm very happy with the result. So once I'm over the worst on this cold it's full steam ahead.

I don't work Mondays so tomorrow I'll be batch cooking for work lunches so that I'm not tempted with sandwiches. For me sandwiches need crisps and something sweet to make them feel like a lunch! How silly, but I want to eliminate temptations as much as possible and a proper meal for lunch will do that.

I'm going to attempt more light exercise tomorrow as I think that will boost my mood and start me back in the fitness routine I want.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend.

macpumpkin

Hey Miss Tops,

I'm glad you had a fab Birthday weekend and only spending 50 Euros is amazing.

Try eating loads of garlic to shift the cold as it has lots of anti viral properties and a tablespoon of Manuka honey in yogurt as it as anti bacterial properties (Manuka honey is pricey but is worth it as it works). When I was doing my finals at Uni everyone else's parents sent them good luck cards for their exams and mine sent me a pot of Manuka honey with 20+ anti bacterial activity in the post!!!

I love my parents for being unpredictable....