Paid off the £31,000! BUT - still scrimping!

beanielou

I would do what you are doing if I had an emmergency fund.
That is unacceptable.

lashie

I second the Aldi diffusers. They smell lovely, especially the basil and lime one! And they are £3.99 ��

Seasidegal58

Thanks beanie and DIA. I've heard good news about the Aldi diffusers/candles but I haven't seen them in my branch. It is currently closed for renovation so hopefully they will stock them when it reopens.

END OF SCRIMPY WEEK 1 - OCTOBER

Last spend of the week was my 2 for 1 cinema tickets to seen 'Judy' on Sunday.


SERIOUS SEPTEMBER – DAY 20-30

· 1,500 cals three days in work week, 500 cals on two and lighten up a bit at weekend! – this week went well Ended up losing 4lb when I weighed in on Saturday. A total of 1 stone 8lb lost in five weeks!!!!

Walking at least 30 mins per day, plus the leg exercises that Elnora/Dolphin gave me – Again ok haven't managed to walk excessively above my 30 mins. Again - stretches mostly good, but odd days when I've not bothered……

· - Drink six glasses of water per day – this is gone well.

· Go to bed at a sensible time during the work week – - very hit and miss – I don't honestly think this is going to work properly until I retire and can get myself into a real routine. Unless I'm really tired in the work week I tend to want to stay up to offset the feeling that everything is all work and then bed!

Eating down from the freezer – I had the smoked haddock but ended up giving away the rest of frozen meat and fish. This is because of my big new goal for October……………

….which is I've decided to try going vegan! I've sort of been leading up to it over the last couple of weeks in that I've not been replacing any meat/fish or dairy products and trying plant based versions or lot of fruit, veg, grains and beans instead. This has been brought on as I've been watching quite a few documentaries on a plant based diet and the health evidence appears overwhelmingly in favour of plants! And that's without the environmental/ethical effect as well. Two excellent documentaries that set me on the path are on Netflix – called 'Forks Over Knives' and 'What The Health.' I've been reading up on recipes - DD has decided to join me as well. I'm not saying I won't ever lapse – I don't want to push it into people's faces – if someone offers me a coffee and they only have milk to add then I'll have it. I'll probably lapse a bit a Christmas and New Year as well. The main thing is to keep it going most of the time.

On Saturday I gave all my tinned sardines, tuna, unopened dried egg pasta etc to the food bank and the rest of the meat/fish frozen/dried food to my friend (there wasn't that much left actually). All the perishable dairy in the fridge has been eaten (boo hoo! I had my final frittata with the last of the eggs!

So OPTIMISTIC OCTOBERtoday (thank you milann for that heading!)

Goals are:

· 1,500 cals three days in work week, 500 cals on two and lighten up a bit at weekend, BUT KEEP IT PLANT BASED AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE!

- Keep on with the walking and foot stretches, but see if I can incorporate a few back stretches as well.

Only two goals, but I think this month I'll have enough to contend with re. going vegan.

I'm going to miss cheese terribly though. The vegan version isn't a patch on the real stuff. And the vegan milk chocolate I tried wasn't up to much – although Green & Blacks dark chocolate is vegan apparently, apart from the toffee version. I like dark chocolate so should be ok here.

And eggs…………. I love omelettes and frittatas. I've had to forgo redo's egg wrap on 500 cal days. hummus and ryvitas instead…..

Wish me luck!

Seasidegal58

lashie wrote: »

I second the Aldi diffusers. They smell lovely, especially the basil and lime one! And they are £3.99 ��

Wow! Is that all they cost lashie!:eek: I'm definitely looking at these if they end up being stocked at my Aldi!

Sunshine_girl2

What is a typical days eating now then on your vegan diet ? Interested to see how you get on . We have diffusers in our Aldi as well , I may give one a whirl.

redofromstart

Good luck with it Seaside, My SS and his GF eat vegan a lot and say its done wonders for their weight, health and food bill.

Soup flask and HM soup for the 500 cal days?

milann

Good luck with the vegan diet - I couldn’t do it. So hats off to you if you can :beer:

Sun_Addict

Wow you're doing so well with the weight loss :j I eat lots of vegan food, I don't eat meat and I hate milk, butter and eggs. I know you like your tech so I would recommend the Deliciously Ella app, it's 99p a month and has loads of fab vegan recipes and even yoga sequences and podcasts, well worth 99p.

Seasidegal58

Thank you guys for all your good wishes!

SG2 and redo – I can still eat quite a lot of what I ate previously as long as it doesn't contain any meat/fish or dairy products. The ingredients list on products is now essential reading!

Breakfast: e.g. my porridge and banana breakfast – all I've done is swap the milk for oat milk – which goes beautifully with the porridge as its creamy – I use the oat milk in my coffee as well and bring some into work each day. Can also make up bircher style muesli with Alpro plain yoghurt. Breakfast at the weekend – I can still have beans on toast or peanut butter on wholemeal toast (I found an excellent little loaf in Waitrose made up mostly of seeds – very dense and yummy.

Last Sunday I had brunch out with my friend – I had the caf!'s vegan breakfast which consisted of rosti, tomatoes, large mushroom, sour dough bread with beetroot hummus and spicy salsa. It was delicious. And my friend (who usually has the pancakes) said she wanted to try it next time as it looked so nice! Plus soya milk flat white (luckily most decent eateries in London and where I live serve up coffees with plant based milks now).

Lunch on 500 cal days has been swapped from egg wrap to low-fat hummus and ryvitas. On non-500 cal days I can still have my whole meal bread/wrap sandwiches – packed with all sorts of veg, nuts, hummus etc. I'm going to start experimenting more with salads made with veg and legumes/seeds.

Dinner on 500 days stays the same – any veg soup that does not contain dairy, plus ryvitas or rice cakes with a little spread. Spread has been swapped from Lurpak spreadable to olive oil spread. Dinner on other days and at weekends so far has been Eat Well for Less's butternut squash risotto made in the microwave and chili made with extra chickpeas/kidney beans to replace the meat.

And lots and lots of fruit and extra veg! Fortunately, there are what seems like thousands of vegan/plant based recipes out there on the internet to experiment with. I had to buy a B12 vitamin spray though.

Plus, thanks for the Deliciously Ella app heads up SA – I'll definitely look into that one.

Reactions from family and friends have been mixed – as I wrote, DD is going to join me on the vegan journey. DSIs was gobsmacked – as was one of my best friends – their reaction basically was that the weight should drop off me now that I'm going to live off salad and carrots! One of my dear colleagues in work said that he would break me and emails the odd photo of cream eclairs and steak and chips to me!

P.S. I've just found that Bailey's make an almond milk based liquor! Apparently, it's sold in Waitrose and Asda. I'm going to buy a bottle so I can still have my Bailey's tipple when wrapping up the Xmas pressies!

Seasidegal58

SCRIMPY WEEK 2 – OCTOBER (started on Wednesday)

£50 Ad Hoc spends again this week. So far non-budgeted spends have been £49 to the private doctor re. referral letter.

Re. the eye problem l- I saw the private doctor and got a referral to an eye specialist that I used a few years ago. I've booked an appointment to see him at Moorfields.

One other biggy thing that I must buy (and this will come from the PPI funds) is a new mattress. I've had my present mattress for years and I'm starting to wake up each morning with a lower sore back – even with the mattress topper. So research to be done on this plus the ioniser this weekend.

OPTIMISTIC OCTOBER (DAYS 1 3)

· 1,500 cals three days in work week, 500 cals on two and lighten up a bit at weekend, BUT KEEP IT PLANT BASED AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE! – all going well so far (see my previous post)

- Keep on with the walking and foot stretches, but see if I can incorporate a few back stretches as well – haven't got round to back stretches yet so fail here! Need to start this NOW (see achy back mention above!)