Get a grip woman!

Karmacat

19lbs down after 7 weeks! Thats really, really good, congratulations. I don't really have any sugar at all now, after being addicted to the stuff for years - though I do have honey on my porridge, and I often snack on dried fruit like sultanas, but thats it - the only refined sugar I have is in baked goods, once in a blue moon, which used to be several times a day.

Carbs ... now thats another matter altogether! Can I ask what you're eating instead? Is it more fruit and veg? And what about your garden?

Suffolk_lass

My diet
Thanks for asking Karmacat. I try to avoid simple carbs (except Christmas chocolate!). My old carbs were potatoes, pasta, rice, bread (hm or Hovis wheatgerm).

I have cut out potatoes at the moment (hardship is jacket potato with a crunchy skin, which I love) - things like mash or roast, I have just left off my plate. I am eating more cabbage and carrot at the moment!

Pasta - none, I made lasagna with leek sheets but note to self is to shorten them so they run across not lengthways as once they are cooked they are difficult to cut - the flavour is excellent though - I also used bol sauce in a halved capsicum pepper (grated cheese on top and bunged in oven for 30 minutes) instead of mixing it with penne when I did this for son and husband last week. Think I actually prefer this.

Rice - just ordered onion (and sag) bhaji (made with gram flour) instead

Bread - had to cheat on Saturday as we went out for a curry with my Mum and the restaurant refused to let me order a vegetable side dish as they were too busy (we were in the West of Scotland and apparently this is normal (!)) - so I had to mop up my very wet gujarati spiced chicken with a bit of my husband's plain naan bread.

My conscious cheat has been to make a flour-thickened cheese sauce to have with leek and cauliflower - using about a dessert spoon of organic stoneground white flour to about 50g butter and oil.

In terms of fruit, I have been eating berry fruits (frozen), stirred into greek yogurt and allowed to defrost, with nuts and seeds and a dessert spoonful of raw jumbo organic oats as my normal breakfast on work days. Other than this, a daily orange, and an occasional apple with cheese (or celery sticks with cheese). No bananas, tropical fruits, dried fruits because of their high or concentrated sugar content.

And we get through loads of coleslaw (bog-standard with no added sugar (the deli-style has sugar!) as I have been adding it to salad instead of salad dressing. I also notice I am eating unsalted cashew nuts as my protein in salads (£1.29 a bag in Aldi!) and as a snack if I am struggling. And cheese. If I am hungry it is filling and easy to have an ounce as a snack - especially with celery (sub for crackers!) which I peel with a potato peeler as it is stringy at this time of year!

Our garden
Regarding the garden, there is masses to do. We have planted chatted early and main crop potatoes and onions so far in the veg beds.

We have 10 raised beds in what used to be our secret garden but is now our kitchen garden - surrounded by fruit bushes/canes on three sides with a beech hedge on the fourth. Also rhubarb and a few fruit trees. The onions and potatoes are in two of the raised beds.

We have a 1-year old asparagus bed (hopefully) - our son dug out all the plants last autumn (- it was a not listening moment). At least one pink shoot has shown itself (!).

Then we have two higher narrower beds for strawberries. We replaced them all last year but lost one lot so are expecting more (on order from Ken Muir but a bit early in EA Spring) - the other lot look very small and really struggled - I think we burnt them with too-rich compost topping up.

Our other big innovation this year is some arches that husband has made. These arch over the path between two beds and along the length of two. We saw a large open garden last year that was growing beans, squashes and cucumbers in this way. We hope to emulate with a few sweet peas thrown in for colour, scent and pollination assistance.

I have not planted any seeds yet but will do so - sweet-peas and tomatoes first, then sweetcorn, salad crops, broad beans, runner beans, peas, dwarf french beans, carrots, beetroot, cucumbers, melon and butternut squash for the arches, plus leeks and kale.

We have had miserable failure with all brassicas which regularly become the national centre for cabbage white butterfly and a snack-pot for pigeons. My only consolation is that they are quite cheap locally.

Then we have the plagues - Blackfly on blackcurrants, American aphids on lupins, and worst of all, Rosemary beetle on our Rosemary hedge (decimated) and found some in with sage. We have resorted to spraying these with a specific control. Rabbits all had mix last year so less of a problem, and the local farm manager came and shot 60(!) at the back of our garden last year in two night's lamping.

Last year we opened our garden as part of a Village Open Gardens fund-raiser but I don't know if we will have time to explore this more until we both retire - we did enjoy it and might consider doing it for charity in the future.

Karmacat

Wow! Now that's really something

Even with sugar, sounds like I'm way behind you - I definitely have a handful of dried fruit most days I'll work more on my food once the garden and the finances are more under control - right now, I just plod along on the basics, assembling food rather than chopping or making stuff (frozen veg, which I used when I was really ill, and not weaned myself from yet). Salads will help, with a strong dressing, I eat way too much salt as well

I hope your asparagus survives! I was doing my too-hopeful thing, and I received some offered asparagus berries from a neighbour of my mum's, it grows like weeds on their sandy soil, but on my thick clay, I haven't even tried, to be honest.

Loving the sound of your arches, how beautiful is that! Sounds like its going to be even more wonderful in the future!

Suffolk_lass

Time to update - for March 2017 (as husband got paid today and all payments are out of my payments account):

Debts

£[STRIKE]110,621[/STRIKE] £106,166 (£4,455 paid so far) - Mortgage
[STRIKE]£3,476[/STRIKE] £3,076 (£400)- DH's car
[STRIKE]£8,755.54[/STRIKE] £7,959.58 (£795.96) - Barclays Finance for double glazing

Total [STRIKE]£122,852.54[/STRIKE] £117,201.58 - that is £5,650.96 so far



£8059.77 (aiming for £10,000) Emergency fund today -£1940.23
£12,226.24 S&S ISA with Fidelity International (original £10,000 4 years ago, no further capital added)
£5,247.88 DH's S&S ISA with Charles Stanley Direct
£3,113.08 2 year Bond with Skipton BS @ 4% Finishes in early 2018
£10,947.52 7 year bond with Skipton BS - matures Oct 20
[STRIKE]£38,630.43[/STRIKE] £39,594.49 Total actual savings

Shortfall [STRIKE]£71,990.57[/STRIKE] £66,571.96 (mortgage)

3 bad things -

1. Home insurance was £1448.72
2. Had to sub the other house account £600 to cover the bill shortfall
3. Husband's bike insurance up by £70 to £220 or so, and he chose this month to get the bike repaired and buy a new disk for the rear wheel

3 good things

1. I had budgeted enough for the home insurance
2. I still managed to save a bit, despite subbing £600 - it would otherwise have been my best month in 2017
3. [STRIKE]I have lost 22lb so far[/STRIKE] not money but couldn't resist it - moderately thrilled!
4. Husband's pension statement through for his small DB pension is just under £7k with 2 and a half years to go

Karmacat

Suffolk_lass wrote: »

[STRIKE]I have lost 22lb so far[/STRIKE] not money but couldn't resist it - moderately thrilled.

Quite right too - being healthier lets you continue to take care of all of this, *and* enables more fun :j

Suffolk_lass

Karmacat wrote: »

Quite right too - being healthier lets you continue to take care of all of this, *and* enables more fun :j

Yes, I am going on a Spring walk on the Shotley Peninsular with a friend this morning (I have invited husband but I think he plans to put his motorcycle rear wheel back together with the new brake disk) - we are going to be near The Royal Hospital School in Holbrook. Although relatively flat, the views over the river are fantastic and hopefully a plethora of Spring bulbs in bloom will add to it. The sun is shining and there is a promise of future warmth in the air.

Best of all, it is free entertainment. - And I've just had to trawl through my wardrobe for a pair of smaller trousers! - like any good hoarder I have clothes in five sizes in my possession

Karmacat

Sounds wonderful! Have a lovely time

boxofpaws

Wow, you two (you and Karmacat) are a sugar-free inspiration! :AYour weight loss is amazing. Has it been easy? You make it sound quite enjoyable.

I would love to do the open gardens, ours is nowhere near good enough for that, but maybe one day...

Your money news is all good too, well done.:T

Suffolk_lass

It has been quite easy Paws. I don't mind the same thing for work-day breakfast and lunch (both eaten at work) so have been taking two plastic boxes each day.

Regular breakfast is a mix of raw jumbo organic oats mixed with full-fat greek-style yogurt, berry fruits (sometimes the frozen pack of summer fruits, sometimes fresh) nuts and seeds (I mix pumpkin seeds with pine-nut kernels, raw cashews and a smattering of macadamia nuts). A generous tablespoon of yogurt with a heaped dessertspoon of each of the others for portion-size.

Lunch is a basic veg salad with one of egg, cheese cubes, half an avocado or a sprinkle of cashews, with some shop-bought basic or classic coleslaw (without sugar - so not deli-style) and no dressing. Plus a piece of fruit like a plum or satsuma

Dinner is a small piece of meat (size of a pack of cards) like a chop or a couple of good sausages, with steamed veg like broccoli, carrots, cabbage and peas.

If I want to snack I have been having an orange or a (peeled) stick of celery chopped into 3 and filled with cheese or spreading pate.

The things I have avoided are all based on the Michael Moseley (8-week low blood-sugar) book advice but not following his meal-plans and not counting calories or anything obsessive like that.

So - no pre-prepared food like ready meals, no dried fruit, no tropical fruits (except citrus, which I have been eating regularly), no bread, potatoes, pasta, rice, crispy snacks or cereals (except oats), no biscuits (apples and cheese or carrot sticks and celery are nicer than crackers in my head now! And no puddings except natural unsweetened full-fat yogurt with berries. Nothing with added sugar except...

I have had the odd herb omelette or bacon and eggs, with a teaspoon of HP sauce and two curries where I had a corner of my husband's naan bread to mop up the sauce.

I have also had peppers cut in half and filled with ragu sauce and sprinkled with cheese, then baked, instead of the pasta everyone else was having with ragu sauce, and the Hairy Bikers' lasagne with leek sheets substituted for lasagne sheets (make sure you pre-cut the leeks to where you want the portions or they are impossible to cut).

Once or twice I have fasted all day and then had a normal evening meal (as above).

Re drinks - nothing sweet at all. A couple of morning black coffees, then chilled water all day, maybe a cup of tea with milk, a glass of red wine no more than once a week (I think I have had 6 in eight weeks - and I normally drink white!)

All I can say is it works for me.

After a week off (next week) while we are away, I will resume a mediterranean diet with two fast-lite days (two small meals like I have been having). I live in hope that I can stick with it, as I would love to shed some more by the end of the year. I could comfortably lose two stone without replenishing my clothing hoard.

I think jacket potato is the hardest thing to have given up so might need to have an occasional one too.

Suffolk_lass

My current fixed deal will end on 30th April.

I received the nudge from the MSE Cheap Energy Club to look for another one. I like the certainty of a fixed tariff, preferably without penalties and I'm not bothered about cash back.

I did the comparison and the first four or five all had terrible customer service ratings. They were all more money than my current tariff (Connect 6 with Flow). I tried the variable tariffs with similar customer service ratings (we are talking 50%+ in poor or terrible!). The next one was Flow's variable tariff. So I logged in and secure messaged Flow to ask them to move me to their variable tariff when my current deal expires.

By return I received an email saying they are actually introducing a better value fixed deal with no penalties (so offering the same flexibility as the standard variable tariff) and so they would move me to that instead as it offers better value for money for me! :T I am so happy they have done this.

Of course I did get the standard email from them a couple of days later saying my current tariff is ending next month - so either the auto-generated email cannot be suppressed... or they forgot to do that.... or they forgot to change me to another tariff

So in conclusion, this could be my best ever experience of customer service from an energy supplier, or it could be something else. As a glass half full sort of girl (in my head I'm still a girl!), I am hoping it is the former. Very happy with that though!