New Year, New Plans and Hopes

suki1964 · 6 January 2018 at 12:44PM

Have an amazing adventure, enjoy every moment

See you in six weeks to hear how this trip has inspired you further xx

nannywindow · 6 January 2018 at 4:36PM

Lessonlearned I hope you have a wonderful time !
Suki well done you.
I think I've gone backwards

. So I will make a concerted effort this week ! This week I need to get all the stuff out of the spare bedroom cupboard ( almost walk-in size, but without the room to walk at present :eek: ) as I need to put the Xmas stuff back in there, which has been dumped in the office ) I'm sure there are some items in that cupboard that I can release into the wild :rotfl:.
On the plus side I haven't done a large food shop since Xmas except for the bread and milk and fruit on the 2nd.

Irenadler · 6 January 2018 at 7:41PM

Hello all,

I'd like to try some ideas to improve my own life for 2018

1. Devise a way to stop the dog using the old veg plot as a personal pee place, so I can get my head around growing veg again.
2. Keep on job hunting so I have a viable income at last, instead of worrying I will be in debt soon.
3. If (when) get a job, save so I don't worry about losing it!
4. Get up the courage to de-clutter OH's stuff (managed to give/donate some already). Sadder than sad when I come across his things....
5. Make a decision as to stay or move/downsize. Hard - so many memories.....
6. Get my head around budgeting properly to avoid overdraft.
7. Use forum threads on here as motivation!

CurlyTop · 6 January 2018 at 8:59PM

Hi

I'm subscribed daily to this thread but never posted.

I too would like to change the way I do a few things. I plan to:

Read more (have set myself a GoodReads challenge of 60 books for the year - wish me luck on that one, may be a little ambitious but will see)

Keep an eye on my health more - had a nasty fall before Christmas and still stiff and achy. Will monitor that one.

Try not to buy things unnecessarily - food is a problem with this area. My DH thinks I'm stockpiling for the end of the world. I think this stems back from childhood and each month I say I will watch what I'm doing (I have a spreadsheet going back to 2010 and tbf, last year overall we were down on the previous year). I know I can do better. I went to Sainsburys this morning and found myself going back around the counter to put things back, so it's a step in the right direction.

Have some more me time. I work 3 days per week so this should be doable as there is only DH and I but last year was spending days food shopping (no no this year) and trying to do jobs. I think I feel guilty about working 3 days per week (had to reduce days down due to health) and therefore fill my time with things to do. That needs to stop.

I think that's it for now suffice to say:

Jackie O - great thread and comments from you as always. If I can make myself half as careful as you with money, whilst still living life large, I'll be well happy.

Lessons learned - go enjoy that adventure. I remember you from previous threads over the years at the time your DH was poorly. Your tenacity to keep going knows no bounds. Have a great time. I'm sure your DH, mum and dad are looking down on you, saying 'there's my girl'.

eandjsmum - I so admire you. I have tried swimming lessons twice, albeit when I was schools (many many moons ago) but my fear of water and I think having a nasty p.e. teacher, has seen me never venture into a pool again.

Suki1964 - I wish you every success this year. You're facing life challenges head on and realistically. If you choose the behaviour, you choose the consequences (as Dr Phil McGraw would say).

To all other posters, let's rock 2018 !

I'll be watching daily and will post when I can.

Mrs_Salad_Dodger · 7 January 2018 at 5:10AM

CurlyTop wrote: »

Hi

I'm subscribed daily to this thread but never posted.

I too would like to change the way I do a few things. I plan to:

Read more (have set myself a GoodReads challenge of 60 books for the year - wish me luck on that one, may be a little ambitious but will see)

Keep an eye on my health more - had a nasty fall before Christmas and still stiff and achy. Will monitor that one.

Try not to buy things unnecessarily - food is a problem with this area. My DH thinks I'm stockpiling for the end of the world. I think this stems back from childhood and each month I say I will watch what I'm doing (I have a spreadsheet going back to 2010 and tbf, last year overall we were down on the previous year). I know I can do better. I went to Sainsburys this morning and found myself going back around the counter to put things back, so it's a step in the right direction.

Have some more me time. I work 3 days per week so this should be doable as there is only DH and I but last year was spending days food shopping (no no this year) and trying to do jobs. I think I feel guilty about working 3 days per week (had to reduce days down due to health) and therefore fill my time with things to do. That needs to stop.

I think that's it for now suffice to say:

Jackie O - great thread and comments from you as always. If I can make myself half as careful as you with money, whilst still living life large, I'll be well happy.

Lessons learned - go enjoy that adventure. I remember you from previous threads over the years at the time your DH was poorly. Your tenacity to keep going knows no bounds. Have a great time. I'm sure your DH, mum and dad are looking down on you, saying 'there's my girl'.

eandjsmum - I so admire you. I have tried swimming lessons twice, albeit when I was schools (many many moons ago) but my fear of water and I think having a nasty p.e. teacher, has seen me never venture into a pool again.

Suki1964 - I wish you every success this year. You're facing life challenges head on and realistically. If you choose the behaviour, you choose the consequences (as Dr Phil McGraw would say).

To all other posters, let's rock 2018 !

I'll be watching daily and will post when I can.

CurlyTop,

I love it ... “let’s rock 2018”

My decluttering is not going well - I start on a box then get distracted by the contents, go off at a tangent & then add more to my “To Do” list SO my new plan for 2018 is

“START & FINISH ONE TASK AT A TIME”

However the baking is going well - January 2, 3, 4 & 6 plus today = 5 out of 7 days this week. My DH is appreciative but not his waistline - I have to persuade him that he doesn’t have to eat everything in one day after all I am storing everything correctly so it won’t disappear/go off!

Good luck to us all in whatever we have chosen to hope or plan for!

Mrs SD:)

wannalot · 7 January 2018 at 1:54PM

Hello,

I’ve been lurking on this thread, finding it really interesting. I hipe it’s ok for me to add my own plans, although I think I might be the first man to do so...

Anyway, in 2018:
1. I want to take better care of myself. I’ve only just realised the horrendous effect that 15 years combining full-time work with being a daily carer for my mother (who had diabetes, copd, arthritis and latterly dementia) has had on me physically. Mum passed on three years ago, but the bad coping strategies I used to cope all those years have not changed. I’m a fat, inactive sugar addict. I want that to change this year, so I’m going to try to cut out all added sugar (i.e. sugar from sources other than fruit) and I will try to walk every day, starting with a walk around the block and building up from there.

2. I want to save at least £5000 this year. This should be very possible for me, and would let me rebuild some savings after last years major financial commitment when I used my savings to buy my sibling’s shares of our family home (where I had lived with mum). On the one hand I am mortgage free, but on the other hand I now have less savings than I did 15 years ago! This is slightly worrying, since I am unattached and really only have myself to rely on.

3. To achieve my saving goal, I’m going to keep a spending diary, starting on payday this month, and I am going to try to keep an eye on spending of all kinds. To this end, I have already changed my energy and phone and broadband suppliers in the past month (which was unbelievably easy thanks to this site. It took me less than 30 minutes to change both) and should make savings of at least £550 per year. I also cancelled my National Lottery direct debit (£60 per month :eek: for four lines, two of which were mum’s).

4. I want to get back to using public transport more, instead of taking cabs. This will help me to get fitter (as I will need to walk more) and save a huge amount of cash!

5. I want to declutter at least 750 items this year. I’m a hoarder, but I hate the mess it makes! The house is still full of stuff which I have kept in memory of mum, but enough time has now passed that I feel I want to let some of it go. I’m going to start with mum’s clothing (good quality, smart stuff which someone should get use of). I’m going to take a few bags to a charity shop.

6. I’m going to take at least 2 holidays. These don’t have to cost a lot, but they should give me time to recharge my batteries.

7. I’m going to have at least one screen-free night per week, starting this week, and hopefully building up to a couple of screen-free nights per week. No TV won’t be too bad, but no ipad will be very difficult!

Anyway, sorry to be so long-winded, but it feels great to have typed all this out! I hope 2018, brings great progress for all of us!

LameWolf · 7 January 2018 at 2:29PM

Mrs_Salad_Dodger wrote: »

Stopped reading newspapers years ago & stopped watching the news on tv except for once in a blue moon. DH lets me know if anything important is happening in the world. I was getting depressed with the constant bad news. Where do “they” put the good news and all the “little kindnesses” that make life enjoyable. Oh, I know - on MSE OS Forums:):)

I'm glad I'm not the only one; Mr LW used to have a paper every day, but has cut back to just getting one on Saturdays since he retired, and I ask him to just give me the bare bones of what's happeing, I don't want to know all the gloom and despondency.

I've been umm-ing and ah-ing about posting on this thread....

However, I have kind of started as I mean to go on, by kicking the rather poor audiologist service into touch and finding a new service provider - new hearing aids have been ordered. I shall also be switching opticians, as will Mr LW.

I am going to CEASE doing things because someone who thinks they know what's good for me better than I do myself says I ought to. I am terrible for saying "ok anything for a quiet life" and just doing as I'm told. This includes eating when I'm not actually hungry just because Mr LW declares it to be lunchtime. That way I might just shift this extra 2 stone. Don't get me wrong, Mr LW can still eat if he wishes, and I'll happily prepare the food for him (though he usually does it himself) but I won't partake just because I feel I must.

The other major thing is to get bck to driving regularly. The "default setting" at the moment is for Mr LW to do all the driving; we were in a nasty accident in April 2015, when we were almost stationary in a queue of traffic, and someone came whizzing round the roundabout and rear-ended us at speed, writing off our car. As a consequence, to this day I shake just getting into a car, and have only driven a couple of times since.
Mr LW has some hospital tests this month, (three appointments), and the idea is that I will go along and bring the car back, then collect him afterwards, as the petrol used will be a lot cheaper than the eye-watering hospital parking charges - this will MAKE me drive at least three times. (We could park free with my Blue Badge, but then I'd have to hang around the hospital waiting for him, which is a waste of time).

Other than that - hopefully I shall continue to get Canine guests - I already have a few bookings, and I have a "meet'n'greet" visit to get to know some potential new guests - a couple of Cavapoos - on Saturday. These visits are the hardest part of the dog-sitting, as I have severe social phobia, and people scare me to death, but it has to be done.

suki1964 · 7 January 2018 at 2:35PM

Welcome Wannalot and Curlytop

Wannalot, that why I spill my guts out on threads like this. It's out there. I've told people what I hope to achieve and know I'll get the support I need to get to the end result. It's a sort of fail safe for me. I don't want to fail as I'd feel like I'm letting you all down iykwim

Anyway it might sound mad but it works for me

It's like one time I was really overweight. And I kept trying to do something about it and didn't because no one knew so I was only cheating myself. So I joined a slimming club and having to go in every week and be weighed really helped me. There was no one telling me off if I didn't lose, just new friends encouraging me to stick with it, offering advice on where I could possibly be going wrong and really cheering me on to get to goal , and maintain it, which I did for 12 years till I hit the bottle again

So that's another challenge for me for later in the year, shift the middle aged spread and beer belly. Well I'm hoping the beer belly will shrink of its own accord as there's no alcohol going in

. I am seriously a very light eater, a sandwich for lunch and then a small plate of dinner at around 7. I can honestly put hand on heart and say my " goodies " since Christmas Day have been 8 Ferraro, 2 after dinner mints, 2 mince pies, 1 slice of cake and half a pack of Lebruchen Hearts I've got 5 boxes of chocolates sat here unopened which I will rehome as I've still got shortbreads and crackers here from last Christmas lol

Anyways, I saw my friend last night who does the walking and swimming. I'll not go swimming as I'm not a good swimmer and she does length swimming, but we have talked about us going bike riding together in the evenings as soon as it gets lighter. It's already staying light till five so not too long to go. I can drive to her with the bike on the rack as she's near town and lit cycle paths

And I met her in the pub and I ordered coffee and never even felt like I wanted a drink

The decluttering of that corner starts Tuesday. I'm back to a 3 day week so I've no excuse not to plus Mr Suki is now thinking he's knocking the ceiling out to put a dormer in and once he thinks he will, means he will no doubt start in the next week or two , regardless of the weather lol

Hope everyone is still feeling positive and still moving forwards xx

Charis · 7 January 2018 at 4:15PM

silver-oldie wrote: »

I want to understand the techie world more. I struggle with it ALL.
Took me all afternoon to work out how to take the back off my new phone to put the battery in

I find that most times I can't even find the answer to problems in the maker's manual, or on their site, so now I always Google the problem, along with the make and model, and someone, somewhere has almost always come up with a solution. There are the most random things online, either in written form or on YouTube. I'm just careful about the websites, the most helpful are often run by user groups or are connected to the supplier, like Apple users' website.

Incidentally from the end of last year, most new phones are designed to prevent you taking the back off. If you have to use a pin to open a drawer to put your SIM and memory cards in, be careful.

Primrose · 7 January 2018 at 4:36PM

Coming to this thread a little late but planning to
*. Become a little more active and healthy (have bought Dr Rangan Chattergee’s The 4 Pillar Plan”. Details on Dr.chattegee.com. I am buying a wrist step counter to incentivise my daily paces taken. It will hopefully shame me into doing better.
*. Select and enjoy listening to a different CD every day from our large neglected collection. (I can alwaych notch up some paces or squats whilst listening!!)
*. Rundown freezers and storecupboards before restocking them and menu plan two weeks in advance
*. Only grow the veg in my plot which do well instead of trying the same old failures every year (my plot will just not produce decent cauliflowers or celeriac yet every year I waste time and space trying to grow them !)
*. Keep in better touch with some of my more distant friends.
*. And the annual one which regularly appears but which rarely gets completed: Declutter, declutter, declutter!:rotfl:

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New Year, New Plans and Hopes

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