Happy New Year! (Week 15)

Firstly I would like to wish you all a very Happy New Year! 

(Here's me with one of my lovely, glamorous Ding Dong besties on NYE)

 

Secondly I would like to announce something that nearly made me faint and shocked Mr O - before you ask, no! I am not pregnant! BUT somehow I managed to LOOSE 2lbs over Christmas. 

I really don't know how I managed it. I had the full on Christmas dinner & buffet tea on Christmas Day and then the same again on Boxing Day. But the worst part was the desserts - I even had several helpings of my mother in laws desserts which are amazing but FULL of naughty stuff. I didn't bother pointing Christmas and Boxing Day. But the worst is still to come.... On the Sunday we went out to celebrate my little sister's 18th birthday and where did we go?... For a curry. AND I had all the trimmings - rice and a naan! So when I stepped on the scales you can imagine why I nearly fainted! 

So my total loss on weight watchers is now 20lbs :) 

However, I found some paperwork from this time last year when I was a test patient at work and I weighed 15 stone. I can now proudly say that I weigh 13.2 stone. I am now 1lb off getting to my 10% goal, which is something that weightwatchers sets you. 

I have also set out myself some new goals which the first one is to loose 13lbs by the time of my sisters wedding - as you all know this was one of my main reasons to loose the weight. That works out as 1lb a week which is a nice, slow and healthy way to loose the fat! 

Now any of you who are following the 'Weight Watchers' lifestyle will know that they have started the new Simple Start approach which is exactly what it is. It is a way to slowly introduce people to a healthier and more filling way of eating and then to slowly introduce you to the pointing system. As I have already been doing Weight Watchers for the past 15 weeks I had decided not to start this as I know that the points system is already working and I already know a lot about it. 

I also took the Christmas break as a time of reflection of this past year for myself. My health still may not be good - I am still awaiting results from the hospital (they are in but have told me I can't have them yet until the Doctor has gone through them and decided on my care plan ANNNOOOYYYYING!!!) - but my weight loss has helped me focus on some positives..... Look at this for an example.... 

It also made me reflect on how important Mr O is to me. He has been my rock and shoulder to cry on this last year. He's been the person to cheer me up when I've not been well or had a really rubbish day. Plus his cuddles aren't too bad either!

So as many people decide on New Years resolutions, I've not decided to make any this year but to just keep going as I am as I feel that the way I live at the moment 'ain't too bad! 

One of my lovely Christmas pressies this year was a blender. So on Monday I decided to completely gut the kitchen, pulling everything out, checking best before dates and cleaning everything. This is also because Mr O got a Nespresso machine for Christmas. Then, on NYD I made and enjoyed my first smoothie......

I made it up of a kiwi, a banana, a handful of frozen mango and a swish of water (all 0pp on weight watchers)...

I then enjoyed it with a 2 slices of weight watchers toast and a tea spoon of nutella. Which resulted in a yummy 3pp breakfast. 

Have any of you made any New Years resolutions? Or have you received any useful everyday gifts?....

Happy New Year and here's to a fabulous 2014 :)

Love, Mrs O x

Week 14 - Sparkle! It's Christmas!

So week 14 is here!!! This was originally my 'D-Day' where I set myself to loose 1 stone by Christmas (1lbs a week).....

This last week I haven't exactly kept on track so I've gained 1lb. But in total I have lost 18lbs :)

Weight watchers had set a 'challenge' ? to their followers to 'Get set to Sparkle' which, at this time of year I can't say no to a bit of sparkle and glitter - OK, maybe all year round I can't say no to it!

 

So within these last 14 weeks I have lost a total of 18lbs :)

 

This is just the start to my weight loss - This Christmas was my starting goal - now for 2013 to keep loosing it with my Sister's wedding as my next mini goal! (Remember THIS post?!)

 

So my next aim is to stay the same over these next few days of festive joy and then from 1st January I want to loose 13lbs before my sister's wedding - 1lb a week - a healthy way to do it!

 

But for now, on Christmas Day.....

 

I just wanted to write a 'post' Christmas card to you all and show you some of my highlights in the lead up to this lovely time of celebrating the birth of Jesus.

 

 Singing at The Salvation Army's Carol Concert at The Royal Albert Hall

 

 

(sound check part.... Singing and sitting next to my lovely new 2013-gained friend!)

 

 

Receiving lovely Christmas cards...

 

 

Pug (our guard dog door stop) gained a new friend...

 

 

Putting out my lovely Argentinian Nativity Set

 

 

Opening and lighting this beauty of an advent calendar (PS Yankee Candle please do this again!)

 

 

Oh, and putting up and filling up Mr O's Advent calendar too!

 

Buying, getting it home and putting up the Christmas Tree...

 

Making Christmas Decorations, cards and pressies (the rest of these obviously can't be shown!)....

 

 

 

Putting out old handmade deorations made by Mr O himself when you could actually read his writing!

 

 

 

 

Lovely Christmas days out and doing things like meeting Father Christmas (Read more HERE about these days out)

 

 

And Finally... sparkling at my work's Christmas Do...

 

 

 

May your Christmas be filled with love, peace and Joy.

With Love and Festive joy to you all....

Mrs O xxx

... Back to the old ...

I wrote this last week and forgot to post it! So here it is.....

As I said in my last post I feel that all I write about at the moment is my weight! So I am currently sitting down with my old 'Mrs O' hat on....

This last week I have had a lovely fun-packed week being spent with friends and family.

As you will already know, Mr O & I hosted a lovely fun Christmas-themed party for a bunch of friends. We had so many laughs about lots of different things. One thing I love about these friends are that they have all come into my friendship circle thanks to Mrs O. Don't you love that about relationships? You get to meet and build friendships with others you thought you never would have...

Unfortunately I didn't manage to take any photos of the night - maybe I was just enjoying it all too much?! However, in the run up to the party, Mr O and I (yes, that's right, Mr O too!!) got creative. Not only did we make the invitations ourselves, but we also made crackers. gingerbread men and decorated them as a party bag-esk item and ice cream (ok, the latter too I did but Mr O cooked everything from scratch)

Monday night then found me travelling around the M25 back to my home shire to see my family. Mum and Dad had to go out carolling so my youngest sister and I went round and visited my Nana. We always have lots of giggles with my Nana. She's a lady who says she's 58 as she says that her and her friends switch the numbers around when they get past a certain age. She comes out with the most hilarious stories and comments. Lil Sis and I just wanted to film the whole thing as it would be funny for all to see. We even played a little prank on her too - which she loved!

Mr O and I decided to take Wednesday off work. Originally it was planned to take it off so we could go Christmas shopping, but we luckily have already sorted or bought all the presents this year. Our halos are shining! So instead we decided to spend the day up in London. But in our true fashion, we slept in until 10am! So we decided to have a lazy-ish start and to have a lovely cooked breakfast and then head out and up to London.

Here is my OOTD for Wednesday:

First stop was to Borough Market. Last minute we decided to call my Dad and see if he wanted to meet up with us for a coffee - he works round the corner from there - so we did. We had a lovely look around, didn't spend too much money, but spent most of the time looking at the amazing displays of food and being amazed at how cheap the food actually was! Just look at some of the displays...

 

 

Just so you know, we didn't buy much, in fact I think all we bought were coffees and a punnet of grapes.

We then headed off on a walk heading towards the South Bank. We stopped on the way for a lovely meal at Pizza Express - check out the massive salad I had and the amazing view!

 
So to work off the lovely big meal we decided to continue our walk over the Millennium bridge and over to St Pauls. ~ For any of you who don't know London this is the famous bridge that sways. ~
Of course we had to stop for a selfie but I also managed to capture this amazing picture. I felt like singing 'Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner'!!

 

We then hopped back on the underground and went for a walk through Regents Street, Carnaby Street and then along Oxford Street.

We did the 'Christmas thing' of going into Selfridges, trying out different things and bumping into this famous old man...

Oh and I found my new dolls house... hahaha

We then headed onto M&S to find a jacket for me as Mr O is still on a hunt for a Christmas pressie for me! I then randomly spotted this amazing jacket :

I know, I know, it does look a little tight but it is my 'new size' and this would be a spring jacket and so hopefully by then it will fit perfectly!

We got a random phone call from one of my besties - Mr Ding Dong himself - so we decided to take a hop skip and a jump onto a bus and went to Winter Wonderland. And my word did it make me feel like I was a big kid again. We went on rides, had hot chocolates and mince pies in the VIP suite, froze our bottoms off in the Magical Ice Kingdom and got completely lost in the mirror maze. Not laughed like that in a long time!! Here are some of the pictures....

 

 

And to end the week off I tried out some new recipes - Weight watchers Chicken and Broccoli Bake with a crusty cheese topping and I also made up a new recipe of fake peanut butter ice cream ... I will post about the ice cream once I have tried and perfected it.

         

 

So tonight I plan on doing some more Christmas present crafts - which will all be revealed in the new year! A night by the sewing machine.....

Hope you've all had a lovely week.

Love, Mrs O x