Would you be proud of me?

Dear Dad,

It's been 25 years today since I last saw you, I often wonder if you'd be proud of me, the life I've lived and the choices I've made along the way. I know there are times you would have shook your head and wondered what had gotten into me and times when you'd have just been there when I needed you, at least, I hope so. And so today is my day to think of you and to remember you, I still do you know. I may have only been 12 when we lost you but I have some good memories to keep.

Remember the french cricket games you used to organise for all us kids? the picnics that we'd go on most weekends through the summer? The best memory I have from them was the day when George chased that squirrel round and round the tree because every time he went one way, so did that squirrel, I don't think he ever did see it did he? I wonder sometimes if he thought we were making it up!lol

I wonder what you'd make of the technology today, you always did love the new gadgets and things coming out didn't you, in those days it was Vic20's and VCR's, I wonder how you'd react to 3D TV and all the consoles that we have, actually, I guess I know, you'd be like me and want them all to play with and wonder how they work, you're where I got my gadget love from and Dave shares that love with me.

I know you'd like Dave had you met him, just as I know you would have hated all the other choices I've made in my private life and you would have been right about them all but hopefully this time you'd see I have a very good man, one who loves and protects me just as I love and encourage him.

I'm happy now Dad, I can still feel sad that you're not here with us anymore but life's been good to me the last few years and I'm settled with a great man, some good friends and a bright future to work towards. I really do hope that wherever you are, you're proud of the woman I've become and am still becoming.

I Love you Dad xxxx

YAY - I'm Back

After a lot of faffing about this week I found out that something had gone wrong with blogger and I haven't been able to get in here and share all my news ...... and now I'll have to have a think and try to remember what it all was!

I know one thing was I've passed the 30lb level on my weight loss which is good and also we were on TV ...... well, we know we were but it's doubtful that anyone else would have known it was us

See what I mean!lol But we did have a good time and I came home with a cuddly red Welsh dragon which is very cute and I got Michael Vaughan to sign my program when we saw him walking around in the dry bit. The last memento of the day started to show itself in both of us last night, all the rain and wind has given us both nice colds so there goes all our plans for this weekend as we don't want to share this particular reminder! 

Books Books Books Books! :-D

Time for another diet update, I've just passed the 2 stone weight loss mark, I'm so impressed with Slimfast right now. I know I'm losing it very slowly (average 1 lb a week) but that's the right way to do it and I'm seeing vast improvements in my fitness and flexibility which will help me to exercise more and keep it off and get rid of more as time goes on.

I have an agreement with Dave that for each stone I lose I can order some more books from Amazon and this time I added to it with a voucher I won and ordered 6 that I've been wanting a while, just checking with them and the books are in Bristol right now, hopefully I'll get them tomorrow

    

I was going to write a review this week but I find it really hard to write a review on a product I really didn't like, especially when I know others do like them, it makes me think there is something wrong with my taste buds!lol All I will say is that I'm sticking to my slimfast, it's working and doesn't taste like unflavoured sawdust like a certain other companies diet bars do.....

  

It's been a while!

I know I meant to keep this going but things like holidays got in the way but hopefully now things will start getting back to normal again for us and I can get back to writing this more often. I still need to sort out the spare room properly but I'll get there with that, it's been on hold the last month as well but at least I have the shelves sorted out now to put the boxes on once they're filled!

As for my diet, well, there have been some ups and downs over the last month or so, I've lost a total of 25.4lbs since the 10th of January, which although isn't amazing I'm really pleased with it and am determined to keep going with it and reach my target, yes I've finally set myself one!lol I haven't set a weight I want to get to, I just want to be able to buy clothes in a normal shop again, I think that's totally achievable as well by next summer :-) And those fried breakfasts while we were in Sheffield were totally worth every mouthful ;-D

And so onto whats happening now, well, I've been back on the slimfast for over a week, my weights nearly back to the lowest it's been this year (0.2lb to go so fingers crossed for tomorrow or Friday!lol) but that is all going to change for 2 weeks. I've been asked to change what I eat as part of a study for 2 weeks and after looking into it I decided to accept the challenge and applied, I just heard back that I've been accepted and the items I need will arrive tomorrow! I'll let you know how it goes but wont be able to say what I'm doing sadly but hopefully it'll all help out anyway :-)

My journey into comping!

I’m trying to win an iPad 2 in the iSave, iWrite, iPad competition from PlayPennies.com!

Five or six years ago I became aware that some companies online gave out freebies, mostly small samples of their product for us to try before we buy. I joined a website that used to collate all the freebies and had a lot of fun there, made some friends and received quite a few things through the post. After a while there one of the friends I'd made told me about sites that list online competitions and I was curious, I'd been doing the weekly magazines for years and only ever won a set of make up brushes from Take A Break many many years ago! So off I trotted to the Competitions Time forum on MoneySavingExpert.com, to say I was shocked and totally overwhelmed would be an understatement! There were so many companies offering prizes ranging from stationery and promotional materials to houses, cars and even a boat!

So I had a look around and read some of the posts and started entering a few each day, a couple of weeks later I found an email from one of the magazine's online websites saying I'd won a prize from them (a pet poets calendar and book) I was amazed at how easy it was and started to enter a few more. Before long I was spending hours and hours online each day entering competitions but the wins kept coming, sometimes I'd have an email or telephone call telling me I'd won something but other times things would just appear in the post. It felt like Christmas most days when the postman delivered and I found myself getting more and more hooked as the more hours I put in the more things I won.

 At first I won things for us, then I started winning the Christmas and Birthday gifts for our family and friends, they knew how we'd got the gifts and seemed to be happy with them as everyone was getting much better gifts than we could have afforded to get them by buying them. This year has been more difficult so far though, a lot of people have started comping recently, some see it as a quick and easy way to make money when they see people winning lots of things and if you're lucky it can be but it can also be a lot of hard work, the trick to it is to not mind, to hope you will win something but to not rely on it and to make friends within whichever community you are a member of, seeing a friend win something when you have had a dry spell really does help keep you going and hoping for the comping fairy to smile down on you again.

I view my wins as all bonuses, lovely little surprises that turn up every so often and you can see how my winning has been going on my Kims Wins blog if you're curious. I've also just recently helped my Fiance's Sister's fundraising efforts by donating some of the things I'd won to top up her sponsorship when she ran the London Marathon and if you would like to sponsor her she's also doing both the Great North Run and Great South Run later this year for the Guide Dogs her sponsorship page is here.

So after hearing all that you probably want to know how come this is money saving, right? Well, in the past 3 years I haven't had to buy any toiletries as I've won loads, far too many for one woman, but they make great gifts don't they ;-) I've won things that we would have purchased anyway (a TV, Wii & Sainsbury's Vouchers) And I have a mountain of laundry detergent which I'm working through still not to mention all the cereal and just don't get me started on iPods, I think everyone we know has one of them now!lol I even won the Slimfast that I've been using to help me lose weight! So if you have a few spare moments I'd say try out a few, the only competition you really cant win is the one you don't enter ;-)