The Night before Christmas by Scarlett Bailey

I received a copy of this book after applying for one from the Ebury Women's Fiction Facebook page last month and very happily I was one of the lucky few to receive a copy.

All Lydia's ever wanted is a perfect Christmas...

So when her oldest friends invite her to spend the holidays with them, it seems like a dream come true. She's been promised log fires, roasted chestnuts, her own weight in mince pies - all in a setting that looks like something out of a Christmas card.

But her winter wonderland is ruined when she finds herself snowed in with her current boyfriend, her old flame and a hunky stranger. Well, three (wise) men is traditional at this time of year...

Christmas is just about my favourite time of year and so when I saw this book and read the synopsis I just had to get a copy and read it. It has all the elements that you'd expect from a Christmas story, lots of family troubles, arguments and the odd stolen kiss. Alongside the main story there are some nods made to the more traditional Christmas stories, there's the boyfriends (past, present and possibly future too) there's the heavily pregnant woman due to give birth and the modern favourite of being snowed in at a remote location.

The description of the setting is wonderful, a remote house outside a village in the Lake District with a colourful history all of it's own! But, what made this book such a page turner for me was that all the characters are so well written, you get to feel as if you know them and can sympathise with them and what they are all going through. You want to keep reading just to make sure that everything turns out OK and that our Heroine gets together with the right man in the end and that all is well with all of her friends and their relationships too.


It all works together to make for a great read and I really do recommend this for anyone especially with Christmas fast approaching us now, it's a great Feel Good tale

Another week closer to Christmas :-D

And it's another 2lbs lost on the diet

Something I noticed over the weekend is how I see myself, I still struggle to see the weight I've lost even though I know I've lost a lot (jeans that I couldn't get on at Christmas are now too big for me) but I've figured out why, or at least I think I have. Because I'm mostly still wearing the same clothes, they're quite baggy on me now and I see the outline of me where the clothes hang which is making me look quite a bit bigger than I am. Luckily I have a good stock of clothes that I've kept from when I was gaining the weight to use as I slim down but right now the next size down (which is quite a few sizes down from my biggest) are still a bit tight. So I'm stuck, do I wear uncomfortable clothes slightly too small  which make me look fatter than I am or do I wear baggy clothes which hang loosely and make me look bigger than I am .... it's a tough choice but hopefully I wont be stuck in this area for much longer. With the way the weights coming off and my shape's changing I cant see it being much longer till the smaller clothes all fit me comfortably and I will be happy again ...... for a while at least

 

Diet!

Like most of you I'm on a diet now, I started in the second week of January as I wanted to make sure as many temptations (Christmas snacks) were out of the way as possible when I began.
I decided to try the Slimfast system again, I'd done it many years ago and had had a little success with it and I am again so far and I'm really pleased, clothes are starting to fit better and I've hauled out the next size down from the airing cupboard as an incentive to get into them quicker.

So far, I've been on slimfast 4 weeks and have lost a total of 10lbs but I know I have many more left to go but as an added incentive, here's my before picture, this was actually taken on a very enjoyable evening last month when I finally got to meet up with some friends I'd met through MSE and Twitter

Yep, that's me in the red on the left, hopefully not for much longer though :-D