April Favorites 2015!

Hello!

This year is flying over, I can't believe it's May already! I thought I would do a post detailing a few items that I have enjoyed using a lot this month, as I didn't start the blog that long ago I'm just going to do three items for this month, so here they are:

1 - Food Diary

I purchased this food diary from eBay, you can get food diary sheets from Slimming World for free but I am getting closer to my target and wanted to have them all in one place so I can look back on them. The main reason for this is once I'm at my target I can keep a record of the weeks that I've maintained my weight and what I did food and exercise wise that week. 

The diary I got is not an official one but it is laid out for people following SW, so it has space for your healthy extras, syns and free foods, as well as exercise and notes for the week; each week also features a menu planner and a weekly summary for the end of the week, which I love! In the front of the book there are pages for tracking your weight every week, body magic (exercise) awards, monthly measurements, before and after pictures and pages for your favorite recipes! I'm in love with it and have been filling it in religiously! This one will last a full year and I will definitely be purchasing one for next year!

2 - Sprinkle of Chatter

Sprinkle of Chatter is Louise Pentland's vlog channel and her secondary channel on YouTube, her primary channel is Sprinkle of Glitter which I also love, but lately I have found myself just watching my way through all of her old vlogs.

I find they're just easy to watch and it's been lovely watching her little girl going to Disney World and such as well as just seeing what Louise does day to day.

3 - Journal

I'd recently read "20 Things To Do When You're 30 That Will Make Life Better At 50" now I'm only 24 but after reading it I realised a lot of them were changed I was currently trying to make in my life anyway. One thing stuck out to me thought which was no. 18 Keep a Journal. It's something I've always wanted to do but I would normally start one and then only write in it once or twice and then just stop. When I was in TK Maxx at the weekend (haul post will follow soon!) for some home and wedding bits and I saw this lovely note book in amongst the book shelves.

After having a little look at the layout inside I decided it would be the perfect book to start my journal in. I've been doing well with it so far and it's nice to have a  private place to write your thoughts and just to vent when you feel like it!

Anyway that is my favorites for April! Thank you for reading and if you have any questions or comments then please leave them in the comment section below!

xXx

Lucky in Life?

A few months ago I had someone at work tell me how lucky I had been in life. She had been talking to me about the (what seemed like) mass of problems that she was going through and afterwards had asked about a few things in my life, such as my:

Weight-loss

Home

Fiancée

Wedding

Work

Life in general

I replied that they were all good, "You're so lucky, you have a perfect life" was her reply, I told her that no one was perfect and left it at that, but it's been repeatedly playing on my mind. I'm not saying I have a bad life, currently my life is very good, we all have ups and downs, good days and bad, but it felt like she seemed to think that everything had just been handed to me and that I'd never had to work at anything.

Me and my partner have been together for almost 9 years and have had some amazing times but also times when we felt overwhelmed and that we weren't going to last much longer. However we have worked at our relationship and have come out stronger for it. We have a wonderful house that we're hoping will last for most of our lives but in order to get this house we had to work hard and save for years just for the deposit.

My work is something I love but it's taken me a long time to get to the stage that I have and on the way I've had some jobs that I hated, one of which came close to driving me into depression. Even the amazing job that I not have has had it's bumps in the road, working 6 day weeks (which included 4 hours traveling a day) for a low wage, then having work to do at home on top of that, while hardly getting to see my partner, was extremely difficult and tiring but has all been worth it.

My weight is something I have a had years struggling with and I have let other people deter me instead of doing what was best for me. I'm finally in a place where I am making better, lifelong changes to my life for my health and I've never felt better!

The only thing I can say I was truly lucky to have in my life are the two amazing people that raised me to be the person I am today. I come from a very stable, loving and supportive home and couldn't imagine my life without my parents, they have done so much for me throughout my life and have always said that they don't care what I do in life, as long as I am happy, and that is what I am... Happy! 

Not lucky, just happy. 

If you can learn to be happy and appreciative with what you have in life then I believe you'll always feel lucky.

xXx

Slimming World

Hello!

So for my first proper post I thought I would talk about Slimming World, it's something that has been a big part of my life and so I thought I'd share my journey with you and let you know what it's all about, for anyone who's not quite sure. 

The first thing about it that I think is very important and that you should definitely know about SW is that it is not a diet, it is not some easy fix to lose weight quickly without effort. It is a lifestyle change that teaches you about the importance of balanced nutrition that helps you to lose weight and then maintain to your target weight. 

Now, weight is something I have struggled with for a long time, this isn't the first time that I have been a member of SW but I'm hoping it's the last.  The first time I joined I did very well, I got all the way to my club 10 award (which is losing 10% of your body weight) and then, for various reasons, I ended up putting it all back on. I then joined on and off for a few years but really my heart wasn't in it and I think I thought that if I joined I'd be motivated to follow it properly but, of course, that didn't happen. 

I'd been having some tests done on my liver and my doctor mentioned that it could be fatty liver disease, which shocked me and I made the decision then and there to go back to SW but this time I was determined not to let anything stop me. My health should be a priority and that was back in June 2014.

 Since then I have lost 2 stone and I'm feeling much better within myself and have even started being more active. I'm feeling more confident and have started wearing makeup and nicer clothes!

The plan itself is very easy to follow, I'm not going to go into loads of detail as I'm not a SW consultant and you can find a lot of the basic information (as well as some sample menu plans) on their website, so go and check that out if you want to see what it's all about! :)

Tomorrow (Wednesday) is my day for group, which I love, I thrive on the group support and don't think I'd be doing as well if I was doing it alone; my consultant is amazing and I don't know where I'd be without her! I am getting closer to my target weight and will update as I go. Let me know if you'd be interested in a post about some of the different meals and snacks I have, as that might be something to do in the future!

Thanks for reading!

xXx

A little bit about me and an introduction to this blog!

Hello all!

I'm Jess and welcome to my blog! I don't know if this will be of any interest to anyone but it's something I've always wanted to do and have decided yo just go for it! Writing is something that has always interested me but I've never been very good at it so I hope this isn't to bad!!! So I thought as an introduction I'd tell you a bit about myself (hopefully without too much rambling!) and just take it from there.

I am 24, work full-time with my father; me and my partner have been together for almost 9 years and recently (9 months ago) got engaged and so we're currently planning our wedding, so I will be posting updates on that. We moved into our first home almost 2 years ago, unfortunately there is still a lot to do in the house so I'll be posting about the house and garden.

I am also doing Slimming World and am getting close to my target so you can expect updates on that and soon will be going through all my clothes and replacing them with a new wardrobe (obviously a little bit at a time!) so there will be posts about clothes, make up, hauls etc. too.

I think that seems like enough for an introduction, thank you for reading and if you have any questions, leave them in the comments below!

xXx