Monday, 21 March 2011

The Sainsbury's "Five Family Meals for £20" Plan - Day One

My husband and I decided to try Sainsbury's (relatively) new collaboration with Jamie Oliver, the "Five Family Meals for £20" plan this week, as we've been finding ourselves going to the supermarket for tea every evening rather than planning in advance. Obviously, there are only two of us, so the plan will leave us with leftovers each day - we are going to either eat these for lunch or freeze them, both options will end up saving us money in the long run.

We went to shopping on Sunday morning armed with our list of ingredients (printed from the website), which we were told would cost us £19.97. It actually ended up costing us slightly less as some of the items were on offer. I was a bit worried that some of the items might not be available, but we had no problem getting any of the things on the list. The plan assumes that you have basic stock cupboard ingredients of things ilke stock cubes, garlic and olive oil, so if you didn't and had to buy them, the weekly cost would obviously be slightly higher than £20.

We started with week four, and day one's recipe was "creamy sausage & lemon pasta", which took about 25 minutes to cook and very little time to prepare. It was extremely easy to make, and very tasty. The only thing I would say though is that the recipe called for 350g of pasta for four people. 350g! That's almost 90g per person! I usually eat about 50g, so ended up leaving quite a lot on my plate. I think next time, we'll use less pasta and slightly less lemon juice as the lemony taste was ever so slightly overpowering.

 
 Overall score out of 10: 7.

Saturday, 19 March 2011

Recent eBay purchases...






From top to bottom: Topshop t-shirt (£4.96), Tatty Devine necklace (£14.99), Topshop dress (£5.50), Assorted rings (£2.20), Primark dress (£1.99).

All bought in the last three weeks. Bargains! The Tatty Devine necklace cost more than I'd usually spend on eBay, but I've wanted it for so long so I snapped it up at its "Buy It Now" price of £14.99 as soon as I saw it. It retailed at around £40 years ago, so I thought £14.99 was a really good price.

All pictures were taken from the eBay auctions.

Monday, 14 March 2011

Getting fit: Couch to 5K.

So. I've been meaning to do a "couch to 5km" plan since January 1st, but have only just got round to starting. I would say that life got in the way, but really it was laziness and nothing else. But, on Saturday afternoon I took the plunge and downloaded an iPhone app from here. I added a selection of "motivational music*" from my iTunes, put on my running gear and headed out. I really enjoyed it, and so did the drivers of Worcester if my "beeped horn count" is anything to go by (four, if you're interested). I did the second workout on Sunday (two beeps), and the third one today (three beeps). That's right, three days in a row. It's almost a trend...

The plan is designed to last nine weeks, with three workouts per week. Week one workouts last just over half an hour and are made up of a five minute brisk walk for a warm up, a walking/running interval section (60 seconds running, 90 seconds walking) for 21 minutes, and a five minute cool down walk. Each week, the amount of time you spend running increases and the amount of time you spend walking decreases. At the end of the plan, you should be able to run for 30 minutes, which should equate to 5km. I plan to try and squeeze four workouts in each week, which will mean I complete the plan in about six weeks. I'll do the week two, day one workout on Thursday this week I think. Parents' Evening tomorrow and Wednesday, so I'll want to veg out when I get home...

Here are my stats:

Saturday: Covered 3.86km in 31 minutes at a pace of 10:53/mile for the running section and 13:54/mile overall.
Sunday: Covered 4.02km in 31 minutes at a pace of 10:23/mile for the running section and 13:00/mile overall.
Monday: Covered 4.02km in 31 minutes at a pace of 10:30/mile for the running section and 12:57/mile overall.

Not bad. Wonder how long I can keep it up for? I think I'll blog about it once a week to keep a record. The fab thing about the app (which costs 59p) is that it tracks and keeps a record of progress so I'll (hopefully) be able to see an improvement over the course of the next few weeks, as well as feeling an improvement when out on the road. The sad mathematician in me likes the little graph you get too...

Has anyone else tried one of these plans before? How did you get on? Did you keep running afterwards?




* A fantabulous mix including System of a Down, Muse, Girls Aloud, Glee, PJ & Duncan, ELO, Pixies, Backstreet Boys, Chemical Brothers, The Strokes and MANY MORE amazing tunes. AMAZING.

Sunday, 6 March 2011

Outfit post...

We went out last night and this is what I wore...

Please excuse the hideous photos - I am terrible at having my photos taken! I never know whether to smile or not, so always end up with some weird half-serious, half-gormless look on my face.

Anyway, outfit details are as follows:
Floral jersey dress: Topshop
Brown leather belt with heart detail: Topshop
Grey jersey cardigan: Topshop, via eBay
Forest green tights: M&S
Long black ribbed socks: New Look
Taupe wedges: Office (a sale bargain!)
Vampire teeth and blood necklace: H&M

We had a really good night, although I spent much of it worrying that my skirt was too short!

Thursday, 24 February 2011

New hair!

From this:

To this:

I love it! I feel so much more "me" with shorter hair. I have been going on and on about getting my hair cut into a bob for over a year now, and I am so pleased I finally took the plunge. The ends were so tatty and disgusting that I needed at least six inches chopped off anyway, and I tended to wear it up so long hair was wasted on me!

Please excuse horrible "after" picture - my laptop webcam is terrible at taking photos in anything other than natural light!

I went to the charity shop and I bought...








The floral set includes six cups, six saucers and six side plates (which I like to call "cake plates") and was an unbelievable £2.25, whilst the Professor Umbridge-style cat cup and saucer set was £1.25. I saw them up in a branch of Acorns in Pershore this morning and just couldn't resist! My ultimate goal in life is to have a massive dresser/cupboard full of mismatched vintage cups and saucers, so this haul definitely helps...

Photos taken with our new camera - you can see that I need a lot of practise!

Tuesday, 22 February 2011

NOTD: Models Own Juicy Jules


 
 
Three coats, plus Seche Vite. Doesn't photograph at all well with my husband's phone camera! It's lovely in real life and applied beautifully, but I think it would really pop over a dark navy blue or black shade. Will try this in the next couple of days, I think.

New toy - Nikon D5000 DSLR camera

Bought a new camera on Saturday - expect many posts filled with bad pictures as I try to get to grips with it! It's the Nikon D5000, and it came with two lenses.
Picture taken from Amazon, but I actually bought it from Jessops. I say I, it was a joint purchase with my husband and we are planning on using it on our (delayed) honeymoon in the summer.

Yet another Topshop wishlist...




Sunday, 6 February 2011

I went to the shops and I bought...





Didn't get the zebra blouse as it was too short for me :( I know it's a cropped style, but it just looked incredibly unflattering on. I was very disappointed as the print is beautiful, until I found the bird print blouse in New Look, which is GORGEOUS in real life. Mine actually has more birds on it, but I couldn't find an exact picture online. The ring and leggings are from Topshop, the telephone necklace is from Accessorize, the pussy bow blouse is from New Look and the Neutrogena Visibly Clear Pink Grapefruit Daily Scrub (wow, that's a mouthful) is from Boots. I tried a sample of the scrub last year and liked it, but only just got round to buying it!

Wednesday, 2 February 2011

On Saturday I am going to buy...

It's H! by Henry Holland for Debenhams, and is £25.

I just LOVE it! The Peter Pan collar, the waist tie, the perfect shade of yellow, the ZEBRAS!
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