Thursday, January 29, 2015

+ 365 Days 25, 26, 27, 28 & 29

I haven't been online really for last 3/4 days as the little head cold I have had turned into full blown flu - still not 100% better but well enough to sit up and type so thought I had better get my butt in gear and add in the updates:

Day 25 - Sunday

Felt crappy all day but went out and took the dog for a walk - highly amusing how a white and tan dog became a brown and brown dog - he loved every minute of his walk over the fields despite the freezing cold and the rain :) He even behaved himself in the car after sitting on his allotted spot on the towel and having a quick bath when we got home too :) Happiness is a mud covered dog walk :D


Demon Doggy





Day 26 - Monday

Lost my voice today - you ever seen that episode of Friends where Pheobe gets a cold and gets that really husky voice? that was me. I really didnt want to be in work as I felt so poorly and couldn't concentrate on anything so was really happy that my kind supervisor said I could go home at 1pm which I did (and then spent rest of the day in bed). Having a nice supervisor in work can make all the difference when your feeling bad


Day 27 - Tuesday

Full blown flu symptoms today so stayed home from work - ear ache, head ache, sore throat, cough, temp, fever, aching all over and producer of bucketfuls of snot. Today I felt a new appreciation for my hot water bottle. I spent the day cwtched in bed cuddling a reindeer covered hot water bottle with occasional trips to the kitchen to get more squash to drink, paracetemol and to clear away the piles of used tissues. Thank you whoever invented the hot water bottle!

Day 28 - Wednesday

Felt rough as anything today and stayed home from work but was able to get myself out of bed and into the shower which I needed as I stank like a hobo and my clothes were literally sticking to me where I had sweated (you getting a nice mental picture here? I could add in about the sneezing fit at 4am where I didnt get to the tissues in time but I dont think thats necessary :P ) I dont think I have ever realised before how much I love the shower. I had to put the heating on for about 30 mins before hand as there was no way I was stripping down and getting under running water in a freezing room. It's mad to think that we only got central heating about 10 years ago - before then it wasn't uncommon to find ice on the inside of our windows! I am happy we are able to heat our small flat really well, that as we are the upstairs flat in a masionette we also benefit from our downstairs neighbours heating too as heat rises.

Day 29 - Thursday

Still feeling lousy and again not in work, I am starting to worry as I have lots of work that needs to be completed by the end of next week and by being sick all this week I am now seriously behind it all - just thinking about work makes the drummer in my head bang harder and louder :( but there isn't anything I can do about it. I am not fit to be in work, certainly not fit to be in work in a hospital and I am not safe to drive like this either so I just have to suck it up and when I get a reprimand just take it on the chin. I work hard and do my best but if I am sick I can't help that.

Today's positives are the council have come out to examine the property because we have had mildew and mould around the windows which I hate mould freaks me out - they have arranged to come back out and paint all the windows with anti-mould stuff in a couple of weeks. Yay no mould. I know it has its place I mean that's where penicillin come's from but yeah its gross

Reading back these dont make a whole lot of sense LOL trying to write with a fever does that I guess.

Also my kitties have spent all their time since I have been unwell cwtched with me - cant move without at least 1 kitty coming and sitting next to me :) love these cats

Lady found the hot water bottle
Lady and Leo snuggled with me

Morticia sat next to me

Leo and Lady having a wash after guard duty

Dena cwtching with me on the chair

Sunday, January 25, 2015

+ 365 Day 24

Saturday :) Simple Things

Saturday means fresh bedding :) There is something really nice about having fresh bedding. It makes me happy.

That's it for today as I am sick boo got a sore throat, headache, cough and temp so have done nothing except change the bedding shower and sleep

Saturday, January 24, 2015

An update on our ProPlan Trial

So it's now been a week since we started the trial of ProPlan Delicate cat food with Lady.

This what we think so far:

Wet Food:

Ease of opening packaging - I am sure I am not the only one who has had kitty gravy/jelly/juice from the food squirt over them when opening up the pouches its gross. These pouches are easy to open and so far no squirting incidents!

Getting the food out of the pouch - this is surprisingly difficult the food sticks like glue to the inside of the packet and you cant just pour it out - you have to get a spoon and scrape it out - no idea how they could resolve this maybe an easy slide coating on the inside?

Look and smell - the food looks really appetising and smells okay too - no long lasting odours

Tastiness -  I haven't personally tried it but Lady seem's to like it well enough. The first 1-3 days she wolfed it down last 4 days or so she hasn't been as keen. I think she might be getting a bit bored of only having one flavour to eat every day. I think if they could do 2 or more different flavours it would be better as you could mix it up each day.

Dry Food:

Easy open and seal packaging is a fab idea keeps the food nice and fresh and stops the kitties from eating it all - unfortunately my other cats decided to chew a hole in the bag which they managed with relative ease so its now in a carrier bag in a box in a cupboard!!

Look and smell - it looks pretty boring uniform size and shape and colour to the biscuits. It doesn't really have a strong smell at all so can leave the biscuits out in the bowl all day without it smelling out the room.

Tastiness - Lady munches her way happily through the biscuits and has done since day one - some days she seems to prefer the biscuits to the meat as she will fill up on biscuits and just have a few bites of the wet food. My other cats are obsessed with the biscuits to the point (see above) that I have to lock them away. They act like it's some kind of huge treat and keep stealing a few biscuits when my back is turned!

Results: We are impressed with the food so far - it seems to be doing the job Lady has a sensitive stomach and no wind or diarrhea since eating it. Lady is a pretty active little cat and runs around like a loon so she's obviously getting her nutritional needs met by this food too. Her coat is very shiny and glossy and she seems quite happy in herself. She prefers the dry food over the wet - mainly I suspect because the wet is all one flavour which she is finding boring now.

We have around another 2 weeks of the trial to go and will update again in a week or so :)


Friday, January 23, 2015

+ 365 Day 23

Today I have been off work - due to an accumulation of annual leave up until the end of February I have every Friday off and it is pretty amazing - I'm not sure how I am going to cope with having to work full time again come March!

Part of having Friday's off is to help me relax more - I don't sleep much a good night is 5 hours sleep a bad night is 2 days without sleep or only an hour. This means with work and stuff by the end of the week I am exhausted and I make silly mistakes like putting the wrong time and dates on peoples letters which isn't so good.

Anyways today I had to take my cat to the vet - Leo suffers with conjunctivitis and the other day when I saw his eye I knew he had it again and needed the vets for drops as we are out of them. Unfortunately I couldn't take him yesterday as I had a dr's appointment so I had to wait until today.

We saw the vet who saw us before and she asked me how his diet was going as he's a pretty large cat - I was like yeah pretty good he's on low fat biscuits and he only gets 1/2 a pouch of food in the morning and night. So she weighed him and he's put on 1 kg *awkward*

We got the drops and as a treat I bought him some chicken nuggets from macdonalds and Jac the dog who was also with me had a plain cheese burger and I had a festive pie - so much for the diet!

So today I am happy that my lovely kitty cat is going to be okay - that I am fortunate enough to be able to cover the cost of his vet bills and to live in a place where looking after your pet is possible.

Here's some pictures of my poorly kitty taken today:




+365 Day 22

Today's positive is a little personal and I wasn't sure if I was going to post it or go with something else instead.

Anyways at the age of 33 I recently discovered a lump in my boob. Being a chunky monkey I figured it was a fatty lump and for the last 5 weeks or so have been gingerly checking myself everyday to see if its a. gone b. gone smaller, c got bigger. The answer has been none of the above. It's remained the same grape sized lump it has been since I first discovered it.

I figured it was time to go see the GP just in case.

Now believe it or not despite having the same figure as a neanderthal goddess I have no problem with whipping everything off at the Dr's - having been diagnosed with poly-cystic ovaries at 16 & being on a 6 monthly recall for smears means that they have seen plenty of my bits which I dont usually display in public so having a Dr look at and play with my boob wasn't something that bothered me - I was just grateful that her hands were warm.

Turns out she agrees with me that its highly unlikely to be nothing sinister and is probably just a bit of damage from a huge bruise I had there. I'm to keep an eye on it and if it gets bigger or stays the same go back in 4 weeks and if it gets smaller or disappears to forget about it.

So the positive for today is being confident enough in myself to go get something like this checked out. So many women are embarrassed or afraid to go see the Dr when something doesn't feel right - I have a good friend who has one boob significantly smaller than the other (we are talking D cup and B cup) who ended up hospitalised with pneumonia because she wouldn't go to the Dr's with her severe cough because she didn't want them to go anywhere near her chest - madness

I'll leave you with this pic - it's not my pic I copied it from google but it's something every woman should know :)

Thursday, January 22, 2015

+ 365 Day 21

Today's positive is really easy PAYDAY PAYDAY PAYDAY and being a lowly NHS worker in Wales I got a one off bonus of £187 woohoo sadly after the taxman, pensions, student loan etc took their cut it actually works out at around £110 more but hey that's still pretty awesome to get in January when your still recovering from Christmas.

Speaking of Christmas here's a photo of Mister Leopard Belly aka Leo aka Big Daddy in his rather fabulous Christmas hat and bow tie - he drinks his milk shaken not stirred


+365 Day 19 & 20

Day 19 - Monday

Today's positive is I managed to get on twitter and semi-understand it. As I am comping quite a lot I thought I should make a twitter account so I could enter the comps on there too but I kept putting it off and putting it off as I really didn't understand how the darn thing works but I am doing okay and already have loads of followers. I have even worked out how to tweet, message people and tag people in tweets - GO ME! Now I just need to work out how to do the comps on there and start winning hehe

Day 20 - Tuesday

Today I am happy because I weighed myself and I have lost in 2 weeks like 1.8kgs - I am the sort of person who gets disheartened and gives up quite quickly but knowing I have lost the weight is making me really happy - now just another 20 or so kgs to go and I will be nearly at my 'ideal' weight.

I worked out that 1.8 I lost equates to the amount I put on over Christmas so it might slow down but I know it's achievable :D


Sunday, January 18, 2015

+ 365 day 18

A short one today because well I did pretty much nothing all day - took a few photos and loaded some items onto ebay and to freecycle and put some stuff in the attic and thats it.

Sometimes a lazy do nothing day is the best kind of Sunday :)

Today's positive is lazy sundays, comfy pjs and chill out time *yawn*

Saturday, January 17, 2015

+365 Day 17

Today I made curtains :) well that's not 100% true - today I altered curtains I got off freecycle about 4 months ago for the kitchen - they were too wide and too long so needed to be cut to size and hemmed and whatever the technical term is for doing the side of them too. I'm pretty darn impressed with myself because they are actually the same length and almost the same width - the one is about 1cm wider than the other.

This may not seem like a big deal but I give you exhibit A B & C - my current curtains.
Exhibit A
Exhibit B
Exhibit C



You will notice the uneven / wonky lengths and widths - I did that - oops and I was really proud of them too but they are definitely looking pretty shabby now!

The new ones are a VAST improvement but they wont be going up until they have been washed (the cats slept on them whilst I was waiting to alter them and they are now decorated in a multitude of fur)

I also managed to work out how to load the bobbin with red thread to do them - I'm not sure if that's what it's called actually but it involved transferring the cotton from the reel onto the bobbin that fits in the bottom of the sewing machine so that all the stitches were the same colour.

So today's positive is achievement - or in my case setting myself realistic goals. Once I have washed and put the new curtains up I will try to remember to take a photo of my amazing achievement :D

Oh and I also managed to change the bobbin and reel on the sewing machine back over to white so I can continue with the kitty project I am working on which is going pretty slowly eep.

And one final positive - Lady's trial of the food is going really well and it's for delicate tummies and so far so good no nasty wind (thank god as she sleeps on my pillow!) or stinky litter trays yay

I'm going to finish today with another picture of one of my lovely Lady - this time with Mister Leopard Belly aka Leo aka big daddy (he weighs around 8 kgs at the moment!) I love this picture or them sleeping cwtched together - it looks like one body with 2 kitty heads :)



Friday, January 16, 2015

+ 365 Day 16 - post number 2

I didn't realise how difficult it would be to actually post to this blog daily - finding the positive in the every day is easy - getting the time to come online/getting my laptop/tablet/internet to work isnt!

I am hoping to get back on top of things soon as I have decided to close down my other blog account and just concentrate on this one (my other blog is about disney and stuff) so I will be posting some of the stuff I would have posted there on here instead so I am going to post this stuff but without the + 365 label in the front :)

Anyways... following on from the massive post earlier today's positive is trying something new - in this case it's my kitty trying something new not me but happy kitties = happy me


+365 Day 16 - Purina ProPlan Trial

Lady and I have been selected to partake in some market research on Purina ProPlan - well Lady is going to test it and I'm going to do the paperwork :)

We had an e-mail yesterday saying our pack was dispatched and it arrived today - Lady was very impressed with it all

Oooh a box a beautiful box - how did you know I wanted one????...what do you mean this isn't the best part?

Mine...all mine mwahahahameow




 Included in the box is:

2 x 10 pack of sensitive pouches
1 x 5kg back of sensitive dry kibbles
1 x 10 pack regular proplan pouches (to give as samples)
4 x sample pack of regular kibbles
1 x sample pack of dental kibbles
1 x sample pack of steralised kitty kibbles
5 x discount coupons (£3 off wet/£5 off dry)
1 x questionnaire pad
6 x 2 product leaflets
1 x research book
1 x kibble roll


 So for Lady we have the sensitive food - Lady has a bit of a dodgy tummy so if she eats regular kitty food she gets diarrhea and wind - neither of which are pleasant for her or for us either!

Lady normally gets 1/2 a pouch of wet in the morning and night and then kibble/dry is left down throughout the day for her to munch on along with plenty of fresh water.
mmm my pouches

I gave Lady half a pouch of food this morning and she was super keen to get into it. She really enjoyed the food and found it easy to eat off the plate and licked the plate clean too.
nom nom nom



Anything left on my whiskers?

 I put the kibble roll together with some kibble bits but Lady didn't really understand the concept - being a special (she has a little bit of brain damage-was starved of oxygen a bit at birth due to an emergency c-section) My other cat Morticia was very interested in the kibble and stole a few pieces too!
Kibble Roll

Filled kibble roll

Morticia discovering the kibbles  

mm delicious kibble

Lady getting stuck into the kibble too

 As my kitties have given aPAWroval of the food I will be passing on some of it to my kitty owned friends too.

I spent a few minutes scanning through the information that came with the pack and put together 5 sample packs for friends which will have 2 x pouches of food, a sample of kibble, information sheets and the money off vouchers



 We will continue the trial with Lady and I'll update on how good the sensitive food is too (once she's used the litter tray yuck)

So far we are impressed :D
















+ 365 Day 13 14 & 15

So my internet is still intermittent (come on sky pull your finger out!) but I have been writing up the blog briefly on word to transfer over when I get a signal :)

Day 13 - Tuesday

Another successful diet day woohoo although I am now starting to imagine people, objects the cats as bars of walking chocolate!!!

Today's positive is online friendships. I'm not a hugely social butterfly - I dont particularly like great big crowds of people and I'm getting old now so meeting like minded people can be difficult. I am sure there are other people out there who are 33, fat, obsessed with disney, like fantasy and sci-fi and love a good korma but finding them is a difficult thing. However thanks to social media I am linked in with hundreds of like minded weirdos :) If it's 2 am and I want to chat to someone about the latest Discworld novel there's bound to be a friend online from the states or Oz willing to chat :) If I want a Disney pin that's limited release and can only be bought in DisneyLand Anaheim at 5am on the 3rd day of the 3rd month with the moon waxing well there's a friend online who will do that for me too.

More seriously the net and social media allows us to connect to people we would never have the opportunity to meet before and I really do have friends online from all over the world as well as local to home too. So today I am happy that we have the technology and ability to communicate with ease :)

This is my current FB profile piccy - meow :)



(on a side note I dont play farmville stop inviting me please dear go make it stop!!!!)

Day 14 - Wednesday

Hump day hump day humpity dumpity HUMP DAY - halfway through the working week whoop whoop.

Today I discovered why the plants in the kitchen are dying! Little Lady our special needs kitty is playing/eating/destroying them. Her very very guilty look when caught made me smile today and my positive for today is furry family members who make me happy - unfortunately I didnt have my camera to hand to capture it however - Lady is always getting into mischief and trouble. Here are a few of my fave photo's of her

Look into my eyes...you will hand over the chicken 
I don't like it!!!


Quick hold my paw I just saw a HUGE spider


Day 15 - Thursday

I won an awesome competition for an amazing prize. Seriously I love comping and I do it while I am watching the tellybox or when I have some time and I have won some cool little prizes from a little benefits makeup set to smal items like handwarmers, candle holders and trolley keys but today I had an e-mail about winning an awesome prize. I have won a  *drumroll please* a Diana F+ Deluxe Kit

Now everyone reading is going to be like what?

So I have basically won a really cool retro look old school camera - the type that still uses film! It also comes with a selection of different lenses and a bunch of accessories in a nice presentation box the whole thing is worth around £150 too so it's not cheap. I am super excited for the prize to arrive now :)

My prize!


and all the bits that you get with it

Monday, January 12, 2015

+ 365 Day 12

Today I started my diet - I weigh like 93kgs which is clearly not healthy so I am on a diet. I havent done too badly today which makes me think a sensible and healthy eating diet is something I can achieve:

Today's Menu:

- Breakfast -  Tesco own meal replacement shake
- Lunch - vegetable soup
- Dinner - sweet and sour pork with rice
- snack -  muller light yoghurt
- snack - orange club

Okay so that might not seem a huge diet but for me its a vast improvement on my usual one of:

- Breakfast - 2 x toast or bacon baguette
- Lunch - pie and chips, sausage and chips, pasta bake etc
- Dinner - pizza and hot dogs! Curry, Fish and chips etc
- Snacks - pack of crisps / 2 pack of crisps
- Snacks - chocolate bar
- Snacks - 4-6 biscuits
- Snacks - icecream, yoghurt
- Snacks - toast / bowl of cereal

My plan is to have a meal replacement shake for breakfast, followed by soup for lunch (without bread) and then a regular meal in the evening and to cut down on the snacks - I am going to allow myself 2 snacks a day one of which can be a naughty snack e.g 3 regular biscuits. 1 small chocolate biscuit and one which has to be a good snack - fruit or yoghurt or similar and to try and cut down on the amount of bread and carbs I eat. Hopefully my body will get used to eating less and I can then cut the snacks down to just 1 a day and this will also help improve my diabetes control too.

So surviving todays diet start is my positive (I'm now going to bed feeling slightly hungry!)

NB also won a football in a comp too today - bonus!




Sunday, January 11, 2015

+ 365 Days 4 - 11 (Internet has been down:( )

So my wonderful (not) sky has been messing around for the last week and that along with being back to work has meant I haven't had chance or opportunity to update the blog I have however made notes in word which I am transferring below for each day :)

Day 4 Sunday :)
Today's positive - I got to sleep in whoot. As someone who doesn't really sleep a lot and spends a lot of the time going through life in a tired sleep deprived haze sleeping late is an awesome thing. Today was also the day that my dad left for his hotel in Bristol before flying out to Benidorm tomorrow morning for 2 months! I like spending time with my dad but he is LOUD so it's nice to have peace and quiet in the flat and I am sure he is happy to be a) sleeping in a bed rather than on a sofa and b) away from the cats and dog as he's allergic to their fur and has to take daily antihistamines when he is here.

Day 5 Monday
Today was the first day back in work following 2 wonderful weeks off. The positive today was seeing some of my work colleagues - I get on well with most of them and it was nice to catch up and find out how their time off had been, what their kiddies had been up to etc and generally have a chin wag. Having work colleagues you like can make a tedious repetitive I want to drill my own brain out job at least a little bit more endurable.

Day 6 Tuesday
So today I made the most awesome food ever! Seriously I can't cook but this was gorgeous. I basically used up all the left over stuff that was in the fridge - tomatoes, leek, onion, potatoes, that weird cubed Italian bacon bits, some left over tinned ham, mushrooms and tinned potatoes, fried it all up with a bit of seasoning and then whisked up some eggs and poured it over. I was hoping for edible but it came out divine! Even my mum and uncle enjoyed it especially with the left over sour cream dip from Christmas. And being on a roll I made a curry ready for tomorrow dinner too. It's amazing when you actually make something that tastes good, is good for you too and is cheap :)

Day 7 Wednesday
Hump day hump day!!! This week is dragging the happiness at seeing my work colleagues has now turned into the arrggghhh do I have to go feeling for work. But today is hump day which means its a slope towards the weekend! Today's positive is pretty much like yesterdays in that the curry I made was again edible, tasty and enjoyed. I'm one of those people who get grumpy when I am hungry so a nice dinner makes me happy :) and my mum did the dishes too!

Day 8 Thursday
Today I came home from work to a HUGE box I was really excited what could it be??? I opened it and it was a competition win from back before Christmas - a star candle holder. Now I was expecting like a tea light holder but this was way better - it's a metal star (pentagram) shaped holder which holds 10 (yes 10!) candles in little silvery glass jars. This will hold yankee sampler candles or tealights (I need to buy another 6 or so yankees to fit lol) and also came with 2 extra spare glass holders - they obviously heard about my ability to trip over air and drop everything! Parcels are always an awesome thing to receive unlike envelopes which often contain bills lol and to get something so pretty was awesome and made me very happy (I've put a pic on here but it really doesn't do it justice its truly gorgeous)

Star Candle Holder
Sparkly Glass bits to go in it :)




















Day 9 Friday
Last day of work before the weekend woohoo. Today I got an e-mail telling me that me and the 4 cats had been selected to take part in a months trial of Purina cat food. This is very exciting - my kitties are quite fussy when it comes to food - they wont touch whiska's or pets at home own food - the only thing they will eat is the ludicrously expensive stuff or the mildly expensive Felix as good as it looks. I <3 my kitties and having them happy makes me happy and I think this food is gonna make them very happy - until it runs out lol

Day 10 Saturday
Simple things - today we took the dog to the park for a walk - he's completely bonkers and he and I enjoyed every minute of it. We even had a quick look in the charity shop where once again I ended up with yet more books. I love books and reading but I go through phases where I buy loads and loads and read them all and end up with piles of them forming in my room and then I get annoyed and take them all to the charity shop...and it starts again. Here is a picture of Jac the dog - he's a Schitzu x Jack russell and he looks a bit like an ewok



Day 11 Sunday
My internet is working woohoo

Today's positive is family time. My nice came round and we went to my sisters to see my other nice, my sister, my aunty and uncle (who live next door) my big nephew and my great nephew (the big nephew's son) and their pets. I took down a little tykes car we got my little niece off freebies which as you can see she loved and so did my great nephew too :)

Broom broom

D finally getting a go

H 'driving the car'



Sunday, January 4, 2015

+ 365 Day 3

Today I started work on a new project. I'm the first to admit I am not very arty or crafty but I think I can manage this one :)

I am making a little kitty ornament for a friend of mine who runs a cat rescue - It's going to be named CleoCATrah and will be made from various materials.

So far I have made a little pouch and filled it with rice - this is going to be the kitties base of support so she can stand upright whens hes complete. I have been scouring pintrest for different ideas and I have a little plan in my head but we will see if it turns out how I imagined.

The great thing about doing something like this is it doesn't matter if you make a mistake or if it turns out differently to how you expected - it also gives me something to focus on and work towards. I am hoping to complete it this week and will be sure to post some photos once its done :)


Friday, January 2, 2015

+ 365 Day 2

Today's positive is thoughtful gifts. I have been sorting through my Christmas gifts and one of the best ones I had probably cost less than a lot of the others yet it's ideal for me - the person thought about what I like, what I like to do and what I need to do it and then put together a gift hamper for me.

In my case I recently acquired a sewing machine - I'm going to be honest it's a cheapo one but that's fine because I'm not really good :P

The gift I received was a little tool box filled with spare bobbins, spare machine needles, every colour cotton imaginable, zips, elastics, poppers, buttons of all different colours and sizes, actual sewing needs, a threader and a bunch of other stuff.

The whole thing may not have cost a huge amount but the thought and effort that went into it is what counts - I had a lot of expensive gifts that were bought for me not because the person thought I wanted them but as a 'that will do' gift - I am sure everyone knows the type I mean - generic gift sets which cost the earth but aren't personal that you buy as you run around like a headless chicken and think that will do for so and so and this will do for that so and so - little thought or effort.

Dont get me wrong I am not ungrateful and I do appreciate all the gifts I have received but I think the personal catered to the individual gifts are the best :)

I love my little sewing tool box and cant wait to break it open and try making things!

Thursday, January 1, 2015

+ 365 Day 1 - New Years Day

Today has been a good day :)

We have been shopping in the sales - Primark once again suckered me in with all the random reduced junk that I dont actually need or want yet somehow end up buying.

Today's shop came to a whopping £34 and included (a lovely light grey gillet with furry hood £7; a base layer fleece in black for running - ha when do I run? for £3; a Hermione Grainger HP Tee for £3 for the hols after all we are going to Universal to see HP world; A Big Bang Theory Tee for £6 but I love the show; a Tiger tee for my nieces Bday in Feb for £3; 2 x packs of xmas socks for £1 for pressies for next xmas of course; a fluffy hoody with ears for £5- just cos it looked cute; jeans for £5 because I am at the awkward between sizes stage and all my jeans give me a saggy looking ass - true story!)

Also got those special people cards for Christmas for next year - my mum for some strange reason gets very put out if she gets a bog standard card! Got a couple n the card factory which lets be honest is fab and incredibly cheap anyways but all the cards and loads of stock was 1/2 price so I paid a grand total of 58p and got a nice mum card and also a card for my friend who runs a kitty rescue - merry christmas from the cat which I thought was kind of appropriate and cute. Now to store these in a safe place where I can find them again!

We have a great rule in place for New Years Day - or maybe it's a superstition? No washing or cleaning on the day as if you do you wash your life away - awesome an excuse to not wash up or put the washing on! Of course I still made the bed and cleaned the kitty litter trays and had to wash the bath out (Jac had a lovely long walk around the canal and river and came back black with mud so needed a bath and then the bath needed a bath)

Finished the day off with a few hours of free bingo down Club3000 Cardiff - Thursdays are free days - we didnt win but we had a nice evening out and we did buy dinner there - I had a lovely steak and ale pie with potatoes and veggies and gravy and mam had the worlds largest baked potatoe with about 4 cans of tuna mayo stuffed into it. Food was delicious and for dessert we had Strawberry Gateau nom nom nom - total cost for both of us was under £10 - total bargain and we had a laugh too - all in all a good night :)

Thoughts for the day:

Resolutions - I'm not making one - I am making this blog instead to try and focus on the positive everyday for the year.

If I was to make a resolution (which I am not) it would be to be happier, healthier and a better person.

I am however going to make myself a pot of positivity (is that even a word?) I am going to make it tomorrow and I am going to write out 52 positive comments about myself and stick them in a pot - once a week on the worse day of the week (which in fairness is likely to be a monday because that's when the work week starts) I am going to draw one out and read it and remind myself of something good.

Happy New Year and here's to a POSITIVE HAPPY 2015

+ 365 - 1 New Years Eve :)

Today's positive is:

I went back to the pub where I was attacked, sat and had a nice meal with family and stayed for a couple of hours watching the entertainment - and I was nervous as a kitten but did it.

I have to admit I am afraid that this crazy woman will attack me again if she sees me in a public place - since she attacked me I have been out every single day to try and curb and manage my nervousness and fear and it has been quite difficult.

The physical marks are fading rapidly but I think the psychological scars will take a little longer to heal up. I have traveled the globe by myself without fear but since the attack the thought of going to the local shops makes me nervous. I will however overcome this :) I know it

Short entry to the blog but a major achievement for me