They Say Things Come in 3s.......

So, things come in 3s, be it good or bad and for once the last 3 have been all good things.

Firstly we managed to get David's kilt at a fantastic price. We do have to replace the shirt and sporran but it is still going to be so cheap in comparison to what we thought it was going to be.
Secondly I ordered my wedding dress - and managed to get the dress I wanted, despite being told all those weeks ago that it had been discontinued.
Thirdly, today we were given confirmation of our wedding date - and it is the date that we asked for. So we are getting married on the 31st of March 2010.

Hopefully this is the start of things to come. Could do with some nice things happening for a little while.

My dress - done

Just back from the shop and that's it, decision made and I have ordered my wedding dress. I have gone for the more sensible choice which is the light weight chiffon dress. Thankfully though everyone that came along (there was 6 of us) actually preferred this dress so I was quite pleased.

I have set myself a bit of a target as well. I have ordered my dress in a couple of sizes smaller than I am at the minute. This is for 2 reasons - one because obviously it makes me slim down before the wedding. The second is purely because I am tight. If I had ordered the dress in the size I am at the minute then I would have had to pay 10% extra so by ordering the slightly smaller size I actually get a discount. I have been sensible though and realistic about how much weight I can lose before the wedding - I only need to lose 4 inches around my tummy to fit into the dress so that should be achievable in 9 months.

David & I are heading out for a walk now to start the weight loss battle. Finally something proper to work towards - just the wedding wasn't obviously enough.

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Dress Shopping Today

Just about 1 hour to go before I buy my wedding dress.

I am still undecided about which of the two dresses I am going to choose. I am leaning more towards one dress than the other - but the one I am moving away from is the dream, princess dress that if I was getting married here would be picked in a heartbeat. However I do need to be slightly practical about the dress as I have to transport it on a plane as my hand luggage.

Will let you know what happens when I get back from shopping.

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Bridal Shopping Tomorrow

Tomorrow afternoon I am going to spend the biggest sum of money on one item of clothing that I have ever spent in my life.
I am going to order my wedding dress.

How scared am I?!?

I still haven't fully decided on which dress I am going to order either.
I am currently swaying between 2 dresses - and they couldn't be more different.
Thankfully though the dress shop has them both so I am going to try them both on again tomorrow and with my small panel of experts (there a total of 6 of us going tomorrow) I will decide what one to order. I am also taking my shoes and my borrowed veil with me to get a good idea of what it is going to look like.

Looking forward to tomorrow.

x

R.I.P Michael Jackson

Just wanted to write a short blog entry to acknowledge the passing of Michael Jackson. It is a shame that he has passed at such a young age. There is no doubting the talent of the man and his influence in the music industry over the past 20+ years.

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Lets not leave it too long

Today I was at a funeral and it got me thinking about how often we meet up with people - sometimes it is as frequently as wedding, funerals and other family events but that is it.

I have decided to start keeping up with people more frequently and definitely catching up on the sooner rather than later philosophy.

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slightly calmer now, but still not happy

so, last week wasn't a great week for me on the scales and if I am honest then there hasn't really been a great week for me for a long long long time. This week though I thought all of that was about to change. I posted a picture of the massive fruit salad I made on Friday night, well all that was gone by lunch time on Monday (thankfully as I was starting to retch at the sight of fruit salad). This week was meant to be a good week on the scales. I had been so careful with portion control as well as what I was actually eating so what happened when I jumped onto the scales this morning. Nothing. Literally nothing, well not literally nothing - I am not that light yet but what I mean is that it laughs at me and says "You haven't lost anything. You haven't tried this week. Ha Ha Ha".

I wasn't happy. Still not happy. Not quite sure what to do now. Followed the diet to the letter and still don't lose any weight. Have been told to follow it for another week and see what happens next week - I tell you now though, there better be a good weight loss or there will be murder.

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David's Kilt - Done

So yesterday David's mum and dad decided to have a day out up in St. Andrews. When they were there they saw a kilt shop offering the kilt (with a choice of 6 different tartans), belt, sporran, Jacobean shirt and the socks for £100. David has been wanting a purple tartan to go with my choice of shoes. Although my dress is white I am wearing purple shoes. We have only found purple tartans in the full kilt but we have wanted the lightweight version as it is easier to transport and will be cooler to wear when we are out in the heat of the Dominican Republic.

After speaking to David we decided to get his mum and dad to get us the kilt so we waited last night for them to bring it home for us so David could try it on. I wish I had remembered to take a photo of it when he was wearing it as it looked so smart but there will be loads of photos when he is wearing it on the big day. Here is a photo of the kilt hanging up - as you can see it really doesn't look any different to a "normal" kilt but it cost over £300 cheaper. I think that it was even cheaper than what it would have cost to hire a kilt for the time we need it.


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Prevention is better than Cure....

So, as the title suggests I am trying to prevent myself from putting on more weight and in fact I am actually trying to speed up the weight loss.
So I made this:
Just a little fruit salad.
There is everything in it. We have some strawberries, raspberries, cherries, apricots, blueberries, kiwi, plums and pineapple. This is my breakfast and lunch for the next couple of days. Having it in the fridge means that whenever I start to feel peckish then I can snack on this instead of the usual junk that I would normally go for.

P.S. Happy Birthday to my Auntie June, have a good day.

x

The Chosen One......

A few weeks ago I was reading on of my favourite blogs

http://www.hey-dollface.com

where there was an advert for people to test the new products from TRESemmé. It's for the new 24 hour body range. I had to email of my name and address and that was it.
I sent of my details and didn't think more about it, the advert said it was on a first come, first serve basis so didn't hold out much hope.

Yesterday there was a knock at the door - a nice postman with a big parcel for me. It was the samples. Well I say samples - they were 3 full size products.

I haven't started using them yet but I am looking forward to it. I have quite thick hair but it is quite flat so it will be good to see if there is a product out there (well in the future anyway) that will help with the styling of my hair and stop me having to tie it up all the time.

Will keep you posted as to how they go.

Wedding Dress Update

Just a little blog entry today - still trying to recover from yesterday's mammoth journey where I drove to Oxford and back for a delivery.

I have been looking at the wedding dresses online in the run up to actually ordering my dress next week. I still think fondly of the dress that I tried on when I went for my first every shopping trip but couldn't order as it was about to be discontinued at the end of that week - or so I thought.

Today I went back into the dress shop to ask if it was definitely the case that the dress had been discontinued as it is still showing on the website. They happily called the designer who said

"no, it hasn't been discontinued".

OMG, talk about elation.
Although I had picked another dress - and totally fell in love with it - it just wasn't any comparison to this dress. So decision made. Roll on next week when I can order it.

And More Shopping....

So this morning me and David went into Edinburgh to do a spot of DIY for my grandad. Whilst waiting for B&Q to open we decided to go into Tesco to kill some time.
They have some really nice holiday clothes in at the minute and I really liked a sundress they have at the minute. I had been looking at it for a couple of weeks now so decided to show it to David to see what he thought.
He told me to buy it but I didn't know what size to buy as I am trying to lose weight. He told me to pick a size that is realistic to get to, even without too much effort and get the dress in that size - to act as inspiration for the weight loss. Here it is:









Also I bought a pair of shoes to match. I have problems wearing heels - after a couple of hours my feet really start to hurt and I need to change into flats. However I can wear wedges, even really high ones all day long. These were only £8 so grabbed them whilst David was offering.









David has put a ban on me wearing these shoes though - unless I am wearing the dress with them so I better get a move on with the weight loss.

Still Holiday Shopping

It is 40 weeks on Tuesday until we go away - yeah that is 283 days until we depart for the Dominican Republic and I can't seem to stop myself from buying "essentials" for the holiday.

Yesterday I went out to the local shopping centre and bought all out suntan lotion. Admittedly it was all on offer so instead of paying £13 a bottle I got it on a buy on get one free offer so it did save us some money but even still. Don't think David was too impressed to begin with, until he remembered that there isn't another summer before we go that we can take advantage of the offers that are on. So as well as getting all the sun cream I also got all our toiletries. We have been advised by different websites to take everything you need as the resorts don't stock these items, nor do the supermarkets - you have to go to special shops to buy them. I bought all the miniatures so that we can ditch them once they have been used without bringing back half empty bottles with us.

Just a pity I cant be bothered to start buying some of the clothes I will need. Admittedly this is because I don't know what size I will be by then - I have a realistic idea of what size I could get down to by then but don't want to buy anything yet, just in case I either don't do it or exceed my expectations and lose more weight (yeah right).

Going to go back into the centre today - forgot to buy the after sun that was also on offer. Might have a look at the clothes as well, there are some good offers on just now.

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Wedding Purchases

A few months ago I was doing a delivery for one of my customers to a company that cuts pieces of metal and quartz and stuff with water jets. I asked about getting some initials done for the top of our wedding cake as we had been quoted £200 from a wedding cake shop to have them personalised. I was told I could get them done for about £40 so I ordered them.

For weeks and weeks and weeks I have been going out to Hillington (other side of Glasgow) to collect them only to find that they haven't been made yet (I told them that I wasn't getting married until next August so there was no rush).

Typically though that when my mum was out there for one of her deliveries she asked about my initials - and they were ready. She collected them for me.

Here they are:



The spikes at the bottom are going to go into the cake so that the letters stand up from the cake.

Update Again

Went to Slimming World this morning and have lost another pound.
It is coming off slowly which isn't ideal but at least it is still coming off.
I did a long trip up to Inverness yesterday and set up so early that I didn't have a chance to make anything to eat before I left so I ended up eating rubbish from a service station before I left Inverness to come home again as I was starving. I am sure had I had packed something proper to at then I would have lost more than 1 pound but I cant look back now - just have to focus on this next week and see what I can get at the end of it.

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Still Going Strong

So, the other day I posted about how I was going to focus on maintaining the weight loss by reducing my calorie intake (sensibly though) and trying to get a bit more active.
Yesterday me and David were meant to be going up the Pentland Hills (just outside Edinburgh) for a walk but a trip to B&Q and a visit to his parents stopped that from happening, however the diet is still going well. I am well within my limit of 1500 calories (well maybe except yesterday as we got a takeaway for David's mums birthday) and it is going really well. I am eating so much fresh fruit and veg, as well as proper home cooked meals and it is surprising how much you can still eat.

1 week done - hopefully more to go.
Roll on Wednesday to see what the weight loss is.
Will get more active too - promise.

x

Update time again...

So, slimming World this morning.
Went in, jumped on the scales and lost half a pound.
To be honest wasn't really expecting it as I have only been watching what I have been eating since Monday. Hopefully this is a reflection of my careful choices and there should be a big weight loss next week - and for a few to come before I start to slow down again.

Go Me!

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Getting fired up again - got a new eating plan and this one is simple

How amazing has the weather been this week? I even managed to get myself a bit of colour whist working at the weekend.

Also we have been getting more active this weekend. David ordered some boxing gloves and focus mits off the Internet last week and they arrived yesterday. I think I lasted about 5 minutes before collapsing in a heap. We also got a skipping rope so hopefully we will get active and then the weight should start to drop off. We are also back on the healthy eating bandwagon. We decided to ditch the non-carb diet and the high fat diet and all the other silly stuff that people try to do. Instead we have opted for calorie counting and I have restricted the number of calories I am taking in. Instead of the usual 2000 I am on 1500 calories. I have been reading loads recently about what is a realistic, healthy amount of calories to eat and still lose weight. Also (although it is sad) I watched the documentary that Clare from the pop band Steps did about how she lost her weight for her wedding. In 6 months she managed to get from a size 16 to a size 10 - her target was to wear a size 12 wedding dress. She did it through careful diet and exercising 3 times a week - totally realistic and achievable.

I started yesterday so there may not be any time to show a result on the scales tomorrow at Slimming world but hopefully by next week there will be a big difference in my weight. The aim is to begin by losing 3 pounds a week then aiming for a stable 2 pounds off a week.

Hopefully by the time the dress arrives from the designer in January/February time I can be a fair bit smaller than I am just now.

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