Monday 20 March 2017


Blogging. Never tried it, but my mum kept telling me I should have a go.

I have a lot to say about various topics, such as weight, weight loss troubles, general life, my gym life and food. I have just been tootling about cooking and having a good think and I thought I would start with a post about how I manage general life and the things I do to make it easier (or as easy as it can be when learning how to juggle a full on job and a new home).

Life hack number 1:

I go to the gym. I am by no means one of those people that is a totally virtuous gym bunny, but I do it because it is necessary. I have always struggled with my weight and it helps. Also, I will begrudgingly admit, it makes me feel better in general. I am the kind of person that will have all intentions of going to the gym as I leave work. I will set off in my car convincing myself that I am going to go and then just drive straight past the gym, waving at it, as I head for the shop to buy wine. SO, I combated that by making the painful decision to go on a morning before work. My alarm goes off at 5.30am and it nearly kills me every time, but I force myself up and I go and I have to say that by the time I am finished (I train from 6-7 and then have a mad rush to get showered and ready by 7.30 to get to work by 8), I am ready for the day. I also feel smug. Smug with myself because I don't have to feel guilty about driving straight past the gym on the way home. I am also less inclined to consume wine when I have been to the gym and am feeling smug.

Look... I make such an effort with my appearance when I train...

Life hack number 2:

I spend 20 minutes or so on a Sunday planning the household meals for the week. I say household because there are 3 of us. Me, my boyfriend and my best friend, Brods. Brods is doing a PGCE and has a completely crazy workload, so I plan for the 3 of us. When I have planned the meals, I write my shopping list based on that, so food waste is at a minimum because, frankly, we can't afford to waste food.

Life hack number 3:

I always shop at Aldi first. I buy everything I possibly can from there to keep the cost of the weekly shop down. I go to Asda from there to buy any bits I couldn't get at Aldi (perks of living in a town). Our weekly shop averages at around £60, which I think is very good to say I am feeding 3 adults home cooked meals for a week. Sometimes there is the odd stop off at a shop to pick up something during the week, so perhaps add an extra £10 to that total. Still good, I think.

Life hack number 4:

I buy frozen veg. I do also buy some fresh, but only what I absolutely know will be eaten. Things like green beans, peas, sweet corn, broccoli and cauliflower, I buy frozen. Then I know I always have them and they don't go off.

Life hack number 5:

At the weekend, I do as much food prep for the week as I possibly can, or have time for. If we have soup down for a lunch, I will get it in the soup maker, or I will make something like the Weight Watchers Moussaka (google it, its great) and will portion it up when it's cool and store in the fridge in Tupperware, ready to go. If we are having something like salads for lunch, I will chop up the cucumbers, spring onions, tomatoes etc and store them in Tupperware in the fridge, so I can make the salads up on an evening with no hassle, or extra washing up. Most weeks, I will also make something like a shepherd's pie mix (5% fat mince, onions, carrots, stock), or a bolognese (same mince, tinned tomatoes, tomato purée, garlic, herbs and stock) to put in the slow cooker. The slow cooker is my best friend in the world. I love putting it on low in the morning and getting home to a dinner that would have been really boring if made to eat there and then, but instead has loads of flavour because it's been cooking all day. Slow cooker meals are also, generally, very cheap to make. Win.

Bargain Tupperware! I am always on the hunt for it.

Life hack number 6:

As soon as I get in on an evening, I crack on with jobs. I get the next day's lunches prepped straight away and pile them up ready to be put in the relevant lunch boxes, so they won't be forgotten and I get an extra 5 minutes in bed in the morning. I also get tea prepped as much as I can, so it's easy to just throw together when we are all ready to eat. Tonight, that has meant making little fish parcels with tin foil (sea bass and salmon fillets from the reduced section... always scour that). I put the fish on the piece of foil and seasoned with pepper. I chopped a couple of spring onions and sprinkled over the fish and then poured over a mix of light soy sauce, a squeeze of agave and grated ginger. I then made little parcels out of them and lined them up on a tray by the oven. I also chopped some more spring onions, a pepper and some broccoli (very finely, almost like broccoli rice) and stir fried them with a bit more soy sauce ready to heat them up with a packet of microwave long grain rice later. One pack easily feeds 3 of us with loads of veg mixed in. After the kitchen jobs, I always go upstairs and pack my gym bag for the morning. I put my gym clothes on the landing, so I don't wake my boyfriend and get my outfit for work packed away.

Life hack number 7:

I keep my gym bag packed with a toilet bag (deodorant, shower gel, face wash, talc (cheap dry shampoo... I do NOT have time to wash and dry my hair after gym), hair brush and hair pins/bobbles), my daily make up and a hairdryer at all times. That means all I have to do is chuck clothes and shoes for work into it and I am good to go. Literally ANYTHING to make life a bit easier in the early morning. 

 

So, these are some of the things I have got myself into the routine of doing on a daily basis and I really do think they make my life easier.

What do you think to them?

Have I given you any inspiration?

Do you have any ideas of things I could do to speed up the mundane even more?

Let me know!

Charlotte

xoxo


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