Christmas is supposed to be a time of joy and celebration, but for many people it can also be a source of stress and anxiety. How can you cope with the pressure of finding the perfect gifts, planning the festive meals, family and friends get-togethers and managing your budget – all at the same time?
Here are some tips to help you have a relatively stress-free Christmas
START EARLY
Don’t wait until the last minute to buy your gifts, book your travel, or decorate your home. The sooner you get these tasks done, the more time you’ll have to relax and enjoy the season.
SET A BUDGET
Before you go shopping, decide how much you can afford to spend on gifts, food, and entertainment. Stick to your budget and avoid impulse purchases that can lead to debt and regret.
BE REALISTIC
Don’t try to do everything yourself or make everything perfect. Delegate some tasks to your family or friends, or outsource them if you can. Accept that things may go wrong and be flexible to adapt to changes.
MAKE LISTS
Having a list of everything, from gifts, secret santa gifts, Christmas cards, food items, menu for parties and the big day makes the whole process so much easier. It means you can keep track of your budget and avoid overspending every time you see something pretty or potemtially useful. It lets you plan ahead and avoid last minute shopping ot cooking stress and you cab prioritise the most important tasks and delegate the rest to others.
My Ultimate Christmas Planner*
TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF
Don’t neglect your physical and mental health during the busy holiday season. Make sure you get enough sleep, exercise, and healthy food. Take breaks from the hustle and bustle and do something that makes you happy.
HAVE FUN
With the run up to the festive period we usually forget Christmas is not about the material things, but about the people you love and the memories you make. Spend quality time with your family and friends, play games, watch movies, or do something creative. I usually find that, once orgaqnised, it’s the run up to Christmas I enjoy the most doing some baking or making decorations with the kids.
If you need some more help with planning your Christmas, I have something for you: my Ultimate Christmas Planner!*
It contains everything you need to organize your holiday, such as a gift planner, a budget planner, a menu planner, and more. You can purchase it from my Etsy store, print it out at home and use each year to get organised. It will save you time, money, and stress!
I hope you found these tips useful and that you have a wonderful Christmas!
Don’t forget to share below your ways of making the run up to Holiday period as stress free as possible, or are you a last minute person and thrive on stress?
Autumn is a beautiful time of year, but it can also be a busy time for mums. I know a little about it as – two older kids in primary and secondary school as well as toddler twins.
Between the constant demands of caring for two little ones, keeping up with the house, and trying to also work some freelance projects, it can feel like there’s no time left for anything else.
With the kids back in school and the holidays approaching, it’s easy to let your own self-care fall by the wayside.
But it’s important to remember that taking care of yourself is essential for being a good mum. When you’re taking care of yourself, you’re better able to handle the stresses of motherhood and be present for your kids.
Here are some self-care autumn ideas that I’ve recently found to be helpful:
READING
Create a little haven for yourself with a comfortable blanket and your favorite book. Even few pages a day make a difference. I try to pick up a book instead of a phone and commit literary escape, allowing my mind to wander and unwind.
A WALK IN NATURE:
Even if it’s just for a few minutes, getting some fresh air and sunshine helps to clear my head and boost my mood. I usually have the company – my toddlers, but luckily they still manage to sit for a bit in a stroller and I can fully take this beautiful season in. I think autumn (when it’s not constantly raining) is one of my favourite seasons.
HAVE A WARM (LUXURIOUS) BATH
When you have a few minutes to yourself, take some time to relax in a warm bath or shower. To make it luxurious you don’t need expensive products, I just add some essential oils or bath salts to the water for an extra pampering experience. Light a scented candle or use essential oils with autumn-inspired scents like cinnamon, vanilla, or eucalyptus to create a serene and relaxing atmosphere.
SPEND TIME WITH LOVED ONES
Even if it’s just for a quick phone call or coffee date, making time for your friends and family can help you to feel supported and loved. I find that motherhood can sometimes be lonely, especially when you have multiple kids with bigger age gaps. Phoning / video calling someone I can chat to makes days a little easier and I get that extra boost to keep going.
I know that it can be difficult to find time for self-care as a busy mum, but it’s important to remember that even small acts of self-care can make a big difference. If you can only spare 10 minutes a day, take some time to do something that you enjoy and that makes you feel good.
How do you find time for some self-care as a busy mum?
I find that sometimes it is hard to carve out even an hour for myself but I’ve also promised myself that those little pockets of “me-time” make me a less stressed, better mum.
Here are some tips that worked for me in order to find time for self-care as a busy mum:
GET YOUR PARTNER OR OTHER FAMILY MEMBERS INVOLVED
Ask your partner to watch the kids for an hour or two so that you can have some time to yourself. Or, ask your older children to help out with chores around the house so that you have more free time.
DON’T BE AFRAID TO SAY NO
It’s okay to say no to extra commitments if you’re feeling overwhelmed. It’s more important to take care of yourself so that you can be the best mum you can be.
BREAK DOWN SELF-CARE INTO SMALLER TASKS
If you feel like you don’t have time for a full hour of self-care, break it down into smaller tasks. For example, you could take a 10-minute walk, read a chapter of a book, or listen to a podcast / book / music.
SCHEDULE TIME FOR SELF-CARE
Just like you would schedule any other important appointment, schedule time for self-care in your calendar. This will help you to make sure that you’re actually taking care of yourself. When I do that (learning currently how to time-block effectively) I seem to treat it as an appointment.
It’s also important to remember that you don’t have to do everything yourself – this has been the biggest lesson of all for me.
Remember, you’re not alone. Being a mum is hard, and taking care of yourself allows you to better care for your loved ones.
Let me know in the comments what things you do to practice self care in busy periods of your life and how easy or difficult is it to get some time for yourself.
It’s been unsettled few months and I don’t know anyone who’s not worried about money or how things will pan out over the next few months. We have been bombarded with practical tips on how to save on heating in the coming weeks and months, how to cook low budget meals and make them stretch as much as possible and how to cut down on shopping or at least make budgeting go further.
Rising prices of everyday items and just general uncertainty can cause lots of anxiety and even for those who boss at budgeting it sometimes becomes too much. Speaking from experience, I budget, and although I’m not a pro at it and feel like I’ve still got a lot to learn I’ve found myself worrying more often about months ahead. When I worry I seem to plan more and do more but in this case I think that instead of acting, I froze at realisation that what if I’m not able to do more, to save money or keep within the budget. Let’s not forget all those unplanned things that also happen and need adressing (namely, money to buy or fix them).
However, I worked out that in order to make things happen and find solutions, apart from applying some of those practical tips we have been reading about everywhere, I also need to work on my mindset and general well – being and thought I would share some of the things I’ve learnt and changed along the way.
Relax
It’s probably hard to do when you have hundred and one things to think about but it is so important to make sure we find time to unwind and switch off. You can practice yoga or meditation – there is tons of free tutorials on You Tube or going for a walk / run is a perfect way to release some endorfins and make you feel like you can tackle everything. Make sure you include any form of activity into your routine at least 3 times per week.
The right amount of sleep also plays an important part in how stressed we feel about things around us and how we tackle them.
Work With Your Worries
Pick 2 or 3 days per week, plan them in your dairy and write down what worries you. Then use a formula
“If X happens…..I will do Y….”
Things sometimes seem so much bigger when we play them out in our heads and I found that when I wrote them down, suddenly in some cases I could find a solution and work out a plan for how to tackle a particular situation.
Gratitude Diary
I know, it’s hard to think about all the good things when I’ve just asked you to wirte down all the things that worry you. But there is a point to this. Every day, I sat down and wrote things I was grateful that day along with my plan for the next day. In that gratitude diary there were also points relating to money and material things. Some days, the list was exactly the same but it didn’t matter. What mattered was that when I sometimes went days & weeks back in my logs I found that there are a lot of things I should be grateful for even though there are some worries, which in most cases can be tackled.
Stop Comparing Yourself – Especially online
We know that comparison is thief of joy and these days most of it happens on line on social media. We compare our financial situation to others, people that in most cases, we don’t even know in real life. There is a lot of great communities on line, but I found that the more time you spend on line, the more you make you think less about your own achievements and instead you start to focus on things you don’t have and don’t do.
We don’t know really know what people’s journey has been – especially when we look at financial / debt-free commuities. We mostly see the highlights and all-the-good things , often forgetting that they are just highlights. People will portray the best version of themselves and show only a snippet of their life, without all the nitty-gritty details and in some cases financial difficulties.
The only person that you can change is yourself and that’s what you need to focus on. Instead of pointing all your energy at other people’s successes, create your own targets and financial goals you’d like to achieve.
I hope those little tips will help you along the way the same way they helped me. But also, I am curious whether you already do any of those things or maybe have some other suggestions which work for you when it comes to working with your worries?
Until recently in preparation for New Year I used to set goals and resolutions – a lot of them as well. Some were more specific and some less so, but it was always the excitement of a clean slate, new beginning, forgetting about the year I was leaving behind that spurred all those resolutions.
However, a couple of years ago I discovered a New Year’s Resolutions List in one of my old notebooks and realised that I could only ticked off a couple of things on that list that I achieved. I’m also sure, that back then, in 2018 I didn’t even look more than twice at that list, so how was I supposed to even make those things happen?
There are various studies conducted over the years, saying that people won’t even stick with their new year resolutions beyond 19th January or that they forget what their goals were by the second week of February. I probably, was part of that statistics until recently….
This made me realise that I needed to be a bit more mindful and strategic with my resolutions and start earlier than 1st January to plan, so that I can set myself up for a successful and joyful year ahead.
The process is very personal and it will be different from person to person, but it is all about transitioning from the old into the new year with intention. I found that last year, despite pandemic, I have managed to achieve more things from my list than when I didn’t go through this process a couple of years ago.
I thought I would share a bit about my New Year preparations to give you some ideas for your own New Year prep.
REFLECT
For me, it is all about taking stock of the old year and what went well, what I have been grateful for, what were the proud moments of the year, what I’ve learned and what were the challenges. Let’s be honest, 2020 has been very challenging and when I sat down to write all of those things down I thought there were hardly any positives but once I started there have been a few and it is great to remind myself about them.
I also look back at the habits or behaviours I don’t want to repeat in 2021 as well as areas where I need to let go of or lower my expectations moving forward.
PLAN
I learned to take time out at the end of December to figure out what I want in the coming year. I jot down all the usual important dates as well as school breaks, holidays and plan some of our holidays around it. What helps with that also is journaling and jotting down some of my work/personal goals and then breaking them down into smaller chunks. For me this is a work in progress document as I like to go back to it over the course of the year and tick things off or add to it. Also, having a big goal broken down into smaller goals makes it less scary and more achievable. This can be done in digital form also (notes on your phone), but I am a pen & paper person 🙂
One Little Word was a project created by Ali Edwards – it’s all about picking a word each year, to focus on, reflect upon and go about your daily life. I’ve done it twice now and last year my word was Balance. For 2021 I picked two words – COURAGE and ENJOY. This is all to do with the fact that I would like to step out of my comfort zone in order to pursue some projects, which will lead to (hopefully) enjoyment in personal and professional life.
Also, alongside the goals and plans for 2021, I write my vision for the new year. It’s very simple. I sit down with a big cup of coffee and start with “By the end of 2021….” – at the beginning it seems hard but then the words just flow and it’s a brilliant thing to come back to every quarter at least.
DELETE AND DECLUTTER
I find that time between Christmas and New Year is perfect for getting rid of clutter. I wrote a post about all the THINGS I GOT RID OF BEFORE 2018 in order to start the new year without unnecessary junk. Apart from getting rid of physical objects, I also go through my emails and delete the ones that clog the mailboxes as well as unsubscribe from all the newsletters that I don’t read anymore / tempt me too much to spend on stuff I don’t need and clean up the folders on my personal and work laptops.
SELF – CARE AND RELAXING
Autumn/Winter months in the UK are glum and wet. We do get occasional snow but where we live it happens very rarely. It certainly affects how I feel and even with best plans and intentions, it is hard to remain totally focused on your goals. Some days, I just don’t stick to certain plans or routine with the kids and we do things that make us feel good. It will mean a long Netflix movie with some treats, long, muddy walks or just a walk all by myself with a podcast or a call to a friend. Sometimes, that’s all I need to re-set and get back on track.
So, that’s me. I’d love to know how you will be preparing yourself for the new year.
There is no better way to get into the festive spirit than decorate your tree, dress your house in loads of twinkle lights and bake gingerbread cookies. I used to use a different gingerbread recipe each year (thanks Google!) with mixed results, until I found this simple recipe on one of the BBC websites. This gingerbread recipe was so good it ended up in my recipe binder (very old school) and I have been making them with my boys each year.
There are few things worth mentioning before you get started:
The recipe will produce around 20 cookies, although all depends on what size and shapes you use. During our recent bake off we ended up with well over 25 cookies.
You can use food processor (as this recipe suggests) but if you don’t have one, you can simply work the flour and butter in your hands until the texture resembles fine crumbs and then follow the rest of the recipe.
DON’T SKIP refrigerating the dough as it will help to cookies keep shape whilst cutting and baking.
You can double up the recipe and either refrigerate the dough for up to 2 days or freeze for up to 3 months.
Cookies keep well in airtight container for up to 5 days without loosing their cruch – if they ever last that long! 🙂 and once decorated they make a great gift for friends, family and neighbours!
If you are really not a fan of ginger flavour you can add less ground ginger (1 tsp) or skip it all together and replace it with either all spice/nutmeg, increasing cinammon ratio or add vanilla extract (1-2 tsp) to your egg & golden syrup mixture – possibilities are endless 🙂
Please let me know either here or over on my Instagram @frugally_balanced if you decide to make them.
INGREDIENTS:
350g plain flour plus extra for rolling out
1 tsp bicarbonate soda
2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinammon
125g butter
175g light soft brown sugar
1 medium egg
4 tbsp golden syrup
writing icing / sprinkles
METHOD:
Sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda, ginger and cinnamon and pour into the bowl of a food processor. Add the butter and blend until the mix looks like breadcrumbs. Add the sugar and mix together.
In a separate bowl beat the egg and golden syrup add to the dry ingredients and pulse until the mixture clumps together. Tip the dough out, knead briefly until smooth. If the dough is sticky add dusting of flour until the dough becomes smooth.
Wrap the dough in cling film and leave to chill in the fridge for 15 minutes.
Preheat the oven to 180C/160C Fan/Gas 4. Line two baking trays with greaseproof paper.
Roll the dough out to a 0.5 cm thickness (£1 coin thickness) on a lightly floured surface. Using cutters, cut out the gingerbread men shapes and place on the baking tray, leaving a gap between them.
Bake for 12–15 minutes, or until lightly golden-brown.
Move to a wire rack to finish cooling.
When completely cool, decorate with icing / writing icing.
The mornings are dark and gloomy. When I finish my day job (in my home office currently), it’s pitch black and the other day I finally gave in and switched the heating on. Hot drinks are on rotation and comforting & hearty dishes made way into our meal plans. Autumn or even winter is well and truly upon us, and I suppose this year I have been struggling to adjust to change of seasons more than years before. Add to it a global pandemic along with another lockdown and I have truly caught some winter blues…
Despite some restrictions, we had a great summer, and it was hard to go from shorts and t-shirts to raincoats and wellies but the last couple of weeks have been particularly hard. Dark, wet and gloomy.
Of course, there is sure cosiness about Autumn, and I know some people jump with joy when Pumpkin Spiced Latte season begins.
However, I could not help but feel a little bit under the weather and lacked the enthusiasm for all those autumnal vibes. Last year we did quite a lot of season-themed crafting, hunted for acorns and conquers. This year I put the effort in to repeat that or even do more but found it hard to get up and go for some reason.
That’s how I came up with an idea for this post. I decided the other day that unless I make some changes, the winter blues will take over.
MAKE YOUR HOME COSY :: RE-DECORATE
As we naturally spend more time indoors during winter months (and even more this year), I like my surroundings to be cosier and inviting. In the summer I concentrate on the garden and the kitchen/dining as that’s where we mostly spend our time. In winter months my focus shifts to the living room and the bedrooms.
We have just refreshed the walls to a soft grey colour, and I will be adding some warm yellow or orange accessories, such as pillows, a couple of throws and blankets to brighten the space a little. Soft lighting as well as twinkle lights make all the difference when suddenly at 3pm it gets darker and darker. House plants will also make the room look fresher – I’m not green fingered, however noticed how plants brighten up the space and also learning about how to look after them keeps us busy. There is certain joy coming out of not killing a plant but also seeing new leaves appearing.
Lastly, what would autumn and winter be without candles? I already have some Woodwick candles which give out amazing smell as well as crackle noise which sounds like a log fire. Very cosy…
It is all well and good to be cosy indoors, and I would love to hibernate throughout winter months. It is also essential to get out and make the most of the daylight. Having two little boys, who need to burn some energy during the day is enough for me to get out and go but I know that if it weren’t for them, I would probably be a hermit during winter. I love warmth too much.
Also, working from home means that I’ve noticed I move less and going out makes such a difference to our mood as well as productivity.
I have learned that there is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing!
Thanks to the first lockdown we have discovered great walking paths a stone throw away from our house and every time we go out we manage to see and find something new. It made us appreciate a lot more where we live and make the most of it.
And of course, nothing beats a cup of hot chocolate or lemon tea after being out in the cold.
HAVE A SPRING CLEAN
I’ve noticed, that a lot of my irritability and bad mood came from cluttered space. I used to keep hold of things just in case and the more I gathered the more overwhelming it felt. I tend to declutter every 2-3 months and either donate stuff or sell them on Ebay / Facebook Marketplace. It’s amazing how much better you can function in a less cluttered space and also tidying up takes half the time.
TAKE UP A NEW HOBBY
It’s all too easy to come home, do your chores, have dinner and park in front of TV binging on Netflix – believe me I know! I am partial to a good crime drama. I set up this blog as a hobby a while back as I wanted to write, learn all the stuff that involve blogging and it was an obvious choice. Setting up a blog is very easy. Once you know what you want your blog to be about there is a whole host of things to learn, starting from setting up themes, social accounts, managing social media to promoting what you write – it has kept me very busy :). This also made me realise that I lost passion for my current career path and potentially want to do something completely different. You never know where your little hobby may lead you.
I love cooking and experimenting in the kitchen. I certainly do more of that in autumn/winter than summer months. Baking is easy, cheap and if you have little ones you can involve them as well.
Eat the season! This is the time when slow cookers come in full force and our family embrace soups, crumbles, stews and curries. I love collecting recipes and then trying them out depending on the season. I already have a folder full of what I would like to cook this winter.
Other things that can make those longer evening more interesting are crocheting, knitting, learning a new language, taking up Yoga (my recent favourte), Pilates or starting a new workout plan – You Tube is full of fitness videos and you can choose whichever activity suits you.
It sounds cliche and somehow strange as we have spent most of this year together, with homeschooling and working from home. Between maths and a Zoom meeting there wasn’t that much of a quality time. We spent as much of the summer outdoors as we could and with shorter days and restrictions due to lockdown in place, evenings seem longer. Since seeing your family and friends is somehow restricted we have done a lot of virtual meets and our eldest also plays some Battleship games with his friends over zoom.
We are making the most of all the board games accumulated over the years and the 5 year old seems to be beating us all at Ludo, Checkers and most of his Orchard games. Those longer winter evenings are perfect for movie nights, so we try to have one every now and then – homemade popcorn and some other snacks are a must.
MAKE PLANS
Currently it is hard to plan anything too far ahead but planning something to look forward to, doing research and even plotting next year holiday makes me a little bit excited. It’s nothing extravagant, only a staycation but keeps me going. We tend to focus on one big holiday during summer, which gives us plenty of time to research the place, things we want to see & do. Then we usually break it down to half – term holidays and Christmas break when we can go and visit some places and people we don’t get to see that often. We don’t know what 2021 brings but even if it is daydreaming at the moment it makes those long, cold nights a bit more bearable.
DON’T FORGET ABOUT YOURSELF
With our life being constantly busy (even in lockdown) I forget to make time for self-care and making sure I re-charge the batteries. I have been feeling so overwhelmed running from one place to another, looking after everyone else that at some point I forgot about myself. I realised I caught winter blues – I felt slow and unmotivated but now I am determined more than ever to carve out some “me time” and make sure I relax.
I now make sure that I have a nice relaxing bath once in a while, take more than five minutes to do my nails, sit with a face mask on while reading a book I was meant to read months ago and never got to it, journal and have an early night. It’s not much but some of those things put a smile on my face, don’t cost the earth and make me feel a lot better about myself.
What do you do to cope with the winter blues? Please do share them in the comments below!
If you liked this post or thought it could inspire someone, share it or like it.
Imagine you sit with a glass of mulled wine snuggled under a blanket, watching one of the Christmas movie classics. It’s perfect. But what does it take to get to that relaxing stage? There is a lot of planning, shopping, cooking and generally running around…about four weeks of it. Every year, you think you can make Christmas better than last year and every year the preparations seems to be a lot more stressful. This year brings its own challenges but we are still hoping we can make it special.
As it gets closer to the 25th I usually feel increasingly tired and less likely to actually enjoy the festivities. There are work deadlines, school activities (this year all mostly virtual) and the usual making sure everything is in order. Last year was an improvement on the year before, minus the pandemic, and so with that in mind I thought I would let you know how I go about planning my holiday season without too much stress.
PLAN, PLAN, PLAN
It won’t be a discovery of the year if I tell you that the first thing to do is to plan everything. Not only the shopping but also the meals, the gifts and activities. I always laughed at my mum, who had scraps of paper everywhere with shopping lists, lists to do, even scribbling down what she bought and how much she paid. I am not laughing now, as it is the best way to organise yourself, not feel overwhelmed but in control before you realise you overspend or double booked yourself for some festive celebrations, on top of some chores (yes, I did that!)
Dedicate specific days for cleaning, shopping, tree / home decorating, making food that can be prepped in advance, seeing friends and family (where possible, as we still don’t know how things pan out in December). Having it all written down always gives me a clear idea what can be done when and what can be completely given a miss.
PERFECT DOESN’T EXIST
Well, it does…in cheesy Christmas Movies 🙂 At some point I had to let go and forget that Christmas isn’t about perfect gifts, decorations or perfectly baked gingerbread reindeers. I had to let go of perfectly clean house and creating dishes that will be half eaten but look pretty. I have two boys who are also fussy eaters. Until their taste buds can appreciate a bit more imaginative foods, we are stuck with tradition and that’s fine for now. As we are a pretty busy family, for us it’s all about spending quality time together.
MAKE YOUR LIFE EASIER
When your Christmas food shopping list is complete, throw in some items with your weekly shops and tick them off. Don’t forget about some extra items for a food bank if possible. Financially, you will hardly feel it and if they are items with long “use by” date or frozen it means you will have them ready.
If you don’t mind on-line grocery shopping, a lot of them have got introductory offers and it is so much easier than braving the shops, finding parking spaces, battling with a toddler who refuses to sit in a trolley and then spending more than anticipated.
Whatever can be made in advance and stored / frozen – do it. However, if you don’t fancy cooking or can’t face it, see whether you can order a Christmas Dinner delivered to your home. There are a lot of local cafe’s and independent businesses who will be trying to make up for lost revenue during this pandemic and expanding their offer with Christmas Dinner offerings. Also, most major supermarkets offer some sort of festive menu and once it’s ordered you don’t have to worry about it.
I don’t do a big clean in one day. I try to divide bigger tasks into small chunks and I don’t go after every single nook and cranny (that’s reserved for big spring clean). I also try and delegate cleaning tasks, so far only to my husband, but it means I am not the only one doing everything.
DON’T PANIC BUY + STICK TO BUDGET
I was guilty of that in the past. Poor planning, no shopping lists and I was out shopping a couple of days before Christmas like there was no tomorrow. Often it’s hard to resist – another cheeseboard, festive biscuits, snacks and drinks. You are also bombarded with offers, hard to resist offers and so you end up with surplus of gifts, decorations and food that won’t probably be eaten and used.
Armed with your shopping lists, all planned ahead and knowing how much you CAN spend you will have that weird feeling of satisfaction that you managed to resist all of those last minute buys. Often when I got home I forgot I even wanted those extra bits.
LET GO
Come December and everyone is busy, however you don’t have to do everything at once as you will end up stressed out and with a feeling that bu doing one thing you missed out on another. See what works for you and your family, but don’t feel under pressure you need to do everything that you are potentially invited to. You do you.
RELAX
Even if it means 15 minutes all by yourself to gather your thoughts, a short walk, a pampering bath, or having your favourite drink with a book or magazine. It’s extremely important amongst all that planning and prepping to look after yourself as you can’t pour from an empty glass. I feel much better after taking some time off and feel happy to get back into ticking off the to-do list again the next day.
The run up to Christmas can be stressful but can be enjoyable at the same time. After all it’s not only the day of 25th December that we create memories. It is the month of preparations and anticipation for the big day that the little people (and us) also remember. It is the time that new memories and also sometimes new traditions are created. Nothing will ever be perfect, I will probably not tick all of the things off my to-do list, boys will not keep the house clean & tidy but that’s ok, I won’t stress about it (well, I will try my hardest:))
I am happy that we all will be spending some quality time together and enjoying some delicious food, even if it’s not all perfectly home – made.
I’ve also created two Gift Planning Printables which you can download for free! Don’t let the holiday stress get to you this year and have everything in check.
I am curious to find out whether you have any tips for stress free holiday preparations?
Please do share them in the comments below!
If you liked this post or thought it could inspire someone, share it or like it.
One of the main New Year resolutions for almost everyone is to either go on a diet and lose the Christmas / New Year bloat or introduce some healthier food into their diet. I know, from my own experience that once I know I am on a diet, I am constantly hungry and can eat anything in my sight!
So this year, I haven’t made any food or fitness related New Year’s resolutions as I knew deep down that I would not keep them. I didn’t want to start another diet. My aim was to change my eating habits and with a bit of luck, make sure that as a family we all eat a little bit better.
It is worth mentioning that those are my Healthy Eating habits and I am not a trained nutritionist or dietician. However, I have noticed a change in the way I am eating and feeling, hence I decided to share this on my blog. I haven’t re-invented the wheel. Everything is fairly simple and it’s almost like going back to basics. I still have some work to do on a pair of little fussy eaters, but it’s work in progress 🙂 Let’s start….
1 – Eating Regularly
This is key. Since going back to work full time with two kids, I basically skipped breakfast or grabbed a pastry with a hot flask of coffee. It was consumed in the car, en route to the office. Between getting to the office and lunch I would have 3 snacks and I would still be starving just before lunch, which meant I mostly overate at lunch as well. Feeling sluggish up until 3pm and then being ready for a nap did not help when I had to be alert for few more hours. No wonder the weight was creeping up and I was feeling more and more exhausted.
There are different theories about how many meals per day you should have but for me 5 every 3-4 hours work best. I make sure my breakfast fuels me for the first part of the day, followed by a small snack, lunch which consists of carbs, fats and proteins, then another snack and a light dinner. This sort of pattern makes my metabolism work (hopefully) and I don’t feel like I need to overeat at meal-times. I eat regularly when I am hungry and not when the time comes.
This brings me to another the next point….
2 – Meal Planning & Food Diary
I told you I won’t be re-inventing the wheel. Meal Planning helps me with not having to go out and buy a dried out sandwich for £4, keeps food waste to the minimum and cost of shopping under control. I don’t have a strict day-by-day food menu but I plan what meals we will eat each week and make a note of that in my notebook along with a shopping list. I don’t have a sophisticated Meal Planner. Instead, it is a chunky notebook with all my other to-do lists, shopping lists, etc as I like keeping everything in one place.
This is an example of one of the pages for my meal planning for the week. I know what meals we are having and depending on time and what we fancy we just cook from the list below. A copy of that list is on the fridge as well, so my husband knows what’s on the menu for the week.
It cancels this boring, everyday question “what do you want for dinner tonight?”, reduces waste, cost of our shopping and we make healthier choices.
The evening meals / lunches shuffle between the days but it means I buy what we actually need and resist the temptation of getting a take – out. There is no excuse if there is food in the fridge/freezer. Also, I do like the view of 2-3 boxes worth of lunches in the fridge for the week ahead.
Food Diary, on the other hand, helps me keeping track of what I eat, especially snacks.
3 – Batch Cooking
I am known for cooking for masses – there is no portion control. This comes handy when you are able to freeze those meals ready to be used later. At the beginning of the month, I really didn’t feel inspired to come up with fancy meals and I could not think of anything worse than standing over the cooker for more than 30 minutes. Luckily, apart from having some quick meal ideas in my repertoire, I also had portions of coconut dal, lentil spaghetti Bolognese sauce and a couple of curries in the freezer. It meant that I didn’t have to worry about slaving in the kitchen, buying ready meals or ordering takeaways and it meant we still had good, nutritious meals.
4 – Eliminate Bad Eating Habits
I stopped saying that “as of Monday I won’t eat chocolate” or “healthy eating starts Monday”. Guess what? Usually, on that Monday I felt like I could eat a horse…made out of chocolate. I would then find a hidden stash of chocolate or invade kids’ “treat box” and the whole “diet” goes out of the window with me feeling very, very guilty.
Small steps worked for me. I have never been the biggest fan of fizzy drinks, so they were eliminated first. Next, fast food chains. I don’t eat there often, I am not a fan so again it wasn’t that difficult to stop eating there altogether.
The hardest for me is to stop the urge for a sweet treat after dinner. I usually have a square of dark chocolate and although it does the trick it is still not Galaxy 😦
I hate feeling deprived and same goes for food. Everything is good in moderation and since I don’t crave sweet stuff as much as I used to I much prefer to bake something at home. This way I know what I put in it and enjoy it thoroughly.
5 – Drink Water
This is so obvious, however even I don’t sometimes remember to drink it. Weekends are probably the worst for my water intake and I love my hot drinks way more. We should aim for 1,5 – 2 litres of water every day and there are days when I find it hard to get it in me. Luckily herbal teas also count (thankfully!), so I top up with some herbal infusions (ginger & lemon, flavoured Green Teas) and in the summer I like to infuse my water bottle with some fruit.
6 – Turn – Up Your Metabolism
I aim to start my day with a cup of warm water with lemon (and honey some days) – this will wake your digestive system up and make it work better throughout the day. Sometimes, when I need a change I swap lemons for apple cider vinegar (it is acquired taste). I also make sure I have my breakfast within an hour of getting up. This was a challenge and usually having overnight oats in the fridge which can be heated in the microwave and topped up with any fruit or nuts does the trick. That way I have breakfast on the go whilst I get ready for work.
7 – Move
This has been the most challenging part and one that I am still trying to be consistent with. These days you don’t need an expensive gym membership and You Tube is full of resources. I aim for 2-3 HIIT ( High Intensity Interval Training) Sessions per week but I’ll be honest I need to fight an internal battle to make myself do it sometimes. It’s winter, the day was long & stressful, kids didn’t cooperate at bedtime – there are countless excuses. However, once it’s done I feel much better.
I also track my steps using a mobile app and that seems to add up, especially if I end up on a brisk lunchtime walk.
So this is it. It helped me to gather everything that I have put into practice since the beginning of the year and hopefully, it will also be useful to you.
Throughout the process, I needed to remind myself what motivated me to make those changes (wanting to go back to pre-pregnancy weight) and then put those changes into practice so they won’t become a temporary fix.
What are your tricks or habits that help you stay on track? Please do share them in the comments below!
If you liked this post or thought it could inspire someone, please feel free to share it or like it.
This green pea soup recipe has to be the quickest and cheapest I've made. In winter I can live on soups all the time and they are the best to batch cook for week worth of work lunches. This recipe is fresh, filling, cheap and quick as well as Slimming World friendly 🙂
Ingredients
1 medium potato, chopped
500g bag of frozen green peas
350ml hot vegetable or chicken stock
pepper to taste
chilli flakes (optional)
Directions
In a medium pan, place the chopped potato in hot vegetable or chicken stock and let it cook until soft (about 12-15 minutes).
When the potato is cooked, add the frozen peas and wait until boiling point.
At this stage, you don’t want to overboil your peas. I still like slight crunch to them, therefore I just switch the gas off when potatoes and peas reach boiling point.
Blend it in the hand blender to your liking, season to taste.
I loved sprinkling some extra chilli flakes on top.
Whilst finishing off the mince pies and chocolates, I am also making plans for 2018 and de-cluttering the house. Room by room.
I don’t think I will reach a minimalist space with two boys for quite a while yet but I can at least try
The amount of “stuff” we seem to accumulate amazes me each time I do a good clear out. Each and every time I make a promise to myself to buy things we really need but here we are again….
I thought I would share with you stuff that I waved goodbye to in the last few days.
I always make three piles – For Sale, To Donate, Bin.
➡️CLOTHES THAT NO LONGER FIT – I still found some pre-pregnancy clothes from years back and stuff that I am hoping to pair up with something. My rule now is that if I haven’t worn it in the last 12 months – it’s out and making space for something new!
➡️OLD MAGAZINES – despite not buying hardly any magazines this year, I’ve still got a little pile. If I haven’t managed to sit down with them yet, don’t think it will happen anytime soon.
➡️ OUT OF DATE MAKE-UP / SKINCARE / TRAVEL SIZE TOILETRIES – not very safe to use
➡️ DAMAGED / UNWANTED JEWELLERY / HAIR ACCESSORIES that have seen better days
➡️ KITCHEN UTENSILS (doubles / well used items)
➡️ PANS AND POTS – especially the non-stick ones which are scratched and not healthy to use. I was amazed at what I found!
➡️OUT OF DATE SAUCES / GRAINS, etc. that I never got around to using.
➡️ TOYS – usually I get rid of them every few months and still found some that we could donate.
➡️TUPPEWARE – I ❤️ my Tupperware! There were so many mismatched items in my Tupperware drawer – I struggled to shut it every time – I don’t anymore.
➡️ OLD TOWELS & BEDDING – those can be donated to a local animal shelter, especially in winter I’m sure they will appreciate it.
➡️ MANUALS for stuff we no longer have / OLD INVOICES / BILLS / NOTEBOOKS / STATIONARY that’s no good for anything
➡️ FILES and PICTURES on your PC that I no longer needed. I find that every 6 months I need to do a digital de-clutter, otherwise we end up with duplicates of pictures, files and documents we won’t use, random excel spreadsheets, etc.
It’s a pretty long list but once I got going it felt so good taking all that stuff out of the house.
Have you embarked on a big de-clutter before the year ends or just when 2018 has started?
Frugally Balanced 