Back after 5 years - still knitting and struggling with the food issues ! Heading to a yarn show at Newbury race course this weekend and taking part in some workshops there. More on that to follow- watch this space

'been a long time since we rock and rolled' but I need to do something ! I had lost 4 stone but am back to just over 3 stone so I have signed up to a challenge to lose a stone in a month! I want to use this as inspiration with recipes and tips.
Breakfast - 1 brown roll with bacon and tomato

Knitting.... at last you say!

Whilst sitting here waiting for the log in page to load and the kettle to boil I happened to read the first couple of lines of the last post and thought ...... how wonderful would it be to have a sunlight STImulating bulb.... you turn it on and out comes the sun!! ( I know I scare myself sometimes, please don't phone the men in white coats, I rang them last week and asked if anyone was in room 47. Their reply was "no" ..... " Oh good" I exclaimed " I've escaped!!" )

Ok onto the knitting which has been a constant throughout my absence on here. You can now find me on that amazingly time consuming place Ravelry. I am very pleased to say that after months of encouragement and ..... well yes nagging, my daughter is now knitting again. The reason is that Marvellous Maggie took up knitting ( mother's don't inspire daughters enough to knit it seems !) here is the scene on my sofa 2 weeks ago.

Needless to say I didn't get very much knitting done at all ( I have however made up for it since!!)

I have been making a pair of river rapid socks but found that it wasn't something that I could just sit and do mindlessly so, after reading many other peoples posts on Ravelry about having both a challenging and a very simple project on the needles at the same time I thought I would do that. I don't usually like to have so many projects on the needles, preferring to work on one at a time usually but this did satisfy the different knitting urges I had and seemed to work well.

River Rapid socks ( a sock bug pattern)
The plain old sock ... made with machine washable wool as all my lovely wool socks keep shrinking even when handwashed ... boo hoo


I made a pair of mittens for my daughter at Christmas. My sister, who is disabled and has arthritis in her hands asked for a pair so I am now knitting a third project .... well tecnically now a second as I have just finished the plain old socks!

The return ...

After a considerable absence I am back. Don't ask what happened ...the dreaded Winter ! Am I the only one who gets down through those long dark months? This year, I swear I am buying sunlight simulating bulbs. Feeling much better now thought I love light, damn it I need light.

Has the tide turned? I have recently found several sites accepting and even celebrating the larger form, hurray!! Celebrities are goo goo eyed over their larger wives who have not bowed to pressure to become 'fashionably thin' . I have recently seen photo's of Pierce Brosnan who is obviously loving his wife's curves, and am beginning to believe my husband when he tells me he really doesn't find stick's attractive.( I should have put that he finds my body attractive .... still hard to say !) Why, because we are larger do we instantly think we are less worthy and unnatractive? Well today I feel attractive and yes, I am large but boy I wouldn't swap my breasts or curves for anything? If losing weight means losing my curvy-ess (is that a word?) then I will stay larger. I know that I will never be thin and that it wouldn't suit me, I also know health wise I need to lose a little weight just for comfort etc but i am not aspiring to become a size 14.

Sites that I have found refreshing and inspiring recently include

Too Fat For Fashion


We're here. We're fat. Get used to it - This Britain, UK - The Independent

http://www.loveyourbody.org/ Check out other parts of the site expecially adios barbie.

Oh and you should definately watch this gorgeous babe and her 'fat rant' Fantastic!!!

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=yUTJQIBI1oA&eurl=http://www.adiosbarbie.com/

Now don't you dare laugh!

Oh go on then ... just a little bit ( I know I did!)

We had such a lovely day out by the side of the road in Huntingdon. We set out on our journey at about 10.30 am ... please take note of the time.

The traffic wasn't too bad ... a bit heavy .... but soon we came across lots and lots of accidents and moved very slowly. My poor little car overheated, the services were chocca!!! and I mean CHOCCA! But we pulled off ... cooled down and set off again .... the traffic had cleared ... well a bit and we drove for about 10 miles when the car started to make a funny noise so we pulled over .....this was 4 hours after setting off and we had only done 80 miles. Grrrr we won't go into all the annoying and niggly details but we sat and waited for 3 hours for the RAC to come.

We waited
And waited
and waited ... nice toilet facilities in the parking bay!!

Well eventually after a mix up and 3 hours the lovely RAC man turned up. The head gasket had gone. He towed us to some services where ...... you guessed it .... we waited and waited .... oh yes and .... waited to be towed. At 9.30 pm the lovely man came and loaded the car onto the flat bed truck and ....hip hip ...... we were off! Well for a while anyway.... a couple of miles down the road the truck pulls over ....it's indicator light wasn't working..... so we waited....
and waited ....is it friday the 13th?
and waited ..... you get the picture don't you..... we arrived at my Dad's in Plumstead at about 12.30

Back soon

I'm off too Yorkshire for a few days so you have a reprieve!! Have a good bank holiday weekend.

Watch this space.....

this is soooo funny, I cried when I saw it at the cinema I had to share it with you!

to market to market to buy .... well who knows!

for some reason my heart/head (whichever is controlling my feelings ...which feels like my stomach at the moment with nerves) is stopping me from continuing with my next session. I know that for me, the fear of something new is very strong. There are times when I would happily wallow in my misery ....well that's a bit strong ...but happily wallow in whatever I am in instead of facing up to things ...after all it is familiar.

As each day has passed this week I have felt worse ... I know what this is .. .. it is the fear of starting a new job ...ridiculous eh but it is soooo strong it is depleting my energy and resistance and I feel like i am on that slippery slope into a mild depression! My post today therefore is to pull my self out of this and make a firm plan. I am this morning, taking my father out for a bit and then when I arrive home I am going to continue to do the next cbt and give myself a damn good talking too. After all I am in charge here ( I hope!!)

Phew just let me catch my breath …. Had a very busy weekend which included a lovely walk. This afternoon I am going to meet a couple of friends for a drink and a gossip!

Ok now to get down to the serious stuff! This blog is after all about my life and my obsession with food, which I have to say has been in evidence much less over the past couple of weeks which has led me to draw certain conclusions.

• I am obsessed with food and this is not a conscious fat persons greedy obsession but an illness much like drug addiction or alcoholism.
• I eat to make myself forget, feel happy and to combat stress and boredom.
• Whilst on holiday recently I ate a good breakfast and WAS OFTEN NOT HUNGRY OR THINKING OF FOOD for most of the rest of the day! Which led me to think about the boredom and anxiety I feel at home. My conclusion is that I definitely need to continue with the cbt and change my attitudes and behaviour.
• I love cooking and when I am cooking good wholesome fresh food, I eat much more sensibly and feel much more satisfied.
• I am becoming very concerned ( down right pissed off) at the media and public perception/ prejudice against larger members of the community. There has been an awful lot in the press recently from fat people just being greedy, to them costing the nhs more to the ‘ who ate all the pies comments’ I rarely eat pies and I bet my general diet is a lot more healthy than many thin ‘normal looking people’.

My plan of action is now to continue with my therapy and tackle smaller chunks of my problems rather than try to change every thing at once. I don’t necessarily think that dieting is the answer for me …. I strongly believe that eating a healthy balanced diet and reducing my portion sizes is the answer for me. I am aware that I will have good days and bad days and hope that I will not blow the whole day or week because I succumb to temptation occasionally. I also firmly believe that a balanced diet does not mean depriving oneself of the odd treat, just making sensible choices and ensuring a balance.

Nuff said! Have a good day.

Mad kids and Englishmen........

I have already shown you how mad my animals are .... I wonder where they get it from? Just look at what my 'children' did to Smeagol the other day .... for all you animal lovers out there .... he wasn't at all worried about wearing his glittering tiara and kept it on for some time!!Archie definately knows how to make himself very comfortable ..... this is his usual position ...when allowed to get away with being on the couch....it really is a hard life being a dog!!
And take a look at what came in the post the other day ...which reminds me I must send an email to say thank you ..... this is the lace weight wool that I won in a competition !!
I have had several good days recently followed by one low day .... I have not completed any more cbt units but must do another this week ... I have however been thinking a lot and have come to several conclusions which I will post soon ....well as soon as they are clearer in my head. I leave you tonight with further proof that it is indeed a dogs life !!

This is Archie laying .... very comfortably on all of the cushions on the sofa!

A change is as good as a rest !!

Well whoever thought up that saying has never been on holiday with my family!! We always have very busy, active holidays...but oh boy do we enjoy ourselves.




We stayed at a lovely place in Bransgore and had a 2 bedroom chalet.... guess who , being the only female in the group got to sleep on a matress on the floor and even that wasn't sacred!!

This is my bed as soon as it was made!! It's a dog's life!! Poor old Archie really doesn/t like going away on holiday, he seems to think that he is going to be left with another family and hardly ate all week. When we were packing up the car to come home, he sat in the car and wouldn't budge, .... just to make sure that we didn't forget him!

My family have always been keen on fishing, a sport that I only recently took up. I have to say that I found it upsettling when I was younger and saw the fishermen killing the fish they had caught so that they could take them home to eat them. I am however pleased to say that I only catch them, photgraph them and throw them back. This was the first big fish I caught, not only was it my first, but it was also my first on a proper rod and reel. I usually fish with a pole and just catch tiddlers.

We found a lovely place called Mudeford Quay where we took the boys crabbing for the first time! Poor little things, they have been sooooo deprived all their lives. We did catch lots of crabs though and the place was absolutely beautiful. We were very lucky with the weather and only had one day of torrential rain. On the Friday before we returned home I managed to book the ' men' on a mackerel fishing trip for 2 hours. Again the weather was fantastic, and having put up with 4 males (3 human.... well allegedly and one doggy) all week, I was looking forward to a couple of hours peace and quiet to read and /or knit on the quay side. Unfortunately they only caught 3 fish on the whole boat but the boys said they enjoyed it anyway. Our trip home was much better than our outward trip which took us a whopping 71/2 hours to get there....to put this into contest it only took 2 1/2 to get back!

I am fairly ashamed to say that I was soooo busy that I didn't really have much time for knitting on holiday. I did start on the monkey's but somehow managed to mess them up ...so moved onto something simpler and am now knitting the Christmas present socks for Helen, which I have to say are looking very good but for obvious reasons I can't post a pic!! I will however show you a pic of my lovely parcels that arrived this weekI also received a lovely skein winder which I had ordered from ebay and which works wonderfully and stops the family moaning about having to lend me their arms for 10 mins.

Sssshh I will say this only once!

Well I have spent all day washing and ironing and packing for the holiday and now I am knackered!!

I did however take some time out to join a rather villainous gang of kidnappers and have volunteered to 'watch over the kidnapee' I wonder what percentage of the ransom is mine???

I haven't had chance to knit today ... see above

Well have fun without me .... I am sure I will!

My current obsession with blogs.....

has meant that I have been reading many many blogs lately .... in fact I just can't get enough of them ... but the downside of this is that I re-read my own blog and found that it is in fact PANTS!! Clearly I am not a writer. How do people like Cara at January one and the amazing Pioneer woman ( only discovered her today ) write sooooo eloquently? It really is a pleasure to read, they also seem to have such interesting lives which of course gives them many many interesting things to write about. mmmmmm off to ponder my new blog's excistence... oh and walk Archie but this time with my trousers on the right way round!

Note to self:- Make sure you breathe and take the time to read through the text slowly before posting!

Back to front !

'The woods are lovely dark and deep, but I have promises to keep..... '

Got up feeling pretty crappy this morning, so decided to do the next step on the cbt programme and feel as though I have made some real progress! The day started to feel better so I got dressed and went to the post office and took Archie for a walk, only when I reached the woods I suddenly realised I had rushed so much that I had put my trousers on back to front !!! I pulled my top down as far as I could and shot through the woods at double speed!! I wonder what the people behind me at the post office thought!!

We did however have a lovely walk through the woods, the sun was shining through the trees but the woods were lovely and cool. Archie found a nice big puddle and lay down in it !!

The rest of the day was much better ...oh and I remembered to change my trousers back !

At last the socks are finished!! I am now working on a pair of monkeys in some lovely wool I purchased from Etsy.

Weyhey ... ouch!!

Today has been a very mixed day, full of ups and downs! I had to go for a blood test this morning ...just routine.... and the nurse had quite a lot of trouble finding a vein.... and when she found it it wouldn't flow so she had to 'dig around a bit' ...her words not mine, but boy did I feel it and now I have a lovely purple arm!!

I did have a 45 minute wait at the hospital and have now nearly finished my socks ( I had hoped to finish and post a picture tonight but they are not quite cooked yet!!)

I also received a lovely letter ...... which we won't go into but ..... urrrgggghhhh neighbours !! So I received this frustrating and annoying letter and managed to let it bother me for some time today and then I decided to apply some of the cbt I learnt. So I thought about how I reacted, analysed my feelings and didn't know what to do next !! lol I now need to look at how to deal with my feelings/change my reactions but it was a breakthrough.

I went to see the new Harry Potter film today and thoroughly enjoyed it. I am afraid I got a little bored in the last one! Of course as soon as I returned home ( and fed the family) I had to check my email and What a surprise! I won a competition. I entered, just for fun really, a competition on a blog site I recently discovered, Cattywampus . The prize is some lovely lace weight wool! Wow now I will have to try knitting something Lacy! Thanks Rachael

Happy happy happy.... my new Addi's have just arrived .... hopefully no more confusion about which needles to knit on.

About two weeks ago I decided to attempt to knit 2 socks on 2 circs ....wow ..... hard or what, but I stuck with it and finished my first pair. I am now on my second pair and have learnt that I have to cast on and knit several rows of the rib on each sock individually, and then transfer them onto the circular needles!! :o( But this seems to work for me :o)

My friend Michelle came round today and she has recently taken up knitting again so I shared some wool and needles with her.

I haven't had chance to complete the next part of the cbt therapy so far today, I think I am still digesting yesterday's session. I did start to have some negative thoughts about the new job I am starting in September but managed to banish them pretty quick. :o)

anyone for a quickie?

This is Charlie... who for some reason insists.... much to our annoyance ... . on sleeping on the tv!And this is the oh so mad Archie, whose hobbies include getting tangled up in my knitting, standing on the computer keyboard when I'm trying to type and generally just being mad!!

I am rushing around like a mad woman trying to tidy up because my friend is coming to visit, so this is just a very quick post to introduce 2 members of my family.

First post!!

This could be a very interesting journey! I discovered a cbt site and signed up today and completed the first session... with that in mind I decided to start a new blog! Hopefully it will record my ups and downs as well as life's general goings on... which ... I suppose is life's ups and downs. I decided to investigate the course after reading an article in the Sainsbury's Magazine. I have for some time been aware that I needed some sort of .... well help to get my life back on track and deal with some food issues. This always seems to become more evident during the school holidays when I have far too much time to think and around my birthday ! ( Yesterday)

Currently on the needles : a pair of socks with wool from The Natural Dye Studio (wow new to this .... first link!!) This wool was the sock club wool for June, which I have to say I wasn't keen on when it arrived but I absolutely love the more I knit.

I have already selected the wool I will take away on holiday next week!! I have a lovely pastel wool to make a pair of socks for Helen as a Christmas present and this months sock wool!

The lower wool is for Helen. I have just signed up for another 3 months with the sock club *( a birthday present from Dad and Helen... thank you!) Can't wait for August's sock club wool which should be here next week !