Saturday, 25 February 2017

New Year Resolutions Review week #8 : Two months in, two down !


Week two of the half term holidays and I really managed to make headway with some of my New Year resolutions and challenges. Two in particular - getting French and getting geocaching.

1. Get Fit(bitting) !
Last week, I hit my 10k steps target every single day, and them some. This week, I had a few light days because I took the kids to see Sing at the cinema and also spent a whole afternoon and the next morning marking, but on the other days, I did get out for some long walks geocaching ... even during Storm Doris (which was called Thomas in France). With two days at 16k steps, my daily average is still 11k and that includes today, which is only at 506 steps because at the time of writing, it's the morning and I'm still in bed ! I said I was focusing on steps, not weight, this year, but I weighed in today and I've lost 2kg since the start of the year, which is better than nothing !


2. Get cooking bookmarked recipes ! 
I've been cooking loads and working through loads of bookmarked recipes, but I don't think I've had time to blog about many of them yet. I found a box of Special K flakes in the back of the cupboard and got all old school, making some recipes that I remember from my childhood. We tried Lomo Saltado, a Peruvian beef stir fry that is served with both rice and chips. Next stop was South Africa - Cape Town tarts are a savoury omelette/muffin hybrid that are great fun to make and would be ideal for picnics and packed lunches. My totally inauthentic but delicious version of gumbo was great for using up odds and ends.


3. Get geocaching !
Last week, I placed my first 5 geocaches and loved seeing everyone going to find them and logging their comments. This inspired me to make some more - half of my glass and plastic recycling this week has been put aside for making geocaches ! - and the kids have been helping me head around town dropping them off in strategic locations - parks, statues, the old maternity hospital where Juliette and Sophie were born but has now closed down, .... I now have  eight caches out there and a few more ready to place. My travelbugs haven't been dropped off yet but they have already travelled 65km. And we fitted in some geocaching around the docks, taking my total finds from 205 to 207.

4. Get comping !
Again, no wins this week, even if I've been entering more than usual as I'm holiday. I'm still on track for one win a month though.
(January : 4 wins - £20 shopping voucher, Mr Lee's noodles, Ambrosia trifle glasses, set of 5 books; February : 1 win - prize for Galina )


5. Get reading !
 I finished reading Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn (click through for my review), taking my total to 6 books read, and I am now half way through Lucky Boy by Shanti Sekaran, which is a tale of a young  Mexican illegal immigrant whose baby is taken into foster care when she is put in detention, so he now has two totally devoted "mums" and, I guess, things will get complicated on her release.

6. Get FLYing !
We tidied up the play room (formerly known as Pierre's bedroom) and I had a good clearout in the kitchen, tidying and reorganising things.

8. Get bloggy housekeeping !
The googlebot put in another appearance and my stats do seem a bit higher on a day-to-day basis but I'll wait until next week to see how things look on a normal week, when I'm back to work and things are ticking over normally again. After my Klout score hitting an all-time low (53.37), it's bounced back up to 54.14 but I still have a way to go to get back to my 90 day high (56.73) My statcounter rankings have stayed pretty much the same at A+/C-/C/C+ (overall B-).

9. Get French !
It's in the post ! All I can do now is sit back and wait !

What about you? Have you set yourself any targets, challenges or new year's resolutions this year?

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