I cannot believe it is only ten past 7! All 3 children are washed, fed and dressed and we don't have to leave for school until just after 8, the cleaning is done and my invoicing for my work today is already done. Am in super organised mode today.
I was outside a moment ago (letting the dogs down the garden) and its trying to snow?! I love the snow normally but after Decembers efforts - 3 inches of snow one day the entire country grinds to a stop, followed by no snow just ice and slush then a little bit more snow, I would prefer it to not snow at the moment.
A family friend rang me the other night to talk about renewable energy - and I admit it I learned something new. He works for a solar panel company and he wanted to see if my house was south facing, due to the Governments feed in tarriff the company he works for will install the solar panels on your roof for free. Being the cynical person I can be I wanted to know what the catch was. Apparently to get the solar panels for free your house (this applys to commercial buildings as well) needs to be south facing and must be able to accommodate at least a 3.5Kw system and must be willing to sign a lease agreement for the company to lease their roof for the next 25 years. The benefits of this is that although the company gets the feed in tarrif from the Government for all the energy going back into the grid the homeowner gets the rest of the free energy and therefore lowers their own personal heating bills. I am going to look into it further and see if my house is suitable - as far as I am concerned it would be a selling point for my property (if and when I sell) as who wouldn't want cheaper heating bills for their home!
Last night I was proved right in my obsession in double checking. I did a "tricky" property the other week, beautiful house but there were numerous improvements that the rdsap would not be able to calculate properly. So to make sure that my EPC was produced correctly and as accurately as possible I rang my accreditation company. This is my 4th year of being a DEA but I would rather ring and double, triple check than produce an incorrect EPC. After quite a bit of back and forth calls we came to a conclusion that would produce the most accurate EPC for the client. Last night made me very glad that I had done that as the client queried the result on the EPC - I managed to explain everything and because I had checked thoroughly I was confident and happy in my answers.
Off to get myself up and dressed ready for the walk to school (saving petrol and energy and hopefully working off a bit of the Christmas stodge!)
Showing posts with label walking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label walking. Show all posts
Wednesday, 26 January 2011
Tuesday, 25 January 2011
Austerity mum?
I read this morning that a lady had been writing a blog about tightening her belt, cutting costs and saving money during the current climate - only problem was she was writing this "creatively" as she actually lives in a beautiful 8 bedroom house which includes a ballroom -
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gxc4j1ZnMwlk_CYVjKYfxol0Kihg?docId=CNG.ae92b0aa2b694ca3182261c1f11bfc1a.781
Unfortunately as I write this I am not sitting a mini mansion in a lovely countryside retreat I am sitting in my "office"/4th bedroom/boxroom hoping more work will come in this week!
In all fairness it is getting increasingly difficult for the majority of people - negative equity, not able to remortgage, lack of work, overtime cuts, prices going up in the supermarkets and on petrol!
I try and work as much as I can, send out email marketing letters to estate and letting agents, walk everywhere possible - school run etc to reduce petrol costs, I even have one of those meters (that you plug in) in the kitchen telling me how much electricity I am using per minute - it really does help me remember to turn things off at the socket!
We are all having to tighten our belts and its not fun - but in a minute I am sticking the two youngest in their wellies and we are going into the garden so they can play/get filthy and I can sort out the veg patch and the greenhouse and see what I can start to sow ready for the summer months. I do actually like gardening, its relaxing, I get to see results fairly quickly and its really nice eating fresh tomatoes and cucumbers etc. It might not be much but planting garlic last year meant that we haven't had to buy any over 8 months and in these times any little helps.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gxc4j1ZnMwlk_CYVjKYfxol0Kihg?docId=CNG.ae92b0aa2b694ca3182261c1f11bfc1a.781
Unfortunately as I write this I am not sitting a mini mansion in a lovely countryside retreat I am sitting in my "office"/4th bedroom/boxroom hoping more work will come in this week!
In all fairness it is getting increasingly difficult for the majority of people - negative equity, not able to remortgage, lack of work, overtime cuts, prices going up in the supermarkets and on petrol!
I try and work as much as I can, send out email marketing letters to estate and letting agents, walk everywhere possible - school run etc to reduce petrol costs, I even have one of those meters (that you plug in) in the kitchen telling me how much electricity I am using per minute - it really does help me remember to turn things off at the socket!
We are all having to tighten our belts and its not fun - but in a minute I am sticking the two youngest in their wellies and we are going into the garden so they can play/get filthy and I can sort out the veg patch and the greenhouse and see what I can start to sow ready for the summer months. I do actually like gardening, its relaxing, I get to see results fairly quickly and its really nice eating fresh tomatoes and cucumbers etc. It might not be much but planting garlic last year meant that we haven't had to buy any over 8 months and in these times any little helps.
Monday, 15 November 2010
Its all my hard work.......
I have huffed and puffed my way up today to fetch my 3 yr old from playschool. I was walking for two reasons - one to save petrol/energy and two to improve my fitness.
After taking the dogs to agility class yesterday I was shattered, I woke up aching and had to force myself to do 10 minutes on the evil exercise bike/clothes hanger that lives in my conservatory just to loosen my muscles up.
When I was 17 I was slim - you could circle my waist with two hands, now you'd be lucky to circle my thigh with two hands! I have gotten unfit and fat - there I said it. I'm not beating about the bush I am telling it like it is, no polite phrasing such as slightly overweight, bubbly and chubby definately not I have gotten fat. Its been a long process and its took hard work - chinese, kebabs, snacking on chocolate, no exercise (or very little), no fruit, missing breakfast, eating too much late at night because I haven't eaten during the rest of the day........and its my fault.
So I'm not doing this as a new years resolution, I'm not doing this for anyone else I am going to do this for me -
1. eat healthy (not 1 stick of celery for lunch, but proper balanced meals)
2. exercise more
There is no need for fads I need to change my eating habits and make myself exercise more so that I can look in the mirror and like what I see, so that I can run an agility course without getting out of breath and run round after my children.
Before I go though I do want to say - I don't want to be a size 0 or even a size 8, I want to be a realistic HEALTHY weight for my height and build size 14 would be ideal.
After taking the dogs to agility class yesterday I was shattered, I woke up aching and had to force myself to do 10 minutes on the evil exercise bike/clothes hanger that lives in my conservatory just to loosen my muscles up.
When I was 17 I was slim - you could circle my waist with two hands, now you'd be lucky to circle my thigh with two hands! I have gotten unfit and fat - there I said it. I'm not beating about the bush I am telling it like it is, no polite phrasing such as slightly overweight, bubbly and chubby definately not I have gotten fat. Its been a long process and its took hard work - chinese, kebabs, snacking on chocolate, no exercise (or very little), no fruit, missing breakfast, eating too much late at night because I haven't eaten during the rest of the day........and its my fault.
So I'm not doing this as a new years resolution, I'm not doing this for anyone else I am going to do this for me -
1. eat healthy (not 1 stick of celery for lunch, but proper balanced meals)
2. exercise more
There is no need for fads I need to change my eating habits and make myself exercise more so that I can look in the mirror and like what I see, so that I can run an agility course without getting out of breath and run round after my children.
Before I go though I do want to say - I don't want to be a size 0 or even a size 8, I want to be a realistic HEALTHY weight for my height and build size 14 would be ideal.
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