What can you do right now, aside from bubble wrap?

photo by baboonâ„¢	via PhotoRee

Apologies in advance to any gardening enthusiasts who have have happened upon this post looking for hints and tips on sprucing their garden up. This IS about bush trimming but is probably not what you are looking for.

The trimming of the bush!

It’s the beginning of a new year and many of us have decided to ditch the crap and lose weight, becoming healthier as we go. After reading a post by Liz Jarvis about wanting to ditch the bigger knickers, I vowed to ditch the M&S belly grabbers and get into smaller and more lady-like knickers. The only problem with is, what do I do about the topiary?

I’m a Northern gal, it gets cold up in here in Yorkshire and I believe that the fuzz is there for a reason, it’s to keep us warm obviously. That said, there is a difference between warm and protected and looking like there is an escaped fur-ball on the loose in your granny pants.

What IS the “best” way to sort the shrub? I vividly remember someone telling me once about their Brazilian Wax appointment (we don’t talk any more, clearly we had nothing in common), and I’m told that you can indeed shape your urm bush topiary-style if you wish. What do you do? I’m quite happy as an established married woman to give myself a quick short back and sides with a razor but is it enough? What if my lady garden is no longer up to spec in the design department? Should I be shaping, tweezing, waxing and buffing?

More to the point, how does one know what is fashionable? I am not going to Google “how to shave my mary” because I am pretty sure my laptop will explode. I have never seen a tweet that goes “Hey guys, my bush is overgrown, what do I do?” so I’m guessing that is not the done thing to do do either. I know, I’ll do a post about it, that’s nice and discreet!

So come on ladies, what is the right way to spruce the bush?

I was always the one who got excited by a new school year when I was younger. Brand new sharp pencils, the smell of the new books and that first clean page on the exercise book. Apart from the fact that I don’t wear school skirts rolled up short or indulge in ridiculously heavy eye make-up any more, little has changed, I still love a new year!

Every January I lovingly unwrap the new calendar and fill in it and get the diary set up (this year it’s a Dodopad Pax – for a stationery tart such as myself, this is like heaven!). Then it’s money time!

I’m told money can’t buy you happiness. I’m sure it can’t, but being skint can make you pretty miserable too. After Kieran was born I gave up my well paid career to work from home. An income that disappeared overnight was a challenge and a half and taught me a lot about not only how to budget better and save but also about my attitudes towards money. Even now, with my income restored I’m still careful and hate waste.

I set myself a few tasks at the beginning of each year:

• Ring / contact all providers (ie gas/electric, phone/broadband/ insurances etc) and check I am on the correct / cheapest tariff / packages
• Adjust budget accordingly
• Use the new budget to update the standing order payments for savings.

Three simple steps when set me up financially. I do check tariff info throughout the year and when contacts expire but it’s important I start the year off properly.

Record keeping.

My business books are always kept up to date and I file my tax return in May every year (I like to get it out of the way). My household books are run the same way. I use free bookkeeping software to track my spends. Knowing whether or not you are keeping within your budget is important but looking closer can be helpful! Last year I looked back at my spends and realised I was doing a lot of top up shopping, despite doing a weekly shop. I was going mainly for fresh fruit and veg and while there I always managed to pick up some unneccesary items. Looking at this I decided to have a veg box delivered weekly and this has saved me a fortune.

This is just one example that shows how a bit of planning and organisation can make a big difference.

I enjoy my new page at the beginning of the year and getting organised. What do you do at the beginning of the year to start it off on the right foot?

I am not much of a resolution maker usually. Unless you count the one I make every year, since high school: to exercise more (or at all) and eat healthy. As 2011 came to a close, I couldn’t help but think that this should be the year I actually make, and stick to, some resolutions. The big resolution I wanted to make is unfortunately not really in my control, so I thought long and hard about the resolutions I can make that I can control and here’s what I came up with.

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This post is therefore not a list of “I will’s” but me taking 5 minutes to stop and think about the fab people I’ve come across in 2011. Social media is a poweful tool but if you use it in the spirit that it is intended ie socially you can get a lot out of it. I have interacted with many fabulous people this year, some I’ve been lucky enough to meet in person, some I might speak to on the phone or via video, and some I’ve tweeted with. These few really jump out at me so I wanted to introduce you.

People I am glad I’ve interacted with in 2011

Liz Jarvis – Liz has a wicked sense of humour, can be very witty and is one of the few people whose tweets, posts and the like I look forward to because I always get a lot out of them, be that a belly laugh or something to think about.  More importantly, Liz is the only other person I know who has watched and loved Green Fried Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe. This in itself makes her someone worth knowing in my book!

Helen Lindop. Cool, calm, collected, professional. Helen also has a wicked sense of humour! (No really, truly wicked!). Helen is my first port of call for all things business-like and the one I run things past because I know she’ll be honest yet constructive, despite perhaps wanting to say “What on earth…..?!”. Helen started off the year as a colleague of sorts and I now think of her as a friend.

Claire Lancaster – I love this gal! Always a pleasure to talk to, be it work-wise, or just general nattering, Claire is someone I’m very glad to have got to know better in 2011!! I love the way she writes and also that she doesn’t gloat when she beats me at WordsWithFriends which is very kind of her seeing as she does it so well. This year would have been missing something if it hadn’t had Claire in it!

Jay Mountford. Hugely talented photographer, someone who blogs purely for herself (the results of which being bloody fantastic posts that with either make you scream with laughter or sob into the sofa – but either way, you just couldn’t not keep reading!) and who has kicked my arse more than once this year. Jay doesn’t follow the crowd and is entirely herself all the time. I admire this. Advice from Jay (after kindly letting me whine on for far too long) has really turned things around for me. Love you woman!

There are of course many more and I have a mental list of people I am looking forward to getting to know better in 2012 (in a non-stalker way of course), but these four lovelies are the four I am infinitely glad to have got to know better in 2012.

Happy New Year all – and thanks x