Pancake Tuesday and I’m on day 52 of WeightWatchers, so Ally and Bláthny made me this low fat, healthy pancake.

Very funny!

I ate it, but I also had another one, slightly bigger, with melted dark chocolate, cream, and honey.  It was delicious.

Thankfully my two wonderful daughters have not inherited my skills in the cooking department, which is a relief.  Or those of their father….who once flipped a pancake and stuck it to a stippled ceiling.  I’ve  never bothered to flip them as I could never catch them.

Tomorrow is Wednesday and it’s weigh-in day.  I should probably run up and down the hallway a few times tonight to make up for the pancake!

this is a recipe for WeightWatchers style pancakes, emailed to me by my WeightWatcher’s leader this week:-

SIMPLE PANCAKES

2 PP PER PANCAKE                          Makes 8 pancakes

120 g plain flour

1 medium egg

200 ml skimmed milk

150 ml water

Pinch of salt

Calorie controlled cooking spray

Sift the flour into a bowl with a pinch of salt.

Whisk the egg with the milk and 150 ml water.

Whisk in the flour to make a thin batter.

Cover with a clean tea towel and leave to settle for 30 minutes.

Mist a 20 cm diameter frying pan with cooking spray and place over medium heat.

When pan hot add 4 tablespoons of batter and swirl around to evenly coat pan.

Cook for 2 minutes or until golden brown underneath.

Flip over and cook on other side.

DON’T FORGET TO COUNT IN THE PROPOINTS FOR ANY TOPPINGS YOU ADD TO THEM!

I made a last minute decision not to be such a Valentine’s humbug today so I put this together, more for the girls than for us.

The photo was taken with my iPhone as I was too lazy to get my camera…and besides, I’d to watch the steak.

Yes….there is a LOT of chocolate on that table.

The steak mightn’t look that good in an iPhone photo, but it was lovely!  I love a rare steak….and fried onions….and mushrooms….and new potatos…and mushroom sauce….!

I had to sample some of the chocolate cake too…and I didn’t want to leave those Lindt chocolates sitting there, so, naturally,  I’m cringing at the thought of the WeightWatcher’s scales tomorrow.

Dun dun DUUUUUNNN!!!!

Bubbles – French Style, originally uploaded by Susan Cloonan.

One of my favourite photos from when we were in Paris last November. There are just so many funny things about this pic – the altered road signs, the faces on the people. I love it!

I was saddened yesterday morning to hear of the death of Whitney Houston.

Whitney in the News

Whitney had featured a lot in celeb news over the last couple of weeks, mostly with regard to her finances, and her appearance and behaviour in public.

Last week TMZ carried a video of Whitney leaving a restaurant in West Hollywood with Ray J with whom she is rumoured to have had an on/off relationship with since 2007.

From the footage captured she looked well.  Nothing to worry about there, surely?

Reports from other sources, including The Sun and The Daily Mail,  last Friday, suggested otherwise.

On reading the reports, I took the view that:-

1. Of course she looked the ‘worse for wear’.  She’d just come out of a club in the early hours of the morning.
2. Rumours are that she’d had a run in with former X-Factor star, Stacy Francis too (see NY Daily News).  Thus the agitated state.
3. Then again, her agitated state could have been brought on by the paparazzi lying in wait for her outside. I doubt they’d have helped her mood.
4. She was partying, singing and dancing inside.  Why wouldn’t she have a ‘dishevelled appearance’?

Whitney in the ’80s

As a teenager growing up in the ’80s, I remember Whitney Houston’s music filling the airwaves.  RTE 2 FM had a phone-in radio programme called ‘The Hotline’ .  The Evening Herald would publish a request list for the show, and I remember Whitney Houston’s ‘How will I know‘ being listed in it for weeks!

I remember it because I’d a crush on a young lad in my class at the time and that was *my* song. (God help that poor young lad. I gave him an awful time.)

‘One moment in time‘ got me through the summer of ’88 when I’d finished my Leaving Cert and moved from Dublin to the country.

And, of course, I sobbed my eyes out to ‘I will always love you‘, after a relationship I was in ended.

Whitney Houston wasn’t just a singer.  Her voice and her music were the backing tracks to my youth.  Her songs were packed full of emotion, whether it was joy, sadness, love, or just fun!

This is the Whitney I want to remember.  It’s how I feel she should be remembered – for her singing, her talent, and her achievements.

Rest in peace, Whitney Houston.

I decided long ago
Never to walk in anyone’s shadow
If I fail, if I succeed
At least I lived as I believe.

 - Whitney Houston (The Greatest Love of All, 1984)

WeightWatchers

Week 6: Weight Loss: 3lbs

Total Weight Loss: 15lbs

I’ve been attending WeightWatchers since the beginning of January.  Having spent the last few years as a ‘January dieter’,  I felt the time had come when I needed to take serious action to reduce the ever expanding me.

Seven years ago, when I weighed over 11 stone I’d followed the WeightWatchers programme at home.  I’d stuck religiously to my recommended daily points and walked three miles most days.  But I was on a mission back then.  I’d bought a wedding dress “off the peg” that I wanted to avoid getting altered if at all possible.

I lost a stone, and the dress didn’t need to be altered as much as it had originally needed to be.

Unfortunately WeightWatchers’ point (‘scuse the pun) of ‘healthy eating’ was completely wasted on me.  Since my wedding day I gained….well….I gained a lot more than I lost – three stone to be precise.

Clothes Shopping – The Shame!

Buying clothes has, for a while, been a pet hate of mine.  Long gone are the days when I could pick a pair of jeans off a clothes rail, pay for them without trying them on, and know that they would fit.

Everything has to be tried on these days, and it’s an ordeal.  I’m not huge, but neither are a lot of dressing rooms.

I’ll say one thing about Dunnes Stores.  At least they’ve decent dressing rooms with proper doors on them.

I detest the curtained cubicles, especially the uni-sex ones in the middle of some shop floors.  The curtain never seems to be big enough to stretch from one side of the cubicle to the other, as narrow as those horrible rooms very often are.  As a result, after wrestling with the curtain for ages and eventually giving up, exhausted, I’m forced to keep my eyes honed in on the gaps in morbid fear that someone will peek in as I’m changing, or even try to enter the cubicle.  (Trust me….the shock would be infinitely worse for them than it would be for me.)

Then the fun starts.  I usually pick up two sizes of each item.  The race is on to try changing in and out of them all before a ‘helpful’ shop assistant comes along, pulls the curtain back, and observes the state of me struggling with tops and dresses.

‘Can I help you with anything?’

This is usually asked of me as I stand, frozen in motion,  displaying the shabbiest pair of tights I’ve found that morning, underwear that Bridget Jones wouldn’t touch with a barge pole, a dress half on-half off over my shoulders, my static enriched hair sticking out a mile, and a deranged grin on my face.

‘No, *gasp* I’m fine, thank you.’

‘Are you sure? Can I get you another size or anything?’

This translates as:

‘I can see you’re having some obvious difficulties and have chosen some styles that are at least two sizes smaller than you need (…you silly horse!).  Will I see if I can find that in XXXL(ephant)?’

The dress is half over my shoulders because it’s stuck there.  Something to do with the way dress manufacturers label clothing these days. As soon as I’m alone I spend the next couple of minutes trying to extract myself from the hateful thing.  I have visions of the shop attendant returning with a scissors to cut me free.

When I eventually remove myself from the offending piece of clothing I decide to try the next size up.  It slips on over my shoulders and I feel like crying with the joy! Then I turn to look at myself in the mirror and realise that I look like:

A FOO-KING DUCK WITH A BOOB JOB!!!

No exaggeration.  When I looked at myself in the mirror during the Christmas sales, that’s exactly what I saw.  And, between that, and the doubling in size of the clothes I was wearing, it gave me the kick I needed to get in shape.

www.cheezeburger.com

Keeping Motivated 

7, 10 and 5 are three numbers that have kept me going over the last few weeks.

7 (lbs) = Silver Seven

10 (lbs) = One dress size

5 (%) = 5% of body weight

I’ve achieved all of these within one month.  I never realised before the importance of setting mini-goals.  They make the bigger goal seem much more achievable.

The Reality

I’ll admit, for the first two weeks all I could think of was chips! I was STARVING!! And when my team leader asked me after the first week if I was hungry, I was so embarrassed that all I could say was ‘Ehm….uhm….well, not really….’, which was an outright lie.

The advice that’s given is to fill up with zero points fruit and veg, but I’m not a fruit or veg eater.  If I was a fruit fly I’d die of starvation.

So I turned to pizza!

8 point WeightWatchers Style Pizza

Ingredients

Tortilla wrap for the base – 3 pts

Tomato slices – 0 pts

Goats cheese (60g) – 3pts

Pepper, onion, garlic, pineapple – 0 pts

Ham 3 slices of wafer thin – 1pt

Pesto – 1pt

Instructions

Throw everything on the tortilla and bake for 5 -10 minutes.

Handy, huh? And so easy to keep track of points. And healthy! Who’d have thought that pizza could be that healthy? And so filling! Win!!

Friends

I’ve a few friends trying out WeightWatchers too, and it’s been great to be able to share tips, advice and support.  It’s not a diet.  It’s a new lifestyle, and a healthier one.  Before I started this I couldn’t walk a mile.  Now I’m walking two and running two most days.  Admittedly the two that I’m running are downhill, but….sshhh….they’re helping to get the duck out of here!

From www.cheezeburger.com

Vodafone and Dublin GAA  announced a unique initiative for the first games of the Allianz National Football and Hurling Leagues on January 23rd this year that would deliver a timely boost for promotion of mental health issues in Ireland.

The country’s largest total telecoms provider committed to vacate its jersey sponsorship for the much anticipated opening Croke Park Spring Series football league clash with Kerry and hurling league meeting with Galway for the Suicide or Survive Charity (SOS) www.suicideorsurvive.ie.

The undertaking was initiated by and is being promoted through the Vodafone Ireland Foundation, which provides funding annually to a number of Irish charities.  SOS – an Irish charity focussed on breaking down the stigma associated with mental health and supporting those affected in getting access to quality recovery services – is one of Vodafone Ireland Foundation’s existing charity partners.

Please support this campaign via the Hill16 Facebook page. 

The two match initiative – for the football league opener against Kerry last Saturday night, February 4^th in Croke Park, and the first hurling league game against Galway in Pearse Stadium on February 26^th – is built around a ‘Talk, Listen, Change’ (TLC) theme.  The objective is to encourage people enduring stress and other mental health challenges to open up about their difficulties, seek the support available and by doing so effect a positive change in their mental health.

Vodafone and Dublin GAA are asking customers across all networks to donate €2 to the SOS charity to help fund its ongoing work in the area of mental health.  Subscribers can make the donation by texting the word ‘SOS’ to 50300, with the entire proceeds going to the charity.

Announcing the initiative, Vodafone Ireland Strategy Director Paul Ryan said:  “Mental health issues are more prevalent in Irish society today than ever before and suicide is now the leading cause of death among young people.  That shows how serious the problem is and the Dublin jersey is a great platform to raise awareness of these issues from.  We are delighted to support the ongoing campaign around mental health issues by setting aside our logo for the Suicide or Survive charity for these games.”

Said Dublin GAA CEO John Costello:  “We didn’t have to think twice when Vodafone came to us with the idea of swapping their logo for that of the Suicide or Survive Charity for these games.  With one in four people experiencing mental health problems at some stage in their lives, it is essential that organisations like Dublin GAA and the GAA get behind efforts to encourage people to talk and look for the help that’s out there.”

CEO and founder of SOS Caroline McGuigan described the joint Vodafone-Dublin GAA initiative as one of the most important developments since the organisation was established.  “This is a wonderful gesture by Vodafone and Dublin GAA.  It’s the biggest opportunity we have had as a charity to reach and educate people about mental health issues, not least breaking the stigma around them.  Between confirmed suicides and undetermined deaths, it’s estimated that 600 plus people die to suicide each year. That’s a two people per-day average, three times the number of deaths in 1980, for example, and three times the number of people killed on our roads.”

The Dublin Spring Series in Croke Park this year involved the footballers’ opening Allianz League clash with Kerry on February 4^th, which has the Tyrone v Kildare game as a curtain raiser, plus two football and hurling Allianz League double headers.  As with last year’s Dublin Spring Series, the fixtures  include interval performances by some of the country’s best known entertainers.  Value is at the core of the Dublin Spring Series initiative, with the events very much priced for the family.  Adults can attend all three events for just €30 while a child’s ticket for the three fixtures will cost just €10.  Single match tickets are priced at €13 and €5 respectively. The Dublin County Board has also embarked on an innovative revenue share scheme whereby €1 from every €3 generated from ticket sales by Dublin clubs will be returned to them.

Dublin hurler Conal Keaney, Vodafone Ireland Strategy Director Paul Ryan, Dublin footballer James McCarthy, Dublin footballer Michael Fitzpatrick, SOS CEO Caroline McGuigan and boxer Bernard Dunne.

Suicide or Survive

Established in 2005, Suicide or Survive Ltd (SOS) provides services and supports aimed at suicide prevention in Ireland.  The aims of the organisation are to raise awareness of mental health issues, highlight the need for SOS programmes and for more open dialogue on suicide and its prevention.  SOS is focussed on rolling out  the Eden therapeutic programme to fill gaps in current service provision for people at high risk of suicide as well as providing educational services that help people understand their own mental health and find support if they need it .

SOS is an active partner of See Change – Ireland’s national partnership to reduce stigma and challenge discrimination associated with mental health problems. See Change (www.seechange.ie see also www.nosp.ie) is an alliance of organisations including the Health Service Executive, Government Departments, non-statutory agencies, service users and carers and other stakeholders – all working together through the National Stigma Reduction Partnership to bring about positive change in public attitudes and behaviour towards people with mental health problems.

Now that we’re all back to school, this is what our kitchen table looks like most evenings.

Ally’s current art assignment involves an A1 sheet of paper and a pointillism/sgraffito task.

I wasn’t sure what either pointillism or sgraffito were, but I know now.  With pointillism you take a pencil and dot it, loudly and repeatedly, on your page, while giggling at the poor individuals around you being subjected to the noise.

With sgraffito (I wonder why they don’t call it scratchillism), you scratch layers of paint off the page to reveal layers underneath, while covering your surroundings with the bits of paint you’ve discarded.

With all the tapping and scratching going on, I’m glad my own assignment involved a set of headphones. (Testing the Embed code below)

The Coma by Susan Cloonan

I bags NOT doing the hoovering tomorrow by the way! (Just in case Ally reads this.)

I’ve come to realise that I am a procrastinator.  I don’t necessarily put things off because they’re difficult or because I don’t like them.  Sometimes I delay doing things that I enjoy and that I want to do.

For example, I fully intended to start a project today that I’ve been looking forward to.  This is what I did instead:-

I got up late.

I went for a walk.

I took photographs while out walking.

I came home, cooked dinner, went to the hospital to fill in for another presenter at the station, came home (again),  and took more photos.

It was actually interesting to take these and to experiment with different shutter speeds and lighting methods.

In all of these photographs I used extra light from a torch.  The one below probably got a bit too much torch light. It shows up the plastic leaves on the branches, and I should probably have hid the wires.

This is the top of the piano.  ’Scuse the dust.  I’ll sort it out on the 6th.

The Cinderella ornament below is  the topper that we had on our wedding cake.  It sat on one tier, while the horse and carriage pictured beside it (in the previous photo)  sat on another.

Taking photographs did not contribute towards me getting my project started.

I came across a really good article on procrastination this evening.  I’ve always been of the impression that I work best under pressure but this is what the article had to say on the subject (with regard to writing a paper):-

Myth #3: ”I do my best work under pressure.”

Challenge: There are lots of other ways to create pressure for yourself, besides waiting until the night before the paper is due to start writing it. You can set a time limit for yourself—for example, “I will write this paragraph in ½ hour”—or you can pretend that the paper is a timed essay exam. If you do this a week or two before the paper is due, you’ll have a draft in plenty of time to revise and edit it.

If only I’d read this ages ago.  You wouldn’t believe the number of people who’ve told me that they work better under pressure too.  Next time someone tells me this I’m going to point them in the direction of that webpage.

I intend to create a time table in the morning (no, seriously I do), for the project that I’ve been putting off for a while, and I’m going to apply this to future projects that I undertake in the future.

This is a Proper 2012 New Year’s Resolution #1

I’m always making New Year’s Resolutions and not sticking to them, so this year I’ve saved myself the bother of thinking them up,  and I’m using last year’s lot.  They’re always the same old thing anyway:

1. Lose weight

Nothing’s changed about this one, only that instead of having to lose one stone I now need to lose two….at the very least.

I am committed this year though.  (I am also starving.)

2. Stop procrastinating

I’ve broken this one already because there was something I was meant to do today, but I started to write this blog post and now I can’t remember what it was.

3. Walk more

I usually manage this one for about a week before I start making excuses not to go for a walk.

I walked just over three miles today though – it took me an hour.  In fairness it was an uphill walk (for the first mile and a half), and the dog had to stop constantly and sniff every blooming thing within an inch of her nose.

Photographic Evidence that it really was up a hill

4. Study every evening

I feel like a child for posting this.

It never happens…which also contributes to making me feel like a child.

5. De-clutter

Also never happens.  I hoard stuff, especially books, and I become emotionally attached to everything.

I did, however, manage to gather together seven bags of clothes (mostly my own) yesterday for disposal.  My problem now is that if I don’t get the bags out of the house soon I’ll start removing stuff from them and eventually everything will find its way back into my still overflowing wardrobe.

I’ve been holding onto clothes that are much too small for me, thinking that, some day, I will fit back into them, but it’s like this….if I ever find myself able to fit into a size 10 jeans again, then I’ll be so delighted that I’ll want new jeans, not some crappy unfashionable old pair that have been lying in my wardrobe for years.

6. A photograph a day

I tried this last year and I didn’t get very far with it.  It’s quite time consuming.  But I was inspired by Vicky, a lovely lady I met at Wordcamp in Kilkenny (how long ago was that), to try it again.  Vicky took a photo a day last year – not just ‘snaps’, but beautiful photos that can be seen here.

I could have taken my camera with me when I went walking today and taken a photo but I forgot to.  So I took this one of the Christmas cake being cut when I got home.

All that rushing  trying to get the cake iced before Christmas and it wasn’t cut until now.  It’d still be lying there only the two Danbos came along.

Looking back – the not so good.

I can’t believe it’s New Year’s Eve again!  The year has flown!

This time last year we were wondering how we were going to get through the year.  New Year’s Eve 2011 brought with it the news that John was to be made redundant at the end of January. Obviously it was a shock, although with him working in the building industry it’s safe to say that we could see that business was slowing, and the worry of what might come had been at the back of our minds for some time.

Our initial reaction was to immediately knuckle down and see where we could cut corners with regard to outgoings and bills.  For the first time in years I found myself penny pinching at the supermarket and doing my shopping in three or four different places to get the best deals.  I think the last time I was that ‘thrifty’ I was parenting alone – a long time ago.

We struggled through the first six months with the proverbial belt tightened and things got a bit easier.  I was lucky to have a part-time job, although I’d to fit this in around college and a full time work placement during the summer, which left me physically drained by the time it came to returning to college in September.  I have never yawned as much in my life as I did in front of lecturers this year…and it wasn’t them… it was me.

Looking back – the GOOD!

The year wasn’t all bad.  I turned 40 (ok…maybe that bit should be with the bad bits).  But it WAS good, because I got to visit my younger brother and my sister-in-law in Oregon, who I hadn’t seen in nearly three years.

I graduated with a Higher Certificate in Creative Multimedia.

Following my work placement, which was with a local radio station (TippFM),  I was offered a regular slot on a Saturday evening.

And I was very honoured to receive an award for Best New Presenter at the Hospital Radio Awards this year.

John got to go to Germany on a CESBEM course with Tipperary Institute, which was a great experience for him.  He also got a place on a Post-Graduate Certificate in Digital Analysis and Energy Retro-fit in Bolton Street, and got his Chartership in April.

And Ally got her Fetac Level 5 Award (all distinctions) in Art and Design.

(At this point, Bláthnaid wants me to add that she got Korn tickets – big positive aspect to 2011 in her opinion.)

So 2011 brought with it a lot of good things.

When the girls both got sick and ended up  in hospital a couple of weeks ago, I thought the year was going to end in a similar vein to the way it started. Ally had only just been discharged when, on the Monday my exams were due to start, Bláthnaid was taken in. Needless to say I ended up deferring my exams – a huge disappointment for me, but unavoidable.

It’s true what they say though – when the going gets tough, you know who your friends are, and that’s another positive of 2011.  As I head into 2012 I’m aware of those I can trust and rely on.  People are surprising!  And help can come from the most unexpected of places.

Thank you to those who supported us during tough times – your help was hugely appreciated.

Happy New Year 2012!

To our family and friends, we wish you health and happiness in 2012, and may the new year bring all that’s good your way.