My new fav bathroom product.

I've become a bit fanatical about those body puff things. On my trip up to IKEA I saw a pack of them for cheap...

Ikea Body Puffs

Not only do they exfoliate you while you soap yourself but they probably use about half of the shower gel you would normally use without something like that. It makes the shower gel foam lots and lots so you won't have to buy as much as often! My skin is normally a bit pimply and I've been trying to get it in better condition in case (god forbid) the weather becomes nice enough to wear summer clothes on a regular basis. I reckon these body puffs are too good to pass up and you'll thank me for your new improved skin and lowered expenditure on shower gel ;)

Nom Nom Nom - healthy bait

I've been trying to get creative with my lunch. Especially since our place of work will soon be further away from the ASDA I use as a fall back when I'm too lazy/short on time to make something.
The other night we tried this lovely recipe from Morrisons. It's a very delicious, cheap and easy recipe. I had it with some boiled rice and pitta breads for my tea and then again for my bait the next day.

2 tbsp olive oil

1 onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, crushed

2cm fresh ginger, peeled and finely chopped

1 carrot, diced

½ tsp ground tumeric

½ tsp Schwartz Crushed Chilli

2 tsp ground cumin

2 tsp ground coriander

1 cinnamon stick

400g can chopped tomatoes

800ml vegetable stock

150g red lentils

150g puy or green lentils

420g can chickpeas, drained

200g fresh baby leaf spinach

fresh coriander

Method

1. Heat the oil in a large saucepan and fry the
   onion until it begins to brown. Add the garlic
   and ginger and cook for a further 2 minutes.
2. Add carrot and spices and stir well to coat
   the vegetables; cook for 2 minutes. When
   you can smell the spices, they are cooked,
   so add the tomatoes, stock and lentils. Cook
   over a moderate heat without the lid for 30
   minutes, or until the lentils have softened.
3. Add the chickpeas and heat through.
4. When you are ready to serve, remove the
   cinnamon stick, stir the spinach through, and
   serve with toasted wholemeal pitta bread or
   brown rice and a few sprigs of coriander.

If you're entertaining sometime, your guests might like it served with some houmous and pomegranate seeds!

Post 100 - a bit of sadness and random acts of kindness

How exciting. My 100th post! Today has been a real mixed bag. I'll sum it up in a 'Four Weddings and a Funeral' kinda way. Today is now named 'Two deaths, some bad news and some potential work'. Not quite as catchy and slightly misleading. But it has definately been a crazy day full of mixed emotions.

Not to dwell on the bad bits, it's also been quite a life-affirming day. I know you're probably thinking by now that I seem to be a bit deep-and-meaningful this past couple of days, but like I say when you first read my little bio, I just say what I'm thinking and a lot of that comes from the events of the day! Although I've been informed of two deaths and a friend/colleague has received some bad news about her husband, today has shown me that no matter how long you've known someone, you get to care about them really quickly. Especially in a small workplace. The lady from work is having a really tough time of late and we've all rallied around to take the pressure off. Some of her colleagues have known her many years and some (like me) have only known her a few months. What I'm actually taking an AGE to say is that it's really awesome to see people putting themselves out for someone, knowing that it will make that tough time a little less tough and knowing that that person would help them out when they're next in a fix. I couldn't ask for a better bunch of people to work with!

I'm really into random acts of kindness. Whether it be someone helping you to do something, someone surprising you with something they know you'll love, a stranger offering you something that makes even the slightest positive change to you or even someone saying 'bless you' in the street, these things make my world go round and I find them all equally important.

I'd love to know what the best, most random act of kind ness is that you've given or received. Or both? I'd LOVE to hear yours :)

An amazing moment

This week at work has been life changing for me. That is because this week, I got to give someone some great news. The detail to this story is minimal due to patient confidentiality but I'd chased up some results for someone and the individual got to find out she didn't have cancer. Understandably, she was overjoyed and it was the most rewarding moment of my time working there so far. Just to hear how happy and relieved she was will stay with me forever.

Up until then I'd had a fairly average week with a few hiccups thrown in from Chez Chatter, just for good measure. The situation the patient was in really put things into perspective for me. Recently I've loved a good whinge about little things going wrong in our 'refurbishment' and although they've been testing times and set us back a bit (in patience, time and money) I realised that these things that I've been worrying about really do pale into insignificance in comparison to the waiting and worrying this lady has had to do.

Hopefully I won't let this lesson go to waste in the future. It really is so important to remember how sometimes, you are much luckier than you realise.

Glee!

Last night I went to see Glee (the tour) and it was brilliant. I'd mentioned to someone at work I was going and they said they'd never seen Glee (the tv show) because they weren't into 'sunshine and rainbows'. I immediately corrected them. Okay, okay...it is a happy feel good show. But a lot of it is really dark, laugh-out-loud funny or deals with serious issues. The singing of massive pop hits and show tunes is actually a small part of the enjoyment.

I guess they had a point about the show though since it was back to back songs but Mr Chatter acocmpanied me and he's never been into the show. He wouldn't entertain spending an hour of his life watching it but somehow happily agreed to join me last night...hmmmm. If he likes it anyone will love it whether they admit it or not. I was also buzzing about breathing the same air as the real cast from one of my favourite shows. Thanks to my dad for a great Christmas prezzy :D

The tour is happening now. If you fancy a good night out where you'll be hoarse from singing and  your face will ache afterwards from all the smiling, you can't go far wrong with getting tickets for a date on this tour.

Addressing old problems

I'm coming up 28 years old and I'm embarrassed to say I've only just addressed a back problem I've had more than half my life but randomly, my job is to encourage people to get back to health...go figure.

Aged 13, I was on a family holiday in Florida. My one and only trip to Busch Gardens and one solitary ride on the 'Kumba' was all I needed to create a problem that has been with me ever since. Anyone who has been on this ride will know it throws you about a bit and I must have come down in my seat pretty hard to cause such lasting damage. Here's a pic of the ride...

Anyways, long story short...I'm not a fan of the Doctors (lets face it, few people are) and so I've never had the bollocks to go and run the risk of having some sort of treatment. My brother started working in the physio department of our local hospital a while ago and when I was complaining of pain the other night he got straight on to a colleague who came out of his way this evening to try and assess and put right years of wrong.

Tonight I am a very happy young lady. I feel I've taken a step in the right direction finally, all thanks to my brother and his friend/work mate. The talented young fellow told me what was wrong and the steps I could take to helping myself. It just goes to show that sometimes you just need to bite the bullet (or have a family member ready to give you a gentle nudge) and your life can become so much better. In future I'll be a bit quicker to seek help. After all, a lot of the time, it's worse not to try and get it sorted.

Lovely crafty bits for my homemade home!

With the house coming along nicely, I'm trying to put time aside to make things to really put my stamp on this place!

I recently got hold of some crafting goodies which I'm intending to use to transform it into something personal to Mr Chatter and myself. What should it be? The crafting goodies came from this cracking little shop run by a fab lady called Christine. She herself is an experienced crafter and so you can trust she knows what she's talking about and selling.

Her shop stocks lots of lovely things including jewellery making supplies and haberdashery bits and bobs like these...

...all the way up to finished pieces of jewellery and accessories like this...

...so if you're running low on time to grab a gift for someone but want to get your hand into crafting you can kill two birds with one stone! Ideal!

I was inspired to mention this shop in light of re-watching an episode of Kirstie's Homemade Home. I'd taped it to see what a young couple in the same position as Mr Chatter and myself would do with a 'previously loved' home in order to make it super-duper. I got loads of make-it-yourself ideas and I reckon I could execute them with a bit of help from Planet Events Direct!