The God-daughter

Last week was such a good week. I went to my grandma's for a few days (I hadn't seen her since July!!) and got to see my lifelong best friend and pretty much sister, and also meet my 6 week old god-daughter Rosie Elin :) she's so gorgeous and I can't wait to spoil her rotten! :P
I always look forward to seeing Anna because we don't get to see eachother very often and I'm so happy for her and her fiance Allan, they've been through so much and really deserve to be happy. It was so lovely seeing how proud she was of her beautiful baby girl, and it was so nice having lots of cuddles with teeny tiny Rosie! She's so precious, I couldn't get over how tiny her fingers were...and she's so smiley! There are a couple of photos at the bottom for you to 'awwwwh' over...but next time I'm there I really want to get one of me, Anna and Rosie, I'm kinda sad I didn't get one last week of the three of us :(
To help make sure every baby is born as healthy, happy and beautiful as Rosie, and so that less parents have to go through losing a child before they have even met them and before they have had a chance to hold their child in their arms, please support Tommy's by donating via my Just Giving page;  http://www.justgiving.com/catherinelux3

I spent most of my budget last week on make-up and magazines lol. I'm one of these people who keeps foundation bottles with the thought 'if I become poor I can cut them up and use the little bits of leftover', so for once they came into use and I've been surviving for all these months on using the last bits of foundation in the bottles/pots! But unfortunately I ran out last week and just had to spend money on a new bottle. I didn't spend money on food last week because I was staying at my Grandma's, but when I looked in my freezer drawer and cupboard the other day, I realized how full they were! My cupboard is mainly full of porridge, pasta, rice and soup, and my freezer is mainly full of meals I've made in bulk and then frozen. So for the next few weeks I think I'm only going to be buying fridge basics like milk, crumpets, juice, yoghurt, fruit etc.

I also put a couple of posters up at the Spectrum Energy Level Gym where I work on Sundays, and also one at the Guildford Lido where I work on Saturdays. I'm hoping they'll reach out to more people and bring in more donations :)

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Budget:

£2.99 - 4 magazines - Sainsburys
£6.19 - Foundation - Sainsbury's
= £9.18

Me and Rosie x

Mummy and Baby x

She's so beautiful x

Boring.

So I'm posting a few days late, and should really get into the habit of posting on the Sunday or Monday instead of the Thursday after! So this post is for the week 17th-23rd January 2011.
It wasn't a very interesting week, I didn't do much, I worked all weekend, went to lectures during the week, and also realized how much food I have in my cupboards etc and so decided to treat myself to a few treats...which will not bode well with my hips :/

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Budget:

4 mince pies - 29p - Sainsburys
Fruit cake - £1 - Sainsburys
Crisps - 84p - Sainsburys
Yoghurts - £1.64 - Sainsburys
2 Chicken and Mushroom pies- £1 (it was 2 for £1)- Sainsburys
Hot chocolate - £1 - Work

= £5.77

And then I also bought a magazine but can't remember how much it was :(


Sorry for this super boring post. I just didn't have a very interesting week last week. I promise I will have a really good post next week though because I had an exciting week this week :)

x

Bupa London 10K

I have registered to run the Bupa London 10K in May! My mum is doing it with me for some moral support, and we're running in aid of Tommy's, one of the charities I'm already supporting with my £10 a week challenge, to try and get some more donations for them.
There's no backing out now as it's all confirmed...so I better get training :/  I don't think I've even walked 10k's (6 miles) before let alone ran it ha, and those of you who know me will probably be in complete shock right now :P
We're going to see how it goes and if we do well and enjoy it we're going to do the London half-marathon in October as well. Right now I can just see it putting us off doing the half marathon lol!

- You can find out how your money will help Tommy's by clicking here.
- To find out more about what Tommy's do and why click here.
- To sponsor me you can go to my Tommy's Just Giving page; http://www.justgiving.com/CatherineLux3 
 

'It is a very sad fact that one in four pregnancies ends in miscarriage, stillbirth or premature birth.  Through our many research projects, we hope to understand why this happens, and to ensure more babies are born healthy.'

 

Facebook and Twitter event a huge success!

The past week or so have been pretty amazing. Last week I spent under £6! As well as my amazing budgeting skills, I also created an event to try and raise more money for the charity, Hughes Syndrome Foundation. On Saturday 15th January (5 months to the date since Nakita died from Hughes), I asked all of my facebook friends to 'donate a status' for 24 hours, by re-posting their status as;
'IN MEMORY OF NAKITA GRAY - RAISE AWARENESS OF HUGHES SYNDROME -http://www.justgiving.com/Catherine-Lux - REPOST ON YOUR STATUS TO HELP'
Not only did many of my friends join the event and participate, but they also invited all of their friends so in the end I had people who didn't even know me and my family re-posting their status to help raise awareness. Not only did complete strangers re-post their status, but a couple of them even donated! I'm so grateful to everyone who took part.


I would like to say an extra big thank you to everyone who has donated money as well as their status, remember every little helps! But I would like to especially mention the 2 big donators from the past week, my grandparents and family, who donated £50 plus gift aid to each charity, and also to Stephen Fry and his Tweet Team (YES! THE Stephen Fry!!!), for donating £200 plus gift aid to my Hughes Syndrome Foundation page! I was in complete shock and disbelief for hours after seeing Stephen Fry's donation. He is such an inspiration to me and I just love him, I love his television programmes, his films, his books and his blog, so I was over-joyed when I saw the donation from him and his tweet team. It literally made my day!


I really must stress how important it is to donate, even if it is only £1.50 or £2....whatever you can give will help as it all adds up and it all counts and I really am so grateful for every penny that is donated. Just think if everyone donated £1 or £2, we could help these charities do so much to help others. 


Also you'll have to forgive me for being slack on the posts lately, I've been working quite a bit and just completely forgot about this week's post! Although I only spent £5.81 this week, I'm very ashamed to admit I did have a Wimpy meal during my lunch break at work. BUT only because I forgot to take my own lunch and so a Wimpy meal was the quickest and cheapest option! 


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10/01/2011-16/01/2011
Budget:

£2.81 - Wimpy's Meal (my lunch at work...because I work at the Spectrum I get discount)

£1 - Bottle of water

£2 - I sponsored someone running the London marathon

= £5.81

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My Hughes Syndrome Foundation page donations from just the past week;

So far, in total for all 4 charities, I have raised £671.17; 

(Only £3328.83 left to go before I reach my target!)

Raise Awareness for Hughes Syndrome - Easy peesy

So I'm asking everyone to help me do a 'Donate a status/tweet for 24 hours' on Facebook and Twitter. For 24 hours on Saturday 15th January I am asking everyone to update their status or post a tweet saying;


For Twitter:
'IN MEMORY OF NAKITA GRAY - RAISE AWARENESS OF HUGHES SYNDROME - http://www.justgiving.com/Catherine-Lux - RT TO HELP!!'


For Facebook:
'IN MEMORY OF NAKITA GRAY - HELP RAISE AWARENESS OF HUGHES SYNDROME - http://www.justgiving.com/Catherine-Lux - REPOST AS YOUR STATUS TO HELP!!'


Because it has a link in it, facebook will automatically change it to posting a link...all you have to do is click 'status' above it...most of you will probably know how to do this already :)


I's easy peesy to do and I'd be really grateful if you could all help by posting this :) 


Thanks x

A cheaper version of 'Percy Pigs'!

So just in case you're confused because I'm posting on a Wednesday, this post is for last week, from the 4th to the 9th January. (I landed back in the UK on the 4th).

Well, my first week back in the UK was pretty uneventful. Apart from the mountain of work I had to do...4 essays which totalled to 9,500 words. I've done 3 of them and have handed those in, and I now have a 3500 word one to do for tomorrow :) ...yes, that's right...I'm procrastinating...again. So far I've only done 43 words out of 3500 :/
I think I'm going to stop writing what I eat all day everyday..it must be pretty boring for you all? If you agree or disagree, comment on this post to let me know!
Because I've had all these essays to do, and because I can no longer afford top price confectionery, I had to find a cheaper alternative. Sainsbury's do packets of sweets for just 39p, so I found some that looked a bit like the more expensive M&S 'Percy Pigs'. They're called 'Eric the Elephants'....and O.M.G. They are...A-MAZING! I'm ashamed to say this, but they're even better than Percy Pigs!! And way cheaper too! So I suggest you try them out. They're so yummy and really helped me with my essays :P

This week I'll keep my post short and sweet.


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Budget:

1 Cheese sauce and 1 Carbonara sauce - £2.50 (it was 2 for £2.50) - Sainsburys

Basics natural yoghurt - 50p - Sainsburys

Butter - 62p - Sainsburys

Gnocchi - £1.40 - Sainsburys

Bread - 74p

Chicken and mushroom cup a soup and tomato cup a soup - £1 (it was 2 for £1) - Sainsburys

Deodorant - £1.09 - Sainsburys

Tomato pasta sauce - 82p - Sainsburys

'Eric the Elephant' sweets - 39p - Sainsburys

= £9.26

PS; I hate SPSS.

Procrastination

So whilst doing all these essays recently, a procrastination method I have discovered is to make videos using windows movie maker :P
I guess I can argue that actually it isn't procrastination and is actually beneficial to practise as much as possible seeing as I'm a media student. It was actually a friend of mine who fed me the idea, because he has this theory about social media and how vital it is to everything we do now. I've tried the social media sources of facebook, twitter and blogger...so I thought I could create an 'advert' to try out youtube. You know, a bit like those charity ad's you see on television...only less miserable and sombre. Which is why I chose music that sounds happy (Jason Mraz - Love for a child, in case you're wondering)...but the lyrics are actually very meaningful, so listen out for the lyrics as well as read the statistics etc! :)
The first one I have done is an advert for Home-Start, and then if it has any effect or people like it, then I'll create one's for the other charities as well. So take a look and let me know what you think - all comments will be welcome...good or bad! Enjoy :)

Back from the Land Down under

I'm back! After 4 weeks rest and relaxation back home in the sunshine I'm back to the miserable, cold, grey Blighty. Ugh. And I'm currently procrastinating from my SPSS essay :( I actually hate SPSS with a passion!!! It's pretty much ruining my life right now and I wish it would just go die in a hole so I can get on to reading Stephen Fry's new autobiography (a xmas presie).
Well Australia was amazing as always, and while I was away I became a Godmother and 'Aunty Catherine' to a beautiful baby girl called Rosie Elin :) she's such a cutie and I can't wait to spoil her rotten...after all...that's what godmothers are for...right? :P
The only thing I dislike about Australia is they have truly crap mince pies! I really should be a mince pie critic after the amount I tested while I was over there...and in the end I had to settle for Mr Kipling, which I usually can't stand over here. The flights were pretty rubbish too...Singapore Airlines have gone downhill A LOT. In future I'm sticking with Emirates...even though I prefer Changi airport to Dubai airport. I got back to Blight Tuesday evening, and I've been suffering really badly from jetlag this time, I went to bed at 7pm last night, and woke up at 1am...and then couldn't get back to sleep.
I hope you all had a good Christmas and New Year, mine was pretty good...I got awesome presents, most of which are things that will come in very handy with my £10 challenge (books, dvds, a skipping rope, chocolate, gift cards, make-up, beauty products, new ugg boots etc). Chris got an underwater camera for xmas so there's a photo below of me testing it out :)

Also I'm back to my £10 a week challenge, it started again yesterday and I reckon I did a pretty good job of re-stocking my fridge on under £10 :) but I'll tell you all about that on Monday.
I'm hoping more people will start donating when I hit the half way mark, because I'm feeling like a bit of a failure right now. I just feel like I'm failing the charities, having only raised £123 since September...when my aim is £4000. They mean so much to me I really want to help make a difference for them. I'm thinking of doing the Royal Parks half marathon this year as well...but I'll see how my £10 challenge goes first. If I get enough sponsorship for my £10 challenge then I'll do the half marathon as well. I'm just so grateful to those people who have actually donated and sponsored me...if it wasn't for you I wouldn't have the motivation to keep going, so thank you so much!