Bargains and binges

Thanks for all your really supportive comments to my last post and my little ‘binge’. I think I needed a reality check to remind me that its ok to over eat a little at Christmas, especially when you eat healthily the rest of the year.

Today I woke up with a full blown cold. I’m trying not to let it get me down though! Breakfast was a big bowl of Dorset Cereal Cherry and Almond muesli with blueberries and vanilla soy milk.

This was a lovely big bowl and I really enjoyed it. I also had a mug of Christmas Coffee.

I pottered about and made this huge pan of ‘fridge’ soup:

This contained 2 onions, 3 garlic cloves, 1 small leek, 4 parsnips, 3 carrots, half a large swede, green beans and savoy cabbage plus vegetable stock. All organic vegetables and stock made with organic vegan bouillon. Just what the doctor ordered! Despite feeling under the weather I knew getting myself to the gym would do me good. I gave the treadmill a miss but did 1 hour of HIITs on the cross trainer, bike and step machine followed by my usual abs.

When I got home I ate two big bowls of my soup followed by a fruit salad containing 2 oranges, blueberries, pomegranate seeds and the scooped out insides of a passionfruit:

My appetite has been in full force again today but I have decided to just go with it. This afternoon I had a couple of sliced apples followed by a bowl of mixed fruit and nuts and a large mug of fresh lemon, ginger and honey.

For dinner I made one of my favourite meals – roasted vegetable and tomato pasta with parmesan cheese:

I roasted a red pepper, orange pepper, red onion and a courgette then mixed with some jarred tomato pasta sauce and some wholemeal penne. I used my vegetarian parmesan style cheese generously!

For dessert I made up a bowl of Chocolate Cherry ‘Ice Cream’ using frozen cherries, ice cubes, cocoa powder, soy milk, Rachel’s Organic Cherry Greek Yoghurt and some agave. This made a giant bowl which I topped with two small squares of Green and Blacks hazelnut and raisin chocolate:

Perfect for my sore throat! I’ll also probably have a glass of red wine before bed :-)

Yesterday I hit the sales and was very happy to pick up some fantastic bargains. I had a mental list of things I could do with including a new pair of boots:

I got these from Dune, reduced from £139 to £91 – they are really good quality leather in a classic design that should last me years.

I also got this coat from Monsoon:

It was reduced from £100 to £50. I really like its touch of military styling and it should go with lots of different outfits.

I also picked up a few random bits and bobs including this dress and top from Topshop:

The dress was reduced from £38 to £15, I thought it was really unusual and funky with its exposed zip at the back. I just loved the top and its draped design on the front, it was reduced from £40 to just £10! I also got a couple of basic vests for £3, a basic grey cardigan reduced from £19.99 to £10 and some leggings from H&M.

While I was out I thought I might was well get some toiletries I needed. I went for some natural and organic products for a change including this Naked shampoo, conditioner and deep conditioner.

I got some of my favourite Korres body wash and lotion in vanilla cinnamon – they smell divine!

I also picked up my favourite Bad Gal Lash mascara from Benefit and some pour minimising cream to try, plus some organic surge cream cleanser and some cream cleanser from Lush.

I like to use a cream cleanser to remove my make up at the end of the day rather than a wash so I thought I’d try these two out to see which is best. The last thing I picked up was this stability ball in Sainsbury’s which was reduced from £8 to £4.

I’m going to start using this in some home workouts.

So I had a very successful shopping trip! Have you been to the sales yet? Did you pick up any bargains?