Happy new year!

Yes I'm a little late with my happy new year, but I hope so far you've had a great one!

So what plans do I have and what can you expect on my blog this year....
Firstly 2016 for me is about family, money saving, healthy eating and getting fit - and how will I achieve this whilst also working 3 days a week?  With plans and lists - my favourite things, because lets face it, without these I'm quite likely to forget everything.

So firstly family - you may or may not know, my little family consist of yours truly, Mr Moo-Moo (nickname given by my littlest squishy), my 2 daughters and of course Fifi the dog and Honey-boy the guineapig.  We're a busy household, the girls obviously have school Monday - Friday, plus various clubs which include, cross country, rainbows, brownies and swimming.  I work Monday to Wednesday - which means we have to use afterschool care for the girls, and Mr Moo-moo works full time and shift work which means we have to fit family outings and trips around this.  I'm hoping to share our days out, trips away and camping with you - the logistics, costs and fun we have along the way!

Secondly on to the money saving, now its my job to organise the shopping and grub - so I will mostly be on-line shopping, I find this cuts down on impulse buys, I can plan my weekly menu from the comfort of my settee and have the cupboard, fridge and freezer on hand, which is essential in cutting down on duplicate purchases.  I mostly use +Sainsbury's, my main reason for this is that they have nectar points, we like to save these through the year and then the points contribute to the Christmas shop; last year we clocked up a fantastic £80 which was fantastic to add all those extra luxuries to the shop. 

Now that said - I do also like to support local business, so will also use my local butcher and greengrocer, the quality of these are fantastic and I can't grumble at the prices either.

In addition to this we are luckily enough to have an allotment, its not huge, but it does give us the opportunity to grow our own, spend time in the fresh air and have a family interest - plus the girls love a shed picnic in the summer.  We are nowhere near self sufficient, but every little helps as the the saying goes.  I will post updates on this, but also have a separate blog for the allotment -
http://myallotmentadventure.blogspot.co.uk/

Thirdly - healthy eating and getting fit - that old chestnut! I know, this is something I aim to do at the beginning of most years, but this year I have to do it! I'm increasing my exercise - and no I'm not going to the gym, I have purchased a fitbit and intend to clock up 2016 miles in 2016 - by walking, hoping, crawling, running (eventually!).  It works out at around 5.5 miles a day - yes this does seem quite a lot, but I want to have a goal, not an easy one and not an impossible one, but I think this target is do-able.  Along side this I'm going to eat healthy whole food - not all the time because that totally unrealistic and I think would be setting me up for a big fat fail, so I will be tracking food with +MyFitnessPal  - which syncs with fitbit to give accurate calories burned, exercise, sleep etc.  

Well there it is in a nutshell - what I will be aiming to achieve and blogging about through 2016,I've added pages for each section along the top, so check back regularly and I hope that some of it helps you along the way, please feel free to comment and make suggestions - happy 2016! Lets do this!