Oxfam fundraising group

Have got involved in the start up of an Oxfam group in the local area. It was nice to have the odd trip to Manchester to take part in their events but will be even better to be involved in something closer to home. The other ladies (for we are all women so far) seem really nice with a good mix of skills. Hopefully the more strategic organised ones will help keep my creative feet on the ground. We decided to keep the committee to about 5 people to make sure it manageable and at the last meeting there were about 3 places left. We also decided that there may be folks out there who want to get involved but not so intensely. With this in mind we need to make it easy for people to help out at specific events or just keep up to date with what we are up to. Ideas flying around thus far are sports challenges, tea parties, fashion shows, geocaching events etc etc etc, the list goes on and on. So if anybody reading this fancies a challenge to help make the world a better place drop me an e mail bethbarlow@bethbarlow.com

Walk the world

Starvation diet T shirts-help needed

I want to create a starvation diet T shirt. It will have drawn on it the outline of a woman my age who is starving. This will help draw the direct comparison between me as a healthy, lucky eater and another person who is starving. Trouble is I'm finding it really hard to find statistics on the size of a starving woman. Grizzly stats I know but they must be out there somewhere.

Another 4 pounds floats off into the ether

11.7 Pounds is the new weigh in. Will post it to the weigh in maps here soon. http://www.bethbarlow.com/completed_pages/scales_map.html

That is another 4 pounds lost since last time. Need to refocus somehow though on the other side of the coin, those starving. As I loose more weight I am getting a bit more self focused. My feet look like the feet of an old lady. See there I go again, self obsessed.

Getting up whimpy's hill

There is a hill near to us which the kids tell me is called Whimpy's hill because some kids were once playing on go kart's on it and anyone who failed to go down was called a whimp. I don't know if that is really how it got its name but I like the idea that young people can have an affect on naming things which everybody then assimilates into their language about an area. So, as you can guess its a pretty steep hill. Going down it I almost whoop and think that if I was brave enough I could spread out my arms and take off. Probably would just spread out my arms and very rapidly spread out myself and bike across the tarmac but its a nice fantasy. The great thing about Whimpy's hill however is that it allows me to see that I am getting fitter. I go up it on my bike at least once a week. Before I'd go up it and still be heavy breathing when I got home now I get to the top and am hardly out of breath. Before I used to avoid Whimpy's hill now it heralds a minor victory over my aversion to physically pushing myself. Knitting today so encounter with the hill on the cards. Will take a picture and post it.

Summertime

I find that I can wear shorts this summer without squinting critically at my legs. Now I am just squinting critically at all the detritus which seems to be on my studio floor.

Big Pizza, feel sick

Allowed myself to be convinced into getting a 12 inch meat feast pizza for me and George. After two pieces thought, "Full now". But it seems that an open pizza box is still an empty pizza box. George set in for his last piece. "I could leave my last piece" I thought. But no. Feel sick now. Not guilty though. Just think I've learnt my lesson. Stop. Have it tomorrow for dinner have it for breakfast just don't jam it in when you are already full up. In the words of my mothers weight watchers inspired mantra "don't use yourself as a dustbin.".