Giving away my old Diet books

On Sunday mornings I have my own radio show.  I do the Kitchen bit on the BBC Radio Northampton Kitchen Garden show every week from 10am to 11am.  I love it.  It’s fun and really pushes me to get out there and chat with people.  During the past year I’ve had all sorts of guests on the show, from the charming Wiliam Sitwell of Waitrose Illustrated to Ms Marmitelover, James Ramsden, the gorgeous Dan Lepard, Rick Stein, lovely Jules from the Secret Supper society and Gary Jones Head Chef at Le Manoir, Bryn Williams, Auther Potts Dawson and Peggy Porschen, Aldo Zilli alongside lots of local people such as Angelina Cupcake,  Waterloo Cottage farm from Great Oxenden, Ondine our very own Northamptonshire Masterchef finalist and our local Adam Grey.  I’ve been out and about to Oundle, Towcester and Northampton Farmers markets, covered the Northamptonshire food festival and chattered with so many people it’s been such a fabulous year.  I adore Kevin Saddington and Johnny Amos .. we make a great team and  I get so many comments every week from people who listen to the show!  That last time I asked about the listening figures I think it’s about 120,000 people locally, give or take a couple!

So as we were talking New Years resolutions last Sunday Kevin noticed that my diet books I had brought into the studio were all unused.  As I explained that I was always starting diets and then giving up in a fit of utter madness I agreed to kevin's suggestion to diet and chat about it in the show.  But not just diet, but stick to a plan and get weighed in each week live .. yes you read that correctly  ..on air.  .. for a whole year with the aim of loosing 1 lb. a week every week.  Even as I write this I am having a mini meltdown .. I must be a lunatic.   Writing it down right now it seems even more insane.  Why after a decade of trying to loose weight would I suddenly decide to say something so  …  well so ..  just so oh..  what have I done?

I spoke to my boss Mark a couple of days after the show.  I explained that despite all the listeners knowing what I had said I hadn’t actually dared to tell my husband. When I finally mustered up the courage it was as I thought ..  he roared with laugher and echoed Mark's response.  Something along the lines of well you’d better do it then!  -   It was a relatively kind response considering that he's seen me fail so many times before. 

I can’t do it alone. So I decided to sign up with my local Rosemary Conely Class.  I couldn’t face the start of the class so I waited until the end.  As everyone was walking out I walked in and went to speak to Gill who runs the class. I introduced myself and then before I know what happened I burst into tears. I covered my face with my hands and wept.  Wept in anger and shame.  Of all the people in the world who should be able to loose weight it should be me. I know more about food than most people yet despite every attempt over the years I fail over and over again. It’s internally humiliating and so I gave up believing. 

Not so long ago a friend stopped  .. well  .. being my friend with no explanation. It really upset me, and I found myself thinking  that if I was slim then she would still like me.  Of course my rational brain says otherwise, but the emotional me says the effect I have on people would be different if there was less of me.  So really I have her to thank for making me feel so low that there was nowhere else to go but up.

At the same time another lovely lady called Rachel sent me a book called Fat girl Slim in the post. It was a random act of kindness, and as I looked at the book I realized Rachel thinks I can actually do it.  As I explained the effect these two women had on me to Gill tears rolled down my face, She nodded, smiled handed me a tissue before showing me photos of herself before she lost 10 stone. Over half her body weight. Amazing.   For my own sanity I didn’t want to know my weight, so Gill weighted me in and gave me a ground 0 start point. There was no judgment just a friendly smile and understanding. So here I am writing a post I’d rather nobody who knows me reads, and yet in some strange way my tears were in part relief.  Relief that I have finally made my mind up to just do it.

So I am having a clear out of my old books. I am keeping the two Rosmary Conely Books, and the Fat girl Slim .. but the others might inspire someone else, so I am going to give the following books away.

The Dukan Diet

Japanese Women don’t get old or Fat

The Paleao Diet

Neris and India’s Idiot proof Diet

Atkins for Life

RULES

Please see competition Rules before entering. This giveaway is open to all readers over 18 with a UK mainland address.  The winner will be chosen using an online randomiser and announced on 1^st February 2012 You need to have a profile the allow me to get back in touch however please do not include your email in the actual comment as well.

There is one main way to enter and there are 3 more chances to win .. . and you must leave a separate comment for each bonus entry otherwise they will not be counted. 

For a chance to win one of these books please comment and tell me your top diet tip

For a second chance to win please tweet this post using the button below and you MUST comment with your twitter ID telling me you have done so.

For a third chance to win please follow @VanessaKimbell on Twitter and comment below to tell me you have done so.

Please say which book you’d like in your comment!

Each comment counts and an entrance you can make one comment per follow and details of what your top tips are and you may tweet this article daily.  The winners will be picked using a randomizing website.

Kenilworth castle

Well Christmas is over.  the tree has been put outside to be recycled and I’ve made a real effort  to get out.  Outside  in the fresh air  .. it seems to be what gets me through these cold grey days .. that and hot chocolate.  It's easy to bunker down in January, the budget is spent and the days are short and grey  .. but we live in a country rich in heritage so we challenged ourselves to get out anyway and we went to Kenilworth Castle at the weekend. 

It was fabulous, although I do find the buildings with their window’s rather eerie .. like a person with no soul.  The windows are vacant and there is a haunted look about it even with three noisy children, husband and puppy!   You can see and imagine how magnificent it once was. The medieval fortress of Kenilworth Castle in Warwickshire is set in vast grounds perfect for exploring.  It is one of the largest historic visitor attractions in the West Midlands and is just one of the most spectacular castle ruins in England.

The ruins are best known as the home of Robert Dudley, the great love of Queen Elizabeth I. Dudley created an ornate palace here to impress his beloved Queen in 1575. There is also a  newly re-created Elizabethan Garden, which was lost for over 400 years ..

I loved the Victorian graffiti in the sandstone walls, and we had an amazing day out.  Fresh air, some good old fashioned war stories made the perfect winter afternoon out.

I’d highly recommend a visit, although I forgot to take a flask.  I always take a cake and a flask of hot chocolate, so when we stopped in the café, which was light, airy and clean to order tot chocolate and cakes for the five of us I nearly fainted at paying over £20.  It has been years since I’ve bought a drink out and oh boy have a had a reminder of why I take my own.  The cakes were average, and the hot chocolate if I am honest was mediocre  .. really I should have made my own coco with cardamom and made nice big chocolate cake. It would have been far cheaper and much much tastier!

Lesson learned !

New Years Resolutions

There is a safety level writing a blog. It’s easy to paint a picture that comes over as quite candy flossy and whilst I hate to be anything other than positive there are times that are hard .. and then there is the questions about how much you actually reveal about yourself?

So if I am honest about things I’m not really good in January. It’s not helped by stepping back from a person I love in my life who misinterprets me.  I have no idea how to stop the cycle around this relationship .. and the weather doesn’t help. It is bleak; as I look out of my window the trees dark branches are stark against the sky.  Clouds threaten, the wind whistles around the house like a 70’s horror move soundtrack and I am watching the rooks black silhouettes hunched like old women clinging on their perches for all they are worth.  Grey January.. how I long for spring.

Whilst it seems everyone else makes new years resolutions I look back and get a sense of failure wave over me as I realise that I’ve been making the same resolution every year and I have never ever ever achieved it. It’s got to the point where internally I just feel ridiculous. This year I will loose weight I say.  This is going to be the year I do it .. no matter what.  Except I never do.

So this year .. * Deep breath* I am going to make a different resolution   .. I am going to find out about Buddhism, and investigate an Ayuverdic lifestyle. Don’t worry I won’t be preaching or tweeting Buddhist saying every two minutes, but I feel drawn to find out more.  

There is an internal dilemma though. I have to admit it’s taken my sister to push me to write about my personal feelings, rather than another “I love this product post,” ( thanks @FleurDelicia) but I tend to run a mile from anyone who is  actually really religious.  Alarm bells go off. I’m not sure why.  Well  .. now I’ve written that I realise that’s not true. .. actually it’s because I watched my deputy head of school preach love, kindness. compassion and charity in the name of Jesus Christ every morning in assembly before she spent he rest of the day making Cruella de Ville look like saint. 

Evil old bat.

I guess that is why I am deeply suspicious of pushy vocal religious people, and of course there are the Bible bashing wanna convert you lovelies that come and knock on my door every few weeks, always smiling and very sweet but always just before a deadline.  Fruitcakes!  Lovely phrase .. I wonder where did that originate from? 

Still I guess is suits the bohemian in me. I never felt so at home than with the idea’s and philosophy of Buddhism than when I was in Vietnam, which is where my little Buddha is from.  So far it seems to answer questions in a way that makes sense to me, and far more so that my normal once a year C of E does.  It’s been almost two years since I decided to find out more . but before I commit I want to investigate  fully. As luck would have it there is a course starting nearby on the 7th February  .. so I have signed up for it, and I’m still looking into Ayuverdic diets .. so watch this space!

In the meantime  .. where did I put that Rosemary Conley book? 

David Austin Christmas Roses

I want to share one of the highlights of this Christmas ..   these beautiful roses from David Austin Roses.  They lasted all through Christmas and look utterly beautiful.  I like to move my roses every couple of days in the house, that way I notice them more, but what you can't tell from a photo is the fabulous smell.  They are quite simply the most beautiful roses you can get.