Despite my efforts to become more organised, I dropped the ball on my car’s first MOT. New cars only need to be tested after 3 years, and although we did get a reminder from our service centre, I somehow managed to forget to book in the test. Yesterday afternoon, I remembered that the MOT was due soon but I didn’t know the exact date so I called up the service centre to be told that a) the MOT was due that day and b) the car’s warranty had run out at midday. Since our service centre is so far away, I called a local garage and was relieved to get it booked in for 8am this morning and they told me they could do it while I waited which would take about half an hour. The law states that so long as you are booked into an MOT test centre, you can drive your car without a valid MOT certificate from your home to the test centre. Phew! So far, this is all very boring home admin stuff, I know this. But I am telling you about this because of the effect this stupid oversight had on me last night.

From the moment I was told my MOT was due, like, NOW, until I got the MOT all clear this morning, I have been carrying around this sack of anxiety in my stomach. All last night, I kept thinking, ‘what’s wrong?’ because I couldn’t shake that Sunday Night Feeling AKA Exam Nerves Feeling.  I realised that I was really worried that a) I was going to get ripped off by this unknown local garage or b) there was going to be some severe defect that would have been covered under warranty had I just got the car tested on Monday morning. I realised I DID have exam nerves: exam nerves on behalf of my car!

As a fairly confident person in most situations, it really bugs me that I can be so worried about dealing with tradesmen – and yes, they usually are men. That feeling of them knowing something you don’t know is disconcerting especially coupled with the feeling that they know that they know something you don’t know. I wish I could be at least appear competent in these situations so that they don’t view me as just a ‘silly woman’ (their thoughts as I imagine it, not mine) but then the mechanic asks me a simple question, ‘Petrol?’ and I reply, ‘Yes, a full tank’, before realising what he means and then having to say, ‘I mean, no, it’s diesel.’ Oh the shame.

Anyway, Suki passed with flying colours so that is that worry over for another year and I am definitely putting a reminder in my Google Calendar right now so I don’t forget again!

I haven’t finished reading this but I am already convinced this book will be invaluable when my daughter Evelina gets to a certain age (and that age seems to be getting younger by the year).

This self-help book was the basis of the film Mean Girls written by Tina Fey. It aims to help parents of daughters safely navigate the murky waters of being a girl and having girl friends. Undoubtedly, this book has a heavy US bias but I do feel like it is getting more and more relevant for girls in the UK, even if we don’t have the cliques which are as entrenched as they are in US high schools.

While reading this book, it is impossible for me not to reflect back on my own friendships and interactions as a teenager. Like Roisin noted when she blogged about this book (she was the one who lent it to me), I have over the years found myself in each of the various roles described by Wiseman and I am sorry to say that I am quite ashamed of some of the things I did to the girls around me – something that has taken quite some time to admit to myself.  And whilst I have plenty of excuses: crippling self-doubt covered by a shiny veneer of bravado and the ridiculous need for boy-flavoured validation; this does not really help the people who were hurt. I myself also fell victim too, of course.  I can remeber the sting of being shunned in the playground at junior school by my supposedly bes friends and I can remember being mocked by my own friends when I was at high school. If could talk to 13-year-old me I would say ‘be nicer’ and ‘rise above’. What else could I say? I think a certain amount of shifting allegiances is normal as children start to mature.

What I wouldn’t tell 13-year-old-me is that it doesn’t really ever go away. The means that we tear each other down may become more passive-aggressive and it certainly becomes less common but I have seen some pretty pathetic Queen Bee behaviour from women in their 20s and 30s and it does make me feel rather depressed for Evelina’s future.

So far, a lot of the book has covered the dynamics of girls in their social groups and we are looking at anything from the age of 8 upwards (and even younger in some of the examples).  What I would be interested to see is if Wiseman covers another aspect of Girls World, as she calls it, which is the intense closeness between BFFs that is so powerful during the teen years and beyond into early adulthood that it can be both comforting and elating but also confusing and claustrophobic. When these friendships break down, the effect is like a divorce – heartbreak and remorse and hurt and anger all with no real societal badge of grief to wear. It has taken me years to come to terms with my own friend-divorce and I am so very grateful that ten years on, we have been able to reconnect, albeit with a tentativeness that is understandable given the circumstances. I hope that writing about this doesn’t rupture any old wounds – the last thing I want is to cause any additional pain for my friend or for myself for that matter.

I really hope that Evelina can avoid most of the negative aspects of Girls World – in this new social media age, her school life is going to be totally different from mine and I am determined to do all I can (which I realise is going to be limited) to ensure she doesn’t get hurt, or worse, hurt others unnecessarily.  And certainly not over some dumb boy who wasn’t worth it.

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Then we had a baby, moved house, changed jobs and bought a new (and needed) car all in the same year. I have gone from a full-time position to working 2 days a week. We had banked on clearing a lot of our credit card debt when we moved but other expenses sprang up, like needing a new boiler at the new house and all the other baby things that are needed (which is a lot, even when you are lucky enough to have so much from friends).

Now we are living only just within our means – there is not a fat lot over once our necessary payments have come out. We have had to change our whole spending outlook. We have had to do a lot of shifting around of funds and scrimping where we can. The key ways which we have made changes or plan to make changes are:

• meal planning and careful grocery shopping: this has halved our grocery bills. We used to never pay much attention to prices and would think nothing of dropping a DVD in the trolley. Now I use a calculator as I shop and aim to get each shop under a certain amount. This makes me focus on only buying what we need;
• handmade giving: gifts are undoubtedly better if they are thoughtful and handmade rather than bought and perhaps unwanted. This Christmas, I really want to make a lot of presents so that people can see how special they are without us having another credit card bill to pay.
• eBay and bootsale: selling our unwanted items has a double-whammy effect of decluttering and helping with cashflow.
• intentional spending: using our family purpose statement to help inform our spending decisions
• credit card review: have a look at all aspects of our credit card debt including interest rates and repayments.

The following steps show how are dealing with this last issue:

1. interest rates: take advantage of 0% balance transfer deals – nearly all our credit cards are on 0% for the next year or so;
2. smart repayments: avoid the minimum repayment trap by setting up fixed standing order payments on credit cards rather than direct debits to cover just the minimum payment – this tip doesn’t mean you pay any more per month than you are paying now on minimum payments but it makes clears the debt quicker with less interest. Using this method in conjunction with the Debt Snowball Plan below seems to be the most effective in my opinion;
3. one by one: tackle the debts one by one starting with the smallest amount first. This Debt Snowball Plan was originally recommended by Dave Ramsey and explained by Simple Mom as:

paying the minimums on all debts except one, which you pile on any extra funds you have. When that one is paid off, you take the money you piled on the first debt and put it towards the second. Then you do that with the third, and so on and so on, until all your debt is gone.aim to be debt-free (not including our mortgage) in five years.

Once we made a decision to spend more intentionally, it felt so good to have the burden of keeping up with the Joneses lifted. We can be thankful for our lovely house and not dwell on others who have bigger and better houses. In fact, being envious of other people in general is not very productive. When I catch myself doing this, I tend to look at what those people do for a living. I ask myself: would I be prepared to work those hours, do that training or do that job.  Chances are, the answer is ‘no’ so I can’t very well expect to reap the benefits without making the sacrifices that others make.

Every new thing we want just adds to the things we have to maintain or clean and that in itself is a great way of watching what we buy. We have enough TV and films to watch on DVD to last us an eternity (or at least a year or so) so we can hold off from buying that new blockbuster that we want to see until we have made a dent in all the things we already have.

We aim to be debt-free (not including our mortgage) in five years. I also think we will have given our attitude to money, spending and material possessions (which only equal more clutter) an extreme makeover which will serve us well for the rest of our lives and allow us to teach more thrifty values to Evelina as she grows up.

During the day, the holiday was like any other European beach holiday – we sunbathed, we slept (I think we were both fighting off colds) and we swam in the pool.  Each evening though, the huge TV screen in the bar beneath our hot and tiny apartment which probably usually showed the latest R’n'B hit showed CNN’s 24 hour coverage.  I can remember the incongruity of the garish Malia strip with its loud bars and cheap alcohol against the sombre news footage.  It was the first time I can remember the 24 hours news cycle,  watching the news over and over even though the real ‘news’ – the new information – was slow to filter through.   We sipped on strawberry amaretto milkshakes while the predictions of casualties gradually fell.  The initial expectation that tens of thousands dead was gradually adjusted to our relief. The contrasts of that holiday were remarkable – the compulsive viewing of the news, the languid baking in the sun, the drinking of terrible fishbowl cocktails (buy one, get two free – and they wonder why Brits abroad behave so badly…) and the inadvertent falling in love.

And so I think of where I am now, ten years on.  My iPhone does not compare to the Virgin mobile which was my first mobile phone. It didn’t even have predictive text! The only internet connection I had then was at work – my new job in the City. Now we have superfast fibre optic broadband which we can access from any number of PCs and devices within the home. I was living in a room of a friend’s house and my so-called boyfriend couldn’t wait to be rid of me! And it’s true that the world is a more broken place with conflicts and terrorism still causing death and misery.  But my little world has only got better: I have been married to ricardo for more than 8 years; we have a beautiful and hilarious daughter; we have a lovely house; I have discovered a creativity in me that I never knew existed; I have a whole bunch of amazing and inspiring friends and I have even reconnected with my old BFF. It has been quite a decade.

Last night, I went for my second Week 2 run in the NHS Couch to 5K programme. As I was getting myself ready to go, I found myself doing something I have never done before: I found myself looking forward to going out for my run (I KNOW!). Now this might partly be due to the buzz I do get from it. But I think it as more to do with the fact that I can go out for 30 minutes and be completely on own.

I realise that I spend a good portion of day alone – we do have a sleepy baby after all – but there is always something I should be doing and I know that I am not really on my own – I am not free to leave the house, for instance! So these runs are a little luxury for me; they represent a bit of freedom doing something worthy which I don’t have to feel guilty about. It’s a surprising motivator!

• ride on a jet ski
• go to Comic-Con
• write a children’s story
• visit Austin during SXSW
• go on the London Eye
• holiday on a ranch
• learn to skate so I can join a roller derby team

I have just started reading this book because ricardo and I decided that this year, we were going to wrestle our finances into order and simplify our lives. I have been reading Tsh’s blog Simple Mom for a while as it is a great source of inspiration when it comes to organisation and home management. However, now that I am a mama myself, it has become even more relevant.

The term Intentional Living refers to the idea that you don’t just let life happen to you but instead you live with conviction and have more certainty about why you make decisions. It seems to me it is activity versus passivity and proactivity versus reactivity.  This approach is very appealing to me, especially since I would like to get a hold of the things that constantly need to get done and shake this constant feeling of falling behind.  I want to be able to sit down and spend an hour sewing without feeling guilty. I want to want to sit down for an hour to sew rather than watching year-old episodes of Oprah. I want to be able to fully enjoy this incredibly blessed life I have.  I have a feeling that one of the changes will be ‘watch less TV’ but, you know, baby steps…

As a first step, I have made a short list of my goals for 2011 with this in mind. I will share my progress with you here and I have even changed one of my horizons to ‘Simplify‘ so you can easily find posts about frugality, the simple life and all that good stuff.

Finally, I will be participating in Project: Simplify over at Simple Mom.  The first hotspot is the wardrobe and that is definitely an area that needs attention.

Sidenote: The ‘z’ in the title caused me more pain than it should – I am no pedant after all – but it is the title of her book and who am I to impose my British spelling?!

Part of the following quotation from Kate Atkinson’s Behind the Scenes at the Museum was read out by a family friend during the service. I read this book years ago and whilst I remember little about it (sidenote: I must reread it one day), this is something that stuck in the back of my mind:

This is my Lost Property Cupboard Theory of the Afterlife: When we die, we are taken to a great Lost Property Cupboard, where all the things we have ever lost are being kept for us. Every hair grip, every button and pencil, every tooth, every earring and key, every pin (think how many there must be!), all the library books, all the cats that never came back, all the coins, all the watches which will still be keeping time for us; and perhaps, too, the other less tangible things: tempers, and patience; [...] meaning, innocence [...]; and oceans of time. [...] On the lower shelf will be the dreams we forgot on waking, nestling against the days lost to melancholy thoughts. [...] And right down at the bottom of the cupboard, amongst the silk, and fluff, and feathers, the pencil shavings and hair swept up from hairdressers’ floors, that’s where you’ll find the lost memories.

I love this idea.  When I think of all the time I have lost, all the time we all lose, it would be lovely to get those oceans back when we die.

The rules are: 1. Thank and link back to the person who gave you the award; 2. Share 7 things about yourself; 3. Pass the award to 15 blogs you enjoy and let them know they’ve been given the award (I say, pay it forward if you want to / if you haven’t recently had a similar award!!):

7 things about me:

1. I can fit my fist in my mouth. It’s not pretty (and it’s not like I have small hand either) but my English Lit teacher thought this was remarkable.
2. I learnt Latin up to A’ Level standard and loved it (but I think I have forgotten it all now which is a shame).
3. I hate coffee ice cream and coffee chocolates (I quite like drinking coffee though).
4. I started to write a novel and then after two Creative Writing courses with Open University realised I don’t really have what it takes to be a writer (including the inclination to write on a daily basis).
5. I don’t miss wine nearly as much as I thought I would (although I am looking forward to that first full glass, post-delivery).
6. I love baseball ever since we saw a game in New York in 2006. I suppose I support the NY Mets although they have had a shocking year. I also follow the LA Angels as we saw them play the Dodgers in 2007 at their stadium in Anaheim and I see what the Boston Redsox are up to also (which is probably a sacrilege as a Mets fan akin to following United AND Liverpool) since all my US family are in the Boston area.
7. I would love to own a chocolate labrador (but appreciate that we have enough on our plate at the moment).

So now to dish out the award…. I am going to keep this down to my sew make believe girls because they are all lovely ladies with a lot of good things to say:

• A Typical Atypical
• But it can’t be from Dolly Clackett. She gave me an Easter egg!
• Driftwood Dreaming
• Mad Yankee
• Munchkin Mail
• Never let the truth get in the way of a good story
• Second Hand Shopper
• The Writer Side of Life
• Wonderland Boutique
• Zoe’s Craft