Category: growing older

Our Aldi Food Shopping Challenge

- Californian Mum in London 8 Comments

Our Aldi Shopping Challenge

How much do you spend on your weekly food shop? Do you have a budget? When we were a family of three, and I worked part-time, I did not even think about what we spent on groceries. I just ordered from Ocado and that was that. Now that there are four of us, with only one income, I have to stick to a budget. I normally spend about £125 each week feeding our family of four. I’ve been trying to get this number down, but it is so tough. And we eat so much.

So, when Aldi asked me to take part in their shopping challenge, I was a bit nervous. It is one thing to reduce your weekly spend on groceries – but by £55?! There is an Aldi near my house which I go to once a week or once every other week. Husband loves their lager, and I normally buy their brown bread, tortillas, free-range chicken and eggs, and fruit. I also go to Aldi specially for their pull-ups as they are a bargain at £2.99 for 18 (although Dubz is potty-trained, he sleeps in pull-ups). But I’ve never tried buying all our food from Aldi.

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Turning 40 Isn’t That Big Of A Deal

- Californian Mum in London 6 Comments

Turning 40It happened. When I wasn’t looking. Somehow I got old. Okay, not really old. But just not young. I am no longer 20. In fact, I am now double that. Three months ago I woke up to being 40. Forty! In my teens and twenties, I thought 40 sounded so old and grown-up. Like I should wear dresses that fall just below my knee and blazers with shoulder pads, and that I should wear my hair in a short but perfectly styled bob. I now know that I was wrong about A LOT of things in my early 20s.

Before my birthday, I had thought maybe I should do a list – ’40 things to do before I turn 40′. Or perhaps offer contemplation in the form of ’40 things I’ve learned now that I’m 40′. I have considered what it means to be 40, and I’ve only come up with one answer. Being 40 means accepting the person I am and accepting my life the way it is.

I had always planned to be a career gal. Maybe getting married at the age of 40. I had not envisaged this life – being a Stay-At-Home-Mum with two children, while my husband works full-time. It is a different kind of life. But I am happy. I somehow managed to find the love of my life at the age of 25 and I love him even more now (barf, I know). We have two healthy, happy children who bring us an enormous amount of happiness (and sometimes an enormous amount of frustration – tantrums are not cool, so get over it Moozles and Dubz). And blogging has given me a creative outlet, and the opportunity to make some amazing friends.

I am not thin. I am not rich. I am not the cool girl that everyone wants to be friends with. But after many years of changing, figuring out who I was, then accepting myself, I became the person who I am today. Actually, I have been like this since I was about 34. But hey, why mess with a good thing?!