Blog 15 - Music moods...

 

This challenge was one of the easiest but was very long! Challenge 36 was to LISTEN TO MY ENTIRE CD COLLECTION in its entirety i.e. listen to all songs on all the albums I own,  all the way through. Since having children and mostly giving up the remote control on the TV and never getting the time to listen to my own music, I thought of this challenge as it would give me an excuse to turn off the children’s CDs and put my own music needs first for a change. I began this challenge in August and finished listening to all 186 CDs from my and Nick’s collection this week, all in all taking almost 6 months!

Although not a hard challenge, as I managed to listen to my CDs when I was driving mostly, it really depended on which CD I was listening to as to what mood it put me in for the day. Some days it made me all fired up and sometimes it brought me right down, sleepy or low, the music choice really affected my mood. There were some low points, and some truly awful albums in my opinion (mostly Nick’s 80s albums it has to be said!), some amusing moments including Mr Blobby CD and a few albums that brought back some amazing memories.  

One memory that came flooding back was when listening to U2 and I recalled the live concert I attended in Budapest when I was travelling when I was 18. I never really liked U2 until we got offered very cheap tickets in Budapest and I was totally in love with the band after it. I also met two young guys from the then Yugoslavia who lived in the same village and had grown up together but were currently at war and after the concert they would be going back to their respective sides and carry on fighting even though they were the best of friends. It was really emotional towards the end of the concert and a moment in history I will never forget!

On a lighter note, I also remembered running around Glastonbury as a young 20 something watching Prodigy live and singing a long to one of their most famous tracks, but in my naivety thought the lyrics were ‘Take my Picture’, if any of you know the correct lyrics for this song you will know how wrong I was! What a tit!

Anyway memories aside it was an enjoyable challenge on the whole and has helped me narrow down my choices for me to sing in a future challenge, but that story is for another blog!

So my 12th challenge completed, 28 to go!!

COMPLETED CHALLENGES:

Challenge 4 – SWIM 40 LENGTHS – Swam 40 lengths of the 50m pool in Cardiff Bay with Lara Ramsay on 27.10.13. (Money spent £16 for goggles and entry to pool)

Challenge 8 – SCORE 40 ON A DART BOARD WITH ONE DART – Got a double top on my 9^th try on 12.1.14

Challenge 9 – 40 HOUR FAST – I completed 40 hours not eating any food and surviving on water and flavoured water only. (Sept, with Karen Daniel)

Challenge 12 – VOLUNTEER FOR 40 HOURS - Aside from my RSPCA volunteering, 40 hours of my free time were given volunteering for NSPCC Childline Schools Service, PTA events and other fundraising events.  

Challenge 16 – 40 HOUR NO SWEARING OR £1 FINE – Completed between Tuesday 5 to Wednesday 6 November 2013.

Challenge 18 – TURN MOBILE PHONE OFF FOR 40 HOURS – I turned my phone off and had no access to facebook, twitter or emails at all for 40 hours. (Oct)

Challenge 19 – 40 HOUR SILENCE – Completed between Midnight on Thursday 14.11.13 until 4pm on Saturday 16.11.13.

Challenge 22 – ADOPTED A WILD ANIMAL – I adopted Jubilee an Asian Elephant through the Born Free Foundation. (Spent £30 for adoption fee)

Challenge 25 – GIVE BLOOD – Completed on 11.10.13.

Challenge 30 – APPLY FOR A GAME SHOW – I applied to two game shows ‘Deal or No Deal’ and ‘The Chase’ in August but have still not heard anything back. I also applied to Bargain Hunt this month for my colleague Paul who would love to go on this programme.

Challenge 36 – LISTEN TO MY ENTIRE CD COLLECTION – All 186 CDs were listened to by 17.2.14

Challenge 38 – HULA HOOP FOR 40 REVOLUTIONS – Completed in Sept. (Spent £18 on buying hoola hoop)

blog 14 - Making the most of my time...

A really important part of this year of challenges was also to make a difference in some way. I wanted to raise money for charity but also wanted to give more of my spare time volunteering for a good cause. So aside from my normal volunteering work of fostering animals for the RSPCA, I also signed up to the NSPCC Childline Schools Service. This entails volunteers going into schools and presenting an assembly to Year 5 and 6 children, telling them all about Childline and raising awareness of the phone number and website. We also help to define different types of abuse and explain the importance of talking to trusted adults or Childline if they are unhappy, unsafe or worried about anything. We then go back into the classes and give them an hour workshop exploring these things in more depth.

 

This has been a really eye opening experience for me and rewarding as the feedback from children on the Childline website after we have been to the schools really makes you realise how worthwhile it is. I did initially struggle and worry how I was going to talk to children about such serious issues and if it was too soon to talk to them at their age (9/10/11) about these sorts of issues but this was quickly dispelled as I realised how much actually children know or think they know at that age! The biggest issues that do come out are about bullying and the amount of stress that is on our young people nowadays. There are times that I see and meet some kids that I think about and worry about after but ultimately I’m glad that I’m doing it. I’m glad that we are getting the message out to young people that there is always someone to talk to and hope that somehow in our small way we are helping some children, in the future as well as for now.

So for this challenge I wanted to donate 40 hours of my time volunteering, so aside from my RSPCA work I also have given 36 hours for Childline so far, 3 hours for helping out at School PTA fairs and events and 2 hours helping out at a fundraising fair for Arthritis UK. I will be carrying on volunteering for Childline for at least another year hopefully so my volunteer hours should continue to grow.

So this is my 11^th challenge completed and I am continuing to chip away at some of the others, Ive managed to book the Big Zipper, West End Play and the Mudrunner and my training is underway for the running 40k challenge...

Update on the other challenges:

· (Challenge 1 – Write 40 Blogs) this is blog number 14 written

· (Challenge 2 –Get 40 people to donate £10 to charity) Raised £150 so far, £250 to go!!

· (Challenge6 – 40 Sit ups every day) keeping up although some days are a bit half hearted!

· (Challenge 10 - Take 40 photos) – I’ve realised that the photos I have taken for the challenges would fit this brief so I have taken 10 so far.

· (Challenge 11 – Read 40 Books) I am on book number 20

· (Challenge 14 – Have 40 dates with my husband) – Had 17 dates so far.

· (Challenge 17 – Visit 40 pubs) I have visited 20 pubs so far.

· (Challenge 23 – See a Play on the West End) – Booked for Other Desert Cities at the Old Vic for Saturday 19 April 2014.

· (Challenge 24 – Have Afternoon Tea at The Ritz) This is booked for May 2014 to also celebrate my mum’s 70th Birthday.

· (Challenge 26 – lose 14 pounds in weight) struggling big time with this one and have the full 14 pounds to lose!!

· (Challenge 28 – Commit 12 acts of kindness to random strangers) I have completed 10 acts so far.

· (Challenge 31 – Complete the Big Zipper) – Booked for Sunday 25 May 2014.

· (Challenge 35 –Cook 12 new recipes) - 5 recipes made.

· (Challenge 36 – Listen to my entire CD collection) I am still trying to get through this one!

COMPLETED:

Challenge 4 – SWIM 40 LENGTHS – Swan 40 lengths of the 50m pool in Cardiff Bay with Lara Ramsay on 27.10.13. (Money spent £16 for goggles and entry to pool)

Challenge 8 – SCORE 40 ON A DART BOARD WITH ONE DART - Got a double top on my 9^th try on 1.2.14.

Challenge 9 – 40 HOUR FAST – I completed 40 hours not eating any food and surviving on water and flavoured water only. (Sept, with Karen Daniel)

Challenge 12 – Volunteer for 40 hours - Aside from my RSPCA volunteering, 40 hours of my free time was given volunteering for NSPCC Childline Schools Service, PTA events and other fundraising events. (I will be carrying on with the volunteering for Childline and RSPCA so am expecting to clock up over 80 hours by the end of the year)

Challenge 16 – 40 HOUR NO SWEARING OR £1 FINE – Completed between Tuesday 5 to Wednesday 6 November 2013. (cost me £21)

Challenge 18 – TURN MOBILE PHONE OFF FOR 40 HOURS – I turned my phone off and had no access to facebook, twitter or emails at all for 40 hours. (Oct)

Challenge 19 – 40 HOUR SILENCE – Completed between Midnight on Thursday 14.11.13 until 4pm on Saturday 16.11.13.

Challenge 22 – ADOPTED A WILD ANIMAL – I adopted Jubilee an Asian Elephant through the Born Free Foundation. (Spent £30 for adoption fee)

Challenge 25 – GIVE BLOOD – Completed on 11.10.13.

Challenge 30 – APPLY FOR A GAME SHOW – I applied to two game shows ‘Deal or No Deal’ and ‘The Chase’ in August but have still not heard anything back. I also applied to Bargain Hunt this month for my colleague Paul who would love to go on this programme.

Challenge 38 – HULA HOOP FOR 40 REVOLUTIONS – Completed in Sept. (Spent £18 on buying hoola hoop)

Blog 13 - Double top...

Ok so Challenge 8 was to score 40 on a dart board with a single dart, which meant that I had to get a double top. This was a tough challenge in that, I attempted to do it a number of times but was unable to actually get on a dart board in a pub as the board was always busy! I took to carrying around a pack of ‘Emergency darts’ in my bag which is not ideal as for some occasions this might be described as carrying an offense weapon!

These emergency darts however, came in very handy when popping into local pub The Birchgrove on our way home from the Wales v Italy rugby 6 Nations game and low and behold the dart board was free!!!! Slightly worse for wear as Nick and I had been drinking most of the afternoon, I thought this is it… so enlisting the help of a bunch of strangers and in particular a mentor called Steve, we explained what I needed to do and flushed with a Welsh win, they all starting cheering me on. With the first couple of darts I think it became clear that this might take a while and the spectators started moving out of the firing line as they realised their life might be in danger!

Nick and the group were all shouting various directions, ‘aim towards the top’ ‘aim at the 20’ ‘for the love of god aim at the board!’ and I was just getting worse. Then on my 9^th attempt, my mentor Steve said I was aiming too low so said ‘aim at the ceiling’, I adjusted my stance, I concentrated hard and focused on the ceiling, I let go of the dart and there was silence in the pub until it flew right in the middle of the double top!!! It felt like I had scored the winning try at the rugby as the corner of the pub erupted and everyone was cheering or in complete stunned silence that I actually managed it!!!

It obviously was a complete fluke as Nick and I played darts for the next hour with me still aiming for the double top the whole time and I didn’t manage to get it again. Don’t ask me why but I secretly thought that I might have some undiscovered talent as a darts player and this dream has now been squashed but I just might have lots more fun times having a go though! Although I will have to make sure I have a wide berth from the spectators!

You can tell I was a little worse for wear, as I couldn't even point at the 20 properly!

 

Update on the other challenges:

· (Challenge 1 – Write 40 Blogs) this is blog number 13 written

· (Challenge 2 –Get 40 people to donate £10 to charity) Raised £150 so far, £250 to go!!

· (Challenge6 – 40 Sit ups every day) keeping up although some days are a bit half hearted!

· (Challenge 10 - Take 40 photos) – None taken yet.

· (Challenge 11 – Read 40 Books) I am on book number 18

· (Challenge 12 – Volunteer for 40 hours) Aside from my RSPCA volunteering, 37 hours given volunteering for NSPCC, PTA events and other fundraising events.

· (Challenge 14 – Have 40 dates with my husband) – Had 17 dates so far.

· (Challenge 17 – Visit 40 pubs) I have visited 20 pubs so far.

· (Challenge 24 – Have Afternoon Tea at The Ritz) This is booked for May 2014 to also celebrate my mum’s 70th Birthday.

· (Challenge 26 – lose 14 pounds in weight) struggling big time with this one and have the full 14 pounds to lose!!

· (Challenge 28 – Commit 12 acts of kindness to random strangers) I have completed 10 acts so far.

· (Challenge 35 –Cook 12 new recipes) - 5 recipes made.

· (Challenge 36 – Listen to my entire CD collection) I am still trying to get through this one!

 

COMPLETED:

Challenge 4 – SWIM 40 LENGTHS – Swan 40 lengths of the 50m pool in Cardiff Bay with Lara Ramsay on 27.10.13. (Money spent £16 for goggles and entry to pool)

Challenge 8 – SCORE 40 ON A DART BOARD WITH ONE DART - Got a double top on my 9^th try on 1.2.14.

Challenge 9 – 40 HOUR FAST – I completed 40 hours not eating any food and surviving on water and flavoured water only. (Sept, with Karen Daniel)

Challenge 16 – 40 HOUR NO SWEARING OR £1 FINE – Completed between Tuesday 5 to Wednesday 6 November 2013. (cost me £21)

Challenge 18 – TURN MOBILE PHONE OFF FOR 40 HOURS – I turned my phone off and had no access to facebook, twitter or emails at all for 40 hours. (Oct)

Challenge 19 – 40 HOUR SILENCE – Completed between Midnight on Thursday 14.11.13 until 4pm on Saturday 16.11.13.

Challenge 22 – ADOPTED A WILD ANIMAL – I adopted Jubilee an Asian Elephant through the Born Free Foundation. (Spent £30 for adoption fee)

Challenge 25 – GIVE BLOOD – Completed on 11.10.13.

Challenge 30 – APPLY FOR A GAME SHOW – I applied to two game shows ‘Deal or No Deal’ and ‘The Chase’ in August but have still not heard anything back. I also applied to Bargain Hunt this month for my colleague Paul who would love to go on this programme.

Challenge 38 – HULA HOOP FOR 40 REVOLUTIONS – Completed in Sept. (Spent £18 on buying hoola hoop)