Life: Bucket List & 2016 Mid-Year Challenges Revisited!

Rewinnnnndddd. Let's take a look back at the goals and challenges I set myself in mid 2016. How many did I achieve? What exactly did I do in the latter half of 2016? Well.. I enjoyed myself a damn lot. As I expressed in my 16 things in 2016 post, I had a bloody good year.

Mid-year Challenges (5 things to do before 2016 is up). 

So this challenge was one thing a month. Which (if any) did I do?
  • Complete a MOOC - Tick! I completed a beginners Spanish course in September.

  • Read 'The Importance of Being Earnest ' by Oscar Wilde - also completed back in August. I actually really enjoy this play, it was a fairly light and easy to read script. 

  • One month no refined sugar - NO! This was most definitely not achieved. I had too many nights out and trips out for food for this to happen. I really wanted to do it and still do but, I feel like you have to be super organised and prepared for it. I do eat mostly plant-based but I do like my chocolate snacks. It will be hard to give up the chocolate for a whole month :(

  • Read 'Lord of the Flies' - I read this in December. Someone tell me why I even bothered to. I really didn't enjoy it at all but I persevered on through anyway. 

  • 2 weeks living off the £10 a week student challenge - This was definitely a challenge and a challenge which was important to me for quite a few reasons. Firstly, the way student finance works for MSc means I have no 'living' money at all therefore keeping food costs down to a minimum is something I need to do. Secondly, I don't like food waste so keeping your budget low helps to minimise overbuying and wasting products. Thirdly, I do eat plant-based anyway so I can get a decent amount of food to last me a while (it just means no treats!). I definitely did one week of this. I tend to stock up on my toiletries and all that jazz earlier on in the year. So I find it easy to live off £10 a week if I don't go out. I am happy to drink tap water in most places and make packed lunches to take to university with me. I find it easier and so much cheaper to cook myself 3 meals a day. I hope to continue this challenge (and do a blog post on it!). £10 food shop is such a good aim and I can't wait to show you just how much you can get for it when you shop savvy. 

So there we have it. I completed most of the mid-year challenges. I found that setting this challenges gave me something to do. Like instead of reading celebrity gossip magazines I was reading Oscar Wilde (lol!).  Instead of splurging on my weekly food shop, I had an aim. This is something i particularly stuck with throughout the last few months of 2016. My bi-weekly food shop usually cost around £20. This is definitely something i'll stick with in 2017 and hopefully shopping this way will help me eat more whole foods and less refined sugar. Although with the amount of vegan snacks I got for christmas, I don't think a refined sugar-free month will be coming any time soon.


So what did I tick off my bucket list last year?



  • Camping (a very cold, rainy weekend in Chester - fun though)
  • Ice Bar (in Amsterdam!)
  • Trampolining (who knew it could be such a workout)
  • Started to learn Spanish (that's kinda failing now.. I need to get back on it)

CONVERSATION

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