Author: Sam Flynn

carb cycling

Carb Cycling For Weight Loss

I’ve talked recently about how I’m adopting a new approach to my health, fitness and weight loss this year.  This has included working for a two month period with a personal trainer to understand the best fitness and nutrition approach for me.  One of the things I highlighted to my PT was how I would like to increase my metabolic rate, as it’s been very low the past few years and lead to me easily gaining weight and feeling tired and sluggish.  While I’m doing what I can in the gym to achieve this, throwing in lots of resistance work, the other area that needed addressing was nutrition, which is where carb cycling comes in.

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fitness

Improving My Fitness With A Personal Trainer

I’ve always wanted to train with a personal trainer.  Someone who can really push my fitness, and give me advice that is specific to me on nutrition.  But it seemed such a luxury.  They don’t come cheap, and I always thought the guilt would be too much spending the money on myself.  But when I totted up my birthday money from last week, I realised I could buy myself something I’d always really wanted.   That wouldn’t gather dust (hello bread maker!).  Or that wouldn’t end up just being spent on a food shop!  So, I’ve signed up for two months with a personal trainer!

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Aquafresh

Turn Brush-Time Into Fun-Time This Red Nose Day

I’ve become very conscious of my dental hygiene recently.  I floss nightly, use interdental brushes and make sure I brush my teeth for two minutes both morning and night.  And it’s made me think even more about the health of the girls’ teeth.    Research has shown that Brits only brush their teeth for an average of 45 seconds each time.  And I’d be surprised if the girls even do it for that long.  Sienna will happily chew her toothbrush for ages, but when it comes to brushing, it’s a different matter.

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A Weekend at Flamingo Land

Much as a bit of sunshine and heat is always very much welcome (says she who is just back from a hen weekend in Marrakesh!), sometimes sticking close to home can be just as good.  I think we’ve realised that going away with a one year old and a three year old is just not what we want to do.  Flights, heat, shared hotel rooms and trying to get them to sleep, just don’t appeal.  And that’s not even considering the cost of going abroad.  So, we’ve definitely found ourselves being far more open to staycations since we had the girls.

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Lifestyle habits

New Positive Lifestyle Habits

Just like most people, I have a never ending list of things I’d like to do more of / less of / better, etc.! And it seems this year, I’ve finally started ticking some of those things off the list.  Now we’re half way through February, it feels like they are no longer just new year fads, but things I have added to my routine.  New habits that I plan to keep up.  They’ve all definitely had a positive impact and I thought I’d share them with you to maybe inspire you to do the same.

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2017 – Plans and Hopes and This Blog

This time last year, this blog was at its most ‘successful’. In that, I mean I was posting regularly, sometimes three times a week. And I was loving writing and always had ideas for blog posts swimming round my head.

Fast forward to the end of the year, and it’s easy to see the blog has dwindled. I barely post at all any more. I wouldn’t say I’ve fallen out of love with it. More that, returning to my business after maternity leave with Sienna has lead to me throwing myself in to building that back up again at the cost of this blog.  This blog was only ever a hobby. Something I enjoyed doing, when I had the time. And over pregnancy and the baby months, I seemed to have a greater need for that release than I do now.

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Sienna

The Day Sienna Fell Down The Stairs

I remember the day before Ella turned two.  And she ran out in to a busy road.  Thankfully, nothing happened, the traffic stopped, but it took me a while to calm down.  I blogged about it (you can read the post here) and it really helped me to get over what happened, getting it down in writing.

Yesterday, something happened that I similarly feel the need to release as it is playing on my mind A LOT!

In our old house, we never bothered with stair gates when Ella was a little explorer.  The stairs were in our lounge area, so we could pretty much see when she was heading up.  And, until we thought she was confident enough, we would go up with her, holding her hand or standing behind her ready to catch.  We didn’t have a stair gate at the top either.  It just wouldn’t fit on our banister.  She was soon great at coming down on her bum too.  And she never fell.

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I’ve Stopped Eating Sugar

Ok, so the title is a little misleading.  I kind of have and kind of haven’t stopped eating sugar.  But I have made some big changes, and I thought I’d tell you about them!

I’ve always liked setting myself little challenges.  I love the idea of a monthly challenge, and have done them in the past.  But, have lagged a bit recently with ‘challenge Sam’!!  I noticed that I was slowly eating more and more sugar.  I was craving it.  I don’t get enough sleep, work hard, exercise, mother, and all that, and I just felt exhausted all the time and was reaching for the easiest thing to give me a boost – sugar!

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Siblings (October ’16)

I feel that in a lot of ways, the relationship between Ella and Sienna hasn’t really changed that much since Sienna was a tiny baby.  They both love each other immensely.  Like some crazy bond, that only blood can bring.  They really are a unit.  It’s not just about time spent together.  There’s something more to it than that.  Some primal need to be near each other, but just far enough away too!

One thing that hasn’t really changed in any of my siblings posts since Sienna was born, is how we need to constantly remind Ella to be gentle with her.  I thought at first it was about Ella learning the fragility of a baby, when she was really only one herself, still being 1 when Sienna was born.  But it really hasn’t changed.  She’s still rough with her!  So, I wonder if it is actually just Ella’s nature.  She loves her so fiercely that she wants to squeeze her and squeeze her and squeeze her.  To the point where she isn’t really hearing Sienna’s cries to be released, that escalate and escalate.  If I’m in another room and can hear Sienna crying, I can almost guarantee that it is because Ella has a grip of her!

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Where Have I Been?

This blog has been pretty quiet over the last few months.  I thought I’d be able to pick it back up a bit more now Ella is at preschool and I have my non-working mornings to myself, while Sienna naps, before we head to pick up Ella.

But those mornings have been spent working.  I’m doing a big push on my business at the moment.  I’ve always worked towards the ‘work less for more’ approach with my business.  I want to spend time with the girls while they are young, but I also want my business to be a ‘success’ and for me to be a key person of influence in my industry.  And this, of course, does require some time.  I work two full days a week typically.  Some weeks, I work more and Sienna goes for an extra day to nursery, and Ella spends the afternoon after pre-school at nursery too.  But mostly, I work Tuesdays and Thursdays.  And the rest of the week I play at being a mum!

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