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Simplified Mum Life

Nina A Spencer – Motherhood Mentor – Simplifying the every day for busy overwhelmed mums -Mum Of Twins Twice! Placenta Accreta Survivor, Mental Health Champion, On my own simple living Journey filled with adventure and travel . Embracing The Imperfectly, Chaotic moments of motherhood.
Food

Meal Plan Monday. – 25th March

I’ve been think for a while about doing weekly meal plans on here.

I’m terrible at thinking of new ideas though and struggle getting healthy meals into my kids.

Years ago when I first started blogging I use to partake in something called meal plan Monday.

It really helped me to stay on track and plan more.

That’s what I need now. We spend far to much money in the local shop for bits and bobs due to not having a plan.

Doing this (fingers crossed) will get me back into weekly shops and saving more money.

Meal Plan

So after a rather rambley intro here is my meal plan for week commencing 25th March

Monday – Cheesy pasta mixed with veg

Tuesday – Lemon Chicken with new potatoes and salad

Wednesday – Hot dogs.

Thursday – Spanish omelette, ham, steamed veg & sweet potato fries.

Friday – Take out Friday

Saturday – Kids – nuggets & chips Adults – cheese board after kids have gone to bed.

Sunday – I’m hoping for a Sunday lunch somewhere for Mother’s Day

I’ll try and remember to come back next week. With another Meal Plan.

Meanwhile please let me know what’s on your meal plan for the week.

Nina x

Im jointing Katy Kicker’s meal plan linky

Katykicker
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Dreaming of...

Dreaming of…….. a Cornwall Retreat.

Literally dreaming. I got woken from an amazing dream a couple of nights ago.

Myself & Spencer’s ARC Daddy we’re in Cornwall. I’d fell in love with it.

And knowing how much I love to wander around potential new homes he had set up a surprise house viewing.

Now before I could go and look around or even finish my coffee in my dream Melody woke me up.

But it had me thinking about it all day long.

What would our new house be like?

Must haves in my Cornwall Retreat – These are a little like my ideal house that I go to in my head when I need a quiet moment a little meditative trick from the Calm book.

  • Green Front Door – I love the look of a pale green door. Sadly mine is an old PVC door and I’m not sure it would look the as good painted green as some wooden ones I have seen.
  • A large open Plan Kitchen and Lounge – I like to entertain and it think its just feels better to have one huge room to entertain I love the idea of having a big island that I can prepare food around while chatting with friends or family.
  • A nice garden overlooking the sea. Maybe a a gate leading to the beach. With places to entertain, a BBQ area and decking.
  • Keeping with the garden I’d love a veg patch and chickens but separate from our main garden.
  • Oh and a pool.
  • I will also need an office to write in!
  • Im not too fused about the rest of the rooms only ones that are easy to keep tidy and quite simple.

The main living area is the most important to me. its where I would entertain, where our kids would do homework or school work, where I could grab a quite cuppa.

Maybe this is what my Cornwall retreat would have been like?

I love having dreams like that one. Ones that fire your imagination and puts some goal inspiration in front of you!

What would your Ideal House looks like? Maybe you already live in it?

Nina X

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Health & Fitness

Hello I am…….?

Nina?

Well yes that’s my name but I’m not actually sure who that is anymore.

(I’m just going to break for a moment after reading this post back it’s very metaphor heavy and for that I would like to apologise now. I’m not about to start chanting or become some kind of hippy (no offence) it’s just how the writing took me and felt the best way to write how I feel. I’ll also apologise incase you find it a little rambley – right you may continue with the post)

I’m a mum to two sets of twins.

I’m a wife to my childhood crush.

I’m a step mum to a teen.

I’m a daughter, step daughter, in law, auntie, cousin, niece and friend.

I’m a survivor of placenta percreta, I live with mental illness, and am going through the menopause.

Do these things define who I am?

I’m not sure. Of course they are part of who I am but I’m not solely those.

So who am I?

Lately I’ve struggled with knowing who I am, what I truly want out of life.

I’m not going to lie I’ve struggled with the above, being a mum to two sets of twins is hard work , and I often suck at being a wife and even daughter and friend sometimes.

I’m not sure if it’s part of my anxiety / depression or if I’m under in influence of social media and FOMO but mostly at the moment I’m struggling with knowing what I want to do next.

For ages I thought being on social media or being a blogger/ vlogger was the right thing for me. Maybe it still is but as I’ve focused on trying and failing to make me a living from it I’ve fallen out of love with it. Which has affected my creativity so I’m having a rethink.

When I was growing up I never wanted to be married, never wanted children. But then I got together with my childhood crush and he already had a son. I wanted to make us more of a bonded family and have our own children together.

A path I never would have thought about as a teenager or even in my early 20s.

I never thought I would fear my own mortality.

I never knew that I would struggle daily with anxious thoughts.

I didn’t even really know what I wanted as a career.

Now approaching 40 I’m still wondering what I want to do when I grow up.

I recently had a meeting with a family support worker who did a little life coaching with me.

She made me realise some of my passions,

She made me see a long term goal and some short term ones too.

So taking some of those guiding tools I’m going to do a few mind mapping exercises to pick my next path.

Who knows what’s at the end of it or if the destination will change along the way.

So in answer to my own question…

Who am I?

I am Nina, I’m on a journey to discovering who I am.

My first step – Fixing my mental health with some CBT. Maybe then the next path will be come clearer.

If you have any tips of finding out who I am please let me know.

I’m not talking a trek over Kilimanjaro or a week volunteering in a Buddhist temple.

Just little achievable things that I can do during nap time or maybe over a weekend.

Nina x

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Health & Fitness

Menopause Diary – Entry 4.

When you decide to start a family or expand your family you know that it’s going to change your life considerably but what I didn’t realise Is what an impact my last pregnancy would have on the rest of my life.

If you’ve visited the blog before, know me in real life or have followed my Instagram for a while you will know that I suffered a rare but life threatening pregnancy complication with my last pregnancy. Which resulted in a cesarian hysterectomy. I suffered quite a few complications from the surgery. (Twisted bowel, split wound, sepsis, 11 units of blood transfer)

But what I never took into account was that after the healing from all of those , that there would be more issues to come as a result.

The menopause isn’t something I thought about before a year ago.

It was just something that happened to older women.

Something that I didn’t really need to think about Yet.

Yet here I am 38 years old with my fingers crossed that the HRT I was given just 2 weeks ago will make me feel human again.

Will stop all my aches and pains.

Will help with the anxiety I’ve been feeling creep back up.

38 years old what should be the prime of my life really. Often though in a morning I feel more like 88.

I’m trying so hard to be healthy, lose weight, get fit, look after my body and my brain.

I’m finding this new part of me a little bit scary and overwhelming at the moment.

Please feel free to leave any tips for me to get through this new chapter in my life.

Nina x

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Celebrations

International Day Of Happiness & Mental Health

Living with a mental illness doesn’t mean I can’t find moments of happiness

It doesn’t mean that sometimes I can’t have happy days.

It just means I have to try harder to create happy moments.

As today is international day of happiness I thought I would list some of the things that I’m currently doing to stay on the right side of my mental illness.

  1. My most important one is swimming.  I wrote a post just a couple of days ago about how swimming is my most favourite thing.
  2. Walking – I’ve never really been one for exercise but my 20 min walks 3 times a week are now a habit and a little bit of addition. Its not just the walk that does me good but also the fresh air. Which leads me to number 3.
  3. Fresh Air – I’ve written a couple of times over on instagram how I think Im literally addicted to fresh air. I love to be outdoors I love the windows open and fresh air blowing in. – This is much better when its warmer weather but even when its cold I like to wrap up warm and get outside.
  4. Talking – I talk to anyone In fact I think I’m a bit of an over sharer I have been know to discuss a whole host of my issues on instagram, in the coffee shop and at the school gate. But its good to talk, right?
  5. Coffee Time – I often feel lonely and need someone to talk to. One of the best things I find to do is nip for a coffee sometimes with the little ones sometimes on my own. But I have made friends in my local coffee shop now and often have a chat with them while I’m getting my coffee.
  6. Vitamins – If or even when I forget to take my vitamins I can really tell in my mood. Those little vitamins are essential for me. They play a really big part in my wellbeing.
  7. Creativity – I’m actually in the middle of a post about the benefits of creativity and mental health but In short the process of creating rather than the finish project is what brings me most joy. I have found that when I take my time over things I’m creating It also turns out better.
  8. Family Time – Spencer’s ARC Daddy works away quite a bit so we don’t really get much quality time in the week. But at a weekend I love to have a plan so that we don’t waste our time together even if that plan  a movie and a picnic in our cinema room (Its not that posh just a converted summer house)
  9. A cuppa – I’m British enough said?
  10. Intervention – Which rounds up everything from HRT to my therapy that is coming up. Obviously these aren’t having much of an impact at the moment as I’ve really only just started the HRT and not yet been to a therapy session but they are things that will contribute in a positive way (I hope) to my overall mood! – So if your mood is so low your struggling to manage please go and seek some intervention. I struggled on and struggled on for ages. But now Im turning a corner because I have held up my hand and said I can not cope alone with just the things listed. But goodness knows how low I would be if I didn’t do any of them!

I hope this gives you some positive motivation.

Remember you are not alone if you feel like you need to talk to someone there are some great online places out there including the Channel Mum Facebook Page. Or consult your doctor!

Nina x

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Where to next?