As a proud Ambassador for DKMS_UK and former Oncology nurse, I feel very privileged to be celebrating my 50th birthday in February 2022 – that got me thinking! Mission 50 for DKMS was born!
What if I could do something to raise awareness for DKMS around the number 50??
What if I made it my Mission in the year 2022 to raise as much awareness and as many funds as possible?
I started playing around with ideas…
Please consider this:
❣️Every 20 minutes someone in the UK is diagnosed with a blood cancer such as leukaemia, lymphoma or melanoma.
❣️Someone somewhere in the world is diagnosed with blood cancer every 27 seconds.
❣️Only 30% of people diagnosed find a donor match within their family, that’s why swab kits to find donors are so important.
I’m calling on my friends, family and you to join me in anyway you can. Whether it be a training run, an event or donating a raffle prize, or donating to my fundraising page… Just think if everyone reading this page donated, we’d get there in no time! Imagine!!
Finalised calendar will be shared with you over the coming weeks and months. One thing for sure it that it won’t be easy! I’m not at all fit and lockdown poundage is real!!!
Anything to help would be a huge support. You know I am a huge fan of paying it forward and random acts of kindness and now, more than ever, I think we all need a little something to brighten our day and week.
For someone diagnosed with blood cancer, a blood stem cell donation from a matching donor could be their last chance of survival, but what does it mean to become a stem cell donor?
Firstly, let’s talk about what DKMS is and why their work is so important..
Peter Harf, founder of Delete Blood Cancer DKMS speaks about our mission and the need for bone marrow donors.
Every 27 seconds, someone somewhere in the world is diagnosed with blood cancer.
How do I know I can donate my Stem Cells?
If you are aged between 17 and 55 years and in general good health, then you may be able to register as a blood stem cell donor.
If you register when you are 17, you will not be able to donate blood stem cells yet, but on your 18th birthday, you will automatically be activated in our database and included in the global donor searches.
What’s involved in donating blood stem cells?
DKMS_UK followed Tom, a blood stem cell donor’s journey through The London Clinic on donation day, hearing his experience of being called on to donate as well as insight into the process from staff and experts. Take a look at this 3 minute video to find out more. Gives me goosebumps every time I watch it!
“Someone, somewhere has a little part of you with them forever”
jade
Jade, 30, registered with DKMS after watching a friend’s mum go through cancer. A few years later, she gave a complete stranger a second chance of life by donating her blood stem cells.
“Knowing that little bag of goodness is potentially going to save someone’s life who you’ve never met is incredibly hard to describe until you do it.
It’s the most surreal feeling, so to anyone thinking about it – do it!”
Jade
Just 2% of the UK’s population is currently on the stem cell register.. Alongside my Mission50forDKMS to raise £50K in my 50th year for DKMS, it is also my Mission to help change this statistic. If you can get involved or you know someone who would like to like to get involved, please, please do let them know!
We need all the help and support we can to help as many people as possible delete their blood cancer.
This blog is all about you! Let’s explore how to make your dreams come true by answering some simple questions.
Let’s discover what’s holding you back and how you can make that first move to unlocking the life you want.
If not now, then when? Grab a cuppa, your journal and a comfy spot – let’s go in!
If you were to write a list right now about what you would like your life to look like, what would be on it?
Take 5 minutes (or as long as you wish) to write down in your journal or notebook, everything you’d LOVE to be doing.
Don’t over think it.
Consider it almost like a wish list. You don’t need to think how it will happen, just simply what you would like your life to look like..
Sounds simple doesn’t it?
‘Rather than stifling enterprise, the pandemic has led to entrepreneurs creating new businesses in response to the crisis’
Dylan Jones-Evans, Business Live
These last 20 months have thrown our worlds upside down and inside out. The way we live, work and travel have all changed.
Face to face interviews for jobs became a 10 minute video submission to the panel sharing what you could bring to the company.
We worked from home, our childrens classrooms became the dining room table and we spent more time than ever online, connecting, communicating and evolving.
More than ever, we have become a world where we have had to adapt and craete a new way of living.
For many people I’ve had spoken to, it has bought a conversation of what has worked well for them during these strange times.
People have shared with me that they’ve felt that working from home has been better for them as the commuting times are non existant, therefore improving their quality of life. For some, it’s given them the nudge they needed to create their dream business or structure their home life balance a little better.
With this in mind what’s on your wishlist?
Maybe you’d like to start your own business.
Adopt.
Move the the country.
Write a book.
Overcome your biggest fear.
Find your body confidence..
Renovate a room in your home or maybe build your own home.
Whatever made your wish list, NOW is the time.
ASK YOURSELF: What’s holding you back from making your dreams a reality?
You may already know.
Perhaps you are thinking “nothing is holding me back” but don’t have exact clarity on where to start.
That’s OK.
Don’t tell me the sky’s the limit when there are footprints on the moon.
Imagine..
Imagine the thermometer in your home.
Set it to 21 degrees, guess what? Your home becomes a gorgeous 21 degrees – no more, no less.
Imagine if you set your personal thermometer to HIGH. You removed all the worry, self limiting beliefs and behaved that your wish had already become true.
What would you be doing?
What would your day look like?
What would you be wearing, feeling, saying?
Once you know the answers to these simple questions, you can start to make your dreams become true.
Really knowing what you’d like your life to look like and actually visualise, right down to the nitty gritty, what it would look like, that’s when the magic starts to happen1
Be bold, be brave and go for it!
”Happiness Is Not Something Readymade. It Comes From Your Own Actions.”
Dalai lama
More than anything, these last couple of years have taught us that nothing is certain and whilst that can be really scary. In some form it’s exciting..
Now really is the time to go for it.. make that jump, live that dream, because if not now – when?
It’s OK to make YOU a priority and create the live you wish to have.
I’d love to know how your attitudes and passions have changed. Please do join me on Instagram, where the conversation continues, with inspirational weekly mini missions which help you make life changes so your dreams come true.
In this weeks blog, I’m sharing my top tips to plan effectively so that you can prioritise more time for what’s important in your life, how I plan my diary and one very key lesson I learned years ago, which I still use today.
How do you plan? Are you an electronic diary kind of person or, like me, love to have a pretty planner..? Or several..?
Whilst this may seem excessive, I’m yet to find a planner that ticks all my boxes – so I use two or three. One for the home and my interiors projects, one for my Blogs and Missions and one for my Fitness and Wellbeing Goals including the “everyday” . The dream is to take all the aspects I love about the planners I use and add my own little spin. Wonder if you can guess what I’d add? Do you think if I make a wish, it might just happen..?
“The key is not to prioritise what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.”
Stephen Covey.
I have used the diaries and calendar from Boxclever Press for years, in fact am sure I was one of their first customers the year they launched which coincided with me becoming a new mum. Writing the important things down is key to managing my time effectively.
I was delighted recently when they asked me to review their new academic diary and calendar for 2021 / 2022 and share with you how I use them and what works for me. These planners are as close to perfect as I can get. They have everything for me as a busy mum of teens and and help me plan my writing and goals effectively.
The new school term for me is a perfect time for a new focus, and yes with that, a new planner! There’s something about having a new pencil case and notebook to reignite the passion around your working life, home life and yes, planning the final quarter of the year, all whilst wondering how that time has passed so quickly!
The planning starts for me before the Autumn term begins. I’m not sure what it’s like in your house but as the school summer term finishes, my inbox starts to flood with fixtures and dates for the new term. As a swim mum, this includes swimming fixtures as the season runs from late August through to the following summer.
Getting everything in place from dates to labelling the school uniform, early in the school summer holidays, means I can relax that little bit more without too many shocks the week before the new school year begins!
“Most of us spend too much time on what is urgent and not enough time on what is important.”
Stephen Covey
Look after the big rocks first.
The same year I became a first-time mum, I attended a Franklin Covey course on time and life management. There began my love for Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits for Highly Effective People. The biggest lightbulb moment was to look after the Big Rocks first.
The Big Rocks are the things in your life that are MOST important, they go in your planner first. It sounds a simple thing to do, but how many times when we are in the thick of life, we can revert to reactive living and not proactive. With a planner that works for you together with effective planning, life really does seem that much more manageable.
My Top Tips to Effective Planning:
Find a planner that works for you. it sounds really obvious but get to know it, spend time looking at all its functions so you are able to use it to your best advantage.
Put the big rocks in first, including YOU time – book it like an appointment. You wouldn’t miss you appointmentt for your car to have an MOT. Book them in for you too! Easier said than done I know, however practise makes perfect!
Create a system; with pens, stickers, whatever works for you to highlight the important appointments and fixtures that matter.
Create time for a Power of an Hour each day. Having focused time to work on ONE thing, working with intention and without distraction, it’s incredible what you can achieve.
Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail! It’s the little things that have a huge effect on the big things, so simple but true. So plan ahead – if you’re planning on working out first thing in the morning, prepare ahead by getting your kit ready the night before.
Consider how you can limit any stresses that come your way. What do you need in place to limit any stresses that may come your way? As a stationary lover, having a box of birthday and celebration cards to hand is always helpful with children in the house.
Each Sunday, I spend a little time getting prepared for my week ahead. This involves looking at my planner, doing a diary check with the family. Adding and taking out what can help and hinder the week ahead. I confirm my workouts, plan the weekly menu, including the shopping list and print my Consistency Checklist for the week ahead. I’ve created some free downloads which might help you.
“You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage—pleasantly, smilingly, non-apologetically, to say “no” to other things.
Stephen Covey.
Let’s be real.
Trying to plan effectively and having systems in place, are all well and good, but let’s be honest and realistic for a moment, life happens! We can plan for most things, yet curveballs can occur which will send us out of kilter. We’ve certainly learned that in the last year haven’t we?
We all know that it is how we respond to these circumstances that matter so please be kind to yourself. If you drop the ball, that’s ok. I truly hope that sharing some of the things that work for me, help you too. Be kind to yourself and put things in place that work for you.
A little mission – pantry makeover and organisation. What I did so our kitchen worked more effectively for us as a family. We all have our systems in place and I’m sure you have your own too, however incase it helps, I thought I’d talk you through what I did to organise our kitchen and pantry cupboards.
I always enjoy a good old spring clean and declutter and it seems I’m not on my own – thank goodness! Spending a year in Lockdown has meant we’ve looked at our spaces differently and in my case, decluttering at the beginning last March and now again a year on!
Clear the clutter so you have room to see the potential in front of you.
Syd and Shea McGee
Moving Day; the back story.
To give you a little back story, when we moved into our home, the children were still young, I was running my Fitness and Wellbeing business and up at 4.15am every morning and my husband also has a busy job! Not unusual, I hear you say..
Moving in day was equally busy. I picked up our new keys at midday, having run two busy fitness camps for my clients at 6am and 9am. We had until the 3.30pm school pick up to get the majority of the work done. Essentially I was keen to at least make the childrens bedrooms and the living areas livable! Yes my #PowerofanHours were in full swing, even then!
Obviously in an ideal world, we’d have looked at the space in our kitchen and worked out logically where everything should live. We didn’t, we simply unpacked the boxes (in an organised manner as possible) and that was that, back to our crazy busy lives, excited to be in our new home. It worked.
The simplest of touches for the guest room.
Lockdown bought a new vision
Over the years, I’ve decluttered and moved things around but one of the positives this Lockdown has given me was to really look at our space, how it functioned, or didn’t and plan accordingly.
It’s been a huge lightbulb moment for me, having the brain space and time to be objective, yet creating spaces behind the doors that work so much more effectively for us as a family. I cleared a space in my diary and the “Little Mission -the pantry makeover and organisation” commenced!
I started with one cupboard, where we store our hot drink ingredients, thinking I’d remove the items that were out of date or no longer served the family and simply replace back in the cupboard.. However, on closer examination, I realised that this cupboard also now hosted items we used for entertaining & baking.
Most of the items were already in storage jars but overtime it had become disorganised and cluttered, not only that but our mugs were over the other side of the kitchen. Not a good use of space or time, just to make a cup of coffee! Now I know this sounds silly, I’m sure many of you already have a “hot drinks station” as The Home Edit call it, but remember we moved in and went with the flow!
The top shelf now stores a basket with a stock of fruit teas, together with a storage jar of filter coffee and the cafetière. the second shelf now hosts our mugs and the bottom shelf hosts the teas, coffees etc that we use regularly. Our kettle lives directly under this cupboard and it works really well! Simple things eh..?
“Having a place for everything and everything in it’s place makes the world of difference” A quote my Granny Ruby would say often, I think I adopted her passion for being organised from her!
“I look forward to spring cleaning and putting things in their place. It’s therapeutic for me”
Kimora Lee Simmons
The System
Powered on, I turned my attentions to the pantry cupboards and adopted the same process.
Remove all items.
Discard what’s out of date or your family no longer need or use.
Wash all storage containers and wipe cupboards.
Assess the space.
Consider what you need to complete the job. Labels? Jars? Adjust the shelf heights?
Refill storage jars and place back where they suit you, your family and your lifestyle.
It always looks worse before it gets better!
Things I found useful to consider when starting a pantry organisation.
Think about what you actually do in your kitchen!
Where you cook, where you prepare the packed lunches, which items you use more than others. It took me until recently to realise that I stored my flour on the top shelf, with all the baking ingredients, which meant I’d have to jump onto the worktop to reach it – Every. Single. Time!! Why it didn’t occur to me to have a reshuffle and move these items to a lower shelf was purely because I didn’t give it another thought!
AfterBefore I can now reach the items I use on a daily basis! The baking ingrediants are stored in the basket, making life much simpler and neater.
Plan your layout!
I’m an old fashioned kind of girl and when the brain goes round and round in circles, I write it down. This new system needed to work, I wanted to have a space that was efficient, yet looked elegant and that worked for everyone, keeping the upkeep to a minimum. (Our longed for kitchen renovation is still in the “dream stage” but this process all helps for when the planning becomes a reality.)
I drew the kitchen and cupboard layout on a piece of paper and reassessed which storage jars and labels I needed and where they would go. By writing it all down, having an old fashioned “brain dump” cleared the fog and I could get a clearer perspective. A good thing when you are short of time!
Jars from Amazon Customised labels from Printtailors By working out what you need to refresh your space, before you order can save money and time. I used lots of storage jars I already had and ordered a couple more to complete the task. My coffee bags now have their own jar and customised label.
Divide the kitchen into “Stations”
I’m sure if I shared my steps in the kitchen before the pantry makeover and organisation, you’d giggle. Everything was so far away from each other.. The honey lived in a cupboard far from the toaster. The herbs were in a cupboard on the other side of the kitchen away from the oven.
Having stopped and reassessed and framed this process as “creating stations”, it really simplified everything and made it easier to organise.
The serving dishes, herbs and cooking ingredients are now in a cupboard next to the cooker. So simple, yet effective!
Remove the emotion from decluttering your items.
How many of us keep items because they have sentimental value or because they were expensive? You may remember in last weeks blog, I shared a game our family started “yes, no, go” last year. It really helps to make a quick decision about what stays and what goes. Having a Kitchen and pantry refresh means you can get radical.
Those plates that are chipped and you no longer use? They go!
Electrical items that no longer work? Get them fixed or they go!
Children’s cups and plates they used when they were toddlers but they’re now married and no longer live at home? If you can’t bare to get rid of them, pop them in a box (labelled obviously) and store in the attic. You get the idea!
What to do about remembering expiry dates?
Now you’ve removed all the unsightly packaging, how are you going to remember what expires and when? What if you have family member with allergies and need to know the ingredients on the items you’ve now lovingly stored in jars? I cut the expiry dates off the packaging and taped them to the bottom of the lid of the jar or under the jar depending on where the jar was in the cupboard. I didn’t want to see the tape!
Little touches, make the biggest impact!
I can honestly say that the Little Mission – The Pantry Makeover And Organisation has made a huge difference. The cupboards and pantry certainly “Spark Joy” and life is even more efficient. I was asked last week, how did you get the time to do this? I simply blocked an hour at a time. worked on a cupboard at at time. You know I’m a big fan of my #powerofanhour and blocking out time. In the long run you’ll save time and had a huge sense of satisfaction. A big win all round don’t you think?
Print Tailor
Finally
Forgive me if you’ve read this blog and thought “I can’t believe she’s sharing this, it’s obvious!” You wouldn’t be wrong! I have to say, we all lead busy lives and sometimes the simplest of things such as having your mugs next to your coffee can get over looked. Priorities take over.
I hope that a step by step walk through of what worked for me, might be useful for you and your pantry makeover and organisation too.
Let me know if this has inspired you to take a look at how your kitchen space works. I’d love to know what habits you got into that changed when you had a lightbulb moment, much like my having to jump on the worktop to reach the flour!! Tell me it’s not just me!
I’m the creator of Woman on a Mission, a lifestyle space dedicated to helping women bring more calm, confidence and balance into everyday life. Born from my own journey to slow down and live with greater intention, it offers inspiration around wellbeing, organisation, home and mindset, one meaningful mission at a time
Maybe you’d like to start your own business.
