'Women on the Veg of Reason' 10/10 club - all welcome

[Boco]

For anyone who wants a boost to their general health. The suggested goals are:

EAT 10 PORTIONS OF FRUIT AND VEGETABLES EVERY DAY - if you don't usually eat much fruit and veg I would build up gradually or you could upset your digestion.

DO (AT LEAST) 10 MINUTES OF EXERCISE EVERY DAY - can be yoga, stretching or something more energetic. The plan is that the idea of doing 10 minutes is not too daunting, and having started you may well find you want to do more.

There are no restrictions on what you eat so long as you get your 10 fruit and veg as well. The focus is not on weight loss but on improving our energy levels and hopefully our general mood and well-being. Sign up below and post here to tell us how you're getting on and how you are feeling.

Basic guidance on what constitutes a portion of fruit and veg here and you can download more detailed information by following the link at the very bottom of the page

My sister is tolerable if a little horsey. I also have two brothers but I am the eldest. The rest of the family think I'm quite straight a stuffy and just a little bit snobby. Cam you imagine such a thing?

They also think I am the wordy one, if they could see my typing skills on here that image may change.

LL - I was wincing with that story. Ow is an understatement.

Boco that was so grim for you. I wish we had known you then so we could have all been kind to you. I hope people were kind to you

Father Christmas - we told ds it was true and now have regretted it. It is such a big lie and I don't know how to get out of it gracefully. What we want to achieve is the kind of half believing magical feeling that I still get at Christmas without having to actually think FC is a real person. I have been dropping hints that it is a story but ds is stolidly sticking to him being real. After all, he brought the presents, didn't he? And he's met him, too. Plus my friends will absolutely throttle me if ds tells their children he is not real. Honestly. They will probably stop speaking to me.

Oh yes and Avi DON'T have the stocking in the bedroom - have it somewhere else in the house. Otherwise they wake up at 3 am and find that He Has Been, and start opening everything, and don't go back to sleep, or, they wake up at 3 am and find He Hasn't Been, and scream the house down.

I don't see the problem with believing in Father Christmas. If it is a lie, what about the tooth fairy, or fairies and magic in general? I stopped believing fairly young as my mother was drunk and fell over in my bedroom but my dc's still believe it. DS1 still does and he's nearly 10, though I think he may think he is humouring us by pretending he does. He stayed awake so long last year and I was so tired I sort of threw the stocking on the bed in the end. DD believes with all her heart, but then she goes on fairy adventures every night and also made the world.

We are going out to see a children's show and I have just looked on the website to see what time it starts and it says clowns

oh fuck

it's Franny I think.

Avi - are you saying you want him to realise that magic is a wonderful element of stories and imagination but that it is not real? I'm not meaning to be awkward I'm interested and I can't be bothered to temper all my comments with emoticons but I Am Not Being Huffy...

I really really believed in magic when I was little, I can't imagine not having believed that the fairies and mermaids and monsters from stories were not real. I WAS a princess born into the wrong family.

M ds1 is good on this. He said quite young, 5 or 6. 'People at school say that Father Christmas isn't real and that it's your parents. It doesn't matter does it? It's a really nice thing to think about.'

That's about it isn't it? I'd be a bit appalled if ds1 and ds2 actually still thought he was real, real. But they live in a half-state of imaginative desire and half real understanding.

FWIW, I still feel much like that about Father Christmas. I can't remember ever thinking he was real, youngest of 4 children, but I always believed in him.

If you don't promote the story people will accuse you of destroying

the magic of childhood, the innocence of children, etc, etc.

So be ready.

There have been a couple of threads on this and there has been some tetchiness, I believe.

I can see that telling them a man comes into the house is a FACT, whereas talking about fairies and magic is a more abstract concept, but I don't think that perpetuating
the story is negative in terms of LYING either. I recognise the issue though.

ds1 probably laughed at me checking for him to be asleep, perhaps he doesn't want to disappoint me by telling me he knows, naive me, though I know ifswim. It's not really discussed.

Phew he was a sort of clown in that he was a silly physical humour man but he was not dressed as a clown. He was dressed as an old American man wearing a nightie (well, he was an old American man wearing a nightie). He was very funny. His jokes for the adults were particularly good and his face in itself was very droll.

I agree with 100, I still half believe in FC and that is the state I want ds to be in. Ds always wants to be very clear about whether things are real or not, and whether they really happened or are just stories. He seems to think fairies really are real, and FC obviously. Other than that he asks a lot "That is not really true, is it, it's just a story."

100x - I announced to dh that we were all coming to Bristol after all last night and he was very annoying, said I should have mentioned it sooner and we'd need to leave earlier etc. I had begun to pack though Hotel du Vin had no rooms left. We might go next weekend instead, it is his birthday and he's working there again. We could leave earlier on Friday. I would like to see SS Britain.

Anyway it's a good job we didn't as DD is ill. She came in around 5.30am and said she felt ill ad I said so did I at that time and told her to go back to bed. I feel really bad now as she hasn't got up all day and she has a temp and is asleep right now.

Avi -who thinks you're barking, mnet or your family?

Avi I get what you mean as well. I can't put it into words at the moment - but the saying outright if asked, yes it is true, and going to elaborate lengths not to let children find out and all that, it doesn't feel comfortable to me. The magic and the stories and the jolliness and the pretending together is the nice bit. There have been some great threads on this. Filly was always very good. But they do get very heated, people are livid at the very suggestion that you don't go to any lengths to keep the story going.

Hope small carrot is better. there are a few nasties going around I think

that reminds me, there is someone on here called verylittlecarrot, I saw them on the claire scott thing. Hmm.

so you don't leave footprints outside the window and nibble half a carrot on the hearth then?

Rah! I've typed a really long message twice, and each time the computer has frozen. This is my last go before i throw it out of the window.

DD1 gets really cross with me and demands to know the truth about fairies and father christmas and goblins and everything. She gets so angry and i find that with a direct and heartfelt question - it really does feel like a lie. But, she's 5, and i'm not ready for all that to just be over. So, i'm evasive and mysterious and admit nothing. And we are now kind of at this understanding where we're all pretending to believe. She's made a conscious decision to believe - but also wants me to know that it's a game. It's a tricky balance.

She's just been out with a friend for a birthday treat - they were going to watch the Bratz movie and then to macdonalds. I was a bit nervous because i loathe bratz - and she says they're too ugly and their heads are wrong - and i was worried she'd say something. And i think maybe they did, because the mum just brought her back and said they'd decided to give the cinema a miss. DD said it had nothing to do with her, but i think it may have done. And she's never been to Macdonalds before, and apparently did tell them all that the food is bad for you The girls parents are 21, and make me feel very old and fussy. Dd said the food was yuk and all one colour - so at least she's not been converted.

Erm, well, we do

I've always done it myself, as an adult, so we do it now with ds. I would just like him to know that it is a sort of game. Without me telling him. And never mentioning it to our friends' children