Well that's it the final post. It's been an eventful, wonderful, fun year. I've had laughs and a few secret tears, shared some amazing experiences with family and friends, met some wonderful people and lived life in a year that had the potential to be hard to face. Some of  the activities I will be keep going ones like the dancing, giving blood and doing bits for charity. Others will inevitably carry on as they were life long commitments, others I certainly wont be repeating, the spider one for definite. I don't regret  doing any of them and have gained so much from this last year. It is just left for me to thank each and every person who has helped or taken part in any of the events and I hope that you have all have had as much fun as I have. 

COMPLETED

1. Host a cocktail party where everyone brings the ingredients for their favourite cocktail.  26/1/13
   
2. Have a cocktail made and named after me. 26/1/13
   
3. Go to at least one charity bingo nights. 26/4/13
   
4. Adventure day at somewhere like go ape.  30/4/13
5. Send an individual message to every friend I have on Facebook. 22/2/13
6. Visit a town in England I have never been to before. 9/3/13
7. Go to the races. 23/6/13
8. Do a charity moonlight walk or similar. 29/6/13
   
9. Create my own web page. 
   
10. Plant a tree. 8/4/13
11.  Read all three 50 shades of grey books. 30/6/13
12. Give a talk to a group. 25/4/13
13. Take out life insurance. february 2013
    
14. Buy something to eat and drink for a homeless person rather than passing them by. 23/2/13
15.  Spend a weekend in the country with my husband. 8-10/3/13
16.  Try sailing. 6/5/13
17.  Go horse riding. 30/3/13
18. Register with the organ donor bank. 8/2/13
19.  knit baby hats for local maternity unit. delivered 25/5/13
20. Have a girly day doing girly things. 26/5/13
21.  Get a mention on tv or radio. 8/7/13
22. Write a Blog of my 50 for 50.
23. Contact a friend not seen for over 25yrs
24. Go to a Shakespeare play
25. Do something on impulse
    
26. Left to my family and friends to shock, surprise and/or entice me!!!!!! 28/8/13
27. Go and watch a real football match. 31/8/13
28. Go to a music festival. 23/8/13
29. Visit all the squares on the monopoly board. 21/9/13
30. Visit the natural history and war museums in London. 20/9/12
31. Eat at a restaurant owned by a top chef. 21/9/13
32. Have a professional photoshoot done 29/9/13
33. Go to Banbury canal day 6/10/13
34. take dance lessons 16/10/13
35. Do the circular walk 20/10/13
36. Create a calendar style calendar 21/10/13 (published)
37. have something published 21/10/13
38. See the local Christmas light switch on 24/11/13
39. Give blood. 5/12/13
40. Decorate a room in my house and have it 100% complete.13/12/13
41. Have a go at a winter sport like ski-ing . 15/12/13
    
42. Volunteer at Katherine House Hospic 15/12/13
    
43. Go to Hyde park winter wonderland. 7/12/13
44. Choose a cookery book and cook every recipe in it. 22/1/14
    
45. Save all my 1p and 2p coins for a year and give to charity 24/1/14
46. Have my make up professionally applied and then learn to do it myself 25/1/14
47. Trace my family tree. on going
    
48. Take a photo of myself every day and create a time line of it. 25/1/14
49. Visit Brugge Christmas ice sculptures festival. 28/12/13
50. Work in a professional kitchen for a day. 19/1/14 

Before I write about the last few things I want to just assure everyone that they were done and completed on my birthday. That is except for one which I will talk about later. The first one for this post is the recipe book. During the final week I made the last few recipes. There is no doubt we have had some lovely meals and many of them we will revisit. There have been a few that we haven't enjoyed quite as much and a few that when made weren't quite as the Hairy Bikers intended but I have enjoyed this challenge immensely and we have eaten things we haven't tried before. I would recommend trying this one to everyone to try it's a great way to experiment with your taste buds and discover new tastes and flavours.

The final day and there was one thing left. As I failed to complete this one as part of the make-over day I organised for it to be done again. It was lovely to end my year long journey on this one almost the final transformation from 50 to 51.  This was is to learn to do my make-up properly. I contacted Lucy Weston, a lovely young lady who helped with the make-up for the calendar shoot. She kindly came to my home and  gave me a master class in make-up application. We decided the best way to do it was for her to do one side of my face and I to the other. This could have gone so wrong, I could have looked like I had two very different faces but it worked and under Lucy's expert eye both sides matched. I learnt a great deal and some very useful tips and although I am still no expert I hope that my new found skills will help me to enhance my good points and hide my bad. 

Now for the one thing that I haven't had much success with, the photo time-line. I failed to keep up with the daily photo and lost quite a few I had saved on a disc. The pictures aren't very flattering, in fact they aren't flattering at all but it was a bit of fun seeing if all the excitement and adventure aged me. This one has caused me so many problems from creating the video to posting it here which as you can see from its absence I have failed miserably.  So I apologise for the lack of evidence but promise it did  get done albeit it as in full as I'd hoped. 

Wow what a day. This was possibly the most scariest thing I've done this year, apart from the spider and the calendar. This one was to work in a professional kitchen for a day. Why would I want to work in an environment that is know for its high pressure, bad tempered Chefs and stressful situations? the truth is both my sons work in the industry one as a chef the other front of house. I enjoy eating out and although my sons tell me some about their day I wanted to see for myself what it was like. I wanted to understand a little and appreciate what goes on behind the scenes. I realise one day is not long enough to really get to know what its like but I hoed to get a feel for it. I was very lucky and managed to get a day at Fawsley Hall hotel and spa. I really have to thank my brother Dominic and his connections and Jenny for arranging this for me. To be honest i was so scared of this one I was putting off sorting it. Well the day arrived and Dominic took me over to the hotel. We were early so sat and had a cup of tea wile waiting for the head Chef to arrive. When he came through he took me into the kitchen and introduced me to some of the team then gave me a little tour round the hotel kitchen parts and sorted me some chef whites, yes I got to wear real chef whites, sorry there is no pics of that but i'm no good at selfies. Well in the kitchen and chef was trying to sort something for me to do. Trouble was they are so well organised most of the prep had been done. He decided I was going in the pastry section so while waiting for  Rachel, whom I assumed was the chef de partie I set to polishing some plates. No this is not a typo they really do polish the plate we eat off. Rachel arrived and we set to making scones. Now I don't know about anyone else but scones are the one thing I have real problems with. They never rise and turn out like biscuits! We made the mix rolled out the dough and cut them out. I was given some really good tips, ones I'll be trying at home to see if my scones come out. We set them on a tray waiting to bake later. Next I had to fill some fruit tarts. There was their own made lemon curd to fill them with first them i had to top them with raspberries and some with blackberries. After that it was time to make some bread, focacca to be precise. I've made bread before but never focaccia but under Rachel guidance i did a pretty good job or so I'm told. Believe it or not doing that , picking some rosemary, sorting grapes for cheese boards brought me to the end of my time. Rachel very kindly showed me round other parts of the hotel and we chatted. I had a brilliant time and found the atmosphere not at all what I thought it would be. It was calm and not at all stressful.I know that when service got under way that would probably all change but for my experience I couldn't have had a better time. After I was treated by Dominic and John to afternoon tea to enjoy the things I had made. So if you fancy afternoon tea or a spa weekend/day I would highly recommend Fawsley Hall, its not the cheapest place around but from what I've seen it is worth every penny.

What's the definition of friendship? I suppose it depends on your opinion but one that seems to get passed about is so relevant to what happened to us this weekend and the completion of another task that I'm happy to go with it. It's often said that it is not the amount of time you spend with each other or the amount of contact in any form but the fact that when you do get together you can pick -up right where you left off. I have only felt like this with a few people and I believe its a true sign of a special connection that will remain no matter how much time passes. This weekend saw Andrew and I meet up with a couple we hadn't seen for 7 years. Yes that's right 7 years and the only contact we have had is through facebook over the last couple of  years or so. We met Maggie, Roy, James and Jessica on 

  holiday in Crete in  in August 2006. and as a lot of people on holiday do, exchanged addresses and promised to keep in touch. We kind of didn't do too well in making that happen after we returned home and as Roy is in the services we lost track of where they were. That was until we, and in that I mean Maggie, found me on facebook. She followed my progress on my 50 for 50 challenge and when she posted some pictures of the ice sculptures in Brugge I thought they would be a lovely addition to my list of tasks. Maggie kindly offered to put us up if we decided to go and the rest as they say is history. Arrangements were made dates and travel plans booked and on December the 27th we set off to Belgium.

We were hoping to get to Calais in day light but a delay in the trains meant that wasn't going to be possible. Apparently a whole load of coaches turned up at the same time with flexi-passes. For those who don't know how the Channel tunnel works, these flexi-passes means you can turn up any time and you then get on to the next train ahead of anyone else. Great idea I suppose but when loads of coaches turn up at once as they did in this case it pushes every one else back including those who have pre-booked tickets. The boards were showing 75 minute delays at one stage. This didn't bode well. I was secretly wondering if this was going to turn out to be a disaster. They manage to catch up a little, about half an hour but we were still running quite late. We let Maggie and our boys know so no-one would worry and sat back as the train pulled away and took us under the Channel away from England and on to France. 35 minutes that's all it took, unbelievable really when you think of how long it would have taken when they only way was to sail across. We got to Calais, it was dark and we had never driven round there before. Sat Navs' were useless as the only ones we have as a family didn't cover Europe so we were relying on AA driving directions down loaded from the internet and me trying to read them with no or very little street lighting. After a couple of hours we got to the area we needed to be, now for the bit that is notoriously the most difficult part of any journey you do for the first time and that was to find the house. We turned into a road and the directions said make a U turn! odd I know but that's what it said. They only thing we could see was a kind of central reservation down the middle of the road which meant you need to go back  yourself to get up the other side so that's what we did. Next it said to turn immediately right so we did this too. Now the only problem was we couldn't see any road names or house numbers so we parked up and decided to call Maggie. My phone went off with a text message before I could ring her. It was Maggie so I rang her back and after the initial hellos passed the phone to Andrew and she passed hers to Roy. they chatted and then the funniest thing happened. I heard Roy ask if we were in a  silver car and a front door opened. Believe it or not we had stopped right outside their house. I jumped out the car and gave Maggie a big hug, it was just as though we had seen each other regularly over the years. We laughed and chatted and enjoyed a wonderful meal Maggie had prepared for us before heading off to bed. Our room was lovely Maggie had put towels out , chocolates and guest toiletries on the bed for us it was more like a hotel than some-ones home. The warm greeting and attention to detail was amazing and put pay to the nerves both Maggie and I confessed to having at meeting up after such a long time. 
Next morning and we were treated to a banquet of a breakfast. Cereals and full continental, I'm sure Maggie has missed her vocation in life, She should be running a b&b or hotel. Fully replenished and we set off for Brugge to see the ice sculptures. Now your probably wondering why I wanted to do this after seeing the winter wonderland in Hyde Park? No, well I'm going to tell you anyway. This year has seen me try and experience lots of new things, some as I've explained before were to push me outside my comfort zone, some to make me get up and do things instead or procrastinating and others were simply for enjoyment. This one was a bit of a mix, yes we took Dylan to see the ice sculptures in London but to do some thing like go abroad for a weekend seemed quite extravagant to me and not the sort of thing I would normally do. This was to do some thing that made me get up and act on a wish rather than sit and talk about it. It had the added bonus of meeting up with people you meet on holiday and keep a promise to keep in touch. 
So off to the ice sculptures. The attention to detail was amazing, the use of ice in its opaque form as well as its clear was a sight to behold. Every turn you took made you gasp at the intricate work that went into creating such beautiful pieces of art. The photos probably don't do them justice but at least you get an idea of what I'm talking about. My advice to you all is to go and see them for yourselves you won't be disappointed.  We followed the sculptures with a wander round Brugge to soak up the atmosphere and  culture. I loved it, Not sure if the Christmas lights had a lot to do with it but I so enjoyed the tour round the best chocolate shops around and trying the free tasters!. 
Right now time to head back and get ready to eat out. Maggie and Roy take us to their favourite restaurant. The concept is one I've never come across before but a great one and very novel. Its mainly steaks but you can have chicken or mixed grill. Their mixed grill is three skewers, one chicken, one pork and one beef. The unique thing its it comes on a large platter that contains an extremely hot brick. No I haven't gone mad and yes did say brick. The idea is you cook your own meet at your table on these extremely hot bricks. It was great fun and lets face it if your steak isn't cooked just as you like it you only have yourself to blame. The meal was lovely, we all came away feeling very full and very satisfied. Back home and time for a quick cuppa or liquer coffee. the men head off to bed and Maggie and I sit and natter the night away until we realise it's twenty to three in the morning. We turn in for the night. 
Sunday morning and we are offered a huge breakfast again but just have croissants and choc  au pain. It's time we must leave, the weekend has gone all too quick but its has been so worth it. Our hosts have been wonderful, opening their home to what must have felt like almost complete strangers. We really loved our time there and sincerely hope it isn't another 7 years before we meet up again. If it is I'm sure it will not matter because if this weekend is anything to go by it won't feel like 7 years. Thank you Maggie and Roy xxx.

Wow what a Christmas get together. So many Christmas parties involve going to a venue dancing and eating and drinking the night away, well that's not for us we did something a little different. Me, Hayley,  Sam, Dominic and my student Naomi went ice skating. What a giggle. Putting the boots on was just the start of it, they felt so strange and quite uncomfortable but we got them on. Next we had to stand up in them, not sure how that was going to work out, I was certain I was gong to have my first fall of the day. We made it we all got up and managed to walk, just, to the ice. Yes we hadn't actually got to the ice at this stage and was worrying bout falling! Ok we got there to the rink edge now for that first step onto that slippery stuff. Now I don't know about you but I have trouble staying n my feet when the ground is icy to have shoes on that are designed to help you glide elegantly across the icy was sure to be a recipe for disaster. One step two step and whoooops nearly, just caught hold of the side of the barrier in time, still on my feet that's good. Now everyone is laughing, including me, so hard I can't actually move, the tears are rolling down my face and my sides are starting to ache. Right come on compose yourself you can do this. Holding onto the side I get all the way to the end well nearly, the end was sectioned off for a birthday party. Now , its a one way system on the ice and everyone has to go across the full width of the rink. The horror there is no way I'm gong to do that. Oh yes there is. With Sams' help I get all the way across. All the others I must say are very impressive they are letting go and skating off  by themselves really well, putting me to shame. I get back to the point we first get onto the ice and work my way along the edge again daring to let go. The others go ahead, I have an idea I get off and walk along to the starting point again hey I can pretend I went all the way round, no-one will know surely. Twice I did this and no I didn't get away with it the others spotted me both times. Right this time I'm going to do it, I get to the point I have to go across. Tentatively, wobbly and very much representative of Bambi I get all the way across staying on my feet. Well confidence growing I work my way round letting go more and more and even going round people instead of waiting for them to move out of my way. Right second time of crossing on my own, doing ok, oh no spoke too soon, wobbly, wobble bump I land not so gracefully on my behind. The funniest thing was Dominic, Hayley and Naomi all heard me shout. Naomi turned to see if I was ok, Hayley kept going, concentrating on getting to the other side and Dominic turned and nearly ended up n the ice with me. Next problem how was I going to get up? I had visions of crawling to the edge and pulling my self up. This was going to be embarrassing. I wasn't so bad, I got up and managed to get to the other side. I now know how a baby feels taking their first steps. Ok we go round a few more times and we are all getting better each time. We stop for a drink them decide to give it another go. I nearly manage to get all the way round without holding on. We had such a laugh and all said they enjoyed it. We finished our Christmas do by having lunch at Nandos before going back home.

Busy day today, managed to tick two off the list. Tonight sees me doing some voluntary stuff. It's not quite what I had in mind as the free time I had didn't match up with the times needed by local charities. Still, doing the Santa walk with the Banbury Round table in conjunction with the local school was great fun even if it was a little wet. We saw some amazing houses decorated but this one beats the lot. A couple had created a santa grotto on their front lawn. I just had to sit on Santas' lap. It turned out they had 22 grandchildren, bet Christmas is fun in their house.

I did it I completely decorated a room as we wanted it with nothing left to do. This has got to be a first in my house. Like I said in a past post there is always something that gets forgotten or that gets left with the intention of gong back to it and finishing it off. In my house the getting back to it never happens until it's time to redecorate so to completely finish this room and honestly say there is nothing left to do feels good. This one has had a knock on effect as our hall, landing and stairs has also bee completed at long last and we were prompted to freshen up another bedroom in the house. This one I might add hasn't quite been finished yet but there is just to things to do to complete it. Here's hoping it gets done soon.

Winter wonderland an must place to visit for adults and children alike. It's unbelievable how they seem to build a whole new town in the middle of Hyde park  and once your in it you don't even realise that your in the middle of this huge green space in London. The lights, atmosphere and mock buildings where amazing. Its like going to a theme park only ten times better. Dylan's little face was a picture.He loved the train journey and the underground, not brand new experiences for him but rare ones. He got chatting to a lovely lady on the way to London and even though tired chatted to another  n the way back. Not sure who he takes after but his great Granddad James and Uncle Christopher certainly come to mind! Anyway back to our pre-Christmas treat. First stop was a quick drink then into the ice palace to see the sculptures. It was amazing, the detail was out of this world and the castle they built which you could go round was pretty spectacular too. There was two ways of getting out, down the slide or walk round the outside. Dylan and I opted for the slide while Andrew waited at the bottom with the camera. the queue was quite long and we were getting pretty cold but Andrew just standing about waiting for us got colder to be expected really as we were in a temporary construction full of ice and being kept at an optimum temperature to stop the ice melting. I must say it was worth it. Next we had a wander round to soak up some more Christmas atmosphere then into a nice warm big top to watch the circus. Dylan again loved it he was amazed at all the acts especially the strong man who as he puts is 'got run over by a big car but didn't die'. After the circus we went round and let Dylan go on a few of the fair rides and grabbed a bite to eat. By this time it was about 4o'clock and we had been out for about 9hrs. Dylan was getting tired and asked to go home so we headed back to the tube station and onto Marylebone to get back home. It was a long day but a great day and another one on my list I would love to repeat.

no pics today I'm afraid for reasons of respecting peoples confidentiality. Today I was able to finally give blood. I wont bore you with the details as you had all those last time but suffice it to say I managed to give my first pint of blood. it didn't go without  a hitch though, no that would be too simple. They got the needle in and the blood started to flow but it was slow. Anyone who has given blood before will realise that you only have 15 minutes to give the full amount and that there is a minimum that they can accept. Why is there a minimum? well it's because in the bag is an amount of anti-coagulant and if there is too little blood the mix would be unusable. The nurse got me to continue clenching my fist and my bottom (who would have guessed giving blood could be such good exercise). Ten minutes later and the machine was beeping, I had filled the bag and successfully given blood. this won't be the last time but I hope the first of many pints.

So how is the rest of the tasks going? well looking at the list below I think I'm doing ok. There is only one thing to organise now and several to wait for dates to come round so hopefully they will all be done on time. I've had to make a few adjustments more so with the volunteer for Katherine house hospice one. I've had problems co-coordinating the time I have and the times they need people so instead I'm volunteering to do the Santa float with the local school. It counts as volunteering for charity as it's run by the local round table and local groups. the bedroom will be complete on Monday with the carpet being laid, the cookery book is nearly complete, Brugge just needs travel arrangements sorting and the winter sport is ice-skating with some colleagues in a couple of weeks. I do have one confession to make, I have failed on the photo everyday because I've missed some photos and the disc I've been storing them on doesn't seem to be allowing me to view the pictures, not bad though as it's only one in 50 tasks. 

I know its been a long time since I posted anything on here but that doesn't mean I've sat back and not been doing anything to complete my list. On the contrary I've been quite busy along with the other calendar models trying to sell them. We were to appear on the one show the night before children in need but at the eleventh hour they decided the pictures were, and i quote 'too raunchy' and our spot was cancelled. The disappointment we all felt was indescribable, but hey these things happen and it hasn't stopped us from getting sales. We have even been able to book a session in the reception area of the Whately Hall hotel where the photos were shot to sell some more on the 1st December. The hotel has been very accommodating and based on that alone I would recommend staying there. I should add I have never been for a function there or stopped over in any of their rooms, but the staff have been friendly and gone out of their way to help us with this project. 
Next update is the room to be completely decorated. As you will have already read I have chosen to do my bedroom. It's just about there and all that needs doing is carpet to be laid, that's happening next Monday (2nd December), so not longt to wait to see the finished results on that one. I must say, doing this room has spurred on other bits of decorating and house freshening up. The hall, landing and stairs are finally going to be finished and one other bedroom is getting a bit of a make-over too. 
Now for the dance classes. In short we are loving them, my only regret is I didn't start earlier. So far we have covered the Rumba, jive, quickstep and last week the American smooth. What's been really fun is practising at home and managing to, not perfect the dance but get it together well enough we feel we can almost keep up in class if they do them again. 

Ok who can guess who this is in the photo and where I am? If you are a fan of Emmerdale you may have guessed already, for those who aren't I'll tell you, it's Marlon Dingle and he came to switch on Banbury's Christmas lights. Like I've said before when putting together my bucket list I realised that our town council actually  puts on quite a few events through out the year and I have either never been to them or very rarely bothered.  I really enjoyed this and took Andrew and his mum along with me. They said they enjoyed it too. Surprisingly it wasn't too cold stood amongst the crowd and the atmosphere was great. There were a few artists and one was a Robbie Williams tribute band. They did really well, not that I'm a huge fan but he looked, sounded and moved like him well enough. The evening ended in a firework display and rounded the evening off lovely. It was most enjoyable and I would love to go again.

Really I do want to give blood. Tonight saw my second attempt, my second failed attempt. To be fair I did get further this time. They actually had my details on the system and I made it all the way to the couch where they take the blood but there was a hitch. Before I get to that let me tell you what it was like. I arrived in plenty of time, got registered and was given some information to read. I sat in the waiting area and dutifully read all the information. A guy came and sat next to me and began chatting away about his blood giving history, please tell me I'm not that bad, although I have a feeling I am. I'm called through for a health check and offered a choice of drinks as I'm led to a makeshift cubicle. Everything is thoroughly explained and my health is given the thumbs up. I'm on my way to completing another of my tasks. While sat waiting I look around and all sorts of weird analogies are going through my head. The couches are in rows, neat symmetrical rows. People are laid out on these couches hooked up to bags slowly turning from clear to red. It's like something out of sci-fi horror movie, the only thing that made it seem more like real life were the staff wearing nurses uniforms and not clinical whites from head to toe. I'm called forward and sat on one of those couches. A nurse checked my right arm for a vein, oh this is where the problems began. He asked if he could check the veins in my left arm, sure no problem. The cuff is placed on my arm and he decides to use that one. Ok, in goes the needle, ouch that stung. It's not right and the nurse says he needs to move it slightly and if it hurts I'm to tell him. OUCH that hurt, well he asked to tell him if it hurt. The needle has to come out and he says he needs to get a colleague to check the right arm again for him to see if we can use that one. His colleague comes over and checks but unfortunately my vein will not stay large when the pressure from the cuff is lowered. They are worried my vein will collapse around the needle in my arm so guess what second attempt to give blood failed! I am reassured that when my arm heals I can make another appointment and try again. So that's the story of my donating blood so far. Sorry there's no pictures but it's a bit hard to take them when your on your own and some-one is stabbing you with a sharp needle. Well they may not have got my blood but I got the cuppa an