Overdue Blog Post - Part Three!

Wow, so I finally have the time and space to get writing again and find myself approaching the end of March having not written anything since early January - whoops!

Luckily for me I have been keeping a diary of sorts and so have a pretty good idea of what I've been up to but am wondering how best to either summarise or move on from my last post. Which I think means this will be more of an overview and perhaps there will be separate posts focusing on some of the happenings over the last few months.

Plus I need to figure out a way to get back into writing more often...perhaps I need to go back to my diary type posts that I did over the preceding couple of years...something to think about!

But let's get back to the job at hand and try and summarise what's been happening of late.

So, where were we...ah yes Christmas! This year (or should that be last year?) was different to our usual routine of years gone by. This was the first Christmas since my dad had passed and that meant the first Christmas for Simon and I without any of our parents and while that brought about its own set of emotions it also meant that we had only ourselves to please. Which meant we were able to mix things up a little!

Molly and Dan were spending Christmas at their home, having spent the previous year with us, so we decided to travel down to see them instead. This resulted in us making the journey to Bournemouth on Boxing Day (the day after Christmas Day) for a few days before returning to celebrate the New Year at home.

I'd realised as we approached Christmas that ordinarily after having the big Christmas Day meal we would make use of any leftover food on Boxing Day...but as we wouldn't be home on Boxing Day this meant a change of plan. As Ethan's birthday is on Christmas Eve we decided to have our big Christmas dinner for his birthday instead and then make Christmas Day a very relaxed affair with presents and leftover food, which worked out beautifully. It was so nice to be able to enjoy the unwrapping of presents and have a very chilled out day as opposed to the usual slaving away in the kitchen! Plus because there was only the three of us it meant that cooking on Christmas Eve wasn't the big ordeal that it would have been compared to previous years. Oh and of course birthday celebrations in this house meant it was Mickey waffle time!

We had a lovely few days in Bournemouth even though the weather was rather soggy. We were able to exchange presents, enjoy some lovely meals, do lots of walking interspersed with coffees and even a little ice skating. Although on this occasion Simon decided to forgo the skating as it was very, very wet and joined me and Ethan in watching Molls and Dan enjoy themselves on the ice.

On the 29th December we travelled home with Molls and Dan making the journey as well so that we had a few days with all of us at home. We were able to make use of the outdoor skating rink in Nottingham that this year had an elevated 'skate path'...

Nottingham's Skate Path, above the Christmas market

...and when I saw 'we' I do of course mean Molls, Dan and Simon. I watched from afar and then went off in search of coffee and a little retail therapy. We saw the New Year in as a family with an array of board games and a lovely 'big' meal on New Years Day.

But by January 3rd the house was very quiet; Molls and Dan had gone back home to Bournemouth and Ethan was back at work. That left Simon and I with a couple of days to get the house back to 'normal' as we embarked on the horrible task of taking down and putting away of all the Christmas decorations; I love all my Christmas 'stuff' and hate having to put it all away. It actually took us about three days to put everything away with the majority being done by yours truly once Simon returned to work.

Well with Christmas and New Year done lets move onto January.

We started to get back into our routine of early morning (and rather chilly) walks followed by our Wim Hof breathing and a little meditation. Cold showers have now become the 'norm' for both Simon and I and these have continued regardless of what we have been up to. Unfortunately after getting back into our stride with the morning walks we had to take a little bit of a break as I suffer with chilblains on my left foot and once aggravated it becomes uncomfortable to walk on for extended periods and only gets worse if my feet get cold. So with a spell of very chilly weather we took a bit of a break from our walks.

Through January I was dealing with the sale of my dads house as we had signed all the necessary paperwork just before Christmas and it was now a case of working with solicitors to get everything done as speedily as possible.

We also started making some headway with our Jedi robes ready for Star Wars Celebration at Easter. And of course when I say 'we' I actually mean Simon, and his focus was on making some leather pouches for our belts to house our mobile phones. He also mastered the technique of metal casting by using pewter to make the buckles for our belts. 

For my part I had to order some different trousers as the fit on the pair I'd originally ordered was a little snug. And then there was an awful lot of research into the correct material to order for the outer cloak...something that was of the right dark brown colour and that was also of a heavy, wool like material. Suffice to say I think I went cross eyed looking at all the different options out there.

By the end of January we had found a local dressmaker that was willing (and excited) to help us with the technical aspect of putting the tunic/tabard section of the robes together. But I think I will go into more detail about our Jedi robes in a separate post!

We tried to get out for our morning walks again when the weather eased but no sooner than we had got back into the routine the weather turned rather cold again so we resigned ourselves to just get out as and when we could.

As we moved through January I was focused on getting more things removed from my dads house in readiness for the sale going through, along with the subsequent organising of Ebay sales. And my involvement with pre-school continued as we looked at the ongoing finances as well as a potential change in charitable status; so lots of research and a fair few meetings over numerous cups of coffee.

Ethan is still trying to find himself a house and we managed a viewing of one, but it was not quite what he was after,  and he had another couple of viewings cancelled at the last minute. First time buyer houses seem to go rather quickly once they get on the market - oh well just got to keep on looking.

And I think that covers January, so I will stop here and get writing the next post!

Day 786

Day 786...

So yesterday was a tad on the busy side which meant I simply ran out of time for writing and publishing a blog post.

So yesterday...after a full day at work I took a quick diversion home via Lidl to pick up a few bits I'd forgotten the day before. I wanted to pick up a cake for Molly for her birthday but unfortunately there was none to be found for the second day running. Once home I was then busy making keto bread and keto pizza as well as wrapping up some last minute pressies.

Then before I knew it Molly and Dan arrived home. The evening was then spent with lots of catching up to do, the giving of pressies for Mollys birthday the day before and plenty of food and cake to eat. Molly had made herself her own birthday cake, along with some keto chocolate cake, which is something she has always done for her birthday, and she had brought what was left with her!

And then we have today...

A reasonable, but relaxed, start to the day which saw Molly head off to her old kickboxing academy to take part in their Saturday morning class. A chance to catch up with all those she had trained with over the last few years. And while Molly worked out there Simon and Dan decided to grab thirty minutes down 'our gym'!

Then this afternoon we headed into Nottingham. Molly, Dan and Simon went ice skating while Ethan and I hit the shops and had a coffee! We then all came together and went to one of our favourite restaurants, Soulville Steakhouse.

Once home it was time for more birthday cake with a glass of Prosecco!!

Night all and I will see you tomorrow.

xx

 

Day 653 - Road Trip

Day 653...

Today was our first time using our new electric car for a long journey as we headed south to see Molly and Dan in Bournemouth.

This meant a relatively early start to the day as we got ourselves organised and the car packed. We had made sure that the car had a full charge and we had already set a route using the Zap Map app with a few different options for recharging. In theory the full charge should be sufficient to make the journey in one go but we had already noticed that the number of miles available dropped much quicker compared to the number of miles actually travelled. We also knew from watching some YouTube videos that most cars fall significantly short of the predicted miles.

With that in mind we set off just before 11am for what would be a 3 hour 15 minute non-stop journey. Let's just say our journey took a tad longer than that!

Our first stop was about 80 miles into the journey and when we arrived at the services all the charging points were taken! Thankfully a spot opened up quite quickly but then we discovered that one of the units would only let one car charge at a time rather than the two that it was designed for. But there was a small charger available which we could use as we had our own charging cable with us (the main charging stations had their own cables as these were fast/rapid chargers). But this smaller charger meant a much, much slower charging rate but we figured anything was better than nothing.

Ethan and I went in search of coffee and by the time we got back to the car one of the fast chargers had become free and so we could swap over. This meant that what we had hoped would be a 30 minute stop turned into about an hour!

Back on the road and we started to think about whether we would need another stop for charging and where would be best to stop. We had in mind a services that was around 60 miles from our destination. But when we arrived we were confronted with just two charging stations that were both occupied and had two cars waiting...mmm...we had a quick look on Zap Map and found another option just a few miles down the road.

This turned out to be a great choice; smaller services so not as busy; four units set to the side of a petrol station forecourt; two out of the four units were available; much faster chargers and once connected we could leave the car for a toilet break and to grab a coffee. About 30 minutes later and we were at 90% charge and had more than enough capacity to get us to our destination.

The overall journey took us 5 and a half hours!! A lot longer than it would have took us ordinarily; in our petrol car days we would have had one stop for a coffee so I think this journey took about an hour and a half longer! But what we recognised was that the urgency of a normal journey wasn't there, the whole journey felt much calmer and we had set off with the mind set that this would be a different way of travelling. 

The ease and quiet of the car, coupled with being very conscious of the effect of how we drove affected the charge available,  meant a completely different approach to driving. We knew it was going to take some time so we didn't rush and consequently the whole drive felt much more relaxed and much less stressful.

This is a very different way to drive and I think will take some getting used to and travelling long distances will take planning especially if a journey is time critical. But for us long journey's are not the norm and going forward we will have to accept that more planning will be needed. We have even said that on occasion it may be more beneficial to hire a petrol car, but for now planning will be key.

Although, we have been pleasantly surprised at how easy charging on the go has been. And we have also had some great conversations with other electric car owners, all of whom seemed to be rather new to electric cars and were happy to share their experiences!

Anyway back to the point of today, getting to Bournemouth to see Molly and Dan. Luckily the hotel we have chosen has electric car charging units; they are slow charges but are free! So we parked up and plugged in and left the car to charge away!

Once checked into the hotel it was time to recharge phones before taking the 10 minute walk into the town centre in search of food. Our choice today was Five Guys, a great fast food option for those of us on low carb diet as burgers can be ordered with your own choice of toppings and without the bun!

We then met Molly and Dan at the outdoor ice skate rink that has been set up for the festive season. I am not a skater and was quite happy to watch everyone else on the ice. Dan is a very accomplished skater and Molly is now very skilled and they both make it look so easy. Simon has always loved skating but after taking me many years ago when we first started dating he realised very quickly that me and skating just did not go together! He has therefore not skated as much as he would have liked but he has never lost the skill and looks very much at home on the ice. Ethan was happy to have a go but as it was about 10 years since he last ventured onto the ice he needed a good amount of help! But all credit to him he persevered and was getting better the more circuits he did. The ice was very wet tonight as the weather has been unseasonably warm so I think everyone came away with wet feet but thankfully no-one fell over...there were plenty others who did and who came away very wet!

We then had a wander through Bournemouth's Christmas Tree Wonderland; some lovely lights in a gorgeous setting. It was then time to grab a hot drink before heading back to the hotel.

Phew and that was our day, see you tomorrow for more shenanigans!

xx

Busy Saturday

Day 199...

We had a steady, but purposeful, start to the day today. We had a few 'tasks' to get completed that time to do them during the week seemed to have eluded us.

There were phone calls to make, more online selling queries, selling pictures to post and Simon had some 3D printing to 'get going' as he makes more modifications to his mouse droid project.

The great news was that Molly's boyfriend arrived mid-morning! Phew! Smiles all around and birthday weekend celebrations for him could now go ahead unhindered.

Molly had her usual Saturday morning guitar lesson for which this week she had her own personal taxi service in the shape of her fella. 

We then braved the very wet weather to nip out and get some keys cut for our 'other house' that we are now renting out. As it was going to take a little while to get them cut we headed for a coffee...which meant queuing outside in the rain and seemed to take an inordinate amount of time, especially when you consider we only drink black coffee!

We arrived back home with keys and coffee at the same time as Molly returned home from her guitar lesson. A quick stop for lunch and then it was on with the afternoon. Molly had booked tickets for her and Dan to go ice skating; her fella is a very good skater and this has helped Molly rekindle her skating efforts and since meeting Dan her skating has improved immensely. This was the first time either of them had been able to ice skate since lockdown was introduced. Luckily for us we live close to a very good ice centre who had been able to re-open a few weeks ago, by all accounts they had a great time and Molly only fell over the once!

Simon decided to email the tenants who have just moved into our 'other house' to introduce ourselves and ask about any pieces of furniture that they wanted removing. Then I started some prep work for making dinner this evening while Simon fixed a resource that I had brought home from pre-school...basically a large, wooden, counting frame that needed making more secure.

While we were doing that we had a phone call from our new tenants...wanting to let us know about the pieces of furniture they didn't need. The strange thing was he hadn't seen the email that Simon had sent him 20 minutes earlier...spooky!

So the rest of our afternoon was spent travelling between home and our 'other house' (thankfully only a few miles away) to bring some of the smaller pieces of furniture back to ours. I think these will be appearing online for sale in the next day or so as it's proving to be a great way to move them on to somewhere else where they will be appreciated.

After about three trips back and forth our garage that we had cleared out yesterday is now very full again...better get on with that online selling malarkey!

Then our evening has been filled with party food, birthday cake, ice-cream and smiles. It has been lovely to see Molly and Dan getting to spend the time together they had been so looking forward to, that had at times this week seemed so far out of reach. A little ray of normality in this strange world we are living in at the moment.

Take care, enjoy the weekend safely...keep your distance, wash your hands and wear a mask.

xx