I’m now into my 6th week of furlough and it’s amazing how a little bit of time away from work can really put things into perspective. Lots of things on my mind this week, career, future, plans etc. so my thought process has been a bit of a rollercoaster. Nevertheless, I’ve strived to be happy this week, and a lot of things made me happy!
Monday 18th May
Today I started to get back into the early starts again, having set my alarm for 7am to slowly ease back in. The next series of ‘Minnie Mouse Main Attraction’ pins were released today so I jumped straight on at 8am and was lucky enough to get this month’s set (I’ve only missed 2 so far!)
I then did a bit of writing to start the day and a couple of modules of my course, really want to crack on with it and hopefully finish it by the end of next week.
After a bit of studying, I decided to complete the rest of the puzzle, which is finally finished!!
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about my career path and whether it’s time to start looking into potentially going to university at some point in the next 5 years. My last call for my current qualifications is for 2020 entry, however, I have a wedding to pay for therefore can’t afford to apply for this years’ intake. I decided to start researching a bit more into further education and I think I may have a plan, the self-doubt is really getting in the way though. I’m contemplating doing a 1-year access course after the wedding (2023) to use as a stepping stone to go on to either get my nursing degree or midwifery as originally intended. The university I’m looking at studying with needs to see recent academic study within the last 5 years so hence why I’d need to do another course to keep up-to-date with qualifications etc. There’s just this niggly little voice in my head that keeps telling me I wouldn’t be very good at it or that I wouldn’t enjoy it in the end, and that is making me doubt whether it’s the right path. I just wish somebody could tell me what career is right for me, the indecisiveness and not knowing is frustrating. I know they say life finds you when it’s supposed to, but I’m not getting any younger and there’s so much I want to do in life, I need to know if/when I can fit it all in! I guess I’m just impatient, but I also want to be sure that whatever I choose to do is really going to make me happy in the long run!
I spent the rest of the day reading and completing more modules on my course.
Tuesday 19th May
Started the day by putting the puzzle away! It was nice to see clear carpet again after having the puzzle on the floor for the last month or so. I then over on to my other creative venture, the gem art. They always look amazing when they’re done but they take such a long time to complete. They’re really relaxing to work on though so it takes my mind off everything for a while.
After an hour or so of gem sticking, I cracked on with finalising last week’s blog post and got that uploaded before researching a bit more into college/university courses and my options in terms of cost and whether I can afford it. I think once lockdown has been fully lifted and the colleges and universities are open again, I will attend a few open days to get some more information on funding and finance options available and see whether this is actually something I can afford to do.
To take a break from all the research and thinking, I decided to make a Millionaire’s Shortbread. I’ve never made one before but it looked easy so I thought I’d give it a go! It actually turned out pretty amazing (albeit the caramel was a little soft!) but it was delicious so I was definitely happy with the outcome!
I then did the washing up before getting started with another workout. I’m trying to alternate the days so that I do a home workout and then the next day I’ll go out for a walk, then another home workout the following day and so on. I’m also still looking for a Bike and spoke to my older brother Sam who is also looking for one! We agreed to keep an eye out for bikes for each other and he even found on the same day for me, however, it had gone by the time I looked at the posting, the lockdown has made them like gold dust, impossible to get your hands on!
I spent the rest of the day reading my book and watching Modern Family.
Wednesday 20th May
Wednesday mostly consisted of a lot of researching and dare I say, moping around to be honest. I’m in a bit of a vicious circle about University, do I want to go? Can I afford it? Would the course be right for me? etc. I just feel like I was put here to do something, I’m not sure what that is exactly all I know is that I feel very unfulfilled at the moment and have done for a very long time now. I just want to have some sort of purpose and find contentment in terms of my career and what I should be doing in life and be happy in my career. It’s such a waste to be ambitious when you don’t know what you want to do.
I did a bit more research on courses and watched a few youtube videos on university, nursing, midwifery and student life. After a while, the information overloaded my brain a bit so I decided to watch some TV instead.
Later, I took some squares of my Millionaire Shortbread round to my mum’s house for the rest of the famalam to enjoy. My little brother is now home so I also got to see him which was nice! We all had a chat for a while (outside, socially distant of course) and then I headed home.
Thursday 21st May
Didn’t sleep very well last night, so much whirring around my mind lately! Had a relatively productive day none the less!
I started the day with a bit of reading. I’m really enjoying my current book ‘Hard Pushed’ by Leah Hazard, it’s such an easy read, I’m already nearly halfway through (I love books like that!)
After a while, I decided to finally bake up the bread mix I had in the cupboard from before lockdown started. This was the first time I’ve ever made bread so I hoped it would turn out good, and it did! It was slightly burnt on the top due to having been on the top shelf of the oven for the majority of its baking time (I soon realised and moved it down a shelf!) but still tasted amazing! Very happy with it! I want to try and get some more bread mix to make more but I think that maybe impossible at the moment, flour is only just starting to come back on the shelves, and even then it’s only a matter of minutes before it’s gone again! I’m just really happy that both my baking attempts have been a success this week!
I then decided to crack out my watercolours and do a bit of painting. I recently activated my 2-month free membership on SkillShare premium so I tried to do some watercolour classes from there. My blending techniques went really well during practice but not so well when it came to the actual project 😬I love painting though so it was a great way to relax and do something creative. Watercolours are so much fun to play around with and can really relax you, take your mind off things and the results are usually quite pretty to look at. Such happy colours!
Soon it was time to clap for our keyworkers and NHS staff. It seems to be getting quieter each week now with not as many people clapping, I think the novelty seems to be wearing off for some people as the lockdown eases.
I then decided to carry on with my online course for the rest of the evening and managed to complete another 4 modules! The further I get into it, the more interesting it is, before I knew it, I’d spent 2 hours studying!
Friday 22nd May
Caught up with a bit of writing in the morning and a few more modules of my course. I decided last night to try and create a 5-year plan based on all the things I want to achieve. I’m not necessarily planning on doing everything on the list in the next 5 years, just whatever fits best. I compiled a list of a few things I want to try and achieve so we’ll see how it goes!
I then spent the rest of the day painting. I started off with my watercolours again for a while and then decided to finish varnishing the pebbles I’d painted a few years ago, ready to hide. I left the pebbles to dry and then watched Modern Family before heading to bed!
Saturday 23rd May
Started the day with a bit of course work and completed a few more modules. I then decided to fine-tune my 5-year plan whilst listening to a few podcasts. My favourites are TheTimTracker’s podcast on YouTube, Encore Radio’s ‘Post Show Drinks’ podcast and ‘Shagged, Married, Annoyed’ by Chris and Rosie Ramsey. I chose to listen to TheTimTracker today, I love that it is different from their youtube videos, whereby they don’t just talk about the Disney Parks. In the episode I listened to, they were talking all about ghosts and urban legends which I love learning about!
Whilst writing up my 5-year plan, I decided to do a bit of finance planning which is something I like to do often just to see where I’m at financially. Obviously, at the moment, I’ve got a wedding to save for as well as a few other things I’d like to save for at some point in the future, however, the wedding is a priority right now as well as my house fund. I’m hoping to have saved enough money by the time the wedding comes around to start looking to buy a house in 2023, something I’ve always wanted to do!
I then did some writing for a while and planned out some future blog posts. It’s been tricky lately as I’ve not had much motivation in terms of writing so these weekly recaps have been all I’ve managed! I do have some content planned for the next couple of months though so hopefully I can get something a little different out you!
To finish the day, we watched ‘Hook’ which is such a great movie! Me and my brothers’ loved it as kids! That little bit of nostalgia made me very happy 😊
Sunday 24th May
Sunday was such a great day! We spent pretty much all day outside (completely socially distant of course!) and chose secluded and quiet areas. I spent about an hour in the morning doing some coursework before we headed out to do some Geocaching. (if you don’t already, I highly recommend starting to geocache, it’s so much fun!)
Geocaching can involve quite a bit of walking, we went to some local woods to find one and ended up scaling a gigantic hill, which it turns out, there was a path that led right to where we needed to go anyway 😂 oh well, it was good exercise! The cache was, unfortunately, missing once we got to the drop zone but we did find the remains of a really cool den that someone had made!
It was really nostalgic for me as these were woods that I spent so much time in as a kid! I told Lee of a fairy door that I remembered being in a tree somewhere, and sure enough we came across it again! I love finding cool things like this, and these woods are full of little hidden treasures!
We did so much walking and it was really nice to get out in the fresh air! The weather was beautiful and warm and we had a lot of fun exploring, we even found some new places around our local area in which we never knew existed!
We then decided to drop my painted pebbles off at a local abandoned mansion where a lot of people were laying out pebbles for people to come and look at to cheer them up/make them happy during lockdown. There were so many!
I added my 6 to the line and then took a look at the other pebbles, there were some Disney ones and I stumbled across this happy Jiminy Cricket one, people are so talented!
There were also a few pebbles painted in support of the NHS and keyworkers as well as memorial pebbles for the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. This certainly will be a year for the history books and I am so proud of keyworkers and NHS staff working hard to fight this virus and keep things as normal as possible whilst doing so!
3 things I’m thankful for/made me happy this week
- Pretty much every baking attempt this week was a success!
- Seeing all the pebbles lined up to make others happy
- Finally finishing the puzzle!
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