September - Lately I've been...

I feel as though I've not written anything personal on my blog for a while, so I thought I'd share a few of the things that I've been up to lately! I've been...

Thinking about - The children started a new school in September. Fortunately after a couple of small wobbles they seem to be settling in really well, and are really excited about their topics this term and are making new friends. But I'm always thinking about them when they are at school, wondering what they are doing, and I look forward to hearing all about it at the end of the day.

Worrying about - The new school is close to a town centre a little way away and comes with a few challenges, like lots of traffic on the school run and tight parking spaces. I've found a couple of roads close by though that are just a few minutes walk away and where I can always find easy parking, so hopefully I'll get used to it over time!

Crafting - The Sky Blanket continues to increase rapidly in size, and it is now becoming rather unwieldy. I'm not looking forward to adding the border, it's going to take a very long time! The blanket has a lovely smooth texture and is a nice weight to sit underneath, there are going to be some lovely family snuggles under it (there will be plenty of room for everyone!)

Watching - We don't have a television series on the go at the moment which is very unlike us, and because Ram was watching the Olympics and Paralympics over the last few weeks I've not watched a lot at all. I finished watching Outlander over the summer, I thought the second series as a whole was generally just okay, but the last episode was fantastic, so I'm really interested to see where the story goes.

I have been watching a bit of YouTube at the PC lately though while working on my Sky Blanket, and I recently discovered Cruising the Cut, a fab channel by television journalist who quit his job and bought a narrow boat to go cruising around the UK canal network. It's a little (very unlikely!) dream of mine, sparked by watching the canal boats go by at the bottom of my in-law's garden, and I'm avidly working my way through his videos. I particularly love the boat tours!

Eating - I'm trying to watch what I eat for a little while as my jeans were starting to feel a little too tight. I've cut down all the biscuits that I was eating over the summer holidays, and the other treats that I buy when I'm left alone in a supermarket, but it's slow going. So I've been eating a lot of Ryvita and diet chewy bars, although I do still build in a few treats like the cake I had this morning!

Reading - I seem to have been reading quite a few books lately. I've worked through a lot on my Kindle, both books that I bought in the sales back in January and others that I've found in the free bestseller list. The trouble is that although I can remember the plots, the author and title are less memorable when you aren't picking up a physical paperback! The latest book I re-re-read was The Loving Spirit by Daphne Du Maurier, her first novel and not one of her most popular, but for some reason it's my favourite. I really like it and I've read it over and over. It tells the story of the Coombe family over four generations, beginning in 1830, and I didn't know until just now that it is actually based on real events and places. It's put me in the mood to re-read some of the other favourite physical books on my bookshelf, I might go back to The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, another favourite.

Listening to - I don't listen to music very much, but with a longer school run I've been finding myself in the car quite a lot with the radio on. I really need to get organised and put some Spotify playlists together because I'm always hopping about between channels trying to find something that I can sing along to. A current family favourite to belt out is Shut Up and Dance by Walking the Moon.

Planning - I've been trying to get organised and plan some blog posts for the rest of the year. I've got lots of posts planned out that I'm really looking forward to getting on and writing. I use Trello for my blog organisation and it's great, I have different boards for posts that are published and those in progress, as well as a board for general things To Do that I use to plan my daily tasks and recurring tasks like housework.

Looking forward to - My longest friend from school is getting married in a couple of weeks, which I'm very excited about! I'm also looking forward to half-term as we have a few fun things planned, and I'm sure that Christmas will creep up fast!