Lifestyle, food and drink, and our family life and travel adventures.
Hello! It’s been a while hasn’t it? I feel like I start off all my more personal blog posts in the same way nowadays, but it always feels like there’s been a big gap between them. And then I always mention that I can’t believe it’s *insert month here* already, which I am also going to do – how are we over halfway through June already?! The years go by faster and faster and it’s a bit scary!
A is nearly 11 and a half now and finishes primary school next month, which is mad. She’s part absolute delight and part evil teenager who hates her mum, so I’m REALLY excited for the teenage years. We’ve just come back from a brilliant family holiday to beautiful Portugal and we’re all very sad it’s over – going back to school runs and routine and our house that is falling apart at the seams has been a lot of fun this week. My body still isn’t used to not eating and drinking all day long yet either.
I’m very grateful that we got to go abroad for the first time in years, though and we’ll hopefully be going somewhere in England over the summer so there’s plenty to still look forward to.
We have loads of school stuff going on over the next month; the summer fair, Ava’s residential, her leaver’s party and her final school show, so that should all be fun and I think it will go really fast.
I have a few things I want to keep up over the summer so here are my simple goals for summer.
Before I went on holiday I was doing really well with regular exercising and eating well, and so I want to make sure I keep up with that, both for my general health and fitness as well as to lose some more weight so I feel better about myself.
I only got home on Monday so I am going slightly easier on myself this week and just doing as much walking as I can – plus it’s really hot so if I don’t properly exercise first thing – which I really struggle with – then I can’t really do it later on because I will die.
I have some Renpho scales which sync with an app on my phone and give a load of extra info like BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate), muscle mass, and BMI (which can go eff itself – it’s so outdated and bullshitty and I hate that doctors still have to use it. So there. Please don’t feel bad if your BMI is judging you – until recently mine said I was obese and I am around a size 12). I just use the scales a couple of times a week to check I’m going in the right direction and it helps motivate me too.
The morning after I got back from Portugal I opened the app and stepped on the scales and it said something along the lines of ‘This is a big change, is this your measurement? Did you eat and drink and sit on your arse all day long in Portugal, Louise?’.
I am sitting writing this, out in my garden with a glass of rosé, on a sun lounger in the corner of my garden clinging onto the little bit of sun left (God, to have a south-facing garden).
For me, the sun makes everything better. I know we have to be careful in it and I generally am, but getting some sunshine on my skin improves my mood, I feel so much better with a bit of a tan, and I just feel so much more relaxed and happy with life. I’ve said it many times before but I really want to move somewhere hot, or hotter at least. When we were in Portugal Ava asked if we could move there and I would honestly love to, or Spain. I hope we are able to one day.
I read almost a book and a half whilst in Portugal – the second half of Daisy Darker (enjoyed it-ish but struggled a bit to get back into it after a break and found it quite hard to keep track) and then the vast majority of Dead Rich which I treated myself to at the airport on a BOGOF deal, which I very much enjoyed and liked that it was a bit of a different thriller and that it carried on when I thought it seemed to be almost done.
I was hoping to read more but with three children around most of the time it wasn’t easy to concentrate, plus I kept having to go backwards in Daisy Darker because it had been weeks since I had managed to read it.
However, as I’ve decided to both take it a bit easy this week and also work hard and try and find more work and write more posts, I have allowed myself some time lying out in the sun (before going back to work) and actually been able to start another book (Only Love Can Hurt Like This by Paige Toon) which I’m REALLY hoping I can keep going with and that the next time I manage to read any more of it isn’t the next time I’m on holiday!
Do you have any particular goals for over the summer?
Welcome to Birds and Lilies! I'm Lou: mother, blogger and freelance writer. This is my lifestyle blog, where I talk about motherhood, infertility and IVF, beauty, my love for food and wine, as well as my thoughts about stuff, and our real-life and travel adventures.
Contact: [email protected]
