Holiday Withdrawals

It has been nearly 8 months since our last holiday and lets be honest .... im going through some serious withdrawals right now. 

So holidays bookings are back on the horizon even if only a teeny tiny baby holiday and I'm thinking tropical, relaxing and even a little bit romantic!

What do you think?

My Truth About .... Love

Let me start this post by saying I'm not a young starry eyed teenager who still equates love to the earth shattering, passion filled Romeo and Juliet, Titanic ect style tragedies.

Because of our lifestyle I'm a fairly independent type of a girl. I spend large chunks of time alone and instead of pining and counting down the hours until he comes home I try to live my life to the fullest I can and him coming home was a highlight instead of the be all and end all.

Now this has worked fairly well, until recently. If you told me 5 years ago, before I got married it was only going to get better I wouldn't believe you. I mean, in my head everything loses its shine, and that's not saying its all going to go downhill but it will settle and become comfortable. Instead, what I have found I is that I have fallen even more in love with my husband now than I think I have ever been before. My feelings towards him seem to get stronger every time he gets in the car to go to the airport and when he comes home its as though I can finally breath again.

I also need to stress that I am certainly not a romantic so for me this is not only a bit surreal but a little bit scary. He makes me happy, he keeps me happy and when hes not around im just that little bit less happy than I was. Is it bad that I rely on him so much? Is it scary that he can change my mood just be being or not being around?

I do realise how very lucky I am to have him, he is to me, absolutely perfect (well not perfect, he still can't hang washing out correctly)  .... and here comes another cliche ... he makes me a better person, a happier person, my life is fuller because of him. Even though our lifestyle is difficult, I wouldn't change a thing. 

The butterflies as I wait at the arrivals gate and the feeling of joy when I first see him is something to be so so thankful for and I am, because without him life wouldn't be quite so bright and I wouldn't smile quite so much without him.

So there you have it, a revelation for me when it comes to my version of love. Just like a good wine it seems to just get better with age, stronger and more potent. I just have to cross my fingers and pray that neither one of us lets go of that bottle.

The Book Unpacking Begins

It was three and a half years ago that I packed my books into boxes and haven't seen them since.

Its silly something so small can be such a big loss but wandering around my bookshelves, reading the titles and remembering the stories gave me such joy, I didn't realise until now when I unpack them what I have been missing.

Each book is a small bit of pleasure, a place, a history or a piece of someone's imagination that I get to keep, take out and re-imagine whenever I want.

The problem is books are not pretty, they are not all colour coordinated, they are books so while the book loves eyes light up whenever I see them I have to say, the designer in me wants to arrange them into colour coordinated groups which really is ridiculous.

So im going to let them sit, to settle and hopefully learn to live with the crazy differing sizes, shapes and font that make up my library.

Dual Fabric Chairs

So everyone knows I have a little bit of a crush on a good accent chair. 

What you may not realise is that im seriously digging the new trend of dual fabric chairs.

Its great when an all over pattern would look just that little bit too much but you are dying to use it anyway!

So here are a few I have found, some I love, some not so much but the idea is great. I just cant wait till I'm finally ready to put it all together!

.... and then Someone Helps Make It Better.

So while I still think that everything sucks today one good deed helps make everything suck just that little bit less.

A coffee on the house by my local coffee shop almost brought tears to my eye.

Sometimes its the little things you do that can make a big difference to someone.

The Reality Of Life .....

Every so often I like to do one of these dark depressing posts about how on occasion life just sucks.

The funny thing about this one is that on Sunday I was on a high, you see I had managed to avoid a very nasty hangover, I cooked 2 different healthy soups, found an amazing new fresh fruit and veg shop, organised my fridge and managed to sort out my dining room so the chairs can finally go under the table, did six loads of washing, hosed down and cleaned up outside and cleaned all the inside floors till everything shone with clean.

 

I had a great weekend and felt great about my house and just overall how things were. I finally felt on top of life and on top of everything. Its a good feeling to know you have control over things.

Obviously this feeling didn't last more than two seconds because .... lets be honest .... life just sucks sometimes.

Coming home last night I find darling little Tilly has disemboweled yet another toy and the stuffing was spread from one end of the house to the other. Further to this, they had managed to pull up the carpet which we are using outside to keep down the sand and dig a huge hole dragging sand throughout the house. 

Finally Tilly does 2 inside poo's and a wee meaning she was banished downstairs for the night and made such a racket i don't think I got to sleep until well at 2am!

So lets be honest about the reality of my life. There is nothing clean, organised or on track in my life at the moment. Its just one disaster running into another and if there is just one moment of great organisation its purely to trick me into relaxing my guard before it snaps down like a mouse trap and proves that I am fallible and tend to fall 99% of the time. I Haven't got it together, I don't know how I could ever consider adding kids into the equation because to be honest i don't think I can cope on my own.

The reality is - Life is one big crazy mess and the aim shouldn't be to wrangle it, to control it and try and make it work for you, no no no, the reality of life is you should be congratulated just for coming out the other side of each and every day without going totally insane!

Vegetable Garden Planning

Hundreds of years ago people vegetables were one of the most important parts of a household. People would rely on these to eat and because of this the planning and execution of these would be all about the details. 

 

Now it is tempting to just dump a set of seeds in the ground and hope for the best but for long term vegetable gardens you are hoping to rely heavily on year round I do think a bit of planning is required.

 

So ... the soil is sorted, a lovely mix of nutrient enriched vegetable garden specific soil and horse poo. That's right, the natural soil conditioner. Even better the garden has a water source, we keep the pipes above ground so we can control where and how much water each section of the garden is getting. Its wet and happy and just waiting for its green dressing.

So the planning begins and while I'm slightly intimidated with exactly HOW I should plan the garden I'm determined to get there slowly ... to make long term decisions and get the most out of this exciting space!