LIFESTYLE, PARENTING
I have the bestest family and friends, I really do. Once again I have been well and truly spoilt for my 29th birthday! I had a lot of beauty products on my wishlist as I am always looking to expand my collection, but I was overwhelmed with everything I got. I thought I’d share a few of the beautiful gifts I got that I am really looking forward to using in the run up to Christmas.
I recently wrote a post about five easy ways to show someone that you care on World Kindness Day, which was Friday 13 November this year. Without getting embroiled in political debate, it turned out that we needed kindness more than ever on Friday 13 this year. But I am also a staunch believer that it’s important to practise a little bit of self-care every so often. You can spend so much time running from one occasion to another (grabbing a glass of wine as you go) that you end up feeling burnt out and a bit blue. So I thought I’d share some of my top tips for giving my body, mind and soul some extra TLC.
So today I turn 29. Happy Birthday to me! I do love my birthday but I am starting to feel a little bit anxious about saying goodbye to my twenties. They’ve been pretty good to me – sure there have been ups and downs but the late twenties has had more ups than downs and I want to keep it that way. Being in my thirties means I’m edging closer to babies and responsibility. It’s a teeny, tiny bit scary.
So I thought I would try and give myself some perspective by putting together a list of things I want to achieve in my life and take the pressure off achieving them all by the time I’m 30.
You may or may not know, but there seems to be a lot going on this Friday! Not only is it the ominous Friday 13th, but it is also the Children in Need appeal day, World Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Day and World Kindness Day.
It’s my birthday in less than a week! 5 days to be precise. I can’t believe it, I literally can’t. Where has this year gone? It feels like I’ve been 28 for about five minutes. So much has happened this year that I can’t even begin to reflect on it all yet, but that’s not what the purpose of this post is. You might have seen that I wrote a post recently about being depressed. Well it’s not just about the depression for me – I am also quite an anxious person. I never thought I was, but as I’ve grown up through my twenties I’ve definitely become more self-aware and I can see now that there are some things I’ve always been anxious about.
One of those is my birthday!
What’s not to love about Barry M? It’s cheap, always coming up with fab new products and I recently found out that it is cruelty free as well. A high street beauty triple threat, if you will. Now I must confess I bought this latest lipstick – the Satin Super Slick Lip Paint – simply because I saw a picture of it in a magazine and I liked it. Advertising works! Who knew. Then my friend Katy bought it and I was jealous so off to Boots I went to get some. But was it any good?
I’ve never been to America in the autumn (or fall for all you crazy yanks) but I had the absolute delight of being in New York at the weekend. And ohmygosh Central Park was a sight to behold. The colours in the trees were like nothing I’ve ever seen before – gold, yellow, red, bronze, green, russet and so many more colours I don’t even know the names of. From the moment I walked into the park (listening to Taylor Swift’s Welcome to New York appropriately) I felt a huge sense of warmth and happiness. The effect of the colours in the trees was just incredible. I found a happy place.
Last week, Andrew and I took a long weekend to ourselves and decided to be local tourists. We’ve both lived in the North East for at least ten years but not visited some of the top sights up here. A couple of weeks ago we went to the Weeping Window at Woodhorn Poppy Exhibition (see my post about it here) and enjoyed it so thought we’d continue the historical sights. This time, we headed South to Beamish. For those not in the know, Beamish is a pretty cool living museum that covers a huge site in County Durham. Once you’re there you’re transported back to the 18 and 1900s to see what life was really like then in the North East. I was a bit apprehensive that it wouldn’t be as enjoyable as I’d found it when I visited as a kid. So what was our verdict – worth it?
It’s Halloween – one of my least favourite days of the year (see why here). BUT if we forget about the ghouls and creepy stuff and just focus on the fact that it’s October 31st then YAY it’s one year since we moved into the house that we actually bought, like proper adults. One whole year where the interest rates haven’t increased. WINNING.
But aside from what happened a year ago, what happened over this last month?
A couple of years ago I decided to chop my boob-length hair off to a long bob and dye it red. I think it was a sign of wanting to make a change in my life but not knowing how, but maybe that’s a story for another day. I kept this hairstyle for a year or so, enjoying how freeing it actually felt to not carry a hairband around my wrist all the time.