My Year in Review: 2018, the Second Quarter (Career, Health, Family, Life Generally)

We’re halfway through the year already and I can’t quite believe it – nor can I believe some of the things that have happened (or not happened) in the last three months…!

As I type we’re in the middle of England doing well in the World Cup and we actually won a penalty shoot-out (which is totally unheard of).

We’re experiencing yet another hot, sunny day… the weather is unreal right now in the UK.

We still haven’t moved house and I’m now at the “getting pi$$ed off with everyone involved” stage.

I honestly think I’ve been transported to some strange place and time because three months ago this is NOT what I thought would be happening in my life at the beginning of July…!

I may have spoken too soon about the World Cup – by late Saturday afternoon we’ll know if England have beaten Sweden to get to the semi-finals, so I may well be back in the real world of being English and disappointed by football within 24 short hours of this post getting published (I can be hopeful but I’ve had this feeling every four years for the last 28 years). And who knows, maybe the countless phone calls and messages left for our property lawyers where the house is concerned means we’ll have a moving date by that time too? I’m not holding my breath – I think we have more chance of winning the World Cup to be honest… 😉

This month sees my birthday and 7th blogiversary on the 23rd – I always write a blogiversary post on the day musing about something to do with blogging. This year I can promise another good one worth a read (should be good for a laugh), don’t miss it!

So without further ado, here’s what happened (or DIDN’T happen but should have) during April, May and June…

 

My year in review so far: Life

Let’s get the most grrrrr thing (that should have happened but hasn’t) out of the way, shall we?

The house move

As I’ve already mentioned WE HAVEN’T MOVED YET. (Can you hear my teeth grinding?!) If I described all the errors and slackness (my word) from solicitors, brokers and lenders that have taken place you just wouldn’t believe me – or maybe you would if you’ve moved house recently! We wanted to move before the end of June, that came and went with more delays cropping up. Two weeks ago just one more bit of admin had to be sorted – it was a simple matter which could have been sorted with a FAX of all things, but one fortnight and many, many left messages later for all concerned (basically I’m doing our solicitor’s work for them) and we’ve still not been given a moving date.

I think I’ve aged about 10 years in the last three months.

Onto more positive things where the house is concerned: the response to my question about doing interiors posts once we’ve moved was a resounding ‘yes’ I’m really pleased to say. So I’ll be starting to document the house and the way we decorate and furnish it on my Stories and then hopefully continue it with perhaps one blog post a month about what we’ve been doing to make it our home. I’m still looking forward to moving, but good GOD the services involved are making me grind my teeth down to nothing 🙁

The other thing I’ll be able to do in the new house is vlogs/video tutorials. The new house is open plan and has much more space, so leaving a tripod out with background and lights too won’t be as much of a problem as it is in our terraced cottage!

The weather

When you’re British, the weather deserves a header all of its own. Especially as we went from snow around Eastertime to a heatwave within three weeks. We’re still enjoying gorgeous weather now, with only a handful of slightly cold or rainy days since the end of April. It’s been a truly glorious summer so far. It’ll be one of the ones that we wistfully talk about in future years, Do you remember the Summer of 2018…?! Our new house has a large lawn which we want to landscape over the summer – I hope the weather lasts long enough for us to do that (it’s a new build all painted white so we won’t need to decorate).

Leisure time

In May we went to the Blade Runner Secret Cinema in London and had the MOST amazing time.

You don’t get to dress up dystopian-rainy-LA-in-the-future style (with a touch of the 1940s) every day – we loved it. I’m up for fancy dress anytime, and this was the ultimate.

Last month was also when I discovered the TV series Outlander – HOW had I not watched this before?? I happened to catch the first ever episode on a rerun on More4 and decided to carry on watching it on Prime… I have now finished all three seasons (I binge-watched them all whilst packing boxes) and am now totally addicted. Season 4 comes out at the end of the year and I cannot wait: I now know what is known as “Droughtlander”!

I also mentioned the World Cup already. I haven’t felt proud to be English (where football is concerned) for a very, very long time – I didn’t even support England during the last World Cup as they were such a shameful bunch of individuals, on AND off the pitch. This time the England team is young, fresh, hopeful and inexperienced. But they’ve been doing so well and as I type, Brazil have been beaten by Belgium. We actually have a chance of winning the World Cup. I cannot even FATHOM what it would be like to win, but I know it would be the best thing ever for the country. National feel-good factors are often thin on the ground and this would be one of them #Football’sComingHome

 

My year in review so far: Career

I’ve had a pretty good three months, with lots of interesting projects and lovely events to attend. I’ve been on a fantastic mini spa break in Bath, I went to a garden party in Richmond (trying on diamonds!) and I enjoyed some great press events. Lots of train travel – and regular work coming in I’m glad to say.

However, the major thing that happened was that I won at the UK Blog Awards… again. I was blathering on beforehand about how there was no way I could possibly win for a second time (why would they choose the same winner two years in a row?), but somehow I did it. I couldn’t be more surprised, or more PROUD to represent the older blogger in the fashion category. It did wonders for my career over the last 12 months; although there’s no way to measure it, I’m sure the first win last year made my profile rise dramatically. So hopefully the rise in profile might continue again for the next year; I need to work my socks off and really earn that title.

Will I enter next year? I can say I will 100% definitely NOT be entering again. There’s a very, very good reason why I won’t (and can’t) enter again. I can’t tell you anything right now, but I will as soon as I’m able #cryptic 😉

Things always wind down over the summer where blogging is concerned, and the “summer blogging lull” usually starts around now. But although I may not be publishing new posts quite as often as I have always done (currently about one or two posts per week as opposed to three or four), but I intend for that to change once we move and are reasonably settled in. Moving house in the summer is quite handy where the quiet blogging period is concerned, but come September I’ll be firing on all cylinders.

 

My year in review so far: Health

After my operation in January my leg is slowly getting better – or rather, it’s sort of getting better. I had a follow-up MRI scan which showed that the cyst is still there, but that’s not necessarily bad news. Until we get the results of the next MRI (which I’ll have four months later) we won’t know how fast-growing it is.

Unfortunately despite getting slowly back into exercise I’ve put on a ton of weight (two stone/25lb/12kg) over the last two years and I HAVE to shift it to protect my health. I wrote the other week about how none of my summer clothes fit – even the bigger ones I bought last summer because I didn’t have anything that fitted even then – and I’ve had to buy practically a whole new summer wardrobe. I cannot fit into ANYTHING I already owned apart from some loose summery blouses and t-shirts. Dresses are my friend right now, so that explains why there are so many new ones in my outfit posts this summer.

Both Keith and I need to get fit, and we’re at that really hard stage: Starting. It has to happen because we’re not getting any younger and this is the point in our lives where too little exercise, a bad diet and too little sleep could have some SERIOUS repercussions on our health. I want us to make some major changes, so hopefully by the next installment of this series I’ll have some positive news where our fitness is concerned!

 

My year in review so far: Loved ones

Riley is doing well. He goes to the vet once a month for a check up on his tumour and to get another month’s dose of painkillers. He eats well, he’s endearingly clingy and really demands attention (which we’re happy to give in abundance). He loves walking. And walking, and walking and walking. We appreciate every moment we have with him and are so pleased that he’s had enough monthly check-ups for us to know that the tumour is very slow growing. Of course it could flare up at any time, but he’s doing so much better than we could have ever hoped.

We just can’t wait to move so that he gets to enjoy the big expanse of grass our new back garden has. If you’ve ever seen him on my Instagram Stories you’ll know how he loves rolling around on grass!

I’m so glad June is over because Keith has suffered terribly with hayfever all his life, and June is always his bad month. Due to the glorious summer his hayfever this year has probably been the worst it’s ever been due to the crazy-high pollen counts, but hopefully it will ease off very soon.

And finally: We had a family birthday party last weekend and thought it would be a good idea to have a tug of war. Word of warning: don’t use an old rope like we did. A few seconds into a VERY competitive tug of war (where we were all really, REALLY trying), the rope broke and we all fell backwards hard. Unfortunately in the tumble my sister broke her wrist – it was her 60th birthday that day. What a way to celebrate it, poor thing…! She lives in Australia and was due to fly back on Friday – she may not be able to fly back on that date depending on what the doctor says.

So there’s my thought of the day: Don’t use an old rope for tug of war unless you want to end up in A&E on your birthday 🙁

ARE YOU WATCHING THE WORLD CUP? ARE YOU ALSO A MASSIVE OUTLANDER FAN? ARE YOU ALSO GETTING UNUSUALLY HOT WEATHER? TELL ME ALL IN THE COMMENTS!

LIKE THIS POST? YOU MIGHT ALSO WANT TO READ…

– My Year in Review: 2018, the First Quarter

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