Living on the Down Low

As I slowly recover from weeks of debilitating laziness, I've decided to start embracing the wider world again. I'm clearing through the back-catalogue of un-read articles in my Feedly, I'm doing little projects, prepping for bigger ones, and dreaming of all sorts of things I can do with my time, and I'm enforcing much stricter and shorter TV hours for myself and E during the day. We need to do less watching and more doing.

So what have I been getting up to as I maintained lethargic radio silence here on the blog?

via, Books Direct tumblr

-Reading in the bathtub. This is an activity I highly recommend. (So do many others, incidentally) One night earlier in the week, E had a particularly trying day. So, the Husband came home early, took E out for a romp around the playground, and I soaked in a bubble bath, lit by candles, reading Hitch 22, and having an overly-filling dinner of curry and naan. Luxury at its finest.

-Watching this video. Having looked at some of Epipheo's other offerings, they're occasionally a bit dubious, but this one on the need to take time out to relax, concentrate, and get away from the internet was a good one.

via, Epicurious.com

-Dreaming about Mexican food. I love tacos, burritos, chili, nachos, fajitas, empenadas, salsa, guacamole, and pretty much anything else you can think of that would be served at a good Mexican restaurant (or a Taco Bell). These recipes on Epicurious have made me want to feast on giant burritos all week. Especially since our nearest Mission Burrito is in Reading...

-Going out to lunch. E and I had a fun trip to Nando's the other day. I was just in the mood for a meal out - no lunch in front of the TV. Plus, that chicken and grilled corn-on-the-cob are to die for.

-Making play-dough. I just finished this and I have two tubs of homemade play-dough sitting on our desk waiting for E to wake up. I checked out this recipe online, but you can make this stuff without cooking it. The key is just that you need a bit more salt and flour to keep it from sticking to everything it touches.

via, Domestic Adventure

-Mustering the energy to get to this project. I ordered my fabric of choice from Spoonflower ages ago. Now it's just been sitting on my dining table waiting for me to go get some batting and a staple gun and just make the stupid cornice box for the kitchen window already!

via, Etsy

-Making shadow puppets. Well, I didn't make the puppets themselves, but after playing with this lovely set that we were given by a friend (cheers, Natalie!), my mind has been going warp speed considering how best to make E a shadow puppet theatre to stage some fun bedtime stories.

So what about you? What has everyone else been up to while I've been away?

7 Minutes

Wow, guess who's been super lazy lately? This chick right here. No blog posts, minimal reading of my feeds, and no interesting day trips or laborious DIY projects to blame it on, either! It all just comes down to pure unadulterated, I-couldn't-be-bothered. I know that sounds horrible, but don't we all have those moments?

Anyway, I finally got off my bum today - both actually and metaphorically - and started being a productive human being again. How did I start that off? By trying out the 7-minute workout that's been making its rounds on the internet.

via, NYT

The Husband has been doing this for a few days now and recommended that I give it a go. Much like my usual initiative to run 1 mile no matter what, this sort of commitment is just short enough not to put you off, but just long enough (and hard enough) to feel like it's worth your while not to just skip it altogether.

You do each exercise going pretty much flat-out as hard as you can for 30 seconds. Then, you get a 10-second break and start the next exercise. Aside from the push-ups, which I simply cannot do, the hardest thing was trying to maintain a wall-sit for 30 seconds. Though attempting to keep good form doing the high-knees running towards the end also had its challenges.

There are plenty of apps around to help you time this exercise, if you're into it. Personally, I've been using this site here (http://7-min.com/) because I just workout in the living room anyway, so I don't need anything I can take on my phone. Well, at least not until we head to Vienna next month (squee!). Plus, the ticking of the seconds and the bell to signal the start of each exercise and rest period are nice and simple - not obnoxious at all - and keep you on track for those exercises where you can't easily keep your computer monitor in view.

I'm not sure what I think of it in the long term yet, but I was definitely wobbly when I finished; something my muscles haven't been subjected to at the end of a workout in far too long. I think I'll at least be keeping this up for the month to see just how I adapt to it. Hey; there are worse fads to try!

Anyone else trying to get their ass back in gear after some time out of your normal exercise routine? (Seriously; I know I can't be the only one...)

Lazy Day

For a plethora of reasons, today is a lazy day for me. It's one of those days where I really had to cast about for some motivation to get dressed. Luckily, E has been happy to roll with my lazy attitude today. We watched some Sarah & Duck in bed, let him run around the house and play with his toys, made some more granola bars, and read books in bed until nap time. Now I'm back in bed and catching up on my blogs in Feedly. If I didn't feel guilty depriving him of the company of other children, I'd stay home from playgroup today and continue to veg out with some pizza and a movie.

So, in lieu of anything interesting going on with me, I thought I'd share some interesting things I've found from other people. Enjoy!

Swoop bags. If you had any idea how much Lego there is in our house, you would understand why this appealed to me straight away. I knew what I was getting into, though. This is what comes of marrying a man whose Wikipedia mention centres around his Lego gun building skills. (Also, how proud am I that my husband is on Wikipedia!?)


A cheesy joke is always fun. A drunken cheesy joke can be even better. And finally, a drunken cheesy joke, animated lovingly by your spouse has got to be the ultimate winner of the cheesy joke competition. This made me giggle.

Kim over at Day with KT is brilliant...I know I've said this before. How much do I appreciate her corn salad recipe? Tonnes. Let's just say that there will need to be stake burritos going on in this house very soon to give me an excuse to make some of this stuff.

Teal's post on getting your act together and making what you pin on Pinterest has me inspired. Those taquitos look awesome, plus, I always love being able to do the projects that inspire me. (Hopefully, once I'm over my bout of laziness, I'll have a Pinterest project to share with you soon!)

Thank you, Design*Sponge, for mentioning the company Chasing Paper. This is a wallpaper-loving renter's dream. Of course, so are the removable wallpaper tiles from Hygge & West, but with our tight budget, I'm not holding my breath.


People: I. Love. Steven. Pinker. I highly recommend listening to his TED talk above, though you should know that it does the topic no justice. To really get the feel of it, I strongly suggest getting the book that this TED talk was based off of: The Better Angels of Our Nature. The Husband and I are each working our slow way through it now, but it makes an amazing case for the fact that far from needing to be nostalgic for the 'good old days' when the world was so much better, we're actually living in the most peaceful period of human existence that time has yet seen. Even just the first chapter of his book will blow your tiny mind...it certainly did mine.

Have fun!

A Place to Begin

Happy birthday to me! In the spirit of celebrating the anniversary of my birth, the Husband has taken the day off, and once E wakes up from his nap we're heading out to let me do a bit of shopping and then tonight it's dinner out and Star Trek: Into Darkness, with the oh-so-adorable Benedict Cumberbatch. Ginger or no ginger: he's my type. Tall, thin, pale, blue eyes, deep voice, English. Seriously people, I know I have a type...every last one of those descriptors fits my husband, too! Are you ready for 139 minutes of ogling Mr. Cumberbatch, Chris Pine, and Zachary Quinto? Because I am.

Happy. Effing. Birthday. To. Me.

So what goodies will I leave you with to peruse while I go enjoy my birthday spoils? These ones:


Goodmornings.org, via SwissMiss.
 I like the idea behind this. It's such an easy thing to do to say 'good morning!' as a way to brighten your day and someone else's.

My feet have traveled plenty of places. Edinburgh, London, Salt Lake City, Rome, Venice, Copenhagen...they'll even be going to Vienna next month! I'd like to come up with a fun photo template like this to save all of the fun places we get to visit.

I do love so much of the stuff that Diana at exPress-O links to and this cute story of a trans-Atlantic relationship is really fun. I like the idea of the split screen narrative, because when such an important part of your life is so far away for so long, it really does feel like you're living in two different places at once!

Here is today is a good way to get some perspective; and I love the minimalist style of the animations and the graphs. I feel like the only thing it could possibly be missing is a .gif of Neil deGrasse Tyson giving you a thumbs-up. Let's get on that, people.

Poketo and Lisa Congdon have made tea towels! These look absolutely adorable to me and I have Poppytalk to thank for showing them to me this week. Also: no idea who Lisa Congdon is? Have a gander at some of her work...

So yes, a lot of the cute clothes I've seen lately are either specifically maternity, or are pregnant friendly. This isn't on purpose. But with a shirt as cute as this one from ASOS, surely you can justify buying it with or without a bun in the oven!?

I don't speak French, but I still loved how cute this Olive Us episode was from Design Mom. Little Red Riding Hood? Too awesome.

via BOBgear

So eventually I'd need a double buggy, but if I had my way and money was no object, this BOB jogger would be mine all mine! But then, Runner's World did give a good review of quite a few good joggers that are less likely to break the bank.

Vicarious Tourism: The Vyne

As an early anniversary present, we got a year's subscription to the National Trust from the Husband's parents. I like this sort of gift: it'll encourage us to get out more and to enjoy some of the fun things we can only see living in the UK. So, on the Bank Holiday, we took the chance to grab our friends and head over to Basingstoke and go see the Vyne.

The original house was built during Tudor times. As I recall one of the guides telling us in the family chapel, one of the members of the original family who built the house, saved the life of Henry VIII in battle. Pretty awesome. The house was a fun mix of Georgian and Tudor decor and the grounds were loads of fun to walk around (though the 'Shimmering Lake' wasn't so much shimmering as it was covered in pond scum...). The best part for the kids, though, was the Hidden Realm play area...all themed like something out of The Hobbit.

Though the crowds were definitely in force that day, the kids still had a great time running around, wandering through the tunnels designed to look like Hobbit holes, and going up and down the slide. Snowy in particular got quite good at queuing to wait her turn to go down the slide again. Who knew that was a skill your kid could pick up at the playground?

The whole place was just nice to walk around in. I know the Husband isn't a big fan of crowds (everything feels more hectic when you're navigating throngs of people), but I felt like the whole time there went pretty well. It's the sort of thing that feels really worth the time when you've got a membership and don't have to think about whether you'll do the grounds or the house or both: you can just go as the mood takes you, no planning required. Since our initial plans of hitting up Leith Hill Tower and a few castles during the weekend didn't pan out, we'll definitely have to get back around to that some time soon...what with this nice weather and all.

The downside to the day? Ethan managed to let the 500-year-old gravel at the Vyne leave its mark on him...well, on his forehead. The poor thing! He came home bruise and scraped and dirty, and altogether looking like an action hero at the end of the movie. But he did seem to enjoy the chance to run around outside for so long. We'll have to refine our small-children-in-historic-houses strategy.

A Day Out

 We had what was meant to be a lovely day out the other week with E's cousin Henry and my sister-in-law, Rachel. The sun was out, it was a lovely warm day, and we hit up a little park out by the River Thames for the afternoon once the boys got too rambunctious to be allowed to stay inside.

The boys enjoyed climbing up and down the equipment that was actually part of the playground as well as climbing on some of the outdoor exercise equipment. They loved the chance to run and jump and be as full of beans as they could be.

What E didn't like so much was being made to walk under his own steam. That, apparently, was too much to be borne. Especially because walking on his own meant having his bottle of juice taken away. We aren't quite at the walking whilst drinking stage yet. He would consent to walk about 20 yards at a time - crying all the while - then plant himself in front of me until I picked him up. Though this continued on the way back to the car, at least it all took a break when we got to the lock.

He loved getting to see the boats go through as the water level adjusted itself, though I think he felt something was missing from the experience since he wasn't allowed over the fence. It was a great chance to just wander and enjoy the sunshine...and to chase Henry's football while we were at it.

Though we're still working on not having to be carried everywhere, it was a good chance to get out and do something...but nothing really specific. I want to give him more chances to go out on walks, to wander and play and see new things, like boats going through locks, or areoplanes taxing on the runway, or giant bubble blowing machines and dinosaur skeletons in the Science Museum.

I think we'll have some fun adventures this summer!

Our Favourite Reads: Fifth Edition

There's always something fun about discovering new and interesting baby books, and over the next few weeks I have some gems to share.

I want to start with two books we picked up, courtesy of my mom, when we all went to London for a day to do some museum-hopping, Oxford Street-shopping, and sight-seeing. While we popped into the Tate Modern we had a great time. Mom and I giggled and whispered inappropriately through a movie we were convinced was meant to make you feel like you were on acid. We also came to the conclusion that when you need artifact text of more than a few sentences to explain what your modern art sculpture is about, you've done it wrong. If I can't get some idea of what you're on about just by looking at the sculpture itself, then you're just bad at communicating in this medium and you ought to consider something easier.

But some of our greatest fun was in hunting out souvenirs in the gift shop (cue angelic choirs. Museum of Everything reference, anyone?). We had a great time looking at all the prints, frames, postcards, books, mugs, aprons, and other odds and ends. But the children's books selection had some of the best offerings.

A Bit Lost by Chris Haughton is an adorable story about a baby owl who falls out of his nest and needs help to find his mummy again. Not to mention that the illustrations are bright, fun, and adorable. There's a lot of visual interest in this book, which makes even the simplest story fun to read to your kid over and over. Plus, I felt vindicated when I saw this book featured on Design Mom just a few weeks after we brought it home! (Only for whatever reason it has a different title in its US release! Cut it out, people!)

We all know that Oliver Jeffers is a big deal in this house, so it should come as no surprise that his The Heart and the Bottle was my other choice for something to bring home. It's a sweet story about learning to keep enjoying life, even after losing someone special. Jeffers writes and draws to a superb quality, so this book is fun to read even if you aren't trying to find a way to help your kid learn to grieve.

We've had some brilliant finds over the past few weeks at the library as well, so I'll definitely be getting around to posting those during the rest of the month. Happy reading!