happy

Happy

Content

Peaceful

Calm

Joyful

Grateful

Thankful

romanticising your life

you’ve gotta stat romanticizing your life. you gotta start believing that your morning commute is cute and fun, that every cup of coffee is the best you’ve ever had, that even the smallest and most mundane things are exciting and new. you have to, because that’s when you start truly living. that’s when you look forward to every day. – http://falastinniya.tumblr.com/post/177811409782

November is probably the gloomiest month. Almost no sun. Always cloudy and dark. Cold and rainy. It’s not difficult getting depressed. But the quote above have inspired me to see things from the brighter side. Instead of it being dark and gloomy it is cosy. I put up fairy lights in the apartment. I try to really enjoy my food and coffee. I try to truly enjoy snuggling up on the couch with my two year old and drowning in my one year olds smile. Putting on my hat when going out. Sitting in a cafe and enjoying a coffee cortado while my one year old is sleeping.

here I go again

Almost twp years since my last post! And a lot has happened. And I want to start writing again. I also want to start doing YouTube but it takes more time and since I don’t have an abundance of that right now I’ll start here where I am fairly comfortable.

I had another kid! A boy. So now I have two of them. 2.5 years and 1 year old. And at this precious moment they are both sound asleep next to me.

My oldest is usually in day care but today he is at home with me and his brother. And it goes really well so far! Sure he refused to put on his boots when we went out but he stayed in the stroller instead. And I did get him to wear sweaters and a hat! You have to take the small victories.

The fact that it goes well today is a huge victory for me because this past year has been really hard on me and I got burned out in the summer.

I have been burned out before but then I was single. Now I have two kids and a husband that are very much affected by it.

Fortunately I got better and now I feel myself again! I’m talking to a psychiatrist this time which is a huge help.

I want to write more about this and about my days and such things, because that’s what I like to read about myself.

So, well, here I go, again.

temporary clutter

Temporary clutter. That, to me, is a very soothing phrase from Marie Kondo’s book The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up. Temporary clutter is just that, clutter that is temporary. Because life is not perfect and sometimes at least I don’t have the time or the energy to put everything away straight away and after this weekend dishes were piling up and things seemed to be everywhere. But since everything has it’s place it’s not too difficult to put things back where they belong, and the clutter is, once again, no more.

my morning routine

I feel at my best when I have a nice morning routine I can stick to. Since my son was born it has changed a lot but now I’ve found a routine that works nicely most days.

Preferably we wake up around 7:30. I get up and prepare breakfast for the family (porridge for my husband and son and sandwiches and hot cocoa for me).

After breakfast, I put everything away, sort the dishes and make the bed. Then I sit down to study the Bible for a while before doing a quick work out and do squats to help my knee arthritis. Afterwards I get ready for the day, wash, make-up (mascara, eyeliner and powder) and get dressed. Then I make coffee and hopefully before 10 I’m seated in front of my computer with the coffee in hand, ready to get working for a couple of hours.

needs and wants

I’m riding in the back of our car on our way home after a few days at my parents and I just saw that mnmlist.com has been updated! I really enjoy that blog but it hasn’t been updated in a couple of years. In the latest post he talks about how we need very little and that we don’t have to follow the urges that pop into our heads. Instead examining them before giving into them or simply letting them go.

And speaking of urges that pop into our heads, since tumblr started with ads I’ve been seeing pretty dresses from my favourite store a few times a day and I could actually use a couple more dresses since two of the ones I have are really worn out. But I don’t have time to visit the store so after a couple of weeks of wanting them I broke my rule and ordered a couple without trying them on, and now they are waiting for me to be picked up. Hopefully they fit perfectly. (edit: They did!)

 

declutter a’la konmari

I love decluttering. It’s probably one of my biggest hobbies, if it can be a hobby. But then I used to say that moving was my hobby, so why not? Anyway, as I said I love decluttering and I like to search the cabinets to see if there is something more I can get rid of, and I usually manage to find a few things here and there. But sometimes I get rid of things just to get rid of them and sometimes I “save” things to declutter later. And as the self-proclaimed minimalist and declutter fanatic I am I finally listened to The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo and immediately my fingers started to itch, wanting to go through all my possessions, which are not that many, but still, but I managed to last almost until the end of the book, and one night I tackled clothes and books and yesterday morning I tackled the rest (as I said, I don’t own that much). Sure, I was rather quick about it but I wanted to get it done (plus I have a nine-month-old screaming for my attention), and I managed to put together two bags of stuff. Not garbage bags, large shopping bags, but still. There are a few sheets I’m saving till some friends visit in December, but then they will go to, and it feels really nice and relaxing to get rid of things that I have been hesitating about for a while, and feeling a bit bad for getting rid of but Marie Kondo’s words about letting things go when they no longer give joy and instead of feeling regret or guilt rejoice over the time you had and enjoyed the item, and if it was a gift think of it as the act of giving it was the most important thing about it.

So now my home might not be 100% tidy, and it will probably never be, and that’s ok, but it’s tidier than a couple of days ago and every night before I go to bed I go around the apartment and “put it to bed”, making sure everything is in its place and tidy, enjoying the serenity of it before I hit the sack, looking forward to waking up the next morning to a nice and tidy apartment, before the day starts.

de-stress

There are a few go to things that I like to do when I get stressed out that usually works

• The Doctor Who episode The Snowmen. Especially when Clara jumps up and catches the ladder, climbs up and sees the Tardis, and then the following scene where she wakes up the next day. I adore Clara ‘Oswin’ Oswald!
• This Disney soundtrack. Especially when there is a potentially stressful situation I like to put it on. It helps me to stay calm and relaxed.
• I have a playlist of relaxing and happy songs that I listen to non-stop and on repeat when I’m on my computer working.
• Especially the Clara theme from Doctor Who soundtrack. I like to ‘sing’ it to myself when I can’t listen to it.
• A nice walk. Fortunately I live in an area with lots of forest walks.
• Chocolate! (of course)
• Light by Coco’s videos.
• Long hugs.
• Some tumblrs: Dailydoseofstuf, An early morning walk, Delta Breezes, and my own, tobestuckinthepadorica.
• Asking for help.
• Decluttering and organising helps to calm me down.
• Keeping it tidy

me myself and stress

One of the major reasons why I want to live a simpler life is to reduce stress. I do not handle stress well. Quite the opposite. And the past few weeks has been horrible.

Not that anything particularily stresfull has happened or that I have had a lot on my plate but anything and everything can set me off and I get anxiety, my heart races, I get very very sad and cry for no real reason. I is awful .

So maybe if I write about it and the things that ‘trigger’ me it can help me to figure out how to handle it better. Cause I’m tired to be ruled by my stress.

 

the time i moved on a bike

I’ve moved house about 26 times in my soon 29 years and each time has been different. One of the simplest times was when I threw my suitcase into a cab and went from Upper West Side to Upper East Side in New York. One of the worst was when I helped my parents move, the reason that I became a minimalist. But one of the most special was when I moved into my husband’s to be place. At the time I lived in a house with two other girls and I was going to get married in about a weeks time. My then fiancé was in South Korea and had texted that I could move in when he was away if I wanted to. And if I did! I would have a few days to settle in with my things before he came back and we would embark on our married life. I could have asked my parents to help but I’ve always (for a few years at least) wanted to move on a bike, and this would probably be my last opportunity to do so (I lived in a furnished room and didn’t have any furniture of my own).

So I started packing my things and was overwhelmed with how much it felt like. But still I was going to do it. It took a few turns with an overloaded bike and about 7 km to bicycle, once through pouring rain, but I did it! And I carried everything up 4 flights of stairs into our tiny studio apartment and home for the next few months before it was time to move again.