The end of January

So here we are in the middle of winter and it is cold, as it should be!  

Normal sort of week, just working, cleaning and shopping.  On Thursday evening I hosted our WI cake club on Zoom.  This subgroup is normally held in a back room of a pub and everyone gets to try each others cake, but in Covid times this is held on Zoom with no chance of tasting.  The theme for this month was healthy treat, two ladies made flapjack, one a fruit cake and another a banana loaf.  As I am trying to be extra healthy I did not make anything apart from a bowl of popcorn.  On Friday I met my friend and here dog and went for a walk, which was good, but we didn't go too far as she can only manage 1 hour walking due to her health, but it was good to chat with someone.

Saturday was absolutely freezing cold, it rained and sleeted all day, so apart from a quick dash to the market I stayed in all day and spent sometime watching the birds from my window.  This weekend is the Big garden Birdwatch, counting how many birds you observe in one hour and then upload to the RSPB website

 

I topped up the feeders, grabbed my binoculars and a cup of coffee and watched.  During the hour I saw loads of starlings, some long tailed tits, a blue tit, some green finches, a crow and couple of pigeons, blackbirds and two Magpies

Here is a photo taken from the RSBP webiste of some longtailed tits, they looked exactly like this from my window, but with only a phone camera I couldn't get a good photo!

 

Today started bright and sunny so headed out to the greenhouse to sow some seeds: 

Onions - Long Red Florence, Bedfordshire Champion, Isobel Rose, which I grew last year, lovely pink onions, and some from seed I saved last year, but don't know the variety.

Peppers: Sweet Banana and Corbaci, Chilli Pepper - Eureka

Leeks - Carantan 2

Aubergines- Striped Toga, tried to grow these last year, but only produced tiny fruits, trying again this year

Herbs - Greek oregano, parsley, Corriander and Chervil, all old seed, will see if they germinate

Flowers: Orlaya Grandiflora white Lace

All these seeds are now on a warm window sill in the house, until they germinate

I pricked out some flower seedlings that I had sown in the autumn - Larkspur, Veronika and Rudbekia, all into modules in the green house .

Found some more bulbs that I had forgotten to pot, so popped these into pots in the green house - dwarf daffodils and some pink tulips

I also set the potato seeds out in trays to chit, these are in the porch, the coolest part of the house.

Finished week two of Caroline Girvans Epic 2 workouts, and lost another pound, which is great.

 

Surviving lock down 3

 Just over 2 weeks of this current lock down have passed and it feels like months.  I am really missing the gym, not been since Christmas Eve when it closed again.  In the summer I started running outside and completed two challenges, the first month was to run a marathon distance (26 miles) in total over the month of March, which I did in 5Km runs.  Then in April I crossed the Chanel and much further.  I carried on running every couple of days across the summer until the gym re-opened in August.  Went to the gym 3 times a week and was really beginning to see some progress, then it closed again in November. I went for a run and found that I had knocked 5 minutes of the time it took me to do the same run in the summer.  I might have stopped to take an extra photo in the summer, but was feeling much fitter than I was in March.  But now it is either too dark or too wet or too cold or too muddy to run outside, so needed something else.

I have tried various workouts on YouTube, but this week discovered Caroline Girvan and her Epic 2 programme.  The first thing I liked about her is her accent, Irish, not American like so many of the Youtubers, which I don't get on with.  The programme is 5 times a week for the next 10 weeks.  I have managed 4 this week, with still one workout to do over the weekend.  Each session is hard, far too many squats, but I quite like it!  Lots of weights, which I love, just need to get some heavier ones, but need to decide what to get.  

Combining this with counting calories and logging everything on MyfitnessPal, I am tracking everything with a view to loosing a few pounds..  Rather proud of -2lb in two weeks.

The other thing that is keeping me occupied is stitching and crochet.  I have a long term crochet blanket project on the go, but have also been doing some cross stitch, just finished this

 The kit had the word "Welcome" in the box, but I changed it to our house number.