Santa sundays: Book edition

When I read Rivers of London on the Kindle I finished it in one sitting. Then I read it again, then I reluctantly let my husband read it, and then I read it again.  It is one of the best books I'd read in years.  I tell everyone I know who might enjoy it that this is one book they must read.
Smart, genre savvy, with a world populated by characters who are not just straight, white and male- something which is depressingly rare in fantasy, Rivers of London is my kind of book.
The series follows Peter Grant, a police officer and apprentice wizard in his education in the ways of London's other world. Lying somewhere between a police procedural and Terry Pratchett one of the things I liked most about the book was that it took place in a real physical place- much of the books are based in bloomsbury, soho and covent garden a part of London I know well and love.   Unlike many books set in a real place this series depicts it so accurately and the atmosphere and feeling of the district is so right.  No small feat in a fantasy novel.
 I am desperately looking forward to book four, Broken Homes coming out in June.  However if I have to wait til Christmas to get it I think I might cave and buy it myself!

The gym and self image

Today was my eldest child's third birthday.  Husband took the day off, but eldest was in playgroup this morning.  We had a whole morning with much less childcare than usual.  The sun was shinning.

So what did I do- I went and spent an hour at the gym, doing weights and running, rather than mooching into town for a coffee and some adult conversation with my one true love.

When I joined the gym a month ago it would safe to say that I had not seriously exercised in over a decade.  I'd made a few attempts to start running which had petered out after a little while.  But nothing else.  For along time I'd built my identity as someone who didn't exercise 

The truth was I don't like it when I'm not really good at something.  Brilliant in fact.  But I was pretty good at sports in school, on all the teams even.  But! I wasn't the best, so why would I bother?  And I didn't bother at all.

In the ten years that have passed since my secondary education I have gained several dress sizes and a few stone.  Which didn't bother me that much.  My father has become seriously ill with blood pressure and heart issues, which worried me a lot but didn't really motivate me to change anything.

Then I look at my children.  My wonderful children who love to move, who won't stop running and dancing and climbing and find such joy in it.  I thought about the example I wanted to give them as an adult and knew something had to change.

So I've joined the local council gym.  I was nervous about it.  Friends asked me if I was worried about all the "fit" people judging me, about looking stupid.  And I was, a little bit, but mostly I was worried about being bad at it!  I knew I wasn't going to be able to run at first, or lift as much weight as someone else or bend properly, or well anything.

But I went and did it anyway.  And found the pleasure in the endorphins a good workout will give you.  More importantly though I'm not good at it- I was certainly not any good the first time I went!  I've kept going anyway and I'm getting better and better.  Honestly I love it!  Even when my back is bad I want to go, actually want to!

I'm showing myself and my girls that it's ok to fail, to be wrong, that it's good to keep trying and learn to do better and better.  I've been limiting myself to things I can do without failing.  It's a lot healthier and braver to be failing and doing it anyway.

Santa Sundays: Chocolate from Monty Bojangles

It's been such a busy fortnight here that all the blogging I've managed is these santa sunday's posts.  But hopefully I have an exciting week of new posts ahead of me.
This weeks santa sunday is dedicated to chocolates, I'm not the biggest chocolate eater in the world but I love these have converted me from Monty Bojangles

They are absolutely heavenly  I was given a box by a friend as a house warming gift and was blown away by them- how chocolate ought to taste!
If you love them as much as I do- or just want a stack of excellent little gifts for emmergancies around the place then this pack of 8 Bojangles truffles from amazon is an excellent deal- 61p per pack saving on the rrp!  Just don't eat them all at once.

Santa Sundays: Bernard Green

I have a love, a love of linocut.
Linocut is a form of print making made using a sheet of lino, gouged out to form a relief.  And I love them.
So this is the biggest thing I want for Christmas. (Or as a group present for my big number birthday this year...)

Bernard Green: ‘Blue Wave With Gull’

This linocut captures the essence of a place- a place I love so so well.  The coast around newgale beach, the place I go to feel completely relaxed, like a breath of fresh air to my soul.   I love it.  And this picture, the lines of the waves, the colours, the idea of the sand in the foreground is so perfect.  

It is a little on the pricey side, but then the artist Bernard Green passed away in 1998 which obviously contributes to the cost, but it is beautiful and... well I have no justification- it's just gorgeous!

Santa Sundays: Yarn Bowl

So all year long I suggest things for my husband to buy me for Christmas  birthdays  anniversary.

And he usual makes a note then looses it.  So I've decided I'm going to blog the things I'd like for Christmas or to give someone for Christmas once a week.  Of course at the moment I don't think my husband has bothered to read my blog- he might get a surprise when he does.

This week I've chosen these beautiful bowls from Little Wren Pottery on folksy.

Image reproduced from Little Wren Pottery.  All rights theirs.

I have a real thing for hand made ceramics, ever since I did two terms of pottery as an activity during my IB. My own pots were nothing to write home about but it left me with a strong appreciation of work that goes into them.
I like my object d'art to conform to the principles of the arts and craft movement, if not its aesthetic   This bowl certainly complies!

I can just imagine sitting listening to the radio, crocheting with that bowl holding my yarn, bliss!

Weekly web comic 1: OOTS

I've spent the last three days feverishly refreshing my browser desperate for an update.  Not about anything vitally important, you understand.  I'm not glued to the Pistorius bail hearing.
No my attention is caught by a web comic.

I've been reading Order of Stick since.... 2007?  Which sounds along time ago until you realise that the comic has existed in its current on-line form since 2003- it will be 10 years old this year!
You might have heard about the comic because of it's record-setting kickstarter fundraiser in 2012, which raised over a million dollars to fund reprints of the print editions of the comic book.  Despite it's wide spread fame and popularity I'm always amazed by how many people haven't heard of it.

The comic focuses on a role playing adventure party.  It's very funny.  More than that it's well written.  This week the writer and creator, Rich Burlew shocked his audience by revealing something he had been foreshadowing for years without most people having an inkling of what was going to happen.
And now I'm even more invested in it than usual- instead of checking it out for an update twice a week or so I'm doing it a couple of times an hour.   Sadly OOTS (as Order of the Stick is known to its fans) isn't updated on a regularly basis at the moment as Rich, known as "The Giant" to fans was in a serious accident last year and still recovering.  So there's nothing I can do but keep hitting the refresh until the next installment appears.

OOTS  isn't the only web comic I read devotedly- I've decided to run a series for a couple of months called weekly web comic to talk about my favourites!

Get down and tidy

So I'm really really rubbish at housework- not in a "I'm too incompetent to physically manage these tasks," sort of way, although the fact that I burnt myself cooking no less than FIVE times last week would attest otherwise.

No, I'm rubbish at it in a "really there are a thousand and one things I would like to do and the washing up isn't one of them."

This means my house is fairly messy.  It also means that I have a panic whenever anyone is coming to visit.  So I've been in a mad rush of procrastination and housework avoidance all day to get out of having to tidy before my outlaws arrive tonight.

One of the only ways I'm able to muster any kind of enthusiasm for cleaning is with musical accompaniment.  I have playlist on my ipod shuffle and I stand at the sink belting out songs, boogying my way through mopping up.
Here are my top two cleaning  songs:

This is The Ark with Hey Kwangoma! from their 2006 Album, State Of The Ark



They are an amazing swedish glam rock band that I have loved for a decade.  They sum up happy lovely dancing fun for me.  And my single days!  And Scandinavia.  The only downside about meeting my husband was leaving Scandinavia and staying in Blighty- I don't think I've stopped morning for Oslo yet.

Then it goes to Patrick Wolf



This song just makes me feel so powerful.  In fact the whole Lupercalia album is so incredible that I gave birth to my second child with it playing through my headphones.  The opening chords just give me a feeling of joy in my heart immediately.  I've seen him live more than once, but the best was at the Laugharne Festival with Patti Smith in 2007/8- a rock legend I had adored since a teenager, having an impromptu jam with Partick's violin- it was magical, and, through the magic of teh internets I can share it with you now!



So my advice is, if you can't muster any enthusiasm for chores, find some music that gets you going and use it as your spoonful of sugar to help the monotony of housework go down!

Marriage for all!

When I got married it was because my husband wanted to.

Sure I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him, still do, but I didn't think that I needed to be married to do that.  In fact I had a massive ambivalence to the whole institution, wrapped up as it is in the patriarchy, ownership and assertion of privilege over the week.
I wished. briefly, that there was a heterosexual civil partnership- devoid of the symbolism and the baggage of marriage.

Then we got married and it was, is, magical and wonderful.  The act of choosing to stand in front of all these people you love and care about and saying "this is it," is meaningful, not least because of all the baggage that comes with the idea.  The cultural expectations of marriage give a relationship legitimacy in the eyes of others- my husband and I had known each other less than a year when we got married, but as soon as we said "I do," no-one questioned our sincerity, our love.

So it seemed imminently sensible to want everyone to be able to get married and enjoy the benefits of indulging  a concept that comes with centuries of acceptance and expectations.  Civil partnerships don't have the baggage of the patriarchy its true, but they also didn't have the same social expectations and support.  It wasn't right that we should be relegating part of society to a less socially supported institution   My only criticisms of the new bill are that it doesn't go far enough.

Marriage should be for everyone in a relationship with a consenting adult.  There is no reason that groups shouldn't be able to get married and enjoy the legal and social benefits other than prejudice.  I hope in my lifetime to see marriage recognised for everyone, but I'm not holding my breath.
I also think that the religious exemptions for the CofE and Church in Wales are properly ridiculous.  But then so does the only vicar of my acquaintance...

Get treasure, try not to drown

That sums up the story behind the lovely little board game my husband brought me for Christmas   Sure I was expecting the Buffy Season 8 trade books, but this was a great surprise- only slightly spoiled by the fact that my dad told me the day before Christmas what it was!

Beloved husband brought me Forbidden Island for Christmas- he knew I enjoy playing co-operative board games like this and we'd played it before at the wonderful Chapter Arts board gaming sundays when we could wrangle a babysitter.  It's a beautiful little game, lovely art work and I love the fact that the box is in fact a beautiful tin, with a place for all the bits!  The fact that this was the first thing I thought when I tore open the wrapping paper told me that I am now starting to be a serious board gamer!

You generate the island randomly with some gorgeous tiles.  There are 8 tiles where you can collect treasure across the island and a heli-pad- then the island starts to flood.  Flooded tiles are flipped and if you draw ta flipped tile's card for a second time that tile is removed- it's sunk.  If the treasure squares flood before you have that bit of treasure you drown, if the heli-pad gets flooded it's game over- and the island sinks fast.

As far as game play goes, it's fast- you can play a full game with 2 people in 20 minutes, less with more players.  It's also very easy to pick up and play, taking only a moment to explain the game mechanic to new players.  The other thing I love about the game is that it's truly co-operative- there's no sabotage mechanic here, you either all get off the island, or all drown!  What's not to love!

The game can be purchased here via my amazon affiliate account Other reviews are available via boardgamegeek.com

Great expectations

The truth is that I've been really really depressed.
Somewhere in all the stress of beloved husband's finals and our relocation, Daughter two's refusal to sleep and events with my mil I fell down without noticing.  And because I hadn't noticed I couldn't start to get up.

I became someone I didn't like, I was grumpy, snappy.  Everything was too hard, everything made me sadder.  And I didn't even understand what was wrong.  Which in retrospect I should have done, because I've felt like it before- but before was before husband, before children- I had reasons to be sad then, but no excuse now.  That's how I felt.

Sometime before Christmas I realised that I was depressed- I was stupidly ridiculously depressed and felt ashamed- ashamed I hadn't noticed and had been so useless to my husband and children, ashamed that I had become depressed when I had no right to be.  Ashamed most of all that I hadn't even noticed how bad it got.

It was anxiety more than depression even, the constant worry about practical issues, and more than that, an existential crisis.  I had my 10 year highschool reunion last summer.  Before I hand I worried people would think I was wasting my life now, after I worried if I wasted my twenties!  I'm a sahm and I don't feel like I'm all that good at it-  I can't clean, I'm disorganised and as much as I love my girls the day in day out emotional pressure can be a little much at times.

So I got help- I went to my GP, started on some anti-d's that had worked the last time I felt this low.  And it is helping.

Then I looked at the reasons that I was unhappy- the biggest one was that I was lonely, so I started trying to be a better friend- I wrote to some people, I called some people.  And that really helped.  Now I have a little itty bit of a social life.

And that helped a lot- I started remembering the feeling of being myself.

But I was still beating myself up about existential stuff- wasting my life and education, not supporting my family enough, by staying at home.

Last week I had a phone date as part of my better friending exploits with one of the most together people I know- she is awesome and one of my all time favourite people, Michka.  This is her blog post about that conversation.

As I read it  late last night my first thought was that I'd had no idea how hard she was finding things and wanting to help her.  My second was that I actually gave her really good advice- really good advice that I  need to take myself.

I've spent the last week panicking that I'm some kind of failure who's not living up to their potential because I don't have a masters, or a PhD, or a professional career.  When I should have been focusing on my writing and my family, those are the things that really matter to me.

Sometimes I think the only thing you need to know to be truly happy is let go of what you think you ought to do.

Unhealthy at this size

Healthy at every size works on the basis that you can be healthy however much you weigh, whatever your BMI and fat percentage.
I firmly believe and agree with that idea.
I also think that I am not healthy at the size I am now.  For me this is not healthy.  I am 29  and I weigh about 6 stone more than would be a "healthy" BMI.
I have personal experience with disordered eating.  And healthy at every size and the wondrous bloggers of the HAES network, such as the worshipful Kate Harding at Shapely prose were the beginning of my journey back to healthy (and sane) 6 odd years ago now.
And now I have developed a pretty good relationship with food.  This is important to me because having grown up with one parent with a serious eating disorder (my father) I know just how terrible an impact this can have on children.  The last thing I want is for my children to grow up with food issues because my I have them.
So I've put in serious work, as the americans might say, on getting through those issues.  And it's paid off.  Which is great, but now I want to start to work on the other half of the equation, I want to get healthy.
It's not that I want to loose weight, I want to be able to run, as much as I can with the physical limitations of a dud ankle and a bad back.  I want to be strong and fit and show my girls that everyone can find pleasure in physical activity.

The reason I hated sport as a kid?
Well for one I wasn't that good at... for two I thought it was something for other people- generally the stupid kids were good at sport, and that was nice for them, but I was smart so I didn't need that.  I was such a condescending teenager!

I don't want my girls to think that way- I want them to take joy in movement.  At the moment it seems like they do- they both love dancing!

So I've been exercising, I'm starting light, with 30 minutes of wii fit every other day.  So I'll revisit this in a month or so- see how my excersise regime is working out!

Make a plan!

Part of my journey back to feeling healthy has been getting more organised.
You see its a bit of a vicious circle, you start of thinking that you've not got anything done today, so you're a failure, so why try to get anything done.  Ouroborross.   However the solution to feeling overwhelmed is to break the problem down into smaller tasks, right?  So I've started making a plan.

Now I have a list of tasks to do everyday- the list starts small and includes things that have to be done, as you start to accomplish more you can add more to the list.  I do mine in excel so that I can keep track and it looks nice, but a piece of paper will work just as well!

Doing it in excel has the advantage of enabling me to combine the to-do list with menu planning; we're on a post-christmas budget and the best way to cut my spending is to menu plan!  By keeping it in excel I can check back on what we've eaten over the previous weeks and ensure variety, use leftovers efficiently and save links to recipes I want to try.  

Having it all laid out in front of me makes it easy to think about other commitments and incorporate them into my menu planning too.  For example on Tuesdays me and my husband have a regularly board gaming club, which means we need something fast for dinner.

When you have two little children who go to bed right before supper-time "something fast" means cook in advance!  So tonight we're having a lovely pot roast!  Which I cooked yesterday and to make dinner time go even more smoothly I even prepared the side dishes in advance- they were on my to do list yesterday!

Absence makes the heart grow fonder?

At least I hope so; I'm back!

So it's been a little while since I posted, for a couple of reasons.
I've been feeling a bit down, which is never good.  I'm not really sure why I've felt down.  After a ridiculously stressful year things were just starting to turn the corner when I started feeling down.  And then it's been Christmas and new year and all kinds of busy things liek that.

Now, I'm starting to feel better.  I've struggled with depression for most of my life, and having the last couple of years off from it meant that I didn't really notice until I was swamped by it.

So I'm back and this week will be posting a bit about what I have been doing for the last couple of months and the exciting projects I'm working on now!