The past few weeks haven't been the best for me, it seems like everything is going wrong! But I think it's important to remember there's still things to happy about.

1. It's getting noticeably lighter.

It feels like the winter solstice was forever ago but it finally seems like it is starting to get a bit lighter. Like most people I leave for work when it's dark and don't get home until it's properly dark again. It can get very depressing and I get quite frustrated that I spend all my daylight hours in an office. But I've noticed that it's no longer completely pitch black when I leave work.

Summer is creeping a bit closer every day!

2. Cadbury's hot chocolate.

I had forgotten how amazing this is with real milk. I've had a few mugs of this in the evening recently when it's been cold and miserable outside. I haven't had it for years and it always cheers me up. It's so much richer and creamier than the stuff you make with boiling water. A swirl of salted caramel added to it makes it even nicer ;)

3. Our cat.

Every morning when I get up she's waiting outside my door ready to come and get into bed with me for cuddles. I look forward to it every day.

She wasn't very well before Christmas and it made me so sad to see her looking so unhappy and ill. I'm so glad she seems to have recovered and is back to her old self.

4. My part time studying is going well.

I'm currently studying part time alongside working and it's been going well this week. I'm nearly halfway through the course. I'm actually ahead of schedule at the moment which is nice because it makes me feel like I have enough time to take things at the pace I need to. 

Going back to studying after a break is tricky, particularly as I've never studied this sort of material before. 

Now I need to keep the momentum going!

5. Cookie dough.

Over Christmas I made two batches of chocolate orange cookies and froze them ready for when I had a cookie craving. 

I was feeling a little low and craving something sweet so I dug these out of the freezer.

They were so so good and they were ready in 15 minutes. I'm glad I've still got the other batch ready for when I need another cookie hit...

Is there anything that has made you happy this week? It's always good to try and appreciate the little things!

Moving into our New House

Ok everyone I have an announcement to make: Jared and I have finally moved into our new house!

We finally moved in on the 28^th October and I hope you’ll forgive me for taking so long to write this post. As I’m sure you can imagine, it’s been pretty hectic and I haven’t had time to do anything other than work on the house. 

We celebrated our first night with a picnic on the floor because we were too tired to cook. It was a pretty sweet meal though, knowing all our hard work was worth it in the end. 

By the time this post goes live, we will be returning from a trip to Birmingham to collect Jared’s stuff from his parents house. This is our final phase of moving stuff and then we can finally consider ourselves settled.

So we spent a week moving our stuff very slowly each evening, one car load of stuff at a time. Eventually we only had the absolute essentials at my parents house. By Friday evening my room only had my bed and my empty wardrobe left it in. It looked like I had just moved in, rather than moved out.

That was the worst part as I felt all over the place and quite emotional about the huge change that was about to take place. I was desperate to just get on with it as I knew it would be fine once I actually moved. It finally dawned on me how a big a moment this was and how permanent this would be.

On Saturday Jared and I took our bed apart and reassembled it in our new room. My Dad very kindly helped up move my wardrobe and mattress and did all manner of small jobs like helping put up curtain poles and installing our new cooker (thank you Daddy, you're the best).

It was all going so swimmingly until we started to reassemble our TV. Jared’s sister very kindly gave us our TV for free just after we graduated last summer. She had bought it second hand at uni and then moved to a house where it wouldn’t fit. Although a 50 inch plasma looked ridiculous in my bedroom at my parents house, I can’t afford to turn down a free TV. It worked fine but the only downside was the stand that it came with. Not only was it ugly but it didn’t seem sturdy enough to hold the weight. But the previous owner had removed all the attachments you needed to fix an alternative.

On top of all of it’s other negatives, the stand was also a right faff to take apart and put together. After an hour of aggravating messing about, the TV was finally back on its stand in our new house. At which point there was an almighty crash as the TV fell off onto the glass stand which shattered into millions of tiny shards. To cap it all the TV landed on a leg from the stand and smashed the screen. Pretty disastrous all round.

It took us an hour to carefully pick up all the tiny pieces of glass and hoover the whole room. At which point we discovered that it wasn’t our fault that it happened. The metal bracket on the TV had physically sheared off, causing the TV to fall. So it was basically an accident waiting to happen and I’m mostly grateful it didn’t fall on anyone. 

My parents very kindly let us borrow their TV from their bedroom (after they had finished laughing), while we waited for our new one to arrive. As we didn't have a stand now that our old one was in a million pieces we had to improvise! 

The plus side is we now have a lovely new 4K 50 inch Samsung and it is so so nice *inserts heart eyed emoji*! Watching Blue Planet 2 on it is pretty out of this world compared to our old one.

Our spare room is still an absolute mess and will only get worse once we bring all of Jared's stuff back from Birmingham. But I'm just calling it a work in progress ;)

The best thing is that our cat Boo is now feeling settled and at home here. I love her being here as it reminds me of home and it's hard to feel stressed when a cat is asleep on your lap.

Actually living here feels very strange and although all of our stuff is here and we both feel comfortable, it doesn't yet feel like home. It feels like we're staying in a holiday cottage for a few weeks and then we'll be going back to my parents house. I guess that will change with time as we get used to it. 

If you have any tips for making a new place feel like home, let me know!

20 Reasons to be excited for Autumn

Like every blogger in the world I am super excited that Autumn is just round the corner now we're in September. Without wanting to sound like a dick, I liked Autumn before it was cool and all about chunky knitwear and berry toned lipsticks. 

It's been my favourite season since childhood and people used to tell me I was weird for liking it better than summer. I suspect it's because I've always associated it with going back to school and the fresh start that it brings.  Like the true goody two shoes I am I've always loved school and got excited about going back to learn new things.

In some ways Autumn is sad because it's the end of the summer, but to me I've always seen it as more than just pretty coloured leaves. It represents wiping the slate clean, ready for a fresh start to be born come spring. I also secretly love the stark barren landscape of Wiltshire in the winter. It has it's own unique beauty to it that is masked by all the growth of the summer. 

So because blogger cliches are cliches for a reason here is why I am excited for Autumn to arrive!

1. Layers. All the layers. You're not really that British unless you have got more than one jumper on. You can whip out your chunky jumpers. Your fine knit ones. The oversized sweatshirts. And the fun doesn't stop at jumpers, your extensive cosy scarf collection comes out of hiding. Time to wear all. of. it. 

2. Being able to wear ankle boots with every outfit. Doesn't matter what the outfit is, a sassy black ankle boot with a mid heel will instantly improve it. 

3. No more shaving your legs. Or painting your toenails for that matter. Your razors can gather dust because those babies are not seeing the sun again until mid June at best. Let's face it, it's way too much effort anyway. 

4. Picking blackberries and making the world's sexiest blackberry and apple crumble with enough custard for the crumble to do laps in.

5. Making homemade jam, or going pumpkin picking, or whatever other wholesome venture your heart desires that can only be done properly at this time of year. 

6. Feeling no guilt whatsoever about spending your evening snuggled up watching Harry Potter because there is zero point in doing anything productive when it's already dark and raining.

7. Your extensive blanket, candle and fairy light collection is finally dusted off and put to good use again. 

8. Baking gingerbread to make your house smell warm and cosy. And because baking is a million times more fun with a hot cup of tea and a soothing cooking programme on while you wait for it to come out of the oven. 

9. Getting up early, making yourself a flask of steaming hot chocolate and taking yourself for a walk in the crisp air. 

10. Knowing that every Friday brings you not only the weekend, but that little bit closer to Christmas and all of the magic that December holds. 

11. Forget PSL (gross) it's all about the Spiced Apple tea. If you've never tried this then you need to, it's the most warming and comforting thing ever.

12. Sitting inside on a Sunday with a good book, listening to the rain outside.

13. Making the incredibly difficult decision of which one of your 487895521 winter coats you're going to wear to work today. 

14. Your biggest, fluffiest dressing gown can become your favourite item of clothing again.

15. Treating yourself to a new, fluffy pair of slippers because a girl has got to have warm tootsies at all times. 

16. Shepherd's pie, lasagna, toad in the hole, roast potatoes, gravy... you can stick your fancy summer salads and get back to the old school hearty basics.

17. Halloween and Bonfire night are just around the corner.

18. It's no longer so hot and sweaty that showers are all you can stand. A good long soak in the bath after a long day is just what you need. Preferably with candles, a good book and your favourite bubble bath.

19. Putting your wellies and a coat on and getting out of the house for a good walk to clear your head. Even if it's raining. 

20. The magic of the first proper frost. The cool crisp air, the way everything is really still early in the morning. How the landscape seems so unfamiliar. 

Are you sad the summer is over? Or are you secretly like me and prefer the subtle charm of Autumn and Winter? Let me know what you're looking forward to!

Visiting Bath

One of my goals for the year was to take a day trip to explore Bath. While it isn't that far away from home for me it is a bit awkward to get to and takes a while to drive there, so I've never really bothered.

To celebrate our 4 year anniversary Jared and I caught the train to Bath for a day of exploring and eating.

First stop was to see the Roman Baths which is obviously the focus for most tourists who take a trip here. We weren't even there on a particularly busy weekend but it was packed and quite expensive to get into (like £15 per person!). I wouldn't mind but there was so many people I couldn't actually look at any of the artifacts and I kept getting separated from Jared by the sheer amount of people. 

That said it was really interesting and pretty incredible at how much of it has survived. I particularly enjoyed looking at the curses people had written on pieces of lead and then folded up and thrown into the spring, hoping the Goddess would bring the perpetrators to justice on their behalf. They were mostly complaints about petty crimes, such as someone stealing their cloak but its fascinating to see proof that human nature has changed very little since Roman times! 

Afterwards we went to look round Bath Abby which was pretty awe inspiring. Some of their stained glass windows were particularly interesting with one showing multiple different parts of Jesus' life. In addition the incredible ceiling with its fan patterns makes it well worth a look.

Lunch was the high point of the day and we really went to town to celebrate our anniversary with a full three course meal and multiple cocktails at Turtle Bay. One of the best things about living in Southampton was having a branch on our doorstep and I haven't been since I lived there. Turtle Bay please can we get one in Salisbury?!

Not going to lie it was a pretty extravagant meal but I adore their jerk glazed steak and I live for sweet potato fries <3

We had a look around some of Bath's lovely shops (hello Anthropologie) but I was very good and didn't buy anything so we wandered back to the station to catch the train home.

After all the food and day drinking we both fell asleep on the way home so we were lucky we didn't miss our stop to be honest! It was a lovely day out and a wonderful way to celebrate together. 

Hopefully we will be back soon!

Norway - An epic adventure

Following on from my last post on my experience of cruising I thought I would write a bit more about the places we actually went in Norway.

Norway only has a population of 5 million (that's less than the amount of people who live in London) and of those only 2% live in the Northern regions. I absolutely loved their laid back attitude and how welcoming they were to tourists. Every Norwegian we met told us how happy they were we had chosen to visit their country, and they're right. It’s absolutely incredible. The further North you go the more wild and mountainous the scenery gets. 

Ålesund was our first port of call and reminds me a lot of Prague. This is probably because most of it was burnt down in a disastrous fire in 1904 and then rebuilt in an Art Nouveau style. It’s a really pretty place with its pastel houses along the water. We climbed up to the view point by the observatory in order to look out over the city. There are over 400 steps (plus plenty of steep ramps) to the top and I had a really chesty cough so probably wasn't the best decision I've ever made but the view was worth it. There is a land train that you can take if you don’t fancy the climb which is run by a hilarious Aussie. My Mum, Grandma and 2 of my sisters opted for this and they also went on a bus tour round the city. 

Tromsø is commonly referred to as the Capital of the North but it’s really not that big by UK standards (68,000 people). The city is spread over both sides of the fjord connected by a large bridge that comes out by the Arctic Cathedral. The shopping here is pretty good and we picked up some nice souvenirs. The best part of our trip was it had just snowed and it was our first chance to properly wrap up and experience how people live in this part of the world despite weather conditions that would bring the UK to a halt within an hour. We walked over the bridge and back to have a look at the Arctic Cathedral and just generally have a bit of a wander about. As we were sailing away from Tromsø that evening we saw the best Aurora of the trip from the back of the ship which was an amazing sight. I’m so glad we managed to see them as there’s no guarantee with this kind of thing so we were very lucky. 

Honnigsvag is one of the most northern cities in the world, yet has a relatively mild climate due to the Gulf Stream. Lots of people visit here to see the North Cape but we booked a quad biking safari through the snow that took us up one of the mountains that overlooks the city (again only a few thousand people live here). This was excellent fun (despite some scary driving from my Grandma) and we got the chance to see the incredible scenery as we drove round the fjord and up the mountain. We also went through a 4km tunnel before stopping for a hot drink. We had such good weather for this as it was cold, but very clear and bright so the views were amazing. 

 

Alta was my favourite place we visited. We stayed two days here and packed in a lot of adventure activities. On our first day we went husky sledding, which was unbelievably cold (I thought my face was frozen solid) but so interesting. As fun as the dog sledding was, I almost enjoyed learning about it more. The guides explained to us how they train the dogs and the dynamics involved in dog racing. Our team of dogs took us on a trip through snowy woods and alongside the frozen Alta river. How I stayed on that sled I don't know as there's nothing to hold onto over rough terrain and the dogs are more powerful than you think.

That evening we went on an Aurora chasing trip but although we did see some they were weaker than we had seen from the ship previously. The Northern Lights are tricky to see and a lot of luck is involved, but as we had already seen some fantastic ones in Tromsø nobody was too disappointed. We spent most of the time stargazing and soaking in the enormity of the Arctic night sky. We were lucky in that it wasn't too cold (about -10) and we were quite sheltered from the wind as I don't think it would have been as enjoyable otherwise!

The following day we went Snowmobiling which was so exciting. I've never driven one before but they're very straight forward and no harder than a quad bike. After blasting round their snowy track (and managing to find some bits where we could let loose) we had a chance to look round the Igloo Hotel. The whole place is entirely made from snow and ice and we had a shot of Antifreeze from an ice glass. The whole place is pretty surreal and although you can see these sort of places on TV its nothing like seeing it in real life. If I ever go back to Norway I absolutely want to stay in one of these places as according to the owner it’s not that expensive with rooms starting from £240 including breakfast and dinner. They also have a chapel where people can get married and then stay in the bridal suite which had a bed made entirely from ice.

Kristiansund is an unusual city as its spread out over 4 islands all connected by various bridges and is Norways fifth largest town with around 80,000 people. We went to visit one of Norways Stave churches here combined with a road trip along the Atlantic Ocean Road which connects a whole string of small islands with roads and bridges draped along the coast like spaghetti. The Kvernes church seems small and unremarkable from the outside but inside a lot of the original features remain, with the whole inside painted and one of the biblical paintings from the 1600’s still remains. The pulpit was imported from the Netherlands by a wealthy local who also paid for all of the rest of the interior. A small detail I really liked was the pulpit was designed to feature the four evangelists and Jesus. However because it was built abroad they hadn’t factored in that it wouldn’t fit in the church without the wall obscuring one of the figures. So they took John off and moved him so that he now sits up on the wall overlooking the rest of the church. One of the local women who looks after the church performed some traditional songs for us which was so ethereal it made all the hairs on my neck stand up. When she stood up and said she was going to sing for us I was hoping it wouldn't be too cringey (you never know when people say they can sing) but it was one of the best moments of the whole trip.

Åndalsnes was made even more magical by when we arrived it started snowing. A LOT. It was like being in a Christmas card. Jared and I went on an excursion on our own to see another Stave Church. The Rødven Stave church (built around 1300) is smaller and less ornate but still had the original door which was tall and thin to keep the devil out but allow the angels to still come in. The Crucifix dates from medieval times which was pretty remarkable. Churches in Norway feature a ship, which signifies the journey from the cradle to the grave which I thought was really interesting. Some of the other people on the trip were saying that had seen similar things in Norfolk back in the UK. On our way back we made a stop at the Troll Wall which is the highest vertical cliff face in Europe. However the snow was so bad by this point we couldn't see a thing. This was to become a bit of an ongoing thing as after we returned we had an afternoon trip with the rest of my family on the Rauma railway. This starts at the top of the valley and then travelled all the way back down to Åndalsnes (quite the feat of engineering with the use of turning tunnels inside the mountains) crossing many bridges and waterfalls. So out of three attempts to see the Troll wall we didn't see it once! Not that it mattered because the rest of the journey was incredible. I felt like I was on the Hogwarts Express when they go home for Christmas as it was so snowy and magical. The Romaldasfjord is interesting as well because unlike most fjords it often freezes. This is due to the freshwater input from the river and the runoff from the mountains that surround it. The freshwater is less dense than the saltwater of the fjord so forms a layer on top. As freshwater freezes at higher temperatures than saltwater they often have a frozen layer of ice on the fjord which our guide tells us people skate on and race their snowmobiles. It was just starting to freeze over while were there, not sure if it froze enough for any of that though. 

Bergen was one of the ports I was most excited to visit. This is Norway's second biggest city with a population of around 280,000 people. It’s well known for how often it rains here (on average 200 days of the year) and it managed to be a combination of rain and sleet with a howling wind blowing it horizontally into our faces. Lovely. Jared and I went off to explore on our own here and went souvenir shopping in the historic Bryggen district. We also went and explored the local farmers market and the fish market. I was really impressed with this as its made of glass so you can look out across the harbour. You could choose your fish, watch it being cooked and then eat it in the restaurant. As much as we wanted to try it, everything in Norway is very pricey and main courses were around £35 each which was a bit out of our budget! The weather was so rubbish we didn’t go on the Funicular that takes you to a wonderful view point as we didn’t think we would be able to see anything but if we ever go back that will be on our to do list. 

Out of all the places we visited I think Alta was my favourite. I’d love to go back and do lots of winter activities with more dog sledding and snowmobiling. Maybe a longer stay there would mean lots more chances to see the Northern Lights which was the absolute highlight of the trip.