Wednesday 31 August 2016

The Great British Bake-Off

This show is the only show that makes me want to actually get in the kitchen. To get in the kitchen and bake bake bake until I'm laying on the floor filled with all the beautiful baked cake and biscuits I've made.





















It makes me want to put delicate detail with icing on biscuits and make thick, sweet cream cheese icing to eat out of the bowl no wait I meant, to cover that cake I baked.





















I gasp when they drop trays filled with the biscuits they actually need to use, I can't help but laugh when they cry about it, if it was me I would cry to. "I JUST DROPPED CAKE"






















The Great British Bake-Off is one TV show and maybe the only one that I get excited about watching every year and it makes me want to rob the biscuit isle in the local shop.

Damn you Viennese Swirls! I'm hungry!


These bakes pictured are all made by me.

Where did I begin? Why do I write? When did it start to matter?

My first story was written in 2002, I was ten and I actually remember it slightly. The setting was something similar to a certain coffee shop, who am I kidding the description  was of the much loved F.R.I.E.N.D.S coffee shop Central Perk just under a different name.

My main character met a man  (like all great stories) I don't remember if they fell in love but my main character had a twin sister who died and that man had something to do with it. WHAT! WHAT? I was ten? I'll have to get my mum to look through some of my stuff I left I'm going to want to read that. I hope my writing has progressed in 14 years.

That was my first memory of writing  than I can remember and I've enjoyed it since, for so long it was just personal, jotting in diaries, creating characters and worlds I had no intention of sharing with anyone.

Writing was always my escape or a form of self healing I used to get things off my mind, I would give characters my problems, my thoughts to ease them off myself. It helped and I even sometimes solved my own problems getting a character through them. Trust me I'm not crazy it's just how I learned to cope through life situations.

I don't use my writing for those reasons anymore as I got older I started having problems that weren't novel worthy because everyone was going through the exact same thing, I wanted to give characters some great obstacle they needed to conquer within themselves and for a lesson to be learned at the end of it all. So the problem like forgetting the toilet paper when shopping or I've put the coco pops in the fridge and the milk is in the cupboard isn't something I'd use unless I was writing my auto-biography.

Writing in the beginning started as a way of escape, creating worlds to disappear into, creating situations and dilemmas so I wouldn't have to deal with my own. It helped me escape my reality to put myself into someone else. That ended when I was 19 when I had just finished my first big story. I was giving characters for the first time their own crap to deal with. All I gave them was life and a world to exist in along with characteristics I saw in those people around me.

I write because I have something to say, because I want to write words that other people might just connect with. I write because I want to touch others with the written word, that sounds super cheesy but I have to be honest and it's true. I want to write the truth. There's just one problem.

Up until 2 years ago I didn't let anyone read my writing well apart from two people so far, although so far I've had good feedback the thought of letting people read my words scares me. That's also one reason I've started posting on here again.

I put everything on paper, I pour myself out between the lines, it's personal even when it's fiction it's all me, so it's daunting to allow people in on it. People who will love it, hate it or critic so much you might as well shred the entire thing and go hide.

There's something I've read 'If there's a story you want to read but haven't read it yet, you write it'.

That's what I'm doing I'm writing the story I've wanted to read, whether anyone would like to read it that's the question. We'll see. I don't want to get to a point in my life where I have all these words written whether they're bad or good and not give them a chance.

Writing has changed my life and this might sound a bit big headed but why should I deny those words that have done so much for me a chance to change someone else's.

Tuesday 30 August 2016

My Weight-loss Journey!

Around 5 weeks after the birth of Robyn I decided I needed to take back my life, not let it be controlled by junk food and all over negativity about my self confident so Nick and I scrapped all junk/processed food from the cupboards and fridge freezer to start a fresh. I started to plan our meals for the week ahead so we knew what we'd have to buy when we went shopping that also allowed us to only buy what we needed.

Our shopping basket now always looks something like this, so many healthy choices, everything we needed.





















We have been doing this now for roughly 8/9 weeks eating this way, cooking fresh homemade yummy healthy meals that all aid in weight loss and along with workouts and walking long distances it has helps, since the birth of Robyn I have lost 3 stone and 2 pounds. But it has not been pretty. The sweat the actual tears yes sometimes you have to push and push until you can't go any further and you do that because you know that weight will not shift itself.



              








I have had set backs and injuries and even had a week where I've gained instead of lost but I haven't given up and that's the most important thing ever for me not to give up. Not to quit when in the big picture I have come so far and already lost more weight that I'd thought I would. When I started I didn't imagine I would be this far so at this point giving up in not even an option.

I never want to be at that place again where I was always miserable and depressed, where I was actually telling people and myself that I hated myself and I hated my body, I never want my daughter to see me like that ever. I want to be a positive role model for our girls who will look up to me one day and I want them to see a strong confident woman they're proud to call their mother.

'I can I will I must'

I am still quite far away from my goal weight but it's there I see it on this journey I am on, it's there so I know I can do it. I am not short on inspiration and motivation so I believe I can do this for me and my family. For my future self to be happier and healthier.

What major changes did you make if you are on a similar journey?


    

Monday 29 August 2016

Longhand vs Shorthand

If the words are in front of me I can write shorthand for hours, all day in fact before I start editing and realising I've long-jumped over words I've skipped typing...Just me? Ok.

Writing in longhand helps me concentrate and what's in my head to write down just flows and when I write I can keep going for hours until those words run out. I'm then left being surprised by how much I've actually wrote, sometimes I couldn't tell you what I had wrote when I begun but the fact always is I wrote something and I wrote a lot.

I tried writing this on my phone but I got to 'if the words are in front of me' was typed out and I froze, my eyes were drawn to the time and the fact my two year old daughter had turned my phone on flight mode and the words are gone, the screen distracts me when written words already on the paper focuses me, my concentration is steel and can not be broken easily.


I've attempted and failed to sit facing a bright, very bright blank word document and tried to squeezed words out that are just not there. I've failed and even attempted again twice, three, four times even to see if it was just one of those days but no. I got up at my kitchen table with my pen and notepad and the words just reeled out of my pen, like I was the computer and the pen was my printer, printing my words through ink onto my notepad pages. It was so much easier.

75% of what I write may never get used at all but it was 75% more of what I wouldn't have written if I was staring in a blank box straining for words.

















Yes I get blisters  on my thumb from how I hold my pen and my neck aches from leaning the strange way I do and my coffee consumption caps out the daily recommendation but it get me writing the way I want to write.

For me longhand wins out over shorthand every single time. What do you prefer?

Sunday 28 August 2016

Places That Inspire Me Where I Live

Living in Cornwall had been a dream of mine since I was 15 and I arrived for the first time on the Great Western Railway train, I knew Cornwall would be my home one day and that one day happened 3 years ago and I haven't looked back.

Best decision ever made.

Being an artist and aspiring writer I knew I had my pick of places that were not short of inspiration, my first year here I volunteered at an art gallery in Penzance which inspired me to start writing again and gave my writing a twisted edge thanks to the exhibition that was being shown at that time.

There are so many beaches and coastal paths that are so idyllic that you feel like you're walking through a scene of a movie or best selling novel. There was for me so much I was able to draw inspiration from and I do have a few favourites.

Levant

I walk down here a lot mainly because it's 5 minutes from my flat. From spring when it's clear this is my favourite spot to watch the sunset, they're never disappointing. I only take my phone down with me so I when I get ideas or I have something I want to write I use the voice recorder on my phone. Oh the looks I've had from people.




Marazion

I walk from Penzance to Marazion a lot it's a beautiful coastal walk along the waterfront, even with the beach packed you can definitely zone out and just look towards the Mount and your mind is at a place which is the perfect breeding ground for ideas to be created. For me anyway.


Pendeen Lighthouse

When you actually pass the lighthouse there are such beautiful cliffs you walk along and looking down into the ocean is so peaceful, I love looking into the sea I draw some much from it. I believe I should have been a mermaid or at least a shark. The coast around where I'm blessed enough to wake up next to is extremely beautiful everywhere I go it inspires me.


I wonder what places where you live gives you inspiration?

Saturday 27 August 2016

Guess Who's Back? Back Again. Shady's Back. NOPE it's just Zoe!

Wow, my last blog post was the 13th August 2015 and since then a whole lot has happened

In order:
  1.  I got pregnant and had another baby.
  2.  I got engaged.
There's been other events but those two maybe the most important and relevant ones to mention. So yes Nick and I found out in the September that I was pregnant for the second time and we were extremely happy and excited we had been hoping to get pregnant around that time to have another bubba, so it wasn't an unexpected surprise but a very welcomed one.

Mia who will be 2 in 15 days is happy to be big sister not at first as we had many tantrums and one incident that saw my phone screen smashed against the kitchen floor. Now she loves her and funnily enough I think she's forgiving me for bringing home 'another one'. Nick has come away from this unscathed he can do no wrong in her eyes the little daddy's girl.






















I gave birth to Robyn Rose Long in the 7th of May 2016. My waters broke on the Friday morning after convincing myself to final just sit down and watch Gnome and Juliet. (long story) Robyn arrived 7 minutes past 12 Saturday lunchtime. Labour was shit. That's all I have to say about that but it is all worth it when a little human you have made with the person you love is placed upon you and all that pain disappears, well only because you have become numb and have lost feeling in both butt cheeks.

It has been a year exactly since I lasted posted and I've been telling myself to get back on the blog wagon for months, I never gave myself time to write but now I'm in a better place personally and I have realised I can do everything during the day if I wanted to so that's what I'm doing. As there is 24 hours in a day so there's really no excuses for me now.

So yes I have got a lot more on my plate then before but I've got a pretty good routine now so I will definitely be more regular on here because it really did help last time.

X

Guess Who's Back? Back Again. Shady's Back. NOPE it's just Zoe!

Wow, my last blog post was the 13th August 2015 and since then a whole lot has happened

In order:
  1.  I got pregnant and had another baby.
  2.  I got engaged.
There's been other events but those two maybe the most important and relevant ones to mention. So yes Nick and I found out in the September that I was pregnant for the second time and we were extremely happy and excited we had been hoping to get pregnant around that time to have another bubba, so it wasn't an unexpected surprise but a very welcomed one.

Mia who will be 2 in 15 days is happy to be big sister not at first as we had many tantrums and one incident that saw my phone screen smashed against the kitchen floor. Now she loves her and funnily enough I think she's forgiving me for bringing home 'another one'. Nick has come away from this unscathed he can do no wrong in her eyes the little daddy's girl.






















I gave birth to Robyn Rose Long in the 7th of May 2016. My waters broke on the Friday morning after convincing myself to final just sit down and watch Gnome and Juliet. (long story) Robyn arrived 7 minutes past 12 Saturday lunchtime. Labour was shit. That's all I have to say about that but it is all worth it when a little human you have made with the person you love is placed upon you and all that pain disappears, well only because you have become numb and have lost feeling in both butt cheeks.

It has been a year exactly since I lasted posted and I've been telling myself to get back on the blog wagon for months, I never gave myself time to write but now I'm in a better place personally and I have realised I can do everything during the day if I wanted to so that's what I'm doing. As there is 24 hours in a day so there's really no excuses for me now.

So yes I have got a lot more on my plate then before but I've got a pretty good routine now so I will definitely be more regular on here because it really did help last time.

X