10 things I did this weekend

Hello sweet peas,

I hope you had a good weekend? I had a fantastic weekend full of lovely things and lovely people.

Graphic made with Canva

1. We went to London to stay with my mother and father in law.

2. I taught our baby niece three new words On Friday evening - tattoo, bum-bum and ping. Very random, eh?

Tattoo, because she was stroking my arm tattoos, looking puzzled. So I said 'tattoo' twice and she looked at me questioningly and said 'Ta-oooo?' Ah, sooo cute! She's 19 months and at that stage where she repeats everything. She's so quick to learn. She needed her nappy changed so I carried her from the kitchen to the living room at my mother and father in law's house and said 'Daddy's gonna change your bum-bum!' And she repeated bum-bum. Hahaha. Then we were playing a game with my hair bands. I've got some of those gentle hair ties (like these) in hot pink and I had one on each wrist and I showed her they were stretchy by pulling them and saying 'Ping!' so she came over and pinged them lots of times and said ping each time, then she took them off my wrists and put them on hers, saying 'Piiiiing!' in her cute little baby voice. Such a simple thing kept her occupied for ages. Consider me melted.

3. I went to a blogger event in London with TK Maxx on Saturday and had a lovely afternoon tea with sandwiches and mini desserts, and even champagne! I saw lots of lovely blogger ladies I already knew and met some new people too, which was really nice. We were split into two groups so we didn't get to gossip with the other group much but it was so nice to spend some time with each other and be asked for our opinion on fashion by a company who really care and want to get it right.

4. I got to spend time with these beauts!

The beautiful Caroline from Curvy Wordy in her stunning Anna Scholz dress

The gorgeous Georgina from She Might Be Loved rocking the Scarlett and Jo, as am I!

These were the only ladies I got photos with as the other group finished earlier and left before us. Damn, I missed my bye-bye cuddles. Next time. :)

5. This cheeky scamp jumped in when Caroline was taking photos of me. He was game for a laugh, and it made me giggle!

We also got papped by an over-enthusiastic tourist when we were in Soho Square park who (I think) thought we were famous as we were being photographed by the TK Maxx team, but he was a bit annoying so Caroline went and took photos of HIM. It was so funny!

6. I got drenched to the skin on the way home from the blogger event. Even my boots were full of rain water. I wouldn't like to guess how many times I turned the air blue on the walk back to James's parents' place! I haven't had that much of a soaking in a long time.

7. I watched Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, which was absolutely brilliant. I loved it, and may have shed the odd tear in a couple of places, sshhhh.

8. I had a cheeky vino without my bladder cramping up and throwing a hissy fit. Yay for small mercies. 

9. I had a looong Sunday lay in. Ahhhhh.

10. We popped to my aunt's quickly on the way home from London to see my dad, aunt, uncle, cousin and my other little niece, who's 9. So we had a weekend full of loveliness and have topped up the happiness bank to the brim.

The only thing I didn't do this weekend was one of the things I most wanted to, which was see the poppies at the Tower of London. I actually crossed over to the other side of the road to avoid the crowds, which were several people deep the whole way around the outside wall of the moat. The tube station at Tower Hill was like a scene from hell with wall to wall people and even a crushing crowd to get into the station as it was so busy. It's a wonder no one got injured. Note to self: don't attempt to see anything war related the weekend of Remembrance Sunday. ;)

What did you do this weekend?

When I go to stay with family I try to stay off social media as much as possible, so I came home and caught up with a gazillion emails and replied to all blog comments. Thanks for all the comments on my blog about New Look. It's become clear most plus size women have little or no options to shop in a physical store in their home town, whether here or abroad. It's really not good enough.

I have a few things to show you this week - some more winter tights, a lovely charm locket necklace, a dress from House of Fraser - but first I must get some shut eye!

Thanks for reading,
Leah xoxo

My weekend and septum piercing

Hello sweet peas.

I hope you had a good weekend? We went to Wiltshire to stay with friends for Halloween and had a lovely time. We came back feeling really refreshed and happy.

On the way to Wiltshire we stopped off at Petworth in West Sussex which is a beautiful town with lovely architecture, oodles of antique shops and pretty little shops the size of shoe boxes with very tempting window displays. We've driven through several times in the past and made time to stop this time and I'm glad we did.

Of course we had a quick look around the church grounds, but we were short for time as we wanted to arrive at our friends' before dark (the headlights from oncoming cars in the dark give me migraines - another issue Fibromyalgia has bestowed upon me!)

Petworth is a rich town with a rich history. It has that air of wealth about it, and you can't help but fall over an antiques shop or two on every corner. I counted about 8 in our hour long visit, but I've just read there are about 30 overall. Petworth House lies in the heart of Petworth and there's an imposing wall bordering the property which keeps the poor from the rich and looms large over the town.

1736 is one of the oldest legible gravestones I've seen.

On Saturday we went to Avebury stone circle, and I'll talk about that another day to keep this post brief. After Avebury we went into Swindon and I got my septum pierced, something I've been thinking about for the last couple of years.

I've already been asked to do a post relating to the process and the healing so I will do an initial post in about a week and a later follow up. It's a bit sore but it's not the worse piercing I've had. (I've retired a navel piercing, nose piercing and ear cartilage piercing and the belly button was probably the worst of all 3 in healing time.)

I've got a big horseshoe in it at the moment to allow for swelling but can change it for a smaller piece of jewellery in about a month.

What did you get up to over Halloween?

Thanks for reading.
Leah xoxo

Outfit August Round Up//Catch up

Hiya lovelies!

I've been a bit quiet for a couple of days but I'm back with an Outfit August round up post and a general catch up. I did 16 OA outfits in total - not as many as I'd hoped.

Which one is your fave? I really like the monochrome chevrons, the galaxy dress, the animal peplum, the checkerboard skirt and the duster jacket. The only one I really didn't like is in the 3rd collage down, the black maxi with the leopard print hat. It needed more somehow.

So, what have I been up to? Recovering from Plus North, mainly. I've been taking ages to get to sleep at night and sleeping well into the afternoon, which sucks as the hours of daylight we're getting are diminishing by the day and if anything I need to programme myself to get up earlier, not later.

On Friday I went to the Yours Clothing store opening day in Ashford, which was really good but very tiring. I met Katt for the first time and got to see loads of beautiful new things, as well as have a good ol' natter with the other customers in the long queue to pay. (I think everyone who went into the store bought something - the tills were inundated!) I've never met such a friendly bunch of people in a shop queue before. It was brilliant! I'll have a post dedicated to that coming up within the next few days with loads of photos and all the goss. I also picked up a new dress, my bad, post wearing that to follow. Beans on toast for 2 weeks for me, eep. :)

You know I said I was going to talk a bit more about my health with regards to Fibromyalgia and CFS/ME? Here we go...

The travel to and from Ashford was very tiring and left me in a lot of pain. I was really anxious to the point of almost having a panic attack (public transport isn't my favourite thing!) and I didn't stop sweating copiously and shaking from nerves until after I got home. When I got back to my local train station I was so fatigued I had to lean on a lamp post for support until my cab came as I couldn't balance on my own. When I got indoors I was in so much pain I was nearly in tears. I got straight into bed and fell asleep once I'd got as comfortable as I was going to get. Trying to sleep when you're in lots of pain is no fun, as I'm sure you all have experienced at some time or another.

I woke up about 90 minutes later with such a sore throat I could barely talk and massive cramps in my legs and back. I felt - to be frank - like hammered shit. I knew I would end up feeling terrible but I still went because I can't be a hermit all the time. But every time I do something - no matter how insignificant it would seem to a 'normal' person - I have to pay the price afterwards. I'll be feeling the effects of that little outing for days.

All I did was travel on a train, walk for about 15 mins from the station to the shop, do some shopping, sit in a cafe with Katt for a natter and came home again. I was out of the house for about 7 hours in all, so it's not even as long as a normal working day for most people. This for me is what I call a 'big day out' as I know the effects will last for days after the event. Every action is weighed up carefully. Is doing xyz worth the pain it will cause me?

It's not just that. I can feel my mind slowing down when I'm out in public. It's like I'm thinking through the mental equivalent of quicksand. I can't remember a lot of what went on at Plus North, and when I'm having conversations with people I lose my thread half way through a sentence and end up looking like a dumb arse. I can feel the speed I talk at slowing down as I desperately try to remember what the hell I was saying 3 words beforehand. Loud noises, bright lights, people rushing past me in a public place....it's all too much for a Fibromyalgia and CFS/ME brain so it shuts down to cope. I can't talk and walk at the same time, or do anything else for that matter. It's like I used to be a super-computer able to hold loads of data and do loads of tasks at the same time and now I'm a floppy disk. Most of the time I don't load. ;)

I second guess myself all the time. Have I met this person before and forgot about it? Have I said hello to this person already at Plus North? Will they think I'm a effing idiot if I introduce myself again? It isolates me. I hate it, so sometimes I stay quiet when I really don't want to.

Honestly, I leave the house about once a week on a good week, and most of the time it's with James, in the car. Every time I'm out of the house, especially if there are a lot of people about, it's total war on my senses. It's exhausting mentally and physically. I crave quiet and love being out in the countryside with only birds to listen to. I'm on my own all day on the weekdays and still need to stay up on my own for a couple of hours after James goes to bed to decompress from a few hours of talking to him.

Sometimes I need to do things to remind me how bad things are, because believe it or not I'm an optimist and I keep thinking I'm better off than I am, and then I beat myself up constantly for alllll the bad days I've been having lately. Sometimes I need to be reminded of my limitations. So, there's a silver lining in every cloud (or, as I nearly just typed there's a silver cloud in every lining. Ha!)

Wow, I feel better for getting that out. :D 

Thanks for reading!
Leah xoxo

A little catch up

Hi all.

I'd like to make an apology for the lack of err...content in the blog this last week or so. I didn't do a weekly photo post yesterday as I only took about 4 photos all week. So here's what I've been doing:

• Today I left the soap drawer of the washing machine open and flooded the kitchen. I used all but 2 of the towels in my possession to mop it up. Who knew that if you allow air into a washing machine the suds multiply by about 100?! It was like the jacuzzi/bubble bath interface from hell.

• I spent the weekend with my family in Kent. I wanted to go see my uncle as he had a heart attack about a month ago. Luckily, he's totally fine now but it has knocked his confidence in life for six. We spent 4 hours with him on Saturday and it was really lovely to see him and make sure he's doing OK. We stayed with my dad's sister for the weekend and it was really good. We caught up with that side of the family - my dad, my aunt, my cousins (and my cousin Martin's two kids). We watched a few films over the weekend and Martin lent me the first 4 Harry Potter books as I've never read them. (I was waiting for them all to be out before I did.) On Sunday we went to lunch with my brother, his girlfriend and her two lovely girls at their house. It was SO nice to catch up with everyone, it was just a shame that I didn't get to see any of my friends back home as time was so tight.

Little C is 7 and is as lovely as can be. I think this was only the 4th time I've met her and she's gradually got more cuddly and affectionate each time. The last two times we've seen her she sulked a tiny bit when I had to leave, bless her. I made up a bedtime story for her on Saturday night. My cousin, my dad and hubby were in the living room peeing themselves laughing at my tale of her being a princess living in a pink castle with a pink lake full of poisonous marshmallows (she hates marshmallows) and having Slipknot and One Direction play at the castle (she likes both bands.) Harry Styles was her slave. He had to brush and plait her hair and wash her feet. She had pet unicorns who farted fire (but shit glitter) and horses with love hearts on their bums. She loved it and I had loads of fun making it up.

• I have been feeling a little under the weather. I'm anaemic quite often and this is one of those times. I've just been round Tesco and it's been a struggle finding the breath for a slow amble around the aisles. I'm really tired, so tired that I'm actually sleeping well at night, which is rare for me. It doesn't actually make any difference, because I still feel wrung out. The last month has been very stressful for several reasons (especially because of the leak) and I really feel like I need a mini holiday to recover.

• I've been preparing for the horror/Halloween themed wedding we're going to this weekend. I'm going as Morticia and hubby is going as the Grim Reaper. Here's my wig.

What's new with you? Did you have a good weekend?