Showing posts with label hobbies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hobbies. Show all posts

Friday, 18 November 2011

Running App Review: Watching this Space!

I was going to write a review comparing the two running apps that appear to be favourite among me and my fellow runners and bloggers – Runtastic and RunKeeper.

Having already been using Runtastic for a while and have upgraded (and paid!!!!) to ProRuntastic, I downloaded the RunKeeper app and went to use it today. I went to settings and tried to set it to automatically update Twitter (as my Runtastic app already does) and it wouldn’t let me, I had to log into runkeeper.com through a web browser. Hrmph! Not a good sign as I could do this straight from the app on my phone with Runtastic. I start up my laptop and load up the site – I have forgotten the password I used so reset it. Fine, set up Twitter and save any changes I’ve made to settings, go back to phone. Doesn’t recognise the account because the password doesn’t match! Of course! I log in again on phone with the new password. It wont do anything now because of some error. I give up. I load up Runtastic and go for a run!

So far this probably isn’t a fair review as it is probably down to my incompetence rather than the app’s set up (though so far I am definitely finding Runtastic more user-friendly), so I will try to get to grips with RunKeeper – I will also pay for the ‘elite’ version or equivalent to the Pro account on Runtastic so that it is a fair comparison. The other thing I guess I will have to do is take a couple of runs without my iPod so I can make use of the audio features on both apps. Perhaps I’ll have to put an album to run to on my phone and see if the audio interrupts the music to give updates and encouragement etc.

Will play around with all the settings and will write a proper, fair review soon.

Sunday, 13 November 2011

Spiritual Pamper Fayre

I went along to a psychic fayre today. The Reiki Master that will be teaching me Reiki, Lorraine, was the organiser and told me about it.

The event involved a number of stalls selling jewellery, spiritual books, aloe vera products, scrummy looking cakes as well as, as you’d imagine, spiritual ‘practitioners’ offering Reiki treatments, aura photography, past life readings, Tarot readings, Ascended Master readings, mediumship, psychic art plus much  more. There were also a number of free workshops running throughout the day with an hour of mediumship as well.

It was nice to see it had attracted a lot of interest as the one I attended in Surrey was a bit of a let down – there were hardly any stalls and it was empty of visitors.

As I say, this was quite the opposite. That said, there wasn’t much on the stalls selling stuff that took my interest – except the scrummy looking cakes but I really wasn’t hungry. I would have liked to see more crystals on sale – in fact, I didn’t see any (think I was after them when I went to one in Surrey but they didn’t have any either). However, there was such a wide range of readings available which, for me, was my main interest in going anyway.

I would have loved to have gone to the past life reading but it was one of the more expensive sessions and was unsurprisingly very popular with lots of times booked up so I decided to go for an Ascended Masters reading. This isn’t something I had heard of before so was intrigued to see how it varied to Angel Readings and Tarot (Angel readings are what I do and I have had a Tarot reading numerous times in the past and have also read my own Tarot card in a workshop once). Afterwards, I felt it was not too dissimilar to a Tarot reading though perhaps with a slightly different focus, I can’t really explain. The practitioner,Pauline, did say that because she reads Tarot as well, this may have an influence over how she reads the Ascended Masters cards.

Anyway, on with the reading. I pulled out 8 cards one at a time which Pauline placed on the table in a sequence. She then turned them over in turn. The first one up – Angel Healing and she said “I get from this that you are a healer yourself or you should be”- well, if that wasn’t a sure sign that I am starting on the right path with my Reiki, I don’t know what is! The reading also said the path I was embarking on was the right one – there was a very positive and definitive ‘Yes’ card! DSCF5685

Another thing that came out from the reading was that I have an artistic talent and that I need to do more of whatever it was. She felt this was music but this is not something I’ve actively pursued. I really enjoy music but I think I’m a bit late to be becoming talented in anything to do with it. I have, however, been trying to do more drawing recently and wonder if this is it. I’m no expert, I’m not the next Van Gogh or Monet, I wouldn’t even call myself an artist, it is just something I enjoy doing and the end result mildly resembles what I intend it to look like (she also said I should speak of my strengths not play them down or highlight may faults…yeah, this is me trying to do that…one step at a time). As an example, here is my latest offering. Its the tree that lives on the green in front of our house – it looks lovely with the autumn sun shining on its yellow leaves – it inspired me to draw it!

The reading was so clear and the majority of it made immediate sense to me.The reading was meant to be half an hour but the cards were so clear that we were finished in 10 minutes so she asked me if I had a specific question and to choose 6 more cards.

With my thoughts being very much around work at the moment and whether I should be pushing myself harder to find a job and what that job should be, my next question was “should I get a job?”.

The cards were showing that, for now, I shouldn’t be looking for a job as I needed the time to really figure out what I wanted to do and to ‘find myself’. OK, she didn’t use such a cliché but that’s pretty much how I interpreted it. I needed to work on a few things with myself and to not stress about a job. When the time was right, I’d meet someone who would help me get the right job. She also said that, once I had made up my mind what I wanted to do and when the time was right for me to get a job, I should make sure I get a good work/life balance and that I shouldn’t fully adopt just one area of my life and let the others go by the wayside.

This was reassuring. I may have said before that when the time is right for me to do a particular ‘thing’ it kind of just falls in my lap. I’m very lucky that I don’t have to fight hard for it. Yes, I usually (not always) have to go through the hard task of an interview or interviews like everyone else, and they are often far from easy, but it will happen that the job almost seeks me out rather than me seek it out. I have also fought hard for things that weren’t right for me or didn’t come about. So, perhaps I haven’t been searching for a job as hard as I could have and I couldn’t help but wonder if I was being lazy by putting all my faith in fate. I am very lucky that I have this privilege and I appreciate that if circumstances were different I’d be taking whatever job I could get but I was reassured to hear this is the right approach for me. She said if I stress about it then it wont happen but if I relax and take my time it will all fall into place. This is so much like my life. Something I should remind myself of often.

She then did a third general reading of a further 6 cards which did more to enforce what had already been said with more of the ‘Yes’ card!

I did go to the hour’s mediumship too. There were 3 mediums that did a 20 minute session each. The second one came to me with a young boy who was in spirit world that went to my school and that I was close to who passed away young (when I questioned her on this she said between the age of 6 and 17) from a childhood illness. The only person I could relate this to was one of my best friend’s brother who died of Leukaemia when my friend and I were in the final year of Junior school (her brother was in senior school). I remember it well and it was terribly sad at the time but I can’t think of why he would be coming to me. Although I was close to my friend, I wasn’t close to her brother and I was at the age where I didn’t fully appreciate death and illness in the same way as we might do adults, unless you lose someone close to you.

Other than losing enthusiasm for my studies and that whatever I am doing this boy thinks it is the perfect thing for me I didn’t really get anything else from it. She finished with a name, Christopher or Chris, but didn’t say whether he was living or in spirit and didn’t give any further information about this.

The other thing that came to me was psychic smells. The third Medium was asking someone else if it meant anything to her. She asked her if she had started to notice unusual smells (which she calls psychic smells) like flowers and orange scent. This struck a chord with me because when I was running at the beginning of the week all of a sudden I’d smell a really strong smell which was completely strange for where I was – one of these occurrences was the strong smell of orange. It wasn’t quite the fruit but more like an orange scent or another flower with an orangey smell. There was no obvious source for this smell (I think I was running past a hotel carpark at the time) and it stayed with me for quite a while like it was following me. This isn’t the first time this has happened to me and I often smell scents which don’t make sense (pardon the pun) for what is happening around me – often they’ll be in my own home and will remain unexplained and will disappear as quickly as they arrived. When the lady she was talking to couldn’t understand it she asked the room so I raised my hand. She said when you start to open yourself spiritually your vibration becomes lighter enabling the spirits to try to ‘show off’ to you and this is one of the ways in which they do it. There have been a few strange things happening recently – more than normal – so this would make sense.

After the hour of mediumship I left the fayre to go and meet Stuart and Callum, who I had left exploring Moors Valley Country Park.

The event certainly left me with lots to ponder on.

Wednesday, 19 October 2011

Oops! Catch up!

So, found myself recently writing blog posts in my head and my laptop time just can't keep up with me!!! Thought it was about time to reconnect with this blog and to start posting again to get what's in my head, taking up valuable organisation and OCD space, out so I can get back to my organising and OCD!

So, the major update that overrules any other....WE HAVE MOVED!

Here we now are living in Bournemouth!

We are currently living in a nice little 2 bed cottage in between Bournemouth and Boscombe. Just renting at the moment but are already on the hunt for our next house to buy. We are 10 minutes from the beach (*does a little dance), about a 15 minute pushchair walk (times by 10 when the 3 year old decides he wants to walk/meander) or 5 minutes by the many frequent buses that drive past our house into Bournemouth centre – to where all the shops are, 25 minutes from my parents and brother & sister-in-law with their offspring, less than 20 minutes from my sister & brother-in-law with their offspring – that’s all on the upside. On the downside, we are further from my in-laws, our friends in The Ming and to get into London without taking out a loan to pay for it, requires months of forward planning (to go there and back in one day is just short of £100 unless you are lucky enough to get well in advance tickets or go up the day before!! but that's another blog post!). 

Anyway, here is a picture of our little house.DSCF5511

Looking back now, the actual move wasn’t too bad. It had its stressful moments and its not so stressful moments. Callum was a dream and was ready to move as soon as we said go – in fact he didn’t want to go back inside the house or especially inside his room on the last day for some fear he was going to be left there or something.

Following the move was a hell of a lot more stress – for me at least, think Stuart is still in awe of his 7 minute walk to work – if you haven’t heard about it, count yourselves as one of the few. Reading back at my previous post I said I generally look forward to change but am often disappointed later when things don’t go as well as I anticipate. Well, yeah, that! I had a hard time adjusting. I’ve gone from being full time employed around friends in an environment I feel comfortable, familiar, to being a full time mum trying to arrange utility bills, change addresses around trying to be a (bad) mum in an unfamiliar place a long way from my friends. It was tougher than I expected and by the time we went on holiday to Portugal a few weeks later, lets just say it was a holiday much needed.

I came back from Portugal a much more chilled person and, more importantly, so was Callum! I found I could get stuff/chores/phonecalls done without too much protest from Callum and could then start to really enjoy being with Callum and all that being a Stay At Home Mum (SAHM) entails.

So, for my other hopes for our life in Bournemouth, what have I achieved and what has already fallen by the weyside? Lets revisit them:

 

  • Stuart gets a better work-life balance so he gets to spend more quality time with Callum - maybe even do some father-son stuff together. Achieved – Stuart puts Callum to bed most nights and we have more quality time together at weekends, as a family, even if Stuart has to work some of it.
  • Stuart and I get to spend more couple time together so we can focus on our relationship again - feel like it has been put on the back burner for a couple of years now. Hmmm…next! Seriously, we’ve not got round to it yet. Being the time of year, my parents are being kept busy so I’ve not wanted to take advantage so early on (or later for that matter). We’ve not found any other form of babysitter yet. That said, we have taken advantage on more than a few occasions of our proximity to Bournemouth and the many restaurant’s it has to offer and have gone out for dinner as a family on a Friday/Saturday evening. As for just the two of us…yeah, we need to work on that!
  • Stuart and I can start going body-boarding properly rather than just an attempt when we go to Devon/Cornwall - I'll worry about fitting back into the wetsuit later... the closest I’ve got is to be sitting on the beach with Callum and an ice-cream while watching jealously as the surfers and bodyboards hit the waves! To be honest, there haven’t been ‘that’ many opportunities with the waves being pretty flat but when they’ve been there, there’s not a lot I can do about it! Not with Callum about! I even tried to find him his first wetsuit in the hope I could kinda take him with me but, not for at least another year. He is still far too skinny!
  • Callum will get to grow up near the sea and beach Yep! We are definitely taking full advantage of that. It has been lovely to just walk to the beach, even if it isn’t so sunny. However, we have been lucky in that we’ve been having unusually high temperatures in October! Yes, October! We actually spent a day on the beach, and even went in the sea (very very briefly…frrrrr) at the beginning of October! I can’t see us ever getting bored of it – I hope we don’t ever take it for granted!
  • I can start horseriding  I’ve made enquiries! At the moment, I just don’t have the time. I have Callum most days and when I don’t I am either running around the house like a blue-arsed fly (does anyone other than my mum use that expression?) trying to clean the house or I am studying still trying to complete my CIPD Certificate. The end is in sight for the studying though so hopefully, maybe, if money allows, I can pick this up. I’ve now got a few (hundred) other interests I’ve remembered that I want to get round to….lets try to name them! So there’s horseriding of course; drawing (chalks primarily); Reiki; drama (yes acting is still on the cards); body-boarding (as above); climbing; knitting (yes, I did just say knitting); jewellery making…I am sure there are more! Just when am I going to fit all of that into one lifetime, I don’t quite know???

    Going running along the beach Yes! Yes! Yes! I can definitely say I’ve achieved that one! About half a dozen times now or move ranging from 2.3 to 3.8 miles! Its not making much difference to my fitness or the amount I am eating/putting on weight but maybe….yeah…just maybe

    So, that will do for the moment! Hopefully this blog post provides an update of where we are today. I hope to keep posting to this now that I’ve got it up to date. Starting straight away with my next post “A Day Trip to London”.