Lockdown Diaries | Our Time at Home

Happy Saturday!

I hope you've all had a good week. We've loved spending some more time outdoors in our little garden, enjoying this beautiful weather!

As I'm returning back to work on Monday, my time in lockdown is coming to an end. I wanted to write a short post, a bit about what we've got up to in this time and then what I might take away from this time at home. This is mainly to help me remember this strange time at home, so it might be a bit of a ramble of my thoughts! I'm looking forward to reflecting back on this time in years to come.

It's felt like a very strange time, but James and I are so blessed to have each other in our own home. It's been sad not being able to see our friends and family, as I'm sure everyone will be relating to, especially as the weather has got nicer! However we've got lots of dreams of having people over for fire pits and going on adventures with the people we love.

Lockdown began just before Easter. We started to see rainbows appear in windows around where we live, and we started getting some ideas together to fill our time - it turns out that wasn't a problem! In the first week I managed to get some scrapbooking done, and we started out on our journey with zoom, who we've now ended up doing very regularly! It's SO good that we have technology to keep in touch with friends and family, but we've certainly experienced tiredness from looking at the screens too much, we've learnt to make a balance. I started crocheting bunting triangles, a project I've still yet to finish, and we planted sweet pea seeds, which are now starting to add some green into our little courtyard!

James' birthday was a special one, again very strange not to be celebrating with all our friends and family! But we had a lovely day spent at home together. We've enjoyed doorstop visitors, LOTS of baking and watching the birds visit our feeders. We watched films and did facemarks, and enjoyed cosy evenings in.

James and the team have done HUGE amounts of work to keep church up and going from home, so weekly recording sessions have become part of our routine! A new experience which has worked so well, but we all I'm sure look forward to the day when we can stand and worship together.

We've enjoyed tidying up both our front and back gardens, especially after a big issue with a blocked drain - I won't go into detail! Easter involved more baking and crafting, and delivering door step goodies to our pals on Easter Morning. We've enjoyed two taskmaster series with friends, hilarious creations and those who know me well will know that things were bound to get competitive! We've redecorated our bathroom, and are so happy with the result! I've learnt how to use an electric sander, a jigsaw and a drill, the drill particularly a hilarious experience. We've also added a reclaimed scaffold shelf to our bedroom for some gorgeous prints, and replaced our small chest of drawers to a much larger one, now we don't have to keep our socks in boxes under the bed!!

I made scones for VE Day and we enjoyed our first of many BBQs on our little fire pit. I can't wait to have more people round that fire with us in the future!

We've enjoyed serving church as much as we can in this time, both through worship and love your neighbour. I'll miss my Friday shopping trips to buy 13 loaves of bread! It's been great to catch up with people who actually I might not normally be in contact with if we were at church as normal!

We've loved morning exercise over zoom, which initially stared as yoga but then we got the troops in and now we're joining Joe Wicks' P.E mornings - these are HARD.

I've enjoyed prioritising time to read the bible, and to properly read it and start asking more questions. I hope going forwards I can still make this a priority. I'm with a small group of girls who follow Kings Cross Church's pattern structures, and this has been so lovely to talk and be accountable to each other in our daily and weekly patterns.

We've also loved doing the marriage course each week, we've learnt so much through each session, and it has helped start conversations that we might not have so easily been having. This is for EVERY marriage or long term relationship, we've only been married for about 9 months, and we have loved it. I'd so recommend giving it a go, please ask if you're interested for details! James and I are both very homey people. We love being in our own safe space with each other, so although this time has been hard, it's been lovely to spend quality time with each other, where normally work can get in the way of that.

The best thing I've found about lockdown is the slowness, although looking back I can't believe how much time has passed! I'm really hoping that as I got back to work, I can value the slowness of each day that I have been experiencing. It's so easy for life to get so busy with commitments, and trying to get as much into the day as possible. I'm really hoping that life will continue to move at a slower pace, and if it doesn't, it's going to be a priority to adjust this, so we don't become tired, and we can recognise the joys in the small things around us. This is such a strange time, and I know I'll remember the blessings amongst the fear and anxiety that surround us.

How has your lockdown been? Are there things you have learnt?

Here's to a much slower life moving forward!

Thank you for reading,

Emily xx