Yelly Writes

A look back on 2014

Yelly

For the last few weeks, I’ve been saying that I can’t wait for 2014 to end because it has been the worst year.  I take that all back.

While it has been a difficult year, after looking back, it has been a year filled with amazing things: I went home to Manila twice; with my Abba’s amazing recovery, I have seen what I believe is a miracle; I am so very thankful for the support of family and friends (especially the friends I have made here), because your faith, optimism and positivity (and the occasional “it’s okay to go and cry”) has buoyed us and carried us through the difficult months; and I even managed to get myself on TV (for a total of 2 nanoseconds!)!

I am thankful for all the lessons I learned in 2014.  Because while it has been challenging, I learned a lot about myself, my faith has grown, my Abba is much, much better, my family is stronger together and we know that we truly love each other and I have learned that I am made of sterner stuff after all.  I know that I am truly, truly blessed.

I can’t wait to find out what 2015 will bring! 🙂

Happy New Year everyone!  May you all be so very, very blessed! 🙂

P.S.  Here’s a quick-fire list of my blogging goals for 2014: blog more, bake more so I can blog more, cook more so I can blog more, take more photos and post them on the blog…yes, the goal is to blog more!!!

Yelly Snaps

The Art of the Brick

Yelly

Do you know how painful it is to step on a LEGO™ brick?  It’s painful.  No.  Actually, it’s very painful.  And I know.  Because I’ve done it.  So many times.  Of course this was during my childhood.

It’s funny how a small, plastic brick could transport you to worlds you’d never known, make you more creative than you had ever imagined you’d be and entertain you to no end.  For hours.  LEGO™ has never lost its magic for me.  Anything connected to it excites me, makes smile, makes me giggle.  Because it brings me back to the carefree days of my childhood.  If you think about it, LEGO™ was the most amazing toy, if you were fortunate enough to have a set.

Nathan Sawaya is a New York-based artist who creates three-dimensional sculptures made completely out of LEGO™ bricks.  He has a touring exhibition called The Art of the Brick featuring his most popular LEGO™ creations.  I had the good fortune to be able to go and see all his sculptures.  And it was amazing!

The Art of the Brick

The taking of photographs was highly encouraged so take photographs I did!  I can’t really say which one was my favourite although his 3D version of Gustav Klimt’s Der Küss is a forerunner!  I’ve posted all the photos that I have on my Pinterest board, so feel free to have a look-see!

Gustav Klimt's The Kiss by Nathan Sawaya

 

Yelly Writes

Challenging myself

Yelly

I’ve been telling myself that I need to blog more often, more regularly.  That I need to add more content to my blog.

I have this amazing knack of biting off more than I can chew on a regular basis because I have this (almost masochistic) need to push myself and stretch my boundaries.  There are days when I am exhilarated by the challenges I put myself through (I was probably a circus animal of some sort in a previous life because I seem to enjoy jumping through hoops of various heights and sizes); but there are days when I just get completely overwhelmed and I wonder why I started the whole exercise!  I usually bang my head of a figurative wall and ask myself what I was thinking!

But blogging is important to me, and I really miss blogging regularly (sometimes mindlessly, and let me tell you, my verbal diarrhea is sometimes not the most pleasant!).  I’ve been moaning that I haven’t been blogging much.  So, in the interest of developing my writing (an erstwhile goal), I am challenging myself to do BOTH Blogging 101 and Photo 101.  I wanted to join NaBloPoMo but I was afraid I’d miss the prompts!  I have, yet again, challenged myself to do the impossible.  A blog entry AND a photo post every day for a month!  Ha!  But, come to think of it, I already do Fat Mum Slim‘s photo a day challenge and manage to post a photo a day on Instagram most days.  This is just doing that, on a far bigger scale.  I spend so much time online anyway that I think it’s just spending a bit more time on my WordPress tab than being nosy on Facebook and reading posts on Twitter (also a “being nosy” exercise).

So here goes everything!

This month's challenge

Yelly Writes

And…they’re off!

Yelly

The dressings have come off today.  Well, I took them off today.  I took off the dressing and cleaned off the caked blood.

I won’t post a photo of the wound and the stitches because that would be slightly morbid and very macabre.  But the wound site looks good.  It looks like it’s healing well and there seems to be, knock on wood, no signs of infection.

And now I am going to attempt something I have no way of knowing whether or not I can accomplish: ironing and all the work that goes with it (getting the iron out of the cupboard is going to be a particular challenge!).

Yelly Writes

Day 6 of the hand

Yelly

I have stopped taking pain killers for the hand and although there is pain still, at least, the pain isn’t masked by pain killers now.  So in effect, it is now “real” pain.

I’m typing as normally as I can today to sort of acclimatise my hand to the kind of thing I’ll be subjecting it to soon.  I find that there is pain when I use my pinky, ring and index finger (so yes, mostly all my fingers!).  The pain is mostly in the area where the surgery was done.  It is my goal today to get an appointment with the doctor so the hand can be looked at and I can reassure myself that I won’t be doing it any damage by going back to work a week after the surgery.

One of the lovely ladies at work has very kindly (and in a way that only a mum can) told me to stay put for the entire time that I’ve been signed off because I mustn’t do my hand any undue damage.  I do realise though that I need to be patient with myself and that I need to give myself time to heal properly.

That being said, though, I am determined to go back to work this week.  Being left alone with just daytime TV and my thoughts can, sometimes, not be very good!

Yelly Writes

Cheer-me-upper

Yelly

I love flowers!  Every time I walk past a flower stall, I walk away with a smile.  Flowers are the best cheer me uppers ever.

I got flowers today from my colleagues at work.  I feel very appreciated and the flowers have cheered me up a lot.  I have been wandering around the flat like a lost soul with a thumping headache and a very sore, very painful hand.  Getting the flowers helped and am smiling again 🙂

Flowers from work

Yelly Writes

Recovering

Yelly

hurty hand

So now the healing begins.

I had the carpal tunnel decompression surgery yesterday.  I had the procedure done on my right hand over two years ago and it’s helped the symptoms on that hand.  I am hopeful that the symptoms on my left hand are helped by the surgery as well.

I am desperate to get my hand back up to working properly so I am attempting to use it as normally as I would have.  Everything is sore and movement is slow.  But I suppose that is to be expected!  I do get frustrated because I don’t remember my right hand being this sore when I had it done then!  I think what I keep forgetting is that the procedure was only done yesterday!  Duh!

My mantra today?  One day at a time and slowly but surely!

 

Yelly Eats

The (Chicken) Bucket List

Yelly

I have always, always loved chicken: fried, stewed, roasted, poached, steamed, sautéed, you name a cooking process, I’ll probably say go and do it and I’ll eat the chicken.  I’d even go as far as saying that I prefer chicken to any other meat.

My all-time favourite chicken dish, however, is Southern fried chicken.  I loved it so much that everytime I hear of a chicken place that claims to serve “proper” Southern fried chicken, I ask Alan if we can go and try it out.  Thankfully, Alan is almost always too happy to indulge this particular obsession.

So after a lot of thinking, Alan and I have come up with THE list.  It’s a list of chicken places that we have tried and places that we want to try, mostly because they serve chicken.

Presenting our chicken bucket list!

  1. Roost
  2. Spit and Roast
  3. Mother Clucker
  4. Bird
  5. Clock Jack
  6. Wishbone
  7. Red Dog
  8. Jubo
  9. On The Bab
  10. Stax
  11. Ruby Jean’s Diner
  12. Joe’s Southern Kitchen and Bar
  13. Chooks
  14. Meat Liquor
  15. Rita’s Bar and Dining
  16. Eat 17
  17. Jackson and Rye
  18. Clutch

So watch this space as I write through the (chicken) bucket list!

 

Yelly Eats

The Cake Book Challenge Paused

Yelly

I am pushing the pause button on the Cake Book Challenge and I’m going to be realistic.  I can’t cook through a book in the amount of time I originally said I would.

I still have 47 recipes to cook through.  And I will.  But only at a more realistic phase!

So it is with a lot of sadness that I step away from the Cake Book for a while.

Yelly Reads

Literary treat!

Yelly

I’ve had the most amazing Tuesday – no, work was stressful and harried, as usual.  The commute has and will always be a bit fraught.  But all the ickiness of the day fades away when I think about how I met one of my literary heroes today.  The encounter was fleeting but I have a photograph as a memento.

I’ve adored the All Souls’ Trilogy, this trio of books about a witch and a vampire, how they go against all odds to fight for their relationship.  There’s a bit of historical fiction, there’s a lot of talk about love and relationships, and there’s a lot of the supernatural.  But I loved the books.  I love how the stories unfolded and how all the things seemed to really come together and how all loose ends were tied up in the last of the three books.  I thought the writing was brilliant — and that brilliant writer is Deborah Harkness, an American history professor.  I love her books because the historical bits were believable and the fiction was weaved wonderfully with what was factual.  While the melding of fact and fiction was seamless, I thought it gave credit to the reader, I thought the stories didn’t take it for granted that the reader wouldn’t know which part was written for the story and which part was historical and helped set the scene for the story.

I’ve read the books several times now and I follow Deborah Harkness on Twitter.  Nothing a fan girl wouldn’t do hey?  I’m quite pleased to say that I’ve gone a bit further than that.  I’ve actually met one of my literary heroes!  She had a book signing event in Chelmsford and I really couldn’t let the opportunity pass me by.  I had to meet her!

It was quite nice waiting.  I eagerly got there 30 minutes before the event started and expected a huge queue because a lot of people said they were excited she was coming.  I was a bit disappointed that there wasn’t such a queue at the time – but on the flip side, I was second in line so I was a happy bunny.  It was also really nice to be able to chat to other people who enjoyed the books as much as I did!

When Deborah Harkness arrived, she said a cheery hello and told us she’d be right with us, that she just needed some peppermint tea.  It reminded me of how much Diana, the heroine of the trilogy, loved strong, almost greasy tea.  Always made me smile because I love strong Yorkshire tea over Earl Grey or English Breakfast.

When DH got settled, she chatted pleasantly to everyone who came and signed all the books that people brought to the table.  I cheekily asked for a photo and she said, “Of course!  By all means, this is why I’m here!”

Me and Deborah Harkness

She signed all my books and they will sit very proudly on my shelf!  I am a VERY happy fan girl!