As this busy bee makes himself busy on the sunflower in my garden, something has shifted, and I’m not sure I like it. The weather is no longer summer sandal weather. No longer can we enjoy sitting dining al fresco of an evening. There is a shift in the air, and with this change comes, for me at least, a whole load of apprehension about what the autumn months are going to bring us…In terms of the virus, the challenges of my job, our health, our families, the economy… We’re all already tired, being stoic, carrying on, digging deep into our “resolve”.
I am trying to be positive, to look after myself. Unfortunately I have a migraine this weekend, for the second weekend in a row. It feels like the stress builds up during the week and then comes out at the weekend, bang on cue on Saturday morning, to ruin my weekend. Even on a long bank holiday weekend when it should be all about relaxation and fun 🙁.
So, what am I going to do about this? Apart from take some tablets, keep calm, carry on, and hopefully come out the other side smiling?
1 The great capsule wardrobe project
About a year ago now, faced with my groaning, fit to burst wardrobes but still nothing to wear syndrome, I started researching and trying to implement a capsule wardrobe for myself. I have had varying degrees of success with this. My best effort was 50 items of clothing including shoes and coats in my everyday wear. I managed this in my Spring 2020 capsule. It’s so much easier to put outfits together when you have less stuff, and I really like my clothes more when I have less of them in front of me, when I can see the wood for the trees (or the skirts from the trousers), strange but true!
I started off yesterday morning pretty excited about putting away the summer stuff and moving on to put together my autumn capsule. I’m inspired by a red theme this season, together with neutrals of beige, camel and grey that I’ve introduced more of into my wardrobe since I started the whole capsule thing. My inspiration for autumn is something like this. I really like this combination of colours and I always feel positive and strong when I wear red. I’m very pale skinned so I find wearing any kind of bright colour gives me a lift. I’ve just realised the capsule wardrobe inspiration I linked and am basing mine loosely around is dated 2012! I must be well out of fashion as to me the styles look pretty up to date rather than 8 years old. Red will probably not be in fashion at all this year, but I’m not really worried about that. Whatever. I’m just doing my own thing. So there! I’ll start my own trend.
2 Yoga.
I’m trying to do more yoga. Yoga centres me and helps my body and mind. I’m doing Zoom classes from my friend Sue, and in between those I’m doing “Yoga with Adriene” on You Tube. She has lots of great free classes of varying different lengths. Earlier today I did a 13 minute meditation class of hers. I felt hopeless as stupid work issues kept popping into my head whilst doing it. I tried to push them away and focus on my breath. I got annoyed with myself for “failing” to meditate properly, but actually about 10 minutes afterwards when I was cooking the lunch, I realised my head felt a bit lighter and the migraine eased a bit, so maybe it did help after all. I will do another 20 minutes yoga in a minute I think, while the pork is roasting. My purple yoga mat and cushion are all set up and waiting for me…
3. The great outdoors. I really want to keep the strong connection to nature I built up during lockdown as I felt that really helped me. I am sad that the hanging baskets and summer flowers are going over now, the new patio furniture being packed away. But then again there are acorns and conkers and the beginning signs of all sorts of exciting autumn stuff. And actually, in my garden, there are still quite a lot of beautiful end of summer flowers. I went on a tour earlier…
No one’s told this sunflower it’s a bit of a sad weekend…!
There’s still a lovely lot of bright colour from the summer plants.
There are still tomatoes to eat
And rhubarb, although I’ve picked a lot recently for other people..sharing the love.
This hydrangea is just starting to bloom
The sedum comes into its own in autumn.. just starting to turn into its deep red colour.
These berries are nice, more red! Proper new season pic this one.
So I hope you’re all doing well and having a nice weekend. If you’re struggling a bit (like me), you’re not alone. We’re out in nature again tomorrow at Claremont Landscape Garden, National Trust, in Esher. Looking forward to a hot chocolate and snack from the café and to see what nature’s up to over there. Toodle pip! X
The Windsor Waffle 