Hello! Here's a big, juicy update.

So... I haven’t blogged in absolutely forever, and I was going to write this big long post about why, and my feelings about blogging. Then I just realised that it was taking me ages to write because I didn’t really want to write it, because everyone and their insta-boyfriend has written a post about their feelings about blogging... so I thought I’d just talk about what I’ve been up to instead.

And so I knocked this post out in ten minutes while waiting for Matt to come and pick me up from work the other day, so I think we all learned something there.



Wedding planning
It’s a funny old thing, is wedding planning. It comes in fits and starts. We booked our venue back in February and set our date for May next year, then set about booking all the big things. And actually, that didn’t take too long. We have a photographer, a DJ, a caterer, a florist and the registrar is all pencilled in... basically, we’ve booked everything except for booze and clothes. Super excited for our naked, dry wedding. I have so many thoughts and observations about it that I want to share here, so I’m going to start putting my thoughts into some order and will get some posts out soon. Spreadsheets though. They’re fab.

House
We’ve been in our house for just over six months now! That’s another thing that comes in fits and starts. So we did lots at the start, then nothing for ages, and now we’re starting to do stuff again. Shelves have gone up, pictures have gone on the wall and we’ve finally swapped out the hideous yellow-brown curtains that came with the house for some lairy mustard-yellow chevron-print ones. And we bought an orange table for the garden! It’s orange! Oh, and this print, which I think is ace.



Cooking
I made a great tomato, chicken and chickpea curry which has made it firmly into our meal rotation. It’s full of flavour and somehow manages to be low in fat, so we’ve been eating it a lot. I’ll definitely post it here soon. I bought this cookbook, which everyone on my Insta seems to love, but haven’t made anything yet because as soon as it arrived we entered a spell of warm weather and I didn’t feel like curry. But I’ll be back to it soon, because curry is the best. I also made the excellent salad you see above for a Florette challenge, which involved rolling halloumi in Za’atar spice before frying it with DELICIOUS results. I combined it with a Jamie Oliver quinoa pouch for a super low-tech dinner. And still missed the deadline for the Florette challenge. Sorry, Florette.

Diet
I've talked a lot here about trying to be a bit healthier and lose a bit of weight with mixed results. This year I decided to embrace it, and went back to Weight Watchers in January. I've been trying not to be a dick about it on social media, so I set up a dedicated Instagram for it and tried not to talk about it anywhere else too much. I've lost just about two stone so far, and I do feel better for it. I will share a few of my favourite healthy recipes here too, but I promise they're delicious and don't taste like diet food, because I'm not into that.



Holidays
Last weekend I stayed in a big house in Abergavenny with all my mates, which was great, because we haven’t managed to get together this year (no weddings from that group as they’re pretty much all married, you see). The sun shone, the area was stunning, I finally had an excuse to make frozen wine slushies and we had a hot tub. Everything was perfect. We’re off to Spain in a couple of weeks for a much-needed week of lying down, drinking sangria and reading all the books. I AM EXCITED. We’ve also started planning our honeymoon, which is looking epic. We’re going away next September, so a few months after the wedding, but I’m up for that because I think it’ll give us something to look forward to during the wedding comedown. And then we’ll get back and I can start focusing on Christmas really early, and hopefully just stay cheerful until January! When everyone will need to stay out of my way, I imagine, because I’ll be in a terrible mood.

Tring
I am absolutely loving living in Tring. I have a favourite place to eat – which does brunch, fondue and gin – called Jack and Alice. I finally visited my local pub, the Robin Hood. I ate an excellent sweet potato recently at The Akeman. And I’m really enjoying living in a friendly, pretty town that’s coming up in the world. We’ve got a few new restaurants to try and a few new ones opening soon, plus there’s a ton of pubs I want to try out, too. It’s a very nice place. Everyone should move to Tring! You can join our pub quiz team!



Shopping
I went to a wedding this weekend, which was an excellent excuse for buying a new dress. I bought this one. And then this one for good measure. And nearly this one, too. I went big on the makeup and false eyelashes and felt really cute. I also discovered a revelation in the world of sandals – Crocs! But not Crocs as you know them... they do actual nice shoes, too. With decent arch support and everything. I got these ones in brown from Spartoo, and I’m basically living in them. I also got these ones. And I really want this yellow raincoat.

Instagram
I’m getting quite into the old ‘gram at the moment (and I promise never to call it 'the old 'gram' again), and trying to embrace that ‘micro-blogging’ thing that all the cool kids are talking about. If you don’t already, follow me over there and see what I’m rambling about on a day to day basis. Unless you don’t like that kind of thing, in which case you probably haven’t read down that far.

I think that pretty much covers it! But enough about me. What have YOU been up to?