What am I expecting from …

I know I am a little late with “new year post” but – it’s my blog and I write when I want to. Yes, you are supposed to sing it with Cindy’s voice!

Time is an odd thing. It flies and stands still – sometimes at once. This year seems to have lasted already forever, yet – it’s only June. How is it possible and can I change it somehow?

There has been so many things happening and nothing at all. I don’t have any big and life changing milestones, but since it’s been a while I make a short recap of things I remember and you can let me know in the comments if you like to read more about something. Deal?

Dream home

We have been living here full time for almost a year (at the end of June). We have learned to live with less and half off-grid. There aren’t many modern luxuries and we have been forced to be creative with everyday tasks.

We have struggled and failed and tried again until we got it working for us. We have grown a lot as a family and partners,  learning to communicate better and to compromise fairly. 

I have really enjoyed looking over and discovering our garden with the winter gone. Part of my daily morning routine is to walk around and check what new has popped up or where there are new blooms.

We built our own real greenhouse! I was ready to look at some cheap pop-up greenhouses – which now look like plastic tents compared to our wood frame greenhouse so I am happy I listened to my better half.

Adjusting to dream job

Another year’s milestone was with my new job, which also makes me wonder about time. Really ONLY a year (in March)?! Feels like I have been there forever and it feels surreal that I used to go to the office every day.

Since a big part of my new job is creating prototypes I got an opportunity to take a course in UX design and now am a Google certified UX designer. I loved seeing how everything is connected – although partly with other terms the core basis of UX design, marketing, project management, sales management is the same. Just with a different point of view.

One big lesson for me has been to focus on one task at a time and to break big ones into smaller pieces to tackle one by one. It’s odd compared to my previous work where everything needed to be done at once. No matter how complicated the tasks were.

And the second – days off are really days off. No matter if it is a single holiday or a 2 week vacation. Resting and recharging is a huge priority as a part of maintaining mental health.

Blogging struggles

I have been battling with some personal and financial issues which led to almost losing my blog and all the content. Thanks to Vanessa I was able to recover it, but the process was draining and most of my energy was lost there.

One big obstacle I am still adjusting to is that I don’t have a laptop anymore. My previous work allowed me to use a work laptop for personal things also, so I didn’t find the need to buy a personal one for home. But managing blog content only with a phone is hard. I do also have a tablet, but it’s outdated so most apps (including WordPress) are not really working anymore or barely. So one of my next goals is to get a laptop.

I often find myself out of words. Even if I have an idea and blog post forming as a short movie in my head – I can’t find the words to describe it. And my daily routine is really off. Living here – there’s always something to do outside after work and after that I am too tired to do anything meaningful.

This month my blog will become 3 years old! Another example of how time flies. It’s not anywhere near what I imagined it would be by now. Then again for the last 1,5 year I really haven’t done much to achieve the goals I once had. Not even sure the goals are the same now.

At the moment I will be happy, if my new posts get a read or two. I will be happy with myself, if I manage to post at least once a month. Anything more I will count as a bonus. I have some time off so I would love to manage some content ahead, but no promises. To check in you can follow me on Twitter and Instagram for short updates of this adventure.

Gardening adventures

With finding our dream home I also found my desire to garden and grow my own veggies and stuff. I started with a few tomatoes and cucumbers and now I have widened my selection. Though not as much as I would like, but there is always next year.

This year it was challenging to pre-grow my tomatoes and paprikas due to lack of space and light, but I tried and at least for now they look OK. Hoping to get something also 🙂

I am anxious about the end of the summer. I hope to get a lot of crop but I haven’t really figured out the storage for them. I hope and fear. It would be an easily solved problem if I would have the funds, but I am still working through them so meantime I need to find a minimal cost creative solution how and where to keep them. Taking into account the local unfriendly climate where the storage should resist -30C and would be accessible with 50 cm of snow falling down.

At the moment I have a promising amount of garlic and onions growing. And during summer time hopefully some fresh green stuff to put in salads. Zucchini and pumpkin are growing strong and I found them a better place so I am able to cover them at the end of the summer. Last years fall colds came quickly and suddenly and took my pumpkin.

I hope it goes better this time. They got a bit cosier nook which should also protect them from the winds and other weather hazards.

Back to the topic

I have noticed my expectations have changed a lot during that  last year, or even the last few, but most dramatically last year. I don’t care about many things I valued before.

I don’t care about a fancy car or different gadget and features it has. I just want a car that is able to drive me from point A to point B.

I don’t care about clothes as much. I have never cared about the brand names and their reputation. I care how they feel on me and are they comfortable. I appreciate this even more now. I used to like to have options – several tops and pants and stuff, living in a minihouse type space I have learned to deal with less and it actually feels easier.

When I was younger I dreamt about fancy house and vacations driving around the world. My dream vacation now is being at home, sitting in my hammock and sipping coffee. My dream home now is small and smart practical space to cook and chill in. And maybe host some family gatherings.

My biggest dream at the moment is to get past and over with my past mistakes so I could finally focus more on the present day and maybe even on the future.

So what am I expecting? A break from life knocking us down with a new blow every time it feels like there’s finally a light in the tunnel and we are just a few steps apart. Just a break to catch a breath.