What can I say… life really did get in the way. Summer was hectic, fitting work in and around days out with family and friends. I think we were working 4 day weeks and then going out for the other 3 days for a while there. Whew. Good fun but I really understand why so many mothers breathe a sigh of relief as soon as their kids go back to school.

Normally we’d get back to normal when the summer is over, but it didn’t happen like that this year. I ended up getting out in the garden whenever the weather was good, because I’ve been working towards clearing the overgrown parts so we could get a shed base down and to actually have a couple of sheds in the garden. Our house is full of all the stuff you’d normally put in a shed, so we had to push to clear the garden before the bad weather came along.

I’ve got back into Squidoo too, and I’ve started a lens called The Evolution of a Garden that documents the battle I’ve got on my hands. You’ll get to meet our cat Jasper if you take a look. He’s the white one, usually covered in dirt. In between the rain and the wind (and sometimes during it) we managed to get the shed base down. I’ve also dug a border and re-seeded part of the lawn before the winter sets in. All my efforts are being rewarded but I haven’t had as much time for writing as I’ve had before. Here’s part of the shed saga, set in the lashing rain, at The Evolution of a Garden Shed. You can see a theme establishing itself here, can’t you? The pages are doing well and getting a lot of interest, and it’s been a nice way to share what I’m doing.

Anyway it led me to think that this blog was originally all about my online freelance writing career. But really, it’s lately been focusing more on my online freelance writing LIFE. After all we all lead a whole life, don’t we? No matter how much we love to write, the writer in us is just one part of who we are. Just lately, I’ve also been a gardener, a cook (we’ve just bought a new slow cooker and it’s cooking liver, bacon and onions for tonight… yummy).

It also means fitting more into our days. At the moment, even though the shed base is down and the border is dug, we’re waiting for one long day of good weather (i.e. not wet or windy) so we can get outside and actually put one if not both of the sheds up. Yep, we’ve got them and they’re sitting in the hall in flat packs. At this rate we could be putting them up on Christmas Day. I’m not kidding.

Aside from that we’ve ordered 50 (yes, 50) small laurel bushes to go along one side of our garden to make it look more appealing. Long boring fences do not look appealing. So they are arriving sometime next month because November is the time to plant them in this country (we’re in the UK). I dread to think how we’ll manage to get them indoors if they come on a pallet (possible) because our front door opens onto the street and the hall, where we’d normally put them, is full of, er… sheds.

So there you have it – that’s where I’ve been, mostly digging in the garden and writing as per usual and going from day to day doing various other things as well. Sometimes it’s easier to fit everything in, and other times it’s tricky. The good thing is my De Quervain’s tendonitis (I was suffering with that back around May time) seems to have cleared up so that’s good. Just in time to dig holes for all that laurel!

Catch you again soon.

So what is this website? It’s called Graze and the company specialises in sending out boxes of nibbles you can enjoy at your desk while you’re working. I actually came across this website about a year ago but never did anything about it at the time. I wish I had – I joined a week ago and I’ve just had my second box of nibbles delivered today. So I thought I’d introduce you to it.

What kind of nibbles do you get?

Ah yes, the big question! You have more than a hundred to choose from and you can rate them all so you never get anything you wouldn’t at least be willing to try. So for example I went straight on there and binned almost all the nuts and the olives, ’cause they’re not my thing at all. There were a few things I’d be willing to try at least once though and so far there hasn’t been anything I haven’t liked. If I do try something and hate it all I have to do is to go online, log into my account and mark that item as binned. This means Graze won’t send me that item again.

So here are a few of the categories you can choose nibbles from:

* dips and dippers
* breads
* dried fruit and nut mixes
* seeds

There are several others but that should give you an idea of what to expect. The great thing is you never know what is going to be in your box until it turns up. You get four items in each box (the box fits right through your letterbox) and they’ll be different each time. You rate all the foods, binning the ones you hate, trying the ones you’re prepared to give a go, and liking or loving the rest. If you love something you’ll get it more regularly, so after a while you can receive more of your favourites.

I took a picture of my first box so you can see what I got. I had a honeycomb flapjack (it’s actually three small ones); Habas Tapas (basically chilli maize and beans; didn’t think I’d like it but I did!); Garden of England (dried baby strawberries, blackberries and apple slices – very tasty); and Fruit and Nutcase (hazelnuts, milk choc drops and jumbo raisins, probably my fave of the lot). I got that box last Friday and I have just a few Habas Tapas left.

So today I got box number two and I was so excited when I heard the postman arrive I left my slippers behind when I got up to grab the post. You can choose which day of the week you want to receive your box, and it’s up to you how many boxes you want and when. I’ve opted for one on Tuesdays and one on Fridays to get me through the whole week with healthy snacks. At £3.89 a box it’s not bad at all – that’s post free and you get your first and fifth ones free if you sign up with a special code. You can use my code to enjoy a free box to start you off too if you’re in the UK – use WKGGZ61D when you sign up. Alternatively you can use my partner’s code – 6L6W54V. They say this is a limited offer so I don’t know how long it will last.

Today’s box contents!

Back to today’s box. This was a good one. I got:

* deli topped focaccia (fresh baked, with cheddar, red onion and chutney – I’m actually about to have that with my cup of tea!)
* tropical sundae (dried mango, pineapple and banana)
* natural vanilla seeds (vanilla flavoured pumpkin and sunflower seeds)
* bonnie wee oatbakes (wholegrain oatbakes with caramelised onion marmalade)

I took a pic on my phone so you can see it here. Doesn’t it look lovely? I love the fact you get these healthy nibbles delivered to your door and you never know what you’re going to get. There are about seventy different snacks I’ve voted to try on their site, most of which I think I’ll like, so this is a great way to eat more healthily and not to feel guilty for snacking either.

This is part of turning over a new leaf which has led to my partner and I setting strict working hours through the week too. We’re getting up at 7am, going for a walk, coming back for breakfast and then starting our own work at 8am. Then client work begins from 9am til 1pm when we have lunch. Then the afternoon runs from 2pm til 6pm. It’s working wonderfully so far. I’ve noticed I have better concentration, although whether that’s down to healthy snacking when hungry, morning walks or time away from the computer I’m not sure.

Anyway if you are in the UK and you want to give Graze a try, go to Graze and enter either of these codes (WKGGZ61D or 6L6W54V) to get your first box free. You should get your fifth one free too if you decide to carry on with it. When you join I get a pound to knock off the cost of one of my boxes, or I can donate it to the Graze School of Farming, so everyone wins.

Right – time to eat the focaccia. Cheers!

Having been for two physio appointments and been given two sets of exercises to do, I’ve managed to vastly reduce the painful symptoms I’d been having. Writing doesn’t seem to affect it, but I guess overuse will always be a problem. I have to stretch the muscles in my hand (I have De Quervain’s tendonitis, otherwise known as washer woman’s thumb, which made my partner laugh – can’t think why), so I get back the proper degree of use in my thumb.

It’s been interesting, with regular cold compresses, stretching, strengthening and so on, but I’m getting there. A while back I couldn’t have slept without wearing a thumb brace because it would wake me up at night if I happened to bend it or roll on it. Now I can do without it unless I’ve been doing a lot to warrant wearing it. Like for example six weeks or so ago we decided to take ten days off work to redecorate the bedroom top to bottom. So between clearing out the room, moving furniture, decorating, making new furniture and getting the room finished, I really put my thumb through its paces. It did ache and it felt uncomfortable at times but it didn’t set me back anywhere near as much as I thought it would.

So if you’ve got washer woman’s thumb (regardless of how much washing you’ve been doing…) don’t give up. Do the physio, persevere with the exercises and you might be surprised how much improvement you see over time. Patience, as I learned, really can be a virtue.

Now Saturdays used to be work days there as far as my writing career was concerned. But where we’ve had every Saturday off from the shop since January, I’ve actually gotten to the stage where I was able to fit all my work into the five days so I could have a two day weekend. I’ve got loads done around the house and had a clear out to the extent you wouldn’t believe.

Now the coccyx healing is almost complete we’re headed back to the shop this coming Saturday. But I have decided to stick to my usual five days a week working routine as far as clients are concerned. And the Saturday? That will be my day for focusing on my writing work. It could be PLR packs for our PLR website. It could be writing and scheduling blog posts for this and my professional blog. It could also be writing and developing books for the Kindle, another passion of mine I intend to focus on more readily.

Whatever I decide to do (and it could change from week to week) it will be good to have one dedicated day for my own writing projects. I actually find it easier to focus on one whole day rather than trying to slot in smaller jobs on a regular basis throughout the week. Invariably my own jobs get pushed into the background instead of being added into the mix. More often than not I get to the end of the day having completed all my client work, while my own work hasn’t got done. I suspect a lot of writers suffer this same problem.

Anyway I’ll let you know how I get on with this new approach in a couple of weeks – after I take some well earned time off. We’ve got lots of things to do around the home – decorating and the like – so we’re taking an extended break to get it all done. Paint pots here we come!

While it felt odd spending the entire weekend in the office, we weren’t working as such. This actually felt quite refreshing and since we never get time to do any tidying during the week, it made sense to get stuck in at the weekend instead.

The upshot of all this is that the office feels (and looks) a lot better and more pleasant to work in than it did previously. We are rather challenged in our office since we have an eBay business as well, and that creates its own ‘stuff’ to store away.

I must admit our office is a real mish mash of.. well, I was going to say styles, but I don’t think I could honestly use the word style to describe what we have. When we moved in to start our business we made do with what we had in terms of furniture. We got two huge bits of MDF and laid them across several pieces of old bedroom furniture – a dressing table, a couple of bedside tables and a chest of drawers. Luckily they were all the same level otherwise I’d be trying to type this on a sliding computer.

The idea was only ever to make do for a while, but it’s around five years now! The success of our business (writing, eBaying, etc) has meant we haven’t had the time or the inclination to do anything about it. Having said that we’re now making small steps towards a total office revamp. We’ve got some more tidying and clearing out to do and then we have to think of temporarily relocating onto laptops to work while we clear out the whole office, get rid of all the old furniture and redecorate. Might be a question of going back to working at the dining room table again, like we did when the roof was being done.

It did get me to thinking how very few of us have the exact office we’d like though. What kind of office space do you have for your writing?