It is often said that parents are so excited by their first child and so scared to do anything wrong that they dedicate much time and energy to documenting the child’s growth and making sure they’re doing well. However, by the time the 2nd, 4th… 5th… 7th then 8th child comes along, you kinda just give up and let the kids do their thing.
Of course, I’m talking about plant-babies and not real ones *ehhem*. But yes I’m not quite sure how to continue documenting my avocado plants’ growth anymore. The first 4 were super exciting; I cared for them, I babied them, I loved them (for the most part).
But now I’ve stopped updating the post because they’re growing up too fast and there are just too darn many of them at the same time. I guess I’ll do a major update here then. Since we last checked on my avocado plants…
Avo1 has grown out of its pot, been re-planted outside and has grown a lot. I didn’t even realise its roots had grown so much until I turned it over and saw root spilling out the bottom. I’m glad I checked.
Are you having a bad day? In need of a little pick me up? Or just want to listen to something sweet? I randomly remembered 3 words of this song then found it on YouTube, and I’ve basically been listening to it on repeat this morning.
This song is soooo cute!!
It’s called “A Little Sweet” by Wang Sulong and it’s shot straight to the top of my Songs of the Month playlist. It’s just so cheerful and adorable, and so I really wanted to share it with you because no matter where we are we can all do with a little more joy in our lives.
Music has a way of affecting our moods dramatically, so while Taylor is still a treat to listen to, I’m a little over the summer blues and wistful nostalgia for now. My favourite Chinese artist, JJ Lin, also released some new songs recently so you’ll probably see more Chinese songs on the list this month!
Anyways, here are the lyrics in Simplified Chinese (you can find the Traditional lyrics in the video description as well as the video itself) and my translation. It’s in the format of a conversation between a couple so I’ve also added who’s singing, otherwise it won’t make as much sense:
Aside from some of the meals I’ve posted recipes for, we also had a lot of delicious home-made dishes that I did not post any recipes for. Recently we’ve been eating mostly salads and egg-white ‘tortillas’ for breakfast. Lest we forget that we have these in our roster, here are some of the dishes we’ve had in the past few months.
Breakfasts
Coconut milk yoghurt with berries & chia seeds. If I had flax seeds or hemp seeds at the time, I’d have added those too.
Goodness, where did July go? It feels like time is passing so quickly and yet slowly at the same time. So what happened in July with regards to my bullet journal? Well, it turns out I ended up using it much more than I had anticipated I would.
As I wrote in my July setup & August draft post, I really liked the rolling weekly tasks spread by Plant Based Bride and was doing that for my blog/YouTube notebook. However, that one wasn’t a dotted notebook so it was getting messy, so I decided to put all of that into my one bullet journal.
I also began to realise how important it was for me to have more space for my to-do’s and be able to assign the tasks to a particular week or day. As such, July ended up being an additional 6 pages to accommodate the weekly spreads.
I also wanted to give myself ample white space and I loved the extra breathing space the weeklies provided. So, without further ado, here’s my August setup:
Edit: Click here to read my first Chloe Ting challenge experience – 2 Week Shred Click here to read my second Chloe Ting challenge experience – 2020 Summer Shred Click here to read my fourth Chloe Ting challenge experience – Get Peachy
Gosh. I must subconsciously be doing a Try-All-Of-Chloe-Ting’s-Workout-Challenges challenge or something because this is my 3rd #chloetingchallenge in a row. I was considering changing to a different YouTuber’s workout program but none of the other ones I’ve found are fully free, and I don’t particularly feel like paying for them when we have Chloe.
Thank you, Chloe, for making all your workouts free!
The irony is that if other YouTubers all made their workouts free too, they’d probs be earning a lot more money via the ads and get a lot more subscribers too, but hey that’s just me speculating… *raises eyebrow,* *gives knowing look.*
After I completed Chloe’s 2020 Summer Shred Challenge on Monday I was only able to sit on my butt for a couple of days before I really wanted to exercise again, so on Thursday I tried a lower belly video (not bad, but her workout programs are locked behind a paywall), and on Friday I tried some yoga.
I thought about trying a yoga challenge for a month but it’s harder to do yoga with friends and if it’s just me by myself I’ll probably end up not working out after a week or so. Plus there aren’t any yoga channels that I like that offer free yoga workout programs in the way Chloe does, so back to Chloe it is!
I know she just released a new program that starts tomorrow but I’ve learned that it’s much better for me to look at all the videos in advance so I can determine if it’s something that is doable yet challenging for me. I don’t want to start and then either quit or end up short-changing myself by not trying my hardest because the difficulty level is too high.
Whilst trying to choose which new challenge to take on, I flip-flopped so many times between her 25 Day Hourglass Challenge and her 28 Day Flat Tummy Challenge because neither seemed ideal the way I felt her 2020 Summer Shred was going to be before I started that one. After much consideration, ultimately I decided on… her 2019, 30 Day Flat Belly Challenge! Lol.
Why?
Because it looks like the perfect mix of challenging yet not too insane. I love that even she was following the workout herself to get back in shape, and you can tell she worked herself hard because she’s sitting down taking deep breaths at the end of the videos haha. (Plus you get to see her SWEAT for once! Girl is not a robot and that makes me so happy mwahahahaha lolIamahorriblehumanbeing. But seriously it’s actually hilarious to hear the sarcasm in her own voiceovers like ‘ok we have this exercise next… greaaat.’ I feel vindicated and positively gleeful that Chloe feels our pain hahahaha. Somehow that makes me feel even more motivated.)
I like the music and that the song changes happen during the move transitions (both really important!) I like that most days it’s a 30-40min program because I exercise with a group of others; it’s just not worth getting on a group call to do a single video that only lasts 10min, which seems to be the schedule every other day for the 2020 Flat Tummy Challenge. I also love that her HIIT workouts include a warm up and cool down stretches in the actual video.
I may come to regret this later because some days the exercises are super long, but I feel much fitter after completing 2 of her challenges so I want to push a little harder. My only concern is that the entire challenge is comprised of 5 videos. There’s a chance I’ll get bored of repeating the same videos over and over but we’ll see how it goes.
I will be starting this challenge tomorrow but wanted to upload my ‘before’ shots ahead of time since I won’t have time to take photos tomorrow morning. So without further ado…
