How I’ve Spent Self Isolation: Week 1 vs Week 2 vs Week 3

We’ve now been in lockdown for a few weeks, and I’ve found it super interesting seeing how everyone’s been spending their time at home. My Instagram stories are full of sped-up videos of people doing yoga or joe wicks workouts, lots of people are baking bread and facetime pub quizzes. I’ve seen different memes of ‘what type of lockdown person are you’ and I feel like I’ve gone through all of them! My weeks have definitely varied, so here’s a little run-through of what I’ve been up to…

WEEK 1

Week 1 I had SO much get-up-and-go. After getting back to the UK I was desperate for some routine, being able to cook my own meals and just feeling generally more productive. I was in a good sleep routine due to jetlag, falling asleep around 10pm (literally unheard of for me!) and waking up at 7am.  Due to lockdown we’d initially lost some business, so on the work front, we were pretty quiet. This meant lots of free time, so I decided to fill my days with all sorts of activities!

Learning Guitar

I saw an article about how Fender Play was offering 3 months free subscription due to lockdown, so decided this was a great way of keeping myself busy and feeling productive. I stole James’ guitar, signed up and completed half of level 1 in the first day. I used to play guitar as a teenager but stopped at around 16 and therefore was preeeetty rusty. Essentially, I was a total beginner again. I made it my goal to practice every day, which went well for the first week or so but writing this, I haven’t practiced in a few days. It got harder, I got impatient, my fingers were numb and I didn’t have a capo (which I needed now at my stage in level 2). James’ capo is in his other guitar bag at my Mum’s, so once we’ve got that I plan on getting back to this. But for now, it’s nice to give my hands a break! I also cut my hand screwing the lid back on a bottle of wine (why is it always me?), so I’ll let that heal first.

Puzzling

My brother got me a personalized jigsaw puzzle a couple Christmases ago of our old dog, Murphy. It’s 1000 pieces and I’ve never committed to actually emptying out all the pieces

and starting it, but now there’s a chance we won’t be leaving the house for months, it seems like the perfect time to start. It’s ridiculously hard – I still haven’t finished it now (2 weeks since starting it). The photo is literally Murphy stood on a road, so all it is ginger hair, green hedge (totally out of focus, may I add) and grey road (mostly out of focus too). So yeah, it’s a lot of grey and green pieces that look exactly the same! I’ve managed to finish the dog, but the surroundings may take me a while longer…

Yoga

When I said in the starting paragraph my Instagram was full of yoga videos, I wasn’t judging – I’m doing the exact same (just not videoing… yet). I suffer from some back problems and was seeing an osteopath regularly until we moved to France last year, who always recommended I did yoga. I bought a yoga mat and tried to do 20 minutes every evening before bed, and started to really enjoy it. I did a couple of classes too which were nice as they challenged me, unlike the same easy YouTube videos I’d been doing. This habit came to an end once we moved to France, and I wanted to do a class in Bali but felt intimidated so never did. Now we’re back in the UK (and my back has definitely felt the wrath of not sleeping in my own bed for months) I’ve been getting my yoga mat out and doing Yoga With Adriene. I like Adriene’s videos because she has ones focused for lower back which is my problem area, plus she has a super cute dog. I was doing this every day in Week 1 but have slacked recently. I want to try and keep it up purely for the benefit of my back and flexibility, in addition to my core strength and the positive impact on my mental health. I just haven’t really felt like it the past few days, but I’m sure I’ll get back into the groove soon. I’m not pushing myself to keep up with all these activities – we’ve got plenty of time!

Joe Wicks Work-outs

Oh yes, I’ve jumped on the bandwagon. I’ve never been one for home work-outs, but I like gym classes and so I guess this is the next best thing. I did a couple of his PE classes

which were fun, but I prefer his other videos (I guess I’m not a child, although I definitely like the kangaroo jump one – if you know you know). I started the 7 Days of Sweat 2020 videos.. “Started” being the important word here, I haven’t yet finished them and they’re only getting harder. I had a long weekend off anything because I was fed up of how sore my legs were running up and down the stairs. I’m now feeling like a normal human again so I might give them another go!

Jogging

Lol, so I’m a bit of an imposter here. I’ve been for ONE run but I’m gonna put it here anyway as I was super proud of myself for going for that one run. I plan on going on another one.. one day. I just haven’t gotten round to it yet.

Keeping A Diary

I’ve been writing down every day what I’ve eaten and what I’ve done, just so that I have some differentiation between my days as they’re all blurring into one. This helps me remember what day was what! Even if they do all look pretty similar. (Week 3 note, this hasn’t lasted…)

WEEK 2

So as you’ll see, Week 1 was pretty productive – if I say so myself. But I think I knew it was never gonna last… Week 2 has been MUCH more chill, and I’ve had enjoyed it equally. I may not be any better at guitar, any fitter or flexible, but I’m much more well-rested and well-fed. I think I’ll probably bounce between the two!

Collecting Shells

I’m super lucky to be on lockdown right on the beach, but it’s only a temporary thing, so I’m making the most of it. I’m pretty creative and excited to get crafting soon when we move and I’ve got more of my belongings (we’re currently living out of a suitcase), so I’ve been out on the beach collecting shells whilst I still can! This has been on my one exercise outing a day, so no jogs for me (oh, what a shame).

Working

What I said in the first paragraph about work slowing down? Well, it took a fairly dramatic U-turn and we’ve been working pretty flat out over the last week. We’re used to working at home, with something we’re strict on being trying to finish at a normal time and giving ourselves a lunch break, and weekends being non-working days. However, now it’s lockdown the normal working day seems to have gotten lost a bit and we’ve found ourselves working all hours of the day, all week. We definitely need to try and get back into a routine!

Drinking Wine

Last week’s get up and go has been replaced with ‘oh it’s 5pm, we can have a drink’. The nice weather hasn’t helped for sure! I know I’m definitely not the only one in lockdown who is drinking far more than usual at home… Does it balance the fact we’re not going out? I’m not too sure.

WEEK 3

When I originally wrote this post, I was on Day 14 of my lockdown. However, it’s sat half-written on my mac for the past week… So I guess I’ll write a little about this week too. Maybe I can add procrastinating to my list? We actually moved house this week – where we were before was a temporary fix for our 14 day isolation period, and so we’ve spent this week getting settled in, unpacking and balancing out really.

I never thought Week 1 productivity would last, but it’s nice to have found some middle ground. I’ve also finally started my new book, started crafts (all the stuff I wanted to do but didn’t have materials for before!) and we’ve been playing a lot of Guitar Hero. We also had a group quiz on Zoom which was super fun, if you haven’t done this yet with your friends, you really need to!

Update: I FINALLY finished my puzzle but I’ve only been on one more run. Baby steps.

I think you can see, I’ve gone from being super busy to pretty chilled – and both are fine! If you want to spend lockdown just chilling out, that’s totally ok and now is the perfect time to do that. If you are someone who needs to keep busy, then take up all these extra activities or learn something new or decide now is the time to try and get fit. Either way, everyone has a different way of dealing with this new situation and whatever works best for you is the right way to spend it!

Oh and I also tried that whipped coffee thing everyone seems to be making, wasn’t a fan.