This week my Word of the Week is: Football!! #WotW

This week my Word of the Week is:

If you know me at all, this week's word was always going to be football! The World Cup is finally here and I am loving it already. For the next few weeks, you will be able to find me sat in front of the TV watching match after match. I don't even care what teams are playing. I'll happily sit and watch football from morning until night when the World Cup is on. I am even planning on recording some of the matches that are being shown during the middle of the night and hopefully avoiding seeing the scores beforehand.

I have been watching football all week, with the friendly warm up matches been shown. On Wednesday, I was ready for England's match expecting kick-off at 9pm only for them to postpone it because of a storm. It was chucking it down at one point and the pitch looked more like a swimming pool than a football pitch. By around 10pm it was clear. I don't know what sort of magic they worked but it was impressive!

Of course, I'll be cheering England on. Supporting England is part of the fun, we always seem to do so well until we don't. It is a rollercoaster of emotions being an England fan. I always find myself rooting for the underdog teams too. I love seeing countries make history. Cape Verde are one of the teams I'll be keeping an eye on because this is their first ever World Cup. Just qualifying is a massive thing. Curaçao is the smallest nation ever to qualify for a World Cup and has less people in it than the nearest big city to us. Then there are teams like Haiti and the Ivory Coast where their fans have been unable to travel into the US after their visas were denied. It feels unfair that so many fans won't be able to experience the tournament in person. I also have a reason to support the Netherlands. Stu drew them in a sweepstake at work and if they manage to win the tournament, or even finish second, there is money to be won.

One of my favourite things so far hasn't even been the football itself. It's been seeing everything happening around the tournament on social media. I have spent far too much time watching videos of teams arriving, fans celebrating and countries sending their players off in style.

Brazil's plane set off with their plane being baptised, Turkey had what seemed like the longest convoy escorting their team, Norway's players dressed as Vikings for photographs and managed to look intimidating and hilarious at the same time and Senegal had a special dinner with their country's leader before leaving. I love it all! It shows just how much the World Cup means to people.

The American advice videos on TikTok have also been making me laugh. There seem to be hundreds of videos aimed at England supporters warning them not to walk to the MetLife Stadium as it's illegal and dangerous but I understand why fans want to. From what I have read, the train ticket prices before the World Cup cost around $12.90, which is roughly £9.50 but since the tournament arrived, some prices have jumped to around $100, which is about £75. Football fans already spend enough money on tickets without those sneaky price rises.

Another thing I've been wondering about is how everyone is coping with the heat. The players are fit but even they look like they're struggling at times. I've seen clips of players pouring water over themselves and wearing cooling scarves packed with ice and then we have the water break half way through each half. The fans must be finding it hard too, as some of the stadiums are not exactly shaded.

How has your week been? I hope you have had a good one! I am of course linking up with Anne who blogs at Raisie Bay to join in with her Word of the Week linky!

What I have loved this week! Week 24. #FridayFavourites

Happy Friday! I hope you’ve had a good week. Mine hasn’t been the worst but it hasn’t been the best either. It’s been one of those weeks when lots of little things have added up and made me feel a bit meh. The weather has been all over the place. We had hail here on Tuesday, which felt very silly for June and then five minutes later the sun was back out pretending like nothing had happened. Add in cramps, bloating, feeling tired and grumpy. It has not been the best but there have still been plenty of little things to enjoy and I’m linking up with Erika and Andrea to share them.

Sport!

This week has been brilliant for sport! I started the weekend watching the F1 qualifying and then the race on Sunday. The race itself was chaos in the best possible way. Max Verstappen didn’t even make it around the first lap, George Russell was collecting time penalties like Pokemon cards and every driver seemed to be speeding in the pit lane while treating the track like a Sunday drive. The race was stopped near the end because the track was breaking up. Eek! You expect better from Monaco! I've checked and from now on until the end of the season (apart from the Las Vegas one) they're all on an afternoon here! Yay! Then there’s football. I’ve really enjoyed watching the friendly matches in the build up to the World Cup over the last week. They’ve got me in the mood for the tournament and I have a whole post about it tomorrow.

Home made pizza!

We made homemade pizza on Saturday and it always tastes better than shop bought or even a takeaway pizza. The best thing about it is that everyone can have whatever they want without any arguments. I had BBQ sauce, mushrooms, onions, sweetcorn, smoked sausage, pineapple and cheese on mine.

Hot Honey!

I said I wasn’t going to get on board the hot honey food trend but it happened. On Monday we had hot honey, bacon and fried eggs with pancakes. It was a Gousto meal we’ve had before and we love. The sweet, salty, spicy taste just works. I didn’t think honey needed improving but adding chilli was the answer all along. I’ve also become obsessed with the Walkers Hot Honey crisps. I bought a big pack and managed to eat all five packets during the week. On Wednesday evening, I went to get another packet and then realised I’d already eaten them all. I could have cried.

My blanket!

I never thought I’d be sitting under a blanket in June but here we are. Ten minutes ago it was grey, cloudy and raining and now the sun is out again. It’s not freezing, it's just colder than I would like for this time of year! I just went with it, I had my heated cushion on my back, a nice cup of tea and pretended that this was all normal. lol

Flowers in the garden!

Father's Day gifts!

I am loving this stage in life where the girls are old enough to have their own money and online shopping accounts to buy their dad gifts for Father's Day! It has been funny hearing about their shopping adventures. Ellie went off with her friend last week to get something in town. She couldn't find what she wanted so she ordered something from Amazon and Becky did all her shopping online. She said she was only getting a couple of things but got slightly carried away and there were a few packages delivered this week. Oops.

Little things that have helped me through the week!

Even though I felt a bit run down, there were lots of tiny things that helped make the week better: laughing with my girls, fully sticking to the meal plan, not getting caught in the rain, good food, making plans, hot showers, drinks from a coffee shop and a fantastic audiobook, I have an hour of it left and I don't know how it's going to end! Eek!

What have you loved over the past week?

A pretty ordinary Thursday - A day in my life!

It has been quite a while since I did a day in my life post. The last one was last March. I decided to do a Thursday as it's quite a busy day which doesn't involve me just doing the housework. There was a bit of excitement with the shopping being delivered and me cutting and dying my hair. All of this happened on the 21st of May.

I woke up just after half past six as Ellie was getting up to go to college. She had an English GCSE exam to do. I dozed off back to sleep and ended up waking just as Ellie was leaving to get her bus. I love not having to get up and rush about getting the kids ready for school. Becky wasn't even here and Ellie has her own little routine, so me getting up would just knock her off track. That's my story and I am sticking to it.

I had a look at what the weather was doing outside. It was pretty gloomy and it had been raining. It wasn't cold though. We're supposed to have some lovely weather over the next week or so. I predict a lot of moaning about me being too hot. I didn't bother with breakfast as I knew I was getting something delivered with the food shop that was coming later in the morning. I had a glass of juice, had a tidy around. Ellie must have been undecided about what she was going to wear this morning as there was a pile of clothes in the bathroom and shoes in the dining room.

I switched my laptop on just after 9am and wrote my Friday Favourites blog post. Some weeks I have a ton of things that I have loved. This week I was struggling with things to mention. It wasn't that it was a bad week, it was just I hadn't done anything exciting, tried many new things or watched anything different on the TV. 

I checked my emails and had a read of the news. I like to know what's going on in the world but sometimes it can be a lot. I then went and cleaned the fridge out, I like to clean it before I fill it up again and my food shop was being delivered.

I checked my Asda grocery order and couldn't make any sense of the substitutions they were sending. I still have no idea what the flowers were but they sent chocolate croissants which were better than the almond ones that I had ordered. It does say on my order that I had ordered cheese croissants. I didn't, I double checked. How odd!

I saw online that my order was 19 minutes away, so I didn't bother moving from my armchair. I had a scroll on TikTok until my grocery order was delivered. My food shop arrived just after 11am.

The most exciting things to be delivered with my grocery shop were the flowers and Ranch sauce! I finally got some.

I know it is a big thing in the US but it isn't here. Today was the first time I tasted it. To me, it tastes a bit like mayo, a bit like garlic sauce and with a hint of Tartar sauce. My taste buds were confused but very happy with it. Now tell me what you use Ranch for, what it goes well with. On the bottle it says pizza but there must be other things?

The other great thing delivered with the food shop was my lunch. Each week I order a meal deal from whatever supermarket I am ordering from. This time it cost me £3.74 for a sandwich, snack and drink.

I got Bacon & Ketchup sandwich, Tropicana orange juice and a tub of Pringles. It is a good deal. If I was to buy everything separately it would cost £6.05!!

I ate my lunch while watching some more of Grey's Anatomy and then got on with cutting and dying my hair. I started just after midday and finished just before half past two. It's a process! I dye my hair fully with bleach every 12 weeks and inbetween every 6 weeks, just top up the colour. This time was the big one. I bleached my hair to get rid of the dark roots and grey hair that I had coming through and then went and tidied the kitchen while that did its thing. 40 minutes later, I rinsed it off and then let it dry a little while I sorted the washing. I helped my hair along with drying and had a sit outside. The sun had started to come out, it was getting warm and I could see blue sky!

When my hair had dried a little, I popped the colour and let that do its thing. I had a tidy in the dining room, sorted more washing and debated doing a load to hang outside but decided against it and I am glad I did as it got quite grey again later on in the afternoon.

Stu rang while he was on his lunch break and we had a chat. I do love those little catch-ups that we have. I don't see him on a morning as he leaves for work early, so it's good to know he made it to work and is OK. By the time I had finished on the phone to Stu it was time to wash the red dye off.

I sat down just after half past two, got comfy and decided I was having a couple of hours of not moving. I started writing this blog post and decided to watch a movie and put Jurassic World Rebirth on. We have a free trial of Sky Cinema at the moment and this was one of the only movies I wanted to watch off it. At least I could download it instead of waiting for it to start on live TV. As I am writing this, I am about 30 minutes in and I haven't seen a dinosaur. lol I spent the next couple of hours commenting on blogs, playing Cooking Fever inbetween and Ellie got in at around half past four and we had a lovely catch up about her day.

When Stu rang at half past 5 to say he was on the bus, I started making tea. Today we were having pork and apple sausages, spicy potato wedges, mushrooms and peas. 

It was a nice easy meal to cook, the air fryer took care of the wedges and I cooked everything else on the hob. Just when everything was almost cooked Becky and her friend arrived home. I knew there was an extra mouth to feed, so all was good.

Stu came in from work and we all sat down to eat together, which is something that I really like. There will be a day when the girls leave home and it doesn't happen, so I really cherish it when it does. Ellie washed the dishes and then I moved to my armchair and that is where I spent the evening. I watched some of the news, the soaps and then a few episodes of Grey's Anatomy.

I ended up having a latish night, not going to bed until coming on for midnight because Becky and I lost track of time while we were chatting. It was nice to have a catch-up after not seeing her properly for a few days. I listened to half an hour of my audiobook in bed while scrolling on Facebook and then I went to sleep.

What do you do on an average day when you are at home?

The Wednesday Hodgepodge #59

I hope you are all having a good week. It's Wednesday, which means it's time to join in with the Wednesday Hodgepodge with Joyce who blogs at From This Side of the Pond! Each week there are 6 questions, we answer and then link up. Simple!

1. How would you define 'the good life'?

I found this really hard to answer because it’s one of those phrases that can mean a million different things to different people. I think for me the good life isn’t about having loads of money, fancy things or everything running perfectly all the time. That would all be nice but to me that is unrealistic. It’s much more about the real, everyday stuff. My family being happy and healthy is the main thing. If they are good, everything else in life feels easier to deal with. It’s about not having things stressing me out all the time and being able to sleep without spending the night tossing and turning. I feel at the moment we are living the good life. We have enough money to live comfortably, we all have good friends and people we can turn to for support and just enough of everything that we need. I think the good life isn’t anything big, it’s just feeling steady and happy with the life you’re living right now.

2. What's the most used app on your phone (and are you proud of that)?

TikTok is definitely the most used app on my phone. I wouldn’t say I’m proud of it but I’m not mortified about it either. I have learned so much from TikTok, found recipes, kept up with the news and have been introduced to a lot of new songs. I average about an hour a day, mainly at night before I go to sleep. I know it's not a good habit and I should stop but it's just one of those things. Most of the time, I still prefer using my laptop for anything online and according to my girls, that makes me old. They could live their lives just using their phones for everything but I like a bigger screen and a proper keyboard. TikTok and Instagram are the only apps I really use on my phone.

3. 'Every rose has it's thorn', 'everything's coming up roses', 'looking through rose-colored glasses', 'it's no bed of roses' or 'stop and smell the roses'...which rose idiom best relates to something in your life currently. Explain.

I’d probably say it’s a mix of "everything’s coming up roses" and "stop and smell the roses." Life feels good at the moment. My eldest is house hunting and getting ready to move out when the right place comes along and my youngest only has just over two weeks left at college. Things are moving in the right direction and there is a lot to feel positive about. My girls are making me proud, are growing up and I feel like I want to just press pause on life and enjoy this part of it for a little bit longer. In a few months our lives could be so different. Why do they have to grow up so fast?

4. How do you feel about floral flavorings in food or drink (rose, hibiscus, elderflower, lavender)?

No thank you! Floral flavourings in food and drinks are just wrong and are not for me. They feel a bit like someone’s made a drink and then accidentally added some of the garden to it. Elderflower is probably the only one I can almost enjoy but even then it depends on how strong it is, anything too perfumey and I find myself gagging. My girls love Parma Violets sweets which smell just like flowers and I refuse to have them in the house because just the smell makes me feel sick. Food and drinks should not taste like they’ve been wandering through a flower bed.

5. Over the course of your life what have you probably spent more time pondering than anything else?

Probably the things I’ve spent the most time overthinking are the tiny everyday decisions that somehow feel massive at the time, like what to eat, what to wear, whether I’ve replied to someone in the right tone or if I’ve left it too long and now it looks weird. That kind of stuff. It’s never anything dramatic but things that take up way more brain space than they should. As my girls would say, it's not that deep. lol

6. Insert your own random thought here.

I’ve just checked the weather forecast and it’s not exactly cheering me up. Over the next 12 days, we’ve got rain showing for about 10 of them. Ugh! I know, I know, in a couple of months we’ll probably be wishing for a bit of rain when everything turns dry and crispy but right now it just feels a bit unfair, especially after that week not so long ago with proper sunshine and blue skies. It’s like we got a tiny taste of nice weather and then it was straight back to grey skies and wet pavements.