Wonderful Wednesday #219

{Because Monday-shaped sunshine is a blessing beyond belief!}

It's me!  Reporting for #wonderfulwednesday duty definitely with maybe one eye open and even more definitely counting down the hours until i can go to bed!  It's been such a long and busy week - the kind that feels like it should be so much further along than just Wednesday somehow.  Do you ever feel that way too?!  

I'm full of a horrid cold because i've been not being kind enough to myself and have been working too hard and too fast and i fear that the world is simply telling me to slow the fluff down and take care.  Fear not, operation 'Put Me {mostly!} First' is in full swing as of Now and i'll soon be back fighting fit before you know it. 

But without further ado, let's get-a-listin' shall we?!?  

1.  Raspberry ripple porridge.  That's right i'm going right in with the big guns this week!  You and i both know how very much i love my porridge-y breakfasts - there's nothing that brings me more comfort than a huge big bowl of the stuff for breakfast each day and it's something i'll never ever tire of!  This week i ran out bananas *feels the world rock as everyone gasps*.  YES I KNOW!  Truth be told i could have picked up some more but i like bananas from a certain place {they're The Nicest - believe me i know my bananas, some might say i could write a book on them! That's not cool is it? Is it?!}  *cough* and i think i'd rather have The Nicest Bananas than rubbish ones.  SO {i mean are you even still following?!} in a bid to make up for the fact i was lacking in my favourite porridge flavour {mashed banana and Maca powder incase you're interested} i tried something NEW. I know.  I mean i can be a trail blazer sometimes.  I let my oats and hazelnut milk and one scoop of Maca powder blip-blip away in the pan whilst i mashed up some 'almost-past-their-best' raspberries with a teaspoon of honey in my porridge bowl. When the porridge was creamy and cooked through i poured it on top of the raspberries with a heaped tablespoon of chia seeds and folded them through roughly.  It created the prettiest raspberry ripple porridge!  I finished it off with a great big zig-zag of peanut and coconut butter and some toasted coconut flakes and it was HEAVEN!

2.  The sweet scent of a sunny Spring morning after it's rained all night long:  All sweet, fresh and heady with the soft scent of wild garlic and the first buds of flora and the tail end of bluebells.  In a word:  Heaven.  I filled my little lungs with great big gulps of the stuff on Sunday mornings' bike ride to work and felt all the better for it whilst simultaneously wishing i could keep on riding and not go to work. 

3.   The Ultimate Chocolate Eclairs.  I mean are there ever four words that will catch your attention and stop you dead in your tracks more than those?!  I'm not sure if you know but i'm a bit of a chocoholic.  I mean i'm a fussy chocoholic - i like good chocolate and mostly the expensive kind too which actually come to think of it is really rather handy otherwise i'd have no teeth left if i could eat it all of the time.  BUT that does mean where anything and everything is mostly concerned:  Puddings, snacks - anythings - you can bet your bottom dollar i'll always choose a sweet option and i'll mostly always choose a chocolate 'Something' over anything else.  Last weekend we picked up Marks and Spencer's Ultimate Chocolate Eclairs as a treat for after supper and OH MY.  I felt so ridiculously happy and in some kind of delicious chocolatey coma for all of and a long while after.  Between you and I, it's taking all of the will in the world not to buy another packet already and it's only Tuesday.  They're a chocolate choux pastry eclair; filled with a dark chocolate creme patisserie and topped with the fudgiest most deliciously decadent milk, white and dark chocolate ganache across the top.  If like me you ADORE chocolate you MUST try them QUICK.  They equal instant joy!

4.   That heavy kind of 'feeling a bit under the weather sleep' that only comes from sleeping in your softest pyjamas with a pair of fluffy socks {yes i know it's Spring}, a few drops of eucalyptus oil on your pillow and the window open.  The kind where you wake up, not having even moved an inch; don't know your own name or what day or time it is and only that you feel ridiculously better than you did when you went to bed.  Sleep is the ultimate fixer for sure.

5.   Blusher.  I never understand people who say that they either don't like blusher or that they prefer bronzer.  How can you not like having a rosey flush?!  And what's the point of bronzing any part of your face when the rest of your body is paler than a milk bottle and the only sign you've ever been in any kind of sunlight full stop is the sweet scattering of freckles on your arms and across your nose.  The jig is up!  This week a gentle dust of rose pink blusher on the apples of my cheeks has been bringing life to that sleepy little face of mine!  And distracting from my red nose....

6.  The most delicious box of things to munch.  And leftovers too!  There's a certain kind of happiness that comes from using up everything in your weekly shop and being creative right down to the very last wilting leaf of lettuce.  I always find it an enjoyable challenge {i know, i'm that cool} as it forces me to be creative and i love being creative.  I often make sauce and freeze the leftovers to use as the base for other things.  I put homemade pesto into ice cube trays and wilting herbs are also fired into ice-cube trays - sometimes with soggy chunks of raspberry or strawberry, or wedges of lime and sliced ginger- they make great water 'spicer-uppers.'  This week i fired torn up mint leaves, the last few chunks of a massive cucumber, some grated beetroot and sliced leftover strawberries alongside some black sesame seeds and ate the lot of them altogether with my sandwich on Tuesday.  It was like a little tub of Summer AND it emptied the last few odds and ends from the fridge before our mid-week, weekly shop.  HURRAH!

7.   Impromptu family time.  I've been the tiredest soul that there ever was lately and sometimes when i feel that way, once i get home i just want to curl up with my book on the sofa and be just by myself.  At the weekend we drove up to my parents in Scotland straight after i finished work.  My heart wanted to go but my head and 'self' was beyond sleepy!  A sunny drive north with the Mr - leaving the city behind and driving into the 'green' along the coast fixed me beyond belief and once we got there we had the LOVELIEST couple of hours of catch ups and laughs and lovely food and chat.  Family time really is the most precious of things!

8.  Cosy cardigans:  Slung over faded grey tees with slouchy jeans after work; wrapped around shoulders with damp coconut-ey scented hair and pyjamas of an evening or even worn first thing in the morning; sipping Lady Grey in the garden with only the early morning sun and couple of wood pigeons for company.  It's my cosy go-to for whenever and whatever!  Tell me, do you have something you wear that instantly makes you feel better and works with anything and everything...?!

*  *  * 

Golly GOSH and we're all done and dusted and i'm still awake!  Running on who-knows-what {but i'm betting it's mostly all about the tea} but i'm here and we're done and there's only one more day at work and then there's SIX of them off and all to myself for sleeping and eating crumpets and breathing in as much fresh air as my little lungs can manage!  HURRAH!

Go go and hop and-a-skip right on over to  Jo, Helen, Michelle, Sarah, Kate, Cat, Sam, El , Kerri's, and Peta's and Ellie's - my very FAVOURITE gang of #wonderfulwednesday -ers and get lost in another handful of grateful and happy lists!  You must!  Writing and reading these kinds of posts in equal measure is magic for the soul and is even more 'fixing' than any super-hero cosy cardigan cape or millionth mug of something hot, trust me! 

Until next time...