What I’ve been doing

I’m writing this post and thinking to myself why? I’m not very good at writing personal stuff online, guess it’s an introvert thing. I was going to ask if anyone wanted me to write this but instead here goes.

Helo! It’s been a while.

I just wanted to explain what’s been going on. Well, this year I’ve been changing my attitude towards blogging. First of all I just reduced reviews and stopped taking new requests, but I was still requesting books on Netgalley.

I’ve got to the point now that I’ve realised how much time I spend blogging when I could be writing. And lately I’ve been doing other things as well….

What I’ve been doing:

Lost motivation to blog/review

Because of all the things I’ve been doing as well as writing (more info below) and maybe because I became overwhelmed with my Netgalley list (my own fault!) I stopped reviewing books. I was reading this one ARC and I wasn’t enjoying it, I read my Poldark book too quickly. Was feeling tired a lot from not enough sleep and reading and reviewing became a chore. I was enjoying the book I was reading for an upcoming blog tour but it was my Netgalley list that loomed over me. I even met my GoodReads goal.

I found less time to blog and didn’t know what to write about. I had a bit of a slump. I was tempted to write about the things I’d been doing but tired mind and being busy.

Yoga

Photo by Cedric Lim on Pexels.com

I started doing a 30 days of yoga challenge with my favourite yoga teacher, Adriene on youtube. I’ve done this before but always gave up when I couldn’t do yoga on consecutive days, I joined a lovely supportive yoga group on facebook and I’ve just been doing yoga when I can. This was all to change my mindset and feel less anxious which is what I’ve been trying to do with prioritising writing over blogging. So doing half an hour of yoga has taken up more time but I gain time also as I feel calmer and more able to write, read and …

Learn Welsh!

Ok, if you follow me on twitter you know. I am terrible at keeping things to myself, this blog, learning Welsh, writing previously. It seems silly to take on another thing to do when I’m trying to fit writing in but this is something I’ve always wanted to do. This could be a blog post all on it’s own.

I tried learning Welsh in the past, through books and the same website I’m using now Say Something In Welsh   (they do other languages to and it’s great!) but gave up for various reasons. Why I decided to try again now is more of a chain of events than anything else:

• Keeping Faith/Un bore Mercher

I realised that the series Keeping Faith was originally filmed in Welsh as Une Bore Mercher when series two was aired this year. I wanted to watch the series so badly that I tuned into S4C to watch it in Welsh with subtitles obviously. I loved the music in series one and listening to the Welsh songs by Ela Hughes I really wanted to sing along but didn’t know what the words meant. I didn’t continue watching the Welsh language series sadly, I got distracted trying to see what Welsh I already knew so I continued with the English series when it came back on. I really wanted to know what the song was but it wasn’t on youtube yet. (I’ve found them all since 🙂 )

• I think the next thing that happened was:

I seen a chance on social media to win a Welsh course, Alana Spencer who won The Apprentice one year is learning Welsh through Say Something In Welsh and all you had to do was email to enter to win this course. I thought about it but chickened out because it might be on tv, I don’t like photos or videos of myself never mind tv! I can’t remember if I tried the taster challengers on the Say Something In website before I seen this but once I seen this I thought why not try again?

Say Something In Welsh

So I started doing the free taster challenges on the website. I spent ages trying to decide if I should do the full course, the 5 minute course or just subscribe and have access to all the challenges/lessons. I was concerned I’d stop again so I thought I’d see how I went. I eventually decided to subscribe and then as usual wished I’d done the course but finding  the time with work etc can be tricky.

I enjoyed learning Welsh with Say Something In Welsh, joies i fe! It seems so easy, they say something in English and you say the Welsh. They tell you the words and you are learning to build them into sentences. I’m surprised by how much I’ve learnt in a short time (Dw i’n synnu at faint dw i’n wedi dysgu llawer mewn amswer byr).

I started doing this quite often when I was taking a holiday from work for a bit but now I’m trying to fit it in. Sometimes I think I don’t know anyone who speaks Welsh and I am so nervous about talking to people that I don’t. But then I watch some S4C and hear the language on Radio Cymru and realise how much I love it. I remember how I regret quitting all those other times and I really do love Welsh, I’ve gained a new love for the language, maybe it’s because I’m older now.

But I said it was a chain of events…. right? 

Before all this I agreed to happily review a book for a blog tour, it’s due on October 1st,and it’s published by a Welsh press and also written by a Welsh writer translated from the original Welsh language! Coincidence?! A few months after signing up for this I’m now learning Welsh. It’s very odd.

If you humour my imaginative fantasy writer reader (sorry) brain for a sec…. It’s like everything was pointing at me learning Welsh again. It’s just unusual…. 

Ok I’m back. Back to rationality I think. I’m still learning,( dw i’n dall wedi dysgu a mae eisiau i fi ymarfer siariad) and I need to practice speaking. I plucked up the courage to join an online hangout one day, only one person turned up and I was so annoyed with myself afterwards for not speaking enough Welsh and signing off instead of practicing. There’s time. It’s a marathon not a race…. and all that jazz. 🙂

I think that’s it.

Sorry, Thanks for sticking with me and reading this it feels a bit of a ramble. I’m feeling calmer after doing yoga and learning Welsh has given me such a sense of satisfaction that it is also contributing to me feeling good. I’m rereading the third book of my favourite trilogy: The Book Of Life By Deborah Harkness.

I don’t really want to stop blogging it’s just I really didn’t have anything to write about and writing one post takes so much time. I’ve got a blog tour coming up on October 1st for that book I was talking about and I’m also going to review the funny book I read by the person who thought up the Say Something In Welsh website. So more to come. And I’m reading another lovely book set in Wales now. And Halloween and spooky reads are on the horizon….

 

How have you been? Share your latest posts, thoughts, anything in the comments. 🙂

Hwyl!