Eenuh

Ok then! My Etsy Shop Might also share the one I made a while ago for our upcoming (but possibly postponed) wedding:

Congrats @bob! I hope your wife and child are doing fine and that you are slowly getting used to parenthood! As I've been furloughed for just over a week, I decided to try and get an Etsy shop going again. I've uploaded my old Christmas card stock which I never got to sell, and added one set of new cards. The only person who has bought any so far is my sister haha. (Not going to plug my store as I think it's against the rules, but if anyone is interested, just let me know!) But on top of that, I've started making some family portraits. I've started with my sisters' families so I would have some examples to put up on my shop. They were really happy with them and said they were very recognisable, which was something I was worried about! I'm hoping I can get a few of these done if people are interested. It won't pay the bills, but it will help and hopefully help me mentally as well to keep busy. Obviously I've changed the names to something generic and English haha.

So things haven't been going well at work, with no projects coming in since August. We make whiteboard videos for businesses, universities etc, but if none of them are working, obviously they are not going to spend money on videos... Because of this, I've been put on furlough since last week. I know a lot of people are thinking that it's great, no work and 80% of your pay, but I'd honestly rather be working and getting my full pay! I'm worried about my job though, as I think my boss is listed as a director of his limited company (as is his wife, I'm the only employee), and I don't think they can get any government support. Which means they have no income. And if this keeps going on for too long, they will probably have to close down the business, meaning I'd be out of a job. All this lockdown stuff is starting to weigh on me too, every day just feels the same, with nothing happening at all. At least during the Spring we were still getting some work in and I could spend lots of time working in the garden, but not during Winter. I'm stuck inside the house and have only seen 2 friends since February, and I've seen my family once this entire year. I'm going to cancel my trip to see them over Christmas as it's just not happening with all these restrictions. The only good thing is I've had some time to work on some of my own stuff, which I'll post in the Good Stuff Thread! Let's hope this vaccine will work and they can give it to loads of people, so things can start going back to normal!

I never seem to be able to see photos posted from Google Photos. The ones from Mandalore don't work, Ashley's didn't work and I'm pretty sure Soag posted pictures before which I couldn't see either. I tend to just upload photos to a website like Imgur and then paste the link in here.

Have you tried MyFitnessPal? I use it to track my calories, carbs, proteins and fats. There's a big database of things plus you can scan barcodes on products too. Not sure if it will cover exactly what you need it for, but might be worth checking out if you haven't already.

I'm not sure if this is an option for you, but I took a National Express coach into London in August and it was pretty much empty (same on the way back a week later). They took our temperature before boarding, and every aisle seat was kept empty. Plus everyone had to wear a face mask during the entire trip. Might be worth looking into?

I spent quite some time today just collecting seeds from my cornflowers to grow next year. Kept me busy for a bit while in quarantine. My big success this summer seems to have been my cherry tomatoes. They just kept coming and coming, managed to harvest a few kilos of them. I had some with my salads and turned most of them into a tomato sauce, yummm. Still have another container of ripe tomatoes ready to be turned into sauce, and more tomatoes still waiting to ripen. I'm trying to figure out what I can improve on next year, and what I can add to my garden. Will see if maybe I can grow some cucumber and courgette next year too. Not everything was a success though, my spinach failed at the start (trying again now), my lettuce started bolting in July and my onions didn't really do much either. And some of my carrots did better than others haha. It's all a big learning curve though!

As I said I would try and be more active, here's a new thread! A lot of us have recently found ourselves with more time on our hands, possibly because of being furloughed, or just from having to spend more time at home because of lockdown. And maybe during this time some of us discovered some new hobbies or have really gotten into something. Maybe you've gotten into cooking and baking, or you started learning languages or learning an instrument? Or you decided to pick up a pencil and draw or write? What has been your new-found hobby outside of gaming (unless gaming has become a new hobby for you of course!)? It doesn't have to be from during lockdown by the way, but I imagine a lot of people picked up new things to do during this time! As for me, about two years ago I really started getting into owning houseplants. I'd already got a few before when we were renting, but once we had our own home, my love for plants grew and so did my collection! I started trying to grow my own plants by propagating, getting plants swaps from Facebook etc. I even started an Instagram page (which has been heavily ignored recently haha). This year, my love for plants transferred over to our garden. We need to do a lot of work in our garden (including replacing a long fence and getting rid of a massive hedge), but I decided to start growing things on one side of the garden. I really love flowers and have been trying to grow all sorts, such as lupins, snapdragons, dahlias, tulips, hyacinths, a hollyhock, daffodils and more. I've really fallen in love with watching things grow and I love all the different colours you get from the flowers! I go out every morning (and multiple times during the day haha) to see if anything else has popped up or if another flower has opened. I find it very relaxing! Now on top of the normal gardening, I also got into trying to grow some of my own fruit and veg! For my birthday in February (so before lockdown) I had asked for a Vegtrug. I set up a nice little area in our garden for it as well. I ordered some seeds online... and then lockdown happened. I had seeds but didn't have any compost to grow in! Luckily our local garden center started doing a delivery service and I managed to get some compost ordered, as well as some strawberry plants. So I could still continue growing stuff, yay! Here is the setup we have, of the Vegtrug and then some hanging baskets for strawberries. This is from the start, things have grown a lot since then. There have been some successes and some failures, and I will learn from my mistakes for next year! I've been growing 3 types of lettuce, spinach (which failed as it started bolting so I had to remove it), I've got normal onions and red onions, cherry tomatoes, carrots (some failure there too), potatoes and strawberries. It's been nice being able to eat the stuff I've grown myself, though I'm still waiting for most things to finish growing before I can harvest them. Sorry for the long post! So, what have you gotten into?

I can't say the lockdown has been very positive for me. Nothing really bad has happened though, just nothing massively positive either haha. I was already working from home so nothing much changed there. It was nice having @Fierce_LiNk around at home though, but I had to make myself scarce whenever he was teaching online (which was basically 9 am to 4 pm). I spent a lot more time in the garden whenever the weather allowed it, tending to my vegetables (which I was already planning to do before Covid hit, the lockdown just made it harder to get all my supplies). We might have saved some petrol money from Jim not having to go into work as much, but I think we just ended up spending that money on take aways haha. My work has also been affected by the lockdown, as we are not really getting enough new projects in, so there is the constant fear that I might lose my job or not get paid. I missed out on 3 trips to see my family, once in March for my niece's and nephew's birthday, once in May for my sister's hen party and once in June for my sister's (now postponed) wedding. It made me feel quite down, as I wasn't really seeing anyone for months being stuck in the house. Jim and I booked tickets to go to Belgium in August but because of the threat of quarantine, we rebooked Jim's ticket for Christmas. I still went to Belgium and it was lovely to finally see my family again! Last time I saw them was at Christmas, longest time I think I've had to miss them. I got back on Sunday and am now stuck in a spare bedroom because of quarantine rules haha. I really hope this pandemic improves soon and that they can get a vaccine ready (I know that will take months though). I'm so fed up with it and tired of being stuck inside. I want to visit people and go places again. And as our wedding is next August, I really hope things improve for the better and life can start returning to normal again (maybe with some changes like more people working from home).

I probably forgot how to play these after all this time, but sure, count me in!

Such lovely views in your area @Goafer! Love those fields and country lanes and the golden glow from the sun. We've been getting a lot of military aircraft since lockdown started, more than we would normally get. With Bournemouth Airport not being used as much by passenger planes, the military have been using it to do training. We've seen some big military planes flying around in circles doing touch and goes for example. There's some really impressive planes out there, but sadly I don't have any pictures!

Jealous of all the benefits and pension schemes you guys have! My employer's pension contribution is only £35 per month haha. I've looked at FIRE a few times but I don't feel I earn enough to ever really achieve any of it. I'm only on 20k annual pay and there isn't an awful lot left at the end of the month to save/invest after paying for all the bills and necessities or (house) repairs. We generally don't spend much on things like going out or luxury stuff either (our holiday is usually just visiting my family in Belgium, where we only pay for Eurostar tickets and sleep over at my mom's hahaha). I've thought about looking for jobs with more pay, but there doesn't really seem to be much going around in this area in the creative sector.

I uploaded photos to IMGUR to share on here, not sure if there is another way really? Didn't think Facebook/Google Photos would work for me.

"Are you a CRACK ADDICT?!"

Hahaha, when I was a kid, for some reason my uncle/godfather got me a Marklin model train for my birthday (no clue why!). We only set it up once to test it out, but when we got it I kept saying how we should turn the attic into a mini landscape for the train. That never happened of course. I actually did get a few of those model houses you have to put together yourself, I quite enjoyed doing that. But again, they just all ended up in a box because we didn't have anywhere to set it up. Around Christmas last year, my mom gave my train set to her partner, who gave it to his grandchildren. She said they were happy with it, so hopefully it will get used a bit now. Here's a pic of them having set everything up (these houses aren't mine I don't think). Oh man you're making me hungry! Those muffins look so good! I wish I was better at baking, it's something I've always wanted to do but never really got into properly. I've got cake and muffin tins sitting unused in a cupboard haha. Maybe it's for the best as I'd probably end up gaining too much weight. Ooooh I've looked at the birkin before, they are pretty! So is the calathea medallion and the stromanthe! I'd probably fill my house with calatheas, stromanthes and marantas if I had the space and right humidity levels. They are so beautiful! As for cats, we seem to be doing quite well with ours. Of course I'm not going to buy deadly plants like lilies, but anything that might be a bit too toxic I keep out of their reach. To be honest Aya has never shown an interest in my plants, and Ico was mostly interested when he was a kitten (he would nibble on things he shouldn't). Now he mostly just nibbles on my spiderplant (which is safe) and plays with my string of hearts and pearls to annoy me and get me out of bed haha. If you ever want to look up if a plant is safe, this list is pretty good (doesn't have everything but has quite a few): https://www.aspca.org/pet-care/animal-poison-control/cats-plant-list

I can't see the photos! I want to see the photos!

So a lot of these will have been at festivals, where I might have only seen part of a set or just a few songs. I might also be missing out a lot of bands because they all just kinda blur into each other after a while! A = Ash, Air, Au Revoir Simone B = Bloc Party, Ben Howard, Bastille, Blink 182, Basement Jaxx C = Christine and the Queens, The Chemical Brothers, Crystal Castles, Coldplay D = Depeche Mode, The Darkness, Dropkick Murphys E = Editors, Example, Ellie Goulding F = Faithless, Foals, The Flaming Lips, Franz Ferdinand G = Goldfrapp H = Hurts, Hans Zimmer I = Iron maiden, Incubus J = Johnny Marr, Jonsi K = The Kooks L = Limp Bizkit, Lamb M = Moby, Muse, Mogwai, Mumford and Sons, Massive Attack, Moloko N = Noah and the Whale, Newton Faulkner, The National O = Of Monsters and Men P = Placebo, Primal Scream, The Prodigy Q = Queens of the Stone age R = Royksopp, Rammstein, Red Hot Chili Peppers, REM S = Smashing Pumpkins, Snow Patrol, Skunk Anansie, Starsailor, Stereophonics T = Tom Odell, The Twilight Sad, Tool U = V = W = Within Temptation, Weezer X = Y = Z = Zornik, Zita Swoon

Of course houseplants can count as a hobby! You should see how passionate some people get about them haha. Your bathroom looks great by the way! I can't really tell from your picture what you've got (I think I see a spiderplant and monkey mask on the left?). But plants that do great with the humidity of a bathroom and less light are calathea, maranta and ferns.

Ooh, what type of rare plant are you looking for? Are you on any plant groups on FB? I'm in "HousePlant Swap Club - UK", mostly to get advice but I've got a few cuttings/plants through there as well. I don't have a page myself really, I started an Instagram page but haven't really used that much! To be honest my collection isn't anything special haha. It's just stuff you can get in a garden center. Sadly we don't get much light into our house so I'm a bit limited with what we can get. Only have 3 windowsills as well, with 2 being south-facing and getting way too hot for most plants (and have to be shared with the cats). I would love to get more plants, especially some bigger ones like a (variegated) monstera, or more calathea (the orbifolia is on my list but I know I don't have the right space for it). Most of my plants are small, with a lot of them basically just being cuttings which I received/bought and I'm trying to grow bigger haha. Only a few were bought as actual full-grown houseplants. Also, with the cats I have to make sure I don't get any plants that are (too) toxic. Might be something you have to consider if you do look at getting cats!

What a great topic! It's nice to get to know more about all of you! Who I am: My name is Ine, my forum name is how English people might try and pronounce my name (but then still fail). I am 35 years old. I'm from Belgium but have been living in the UK since 2012. I moved to the UK to live with @Fierce_LiNk, who I met through this forum! The first time we met in real life (and also our very first date) was in Disneyland Paris! We've been together since 2008, being in a long-distance relationship until I moved in 2012. Been engaged since 2015, finally (hopefully) getting married in 2021! I really want to visit Disneyworld someday, hopefully as our honeymoon in the future! I have a Master degree in Illustration. I am the only employee of a company which makes whiteboard animations. This means I do most of the work, including storyboarding, drawing up the images, making the video. My boss (or the client) does the script and we get other people to do voice-overs. I have been working from home for a few years now, so this lockdown stuff is my usual routine haha. Recently, I have really got into gardening and growing my own vegetables (see the New-found Hobbies thread)! I love chocolate, pizza and pasta. I love travelling but don't really get to do it enough. We went to Italy a few years ago (Milan, Florence & Rome) and we loved it. We've been dying to go back! Despite being 35, I still love playing games, even though it's not as much as I used to. We have two rescue cats, Aya and Ico. They are our babies!

Ah, it's lovely to see so many old names pop up again! Hello all! I still check the forum every day, but don't really post much myself. I might have to try and change that and be a bit more active!

I'm really interested in seeing people's tips on how to budget and save more money, maybe even tips on investing! As we have our wedding coming up next year, we've been trying to save up for that to create a decent budget for it. We did the same when we were renting and trying to save up for our house. I started budgetting with spreadsheets where I would keep track of what money we were spending every month, but I found it very tedious and at times would forget to put things in it. I then found a website which basically does it all for me, and I think it's absolutely brilliant! You basically link it to your bank accounts and it keeps track of what comes in and goes out for each account. You can set different budgets, there's graphs that show you what you are spending per category etc. But the best part for me personally is the Planner. You can basically tell it what money you've got coming in (like wages) and what is going out. So you can set (repeating) predictions for things like your rent/mortgage, food shopping, one off purchases etc. You can then see what your balance is expected look like over the next 12 months. I find it so useful to plan how much money we might have left by the end of the month and what things we can afford. It also shows it as a linear graph which really helps me, as I like to visualise things. Anyway it has really helped me with our finances I think. I know roughly how much we will be able to save over the next year, which helps me budget for our wedding stuff. For anyone interested, the website is called Moneydashboard and if you join by clicking this link, we can both get a share in the company (whatever that means haha): https://share.moneydashboard.com/VS281LR9 By the way, I personally prefer the website version over the smartphone app, but that might just be me. Just like @will', I also have different bank accounts I use to try and maximise the interest we earn. I have one main account which I use to receive my wages and pay the main bills, then I have one separate account which I use to switch to different banks, depending on where I can get a good offer or a switching deal. I've done the same for @Fierce_LiNk, so we have 4 current accounts between us. And every month I try and put some money away into a savings account or monthly saver, which I do as soon as we receive our wages. We've got a few credit card accounts at the moment which we still need to pay off, but they are 0% interest so there is no rush. If the deal runs out before it's paid off, I tend to do a balance transfer to another 0% card. I just try and make sure the debt on these cards is never more than the money we actually have saved.

Does the second charger work though? I really should look at getting an electric bike at some point, so I can leave the house a bit more (when lockdown is properly over). That, or re-learn how to drive and get a cheap car haha.

I agree about the credit cards, I tend to use them for big purchases now. If you look around, you might also be able to get some that offer 0% interest for a year or so, which can help to pay off a bigger purchase over a longer time.

I've been doing pretty well during this lockdown in regards to my weight/fitness. I've been following a schedule of two days of cardio (crosstrainer), followed by one day of weight training (alternating between chest/back/arms one day, then legs and arms the next) and then have one rest day. On top of that I have been loosely following the keto diet as well, cutting out carbs and sugars, though still allowing "cheat" days once in a while. I also do a bit of fasting as I don't eat breakfast (thanks to keto I don't feel as hungry as I normally would so that's fine). I've managed to lose 7kg since mid-March, which may not sound like a lot but is quite a bit for me! I had not been able to lose weight for years, even though I was doing exercise and calorie counting, so I'm happy that something is finally working. I'll keep up with the diet and exercise and try to get rid of even more weight, need to get fit for my wedding next year!