Autumn absolutely flew by this year! And there is little doubt in my mind that that was at least partially because I had such a fun lot of things I wanted to do – not so much an autumn bucket list as an autumn improvement list, if you remember?
In terms of life management, doing the work of unsubscribing from marketing emails was a winner! I try to do this every few months at least. I’m definitely not above signing up for marketing emails in the first place to score a discount on online shopping, but over the medium term such emails do nothing to improve my life. Calm inbox, calm mind, or something like that. I also loved looking back at family photos to print and frame, when I find the right frames – any suggestions of frames or brands you love?!
You already know all about the buy nothing stint and again, that was awesome for a calming mind reset halfway through the year. Even better, though, was thirty days of yoga! I actually extended this one and rolled straight from one monthly programme into another. If you want to do more yoga, or even start from scratch, I cannot recommend Yoga with Adriene more. I love the monthly programmes as they’re such no-brainers – I just do whatever session Youtube tells me to. During the sixty (!) days of yoga I of course had the occasional day off when I just couldn’t make it work for whatever reason, but they were few and far between. My advice is not to skip those sessions but just to pick it up the following day as if the off day never happened.
I’m still doing yoga frequently but not on a daily basis right now. I’ve replaced it with Melissa Wood Health as my everyday activity for the time being – another programme I absolutely love and highly recommend!
I’m so pleased that I did so much to reset during autumn, because we’ve had some pretty big upheavals in our life as of late! Most pertinently, I recently left my job, which is a pretty major change. Everything is super good but definitely also super different, and as with any change, there are some adjustments to be made…I feel good knowing that I’m in such a healthy place (mentally and physically) to make those adjustments.
Experience and activity-wise, I’ve loved getting to know my kitchen better, haha. Obviously I love cooking but it’s been really fun expanding my range, challenging myself, and making sure I use my beautiful cookbooks! That said, I’ve also realised that I really love being inventive in the kitchen, and for me, the right way to use cookbooks is predominantly for inspiration and visual stimulation – with the occasional hardline following of a recipe for something really special (like crème brûlée!).
We loved our (many!) family trips to Auckland, as well as the bonus parents-only trip! And we really loved heading out west. We had no idea how many adorable little villages there were out along the northern Kaipara harbour. I talk about it a little bit in this post – we visited Paparoa for a wander of the Paparoa Farmer’s Market and a café visit, then drove out as far as Matakohe before turning around and coming back via the Pahi peninsula. As a bonus, in Paparoa we got talking to some really lovely families while Amelie played on the playground, and later realised we had a surprising connection with them…you have to love New Zealand!
It was an enjoyable autumn for sure. Did you set a seasonal bucket list (or experience list, or improvement list)? How did it go?
The Judd Crew 
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