Something useful

Hi everyone — just dropping into your Sunday morning / Saturday night with a very quick selfie to show you my new green puffer jacket in case you want one. I’m so sad we’re heading into fall and winter in Australia, so if you want to grab this cheerful jacket, link is below and very affordable. They’re selling so fast, and also in white, hot pink and black. Perfect for dog-walking…and I’m still so sad I won’t be doing that this winter.

Now, onto the important stuff!

This week I invited a beautiful friend over for a ‘mini-retreat and planning lunch.’ She’s wise and gorgeous, and I needed to chat about moving from being a mum-of-teens to a mum of adult sons. (Her advice was brilliant: “Before you ask them something, consider whether you’d like it if they asked YOU the same question.” Honestly, I’d be irritated if I were peppered with questions all day…so there we go. I’m easing back!)

The second thing we did was talk through 20 Questions for Reflection I compiled from various resources online. One of the questions felt amazing:

Over to you! It’s the easiest way to bring more joy to your day.

What do you love to do that you don’t do enough of?

For us, the answers just jumped out. Ask yourself, and yours will, too.

Happy Sunday! Enjoy your weekend.

Love, Catherine x

P.S. The fun stuff!

• The green puffer jacket is here.

• Yoga: reporting back. Okay, I found yoga…hard. I tried three classes and I’d love to hear why you love it. I’m undecided. I did love relaxing at the end with candles and music! I also do love Yoga with Adriene online: free yoga class for COMPLETE beginners here.

• Double fudge brownies made with a can of chickpeas (vegan). These could be useful for my vegan and vegetarian friends. Haven’t tried them yet…

• If you’re worried about your iPhone “listening” to you — you can shut this off in settings.

• For my sister, Dar, who loves winter ❄️: you can make ice luminaries! So beautiful.

• If you want to do a mini-retreat, here are the 20 Questions of Reflection.

For absolutely everbody...

Hi friends! Thanks for joining me — today I’m up and writing from sunny Sydney. I’m pretty excited about a new development: later today, we’re going to try an in-studio yoga class to see how it goes. I only ever took a class once, and literally could not wait to get outta there, but I was younger and so impatient! Then I did a class or two online — see the link below — with beautiful Adrienne. But today I’m going to give it a whirl in person.

I love trying new things. For me, it’s the best way to get out of a funk. We’ve been so, so sad about losing our beautiful best friend last month, and what seems to help is shaking up my own routine and learning new things.

If unexpected death of a loved one has taught me anything, it’s this: you never know the burden other people are carrying.

Have the best weekend, and take the time to love all the people you’ve been given to love.

Catherine x

PS. The fun stuff!

• For better balance: try brushing your teeth standing on one leg at a time. (I always forget to do this. I need a sticky note on my bathroom mirror!)

• For endlessly hungry teens at my table: quick and easy cheesy garlic bread from Nagi at Recipe Tin Eats. I don’t have her cookbook yet, but I need it! What a gorgeous Aussie!

• For cleaner floors — I’ve never tried a Dyson, but I absolutely love my new stick vacuum. I grabbed it on sale, and it is worth every penny.

• For free, lovely yoga — try Yoga with Adriene.

• For beauty’s sake: remember Sonnet 116? “Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds…”

3 Minutes for Neck Relief...

Hello, everyone! Happy Friday in Australia :)

Welcome to all the new people here at the Love Our Age blog. If you found me via my new book, The 10 Minute Fix, I’m excited to have you here. I hope you’re enjoying the book so far. I got a beautiful message from a reader this week about Chapter 64: “Let People Remember You.”

“That chapter reminded me of how much I used love and wear yellow, too! It also made me think of Mum, how she loved the colour blue, roast chicken, the constellation “Orion’s Belt,” apple crisp...the list could go on and on.”

— Melanie in Canada

How amazing is it that one tiny book can help us remember the people we love?

If you’re new, you need to know that I blog twice a week, Friday and Sunday mornings in Australia, with goodies that are fun and worthwhile. So…on to today.

How’s your posture going? Mine is pretty terrible.

It’s been another busy writing and teaching week for me, with a lot of time in front of my laptop… Ouch! My upper back and neck are feeling stiff. So I did a little search last night and my favourite teacher online is Adriene, who has an incredible YouTube channel called Yoga With Adriene. She’s lovely…take a look!

This is one of her older videos and I absolutely love it.

Here’s why:

• You’ll get neck relief in under 3 minutes.

• Anyone can do this (you could probably do it now sitting in your office chair)

• The video is charming and whimsical — that flowered headband! It’s just…nice somehow.

• The music is sweet and old fashioned, so different from what daily life is dishing up at the moment.

Click here to watch or on the image below. I hope you find it useful!

Enjoy your Friday,

Love Catherine x

PS.

• Lately I’ve been cheering myself up with (silly, right?) nail polish! I had light blue nails this week and now I’ve changed to black. Hello, Halloween. Not an #ad, but you can find cute, inexpensive nail polish in Australia here. My favourite is this brand, Sally Hansen Insta-Dry. Go on, reach for a little Instant Happiness! Why not?