• Life
May, For Me
MAIN HIGHLIGHTS
Travel
- 🚂 We finished off interrail trip around Europe, with Darren joining us at our final two stops in Hamburg and Paris.
- 💙 On our trails, we finally met up with Georgie and Nick.
Daily life
- 🙌🏻 Most of this month has been adjusting into my daily routine again
- 👨👩👧👧 Seeing my family again after travelling for so long was much needed
- 🎟 Watching End Game for the second time and wanting a different ending 🤪
- 🏡 Securing our next apartment! It’s an upgrade and is cheaper. Win.
- 💻 Reflecting on my progress at work
- 🤧 Caught a bug – was left not feeling too great near the end of the month, but seeing the better side now. I spent the bank holiday weekend getting better in Sheffield, which I have to say helped a lot.
- 🌿Attended my first Leeds DevOps meet-up and heard from some fantastic speakers around Severless Chaos and Toxic Work Environments.
- 💙I worked on an article with BBC Bitesize for Mental Health Awareness Month. I shared my experiences during a difficult time, and how I overcame them. This was such an honour to share and raise awareness of what help is out there! 🙏
Online
- 💜 I finally had the chance to update my “About” page again.
- ☁️ I’ve been writing up my blog posts and editing videos to document our trip 😊 One more left to go! But here’s what on the blog now: Budapest, Vienna, Prague and Hamburg.
3 THINGS I’M HAPPY ABOUT
1️⃣ Meeting Georgie
Ahhh, it happened. I finally met my long-time blogging friend, Georgie. We’ve been reading each other’s blogs since I was first writing about my school crushes, including that boy who threw my Valentines gift in the bin. So, yeah, this was a pretty big deal. 🤪
It still feels so surreal, but it happened. I have photos and videos to prove it! 🤣
I always love it when I have the chance to meet my online friends. The *hugs* comments I’ve left on previous blog or social media posts, actually happened. I just feel super grateful to know such incredible people from a space and community where I feel most accepted and comfortable 🥺
It was amazing to meet Pauline after years of knowing each other on the internet 🧡 Blogging has changed and become very commercial since we started blogging like diaries/journalling – we still do this, and it’s why I advocate for doing this still. Real friendships are formed 💖
— Georgie Luhur Cooke (@georgiecel) 1 May 2019
You can read all about how it went down on my blog post on Hamburg where we met.
I’m a little sad that I couldn’t catch Georgie again in London because of sickness. But I will cherish the moments we had together in Hamburg and on the plus side, I’ve never been more motivated to make a trip to her side of the world. 🐨
2️⃣ Travelling around Europe
Doing an interrail has always been something I’ve wanted to do.
I’m so happy that I have had the opportunity to do so around Europe with Matt (and Darren at the end of our trip.) There were so many incredible experiences during the trip – trying out Airbnbs for the first time, navigating different cities every few days, figuring out public transport and train platforms and trying to blend in with the locals as much as possible.
This trip has definitely improved my confidence. I mean if I can navigate the often confusing public transport links in a different city, I can do anything.
3️⃣ Progress at work
Shortly after I returned to work, I had the opportunity to do some reflection on my progress so far in my current rotation. It was nice to see how far I’ve come since I joined both the company (8 months ago) and the team (3 months ago.) I also had some great feedback; woohoo to self-development gold ✨
But wow, 8 months has passed! Time flies – I’m doing my best to make the most of the resources and learning opportunities that I have in each rotation.
On a related note, my photo was included in one of our internal emails and an internal event this month which was pretty cool. 😎
MAY IN PHOTOS
#PAWSITIVITY
It’s moments like these I’m a little blown away/overwhelmed that my message has reached people.
— Pauline P. Narvas 🐾 (@paulienuh) 20 May 2019
Admittedly at first I was a little embarrassed, but then I am *so* proud of what I’m creating and building here. I grew up on the internet, so this was pretty special. 💜
MAY FAVOURITES
- 🗺 My favourites this month has to include all of my travel favourites from last month. Check them out here.
- 🙌🏻 I’m all caught up with Brooklyn Nine Nine! Enjoying Season 6
- 🏠 Matt and I started watching Tiny House Nation on Netflix, and have been inspired by what is possible with tiny.
- 🎧I literally can’t get Lizzo out of my head. Queen.
- 🧘🏻♀️I finished listening to the Headspace audiobook, and can’t recommend it enough for those interested in understanding the power of mindfulness and meditation. There were some really interesting stories and concepts in there!
QUOTE OF THE MONTH
NEXT MONTH
- Next trip is to the Greek Islands, I can’t wait for a trip that is a bit more relaxing!
- It’s my birthday month 🎉
Wishing you all a fantastic month ahead!
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