Life in Lockdown part 4

Well, not much has changed since I last wrote, I've just been taking each day as it comes and not worrying about tomorrow. 

At the beginning of June God gave me Matthew 6:34 which reads "So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today" and this is just what I've been living by for the past month. It has just really helped me to chill out and enjoy each thing as I do it. Last month I spent several moments being still, doing nothing or sitting and listening to God. It was so peaceful and the moments that I have had with God in being still have been so amazing and God has taught me so much. I hope in this next month I only learn more.

So, what did I actually do in June? I mean not loads, but, more than any other month. As we are slowly getting out of lockdown I've been doing more things and seeing more people, but obviously only outside and still social distancing. It has been so good to talk and chat with other people that aren't my family, I mean I love my family, but I've missed other people. 

So on the 15th of June, we celebrated my mom's birthday by spending it walking around the beautiful Lake District to Grasmere

 

 

 

I spent June doing a lot of art, including my 30-day drawing challenge.

On the 24th we went to spend some time with the people who's bearded dragon we looked after last year. It was a really nice day, just sitting in the sun, cuddling their new baby chickens, and chatting about stuff.

  

To celebrate our friend Rachel's birthday a few of us went over to Wirral Country Park to just chill by the water for a bit. I also did some weird rock 'art', but I don't think you could call it art. However my little bro did make a boat out of stones which sadly I don't have a picture of, but it was cute.

 

Over the end of June I didn't do much, just spent more time painting, I even attempted a Bob Ross painting with my sisters and a friend over zoom. I also did some shopping and bought two maxi dresses which I absolutely love, but apart from that I didn't do much and July has just started so I really haven't been doing much. I'm gonna try read a few books this month. Maybe, as we come out of lockdown, I might start looking for jobs, but I don't know, I'm not worrying about it and trusting in God for each day.

This update wasn't that exciting I know, but if there is anything you want to see me talk about let me know in the comments because these lockdown updates will probably be over next month. 

Thanks for reading.

BeeBee

xxx

Shows that have got me through Lockdown

Well, I'm super bored today, so I thought I'd come on here and write about the shows that I've been watching/finished watching during isolation.

• Rewatched Once Upon a Time

Right at the start of lockdown, I started rewatching OUAT I actually really enjoyed rewatching from the beginning, but I realized how silly the show is. I have a sort of love-hate relationship with it because all the characters do stupid stuff and say stupid things, but I love the story and the nonsense anyway. Plus, I can just laugh at it because the stupidity makes it funny.

• Medici: Masters of Florence

This is an Italian Masterpiece, it's beautifully written. It tells the history of the Medici family in Florence. It's an incredible show that makes me laugh and cry, like really really cry!! The final season played just last month, and in preparation, I rewatched the first two seasons. The final season was so heartbreaking but so incredible. If you want to watch this it's on Netflix in the UK, I highly recommend you do watch it.

• Rewatched New Girl

I watched this last year, but my younger sister started watching it for the first time during lockdown and we basically watched it together. If I ever want a great laugh, this is the show, it's just hilarious and it never fails to make me laugh no matter how many times I've heard the jokes.

• This Is Us season 4

This show is another tear-jerker. I discovered it like 3 years ago and watched 3 seasons, but the fourth one came onto Amazon Prime just last week and I've watched already. This show, I guarantee you will cry at least once with each episode. Although it makes me cry, it is also so heartfelt and relatable and funny. If you want an incredibly written, heartfelt, show to watch, this will have you watching for weeks.

• Brooklyn Nine-Nine season 7

Brooklyn nine-nine is a show I've loved for a long time, season 7 is playing on All 4 at the moment, so every Thursday at nine I cozy up and watch this funny, light-hearted show,

• Avatar: The Last Airbender

I started watching this over 4 years ago with my eldest brother, but I never finished watching it. It recently came onto Netflix and I'm now on the last season, I've been loving it, it is so funny and moving and light-hearted. It's a great feel-good show.

This might have bored you, but it entertained me for a bit, so I don't really care. If you did enjoy this, I recommend you watch all these shows, most of which are on Netflix, apart from This Is Us, which is on Amazon Prime, New Girl is on both at the moment. Well, thanks for reading.

BeeBee

xxx

Life in Lockdown Part 3

Well, the world is a mess and there is a lot of real stuff going on. I feel like so much has changed in me and in the world in just one month. 

First of all, after the last blog post, I really did start to cheer up and get off my butt and enjoy doing things again. I've been enjoying painting and drawing again, in fact, I've just started a 30-day drawing challenge on my art account. I've really been enjoying the sun, some of my family and I went for a sunset walk at Red-Rocks beach the other day. I've also been busy with the last bits of college work, which is a bit boring, but I've almost finished now. I am enjoying most days, as much as I want lockdown to be over, I am coping with it better now than I was a month ago.

I think I've been enjoying this last month a whole lot more because I've really been putting a lot of effort into concentration on my relationship with Christ. I've been using Youversion and podcasts to really help me focus on God and Jesus and to really get to know Him. This past month, in fact, throughout the whole of lockdown, I have put so much time into spending time with Jesus that I am filled with this joy that I can't explain, I'm also filled with peace and confidence. I have this burning in my heart each day to read the word of God and pray and to believe in what I am living for. God has really awakened me to so much during lockdown and my heart has been broken, it has been healed and forgiven and my soul feels so fresh.

I don't think it's just me though, I believe God is on the move. He is awakening hearts and minds of the world to see the truth, to find God's love in all that is going on. We have been praying for revival and awakening, this is it. I feel God's movement within the church and I see it in friends and family. I'm so excited for what God will do this month. Yes, it may be heartbreaking, just as the start of this month has been, but I pray that through it all God's glory will come through. 

A while ago my dad preached on the word 'Breakthrough' and how to get the through, you have to be broken first. This is the breaking and God's about to breakthrough. 

God is on the move, let's take hold of His love and overflow with love to others, let's learn from all of this, let's listen to what God is telling us and showing us. It is time to awaken and give God the glory.

REVIVAL IS IN THE AIR

let's catch it!

BeeBee

xxx

Life in Lockdown Part 2

Well, at this point I'm just doing things to distract myself rather than entertain myself. The things that used to entertain me now bore me because I either do them too much or I'm just doing them to waste time, not because I actually want to be doing it. It's just things like painting my nails, I can't be bothered to do it because I do it too much now. Even Youtube, playing games, exercise, and I hate to say it but reading my bible. It's all just to waste time until isolation is over. I don't really know what to do, but I'm just stuck in this circle of 'I'm going to be motivated and get stuff done today' and then actually just sit on my butt all day doing nothing. I can't get out of this 'I can't be bothered' attitude, but I really want to.

I'm writing my blog today, in hopes that I'll just be able to clear my head out a little bit, just outlay my thoughts and talk about what I've done, what I want to do and in the hopes of it helping me get off my butt, get off screens and do more productive stuff, so lets put some pictures out there of some of the things that have kept me occupied recently.

Well to start with, I've been on many a walk around the park, whether that be by myself, with one sibling or with the whole family. I even jogged around the park last Saturday with my eldest brother.

    

I've also done many a painting. Painting is another thing I want to start enjoying again. I haven't done any for a couple weeks, but I do want to do some again.

  

 

  

I've done other various things throughout the last month. We took a stroll around Crosby beach at one point. I've been painting my nails a lot, doing my henna; every other week I am recording worship for our streamed church services. My mum also got my sisters and I a cactus or succulent each.

    

And then, we've had my eldest brother's birthday last Saturday. We spent the day, mostly, down at the church playing games like human basketball. These are games we don't have room to play in the house, but the church has a lot of space we can play energetic games in, so that's what we did. My brother also spent some of the time making cheesecakes, below is his [very messy] Eaten mess cheesecake. It tasted delicious!

I think that's all the stuff I've done, apart from all that I've been watching stuff. I've just finished a magnificent series called Medici. It's based on the true events of the Medici family and the bank in Florence. Its a brilliantly well written and directed show and I sobbed at the end. I miss the show already. Another thing I've been 'rewatching' is Once Upon A Time. This show, although some of the storylines are very repetitive and the show can be stupid sometimes, I still love it. My younger sister has just started watching New Girl, which is also a great show if you want a good laugh. My older sister and I watched it ages ago and we still love it and laugh at the jokes every time.

Over the next few days, I'm going to try and stay off Netflix and Youtube as much as possible because I want to be doing other things. I have actually also got a little bit of college work to do, so that needs to get done, but also I just want to get off my butt and do something other than stare at a screen, otherwise, I might be addicted to my phone at the end of this isolation and that is not something I want.

Well, this is the end of... Whatever this post was supposed to be. I hope you liked it, or if you didn't then, whatever. I'll probs just keep doing these monthly updates. I mean, hopefully, we'll be out of quarantine by next month, but until then...

BeeBee

xxx

Life in Lockdown

It's finally April!! Is it just me or did March take too long to be over?

As there is nothing else to talk about, let me just talk about quarantine.

For the first couple of weeks, I finished off assignments and since then I've been doing various things. Art, exercise, watching Disney+, reading my bible, praying, online shopping, getting bored, decluttering, and probably more that I can't think of.

Quarantine has been... okay I guess. I can feel myself slowly going mad. Every time I think about the fact that I haven't seen anyone except my family in almost 3 weeks I literally just start screaming internally. Apart from internally screaming every now and then, I'm trying to stay positive.

From a Christian point of view, I believe that the coronavirus is part of something bigger. No, the coronavirus is not a good thing and is affecting a lot of people, but I believe God is using it to start a revival that has been a long time coming and that a lot of people in churches all around the world have been praying for. For me, the whole quarantine side of it has been a really good time to just see the things that are truly important and appreciate the little things. But not only that, it's been really good for my relationship with Christ.

My favourite verse in the bible is Psalm 46:10 - "Be still and know that I am God". It is my favourite verse because it applies to every season and is always reminding to just stop, even for 30 seconds, and remember God and who he is. Through quarantine, there is basically nothing left to do except to be still and know that He is God. I am powerless in this situation, the only thing I can do is stay home to keep others safe, it is only God who can heal the earth of this virus. These past weeks I have felt God in such a new way. I've been more devoted to prayer, to reading my bible and the Lord has blessed me with his presence. Not only this but each morning as I am about to start my day off with social media, God finds a way to use social media to remind me that He is the one I should be starting my day with. For example, last week I woke up, went on social media and the first thing I saw was a post from Steffany Gretzinger saying she had released a new album. This album called Forever Amen is so special. I listened to it straight away and it made me cry and smile and lead me into the presence of Jesus from the first song. I have listened to this album almost every single day and each day it is so fresh. The whole album is about communion with Jesus. Having this connection, breaking bread and drinking wine with the Lord Jesus our Christ. One of the lines in the first song, Remember, says he took the alter and made it a table. This is such a beautiful picture. I love the closeness to Jesus that this picture and the whole album takes us to.
Anyway, enough about the album. It wasn't only that album that God has used to bring me to his presence in the mornings. He has also used things like simple verses people have posted or live streams of people worshipping and talking about new music they've brought out. One morning I even woke up praying. My favourite morning so far since quarantine was the first Sunday of quarantine when I woke up at 6:00am. To start with I was really annoyed, like just why. But then I looked outside my window and saw that it was the beginning of sunrise. So, I decided to get up, get dressed and take a walk around the park at sunrise. I listened to some worship music and really felt that God had just woken me up to see His beauty that he has created. One of the songs I was listening to was Bitter/Sweet by Amanda Lindsey Cook. The lyrics talk about how he makes all things new, he makes winter into spring, He makes the bitter into Sweet. As these lyrics were playing I was just praising God for making the bitterness of a 6am wake up into a sweet moment of beauty and stillness with Jesus.

I am still working out how to spend each morning with God and starting my days right. There are some days where I still get it wrong, a bit like today, but in the end, its always God I come to and he always shows me grace and love. One of the things I've been doing to help myself connect with God in the mornings is devotionals on the YouVersion app. One of the devotionals I've done was about creating 7 healthy habits to help develop spiritual growth. I love the habits and they've really helped me, so I thought I'd share them:

• Keep the vision - This is about reminding yourself of the vision that was first set. It talked about when we make new year resolutions we often don't complete them or we forget about them. Keeping the vision is about setting those goals, seeing God's purpose for your life - loving others and spreading the good news - and to just keep going back and reminding yourself about the vision.
• Relearn How to listen - This is about taking that short amount of time to just listen to God, to sit in his presence and wait for him to speak. 
• Persevere in Prayer - This is pretty self-explanatory. Just keep on praying.
• Read the Word every Day - Again, self - explanatory. 
• Praise God for His daily Gifts - Just praise him for the breath, for the sun, for the warmth, for the activities he gives you, for the gifts you have that he gives you every day.
• Listen to God's voice - In everything, hear God, he is always wanting to speak to us.
• Persevere until you see the fruit - Keep on trying to create these habits, make them Habits and you will see the fruit.

I'm still working on making all of these actual habits, but since reading my bible every day and persevering in prayer and seeking him first every day, I feel at peace and calm. I may be getting easily annoyed and I may be becoming very annoying, but I am trying my hardest to not be annoying and angry and irritable. It's just so hard when you're stuck in the same place for so long.

Anyway, after this long ramble about all sorts of stuff, I hope you found some encouragement or a distraction or just something to do in these days of boredom. I will leave you with these pictures I took when I went for a walk at 6am.

 

 

 

BeeBee

xxx