Good Things To Do While You’re Stuck At Home

I hope you are all doing as best as possible during this tough time that we are all going through. Here’s an update from our front, please let us know how you are doing and what you are going to do while you are stuck at home, we’d love to hear. I’m working from home and Michael’s work is closed, so he’s trying to stay busy with some online gaming, and he’s figured out how to play Dungeons and Dragons remotely today. We’re staying home as much as possible, heading out to the park here and there, and definitely keeping a safe distance from others. My parents are still out of the country in New Zealand, with a flight home this week, and we’ll be glad to have them home, and at least the area they are in hasn’t reported cases. Michael’s parents are in Qualicum, his father would normally be working at the golf course, but he’s staying home to stay safe. My sister’s family is in Kelowna, she has teenagers that missed out on competing in the National Freestyle skiing competition they qualified for, but they are making the best of it by getting out for some exercise. My nephew hiked up the ski hill with his skis and skied down, he missed skiing so much.

However, there are so many more people locally and internationally that are in far worse circumstances and we couldn’t be more thankful for all those that are out there helping the people who are actually sick, with the virus, or with other medical emergencies that are happening at the same time. We feel for those who have lost work, wages, tips, salaries, contracts and more, and we are glad to be hearing there’s relief coming, although it can’t come fast enough. We are relieved to see the grocery shelves still stocked and we have our farmers, truckers, bakers, artisan producers, grocery store employees and anyone doing their part to literally put food on the shelves to thank! We’re blessed to have all we physically need to survive and aren’t taking that fact for granted.

While it’s easy for me to just escape at this time, have that extra glass or, ahem, bottle, of wine, I’m going to try to make the best of things and get my home in order, get some exercise in, catch up on the finances and perhaps learn a few new skills. I’ve put together a few resources that I’m using to keep myself on track, so thought I’d share my list of what to do while you are stuck at home. Let me know what else I could add.

Cleaning Up

This is going to take a while here, we’ve got a lot of stuff to manage, but I’m sorting through things and am hopeful that I can part with some items. We’ll be having a culinary garage sale at some point, a fundraiser for Les Dames d’Escoffier scholarships for women’s initiative, so if you have anything to donate, let us know. If you can’t store it for now we’ll figure out how to pick it up and store it until later.

A great resource for spring cleaning comes from our friend, Leslie Rossi of A Life Well Consumed, who’s been getting her home in order as she’s about to have a baby. Here’s her Spring Cleaning Guide Checklist. We’re very fond of the aroma and effectiveness in the Fruits and Passions Cucina Dish Detergent and All Purpose Cleaner in Lime Zest and Cypress, and the Aspen Clean Line of cleaning cloths, cleaning supplies and laundry detergent.

Learn Something New

There’s lots of ways to learn a new skill right now. edX is an online platform for education and learning. Founded by Harvard and MIT, edX is home to more than 20 million learners, the majority of top-ranked universities in the world and industry-leading companies. Check out their courses here.

Brainstation has online learning courses, I’m about to start one in Web Design, and they also have courses on social media, digital marketing, data, design and product management. I took the digital marketing course at the school and learned a ton.

If you are a member of the Vancouver Public Library, check out Lynda, an  online education database offering over 5,000 video courses by top experts in many fields including web design, business/marketing, software development, photography, video/music/audio editing, 3D animation, graphic design and more.  Unfortunately you have to have an account pin and have registered before, and the library is now closed, so you can’t remedy this if you aren’t already registered. AND of course, I can’t find my card, or remember if I  had logged in. Another reminder that being organized ahead of time would have been a prudent move. I’m finding many of these reminders in this time and I’m not overly impressed with my lack of general preparedness for a lot of things. Hindsight is golden. UPDATE – I’ve tweeted them and have a number to call to remedy, number is busy, but it’s a start. Thanks VPL.

LinkedIn Learning offers courses on business, software, technology, and creative skills, and they’re even featuring a course on Time Management, Working From Home right now. I’m thinking about learning Adobe Creative Suite, more SEO, photography and photo editing and maybe more excel tips and tricks.

Exercise

I’ve been in a phase of being rather lazy of late; I’m one of those people that go through phases where I it together fitness-wise and then fall off the fitness wagon completely. I’m going to take this time to set some goals and take better care of myself and my body. I’m heading out for a walk today, and I’m also looking for some online fitness routines as well. Here’s a few I’m finding useful.

Fitbit has given me a premium membership for 90 days, which is great, however my Ionic Fitbit heart rate monitor hasn’t been working properly since August and their response has been “we can’t offer or send you another device since we have an existing issue with heart rate” “It was a reported issue that our team is working on”. I’m not wearing it right now, and the monitor shouldn’t read a heart rate, but it reads 59, and when I wear it, it shows that my heart rate is 155 and more when I am in resting mode. If only I was burning those 5,000-6,000 calories a day that it’s telling me that I am; I’d be at my goal weight within a week, two max. But thanks for the workouts and the membership anyhow! 

Another resource is Fitblender, which has a variety of HIIT videos, pilates, yoga and cardio, and you can choose options such as no equipment or mat workouts.  There’s also a list from Narcity of Canadian gyms offering free online classes, find that here, and SB Nation has a list of some free and paid classes including yoga, total body and dance, check that out here. Lots of workouts available to do while you are stuck at home.

Cooking and Baking

Flour stocks were low at my local store late last week, but I’m sure they’ll be filled up again by now and I know that at Flourist , on Commercial Drive they have take out flour and are now offering free local delivery of all of their 100% traceable grains, beans, and freshly milled flours! They even have sourdough starter and I’m in the process of baking a loaf with their Red Spring Wheat Flour. Here’s a great guide from the Clever Carrot on how to make your own sourdough, and a couple recipes for the sourdough discard from King Arthur’s Flour here. 

There’s tons of great recipes on Closet Cooking, including this one for Sesame Chia Banana Bread that uses up that excess bunch of bananas you might have bought, and I’ve been pining recipes like they’re going out of style of late on my own pinterest boards here. There’s a few recipes on Good Life Vancouver here too, but it looks like I need to reorganize that section a bit as there’s some weird dropdowns to fix, another task for me to do while home!

We’ve also taken some of the hassle of shopping right now off the table with an extra meal from Fresh Prep Food Delivery this week. Click here to get three free meals for yourself. You can even order add on proteins, bread and more.

Self Pampering

Now’s the time to use the good stuff you’ve been saving for that rainy day. Indulge in bubble baths with bath salts or foam, we luckily picked up some Meadowfoam bath salts and luxe body butters at the Wellness Show and have lots of stock. Maybe it’s time for a facemask,  try the Bl’Eau Glacial Ocean Clay Detox Mask, or make your own from household supplies with recipes here. We’re also taking a little extra care with our skin and have splurged on the Elizabeth Arden Advanced Ceramide Capsules Daily Youth Restoring Serum, our goal is healthier, younger looking skin right now.  We’ve also been loving the newest Active Clay Cleaner from Dermalogica, a prebiotic cleanser that helps balance oily skin, and calm redness, and their new Biolumin-c Eye Serum, a supercharged Vitamin C eye cream, that brightens and firms skin around the eyes. We’ve got a couple Jade Facial Rollers that we’ve put near the couch and have been using them while watching TV. Herbivore Botanicals have a wide selection of Facial Tools to help step-up your natural skin-care routine in 2020.

A Few More Things

Ways you can help your neighbours right now from Fatherly here. 

Check out new releases on Netflix, Amazon Prime and stay tuned for more on what to do while you are stuck at home.