THINGS TO DO DURING SELF ISOLATION AT HOME
I can imagine that it can be tough at times to think about what to do when you are self isolating at home. Being the creative person I am, I have brainstormed some ideas and have even actioned some of them. Here is a list of things that you can do at the convenience of your own home! Remember to continue to be creative and enjoy your time at home! All photos were Photographed With Love of course!
1. START A NEW PROJECT
Have you been meaning to complete a personal project at home? Well, now is your chance as you have plenty of time to get the ball rolling. For me, as a photographer, I love to keep my creative juices flowing and find a way to get my camera involved in some ways. Many people usually have kids or pets to photograph at home, but I do not have any kids or pets! So, I decided to think outside of the box and get my cute and cuddly soft toys (also known as my babies) involved. Meet Reiny, my reindeer baby from The Netherlands!
2. LEARN A NEW LANGUAGE
Obviously this is easier said than done, but I am determined to learn a new language during self isolation. For those that don’t know, my husband is Dutch and I have been meaning to learn his language for a really long time. We’ve been together for almost 7 years now and I only know very very little Dutch words, like “How are you” and “Thank you”. My hubby has kindly agreed to help me achieve my goal. Him being a native Dutch speaker is an absolute advantage for me as he will help me with the proper pronunciation. Plus, I will get to practice speaking the language with him. In any case he is not available, I will have Reiny to help tutor me as well!
3. STAY FIT AND HEALTHY
Staying at home and not doing much can be restless and emotionally draining. For me to stay sane, healthy and positive, I have partnered with my hubby and have scheduled a workout at home, 3 times a week, 1 hour each session. He usually does martial arts during the week, and since his martial arts school had to close, he has been teaching me some of the moves and it has been very interesting and exciting for me.
Apart from that, I have just recently joined TikTok and have been quite addicted to it! There are so many things that you can watch and learn. One of the things that I picked up from it was the #PlankChallenge and they have a variety of plank challenges that you can do too! Managed to convince hubby to join in the fun.
4. EDIT PAST TRAVEL PHOTOS
This one in particular have been in the backlog for quite some time now and hubby keeps asking me when our travel photos are going to be done! Now I can finally provide a date to him! I currently have 3 travel photos that needs to be sorted; Europe, USA and Perth! Having this free time at the moment is great as I can catch up with my editing and finally make our travel album! Europe travel photos are done, that leaves USA and Perth. 1 down, 2 to go!
5. MAKE A PHOTO ALBUM
If you have been wanting to create an album of your holidays, family, or even wedding, now is the perfect time! You can spend some time going through your photos and pick your favourites to be part of the album. I made an album for my wedding and absolutely love it. As you can see, you can definitely mix black and white with coloured photos. If you need some help with making a photo album, feel free to reach out.
6. TIDY UP HOME AND REDECORATE
For those that don’t know me, I absolutely love to clean and tidy up the apartment. With that said, we are living in a 1 bedroom apartment, so there’s not much for me to clean apart from maintaining cleanliness and neatness. When cleaning or tidying up the apartment, I often adopt the Marie Kondo approach. Every thing has its place in the apartment and they should always be there. I guess, this is the part where I can be OCD as I need things to be folded in a specific way and placed at a specific place. For instance, when folding the towels, I would always do it in 3 folds, but when hubby does it, he folds it any way that would fit in the towel basket! I often would refold anything that he has folded! In addition to that, Marie Kondo keeps things neat by using proper storage for things and I absolutely love it! I have spent many hours (cumulative, not in 1 trip!) shopping at KMART! They have numerous types of storage options and I love to keep ours simple and easy.
This pretty much ties in with the tidying up of your place simply because as you are tidying up, you will be able to redecorate your house/apartment. You perhaps find photos that you have printed in the past and they are just sitting there in storage instead of being hung up on the wall or in a frame. You could also opt to print some new photos just to refresh the house with new memories.
7. LEARN NEW DANCE MOVES
When I downloaded the TikTok app, I also saw some dance moves that I could potentially try and I managed to get hubby to join in the fun too! This may not be the typical ‘dance’ that you may imagine, but it’s somewhat a dance as they involved many moves and various steps! Here’s what we got up to! The one on the left is the #OhNaNaChallenge and the one on the right is the #HandshakeChallenge. Perhaps we should try some proper dancing!
8. PLAY GAMES
During the isolation period, it’s also a great time to take the board games out and have fun! Over the years, we have collected many games for us to play at home and the newest addition was the UNO Flip and definitely much more interesting than the regular UNO. The best things about these games is that you can play them with your kids to keep them occupied. You can also download fun games directly onto your phone, such as the Charades game below. They have many different categories and is heaps of fun!
9. LEARN NEW RECIPES TO COOK AT HOME
I absolutely love cooking as I find it therapeutic, especially the prepping part and cooking as well of course! Recently there has been a new coffee trend where people are whisking their coffee and turning it into something magical. It’s the Dalgona coffee and you can find the recipe here. It does require some hard work if you are using a whisk to turn it into whipped coffee! I’ve been exploring more dessert options as I rarely make them. Mom forwarded a classic ‘Apam Balik’ recipe, which is the Malaysian sweet pancakes and made it my own version. It involves corns, peanuts and plenty of sugar for sure! I added some Nutella into mine and it was absolutely yummy! My most recent adventure was the Coffee Cake that I discovered from the Nespresso site. It is super easy and simple to make and you can find the recipe here. Give a try and let me know how you go.
10. RECONNECT WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS
Then there’s of course no better time to reconnect with your family and friends. We have to embrace the new future, so why not? So many options to pick from, FaceTime, video call, Zoom, you name it! So make it enjoyable and stay in touch! So take care and stay safe everyone!
