I loved writing the blog post about the small moments of hope I found during my depression and eating disorder relapse. It made me want to turn it into a weekly series — documenting everything that kept me going and all the moments of comfort in my week.

It’s true that even in the darkest times – and this week has been ESPECIALLY dark – there can be little glimmers of light. They may be small and don’t fix anything — like expecting a tealight to light up your pitch black house — but they still mean so much to me.

When I’m feeling absolutely TERRIBLE, it’s not just the big things that help me push through. It’s also the small moments of comfort — whether it’s enjoying a delicious cup of tea, overcoming a fear food, or making a brand new macramé bag for my Jellycats. These little moments don’t fix anything, but they make a massive difference.

I Found My Favourite Tea.

This week, I ordered a Bird & Blend gift box with four different flavours of tea to try. On the third one, I found my favourite tea of all time.

I have expensive tea tastes, so I actually sold a Jellycat bear to pay for the set. I haven’t bought tea for a long while due to financial reasons, but tea really helps me. It’s something I can still enjoy now even in the midst of my eating disorder relapse.

Supermarket tea is 90% dust, and I hate most of them. I’ve always LOVED TeaPigs, but I’ve wanted to try Bird & Blend for ages.

Here’s a mini-review:
Bird & Blend teas are overpriced for what they offer. The teas are weak and watery — you need two tea bags per cup to get any flavour, and even then, it’s still faint. It’s disappointing because they smell incredible, but the dominant flavour is just… water. Leaving the bag in for AGES didn’t help — I had to double up, steep forever, and squeeze the bags repeatedly to get any real taste.

My favourite though was Moondrop Dreams. With two tea bags, it actually tasted like tea. It’s delicious and earthy, with rooibos, lavender, lemon, apple, rosehip, and orange peel. One of my favourite tea flavours ever. But I won’t buy it again. Using two bags per cup makes it way too expensive, so I’ll stick to TeaPigs, which actually have flavour without needing double the amount.

Bird and Blend is less flavourful than the dusty supermarket ones, and I personally think it’s an absolute joke to charge so much more than Twinings. Still, I really enjoyed Moondrop Dreams while it lasted, and I have a few bags left for some more cosy cuppas this week.

I Challenged The Cheese Hot Cross Bun and Won

For months, I’ve avoided cheese due to my eating disorder – cheese is on Clippy’s ABSOLUTELY NOT list – and I’ve really missed it. But when Marks and Spencer introduced cheesy hot cross buns for Easter, I couldn’t resist trying them, despite Clippy’s rage-fuelled PowerPoint presentation on why I absolutely should not.

I am a savoury person. I don’t really like dessert or sugary food even when I was in a healthier place with my eating disorder. I’d prefer more meals to a dessert, or even an entire loaf of bread. Cheesy hot cross buns therefore, are definitely something I had to try, and try them I did.

I first tried toasting them with just butter, and they were delicious, though they seemed more like cheesy brioche buns than traditional hot cross buns. Then, I had the brilliant idea to use them instead of regular bread with my pea soup, and it was INCREDIBLE. The combination enhanced both the soup and the buns.

The cheese in these buns is really tasty, and they smell ABSOLUTELY amazing. I think they might also be good with extra cheese and some brown sauce, although I’m not sure if I’m ready to try that yet. It could be a future fear food challenge for me though.

Trying these buns was a big step for me because new foods always make me REALLY anxious, even when I’m at a healthy weight. I’m proud of myself for overcoming my fears and giving them a try. Even though Clippy had things to say, I did it anyway. I ate cheese for the first time in months, and nothing terrible happened. In fact, I actually enjoyed it. That’s a win, even if it doesn’t feel like one yet.

I Made a Macrame Bow and Bag for St. David’s Day

March 1st was St. David’s Day, and as a very patriotic Welsh person, I wanted to celebrate properly. Of course, my Jellycat bears are Welsh too, so I decided they needed a little dark red macrame bow and a matching bag to mark the occasion. I also picked up some Welsh cakes to create a cute little photo scene because what’s St. David’s Day without Welsh cakes?

Making macrame has been really difficult lately because of how exhausted I’ve been, but I was determined to push through. I’m so glad I did because the finished pieces turned out adorable. The dark red shiny thread makes them look really stylish, and I love how tiny macrame accessories look on my bears and Beean Beeale. I use 1mm macrame thread and follow the same pattern I created for my larger macrame bags — due to this the small ones take just as long to make. There’s a lot less visible progress compared to larger macrame pieces, which can be frustrating at times, but the end result is always worth it.

I also bought daffodils to complete the St. David’s Day setup, but they didn’t even bloom before they died (thanks, supermarket flowers). I always get a bit sad when flowers don’t last, which is why I rarely buy them. But even without them, the little photo scene turned out so cute! My bear and bee look absolutely perfect with their new accessories, and I’m really happy I pushed through the fatigue to make them.

St. David’s Day is about celebrating Wales, and I think my plushies did just that. Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus!

My Bears Became TikTok Stars (Well, Sort Of)

Okay, so they didn’t exactly go viral, but my bears are thriving on TikTok. Hardly anyone watches my videos, but honestly, that’s not the point. I had so much fun making them.

This week, I put together a few little videos — one featuring our bees, another for St. David’s Day, and a mini day in the life vlog starring Beean Beeale. Just watching them back made me smile.

I’ve always loved making little videos of my plushies, but most of the time, they either sit on my phone forever or get posted to my Instagram stories before disappearing into the void. Eventually, my iCloud starts screaming at me, and I have to delete a bunch just to make space. Now, at least, they have a proper little home.

My bears are ridiculously cute, and I love creating tiny stories with them. Maybe I’m just a big kid at heart, but considering my childhood wasn’t exactly fun, it’s nice to finally let myself enjoy these silly, wholesome moments.

I’m not in it for views or likes. My social media, much like this blog, is just a way to document my existence. If people come along for the ride, that’s cool — but I’m not about to post things just to chase engagement. I’d much rather make genuine connections.

Since WordPress won’t let me embed TikToks (sigh), you can watch them [here]. Hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed making them!

Lights Missing From This Post To Avoid Repetition.

My son was amazing and even though he was struggling with burnout came to meet me after my medical appointment. I appreciated that so much. You can read all about that here. We also went to Starbucks and took Beean Beale to see some flowers. Also my medical was fine so far, still waiting on blood test results but my heart despite having low heart rate occasionally is okay.

To help cheer my son up, I made him some more brownies, because it doesn’t have to be your birthday to enjoy brownies, it can just be a random Thursday. He was so appreciative.

I have been obsessed with gherkins for some reason, and have eaten two entire jars of them. I have become a feral gherkin goblin munching them straight from the jar.

What were your moments of light this week? I’d love to hear about them.

For St Davids Day reasons, here’s my favourite Catatonia song:-