This week has been a lovely mix of relaxing and starting to explore and socialise again. After a very quiet Sunday, Monday and Tuesday morning of Peter recovering from his ear infection, we hopped on the DLR on Tuesday afternoon and headed down to Oxleas Wood. I’d read online that this was a good spot to see bluebells flowering in the ‘woods’ in South-East London, but we were clearly a little bit early as we only saw a few – and they were growing around a bin so didn’t make the best photo opportunity. Nevertheless, it was a beautiful walk in a green space and just fantastic to get outdoors for a proper walk. We caught the bus up to Greenwich Park afterwards and walked up past the Deer Park and the Flower Garden, where there was a much more impressive selection of spring flowers. By this time though the cold wind was getting into Peter’s ear and he was quite uncomfortable so after a very brisk walk through the park we headed home. We were pleasantly surprised to find the cold justified when we got home and it started snowing! Only a few minutes of flurries and then a bit longer of some drifty snow, and then it disappeared as quickly as it had appeared.

On Wednesday we had the virtual funeral for a friend who we met through Peter’s cousins. His death from a rare form of cancer was a huge shock when we found out in March, having had a virtual New Year’s Eve with him and not realising he’d been diagnosed soon afterwards. I definitely wouldn’t recommend the experience of virtual funerals, as it was a bizarre way of participating, but it was a nice reflection on his life and we were glad that Brian and Paul were able to drive from Huddersfield and Edinburgh to be at the funeral itself.

To distract ourselves from that whole experience, we spent Wednesday booking some little trips – my 30^th birthday train trip that was my gift from Mum and Dad, which we’ve booked for June, and also a weekend away going on some walks for the weekend after this year’s birthday. It’s nice to finally be able to book some things to distract us from everything going on – and with last Monday’s announcement that the next relaxation of restrictions will go ahead tomorrow (12 April) we can look forward to these trips away.

I headed up to Finsbury Park on Thursday to meet up with a friend for a walk through the ‘Parkland Walk’, a trail along an abandoned railway. We ended up finishing it quicker than expected and continued the walk through Highgate Wood and Queen’s Wood, which were both beautiful green spaces as well. It definitely made Shadwell seem even more like a concrete jungle, and made me look forward to our move even more as there’s far more green spaces near the new place. Jesse is a teacher as well, although his school is very different to mine, and it’s always fascinating to hear another year 6 teacher talk about a completely different approach to the UK system.

On Friday Peter and I went to Peckham to check out the garden in Peckham Rye Park, but again found that we seem to be a little early for a lot of the blossom-blooming I’d been hoping for. However, we did spot lots of bluebells, tulips and daffodils and had a lovely walk in the sunshine before heading home for a quiet afternoon and a virtual beer tasting for Pōhjala, an Estonian brewery.

We walked to Greenwich Park on Saturday morning, where we met Lee and Sus and grabbed a takeaway breakfast and coffee before walking around the park. It was extremely brisk and drizzling (classic London spring) but it was a really nice catch up with them as we haven’t seen them face-to-face since December. Once we got home in the afternoon we tuned in for the BrewDog virtual AGM and then made some margaritas and had ribs for dinner. We also started watching The Disaster Artist, James Franco’s film about the making of cult classic ‘worst movie ever’ The Room. We watched The Room on Thursday and it is just so baffling and strange, and Rachel and Stu were telling so many stories about the making of the film as they’ve read the book ‘The Disaster Artist’, which James Franco used to make the film – so we figured we’d better watch the film ourselves. We paused it about halfway through to have a virtual catch up with Paul and Brian and talked through some potential plans for seeing them over the summer for some hikes.

This morning we finished The Disaster Artist, which was actually a really good film. The whole background to The Room is so bizarre that it makes for a great story. We’re planning a quiet day for today, just catching up on bits and pieces and maybe going for walk later.