A lockdown Christmas

So this Christmas did not go how I initially wanted it to go or had planned, but with the global pandemic and all, it’s been the best it could be. Unless you have been living under a rock for well over a year now, Covid-19 has taken over the world and has changed a lot of our lives. We’ve gone through quite a lot and have experienced things we would never of expected to. From a national lockdown to 2020 ending in Tiers (pardon the joke, I had too), from toilet roll going almost extinct and day time drinking became a normal thing; there’s no more “It’s 5pm somewhere” now “why the f*** not?!”. Countless hours on zoom and TikTok our generation has surely changed. I’ve almost forgot what it feels like to be surrounded by a crowd of people at a gig or in a bar/club, which is sad. And with Covid Christmas markets were cancelled, including Winter Wonderland.

Harrods lights

Around Christmas me and my boyfriend normally spend our weekends going through our winter ‘check-list’ and with Winter Wonderland being closed that had to be scratched off. We still managed to do a few things though:

• Christmas at Kew Gardens
• Christmas lights throughout London
• Covent Garden
• Leicester Square
• Trafalgar Square
• Piccadily Circus
• Carnaby Street
• Harrods

Christmas at Kew Gardens

We had booked this in July/August as soon as it got released as tickets always sell out quite quickly, obviously with covid and the ever changing regulations we weren’t 100% sure if it would go ahead, but luckily we got to go just in time! We went on the Friday before the Saturday when London went into Tier 4 which meant Botanical Gardens (e.g. Kew Gardens) would close.

Some things were the same as the year before (just as nice & magical!) but there were some new features too! It was probably the best i’ve seen (Was my third time), it took us an hour and a half to walk around the trail, we only stopped a couple times to get some hot chocolate and mulled wine.

Carnaby street

This is the fourth year me and graham have gone to Carnaby street at Christmas and if I’m totally honest, it was my least favourite display compared to the previous years’ ones. This years theme was ‘Choose Love’ and was a very basic display of pink/purple signs with positive affirmations on them.

Covent Garden/Leicester Square/Trafalgar Square/Piccadily Circus

These had the same displays they normally have but nevertheless was still nice to walk around and see them all again.

Thank you for reading this post! I hope you have all had a good Christmas or the best you could of had considering the pandemic.

Stay safe 🙂 x

My Netflix to watch list

I don’t know about you but during lockdown i watched Netflix more than usual, although I have always loved watching Netflix, more free time meant more watch time. Which in turn, meant I could watch more series/movies.

I personally love reading about what series and films other people watch so I thought I’d do my own. (I do think ive done a post similar to this before, but oh well).

Let’s start off with the series I would recommend:

• The Umbrella Academy (Season 1 & 2) – if you haven’t heard about it (I highly doubt it as it is super popular) then you definitely need to give it a watch; it might take a few episodes to get into it though.
• Good Girls – I don’t think this is overly popular but it is really good and quite funny, it’s better than you’d first expect.
• The Vampire Diaries (all 8 seasons!)- I have loved this series since it first came out on ITV2, I remember I used to watch it when I was younger with my parents, since growing up ive rewatched it twice, once more recently as I kept on seeing it on TikTok so I decided to rewatch all EIGHT season, totally worth it. I would highly recommend this but obviously if vampires aren’t your thing then maybe not… however there are lots of eye candy *cough cough* Ian Somerhalder, Paul Wesley…the list goes on, so maybe just watch it for them.
• The Originals (5 seasons) – I’m currently watching this now and am loving it! if you like the vampire diaries you’ll love this!
• Dynasty – it’s a remake of an old series, I haven’t seen the older version but this one is brilliant. It’s funny, witty, romantic and dramatic.
• Gossip Girl (xoxo) – this is a classic and i’m actually planning on rewatching it even though I know who the gossip girl is, its just so good.
• The Witcher – didn’t think I’d enjoy this but I was hooked, would definitely recommend.
• The Bodyguard – another series I didn’t expect to enjoy but it took me by surprise, also doesn’t hurt that Richard Madden is in it.
• Emily in Paris – this is very popular at the moment and I have seen mixed reviews but personally I loved it.
• The Haunting of Hill House/Bly manor – if you like horrors then I would 100% recommend these series; although the second one is not as scary or as creepy as the first its still really good and gripping.
• The Kissing Booth 1&2 – cheesy feel good movie
• The Holidate – again, a cheesy feel good movie

As you can see recently I have watched a lot of series and I can’t remember the other films I watched but there was definitely more. I also watched some series that I wouldn’t watch again or recommend to others which are:

• Big mouth
• Ratched

and there are some series that I haven’t watched yet but am planning to which are:

• Lucifer
• Cursed

What are you watching at the moment and is there anything you’d recommend?