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My creative week - the tale of two hot tubs!

This week my husband and I had the week off! Which may make you think that I didn't do anything creative but that's not the case! In fact I found it really helpful to take a step back from being busy and have some time to relax. And, as you can see, I did still work a bit - the trials of being self-employed!

Monday 20th November 2017
My husband Gary and I drove to Loch Fyne in the Highlands of Scotland. I say we drove, I can't drive so I was in charge of the music. And snacks.


Loch in the Highlands. Photo by Gary Ullah

The drive takes about 3 hours from home in good traffic and we made good time. It was foggy but we stopped off on the way for some photos (Gary is a photographer). We were visiting our favourite spot, a place called Portavadie. Gary found Portavadie last year as it's near where we got married and we stayed there the night before we went to our lovely wedding cottage. We were impressed then and this trip is our third visit (and there will be more!)

This is by far our most favourite hot tub! The views of Loch Fyne are stunning and the infinity pool (at the back of the photo) is also really warm and inviting, especially on a cold November in Scotland when it's raining!


Portavadie photo from Trip Advisor
Work wise - despite poor phone reception I had a phone interview with the Daily Mail. Not sure how that's going to pan out so we'll see, I'll keep you posted.

Tuesday 21st November 2017
As it is out of peak season we had a studio apartment this time rather than a lodge room and it's definitely our favourite type of room now. We had our own kitchen but the biggest revelation is that we had further spa access to an upstairs area we didn't know existed! It has lovely loungers with a view over the loch and we spent some time here reading. It also has an additional sauna, steam room and hydropool.
I didn't take my phone or ipad with me as I wanted to relax and not get caught up with checking the internet all the time but I did keep checking my email when we got back to the apartment to see if I'd heard anything about the desk I want to rent. Still nothing. Sigh.

Wednesday 22nd November 2017
Our last day at Portavadie but we managed to sneak in some more hot tub action! It is cold and rainy but the sauna is nice and warm.


Snow in the Highlands photo by Gary Ullah
A few more stops for photos on the way home. There's snow on the peaks now.
We got caught in traffic which kind of ruins the chilled out hot tub vibe unfortunately!

Friday 24th November 2017
Still no word on the desk space. It's been more than a week and I had had such high hopes. Oh well.
It's Black Friday which doesn't really mean too much in the UK but it seems to be something that retailers have taken to! I did notice some great offers for metal clay artists and so I wrote a blog post about them called Five fantastic Black Friday offers for metal clay artists and I shared it on some facebook forums and it's gone wild! Over 660 views at the moment and it's still rising! Obviously I hit a popular topic today!

We decided to try out the One Spa in Edinburgh. So this is hot tub number two for the week! Well, it's more of a hydrapool but it has bubbles!



The spa has lots of different facilities including saunas and steam areas. We did enjoy it but it is quite expensive so more of a treat than an everyday place!

Saturday 25th November 2017
And then this morning I got the message that the desk space is mine! Fantastic. I had continued to hope that this would be the case and I think having to wait a while meant that I won't take it for granted (although I move in next week and then spend 10 days in London so not sure I'm going to be able to get my money's worth in December! Oh well!).

I had other things to do today too, I was demonstrating silver clay jewellery making at The Art Club, Edinburgh

Set up to demonstrate making silver clay jewellery at The Art Club, Edinburgh
It was good fun and I have some of my jewellery available for sale there now until christmas.

Sunday 26th November 2017
The last day of our holiday and we had already booked to visit the Botanic Gardens Christmas at the Botanics light trail it's a cold day so wrapping up warm was very necessary! Our ticket was for 4.40pm and it was already dark! I really enjoyed the singing trees and the lights cast by the disco balls. It's definitely worth seeing and I hope to take my parents when they visit.

So, what a busy holiday week! More to come next week!

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