little white truths

I'd considered writing my monthly positives post a few days ago, but I recently learned that a dear friend has passed away - so I've been grappling with that and I expect it will take some time.

When you hear that a good person, only 45, with two young kids has died via what we can only call a tragic accident, you start to ask yourself some pretty hard questions. Why would I bring kids into this world? Was he happy in the moments before he left us? How will his family cope? How long do I myself have left and am I making the best of whatever time I do have? Am I doing enough for the greater good?

While it's true that I've lost older relatives before, as most of us must have, this is the first time I've lost someone who shouldn't have gone and I can tell you that it's different. It offends the natural order of things. It stops you in your tracks. It writes the end to a story in indelible ink, a story that you wish you could have changed.

I've decided that writing a monthly positives post might be a good idea today. It won't be easy, but here goes.

We've discovered Counterpart

There are few things better than discovering a new TV show and that's been Counterpart for us. We watched the first season recently and it's got to be the best show we've discovered in a long while. It might even be more engaging than The Bureau, if perhaps not as cleverly scripted, and I can't recommend it enough.

While we're currently watching season two of both Westworld and The Handmaid's Tale, those haven't quite hit the mark for me - unfortunately everything these days gets compared to Game of Thrones, which is never going to be a favourable point of comparison - but Counterpart filled something of a gap for us and both my husband and I really liked it. Can't wait for more. If you don't have good TV to get lost in, you're in trouble. Or at least I am.

This time next week, my tax will be done

Yes it's a boring heading but it's overtaken my life these past two months so it deserves to be noted. I'm self-employed so I do all my own tax, and while it has always been one of those tasks that I've dreaded, it's become even more of an issue after children because it's so hard to find the time for it.

I'm getting there. I have perhaps four months left of my outgoings and my other spreadsheets are finalised, so we can probably say that I've only got about one quarter of the lot to go. Considering what a difficult few weeks we've had, I reckon that's pretty good going. It certainly wasn't easy to pick things up again after that dreaded trip to Halls Gap and the loss of my friend soon after, that's for sure. For better or worse, life must go on.

My makeup inventory numbers are looking good

Yesterday I wrote my updated makeup inventory post (see here) and I've successfully cracked less than 90 individual items and less than 150 pans, so I've absolutely made progress and I've already hit my goals for 2018. Perhaps it's time to revise them.

While I had considered dropping my goals even further, for now I think I'll leave them and let myself get a few things for my birthday without worrying too much about what this will do to my overall numbers. Later on this year I might reduce my goals, but for now I've made good progress and that's something to celebrate. Going forward the aim will be to avoid letting things get out of hand, and that's a good-enough aim for me at the moment.

I may be able to change-up Pan that Palette before the end of the year

This is something I haven't talked about yet so you heard it here first: as soon as I finish either my Hourglass blush palette or my Burberry eyeshadow quad, I intend to replace it so I can get stuck into something else and make good progress before next year's challenge.

While in many ways it would be nice to free-up some space in my panning rotation so I can just use what I want to use, I've decided that I would prefer to at least make a start on something else before the new panning year. This won't mean that I can't use other things, but it will mean that next year won't look quite so daunting when it rolls around. Panning isn't easy, so that has to be a good thing.

In sum

While this hasn't been the most positive (or interesting) of all my monthly positives posts, I think the biggest positive is that I actually managed to write it.

The loss of my friend has thrown everything into disorder, and with young kids who rely on me to stay relatively 'together', it's been hard to find the space to grieve. But I do need to find it - it's the only way to move forward - and I expect that to happen in the coming weeks.

During this time I will try to keep blogging, but forgive me if things fall to the wayside a little while I sort myself out.

Hope all's well with you, and speak soon x

* All images courtesy of unsplash.com