Not gonna lie, waking up at 6 am everyday is hard. Especially in quarantine, on holidays and especially for the first week its very hard. The first day was okay because we had made the promise to ourselves that we were going to get up. It felt very spontaneous as we hadn't done any planning at all so we did spend some time sitting around saying "what are we going to do next?" but what we did do was really good. Due to it being our first day, we did a lot of admin; I set up a money tracking page for both of us, made a shopping list, created a weekly planner spread sheet and wrote out a big huge to do list of things I had to do and learn in this strange quarantine holiday break period thing.
Overall, the first day left us feeling really motivated to continue. We struggled to get to bed at 9 like we said we were going to because we got so stuck into the work that we were doing. We had decided to treat ourselves to Mexican food for dinner and Uber eats messed it up so that took a while to sort out and then we sat down with a friend to watch Phantom of the Opera 25th Anniversary performance because it is a favourite in our house. We ended up going to bed late but sometimes thats the reality of life.
Tuesday was a tough day to get out of bed. Apparently you can turn off your alarm and fall asleep again without remembering. I know because I did it and then I only actually woke up when Sophie texted me. After that, it was a really productive day and I got everything on my to do list done (including over an hour of singing practice which was really good to get done). Tuesday we managed to get to bed fairly on time as well. Its amazing how just shifting your life hours forwards can make you so productive and fulfilled. Not going to lie we were also exhausted at the same time.
Wednesday, I found, was really easy to get out of bed. Our walk was really lovely and we managed to catch the sunrise which I think gave us a little bit more motivation to keep going. There's nothing quite like the sunrises and sunsets here in Perth. I got almost everything that I wanted to done. I also managed to film my duet which meant I could concentrate on other things. Wednesday taught us that we can't schedule everything. As we were leaving uni we ran into our friends and had a really good chat (1.5m away of course). It absolutely wasn't planned and yes, it cut into our time doing other things and yes, we ate dinner later than planned but in a time like this, its so important to keep in contact with your loved ones and people who bring so much joy into your life.
Thursday was the same as every other day. We went for our walk, came home, ate brekky and we were productive. I was able to go and do some dance as well which was really fun and therapeutic. I found I was working harder and I had more energy then I did while we were sort of just doing whatever we wanted whenever we wanted, not stetting alarms and things like that.
Friday was a tough day to say the least. Getting out of bed was fine and we got our coffee on our morning walk but as the day went on it got harder. I got some work done in the morning and a close friend dropped some (very yummy) bagels off on their morning bike ride, which was very thoughtful of them to check in on us in such a time. I had a very hard singing lesson in which I felt kind of useless because I had no idea what was going on the entire time because I am a music theatre student and we have been working through the Vaccai vocalises and the recitative vocalise at the end of the book is very challenging, even for the classical students. So that kind of put a stump on my day. While I spent a few hours kind of moping around, I also got some things done. I tried to do some school work but my brain wasn't in the right mode to do any academia so I decided to do some more domestic tasks instead. I did things that I'd normally do on a Friday such as my washing and cleaning, I also made a little collage of 'rainy day reminders' on our fridge because I don't want anyone else in my house feeling like they aren't good enough or they don't know whats going on. It was a kind of therapy for me to write out little positive things for others because it also was a sort of self reminder that positivity is a choice and its what you make of the 'bad' things that matters.
Saturday was an unplanned day. What we had planned, only sort of got done and then a whole lot of other things happened during the day. We started off with a stretch to try out my fitness assignment program. We then made some brekky and started work on our blog. I was falling asleep working on some posts so I got up and went into my room. While I was in there, I found some things that I needed that I was wanting to get our of my suitcases and I put some washing away. After this, I was more awake and able to concentrate on the work that I was doing. I smashed out a couple of blog posts before we went to get ingredients to make scones and do our meal planning. After we made our scones, a friend came upstairs to us and watched a movie and then a few more people came up for drinks. We went to bed really late, like 1am late. It was a real challenge to stay up until 1 but it was a good night with our friends. I think this just goes to show how much our social lives impact our sleeping patterns. It reminds us that things come up and sometimes you do just stay up and have a bottle of wine until 1 and talk about life and that's okay!
Sunday was a late start. We woke up at 7am and stayed in bed for another 20ish minutes. I got up first and started cleaning up and making our pre-planned pancakes. After a wholesome brekky, we went shopping and did our groceries for the week. When we got home, we emptied out our cupboards and rearranged them so now they are all completely organised. We had some lunch and then I went to uni where I was at uni for about 4 hours and then came home and ate dinner and did some weekly admin. I crashed really easily because I was SO tired from staying up late the night before but as long as you catch up on the sleep, its fine. Sunday was a fairly slow day but I love that we were able to be so domestic.
Overall, this week has taught me a lot about who I am as a person and who I have the potential to be. Getting up at 6am has been a good way to kickstart my productivity. I used to think that I would never become a morning person and don't get me wrong, getting out of my cozy bed to go for a walk when its freezing cold is really hard - but the fact that i have someone to do it with is really motivating and makes it so much more enjoyable. Obviously I know that when uni goes back I will have to adjust this routine because of my schedule but I don't mind so much because I will still be established in this routine. I have loved being able to learn new skills (Sophie is teaching me how to cook because I never learned) and having more time during my day to get stuff done. Ultimately, I think its changed my life for the better and I can be more productive now, which is something that year 12 really took out of me.
~ Carolyn xo
