CURRENTLY LOVING | APRIL 2023

In this series of lifestyle blog-style posts, which I prepare every other month or so (the last one was in February 2023), I share a list of ten things that I’m currently loving. You know, a bunch of my favourite things, things that are bringing me joy, my top ten things of the moment.

 “Things” is always something of a loose term, and that is very evident in today’s list. In fact, two of the ten things aren’t even pictured this time!

While Splodz Blogz is primarily an outdoors and adventure focused blog, or at least I want it to be that way, my currently loving post gives me opportunity to include a few bits that are much less of that – homeware, food, personal care products, anything really. One thing that is always true: my currently loving posts include things that make me smile. And that is why I write it.  

This time around I am chatting about my cool new kicks, some favourite breakfasts and trail snacks, and the way I like to spend my Saturday evenings, amongst other things. I’ll be honest, I had hoped to get this written and scheduled for while I was hiking the Cotswold Way, but I ran out of time – so I’m finishing this post whilst drinking tea and watching my now-much-cleaner hiking socks dry on the washing line through the window.

Currently Loving | April 2023

01 Adidas Approach Shoes

You’ll often find shoes included in my currently loving posts. I can’t help it – I just love shoes!! I used some of the voucher I received as part of my adidas collaboration this year to buy these trainers – for the simple reason that I really liked them.

They are the Terrex Swift Solo Approach Shoes, cost me £100, and they are as bright in real life as they are in the photo. These fantastic looking things are at least designed as outdoorsy shoes, carrying adidas’ outdoor-specific technical Terrex branding.

You’re supposed to wear them for quick hiking on trails, over boulder fields, and up rocky scrambles. I imagine they would be good for those things, the sole is the grippiest I’ve worn for a long time, and they are comfortable and supportive underfoot. But for the time being, these are my casual kicks.

Do you like them? Or is the look (and the colour way) an acquired taste?

If you look at getting some of these yourself, note I had to go up a full size on these whereas I can normally happily buy my normal size in adidas trainers.  

02 Rude Health Chocolate Granola

I’m back eating breakfasts again. I go through stages of enjoying them and not wanting anything until lunch, but at the moment I’m a yes to breakfast. Admittedly, I’m eating breakfast after 9am, having had a couple of hours of my day by that point – this isn’t a get up and eat situation, I rarely want food as soon as I wake up.

Anyway, the currently loving item here is the Rude Health Chocolate Crunch Granola. This might be my favourite granola so far. It is delicious. It’s predominately oats, with some cocoa powder, roasted almonds and toasted coconut – very tasty, with lots of fibre, and no random rubbish.

I generally eat my granola with either kefir (definitely my preference), skyr or natural yogurt, and berries. Have you noticed that these pots don’t come with single use plastic lids anymore? I grabbed myself a pack of these reusable ones from Yeo Valley, which are perfect for kefir, yogurt, cream and other similarly sized pots (including many non-Yeo Valley brands). Very handy, and much more sustainable than chucking one or two away every week.

03 Brazil Nuts and Dried Mango

Here’s a question for you… What’s the best nut? For me that’s such an easy one – the Brazil nut is the most superior of all the nuts. And they don’t even have to be coated in chocolate! My friend tells me I’m wrong though; so go on, what’s your favourite nut?

This entry is specifically about the glorious snacking combination that is the Brazil nut with dried mango. This combo makes for such a great hiking snack – and I took a massive bag full on my hike along the Cotswold Way this last week. I always make sure I have some in the cupboard; not just for hiking, but for any good snacking occasion.

I carry them around in my fantastic airtight pots by Matador, which I included in my most recent gift guide for outdoor lovers – incredibly useful, you should get some!

04 National Outdoor Expo

I’m an Ambassador for the National Outdoor Expo, so what I say here might seem a bit biased, but know that I general did love attending the event back in March.

Billed as one of the biggest outdoor community meet-ups of the year (certainly the biggest I’ve been to), the Expo was all about bringing together inspirational speakers, outdoor technology, heaps of gear, and even some activities to take part in.

The highlight of my weekend was getting to spend some time (and receive a few hugs) from some of my fellow OS Champions and other outdoorsy friends who happened to be at the show. The event was crammed full of positive enthusiasm and inspiration for having an outdoor-adventure focused life, and as in 2022, the event filled my bucket, which is completely down to the people I got to listen to and speak with.

And if nothing else, I do love a bit of merch – my Expo hoodie is the perfect cosy layer, and there is no doubt you’ll see me wearing it quite a lot!  

I wrote some (well, lots) more words about the National Outdoor Expo in my weekly blog episode 112 – I’ve brought these back after a bit of a break and I’d love it if you gave those a read each week.

05 Spring Flowers (not pictured)

Hooray for spring finally getting its act together!! It really has sprung now, which I’m sure you will agree, is rather wonderful. It has felt like a very long time coming this, but as we reach the end of April, the spring flowers are putting on their display.

I am incredibly glad spring is here. I much prefer the longer days and the more colourful surroundings we get in springtime, and it was starting to feel like the durge of winter would never end. And over the last few weeks it has been very satisfying to see all the bulbs I planted back in early autumn last year grow and flower. I’ve got some amazing-looking tulips of all different colours and varieties in my garden, and I will definitely be planting even more later this year to make spring 2024 even more colourful.

I could have cut a few tulips and put them in a vase to represent this currently loving entry, but I quite like the variety of colour I can see through my patio doors, so I decided not to include it in the flat lay. You can have this photo of bluebells I took during my Cotswold Way hike instead. Will you get out bluebell hunting this week?  

06 Saturday Night Takeaway (not pictured)

No, not the Ant and Dec show, more of a once-a-week routine and lifestyle choice over how my husband and I like to spend our weekends.  

In short, I don’t cook on Saturdays. I am very happy to spend time cooking meals (at various levels of ‘from scratch’ on the other days, but I rather like having Saturdays off such things. Instead, it’s takeaway night in our house. Which also means it’s eat-in-the-lounge night. And put-something-on-the-telly night.

We love eating out when we can, but on a Saturday evening it’s ordering in that’s important; staying at home, being comfortable on the sofa, enjoying some down time. While we don’t live in the reach of Uber Eats or similar providing a hundred delivery options, we do have a decent selection of your standard takeaways close by. What we actually order depends on what we fancy.

As for what we watch – all kinds of things. Over the last few weekends, we’ve been watching the third series of Picard on Prime. I’m not a Trekkie by any stretch, but I do enjoy a bit of Star Trek, and I always love a bit of nostalgia. This series has been great, and it looks like they’ve set themselves up for a fourth with the ending.

It’s nice – and important – to have one evening a week when we aren’t rushing around trying to do anything other than sitting together in the lounge and relaxing.

Do you have a regular takeaway night?

07 My Original GetOutside Jacket

It is a real honour to work with Ordnance Survey as one of their Champions. I’ve been on the team since very early 2017, over six years now. In that time the scheme has grown from a family of 25 (ish) GetOutside Champions, to a group of nearly 100. We’re now called OS Champions, but the mission is the same – to encourage more people to spend more time outside more often. It fits very well indeed with my One Hour Outside project.

This currently loving entry is in part being one of that number, as well as the blue jacket pictured. This is my original GetOutside jacket, and it’s here to both represent my link with the mapping organisation, but also because it’s a really great jacket.

It’s the discontinued Craghoppers Siena Gore-Tex jacket, a lined waterproof coat, good for spring and autumn walking when it’s a bit nippy and wet. Now old and very well worn (I’ve certainly run it through the mill!), it’s still doing a great job for me when I go out in the rain, thanks in part to washing and reproofing it when needed.

I’ve got other OS-Craghoppers branded gear, but this original jacket is the best one. They’ve since changed the cut of their waterproof coats and they don’t fit me so well, but this one is spot on.

08 Terrex Hiking Joggers

Here’s another thing I spent my adidas collaboration voucher on this time around – a pair of Terrex Liteflex Hiking Pants. Described as “hiking joggers”, they are basically a pair of tracksuit bottoms made with hiking in mind.

Totally different to my usual Craghoppers Kiwi Pro Stretch (did you read my musings in weekly blog episode 113?), I am finding them super comfortable for hiking in so far. They have a wide elastic waistband which sits nicely under my pack, are made with a stretchy material so I can move without restriction, have a slightly water-repellent finish which is great in damp weather, are super thin and lightweight which will be great in summer and for drying quickly. Importantly, they have a zip pocket which is big enough for my phone, and reinforcements around the ankles so they sit well around my hiking boots or trainers.

It takes me a long time to trust new gear, I find it very easy to stick with things that are tried and tested, which is one of the reasons reviews take a long time to appear here on Splodz Blogz. But after just a couple of wears I chose to take these as my second pair of hiking trousers on the Cotswold Way last week. Now I didn’t actually wear them – my others were fine for the whole thing (packing your fears – more on that in my Cotswold Way adventure series, starting soon!), but it does show how much I like them.

These will form the basis for my next adidas post, but in the meantime if you fancy reading what I’m writing for adidas this year, please do check out this post on sports bras for hiking.

09 Arcade Ranger Adventure Belt

Back in weekly blog episode 112, I predicted that my new Ranger Adventure Belt by Arcade, which I bought for my hiking trousers at the National Outdoor Expo, would feature in this currently loving post. And here we are! I have needed a new belt for a while, and when I saw this at the Expo, I gave into temptation.

Marketed as the most comfortable belt ever, I have to say, it’s pretty good. The reason is that the stretchy webbing means you can get an absolutely perfect fit – and once it’s set, it doesn’t wriggle loose like other webbing belts might. It’s travel friendly (doesn’t have any metal bits!), can go through the wash still on your trousers, and is thin and lightweight. I also like that it’s not plain – I’ve got the ‘Heather Black’ one, which is kind of a grey marl, but they also do various colours and designs.

It’s narrow enough to wear on my hiking trousers – and being very thin is very comfortable to wear with a backpack – but mine has found a permanent place on my Alpkit Sequence jeans (as featured in a previous currently loving post). There are a bunch of different styles over at Wildbounds (but be careful on that website, your outdoor-inspired gear wish list will grow massively if you let it!

10 Living (Nearly) in The Cotswolds

My husband and I moved to (nearly) the Cotswolds a little over five years ago, and I absolutely love it here. I feel very blessed to live in the shadow of the Cotswold escarpment, with easy access to vast countryside landscapes.

There are just so many opportunities for hiking here; everything from an hour or two to a full week. Of course, you were meant to read this post while I was doing exactly the latter – hiking the 102-mile Cotswold Way – but I ran out of time before I started that and so instead am writing this having completed my local National Trail.

I’ve heard people say “but it’s not the Lake District”; but the Cotswolds AONB, which stretches from Chipping Campden to Bath, really does have a lot going for it. We have rolling hills, wide valleys, quaint villages, and big views. And even when I’m not hiking, I am surrounded by great scenery to fill my cup.

If you are wanting some short walk inspiration in the Cotswolds, there are six short walks here, or you could get something like the Cicerone short walks book (my well-used copy is pictured).

What are you currently loving this month? What do you think of my choices? Tell me in the comments below.

Want to see all my currently loving posts? This link should help.

In the interests of full disclosure for this currently loving post, and as mentioned within the text above, the trainers and hiking trousers were gifted as part of my 2023 collaboration with adidas. Also, the National Outdoor Expo jumper and Ordnance Survey jacket are because I am ambassador for both those organisations. I have therefore marked this post as gifted, but it is not sponsored – none of these brands asked to be included in my currently loving feature, I did that because I’m genuinely currently loving the items or activities. There are also affiliate links on this page, the funds from which help me go on the mini adventures that make life interesting. Thank you.