Hello everyone!

Top 5 Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by Bionic Bookworm! If you’re interested in participating, check out her wonderful blog to get the details and the prompts for each week!

This week’s Top 5 Tuesday topic is Things I’m Enjoying While in Isolation! I’ve been in isolation since St. Patrick’s Day, and it looks like the earliest I’ll be going back to work is the beginning of June. The day I got laid off, I was sad because getting laid off sucks, but I quickly looked at this as an opportunity to take time to do the things that I love. Most of my hobbies are inside activities, and so far, I’ve had a great three weeks. There have been some rough moments, and I’ve learned to avoid the news like the plague, and to cut back on non-bookish social media, but I’m doing my best to stay positive. Below are five of the things that I’ve been doing to pass the time.

Reading: This is probably the top answer for a lot of bookworms, but it’s true. Since I’ve been home, I’ve been reading a lot more than usual. Before going into isolation, I was struggling to keep up with my Net Galley queue, and my monthly buddy reads. Now that I’m home all the time, I’m able to catch up on ARCs and pay attention to some of the many neglected books sitting on my shelves.

Jigsaw Puzzles: About a month before all of this happened, I randomly decided that I wanted to do one of the jigsaw puzzles that my brother bought my dad years ago. After this, I went out and bought the set of Disney Villainous puzzles, and I’m amazed by how good my timing was. Now you can’t find jigsaw puzzles anywhere, and I have a stash that I’m working my way through. I like spending a few hours sitting on the floor at the coffee table working on a puzzle, I find it relaxing, and I love seeing the picture come together.

Blogging: Since going into isolation, I’ve been able to do a lot more blogging. I’m enjoying having time to draft posts and reviews, and not feeling rushed to throw something together the day before I want to post it. I’ve also enjoyed having time to interact with other bloggers and bookstagrammers and having time to like and comment on their posts. I’ve discovered a ton of new bloggers and bookstagrammers in the past few weeks, and it’s reminded me why I love this community so much.

Baking: I love baking, and I love having time to bake a bunch of tasty treats. I’ve been keeping it simple the past few weeks and sticking to prepackaged cake/cookie/brownie mix, but I love having fresh baked goods available for snacking on. It’s probably not the healthiest thing, but it’s making me happy, and that’s what matters right now.

Cross-Stitching: I haven’t started cross-stitching again yet, but I did go on Etsy this weekend, and I picked out some patterns I’m going to buy. I used to cross-stitch all of the time, but then I stopped because I wasn’t able to find the time to do it. Now that I’m in isolation until at least June, I’m looking forward to picking this hobby up again and making some new patterns to hang on my wall and to give to friends and family.

How about you? What have you been enjoying in isolation? Have you picked up any old hobbies or started any new ones?