Happy New Year!!

Well, it’s here, 2023. It’s hard to believe that another year is over and we’re already into the next one. 

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and New Year and weren’t too bogged down with this nasty cold / flu bug which seems to be everywhere. My eldest son was the first to by laid low, then my husband got it just before Christmas and is still coughing and spluttering. My youngest son caught it from him and has been suffering quite badly with it. I, however, have managed to escape it so far. There, I’ve just jinxed myself, I’ll probably catch it now I’m due back at work.

 

Christmas – well it takes so much preparation and then it’s over in a flash. I hope you all had a lovely Christmas, we did. We spent it with my husband’s family – twenty of us. We all chipped in with the cooking but hat’s off to my brother-in-law and sister-in-law for hosting it all. We had a great time but I was glad we had nothing planned for Boxing Day so we could all recover. There was another party on the Tuesday for a belated 21^st. And then my mum came to stay with us for a few days. It was lovely to spend some proper time with her, especially at this time of year.

 

Amidst all the celebrations, there is also a sadness to this time of year for me. Five years ago, just before Christmas my mother-in-law passed away. The following day, whilst my mum was undergoing knee replacement surgery, my dad was diagnosed with terminal cancer and passed away ten days later on 30^th January. This is him on my wedding day.

 

 

I still miss him so much and am sad that he’s not here to see what lovely young people all his grandchildren have become. I try to look on the positive side though, that he is not really lost to us, but is forever with us in our hearts. It makes me cherish my mum even more though, and I am eternally grateful that she is still very much in our lives.

 

It’s not been a great year for a lot of people, and I’ve had some incredible stressful periods throughout the months, but I have ended the year feeling positive and particularly motivated for my writing in the year ahead. Life is what you make it after all, and I’m going to do my best to make 2023 a thoroughly productive writing year.

 

Wishing you all the very best for 2023!

 

Happy New Year!

Wishing everyone who is reading this a very happy New Year.

December for me is always a bit of right-off writing-wise as I struggle to prepare for Christmas and juggle everything else.  Each year I promise I won’t let myself be distracted from writing but I always am and this year was no exception.

Christmas Day passed by in such a rush I wondered, as usual, what all the effort was for and then on Boxing Day I came down with a cold/flu bug which is going around and which made me feel rubbish.

I did manage to see some family but not all although I recovered in time for New Year’s Eve.

I’m feeling very positive about 2015.  Last year, for many of my friends, 2014 was a horrible year which they were glad to see the back of.  It certainly had its down moments for me, but it was a bit of a non-descript year which seemed to slip through my fingers. I don’t feel I achieved anything I set out to at the beginning of the year.

That’s why I want this year to be different.  I have so many plans which is part of my problem, I tend to flit from one thing to another and it takes ages to get anything done.  This year I’m going to set myself a project to focus on each month, so that the temptation to get distracted is reduced (fingers’ crossed).

For January the project is a novel which is in its fifth draft.  It’s nearly ready to be sent out but not quite and so I’ve determined by the end of January it will be ready.  I’ve been working on some of the edits from my sickbed and so already have a momentum going which I hope to keep to throughout the month.

Instead of setting specific resolutions this year I only have one – and that is to dedicate more time to things I want to do not things I feel I need to do.  That’s my incentive to get writing more, to make this year count.

What do you hope to achieve in 2015?

Happy New Year!

A rather belated greeting I’m afraid but last week was a bit hectic to say the least.

My youngest son has the misfortune of having his birthday on 5 January. I always feel sorry for him because by the time Christmas and New Year is over I often find that I have run out of steam. Usually I just want everything to get back to normal rather than have to start the celebrations all over again. The fact that most people also feel this way forces me to try just that little bit harder to make his birthday enjoyable.

This year though his birthday was dogged by illness. Both my husband and myself had been feeling under the weather at New Year, so it was a very quiet one, with us seeing the New Year in at home and then going straight to bed. To be honest my bed had been calling me for a long time before midnight but I stuck it out because, well, you have to don’t you?

On Tuesday it was back to work (which to be honest was a bit of a relief) but because the children didn’t go back to school until the next day my husband had taken the day off to look after them. I thought everything was on schedule for the next day; presents sorted, party numbers confirmed, friends coming round after school, only to find when I got home that husband’s feeling a bit under the weather had morphed into full blown flu. At first I thought it was a bit of the man flu type flu but as my husband isn’t one to take to his bed I had to revise my cynicism. In fact he was off work for the whole week, which I have never seen before - as he’s self-employed he usually goes to work even when he probably shouldn’t – he spent most of the week in bed and didn’t even want anything to eat apart from the odd bowl of soup until Friday.

So, I cancelled the friends round from school – didn’t think their parents would appreciate them catching the flu after only being back at school for one day – took both the boys out for tea on my own, and even managed his party at Quasar on my own too – that was fun! All this between working flat out at work, school runs, housework and looking after sick husband.

I did my best though and I think youngest son enjoyed himself. Can’t say I didn’t try anyway.

Husband’s better now, apart from a hacking cough which just doesn’t seem to want to pack its bags, and life truly can get back to normal. Thankfully!

Hope everyone's New Year is off to a good start.