Abi at Creating Paper Dreams had this lovely idea of inviting us, at around this time each month to catch up over a cup of tea…
November 2013
“Hi! Come in out of the cold. Gosh the temperature has plummeted in the last day or so. I’ll take your coat and put it by the radiator to get warm for you.
Come in and sit down.” You ask where the dog is.
“Oh Pepsi is here but she thinks you are one of the painters and doesn’t bother to get up for them anymore. I know you’re not a painter of the decorating kind, but she doesn’t! She is such a daft dog, when she hears me talking with you she will be along and bounce all over the place as usual.
We have had the hall, stairs and landing painted and the painters have only just finished up this morning. Everything is dry, they just came in to look the job over and make sure I am happy with it.
Poor old Pepsi has been in such a muddle with them.
Do you mind the Christmas Carols I have playing? I love them and have been playing them for a couple of weeks while I have been making bits for Christmas.
I’ll bring the tea in, I’m still trying to find the perfect mince pie, would you like to try my latest find?
So, how’s you?”
And you tell me what you have been doing, preparing for Christmas, listening to Christmas Carols too and crafting of course.
It is really lovely to talk about crafting and blogging to someone who doesn’t look at me whilst trying not to shake their head in total bemusement. Have you ever tried to explain to someone who doesn’t blog what a blog swap is? I think my one little word for next year could be ‘secret’…as in, keeping my blog activities a secret. We laugh, because of course, you know exactly where I am coming from.
You ask me about my festive swap and I am able to tell you that all parcels have been posted and a few have started to drop through letterboxes all over the world. It has been a great journey but a journey filled with mixed emotions really. Fear of asking, fear of rejection, pleasure when people started to say yes, excitement as the numbers built, anxiousness as the posting day approached and absolute joy when people started to let me know they had posted and then on the day I received Jacky’s gorgeous little robin I had the biggest smile on my face.
You ask if I would do it again
“Yes I would love to do it again; a couple of people have asked already if I might do it next year”.
Then I tell you about this mad idea I had: I decided to make 23 little tree decorations to post out to say thank you. And yes, I did it, they are all wrapped now and some have been posted. Although it was a lot of work, of the nicest kind, it distracted me from posting on the blog which was a good thing for me as so many people have been feeling ‘Meh” about blogging I could so easily have been sucked along with it but I’m fine doing what I do. I try hard to remember that comparison really is the thief of joy.
We talk about the various December Projects around blog land every year and I tell you that I’m looking forward to my December Days project which I have been doing for a number of years now. It started off with Shimelle’s Journal Your Christmas but as the years have gone along I go my own way. I have the book ready and I’m hoping to be able to join in with Sian’s last Story Telling Sunday of the year, which will be on the first of December and will become my first page.
“Are you doing a December project?” And we talk about the joy of doing it on the one hand and the time constraints on the run up to Christmas on the other.
“Would you like to meet up at the end of December? My brother will have just returned home and I won’t have tidied but the kettle will still be warm and I will have found the perfect mince pies by then so do come…”
And as I help you in to your toasty warm coat we hug each other, wish each other a Merry Christmas, and I will wish you didn’t have to go as I wave you into your taxi. Pepsi comes by to see what the furious nose blowing is all about and I hug her too.
Linking to Abi where you will find lots of tea and chat, do pop over to see her and I’ll see you back here on 27th December?…all being well of course.
