Pausing between special events

Have you got your tree up yet?

How many times have you been asked that in the last week? Or, what about: have you got all your shopping done? No. No I haven’t. And no, I haven’t left it too late.

It’s only the seventh day of December. We are still, officially, in autumn. And I’ve still got pumpkins on the windowsill.

What is it with this trend to rush from one annual event to the next with no slow moments in between? As soon as the halloween decorations were put away people were saying, right, it’s Christmas now. Let’s get the fairy lights up. Let’s get our trees up.

And no disrespect to you if you’re one of them. I’m not dictating any rules here.

But me? I just want to pause for a while between these special events. I don’t want one to merge into the other. I want the slow moments. The in between times to just be. To watch as the last autumnal leaves fall to the ground. To savour the seasonal shifts. To anticipate the festive season but to not peak too soon.

How often do you also hear, hasn’t the year gone fast?

Is it any wonder when we’re going from Christmas, New Year, Summer, Halloween back to Christmas again. We’re always looking to the next big event. Regular days get brushed aside. Ignored.

But the regular days are the magic days. The regular days are the days you work towards your goals. Inch by inch. Step by step. Little victories. Small wins. Big wins.

Since September I have been working flat out on my writing business. I’ve created a book club on Instagram. I’ve started vlogging my writing and creative week - first on IGTV and now on YouTube. I’ve also been creating weekly videos about cosy creative living - for example my favourite books or a tour of my office. I’ve set up a Patreon account in order to write regular essays for my patrons. As well as writing three times a week on my blog and inching forward with my novel.

All this whilst taking on a new puppy. Whilst struggling with tooth pain. Whilst missing my boy when he went on an adventure of a lifetime then arrived home with campylobacter. Whilst celebrating birthdays, anniversaries, sports wins, sports losses, sorting GCSE prep, making decisions, some small, some really big, whilst packing school bags, whilst nagging about homework, whilst celebrating a mention in a magazine, or feeling sad about the loss of chickens…

It’s been an amazing few months. I started September working in the kitchen with the puppy and gradually made my way back into my tidied and re-energised office. I’ve written about 45 blog posts, one essay, created 13 vlogs, recorded and edited about 8 videos, numerous Instagram photographs and not as much novel writing as I‘d have liked but I made progress.

So now I’m winding down. I’m going to spend the next couple of weeks sorting the house, walking the dogs, wrapping presents, putting up the tree, having coffee with friends, preparing Christmas food, attending carol service, ice-skating (watching NOT partaking), dinner with friends, hosting my family, reading, watching TV and eating.

I made a big plan for this month but I just can’t do it. The creative well has run dry. So it’s now time to re-fill. There might be other blog posts on here between now and the new year but I won’t be sticking to a schedule. And my vlogs will come back in January. Rested, refreshed and ready to tackle the next three months of my writing and online creativity business.

Before I go I want to say a big thank you. Thank you for reading my blog this year. Thank you for your comments, for following me on Instagram and subscribing to my channel on YouTube. Thank you for becoming my patron and thank you for your support. Any support - big and small. It has all meant so much.

Merry Christmas.

My Christmas Reading List

I love this time of year for reading. I look forward to those relaxing winter days in front of the fire with my nose in a book with a festive theme. I've five books to read over the Christmas period and I am very happy.

Books mentioned in the video

Crime at Christmas by C H B Kitchin

The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey

One Day in December by Josie Silver

Winter Without You by Beth Good

Christmas Pudding: A Novel by Nancy Mitford

You might also enjoy:

My Christmas Reading List

From 2017

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PLAN WITH ME | December 2018 | How I plan my writing & blogging content

As this is the second month’s PLAN WITH ME that I’ve done - in this video I look back at how I did during November. Did I stick to my plan? Did I create all the videos I’d written down in my notebook and did I finally write and send out my essay? Spoiler: yes I did. But I didn’t manage everything.

For December my content is going to focus on food, baking and books as we hurtle towards the festive season and as we head towards January I’ll be writing about blogging and online creativity more.

I also look at what I did from a business point of view during November. I added tiers to my Patreon offering and signed up to a few affiliate link companies.

Five children's books recommended by my 9-year-old daughter

My daughter, soon to be ten-years-old, is a voracious reader. She has consumed a massive amount of books during the course of this year and, at some point, I’ll do a round-up of them all.

She has her own Instagram account (though I oversee it, I won’t be letting my daughter loose on Instagram for some time) called Little Reading Reviews. The only problem being, once she’s finished one book she doesn’t want to review it or photograph it because she’s straight onto the next!

So I thought I’d write a blog post of the five books she has particularly enjoyed in the last couple of months. She LOVED all of them.

The 1000-year-old boy by Ross Welford

Alfie Monk is like any other nearly teenage boy – except he’s 1,000-years-old and can remember the last Viking invasion of England. Obviously no one believes him. But Alfie has been 13-years-old for 1000 years after swallowing a ‘life-pearl’ during the viking invasions. Now, in the modern world after a tragic event, he, along with Aiden and Roxy go on an unforgettable journey.

Death in the Spotlight by Robin Stevens

Well, Robin Stevens has done it again. Delighted and captured the attention of my daughter with her latest Murder Most Unladylike Mystery called Death in the Spotlight. And now Hazel Wong and Daisy Wells are off to the theatre…but something wrong is afoot and then a body is found.

This is a gorgeous series of books, like a mixture of Agatha Christie and Enid Blyton’s boarding school books. If you want to start at the beginning the first one is simply called Murder Most Unladylike.

The Last Chance Hotel by Nicki Thornton

The Last Chance Hotel is described as Harry Potter meets Agatha Christie! No wonder my daughter loved it!

This is the blurb: Seth is the oppressed kitchen boy at the remote Last Chance Hotel, owned by the nasty Bunn family. His only friend is his black cat, Nightshade. When a strange gathering of magicians arrives for dinner, kindly Dr Thallomius is poisoned by Seth's special dessert. A locked-room murder investigation ensues - and Seth is the main suspect. The funny thing is, he's innocent ... can he solve the mystery and clear his name, especially when magic's afoot?

Max Einstein: The Genius Experiment by James Patterson and Chris Grabenstein

Max Einstein is 12 years old and a genius. She goes to college, plays speed chess and talks to Albert Einstein. Then one day she’s recruited by a mysterious organisation. Their mission: solve some of the world’s toughest problems using science.

A great adventure with scientific facts.

A Place called Perfect by Helena Duggan

A Place Called Perfect and the second novel, The Trouble with Perfect, has been a delight for my daughter to read. However, she wasn’t immediately taken with the first one because of the book blurb - it just didn’t inspire her! Violet moves to Perfect with her dad’s new job. She meets a boy called Boy and, without giving anything away, Violet discovers something about the town and its inhabitants and has an amazing adventure. Twists and turns, a little scary occasionally but my daughter LOVED it.