Something New.

Hellooooo, anyone still there?  I'm sorry that I have been quiet so long.  Sometimes the busyness of life causes us to have to re-evaluate what is essential in our list of daily tasks and sadly the blogging has been very near to the bottom of the list.  I have tried to keep my Mrs Craftypants site going as this is turning into quite a busy little business but writing for pleasure, that was no longer a pleasure.

Something or rather somethings have got my writing fingers itching again.  Firstly I was asked to be a administrator on a facebook page that my lovely friend Katharine runs ........ for writers! Secondly the death of the music star Prince, just 10 years older than myself.  The significance of this making my writing fingers itch is the sudden realisation that i have a lot of stories inside me and if I don't tell them they will disappear for ever!

The book that longs to come out is one I promised my late mum that I would write a very long time ago.  She had a very interesting and somewhat harrowing start in life as a war baby, born to a German mother in Hamburg, Germany who had a brief affair with an English soldier at the end of the second world war.  I have managed to find a few stories of American soldiers and French soldiers fathering babies with German mothers, however trying to even find statistics for the English fathers is near impossible.  The UK government unlike the American government did not intervene with policies to help German mothers, for example giving them a right to become alien citizens.

So the story must be told and I think the best way to get myself back in the writing habit is to have a go at doing a blog at least once a week!  That is my goal for now and hopefully I can use my time wisely enough to try and commit to at least 10 minutes every day to research and write.  Just 10 minutes, that is all I have at the moment, it's so easy to flitter way 10 minutes on nothing, so at least now I will have something to show for those particular 10 minutes!

So, same time, same place next week, bye for now xxxx

Hello!!

I thought I'd better check in, it has been quite a while!  As all things have quietened down on the home and health front, we are settling into a nice quiet routine.  I am still swimming, most weeks managing to get to the club 3 times and clocking up 6km swam and lots and lots of repetitions of my hydrotherapy exercises completed.  My weight is slowly (very slowly) coming off, the good thing about this is that it is staying off, even when I have 'naughty' weeks.  I am now the same weight I was about 10 years ago after I had my children, still a long way to go!

When I am not at the club swimming, I have decided to relaunch my crafting shop on folksy, Mrs Craftypants.  In addition to making things for my shop, I have also purchased my domain name, so you can find out a little more about me over at www.mrscraftypants.co.uk.  There has been the purchasing of business cards and getting out and about touting for business.  This is the bit I like least - I wish I could just make and not have to do the selling!  However this hobby needs to fund it self and so I wondered off to a little shop near by armed with a selection of Easter bits and pieces and they have agreed to sell it for me on a sale or return basis.

Another new venture is the start of doing workshops.  I am starting with a crochet workshop first of all on Saturday 7th March, so I am busy this week writing up patterns, taking photo's to go on the patterns and doing things like writing this blog to distract me from doing what I am really supposed to be doing!!!!!!!!

I will try and keep popping by and keeping up to date with other blog posts, maybe if I set myself a few deadlines then I will spend more time prevaricating and do this more often.

Take care for now xxxxxx

One thousand Gifts - Ann Voskamp

I have spent the last 30 minutes going back in my blog trying to discover when I first found out about Ann Voskamp and the commitment she was making and daring to others, counting the gifts that God gives us in the everyday moments of life.  It was way back in January 2010! You can see that very first post of mine here. 

I did discover that by taking on this attitude of gratitude I did start to change.  I did notice that my prayers were less full of 'wants' and more full of 'thanks' and my joy as a result was definitely increasing.  

For three years I stuck at the counting, however the last time I wrote any blessings down in was back in February 2013, I had got to number 949 - this was written just a few days before my mother took her own life.

So why am I talking about it again - well to be honest it has never been out of my mind.  The teaching that Ann was discovering and sharing had shifted something in me.  I no longer read many blogs (You can read Ann's here)  and so have not been keeping up with where she is now, but I do no that her book is a New York Times best seller.  What really started to draw me back was when I took on the role of looking for new resources for the women's group at our church which I help to lead.  That is when I saw the book and thought - NOW was the time to get this, especially as I noticed she had done a DVD as well (our group particularly likes a bit of DVD as well as discussion).  I ended up finding quite a few resources, enough to fill the whole year!

When I met with my fellow group leaders we decided that this particular book/DVD would be a good one for our quiet away day which we usually do in November.  Now you see why this has brought everything back into my mind!  Our away day is this Saturday and I am so enjoying finally getting round to reading the book, the study guide and watching the DVD.  I am doing a section about how our hearts get closed to gratitude - quite apt considering when I stopped!  I'm also doing some craft which I am so so excited about. 

I am even more excited that we are only covering the first DVD session on our away day which means we get to do the next 4 sessions on the Fridays to December.

So I shall stop blathering on now and do a little more counting!

950. Reawakening my attitude to gratitude.

951. Soft tumble dried towels.

952. Golden leaves still on the trees.

953. Summer blooms still out in the garden.

954. Washing still drying on the clothes line.

955. Chocolate cake in the cupboard.

956. Watching an ever changing sky scape as I swim.

957. Another finished home made Christmas present.

958. Children loading and unloading the dishwasher.

959. A dog to cuddle up to when my hubby is away.

And here are a few photo's of my garden (still in bloom in November) - something I am so very grateful for.........

 Blessings to you xxxxxx

Finding my Independence.

I have been feeling rather like this old tree, long dead and decomposing, however my health is improving and I have rediscovered my need to be independent.  In the past I have jetted off to Canada, France, Portugal and America by myself, though have to confess to always having people to see when I got to those places.  However next week I am going off to Portugal by myself, to be by myself and I cannot wait!  There is a little part of me that goes eeeek what am I doing, however I am working very hard to box that feeling away, I do not want it to spoil the good stuff.

Today I decided to give myself a little practise of being independent.  For the last 12 months I have been doing a 210 mile round trip to see my niece in hospital every two weeks - that's at least 26 visits done and there are still plenty more to be done.  We took out National Trust membership a few months ago and this meant I could go and visit somewhere that I have passed the sign to on each of these visits.  That place was Stowe Landscape Gardens.  I had already had a good talk to myself about not trying to do too much, there was no reason to do this as I will be coming past this place many more times yet.  So I thought I would take a few pictures to show you my trip.

It started with a little buggy ride from the visitors entrance to the beginning of the gardens.  Here I discovered that they actually have some little golf buggies that you can book for a two hour slot to drive yourself around the gardens (I know what I shall be doing next visit!).  I asked for advice on how to spend my limited energy and everyone seemed to agree that a walk around one of both lakes was a good start.  Unfortunately I didn't take any photo's (not thinking about blogging) until rain stopped play.

My first picture was the old trunk at the top of this page (this is where my inspiration for a blog started....).  I then noticed this poor tree that had newly fallen and would in some years time go the same way as that trunk at the top.

I tried to pretend it wasn't starting to rain and in my summer short sleeve blouse and skirt I tried to continue.  However I didn't get very far, just around the corner I was forced to take shelter under one of natures umbrellas....

It wasn't too hard to stand and look at this view until the drizzle stopped.

The drizzle got lighter and so I continued until forced to take shelter under more trees right next to these beautiful hollyhocks

It was also this stop that confirmed to me that Autumn is definitely just around the corner.  You can see the leaves changing on this tree.

I should really have made my way back after the first lake, but being me, I ignored my head and my feet and let my heart take me around the next lake.  This view was drawing me in..

While walking towards this I glanced over to the hill on my right and saw this beautiful church..

As I approached this lovely ornate bridge, the rain started again....

So it was a good excuse to sit and ponder and admire and talk to some lovely folks with beautiful doggies!

And of course being a national trust place, there was the obligatory cream tea to be consumed when I got back to the visitor entrance!

So a couple of blissful hours doing something unusual all by myself, I am rather pleased with that, and of course as I got back to my car.........the sun came out!

Bye for now xxx

Ten minutes of writing.

My blogging friend Katharine over at 10 minute writer set a challenge on her facebook page to see how many words one could write in 10 minutes!  So this is my attempt at writing something that is not copied and that makes some sort of sense.  Sense to me anyway.  There are so many topics that come into my head during the day which I would like to blog about but then the time comes for me to sit down and the energy level to consider typing dips.  Why is this, could it be that Candy Crush is finally killing off the brain cells and wickedly keeping me from the key board?  Or could it be that since getting my tablet it is far easier to just surf around and not type anything?  I don't like typing on my tablet - it is just not the same as having a keyboard.  This means to write I have to make the extra effort of getting my laptop out and booting it up.  Oh the problems of the modern world!!!!  And most of the worlds population do not have enough to eat!!

So now my brain is starting to dry up.  What else can I type, I could tell you about the wonderful transformation that is taking shape in our garden.  Since moving into our home 14 years ago we have always been making do in the garden.  Trying to make the most of what was left us, which I have to say was very little.  Then this winter we had a series of storms which finally pulled down the fences.  We have had the two that we are responsible for re done and this week managed to get them painted.  The other one which we are not responsible for was also damaged in the storms but our neighbours decided to just use some old battered second hand panels to replace the ones that were severely damaged.  So this morning I set to with my daughter some fern panelling, a hammer and some nails and we have now screened off the horrid panels and it looks wonderful.  Maybe when I have finished my 10 minutes I will go take a photo so that you can see just how wonderful it is looking.  We also got the builders who did our fence to take up and relay to of the patio areas.  Making them both totally weed free and hopefully that will last.  So now there is just the area around the house that still needs relaying but we will have to wait for funds to appear before we can get that done.  In the meantime at least we will not have so much to weed!

So we are almost at my favourite part of gardening - that is the tidying up of the beds, maybe some new plants and definitely some pots that need filling with beautiful flowers.  I so hope the weather this summer is conducive to me being able to sit out and enjoy the garden this year.  Maybe we will even get in a few more BBQ's, we have already been lucky enough to have one.  That turned into a great bonfire  as we had the barby in the fire pit and then filled it with wood afterwards and had a great roaring fire.  Well this is it my 10 minutes is almost over.  Now I shall have to cut and paste this into a word document to find out just how many words I have managed to type in 10 minutes.  Laters xxxxxxxxxxxx

ps. just so you know the answer is 595 - not to shabby I have to say!

Why New Zealand

So many people asked me before going away to New Zealand why we were going there and to be honest it felt quite strange saying that we were all going to stay with someone I had never met before!  I seem to be making a bit of a habit of this.  First I went and met a fellow blogger Katharine over in Boston MA, we had known each other on-line for quite some years before I went and met her.  We were friends before we met but this visit cemented our friendship which continues to thrive! In fact my husband is going to meet up with her in November this year, but that is a whole other story!

Next we (not on my own this time) went and met another blogger that Katharine introduced us to, Susanne over near San Diego, CA. It really is so nice to be able to finally hear the voice that you read and share conversations with!

So back to the why New Zealand story.  First we have to roll the clock back several decades to when my husband was a teenager, he and a friend Howard decided to go inter-railing together around Europe.  I suppose in it's day it was the equivalent to taking a gap year, only this was done during the summer holidays and was a very cheap way of visiting lots of places!  They lost contact and then thanks to the joys of facebook they were reunited a few years ago.  At some point the two boys had a conversation that led me and Howard's wife Lyn into becoming facebook friends and playing scrabble daily with each other.

Lyn and I started to chat more and more as we played.  I discovered they had both been mental health nurses and Lyn had spent a lot of time doing adolescent mental health.  This is obviously a subject very close to my heart with my kinship caring saga with my niece, and on more than one occasion Lyn helped me to work out what my next steps were.

Then last year Howard came over to the UK on a visit to his family.  My husband Brian went up to his home town and met up with him for an evening and it seems they just picked up where they had left off all those years ago.  Howard made some comment about us going out to visit them - that may have been his biggest mistake.  I wonder how many times people say that not really meaning it???????

So, the rest is history, we decided to go for it.  The photo at the top shows Howard and Lyn on the far left with their daughter and then their son is over on the far right.  Next to their son on the far right are two more friends Paula and her daughter Bethany who came over from Australia to visit us.  Paula also knew Brian and Howard back in the teenage days when they were in a drama group together.  So there were many more years to catch up on there!  We have been fortunate to spend quite a bit of time with Paula and her ever growing family over the years and it was a very hard decision to go to New Zealand and not Australia on this visit, however, NZ it was to be and we were just thrilled that Paula brought Bethany over.

The photo below is of Lyn and I (we are wine tasting which must be why I am a bit blurred!), it was so lovely to give her a hug and to be able to thank her for being the pillar of support that she has been to me.  I couldn't believe that they had been living in NZ for about 15 years and had never visited a vineyard to do some FREE wine tasting.  So pleased we have sorted that out for them and jolly hope they go on to visit lots more - we only managed to do two.

Another friendship that I was also able to rekindle on this visit was with my lovely friend Sara.  We used to go to church together when we were both studying in West London.  I vividly remember her wedding to the lovely Brett (a kiwi) at the Salvation Army head quarters in central London.  It was only about 6 months after that wedding when we were about to get married that they moved over to New Zealand.  Since then we have kept touch every Christmas, we have spoken when Sara has been over in the UK but had not seen each other in the flesh for far too long.

Meeting her, Brett and their lovely children was just so good after all this time.  We have both been through tough times that neither of us had particularly shared with each other so there was an awful lot to catch up on.  But catch up we did and when I got Paula and Sara together it was lovely to go back over how we met, how Brett and Sara met and all the early days stuff over again.  Another wonderful spin off from this is the deep and meaningful emails we are now exchanging as we continue conversations about church and family.

So that is basically why we went to NZ.  I confess to hardly knowing anything about the country before going, except that a few friends had been and loved it.  My amazing husband spent so much time before we went doing all the research to decide where we would visit.  And he came up trumps with a brilliant itinerary!
It really is a most fascinating country and I would definitely like to get back and cover more, we were only able to do a very small bite.  I wonder how often people choose a holiday by the people they want to see rather than the country they want to visit!?!

The photo below is of my daughter Annie and Paula's daughter Bethany, I so pray that their friendship continues over the miles and that they get to share lots and lots of memories into the future.

Starting as I mean to go on.

Happy New Year faithful followers!  And faith full you are indeed if you are still following me - only 25 posts last year and most of those were of me moaning!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I cannot promise to be moan free this year - but I will try and keep it to a minimum.  A dear friend posted the above picture on facebook today and it got me thinking........

1.  Make Peace with your past  so it won't disturb your present.

I have been doing a lot of this over the last 12 months with the help of a very patient therapist and family.  It is very easy to make flippant comments to people about letting go of the past, or letting bygones be bygones.  However none of these are helpful if you haven't come to terms and made peace with your past.  It doesn't mean you have to not care about the past, it doesn't mean your past becomes unimportant.  Your past is goes with you as you travel through life and if you don't make peace with this travelling companion then it is going to be a very uncomfortable ride.

2. What other people think of you is none of your business.

Isn't this just so true!  If people look at me and think I'm a lazy oaf who sits on the sofa all day doing nothing much - does that make it true? (well to be honest occasionally, it probably is).  Of course it doesn't, these thoughts (if they exist)  belong to other people and while I might spend too much time thinking this of myself because it's what I think other people are thinking it.......... it really is none of my business.

3.  Time heals almost everything give it time.

Sounds corny, but it is true.  Though time is a construct that is individual to each of us. I have also noticed that some things heal more quickly than others, just like physical wounds do.

4. No one is in charge of your happiness except you.

Now this one made me think a little deeper.  As a practising Christian I do believe that there is someone 'in charge' - God.  However this faith also means that I have to accept that God gives us free will.  Which then  brings us around to the issue of happiness.  We have the choice to be happy - really? yes, I really believe we do.  When I first had some counselling a couple of years ago one of the first things my therapist said to me was that I used gallows laughter all the time.  I didn't understand what this meant until she explained it and I realised that sometimes she was right.  I laughed because if I didn't I would cry - I was laughing at the absurdity of the situations I was finding myself in.  At the time I felt a little offended by this - it felt like she was telling me this was not a good thing.  However as time has gone on I have noticed that actually my 'gallows' laughter is a part of the armour that God has given me to protect myself from all the absurdity around me.  It isn't something I do to hide what is really going on for me, it is there to help me cope.  And for that reason alone I think it is an absolute blessing!

5. Don't compare your life to others and don't judge them you don't know what their journey is all about.

Ouch, now this is a toughy.  I have been called judgemental to my face twice in my life.  Both times it has cut me down immediately.  Once by someone who new me very well and once by someone who hardly knew me at all.  It makes no difference to how it made me feel though.  We all make judgements all the time, it is a necessary part of life.  Do I want a cup of tea?  Have I got time to do a bit more crochet?  They are all decisions that I make after judging the merits of my situations.  It is therefore inevitable that we will sometimes end up judging other people, but this is where I will refer back to point 2.  If other people think I am judging them, that is their business not mine.  And then back to point 1, make peace with the things that have happened in the past.

I do sometimes look at my life and wonder if I would be happier walking someone else's journey.  However the journey of other peoples lives is obviously just the bits that I can see, I will never know someones whole journey.   I might sometimes look with envy on those who have more physically able bodies than I have.  However when I look at the rest of those peoples lives, I am soon brought back to earth with the contentment I need to carry on my own journey on my own path.

6. Stop thinking too much it's alright not to know the answers.  They will come to you when you least expect it.

I love this!  As someone with an appalling memory for important stuff, like peoples names - I really do know that complete joy when the name actually comes to you!  In the age of google where you can get an answer (or at least think you have ) to almost everything in a few taps it is hard to sometimes just let things go.  This is something I am daily challenged with by my two children, one a teenager, one almost there.  My eldest particularly is very precise in nature and likes to have an answer to everything.  I on the other hand am happy (usually) to leave loose ends.

7. Smile you don't own all the problems in the world.

Now I (along I am sure with many others)  have been on the receiving end of someone telling you to smile when something awful has just happened - gah - it makes me gag just thinking about it!  However if you are able to, a smile can make a world of difference to others.  It can diffuse anger, it can restore hope, it can give you a brief moment of reprieve.  I know this because I have been on the receiving end of others smiles in times of great need in my own life.  I have also been privileged to be told by some lovely people that my smile lights up a room - this may or may not be true but it makes me feel fabulous!

So I cannot say that I think these are definitely 7 rules to live your life by, but I do think they are all very sound pointers.  So much so that I am going to print it off for my 16 year old niece who is in a long term secure mental health unit.  It will definitely give us something to talk about when I next go and visit!

I also saw this picture also recently

and decided this is going to be my motto for 2014.  Saying what I feel has only really been possible through my blog, but slowly, slowly (very very slowly) I am starting to find my feeling voice in public with the people who mean most to me and hopefully this is going to continue into the new year.........

bye for now xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

What do you do for a 14 year old boys birthday????

My husband reminded me the other day that I should really blog about something really really nice that we did during half term.  How remiss of me not to have shared it with you.

I saw an amazing picture on a friends facebook page recently, she had taken her newly turned 14 year old son and his older sister to a place in Basingstoke where you can do indoor skydiving.

Now I have a confession to make - I have always wanted to skydive and do a wing walk on an aeroplane.  I can't explain why - my counsellor reckons it is probably something to do with the feeling of freedom that these activities might give me.  Anyhow, with all my health issues and with what has been going on in my family over the last 5 years, putting any desires like these out there has been impossible.

Then half term came, along with my sons 14th birthday.  He isn't a hugely social lad, he has a small good bunch of friends, but he is also very happy playing on his computer, games console, etc (like so many others it seems).  In previous years we have let him go out bowling with a couple of friends, or to the cinema and then getting a take-out - that sort of thing.  This year he didn't seem to be showing any great desire to do these things.

Can you see where this is going????????  I made the suggestion that maybe he would like to go and do the indoor skydiving thing - well that impressed him no end.  When I asked if he fancied doing it all together as a family (including his little sister) I was absolutely delighted when he said yes.

So it was booked a couple of days before and despite little sisters nerves we all looked forward to it.

And I have to say it did not disappoint any of us.

Yes it was pricey, but then we had kept presents to a minimum and this was the big treat of the holidays as well as for my sons birthday.  Would you like to see some photo's?

First we had to have our hands stamped (after completing very large risk disclaimers!).

Here is the birthday boy

He got the hang of it very quickly, the second picture shows him going off for a tandem ride up to the top of the wind tunnel with the instructor - we all got to do that once we had mastered the art of  'flying'

Next to have a turn was my hubby - it appeared to be much more difficult for us 'oldies' than the children - something to do with relaxing and being bendy I think!

Next it was my turn!  The instructor was so nice, I was a little concerned that he might grab me to harshly by the arms or legs (as it seemed he had been doing with some others we watched) which would have rattled my joints, but a quick chat and he made sure he held me just by my suit.

And lastly it was the little sisters turn, she had taken so much convincing that she would be okay doing it, reassuring her right up to the last minute that she could pull out (but we wouldn't let her pull out before doing the safety briefing and getting dressed up).  She loved it and being so light, kept flying away!

I was so exhilarated afterwards, and the photo below shows my son with a smile - not something that he easily gives away these days.

 I think his Dad rather enjoyed himself too.

So much fun and then I had the thrill of putting photo's on facebook and surprising everyone that I had done it to - I didn't realise that it would be such a surprising thing!

This week I have also hit 28,000 page views on this blog, with the number of posts that averages out to about 85 per post.  Goodness me!  Thank you for popping by!