January 2015

A bit like a wind up toy, I feel exhausted after a Christmas spent celebrating whilst also nursing 3 poorly children, who of course couldn't be ill all at the same time, no they feel ill one after the other until every day of the holidays was spent looking after a sick child! So I am finding January quite difficult. I can't seem to get myself going. If only someone or something could come along and wind me up! The dull days, the cold, the rain, lack of sunlight, non of it helps, it really is a case of digging deep and trudging through these first few months of the year, hanging on to the thought that Spring is just around the corner! I am not one for making New Year resolutions. I have tried in the past and in general fail. I do like however to spend the start of a new year thinking about the past 12 months. What can we learn from it, what did we do wrong, what should we change, what could have been better. But there's the thing, its often easier to think and to stress over the 'things' that went wrong, the things we shouldn't have said, the things that we didn't do, than to think about what we got right. As a parent especially I think we often worry and beat ourselves up mentally about how we are bringing up our children. We worry if we are doing it correct, are we saying the right words at the right times, are we there for our children when they really need us, do we spend enough time living in the moment, are we listening to them and each other, which is sometimes so difficult in our busy lives. I think its good to try and learn and possibly change but we do need to remember what we did right. Remember the moments of harmony, the moments when life seems perfect, the times when we all laughed together, the times when you think this is it, we are happy.
I found myself on New Years day sat on the sofa with my laptop, the kids happily watching a movie, the fire was lit, we were warm, we were full of food, a moment of calmness. I found myself going back over my Instagram account, laughing at some of the photos, smiling at others. It was good, as lets face it most of us that have Instagram accounts use them mainly to show moments of joy, of happiness, snap shots of our 'perfect' lives! So I set about making a photo book using only photos from my Instagram account to remember our best bits of 2014. And there a couple of weeks later it was. My first ever photo book. And it couldn't be any more perfect. So easy to make, I used Blurb Books and found it very straight forward to use. It's the first of many to come. It's such a lovely reminder of our year. A reminder of the good times, glimpses of the past, a great way of capturing time and giving us memories and reminding ourselves that sometimes we do get it just right!