Happy New Year!!!

Hello! Yes - I am still here!!!

We had a very relaxing time over xmas and new year - so relaxed I couldn't even be arsed to blog. But I am back now and don't plan to leave it so long in between posts again!

This was what we saw on our xmas day walk along the beach
And this is A glued to her beloved iPod (xmas present)

Well, the new year has brought a regime change round here. For the past few weeks I had often found myself lying awake at 3am in a state of panic. Its over a year since I became self employed, and although I've had a few pieces published I have very little money coming in. I know I can do better than this, and I know that to a large extent it is a lack of confidence holding me back.
The only answer I can come up with is to push myself more - I just have to go ahead with things, no matter how scared/uncomfortable/inadequate I feel.

I have been thinking a lot about this, and have lots of good ideas and new approaches to try, but I know that what I really need, what will make a huge difference, is structure.
I need to structure and organise my working time much better, and as a consequence of this, I need to structure and organise our HE time more too. I've been reluctant to do this before. In an ideal world - ie no money worries and being able to devote all my time to HE - learning would be much more fluid and relaxed. But back here in the real world I have to work, and as I'm fast realising - I have to work much, much harder!

Sooooo, we have discussed, drawn up plans, have some goals in sight, and are both feeling quite positive about it all. We're not moving into complete schooly-formal HE territory (that would be disastrous for us), just planning ahead what we want to cover, and on what days we will do certain things. I feel I need to stop the amount of 'drifting about' we both do, and we both need a bit more focus. Wish us luck please, we may need it!!!

And here are some random cuddling parsnips I got in my vegbox, I just thought they were too cute not to share :-)

Festive Cheer

Put our decs up last week, an event that A was very excited about! It always seems like a chore to me - until I get started, then I enjoy it all as much as A. We now have several presents piling up underneath the tree :-)

I appear to be fairly well organised this year, I still have a few more of our paper Chinese lanterns to make, and a few snowman chocolates to make (found a silicone ice tray with little snowman shapes, so have been melting chocolate and remoulding it), but everything else seems sorted. Making jam in the autumn was a brilliant idea as its solved a lot of 'what to buy for..' dilemmas.

A is dangerously easy to buy gifts for (dangerous to my bank balance). Maybe its just because I know her so well, but I keep seeing things that I know she will love. I need to stop buying now, as I have loads of things for her already.

A had her drama performance last Friday. There were quite a few technical hitches with the lighting and sound, which seemed to worry the kids a lot. I tried to point out that the audience all seemed to enjoy it anyway, and nobody blamed the kids for errors that were out of their control, but A seemed a bit upset about it.

I was really proud of her though, the part she was given wasn't one she wanted, and to be honest I could see why - it was quite embarressing for a typically self conscious pre-teen (she was playing a giant baby, and her few lines were 'babyspeak'), and there wasn't a lot she could do with it really. But she stuck with it and did her best.

A has also been doing a lot of writing, and is writing a spooky story in chapters. Its looking good (I'm proofreading).

Talking of writing, we had her writing group at ours last Monday, which meant I had to lead the session(!) It all seemed to go quite well, I gave them a couple of pieces of music to listen to and write about. I found it quite difficult to judge how well it was being received, but have had some positive feedback from a couple of parents so hopefully they enjoyed it. They certainly came up with some interesting work - talented girls!

So what else? A fab sleepover at ours the other weekend with a family of four sisters (fellow home edders). There were lots of board games and a bit of film making, and a vegan chocolate cheesecake that we all enjoyed. A very late night, but lots of fun :-)

A spent this weekend with her paternal grandparents, who took her to see the big panto in Inverness. We're so lucky to have all A's grandparents so close, and really appreciate how supportive they all are in their own ways. As a lone parent, life would be much more difficult for me if I didn't have my Mum and my ex in-laws around, and I can see how much benefit A gets from these relationships.

Yesterday we took ourselves off to see the new Harry Potter film, which we both enjoyed. We're not huge Potter fans, neither of us have read the books, but we've seen all the films. Before the film we treated ourselves to a Starbucks coffee/hot chocolate, and had a hysterical game of charades in the coffee shop (we stayed in our seats, we're not that embarressing!) where A had me crying with laughter at her antics. We seem to laugh a lot together, long may it continue!!

Purple guitar

This is A's new guitar:

and she is one very happy girl :-)

She seems to have gone a bit purple-mad just recently, which is a bit of a problem as its my favourite colour too, so we are now fighting over purple stuff (or rather she is now pilfering all the purple stuff I already have!!)

We decorated A's room (guess what colour!?!) and she is now rearranging all the furniture, so it will have a totally new look. This has put me in a rearranging frame of mind for the rest of the house. I have plans, just need to find the time to do it...

We also had a lovely weekend away in Edinburgh with Granny. Visited A's favourite place - Camera Obscura - which had some new exhibits. Also went to the National Museum of Scotland, spent a good couple of hours there. We had an excellent veggie meal at David Bann, I had noodles and smoked tofu in a ginger & red pepper sauce, yum. And we took (a rather reluctant) A on an evening 'ghost tour' of the underground vaults - very spooky! I don't believe in the supernatural and even I was scared! I think we picked one of the better tour companies, some of them seem to be very gimmicky and rely on gory effects, but our guide was good fun, and there was a lot of actual 'history' as well as all the spooky stuff (although there was a 'jumperouter' near the end).
Got a little bit of Christmas shopping done too, and generally had a great weekend, the only bit that spoilt it was our train being cancelled on the way back which caused some stress, we ended up on a bus for part of the way, and not sitting together, but we got home in the end.

I'm still feeling a bit overwhelmed by life, not sure if this is to do with xmas approaching. I think thats part of it but there are lots of things affecting me just now. I've started to get that panicky feeling again (I tend to go through phases of this) where I feel I'm just not doing enough. I'm working, but I'm not actually earning very much, and that makes me feel like I should be doing more. All the stuff in the news about welfare reforms makes me edgy too, as I do rely on a certain amount of help from the state, and probably will do until A is independent.
Of course the other BIG area I'm worrying about is home ed (deja vu, anyone?) Am I doing enough here? To motivate? To offer opportunities? Should I push more? Should I stand back more?
I always have this sneaking suspicion that we're not doing half as much as everyone else.

I suppose this is common for a lot of people (well, I tell myself it is to make me feel slightly better!) and I know I will come through it to a more balanced state soon. I do have some exciting/scary plans for something I want to work on, so maybe just need to focus on that rather than panic about all the things I'm not doing.

Crafty devils

We had a crafty day yesterday, hence my living room looked like this:

Such a lovely way to spend a day, music pumping, scissors snipping, glue sticking, totally chillful. And we got most of our Christmas cards made.



Finally decided on our Christmas project, that is - a little handmade gift we make and send to friends and family every year. Having made quite a few pots of jam I've got local people sorted, but I don't fancy packing up and sending heavy glass jars out to people all round the country. Racked our brains a bit as we've been doing this for years now and are running low on ideas for 'light' items to send out with cards, but the other day I came across the idea of these (tissue paper) stained glass effect chinese lanterns:

I think they look a bit Christmassy, and are very different to what we've done other years.

I know its very early to be thinking about Christmas, but I find if I don't start getting organised in October time runs away and suddenly - oh, I've got a week to get everything done!!

I'm not religious at all, but I do really like winter. I like the dark nights drawing in, cosy evenings in, wrapping up in layers of jumpers and coats, wearing of big boots. Not so much the wind and rain, but I do like frost and snow. So I suppose its more of a winter festival than a religious one for us, but its still a good excuse to take the time to appreciate loved ones and let them know you care.

Need to mention this lovely bag I bought from Cheery Mishmash, its gorgeous! There are lots of other HE related designs for bags and T-shirts, and other non-HE related items too - I got a really cute baby vest for my cousin's little girl from them. Well worth a look!