think I say this every year,  I resist like mad when I see all tinsel and glitter in the shops and totally put it out of mind…….  then I start the usual making process of gifts for my nearest and dearest and THEN, I have that awful feeling of the Christmas tidal wave rushing towards me and about to engulf me and feel like want to  run like hell.

What is it about christmas that does this to me !  Actually I know very clearly why ! OVER CONSUMPTION –  CORPORATE HIJACKING – HUGE WASTE  and the FAKENESS of it all.  And of course my children are not children anymore, no mince pie for Rudolph and Father christmas , no more letters to santa ! and no more getting up in the early hours of the morning to open the presents !

Oh and no more getting up early to put the giant turkey in the oven to feed everyone.  Most of “EVERYONE” have passed over to the spirit world, parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles , nobody left now really.  Being a grandmother, this status has not been bestowed on me , and knowing my children they are not about to in the foreseeable future, so its me, my kids, and if I am lucky I may see my brother.

What is really lovely though and warms my heart is making gifts and not being pressurised to buy, to sit around the fire after eating fine fare and laughing and relaying stories, this year with the added addition of homemade sloe gin and damson vodka !  Another ritual is travelling to the sea for a bracing walk along the beach, picking up lovely finds and dreaming about the months to come, looking forward to natures stirrings, watching new growth as it pushes up through the soil and my next visit to Greece.

Its a beautiful and happy life, of that I am so grateful