January isn’t the best month – most of us are broke or at the very least a bit cash strapped, oh and it’s going to be at least two months before the nights get lighter and it’s cold. The weather has been particularly rubbish today, I love my crisp sunny winter days- grey cloudy windy ones are just plain depressing.

Today’s been a weird one, I’m sort of supposed to be back at work but Imogen is still on (pre school) holiday, and Andrew has spent all day doing some rather intense , and by the sounds of it frustrating, database internet stuff.

I’d started the day in good spirits but within a couple of hours – and a rejected story-  later  I was feeling the January blues start to sink in. I started to panick and before long was wondering how on earth I’d see the day through without bursting into tears or having a panic attack. And this is when Imogen is doing her best impression of an angel – albeit a hyperactive angel.

So I took a deep breath and decided to take the day in baby steps. It was by now 10.30am. (Now as an aside I expect there are many self employed/freelancers out there without little ones who experience the whole range of human emotions before they get to lunch time, it’s exhausting and happens to me at least once a week).

Anyhow I decided that the only way to buck myself up was to break the day into pieces. So after doing the dusting and washing as best as I could. I concentrated on making the best egg mayonaise for Immy, using home-made spelt bread. Somehow just spending a little bit extra effort on something I normally do made me feel better.

I then decided that Imogen and I should go swimming, but first we needed to send out some thank you cards. Now I was tempted to buy a pack of ready made cards, but in my rummage around discovered a make your own card set we had bought from Wilkinsons.

What a revelation, this is the best thing we hahve done in ages – Imogen and I had a lovely 2 hours making cards. Followed by swimming then spaghetti carbonara for dinner (Marks and Spencers!).

I’ve just rounded my early evening off with some yoga – Andrew put Imogen to bed.

So today it started out that the smallest things made me feel unhappy but then the even smaller things (i.e stuff  I normally take for granted) actually made the day one of the best I’ve had in a long time, and that means Imogen and Andrew are happy too.

Today got me thinking, if only I could look on the bright side all the time things would be so much better. And it would mean when real adversity came again, it would be easier to handle – you only have to look at the news today the parents of Stephen Lawrence and what they went through, my silly wobble thing this morning pales really.

You don’t need money to feel better, I think we spent £4 on the card set. I wonder if today was just a different day or am I finally growing up and learning to appreciate exactly what I have – which is quite a lot.