Rocking your world friday

Hello!

This will be a very short RYWF post as this is the first day I have managed to get out of bed since Christmas afternoon. What started out as a headache and stupid cough on the 23rd Dec, had turned into Bronchitis by Christmas day evening and I had to have the doctor out as I could not breathe. I have been in bed since, I don't think I have ever been this poorly before, its totally knocked the stuffing out of me!

Anyhow, enough of that, if you want to play along just put together a list of all your gratefuls in the last week and link up with our host Virginia.

(For some reason, any photos taken with my phone, even though I have edited them with my photo software, blogger still wants to put them on sideways and theres nothing I can do about it!)

* The 21st was Yule and Paige and me were up very early to walk up to the Long Stone to watch the sunrise with lots of other like minded people and the local Druids.

We were up by the stone at just before seven am and took part in the Druid ritual being celebrated, before watching the sun rise behind the stone.

 The view from the top of the hill

 The Stone with the sunrise behind

 Teresa and me

*After watching the sun come up we all went for breakfast together at Weatherspoons. You can't beat a nice veggie breakfast after you've climbed a huge hill in the dark!

*Our friends had asked us to do some Yule stuff with them at their yoga studio so after breakfast we all went back to the studio where we did a Yule meditation, made pomanders with oranges and cloves and made wishes on a yule log. It was a lovely morning spent with wonderful friends.

*In the evening it was our Yule Celebration which went really well followed by a lovely dinner with my pagan family and exchanging Yule gifts. We each give something handmade, I received a scarf, clay ornaments with seeds inside-you plant the ornament and when the clay disintegrates the seeds start to grow and a bag with altar tools inside- really wonderful imaginative gifts!

 For the Yule gifts I gave, I made books of my pagan poetry and art work.The group I belong to always ask for copies of my poems so I thought I would put them all together in a book each for them. I had some help with the order of printing the pages as that really confused me, but other than that, all my own work! The book covers were done with grunge paper (I would have liked to use leather but couldn't afford it!)

 Front cover

 Inside front cover- we even put the copyright in!! Everybody had a different colour inside, relating to the elements.

 First poem

They went down really well and everyone seemed really pleased with them.

*On the 22nd it was my birthday. My children bought me some Montana acrylic paint pens, hubby gave me money as I am saving for an overlocker, my sister gave me a Quaich, which is a Celtic friendship bowl, I have wanted one for ages!!

My sister made me a beautiful chocolate birthday cake and came to my house and cooked dinner for me. My friend came in the afternoon and my parents so all in all a great day.

*Right, Carmen's secret Santa!!! This is the second year that Carmen has done this secret Santa swap, i enjoyed it so much last year that I signed up again this year.I was secret Santa to Virginia this year and I made her an art journal cover and a matching pen/brush roll/wrap. I also got her an art journal, pens, brushes and tools for inside the wrap, scrapbooking papers, journal cards, hand stamped tickets and of course some chocolate.

 And I guessed my secret Santa was Sarah because of the wonderful green man stencil and the handmade bracelet which I love and has had so much thought put into it with all the little charms.

 Loving all the sequin waste as well for my art journalling, the paints, ink and gorgeous buttons

 and some washi tape and a choccy snowman

Thank you so much Sarah, the whole gift was perfect and I love it!!!!!

*Christmas day- thankful to see my kids faces when they opened their gifts, thankful that my kids were grateful for everything they got. Thankful that our whole family spent the day together, thankful that my sister helped cooked the Christmas dinner with me, not so thankful that I had to go to bed by 4pm, extremely thankful that a wonderful doctor came out to me Christmas night and helped me breathe again!!

* Extremely thankful to my amazing, wonderful husband and my wonderful son who have been running around after me, checking on me, bringing me tablets and cups of tea, changing dvd's for me and doing anything else I have asked them to do. My daughter came down with a cold on the 27th so they have been running around after her as well, plus looking after our friends two dogs. Now my hubby has a cold and my son is not feeling great but they wont go to bed as they are still insisting on looking after me. They are the most amazing family in the world and I do not know what I would do without them.They are the ones that rock my world, not just this week, but every single day.

Well, the short post was a bit longer than expected! I hope you all had a fab Christmas and I wish you a happy new year!