Home Again and Happy New Year Wishes

Our week in Yorkshire passed in the blink of an eye, and yesterday we travelled back to London to get back to our normal, everyday life. It's been a strange Christmas, mainly due to OH's father being in hospital.  He is still in the hospital, but is doing a little better. 

OH may need to travel back up to Yorkshire in the next week or so to help out, if needed, but with three of us and the dog, we were too many to stay with his mum for any length of time.  She has enough on her plate at the moment without us all under her feet and roof.

When we got back last night I rang my Manager at the CS to volunteer to work today to give him a break, as he has covered for me over Christmas, but he was happy to work himself today and I agreed to go in for a day next week, although I am still officially on leave.  I'm not making a habit of it, but with the other Deputy not currently at work, I felt it only fair to try to help out.

Apparently, he's had to close the shop quite a bit over the last week due to a lack of volunteers, which hasn't been great, but doesn't surprise me as we were struggling right up until Christmas to secure enough volunteers to open every day.  It sounds like he's got a big recruitment drive planned when I get back to work proper.

As a consequence of not going in, today I am going to get myself organised at home.  Get some grocery shopping done for the New Year and beyond and finish unpacking and putting away everything we brought back with us this Christmas.

We didn't really do much shopping whilst we were away.  We tentatively ventured out to the shops on a couple of occasions after Christmas, but I only really came away with discounted Xmas items such as cards, wrapping paper, gift bags, money cards, etc., that will be put away with all the Christmas decorations ready for me to use next year. I just wasn't interested this year in starting my Xmas shopping early. 

I've decided that I'm changing how I shop for Christmas in 2018, as I don't want to have to store things all year round and in any case, by the time Christmas comes around again, things I might have bought in the sales don't always seem so appropriate.  Besides, I'm going to be giving many more cash gifts or gift vouchers, so that people don't get things they really don't want. As the children in the family are getting older, they seem much happier with this arrangement, which means I only really need to shop for a stocking filler or two from now on.

We received mostly consumable gifts this year, which I'm very happy with, although we got way too many chocolates and food items. I've got enough gin and prosecco to last me a good few months, which is fine by me.

My phone from OH didn't arrive until after we'd left London, so was kindly looked after by our neighbours, which is embarrassing after my rant in a post a few weeks ago. I haven't got it set up yet, but intend to do so over the next few days.  OH also bought me a few books that I'd asked for which always makes me very happy. 

On account of not getting the phone in time, he gave me some money to buy a few extras in the sales, but I just bought a new sports bra, a few pairs of nice socks and a candle or two to use throughout the year. I really didn't need or want anything else.

I've put on a few kg over the holidays, but once I get settled back into regular eating, work and exercise habits, I'm sure it will drop off again.  It usually does. I'm now looking forward to a New Year full of new possibilities.  I had a very eventful year last year, with losing a young friend at the end of last year, trying to reorganise my finances and eventually starting my new job and trying to get a reasonable balance between work and home life, which I'm not sure I ever did.

I'm sure there will be more changes to come this year, especially when my contract ends at the end of March. I like change though in a work environment, it helps to keep you on your toes and helps prevent you getting in a rut.

Let us hope that most of the changes and challenges we face this year will be positive ones and that our hopes and wishes for the year may be met or even exceeded.

Wishing You All A Very Healthy, Happy, Peace Filled and Prosperous New Year.