The Plain Honest Truth

I've kept a blog for many years. It started in 2006 when I started homeschooling my children. It was a record of our learning and our faith.

Living and learning at home is very much a weaving of life through the seasons and of creating a cozy and nuturing home, and so these things crept into my blogging too.

As our season of homeschooling came to an end and the children were now adults and flown the nest, I really found myself struggling to know just what to write about on my blog. To be honest I felt redundant and have done up to now.

As any mother of young adult children will know, Empty Nest Syndrome coupled with trying to figure out just what your purpose in life is after years of raising and educating children is hard...and painful.

During my early Empty Nesting years, I have kept a small creative business running alongside studying for a law degree, doing a bit of freelance writing and working part-time. That is a lot to keep juggling and I confess that I haven't always done a sterling job! Along the way I have actually found that some of what I loved to do and treasured was...not lost...but put away in the bottom of a cupboard and neglected as I struggled to find my way into a new life season.

Every so often that dark cupboard which held those much loved and treasured things would be opened, and waves of longing and nostolgia would sweep over me.

But without time to properly consider these things or pay attention to the thoughts that were rooted in my faith, the door was closed as I continued on with my busy-ness.

Apart from all this, the blogging world has changed over the past few years. It's all about SEO, rankings, keywords and writing in a certain way in order to meet all those things, and blasted adverts on every.single.page - pet peeve right there! I will not read a blog if I have to fight through ads to get to the content. It's easier to just close down the page.

Added to that, society seems to be moving further into a world where everyone is easily offended and overly opinionated. Converstations can no longer be had because if you dare to disagree with the 'Woke' mantras of the day, you get positivly annihilated.

Social media keeps preaching it's false message, "if you have more stuff then you will be happy", and the various platforms are of full of people filming themselves being 'generous' to the less fortunate, or posting 'feel-good' videos of animals saving other animals from frightening and dangerous situations- often from situations that these narcesstic humans have placed them in in order to film and get likes - it makes me positivly sick to my stomach!

To be perfectly honest, all this has actually stopped me from writing and sharing. It's just not me - I don't write 'trending' content. I don't write all these 'how to' articles like I'm some authority or expert who holds all the answers.

I don't pretend that my home is a show-home, or that I spend hours creating the most amazing bakes, or that my garden produces enough to feed my whole family

I don't pretend to have it all together all time, or that I live in blissful peace and joy 24/7. Actually, I worry about my kids A LOT - it's one of the gifts that keeps on giving having come from a country where you have to be super vigilant so that you don't become another victim-of-crime statistic. I operate at a constant low- level of anxiety.

As I mull over all these things, I have realised that my type of 'blogging' was really sharing a little bit of what inspires me to live a more purposful and unplugged life.

It's not magazine worthy. My photographs are not staged with special filters. It's really just a little peek into another ordinary mum's life. Most would say its quite boring.

I am moving away from Facebook so I don't have to see all those awful videos that are pushed into my feed all the time.

Instagram will get very limited input from me because honestly, I cannot work it out and it baffles me how a comment I make on someone elses post can get over 300 likes but noone seems to see my own content and I struggle to get 10 likes on a post!

I'm moving back to blogging and chatting to you on my Youtube channel, and I'm writing about things that are authentic to me. Just ordinary, normal, simple things in a chaotic, overwhelming world.

* I am a Christian.

* I am a wife and mum.

* I love to knit and craft although I don't think I'm particularly gifted in these things but I like to do them - it makes me happy.

* I dream about living in the countryside again in a small cottage with runner ducks but I don't think that is going to happen any time soon.

I would love to finally finish the quilt I started 7 years ago and I would love for my little yarn business to keep ticking over - its a lovely creative outlet.

So I guess what I am saying is that for a long time I have felt that I did not have much to offer on my blog since our homeschooling days came to an end. 

Then as my little yarn business grew I felt I couldn't write about the things that are very much a part of who am for fear that they may be boring.

I have always written from the heart and everything that I do is influenced by my Christian values and the importance I place in the role I have in my home and in the lives of those who are precious to me.

I value people. I value my traditional role. I take joy in my Christian faith, my family, my home and in my creativity. 

I am who I am. My business is part of who I am. It should be run along the same principles that I run my life. At the end of all that, that is just the plain, honest truth of why I do what I do.

So I hope that you will still enjoy popping over here every so often and knitting with my yarn, and reading my very ordinary little snippets of down-to-earth simple life that are about many things, not just yarn and knitting.

And I sincerely hope that in being totaly honest with you about my values and needing to write about things that are in line with who I am, I will not bore you to tears or send you running for the hills!

Instead, I hope you will grab a cup of tea and join me in a little relaxed chit-chat as friends do.