Being cheerful in a pandemic

After starting a new blog to be able to rant and write about more about things on my mind I cheered up and my first post came out all cheerful, but I was feeling like it was not acceptable to be cheerful so had not wanted to put it 'publicly on here' 

Maybe one day I'll progress to not putting a 'disclaimer' on how I feel! 

Here's the 2nd 'Talking on Eggshells' post (written 15th December 2020 so apologies for the mentions of Christmas) 

So where to start with my shiny new blog?

The overthinking is going well and I've had so many post ideas pop into my head in the last 24 hours that I now don't know where to start! 

I thought it strange that I've felt happy / excited about it, and one of the reasons I started 'Talking on Eggshells' was so I could talk about things that made me sad or angry without worrying so much about people I know in real life reading it all so easily.  I forgot though how I love a new thing, even if one of the things I love is sharing it and that's kinda hard with a blog I'm trying not to make personal. 

For several years, inspired by other bloggers, I've looked for the good things in every day, and for reasons to be cheerful, so much so that it became a habit, one I've even passed onto my children.  

However I've been feeling like I couldn't write a 'Reasons to be Cheerful' post, like people wouldn't get it.  I've not been all that cheerful to be honest and feel like I'm constantly struggling with the fact I am actually ok,  not sick, have my family, can put food on the table and just about pay the bills too,   and therefore I don't have anything to complain about.  

Everywhere you look people are sad and struggling with something, and while I know its not a competition, it seems maybe disrespectful to shout about things making you happy - like I needed to add a disclaimer saying I'm also sad, struggling with stuff but I'm just trying to see the positive stuff and not go completely mad. 

So, with that out of the way, my reasons to be cheerful are...

1. It's nearly Christmas!   I love Christmas and am thankful that our plans are pretty much the same as usual. We have small family Christmas at home and can still meet small groups of friends in line with the current restrictions. 

2. We are still able to see our friends, even if not all at the same time.  If our whole group including children and partners are together there are 2 too many of us but we are getting round it by meeting, just the girls, or in smaller numbers on different times.  It's all a bit crazy as it's just 3 families, all the kids are at school anyway, and some of us are out working but it's good we can still see each other. 

3.  I've wrapped presents and prepared Christmas food.   I'm happy that I had some work this year and although not as much as usual it enabled me to buy presents for the kids early - no waiting this year for them to arrive at the last minute.  I really struggled at their birthdays to buy them gifts so I am so happy that Christmas has worked out ok.   They are not getting the big dream present they would love (new games console) but they wouldn't have got that in a normal year anyway, but they will still be very happy.    Not only that, but I've wrapped it all!!

4. Jigsaw puzzles!   I picked up a few jigsaws from our local charity shop and have been doing them with hubby, which makes a change from arsing about on my phone. 

5. My new blog - I've not abandoned my old one as it's my baby but I'm excited about blogging for the first time in years. I feel that every post I wrote was potentially read by people I walk past in the supermarket who know me,  and so it was starting to limit what I wrote about. ( I was once stopped by someone I vaguely knew who was chatting about stuff I didn't remember telling anyone they knew, and then realised they'd read it on my blog) 

In other news I started a twitter and Instagram account yesterday for the blog, trying to remember how I got my followers on the last blog, and thinking that would be a good place to start.   

I used to follow many bloggers and regularly comment on other posts and join in with endless linkups and blog memes, over the years I got out of the habit as so many bloggers I knew gradually disappeared, I'm now down to just a few that I am in contact with but would class as friends even though we've never met - I probably know more about them than my real life friends though these days,  I'll look you all up on Insta and hopefully get back in the the swing of things.