' Hello Again & Kindling The Festive Flame'

Well, well, well, 2015 has not been a year full of cheer & happiness, has it? So much discontent everywhere, displaced victims of war and financial hardship around the world – it hardly seems fair to think of Christmas and of fairy tale scenes, snow and flickering lights…

This blog though is an escape for me from the real world (as I hope it is for you) and so this year again I will be serving up a lot of festive flavours both current and from the past to help your build up to the New Year seem brighter.

I have already compiled another Christmas Quiz to test your knowledge of all things Christmassy and have recorded a very silly new Christmas video single that I hope will bring a smile to your face. There will be posts on both of these nearer to the big day so check back here often!

As well as all this I hope to outdo my efforts last year in spreading Christmas cheer about the place via my ‘Thank You’ card campaign. Its often the little unexpected surprises that make the difference to whether a Christmas is a good or great one and I intend to try and make a personal difference to many strangers experience of Christmas this year.

As we are still only in October at the moment, I’m not going to get too festive on you just yet. Right now is NOT the time for shops to be pushing Christmas down our throats and I have no intention of doing that either. I simply love to start writing this blog from the middle of October because doing so helps me to put some kindling wood on my own personal inner fire. The Christmas spirit is something you have to gradually encourage to grow inside you and cultivation of that frame of mind can sometimes take a bit of doing I can tell you!

Luckily, however bad things get, I have plenty of happy childhood memories of Christmas and the nearer we get to December the 25^th the more memories of past happiness returns to my conscientiousness…