My first Blog…….wow where to start. I think I’ll begin by introducing myself. I can definitely class myself as a very lucky woman. So this is my Lucky List (rather than a bucket list) :
- I work from home. This is more than a little luxury for me, I need to work when I’m able, and hide away when I can’t manage it!
- I was lucky to be diagnosed with MS when my children were needing me less ‘physically’, and were in their teens!
- Lucky that my husband Mat has been so supportive and loving over the years and it still seems to grow!
- Lucky my friends are so supportive, kind and absolutely inspirational to me!
- Very lucky we moved house and now have the garden I waited 20 years for and so much light streaming through our home, even on a dull day.
- Glad that I have support from the MS team at hospital, medicine and fellow MS’ers/friends at our coffee mornings! I LOVE MY COFFEE!
- All in all a totally new way of looking at everything with an unlimited amount of Appreciation and Love!
Last month felt full, here’s a little run down of a few things in last months diary, then I will mention some of the work and topics that I plan to cover in my next blog. Hopefully I can launch a regular monthly blog and we can see how that works out. It is my first ever blog so you didn’t expect a short one.
Well firstly another attempt at a fully functioning website has been at the top of my agenda but the big difference was that I had a new teammate James for all the technical issues, after a little hiccup at the beginning, me being very eager and excited to have help! I have so much in my brain at any one time me it’s unbelievable and so I am going to have to settle down before it explodes. I need my ideas make it into reality and actually do it rather than just think it!
I have all kinds of ideas to do with art and sculpture, well I look out for classes in sculpture and anything art related, because I want to progress and learn as much as possible! And so on 25th July, to mark my parents wedding anniversary, it would have been their 60th. My Dad (George) died on Boxing Day 2016, and so Mam (Elsie) and I had a trip to Newcastle to make ourselves a silver ring each! It was fascinating and a very well organised class! Never too late to learn. It was unfortunately on the hottest day but we managed!
Butterflies have been a love of mine for years now. It all started when the kids were small and we visited butterfly world in Stockton-on-Tees. It’s not just the climate but the free fluttering tropical butterflies and silence transforms your existence for an hour or two. After the photographs I collected there I began to paint, with their beautiful colours and dainty movements kept in mind. So special, I have some prints I shall have to dig out some of the prints to add to my print collection.
My great friend popped an idea into my head – last year I had seen how she looked after some caterpillars, then set them free in her garden. Now I have a garden, why not! Last year was a trial and it worked brilliantly, so I decided this year it had to be repeated. After my husband Mat was so popular with the butterflies in Spain earlier in the year, they had to be a birthday gift for his 47th. And so the caterpillars were ordered at the right time!
Setting them free was fast and ‘how rude’ they flew straight away from our beautiful flowers! They had a life to live fast I suppose 
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My MS society ‘coffee morning group’ had their 35th anniversary meal and show. You appreciate the challenges everyone has on their plates, visible and invisible and I was thankful that I didn’t need my walking stick, although I didn’t get up to dance, that would have been messy and funny, good to laugh! So for last years Christmas Meal I donated a painting and this 35th celebration got a print to raffle. It was a great night with a lot of wonderful people, fellow ms’ers and dedicated carers.
My daughter Jessica, all of a sudden 21 ‘how did that happen’ had her favourite day of the year, Pride, she usually goes all out to celebrate and has done since school, here are a few of her PRIDE days! 
My son Daniel, 20 in November, has been working with his dad at the brewery and so they both have a nice commute together, Mat was showing the painting of Daniel on the internet, after checking he was allowed of course!
POETRY CORNER!
I’d like to leave a couple of poems on here to end my blog isn’t it.
First up, well it had to be my favourite by Sir Edward Dyer.
My Mind to me a Kingdom is
My mind to me a kingdom is;
Such perfect joy therein I find
That it excels all other bliss
Which God or nature hath assign’d.
Though much I want that most would have,
Yet still my mind forbids to crave.
No princely port, nor wealthy store,
No force to win a victory,
No wily wit to salve a sore,
No shape to win a loving eye;
To none of these I yield as thrall,—
For why? my mind despise them all.
I see that plenty surfeit oft,
And hasty climbers soonest fall;
I see that such as are aloft
Mishap doth threaten most of all.
These get with toil and keep with fear;
Such cares my mind can never bear.
I press to bear no haughty sway,
I wish no more than may suffice,
I do no more than well I may,
Look, what I want my mind supplies.
Lo ! thus I triumph like a king,
My mind content with anything.
I laugh not at another’s loss,
Nor grudge not at another’s gain;
No worldly waves my mind can toss;
I brook that is another’s bane.
I fear no foe, nor fawn on friend,
I loathe not life, nor dread mine end.
My wealth is health and perfect ease,
And conscience clear my chief defence;
I never seek by bribes to please,
Nor by desert to give offence.
Thus do I live, thus will I die,—
Would all did so as well as I!
And our second poem this month is one of Stacey Reay’s published poems, from 2012.
A Timeless Blossom
Seasons caress the Earth’s exquisite bosom
Gracefully the distilled flowers succumb
Pivoting and affecting one another in a subtle motion
As one strokes the next in an enviable devotion
Other flowers dwindle in their mighty presence
They stand brave and bold in potent elegance
Everything around them bows in adulation
At the simple flower which represents a nation
The men who fell years ago
Are captured in their heroic glow
Petals whisper to the passers by
Who mourn the soldiers who had to die
A single mark of everlasting respect
In fields they tower, proud and erect
Knowing that they are worn with pride
They remind us why we are alive
Rays of sunshine are swallowed whole
As the power of the poppy takes its toll
All of nature and nations too
Wait in reverence as silence ensues
Poppies blossom in the soundless fields
Keeping secrets, covert and concealed
Secrets of those who have passed away
And are remembered when the poppies sway
