Happy New Year - A letter to my friends

To my dear faithful blog-land buddies.

I just wanted to check in to say, I am still here, nothing terrible has happened! I just lost all enthusiasm for my blog towards the end of last year.

I had all these grand plans to relay all these wonderful stories from the last few months, however instead it just made me feel more homesick and separated from the ones that I love.

So I had to stop.

December is a horrible time to feel alone and it really got to me. I came to this realisation that the good friends I had made in Paris over the summertime had long gone and finding a solid friend to talk to and debrief with was just near impossible. So I spent a lot of time alone, which is always good for the soul but I just craved a good friend that knew me well to go ice skating with or just to share a gossip.

So, the blog suffered and I muddled my way through December the best I could. An unlikely friend threw me a lifeline and invited me to spend Christmas with his family. It turned out to be one of my highlights of the year, it was amazing. It definitely took the sting out of not being home and as a result got to experience my first French Christmas. It was MAGICAL. Loads of laughs and a little bit too much champagne is always what the Doctor ordered!

Preparations for Christmas Eve celebrations.

Being surrounded by French people, it also made me realise that I need to really get stuck into my French. I have been here for almost 8 months now and I feel like my French should be better, so this is yet another reason I have taken steps back from the blog. I put so much pressure on myself to write here that it turned into a chore rather than a pleasure. I want to fall in love with writing again, but right now I feel I need to place priority on learning French and if the blog is what suffers as a result, so be it. 

I am so thankful for those special few of you that actually read this. A lot of the time I feel like I am talking to myself, so every comment and email that is sent my way I truly appreciate.

So I guess I am saying you probably wont be seeing me on here that often. I'm not going anywhere, I am about to embark on a new adventure of working with a French family, so I am sure there will be times I am back here with some funny stories to tell!!

Until then, I hope that everyone had a wonderful Christmas and you are all settling into 2013. I have started a 30 day Bikram Yoga challenge with a friend after being sick with the flu for 2 weeks, so I am looking forward to this year and making every day count!

Big love to you all and see you when I see you!! 

Bisous,

Em