Ho ho ho. There’s certainly a chill in the air and Christmas is right around the corner. For festive parties and weddings, red and green don’t have to be the be all and end all of holiday decorations. For my fellow glitterbugs, I’ve put together some sparkly Christmas craft tutorials. These are easy, quick, fun and are perfect for both parties and weddings. Enjoy!

For bunting, you will need:

♥ Scissors
♥ A pen
♥ Sparkly card (you can buy this from Hobbycraft)
♥ Thin, plain ribbon
♥ A hole punch
♥ A spare piece of cardboard

Step one

Make a heart-shaped template out of the spare card.

Step two

Turn the glittery card upside down and draw carefully around the template on the back of the glittery card.

Step three

Cut carefully around where you’ve drawn so that you’re left with a heart shape. Save the off cuts for later (you’ll see why).

Step four

Repeat as many times as necessary depending on the desired length (or lengths) of bunting.

Step five

Punch holes in the corners of your heart shapes and lay them out in the order you’d like to string them together.

Step six

Cut a length of ribbon (make sure you cut more than you need, you can always trim later) and thread through the holes making sure you go round the back, rather than the front of the sparkly card.

Step seven

Sit back and enjoy your sparkly bunting before using the off cuts for the next project below!

For drink stirrers, you will need

♥ Stick glue
♥ Scissors
♥ Spare card
♥ Off cuts of glittery card
♥ Bamboo skewers

Step one

Cut any necessary templates, such as heart or star shapes. Make sure you make them in even numbers as they will need to be glued together. For flags and crowns, cut strips.

Step two

For flags, cover the back of a strip of sparkly card in glue, wrap around the top of the bamboo skewer, press firmly together and cut a triangle shape out of it. For crowns, cover the back of a strip of card in glue, fold it in half and cut triangles to form a three-pronged crown shape. Then insert the bamboo skewer in the middle of the shape and firmly secure. For heart shapes, cover the backs of two shapes in glue and firmly press them around the top of the bamboo skewer so that they match up.

Step three

Make some fabulous cocktails, sit back and stir. Merry Christmas!

This is genuinely the hardest thing I’ve written in a very long time. I’m writing this because I know from experience that there are millions of couples out there struggling with this issue and because my blog is about helping people. For a long time I’ve been sitting on this out of fear of people knowing about our issues conceiving, and I’ve decided that it’s time to break the taboo that keeps so many people suffering in silence.

Yes, this is deeply personal, I won’t go into the hows and whys, but I’m also done talking in whispers and being ashamed of something that isn’t my fault and can’t be helped. We have a squeamish culture about our bodies, and I understand that some people may think this is an overshare – but I call it a necessity.

For whatever reason John and I are not easily able to conceive. It won’t necessarily be impossible for us but we’ve been trying a very long time and it might not happen for us.

However, I wanted to share my experience because I don’t want other women who are given this news to be crippled with devastation. I have a happy life and I wanted to share the whys and hows of that. So here are the five things that fertility problems have taught me:

Procreation is a sensitive issue

Before we started trying, I probably, thoughtlessly, asked many of my married friends about babies. Now I wouldn’t dream of asking that dreaded question, eyebrows raised suggestively, an annoying, knowing look on my face. I know better now – sometimes that question isn’t just irritating, it’s painful. Unless someone brings up children or volunteers information, I never, ever ask.

I also never, ever, ever offer unsolicited health advice. I’ll write more in-depth about that at another time, but everyone who’s ever had any kind of illness or affliction will know what I mean. If people want your advice, they will ask for it (PS, I don’t want advice). The temptation is to try and fix things for others, but sometimes they can’t be fixed, or if they can, people have already done their own research and come to their own conclusions about treatment.

I KNOW I want children

Before I knew there was any issue, I had never really confronted my feelings about having children. Yes, it’s frustrating to know now that I’m ready and would love to have a child but can’t, but at the same time it’s comforting to know that if and when it does happen for us, I’ll be ready – and that child will be so loved and wanted.

I’m so happy where I am

Having said that, despite wanting something I may not be able to have, I’m also much more satisfied in general. When I first received the news, it made me look at everything in my life.

It completely knocked me over – our whole life plan had been derailed, our dreams of being parents seemed to be shattered. I remember literally wailing-crying to a friend that I couldn’t be happy without a baby.

Then I stopped and asked myself why that was the case. I have a job I love with relatively little stress, a steady income and a great quality of life. I have a home (that I also work in) that’s beautifully decorated, I never go without the things I  need. And most importantly, I have an incredibly loving relationship with my amazingly supportive husband – he would do anything to make me happy and that is more than good enough for me! I would rather live the rest of my life with him and nobody else than with the wrong person and twenty children.

Yes, I’d be lying if I said it didn’t still have its awful moments – that it didn’t bring up feelings of grief, isolation, jealousy, self pity.

No matter whether we end up conceiving, adopting or not having children at all, I know that I wouldn’t trade my life, or my relationship, for anything. Unless you’re happy where you’re at, you won’t be happy when you get wherever it is you want to go.

I’m much more aware of adoption issues

Who knew adopting in the UK is so difficult? And who knew there were so many children who desperately need a home? Who knew that the very syndrome that causes infertility can rule some women out of adopting on health grounds? Who knew being overweight and healthy, but still overweight, could be a barrier to adoption? Who knew that many adoption agencies need you to put in serious childcare hours before you’ll even be considered? Who knew it was such a marathon? It was never on my radar before – it really is now. Even if we do have biological children, adoption is now something I would seriously consider for reasons other than wanting to fill a family and being so aware of what’s involved and going into the system with open eyes is invaluable.

It showed me how strong I am

On paper, the news that we had fertility issues came at the worst possible time, just as I was dusting myself off from a very difficult bereavement. Facing all of those issues head on, going through them instead of avoiding them and knowing that I can be happy through the hard times showed me exactly what I’m made of. From what I hear, parenthood is tough. I remain optimistic that at some point in my life, I will be a parent – good to know I’m strong enough to handle it!

*Yawn* happy Sunday, campers! I have a gem of a quote today which is actually often incorrectly attributed to the teachings of the Buddha (although I’m sure he’d agree with it). Nobody really knows who came up with this one, but whoever they were, they knew what they were talking about: I once had a friend who let me down really badly. Needless to say I felt angry, I’d expected more of that friend and really felt disappointed by their actions. After cutting ties with them, I was ranting to another friend about just how angry I was. That’s when the friend I was ranting at sent me the above quote.

My former friend didn’t care that I was angry. They were completely unaffected, their life went on as usual. So who was my anger hurting? Well, me. I was the one who was stressed, bitter, upset, wasting energy that could have been used more productively on being hopping mad. Not that I’d want someone else to suffer just because they’d upset me, but even if I had, it would be a futile endeavour. My ex-friend was completely unscathed and I was the one suffering.

Sometimes in life, people do crappy things – we’re all only human and we’re all trying our best – name me one person who hasn’t done something crappy in their life. But we have three choices as to how we react to other people’s crapness (totally a word): resolve the situation and forgive, cut our losses and move on or just be angry.

Personally, that last one doesn’t make much sense to me. Next time you find yourself furious at somebody, remember that you’re hurting yourself and not them, send the situation love and move on to better things.