Life is very odd isn’t it?

I intended this post to be about Christmas preparations and mince pie making and indeed it will get to that but I found out today that I may have lost my job!

The last 12 or so years have been tight financially and I have learned to live on a tight budget. One friend of mine gave her daughter a monthly lunch fund which was more than I earned in a month to keep my family! To say that it’s been tough is a bit of an understatement.

I say that I may have lost my job as I haven’t been formally told. We have a work group WhatsApp group and we were told that there was no point in carrying on. My problem is that I am the longest serving member of staff and a straddle two companies the old and the new, the new being the one which has just failed! I don’t know if I’m still needed in the old but I’ll go in anyway. Well, login, I work online. The problem being that there are no workers rights. We won’t get any severance pay and have absolutely no rights in this situation.

I’ll just have to see what happens and at the same time, stop procrastinating about what I could be doing if…….., and just get on and do it!

I’ll keep you updated.

Meanwhile, yesterday I had a wonderful time wrapping presents for my family. I used an IKEA wrapping paper which I bought because it is made out of brown paper and it looks very “crafty” which I like. I made my own tags which are my own watercolour Christmas elements, printed onto textured watercolour paper. I then threaded through some jute string which looked quite in keeping with the paper. I also edged the tags in gold pigment just to jazz them up a bit. I was very pleased with the result. You can buy the printable tags on my Etsy shop, Gatto Nero Publishing. They’re ready to print as in the picture.

You get 16 to a sheet of A4 paper and they can be cut out!

Today was a mince pie day. I’ve been promising for a while. Even though I say so myself, my pastry is a good recipe. It just melts in your mouth. I only did one batch but will do more tomorrow as I may now be unemployed. Wow, I can’t believe I’m saying that!

I put my my mince pies into some festive paper cases I bought at IKEA. They are a bit too big for my pies though but it’s still cute all the same!