Ordinarily, January is supposed to be a relatively quiet time of the year.  There’s the lull after all of the festive season activities and get-togethers are over, and it’s traditionally a time to reflect on the year that’s just gone as well as planning & setting intentions for the year ahead.

Our house did not get that ‘quiet month’ memo…  As soon as we de-Christmas the house, it’s immediately time for more birthday decor to be put up again for the littlest one’s birthday at the start of the month.  I say ‘littlest’ – she’s just turned fifteen years old and is taller than me.  Along with birthday celebrations, I also somehow managed to cram in three trips to London this month; all three girls have had exams & assessments at college & school; we had a belated mini-Christmas with Sophie and her boyfriend; and Lola performed in her school’s annual musical production (which meant an intense rehearsal schedule in the lead up to it).  It’s been full-on to say the least.

As a result, the month seems to have gone by in a flash and I can’t quite believe that it’s over already – a direct contrast to the usual eternal dreariness that January tends to bring.  Maybe the key is to fill it with as much fun stuff and things to look forward to as possible?

Here are all the little things I’ve been loving lately throughout January…

READ

It’s been a good month for reading.  I’m starting the year as I mean to go on, and I’m really trying to prioritise it.  I’ve been picking up my book instead of my phone at lunchtimes, and it definitely helps that all three of the books I’ve read in January have been excellent.

A Man Called Ove: by Fredrik Backman.  Ella read this last year and loved it – she has been trying to convince me to read it ever since.  I received my own copy as part of my brilliant Christmas book haul, and when a friend also mentioned that it’s one of her “most favourite books ever” I knew that it was going to have to be my first read of the year.  I haven’t seen the film adaptation (‘A Man Called Otto’, starring Tom Hanks) yet, so I didn’t really know what to expect in terms of the plot, the characters or the feel of it.

I immediately liked the author’s style of writing (it’s translated from the original Swedish) – it’s very clean, with short sentences that somehow convey an immense amount of emotions and imagery with few simple words.  And the story… gosh.  It’s poignant and devastating and beautiful and heart-warming and heart-breaking all at once.  I loved it, and I think it’s going to stay with me for a very long time.  I finished it within a week and closed the final page with tears streaming down my face – Mimi found me sobbing in the kitchen and didn’t quite know what to do with me bless her.  In the end she just handed me the box of tissues and gave me a hug.  Please read it.

The Electricity Of Every Living Thing: by Katherine May.  This is a memoir documenting the author’s journey of walking the South West Coast Path to try and contemplate & understand why she feels so different within herself, followed by her eventual diagnosis of autism at the age of forty.  It was both a delight and a comfort to recognise some of the sections she walked, especially through parts of North Cornwall (such as Clovelly, Port Isaac, Sandymouth, Bude and Widemouth) from when we’ve visited those places.  It added an extra depth to her words because I knew exactly what view she was admiring, and precisely which spot on the clifftops she was describing.

I really enjoyed her style of writing, and her honesty about her thoughts & emotions.  I also appreciated the way in which she ended the book – it felt neat and tidy and was a positive conclusion.  It’s well worth reading if you, or someone you know and love, has neurodiversity.  I certainly gained a much deeper understanding and it was interesting to walk alongside someone else’s lived experience.  A lot of what she wrote about resonated with me.  I don’t read memoirs very often – I have a feeling that 2025  might end up being the year of the memoir though as I have quite a few in my stack of books to be read.

Kokoro: by Beth Kempton.  I’ve followed Beth for a long time on social media and more recently on Substack too.  I’ve taken a couple of her excellent writing courses in the past and I very much enjoy her voice as an author.  Her entire presence & the way she speaks simply exudes an aura of calmness.  Up until now I hadn’t read any of her books, despite owning four of them.

I decided to dive in with this one first (I very much choose the next book I’m going to read based on how I’m feeling in the moment) – it somehow felt in alignment with a few things that have happened in my world over the last decade – losing my dad and a friend to cancer, midlife creeping up on me, solo travels in an attempt to reconnect with myself, and having big questions around ‘what it’s all about, really?!’.  Plus, apparently I seem to be in the mood for memoirs right now.

It was excellent – seamlessly interweaving Eastern & Japanese philosophies and ‘ways of being’ with her own personal story & journey through motherhood, grief and struggles with a mismatch between how she was living her life vs the life she actually wanted to live.  It also contained thought-provoking journal questions & prompts at the end of each chapter too.  My copy now contains lots of underlined sentences and turned down page corners, and I have a newfound desire to visit and explore Japan, which hadn’t previously been on my travel bucket list.

All three books I read this month were fantastic in very different, unique ways: ‘A Man Called Ove’, ‘The Electricity Of Every Living Thing’, and ‘Kokoro’

WATCHED

Wicked The Musical:  It has become a bit of an accidental tradition that for each of the girls’ 15th birthdays, we’ve got them tickets to see a West End musical as their main birthday present.  Ella and Mimi both went to see ‘Hamilton’.  Lola got tickets to see ‘Wicked’ instead.  She was SO excited – it was our first adventure of 2025, squeezed in just a couple of days after her birthday and before going back to school.

Lola has only been to London twice before.  We went to the Taylor Swift Eras Tour Songbook Trail at the V&A Museum last summer (with a brief detour via Buckingham Palace as she really wanted to see it).  And many years ago when she was very small we headed down there for a blog event where we got to meet children’s author Jacqueline Wilson, but she doesn’t remember it at all.  The only musical she’s ever seen was ‘Ghost’ with her drama class at a local theatre a couple of months ago – she absolutely loved it, and came home completely lit up inside, exclaiming that she wanted to see as many musicals as possible. Unbeknownst to her I’d already booked the tickets for ‘Wicked’ for her birthday.

We travelled there and back in a day, and she did really well with the long train journeys and busy tubes.  We had a little wander around a couple of shops down Oxford Street too before our matinee performance, and she’s already begging to be taken back there for a shopping trip.

The Apollo Victoria is a beautiful art deco theatre – we walked in and she audibly gasped.  The show itself was, of course, incredible – an absolutely wonderful performance.  The costumes and set design were outstanding, there was so much attention to detail and everything was so intricately and meticulously curated.  The choreography, the acting, and the singing were all superb.  The entire production was fantastic.  Neither of us knew the story (we haven’t seen the film version), other than it’s the ‘prequel’ to The Wizard Of Oz, but it didn’t matter – we followed along.  I spent as much time watching Lola’s face as I did the actual performance – she was wide-eyed and open-mouthed throughout.  Needless to say, we both absolutely loved it and I think she now shares my love for musical theatre.

Excited to go and see ‘Wicked’ at The Apollo Victoria Theatre

The sensational cast taking a well-deserved bow at the end of the show – it was an amazing performance

Operation Mincemeat: Mid-January, on a Monday (!) evening, I met one of my best friends at the Fortune Theatre near Covent Garden.  We’ve been friends for over 37 years and I love her enormously.  We have, at various times over the years, naturally stretched away from each other like elastic bands when our lives took different trajectories (uni vs travelling, a career vs kids), and now that we are more or less back in alignment with regards to life stages (the only difference is that she has a toddler where I have teens), we have very firmly pinged back towards each other, for which I am immensely grateful.

We have always shared a deep appreciation of theatre (last year we went to see ‘Guys & Dolls’ at The Bridge), so when she messaged me to say that she’d secured tickets in the ballot to see ‘Operation Mincemeat’ and invited me to go with her, I said yes instantly.  I’ve never been to the Fortune Theatre before – it’s tiny but absolutely perfect for the production we went to see.  We were lucky enough to have been allocated excellent seats – just five rows from the front of the stage – so it felt like we were fully immersed in every scene.

I went in knowing nothing about the show other than it was set in WW2 and that it’s based on a true story.  History is not my preferred genre, but I went in open-minded – I like experiencing new things in the arts.  There were only five actors (three women and two men) playing multiple different characters each – women playing men, men playing women – so it was pretty fast-paced.  The characterisations, expressions and timing of everything was perfection.  Their singing voices were incredible.  It was laugh-out-loud funny, the energy of the cast was insane, and I understood everything that was happening (usually a challenge for me when it comes to war-related plots).  It was utterly brilliant, we both loved it.  Go and see it. Immediately. 10/10 recommend.

Sister Act (Jr):  For the last few years, Lola has been taking part in her school’s annual musical production.  Previous years have been performances of ‘We Will Rock You’ and ‘High School Musical’.  This year, it was ‘Sister Act Jr’.  Up until now, she’s only ever wanted background roles – in the chorus or part of a crowd.  This year, she had two defined roles – a nun, and a cop – and she even had some lines to speak.

It’s been a lot – rehearsals every lunchtime and every day after school since November – and it 100% paid off.  It was absolutely brilliant.  It was on for three consecutive nights, and I always make sure there’s someone there to watch her for every performance (which meant I got to see it twice!).  The whole cast and crew have worked incredibly hard on the entire production.  Lola sang and danced her heart out, her American accent whilst delivering her lines was spot-on, she had a huge smile on her face the whole time and she thoroughly enjoyed herself.  It was very funny too – I laughed until I cried, clapped so hard my hands hurt and am very, very proud of her.

HEARD

Joshua Radin:  I have been a fan of Joshua Radin’s music for several years now, so when I saw he was playing in London at a fairly small venue (Camden Jazz Club – another new-to-me place) I immediately booked to go and see him.

I already had several of his songs on my Spotify playlist, and I can confirm that I have now definitely added a few more (some old ones that I’d not heard before, and some new ones from his soon-to-be-released upcoming album) after this night.  The support act was Ellen Krauss – I’d not come across her before but I instantly loved her voice and the vibe of her music.  Some of her songs may also have found their way on to my playlist now too.

They both showed up in a way that seemed genuinely authentic and down to earth and real, like they were there purely for the love of making music rather than because it was a performance or part of a tour.  It felt like a really intimate show even though it was packed with people.  Favourites that Joshua played were ‘Beautiful Day’ and ‘Here, Right Now’.  New-to-me songs that I fell in love with were ‘Paperweight’ and ‘I Believe I’m Falling’.  And then he played ‘Winter’ as an encore and that made the whole evening perfect – it’s one of my favourites and I didn’t think he was going to play it.  A wonderful evening.

Support act Ellen Krauss

Joshua Radin – he was incredible

MADE

One Second A Day annual video:  Since 2021 I’ve been recording a one-second video clip on my phone every single day.  Big stuff, small stuff, ordinary everyday stuff, stuff that brings me joy, stuff that makes me feel peaceful, stuff I want to remember… I love watching the videos back each month, but my absolute favourite thing about this little app is when the whole year’s worth of clips gets compiled into one video.

A year documented in under ten minutes seems crazy – it’s amazing how many things I’ve forgotten happened, how many sunrises/sunsets I watched, how often my cats feature (!), how much the girls actually laugh with each other, how much joy I get from travelling and exploring new places, how often I spend on trains, and how many times the same things show up again and again and again simply because I love hem.

This was 2024:

WORE

Fluffy socks and a zillion layers:  Non-stop, all month. Because -6°C weather for the first week of January might look pretty but it’s still a big ‘nope’ from me.

AND FINALLY….

Lola’s 15th birthday:  My baby turned fifteen!  She chose to go bowling and have pizza with her best friends the day before her birthday, and then my Mum and Stepdad came up for the actual day for cake and presents too.  I can’t believe she’s fifteen…  She still has one of the biggest hearts of anyone I know.

Lola opening her cards and presents on her 15th birthday

How is my baby fifteen?!  I love this photo.

Sophie:  After several attempts, Sophie passed her driving test!  We’re all so incredibly proud of her for persevering and practising and believing she could do it despite the knocks to her confidence and the anxiety she struggled with in the lead-up to every test.

Now the first chapter of the year is closed.  2025 has started off interestingly, and who knows what the rest of the year ahead will hold?

I hope that you found plenty of little things to love throughout January and that February is as cosy as it can be before we (finally!) transition into Spring.

With love,

Chloe x