There is something special about this in-between time bridging the gap between Christmas and the full-on return to everyday life which follows New Year.

It’s a chance to slow down and take stock after the frantic chaos of Christmas filled with excitement in a hectic whirl of family and friends, food and more food.  It’s an opportunity to look back and to look forward, and to enjoy a feeling of stillness, of timelessness.

In recent years I have avoided New Year’s resolutions.  Past experience suggests that I was setting myself up for guaranteed disappointment: exercise more, get up earlier, sleep better, read more, write more.  This time though, I might, just might, have a couple of goals that, if upgraded to the status of resolution, will make it onto the whiteboard newly installed next to my desk, where I won’t fail to see my exhortations to myself on a daily basis.

There is a fair chance I will stick with the resolutions (if that’s what they become) as giving them this status is merely to name something which has been simmering in the background, but not quite making it out of my notebook. An evolution, not a revolution.

See you in the new year.

Consuelo Simpson is an artist and maker living and working in Hampshire. Her multidisciplinary practice is focused on seeking moments of enchantment and on reaching an accommodation with the world. She remains obsessed with string!