Collect moments, Not things.

This blogpost was just going to be an Instagram photo but somehow there was so much more to say that it has become a blogpost. 

I'm not a materialistic person- I've never felt the need to have the latest clothes or shoes or gadgets. 

So it totally surprised my family just how heartbreaking it was when I was washing up my favourite Emma Bridgewater cup last night and accidentally managed to chip the lip of the cup. 

My husband tried to assure me that I could still drink from it despite the chip (but I know it would only upset me more each time I saw the chip).

My kids kept repeating to me over and over that it was just a cup and that it doesn't matter. 

Of course in so many ways they are right. But at the same time it showed me that none of my family 'get it' about just why this cup was so important to me. 

Of course it's pretty. Stunning in fact. Of course it's amazing for being an Emma Bridgewater cup - an absolute icon of pattern and design. Of course it's practical with its generous size enabling me to have a nice big cup of tea. But none of those things are the reason why I was so upset. 

The reason it meant SO much to me was what it represents. That cup was not just a cup. That cup was... 

...a collection  of moments. Snatched moments amidst the chaos of life. That cup totally epitomized the oh so rare commodity that is called "me time". 

At one point I realised that I was so stretched and thinly spread that I was lucky to sit down with a cuppa even once a week, let alone once a day. 

I was determined to change that and gradually gradually, one cup of tea a week became two. Then I managed to make time for a daily cuppa and more recently realising how important it was to everyone else to make sure I looked after myself I would even occasionally manage 2 cups of my favourite herbal teas in that gorgeous tea cup.  It was a prompt - a daily reminder- "look after yourself" those pretty polka dots would whisper. "Have a nice big cuppa" the generously sized cup would encourage me. "I'm bright. I'm beautiful. I'm here for you whenever life gets too much and to remind you not to let it get too much". 

My beautiful tea cup.  

I shan't be replacing it. Not immediately anyway. It will give the other tea cups a chance to shine for a while after this one had stolen the limelight for so long. ( And had stolen my heart)

Of course there was no way I was going to bin it though. So it will still sit centre stage and be put to use in another way. Here it is giving the last bit of foliage from my Pod and Pip bouquet a final lease of life as a makeshift vase. 

And whilst I do live by the motto of collecting moments and not things, I am grateful to this gorgeous tea cup for the moments it gave me and helping me to understand that I matter.