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February in Lockdown

I often think that February is a funny month, more funny peculiar than funny ‘ha ha’. We are often keen to get through January with the cold, grey days and the lull after the excitement of Christmas and New Year. It can seem like a long month, but then all of a sudden, here we are in February. The short month that seems to fly by, sometimes unnoticed.

February is a month that brings us half term something we all will be looking forward to, even if we can’t take the holidays we might have been hoping for.  It’s a nice month to have a birthday in, something happy to look forward to, my daughter’s 10^th birthday at the start of the month gave us cause for cake baking, bunting hanging and present wrapping which was lovely.

It is a month that, does in fact bring us lots of reasons to celebrate.  You will no doubt have noticed that green shoots are sprouting from the ground once again, the snowdrops are out and the crocuses are poking up and there are buds on the trees again.  The days are longer.  So reason to be cheerful no.1 …..Spring is well on its way.

Furthermore, February brings us Valentine’s Day and with it the opportunity to celebrate and show our affection and appreciation for the people we love, in whatever form we love: family, friendship or romantic.  We are also, this month, raising awareness of LGBTQ+ History month and it is important to remember that many members of our community will be celebrating Chinese New Year today and into the weekend.

Before our short month of February passes us by, please take time to stop and give thought to all of the above.  Living in the remote community as we are at the moment can often leave us feeling isolated, it is easy for us to overthink the negatives, to misread the tone of an email or online comment, to say something we don’t mean because we didn’t think before we sent or spoke.

February bring us an opportunity to remind ourselves of the love, kindness and respect we have for each other, whoever we are. Whatever it is that makes us unique should and must be celebrated, whether that be our culture, our gender identity, our sexual orientation, our interests and our beliefs.

Happy February and Happy Half Term.

LGBTQ History Month

February is the month which is globally recognised as the LGBTQ History month. This an annual month-long observance of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender history, and the history of the gay rights and related civil rights movements. It was founded in 1994 by Missouri high-school history teacher Rodney Wilson, with the help of other organisations.  As of 2021, LGBTQ History Month is a month-long celebration that is specific to the US, Canada, Australia, Brazil, UK, Greenland and the city of Berlin.

Here we focus on 2 Historic Icons you should know.

Perhaps you would like to try your hand at some traditional Chinese New Year foods.  Check out the BBC Food Guide for Recipes.

Art by Jenni Wesson and Keely Ball

The future belongs to you. What do you want it to look like?

Creative Earth is an art competition for people aged 16 and under from across the UK, run by the UN COP26 Climate Change Conference in collaboration with WWF.

Enter the competition to be in with a chance of having your artwork displayed at COP26 and show the rest of the world your vision for the future.  The deadline is February 28th.