Hello 2017 – and nature's New Year celebration

Here's to 2017 – wishing everybody a happy, healthy and peaceful New Year!

There won't be a real review of 2016 this time … I'll just settle on admitting that I am pretty happy to be in 2017 now! And that 2016 was a challenging year at least. Caring for two 90 year old peeps (one of them with dementia) while looking after two households plus trying to run my art and design business often brought me to the edge of exhaustion. I believe that there's a time for everything in life, and this obviously is not the time for big career plans …

So for 2017 I'll just try to concentrate on the positive things. Hoping to help my parents to live their high age life in dignity – which is not easy all the time – and praying for patience for myself. And I'll just take every chunk of time I can get to create. It has become crystal clear to me that this is one of my basic needs, going way beyond any thoughts of career or making money.

For today – and to celebrate the New Year – I'll show you the winter wonderland that we enjoyed for two days right at our doorstep. It started on the 30th of December when we had a day and a night of dense fog. When the valley appeared again out of the big nothing, it had wrapped itself into a festive cloth of glittering frost … enjoy :-) Happy 2017!