Monthly Blog from Silvermoon.
May 2009
Well,
here we are in May already! and I must firstly apologise for there having
been no blog at all in March or April...it is simply being one of those times,
so much going on.. hardware breakdowns, software breakdowns and people off
sick....what can I say ... Except sorry!
It looks as if we are going to have a beautiful summer or so we are led to believe. Here up in the northeast as I type this, the sun is shining through the window, the garden is full of the scent of blossom and the cats are lounging about enjoying the sunshine. Although we get pretty cold weather up here, we do typically get beautiful spring/summer's too.
The recession seems to continue, although my feeling is that either people are getting used to it and beginning to adapt, or things are getting slightly better... I think perhaps we are all becoming more sensible about how and when and where we spend our money... it has to be a good thing and being a natural optimist, I feel that by this time next year we may have turned the corner.
Because of these difficult times, at Silvermoon we are still offering our five pound readings from various readers, again as I type this I believe it is Skye and Drake who are working on these for you at the moment... and for those of you who are members of our ' newsletter club' ( you are automatically enrolled in this if you have ordered anything at all from either our psychics websites or our online shop at:- www.madeinmoray.co.uk in the last six months) will be pleased to see that I am myself once again offering a special very low cost reading for the month of May/June! the newsletter will be rolled out towards the end of this week.
also... if you order five readings within a two month period, you get a free reading!
I feel that many people will be spending their summer holidays in the UK this year, and why not? I think because travel to foreign places has become so easy in the past, we tend to forget that the UK has some beautiful places to holiday in, I notice that we are getting far more visitors already up in the northeast here and it will probably be an ongoing trend... perhaps this is a time for exploring places closer to us?
Anyway whatever it is you are doing this spring and early summer, I hope you have a wonderful time! At times like this we have to enjoy what is available, and not be sad about that which we can no longer afford. Personally, living in what I consider to be one of the most beautiful places in Britain... albeit a somewhat wild and rugged area, I never really want to go anywhere else!
With blessings for May whatever you are doing and wherever you are exploring!
Crystal
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February 2009
This must have been one of the coldest February is I can ever remember! even up here in the northeast of Scotland the weather has been pretty horrible, although we didn't have the depth of snow that was down south, it was bitterly cold, we had the most terrible high winds and when it wasn't windy and snowy it was raining (not the rain is anything unusual in our neck of the woods!)
some areas around us were impassable on certain days, but that is pretty normal for us up here in the North-East, so really the destruction was minimal and most of the schools stayed open for most of the time. I think anyway we are probably better geared up here for bad weather because it is more likely in the winter than down south, all wars! (By down south we mean anything south of Edinburgh!)
so what to tell you in the way of news?
if you are regulars to this site, you will know that when the credit crunch first hit we started offering five pound readings from Maeve... these have proved so overwhelmingly popular, that we then added five pounds one question readings from both Thomas and from Ariel... so now you have a choice! My original idea was to keep these on the first months of January and February, but because things are so difficult and because we have clients returning to us month after month and year after year, I took the decision that we should keep these low-priced readings on for as long as it takes for things to get better! I am truly amazed by the fact that many similar sites to ours have actually put the price of their readings up! this I can't really understand, people are not likely to spend a lot of money in a recession and who can blame them? neither would I! and a purely business point of view it seems a bit silly and certainly not good business taxes to try and take advantage of your ongoing clients. Let alone any new people who are coming to you... so we are offering you cheaper alternatives, and will continue to do so indefinitely! in fact there are more special offers on the way during this month of March.... watch the 'new stuff' page off the index page.
Many you who know us in our own area and surrounds, will be familiar with us appearing at various events and farmers markets... principally Belmont Street in Aberdeen on the last Saturday of every month. We have recently created a new website purely for this with its own ' market blog' and The reason for its construction is to let you know what we take to the markets, when they are and what other events we are likely to be attending.... we have found this necessary because people often go on to our main shop site at Made in Moray, and then a disappointed when they come to visit us at a market because we do not bring with us all the things that other on that site.... this would be very difficult and we would probably need a market all to ourselves to bring everything.... to say nothing of a lorry to carry it in! so now you can go to www.harlequin-crafts.co.uk and see what you're likely to see on our market stall where ever we are. Please bear in mind this site is still under construction and so not everything is on it yet, it will develop over the coming weeks... when I get my photographer son to go and take photographs of everything. But you will see that it is a good indicator of anything new that is happening in the coming months.
There are definitely indications of spring in the garden! Little buds are appearing and I am getting an overwhelming urge to go out and fill pots with compost again! but part of me knows that way we live it would not be a good idea, general clearing up is one thing, but planting things don't happen in this area until Easter time usually... the weather can change on a sixpence!
Well here's wishing you a wonderful March, less doom and gloom! And nicer weather. I will get back to you at the end of this month and update you again. With blessings as ever! Crystal x
January 2009
So here we are in 2009! and what a year!
Already we have seen many well-established businesses disappearing from our high streets, and we expect to see more of this before the year is out.
We seem to face the prospect of a very dismal time ahead of us, but I believe that we can look at this in a far more positive way... this has been coming for a long time, things were just not able to continue as they were for the last few years...house prices hitting the roof, so much cheap food available that we waste more than we eat! Credit available to anyone who asked for it, irrespective of whether they could actually pay it back or not! You have to agree that it could not go on forever.
We waste our resources and we rape the planet of its wonderful bounty...We are careless with what we have.... and we discard things without thought...it had to stop!
We at Silvermoon and Harlequin are seeing this as a positive thing long-term, yes okay we are going to be poorer for a while, some of us will really have to struggle to keep our business is going, and we will have to draw on the old ' wartime spirit' of making the best of what we have, and making use of everything that we have... and wasting nothing!
In the long-term this has to be good I am sure you will agree! Already we notice people are being far more careful with little things even, people are being more thoughtful about the shopping that they do especially food shopping, and when people buy goods from us at Harlequin on one of our market days, it is very rarely for them to ask for a bag to carry it away in, they usually have a stock already with them. this has got to make a major impact on our wildlife situation! We are slowlybecoming more responsible ....because we have to.
I believe the best way forward is to make this a challenge, perhaps a personal challenge to see how little we can harm the environment and how much we can reuse and recycle... and also to see how little we need to actually survive... because it is a fact that the less you have, the more appreciative you are of what you do have and have any extra treats that come your way.
Okay that's my soapbox bit for this month! lets hope for a good year despite the restrictions and problems that we will face, and let's enjoy everything to the full!! We still have the essentials, a beautiful planet, enough food, sunshine, soft rain, beautiful woods-seas and rivers with all the wildlife that they contain. Let's spend this year making the most of what we have and not grieving for what we have not!
Here at Silvermoon we have gone against the usual trend...it has been pointed out to me by more than one of our regular clients that many psychic sites are actually putting up the prices of their readings! I find this very strange and non-productive even businesswise!
We have come to the decision that the people that support us loyally should have support themselves, and not be castigated because we are living in recession right now...at the beginning of the financial problems, we began to offer a short five pound e-mail reading from our top spirit medium and clairvoyant Maeve...more recently we extended this also to Lily... and those of you who belong to our 'Newsletter Club' can now exclusively obtain as many short £7 readings from Crystal as they choose to have!
(you automatically become a member of our 'Newsletter Club' if you have ordered something from any of our psychics sites or goods from Made in Moray within the past six months, unless of course you 'opt out' of the newsletter. We will be offering more bargains and 'freebies' during 2009)
We initially intended only to offer these reduced price e-mail readings for December and January this year, but we have had so many lovely letters from you thanking us for making these offers available, that we have now decided to extend the offers indefinitely for the moment. We feel that having supported us through the good times, we should support you through the difficult times, as this is when you really need a little bit of help and support from us!
So we go into 2009 with no real knowledge of where it will take us, or how the year will end up. personally I believe that this difficult phase will last a lot longer than this year and it may be 2012 before things begin to really pick up for us again, but we can do a lot to help ourselves, it really requires a different way of thinking... and if you want to be really adventurous in your thinking and make surviving 'fun' then try to obtain a copy of a book by John Seymour, called 'self-sufficiency'
John Seymour was something of a cult figure in a way during the 60s and 70s, as he opted out and grew most of his, and his extending families own food on a small plot of land and writing a book about it....thus starting a whole self-sufficiency movement, (of which I was part!)
Of course it is not possible to follow everything he recommends slavishly, and that was never John's idea, but it gives a new perspective on how we could live being free of some of the restrictions that burden us at the moment.... and in this day and age I think it is again very relevant!
So lets go forward in hope rather than in despair! Let's make it fun and we may learn a great deal!
Here at Silvermoon we intend to survive the recession, and will be here for you whenever you need us!
Harlequin.
We will be attending
Elgin
farmer's market, and Aberdeen country fair in Belmont Street on two Saturdays of
every month.
(see www.madeinmoray.co.uk for 2009 dates shortly...
We may also be attending Huntley Farmers Market which is the first Saturday of every month... with lots of new handcrafted ' Made in Moray' gifts and crafts.
Aberdeen Belmont St. Market.
Happy New Year to you all!
With blessings!
From Crystal and the team at Silvermoon.
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