Winter Time Surprise Project

January is both the start of new adventures and the bleakest of months. It's the month of tax returns, bitterly cold days, where you wish for snow, to make that numbness in your freezing fingers feel fun and lists of goals and resolutions.

Every year I want to be kinder. To my family, to my friends, to strangers you meet on the street. I watched the film About Time the other day and I love the ending. To try and live every day with the benefit of hindsight, to make the most of small, seemingly insignificant moments. Like making eye contact with a checkout cashier and smiling as they hand you the receipt, ringing someone you've meant to call forever but not found the time, writing thank you letters, not just from the kids, from you too.

And last year I was overwhelmed by the collective kindness of strangers.

For those of you who took part in one of the surprise project swaps - you made my year!

I had no idea when I started these parcel swaps how many people and how far and wide it would travel. Parcels have been sent all over the world, to Australia, to Sweden, to Germany, to Italy, to the UAE and more.

Little packages of loveliness. 

I was very conscious, when I first published the Spring project, that there are other parcel swaps around the internet and that I didn't want it to be about money. I wanted it to be open to as many people as possible and purposely set the guide price at £5.

I am constantly in awe of the creative resourcefulness of the people who join in. The way people find trinkets, make things, bake things, pass on something they were given or had tucked in a drawer.

And these little acts of kindness go a long way. The feeling you get when you put your parcel together, that warm fuzzy feeling as you wrap up something as simple as a postcard, but with the care and attention that you'd give to wrapping the crown jewels, knowing someone will squeal when it arrives at their door. 

One act of kindness always leads to another.

Be part of it and pass it on.

Sign up here to join in the Winter Time Surprise Project.

Come and join in this special project.

Sign ups are open until midnight GMT on Sunday 31st January 2016.

Full details are on the Surprise Project website. 

Happy swapping!