Well I don’t know how you spent the shortest day, or the longest night, but I was awake for pretty much every minute of them. I’ve just surfaced from a restorative (3 hour) nap and want to thank everyone who made yesterday such a success, especially the people who stopped me going into meltdown!

So massive massive thank yous to

Volunteers: David Mathews, Tash Fairbanks, Judith Stephenson, Muireann Grealy, Penny Pickering, Birgitte Fearon, Laura Davies, Adam Lester, Alix Adams; for doling out drink and cake, selling books, marshalling wassailers, welcoming guests, moving chairs and tables, clearing up, calming emails, and general fort-holding.

Venues: Irena Hill at Made in Greenwich Gallery, and Debra Sullivan at West Greenwich Library for hosting us, and making everything not only simple and stress-free (as far as possible) but for good humour, getting stuck in and enjoying themselves.

Vocal Chords: Melanie Harrold, Alison C, Alison L, Alix, Anne, Brigitte, Caroline, Penny,  Jane, Jeremy, Laura, Roger, for wassailing and wearing silly Hi Vis jackets and singing and being good mates (esp Roger, with newly broken fingers still coming out to sing!)

Readers and Hosts: Katy Darby, Patsy Prince, Ray Newe and Sophie Aldred… and the unexpected pop up performance from Lisa Kelly reading her own poem!

Musicians: Ian Kennedy & Sarah Lloyd, Juliet Desailly, Melanie Harrold, and Peter Thomas & Piotr Jordan.

Composers/ song writers/musical facilitators: Alison Craig, Juliet Desailly, Lester Simpson, Melanie Harrold, Zac Gvirtzman.

BSL Interpreters: Paul Michaels and Martin Fox-Roberts

Writing facilitator (write through the night) Ruth Steadman.

And of course the writers without whom, nothing.

Poets: A.J. Akoto, Frank Rubino, Jill Sharp, Joan Leotta, Karen Bovenmyer, Karina Lutz, Laura Page, Lisa Kelly, Mario Duarte, Marlee Cox, Megan E. Freeman, Pat Tompkins, Scott-Patrick Mitchell, Steph Thompson, Tim Cremin, Ness Owen.

Story authors: CB Droege, David Mathews, David Steward, Jamie der Wahls, Katy Darby, Lee Nash, Liam Hogan, Pippa Gladhill, Polly Hall, Roger W. Hecht, Rosalind Stopps, Sarah Evans, Sarah James,Tom McKay. (those in bold, were there on the night.)

And the audience!!!! We had, in total over the three events about 100 people, and of course back in November at the singing workshop another 38.

To keep you amused until I can nobble other photographers in the audience to share their pictures, and get started editing the video, here are some rather poor quality photos taken on my phone! Some were so poor I’ve not got everyone represented, (sorry Katy!) but there will be video of EVERYTHING.