ACNH Blue Sunday 2022
{This is a bit of a long article, so grab yourself a drink and a snack. Remember it’s okay to take breaks while reading ~ I did while writing this.}
Sunday the 15th of May 2022.
The last day of M.E Awareness week, the week that encompasses the 12th of May, World M.E Day, has come to be know as Blue Sunday and is a very special day to the majority of the M.E Community, their families, friends and supporters. This all thanks to the amazing human that is Anna, who, when becoming severely ill with M.E herself, wanted to figure out a way to raise some much needed funds for research into the illness. But most “traditional” ways of fundraising are simply not accessible for people with M.E ~ we are unable to run marathons or get sponsors by doing any form of activity. So Anna decided that she would hold a tea party and ask people to donate as little as the cost of a cup of tea and a piece of cake, in the hopes of raising some money for her chosen M.E Charity at the time. That was back in 2013.
Fast forward to this year’s Blue Sunday, which has now become an international event with Anna working with many different M.E charities around the world, to help them get the funds they need to support people with M.E in their respective countries. Anna puts so much energy into this event, despite being very ill and her efforts are gratefully appreciated as Blue Sunday brings so many of the M.E Community together during a month of awareness, which can be extremely hard to cope with.
Donations for the charities Blue Sunday supports are now closed but the event has raised over £30,000, shared across the many charities worldwide! If you’d like to know more about Blue and Anna, you can check out her website.
Personally, I have been joining in Blue Sunday since 2014, {I was diagnosed in July 2013 so missed the first one.} sharing a picture of a cup of tea and a biscuit on my Instagram. Over the years, it’s become more of a small family affair, which has been lovely. Then in 2020, Animal Crossing New Horizons came the Nintendo Switch and since the game allows you to play with friends via it’s online function, I decided it might be fun to hold a Blue Sunday Tea Party in game, with some people with M.E who also played the game.
This year I held my third annual ACNH Blue Sunday Tea Party and as with the previous years, it was so lovely to spend a little time with people on my island. The first two parties where held on my island of Hessa, with a little person of me hosting the party. But Hessa is so well established now and is exactly how I want it, that to host the tea party there this year would have meant a complete overhaul of an area of the island. Thankfully, I had just reset another island I have, which I use as a “designing island” and so I incorporated a Blue Sunday Tea Party area into the design and decided that the party would be hosted my new character, Rue on her island of Cedar Cove.
As I like to try and make each party I’ve held a little different from the one before, I thought it would be fun this time to make it into a little Teddy Bear’s Picnic and we’d sit on cushions and have afternoon tea. But as this is a new island, I wasn’t sure if the weather would cooperate, I mean I could be sure of sunshine in Hessa as it had been sunny for the past two years {each island has a set weather pattern}. But Cedar seems to be a bit more on the rainy side and so I decided to set up another tea party location in Rue’s basement, as a back up and I’m glad I did because it did indeed rain.
I had lovely blue umbrellas waiting for my guests to arrive and before Rue showed them to the indoor party, there was some item swapping and some DIY / Food Recipe learning {crafting and cooking is something you can do in the game} and I showed them the picnic set up, where they picked up their presents of a blue balloon and a blue teddy bear. We took some pictures and then we headed inside to take more pictures. After that, I set them all off on a Bell Hunt ~ I’d wrapped up 10 bags of 99,000 bells {the games currency} for them to find. This has been a feature of all the Blue Sunday parties as I love hiding presents for friends to find and it’s so much fun watching them all scurrying around the island hunting down the treasure.
A new feature and one that will also become a permanent feature, is that of a donation box. Last year, the game received a big update and one of the new items came in the form of a donation box that you could donate 1,000 bells at a time into. So if you visit a friend’s island and spot their donation box, you add some bells to it to help them fund their projects or just to say thank you for having you over. So I set up the donation box in the picnic area and told my guests that for every 1,000 bells they donated, I would donate a £1 to my chosen M.E Charity, which this year was The ME CFS Foundation in South Africa. I have family ties to the country and they are in need of help as they are the only M.E charity in SA. All together, my guests donated 23,000 bells which meant I added £23 to the donation from myself, my parents and my brother and his wife.
After about an hour of hunting bells, taking pictures and chatting with the other residents of Cedar Cove, my guests and I were ready to have a break, so we said our farewells. Overall, this year’s ACNH Blue Sunday was another big success. Personally, I was so relieved when my guests said they had a wonderful time and liked the island because, not only had I never really had anyone visit this island since it was finished {the week of the party} before, I wasn’t sure I would be able to top last year’s party. But they declared it lovely and I was happy.
I was so grateful to my guests for coming: Charlotte, who has join all three of the parties. Lorna, who has only started playing the game this year, and Annika who were attending their first party this year. You all looked fabulous and I really appreciate the support! Sadly our friends Chloe and Lisa were unable to join us and were missed. M.E is so constant and unpredictable that even on a special day, like Blue Sunday, it doesn’t give you a break.
As well as the ACNH Blue Sunday, I also had small in person tea party of sorts with my parents and my brother and his wife, who are visiting us for a couple months. But to help with my energy levels and not have so much going on in one day, we decided that our tea party would be held on Saturday the 14th instead ~ so I had a Blue Sunday Weekend if you will.
Saturday was lovely. While my family and I drank tea and ate cake, {I had biscuits, as I prefer them to cake} we played a few rounds of Mario Kart on the Switch. By late afternoon I was beat energy wise but in need of some fresh air. So I retreated out to my Cabin in the garden and laid on the bed in there with my eyes closed, all the curtains shut but the doors open to let in the breeze. It was so peaceful and a lovely way to finish off the day before I slowly made my way back to bed to rest properly before my ACNH Blue Sunday the next day.
It took me until around Thursday to recover, when I managed to slowly make it downstairs for a little while, where I was happy to see that the Blue Sunday bunting was still up decorating the mantle ~ and I still think it’s there even now!
I’ve added some of the pictures I captured of the ACNH Blue Sunday Tea Party to their own page, as I couldn’t added them all to this article. So you can scroll through them at your leisure if you’d like to see some of what my guests and I got up to. Just click here and you’ll be taken to the page.
Thank you so much to Anna, who every year puts forth so much effort and precious energy to make this event absolutely amazing! We haven’t have Blue Sunday without you! A big thank you also to everyone who joined in Blue Sunday and supported the event, whether you’re a member of the M.E community or not. It really is wonderful to see us all come together and support this cause and each other.
I hope everyone in the M.E community is doing okay and taking care. You’re all wonderful, whether you’ve spread some awareness this month or not.
Stay Safe.
L x
