A little bit of life in 2014,

1. Fresh flowers, I have made a conscious effort to buy myself a pretty bunch of blooms every Sunday morning whilst my husband & I are out enjoying the weekend. So far I have enjoyed many Tulips, Daffodils and Roses. They make my house feel more alive and they just look so pretty.

2. Waking up early without an alarm clock, this my friends is a revelation. I’m self employed and work from home and I used to burn the midnight oil in a big way. I would be awake until 2am some nights and thus making me sleep in until mid morning. I would somehow feel like I’d missed out on the best part of the day so one of my missions this year was to get up & out of the house before 9am. I get all my jobs / errands done at a very reasonable hour and I am back home before I would normally be awake. Its been very productive. Although it does mean I’m in bed for midnight.

3. My 5 year old niece Alyvia lives 300 miles away from me in Scotland, I write to her & her dad helps her to write back to me. I love receiving her letters full of stories about her new School and her friends, she tells many a tall tale. Lately she has been Face Timing us too, the youth of today are very tech savvy although I’m mostly looking at an image of her ear or the wall, as she forgets you have to hold it up to her face. Its still lovely being able to see her & hear her heart melting mini Scottish accent. Do you live far away from your family? It can be hard to keep connected to them.

4. We have been watching departures, which is a travel programme about 3 Canadian friends Scott, Andre and Justin who quit their jobs and go travelling, I am on to the 3rd season and they have been travelling the world for 3 whole years. They visit places that are off the beaten track and really go looking for adventure and they want to see what the countries they visit are really about. Its a wonderful inspirational series. I now have a long list of countries that I want to visit since watching that I would never thought were so beautiful and interesting. Namely Mongolia, Easter Island, Chilli and Jordan. If you are looking for some travel inspiration you have to watch it. The whole thing is filmed by Andre and he is incredible at documenting their journey. I am sad that I have watched them all (in a very short space of time). I will be re watching them all over again.

5. February marks 14 years since I met my thoughtful, handsome, supportive husband John. We met in Liverpool in 2000. I wasn’t meant to be out that night as I had tickets to watch the band BUSH play in Manchester but they cancelled at the last minute so my friend and I decided not to let that ruin our night so we went out in Liverpool & thats where I met John. We’ve been together ever since. Its been an eventful 14 years to say the least and it feels we have lost far too many people along the way but we are finally discovering what our ‘happy’ is and we are planning some serious adventures. I’m excited for our future and I know the best is yet to come. I have a serious keeper & I know I’m a very lucky lady.