Anyone else dreaming of warmer climates? Once the colder nights start to draw in I often cast my mind back to holidays spent in the sun, watching Indie swim whilst nursing an ice-cold drink. Which is why I prompted myself to write this blog.
I thought it was time to revisit my vitiligo blog from last year. I really did have an amazing response and what really surprised me was the amount of people that contacted me after reading the post.
With it being mental health week last week it focused me to think about what issues had affected me in my life on a personal level,
The simple act of posting a picture on social media can be taken in and construed in many different ways, the picture in question was one of me beaming my usual cheesy grin at the camera whilst gently cradling a new born baby.
Well hello again! Firstly, I want to apologise for being so quiet with my blog. I guess getting side tracked can happen to the best of us. One of the biggest bit of advice I was given on starting the blog was to be consistent, I guess I failed there but I'm going to make it up to you all.
Every now and again comes an opportunity to do something extraordinary, a once in a lifetime experience. This one meant leaving my little girl for the best part of two weeks, the longest I've not been with her and the honest truth is that I missed her like crazy.
When the worst thing that could happen turned out to be a blessing...
Its pretty crazy that in the very short time I've been writing this blog I've already divulged far more about my personal life than I had ever expected, as mentioned on numerous occasions, I'm a fiercely private person, so to lay bare my take on parenting isn't necessarily the easiest thing for me to do. So I've decided to lighten the mood a little and share with you 10 things you wouldn't necessarily know about me so here goes nothing. Enjoy and feel free to take the mickey out of me.
When John Torode muttered the infamous words "Masterchef, it's going to change your life" I took little notice. It was February 2005 when I became hooked on the show that was to alter my world dramatically. I still remember rushing home from work to tune into BBC2 at 6:30 every evening, for the first time in my life I had a TV programme that I couldn't miss.
In my blog introduction I stated that: "By no means do I think I've done everything as a parent perfectly, God we all make mistakes but sometimes I wish I had been given advice that might have swayed some of the decisions I have made along the way."
Following on from yesterdays tragic events in London I've decided to rewrite part of this as it really got me thinking about life in general and how much we take our everyday lives and situations for granted, ill address this later on in the blog, so onwards we go.
The one thing really worrying me is who are our children growing up to idolize? Like it or not we are growing up in a digital age. It seems that kids, Indie included are obsessed with YouTube vloggers.
Some of you with eagle eyes may have noticed over the years especially during the summer months that my hands are noticeably lighter than the rest of my body. This is not the result of me washing my hands too much or badly applying fake tan, as some felt necessary to bring to my attention over the years on social media. I have been affected by a condition called vitiligo since I was around 5 years old. What started out as a small white dot on my foot has spread to many parts of my body over the years and continues to spread.
I recently took part in a 'no sugar week' on the ITV Lorraine show and even though I'm knowledgeable about food, ingredients and nutrition - what really shocked me is the minefield that is labeling on shop bought food items.
I was inspired to start this blog by a great friend of mine, SJ Honeywell, who has her own amazing blog www.honeymumster.com. SJ kindly asked me to do an interview about my life and parenting, I'm not usually asked about anything apart from cooking but it felt great to open up about things that I wouldn't normally talk about amongst friends let alone on the World Wide Web. I won't lie, it's taken a lot of soul searching and convincing to actually start tapping away at the keyboard and writing things down, here goes nothing!