31/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...

SCHOOLS OUT FOR SUMMER…

…and the holidays are happening. Here’s how to keep the children engaged on your trip away (and consequently, how to keep the whole family happy).

Want to make the most of your family holiday and enjoy the chance of all being together? Planning not pressure is key. From travelling with tots to finding a break that will suit all the family, the holidays ought to be fun for everyone. Follow this helpful guide to make your break away, the best it can be…

30/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...

Fia's first and last day at pre-school

From this...

To this...

i-spy ON A CAR JOURNEY - Book review

Wanting something to keep the children occupied that doesn't involve a screen? These timeless classics have been around for sixty years and two weeks ago were newly released by Collins.

29/52 The GraceFaith year long project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...

Toilet musings of a 4YO (Warning, not for the faint hearted)

S: Mummy, my poo looks like a giraffe.
E: (Rushes to see) Oh my gosh, it really does.
S: Esme, take a photo.
E: (Uses my phone) Look Mummy...

My guilty pleasure

E: Mummy, we haven't had music for ages.
M: I know, but as Daddy got the stereo down from the loft yesterday, tonight after school we can dance to S CLUB 7!
E: Okay. I meant music at school.

28/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...

Intrinsic Toffel Sandal by ECCO - a review

DETAILS

Available online: ECCO website

Price: £45

Colours: Black, White, Coral Blush, Fuchsia, Fanfare and Cobalt.

Material: Nubuck leather with salt water resistant properties.

It's always a bit of a gamble when you set off to work wearing a brand new pair of shoes isn't it? But that's what I did. Because you see that morning, I woke to blue skies and sunshine and a pair of newly delivered Ecco sandals sat winking at me. And as the colour complimented my top perfectly, what else was I supposed to do? Wearing them up to the big smoke and back for review purposes, seemed a logical move. Even if it was a four-hour door to door round trip.

Induction day at infant school

It's an odd thing. But today our little ones began an adventure that will take them all the way to adulthood. I've been wondering how it would go for a while now, imagining Fia would take it in her stride, stepping up through the doorway into school; the year 'R' entrance where they are so carefully welcomed in.

Accompanying her into the room that will be her home each and every week day come September, I watch as she looks about her class, settling down on the floor amid the bricks. Here she will be nurtured and taught all the exciting stuff that lay ahead. You know, life. This is where it all begins.

A quick kiss and a promise to return soon and I wipe back the tear that has caught me off guard. But you know, it seems only yesterday that I was doing this with Esme.

Parents are gathering and many as excited and eager as the children they've moments before walked away from. Not many anxious faces, lots of familiar ones. A tea or coffee sipping group stood snatching glimpses of those they recognise but don't yet know. It's so much easier for our children isn't it? Just down from where we are in the hall, they're getting on with it. Thrown together to learn, to play, to begin anew. School life.

27/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...
(I love that the house is packed to the rooftop with love)!

Simple musings of a 4YO

Dada did u know I like Mummy the best? But Daddy, you are my favourite... 

Look back in wonder

Okay so here's the deal. I travelled a lot when I was younger. I use the word 'travelled' loosely, as it was more like bumming around at the time. The more I saw and experienced, the more my senses were alerted to new cultures and countries, and the more I fell in love with writing about my time away from home detailing the where, what, why, when, who?! I wrote journals and letters mainly, but also sent emails when I could find the Internet. Ha! Seems nuts now, but back in the 90's, the net had not quite reached all four corners of the globe - and trotting around it meant you arrived in cities excited for the consequent Post Restante, where you'd pick up and pour over yearned for news. Five years later, I was back in the UK, working as the professional nanny I had trained to be. It was hard to settle though and I ended up doing a degree instead. Media Writing at Southampton. My thesis was based on a travel writer; Lindsay Hawdon and her hugely successful weekly column in the Telegraph, entitled 'An Englishwoman Abroad'. Her use of the first person narrative was fresh and exciting, but also successful because it meant everyone could travel with her, transported to each new destination, and from their armchairs. I liked her style and using the journals I kept and the letters I sent, I found my own descriptive narrative - and the inspiration for my dissertation. I put this particular piece into a travel writing comp which closes at 11pm tonight if you're interested in that sort of thing - a comp allowing travel writers the freedom to write as they please, rather than have to conform to the often oppressive structure of a magazine. (Really I'll use any excuse to get back to Oz). Anyway, please share if you like what you read... Thank you.

http://scholarships.travel/writing16/tanami-desert-western-australia-june-1999

26/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...

Fish Pond by Fia

HYSTERECTOMY - 10 Reasons for and 10 reasons against

10 NOT SO GREAT reasons to have a Total Abdominal Hysterectomy

1) Major operation comes with all sorts of risks.
2) Meds to help can equal nasty side effects.
3) One being you can't shit for days - bring forth laxatives, stool softeners and suppositories and hope...
4) Trapped wind brought on by laxatives, stool softeners and suppositories can end up causing more grief on its mission to break free than the actual surgery - have you ever felt wind in your shoulder of all places?
5) Having to eat all manner of food stuffs to get the digestive system working again such as prunes and papaya causing yet more wind in a freakishly continually evolving catch 22 scenario.
6) Being observed for blood pressure, temperature and oxygen levels around the clock, which although a necessity is of course a tad annoying on the sleep front.
7) A bloody great scar.
8) Post operative blurred vision (this might have been down to the epidural rather than the anaesthetic, either way, it's getting better a bit too slowly for my liking).
9) Bed rest boredom. Although to be honest, I am toying with the idea that this is actually not a valid NOT SO GREAT reason at all, for I'm enjoying the rest immensely and am yet to be bored. (I know you're hearing me mothers of small children).
10) Watching the dust gather due to being unable to vacuum for weeks on end (actually, what am I thinking, this surely needs to go on the list of GREAT REASONS)?

10 GREAT reasons to have a Total Abdominal Hysterectomy

25/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year

Okay, so this week I came out of hospital and Esme Grace (my brave 7YO) presented me with a card. It now sits with a whole host of unexpected wonderful well wishes, except this one, instead of saying Get Well Soon, speaks the mind of a 7yo daughter who has lost her Mummy to bed rest...

24/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...



Underneath this beautiful flower, the nursery teacher wrote down Fia's thoughts:
"I hope you are better.
Soon we will come and collect you.
We miss you so much.
We love you so much.
Love Fia. xxxx"

23/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year

22/52 The GraceFaith year long art project...

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...