September means that the Season of mist and mellow fruitfulness is approaching. It also means that Shimelle is running her annual class, Learn Something New Every Day.As with the previous few years, I’m recording what I’ve learned throughout September here. September sky Day 11 | It's okay to have a day where you don't learn anything 🙂 Day 12 | … Continue reading Learn Something New Every Day | Days 11-15
Working on our revamped wedding album brought home to me just how relentless the circle of life is. You know that I enjoy a list, collecting numbers and family history - here's what I realised: Deaths | Fourteen guests have died since our wedding dayIncluded in this list are my mum and my parents-in-lawThe first … Continue reading The Circle Of Life As Documented By Our Wedding Album
Before heading home after our night in town, The Boy and I swung by St. Thomas' Hospital on Westminster Bridge Road to see if the Vaccination Centre was accepting teenage walk-ins. They were. The staff were utterly brilliant. Once they knew about The Boy's autism, they went above and beyond to ensure that he was … Continue reading The Best Kind of Early Christmas Present
How are you remaining connected to your loved ones and friends during Lockdown? We have both a myriad of WhatsApp groups and regular Face Time chats with ours. But what I've enjoyed most of all is sending postcards. I was a prolific postcard sender, right up until Mum died and then I stopped. If I … Continue reading Life in Lockdown | Remaining Connected
We've just marked the 4th anniversary of Mum's death and it will be 25 years this Summer since Dad passed away. As we know, the grief we feel when we first lose someone we love is both intense and all encompassing ... but it does lessen as time passes. I've always found it quite hard … Continue reading Defining Grief
The likeness was so startlingly obvious that I actually gasped. I grew up being told "you look just like your mum!" At the Lakeland Wedding in July, the groom's brother called me Maggie, which gave me something of a moment (although I was grateful he hadn't called me Auntie Maggie). I'm used to that. I … Continue reading A Family Likeness
What am I going to do with all the letters? Paired I'm going to read them. Of course I am. Safe in the knowledge that Mum knew that I would, at some point, and that I have the blessing of our Australian friends-like-family. Over his morning coffee, The Brainy One casually enquired recently, "What will … Continue reading The Original Happy Mail | Those Letters
You know you must have done something right when someone from Australia gets in touch to say they'll be in London and wants to meet up. The young lady in question is the grand daughter of Mum's penfriend, Kay, and I haven't seen her since The Brainy One and I visited Australia in 2005. We … Continue reading She Came From a Land Down Under
Dog tired ... She has brought so much joy into our livesShe's not quite there with the house trainingShe's a very dainty eater (not like Max at all!)She has her own group of friends on the school run. I am ignored by strangers who say hello to her by nameShe's not afraid to bark at … Continue reading 10 Things | Tilly
In June, 2017, I wrote that I had been on the receiving end of the cruel act of ghosting and was asked recently if the situation behind the ghosting had been resolved. Almost two years on and no, it hasn't. I've hesitated about commenting further here about what happened to me and, ultimately, have decided … Continue reading What I Learned From Being Ghosted
This West London Life 