Me and Mine – A Portrait for September

September has been a month of new beginnings, new routines and making plans.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t relieved to start this month; I mean I loved the summer holidays and we did so much – fitting in a few holidays, a festival, camping, loads of play dates and a few sleepovers at granny’s – but these two are tiring and the last few weeks of the break really felt like they needed to be fast forwarded a bit.

Florence has started primary school this time and so I now have two children at school, in the same school, and it feels like quite a milestone. I definitely have that ‘I made it!’ feeling, thinking back over the struggles we have had since Flo was born and to think that she’s now safely delivered to school, well I’m kind of breathing a sign of relief!

I’ve just read back last month’s post and can confirm I was in fact waiting for the ‘I made it’ feeling, so am pleased to announce it did actually arrive.

This month has been a lot slower, calmer and with more time to myself to sort out all that boring stuff that if I were to make you cringe I’d call life admin, and also to make more time to exercise (need to fit in more, thinking personal trainer vs finding my own mojo), relax and just breathe out a little more.

I work three days a week so now have two days where I’m free in school hours to get the house straight, go for a run, mess about on my blog or what I’m meant to be doing, writing! I’ve felt pretty tired lately and haven’t had the headspace for writing too much, as I wrote in this post about wondering what to do next. I’m sure it will come though, and the more I worry about not doing it the less I’ll do, so I’m trying to just roll with it.

So what have we been up to in September? I guess over our weekends we have been pretty low key, as the new routine sets in everyone seems to need a bit of chill time and we haven’t really done any big days out. We did go to Ikea last week which the kids absolutely loved, if you can count that as a family outing?! I managed to arrive two whole hours before it opened, so was high on coffee by the time we hit the store. Sam and Flo grabbed their own mini trollies and got stuck in with buying cushions, soft toys (essential) and of course the obligatory Ikea hot dog. I think they actually like shopping as much as I do!

Earlier in the month I was away in Wirral and Wales, as I walked Snowdon overnight with a team from St John’s Hospice. I had an amazing time and have now raised £1,455 which is way more than I set out to. Thank you so much to everyone who sponsored me, I know lots of my blog readers contributed too and I’m so touched by that, so thank you. You’ve made a determined woman very happy.

Last week I spent a day at the spa at a gorgeous hotel not far from home, The Devonshire Arms in Bolton Abbey. My friend Claire came up to visit and it was such a treat day, I used a voucher I was given for my birthday and I am so ready to book another one now, it was just the tonic I needed.

October is of course Sam’s favourite time of year, as it’s Halloween and we always have a party at home and go trick-or treating. Since having kids I’ve really come to love halloween and find it’s a great way of getting to know your neighbours while leaving the house with fake blood on your face, if last year was anything to go by.

I’m also looking forward to a visit from my Australian cousin and her husband, so will be showing them some of the Yorkshire sights and having a few nights out with them hopefully too. Well they need to sample the Yorkshire gin, don’t they?!

The photos for this month’s post were taken this morning at my mum’s house, Sam and Flo moaned a bit about having to stand still for a picture but I’m glad we persevere with it, because now we have two years of monthly family snaps, more than most people who aren’t strange enough to write a blog have I’d say!

I hope you all have a great October, and thanks for sticking with me when I don’t really know whether to write or not.

x Julia