Thursday photo #255

Isn’t it a strange rule of life that everything happens at the same time? I can go months without socialising and then suddenly find myself a social butterfly for a week or two. This has been one of those weeks.

A trip to London and a punch on the nose

On Tuesday, I went to London to the Situp event for travel brands and influencers. It was a fascinating day. I caught up with friends I don’t see often enough, met new people and chatted to brands and tourist boards about some incredible destinations. I was a bit apprehensive before I went because my blog is not totally travel focussed. Whilst I write a lot about places to visit, I don’t want to lose posts like this that are about family life.

I needn’t have worried, the people I spoke to were all incredibly friendly and encouraging. It was great to escape from life for a day too. Whilst I love working from home and wouldn’t change it for the world, it does become a little monotonous.

Meanwhile at home, I left my husband in charge of the children. He dropped them off at school, picked them up from school and went to an information afternoon about Libby’s SATs. Next, they were off to Libby’s piano lesson and home for dinner and some time to play before bed. I think days like this make my husband appreciate how difficult it can be to fit work around the children’s activities. The time they are at school really does fly by when you’ve got a lot to do.

Most notably though, he realises it’s not necessarily a total breeze being in charge of the children, even when they’re at school most of the day. By the time I came out of the event in London and gave them a call, they’d had a fight. Lia had punched Libby on the nose and Libby had a nose bleed. I think my husband was glad to get back to work on Wednesday.

The singing competition

Libby started singing lessons at school last September. She has always loved singing but it doesn’t come quite as naturally to her as it does to Lia. Before Christmas, she was asked whether she wanted to enter a singing competition. In true Libby style, she was delighted and couldn’t wait to take part.

Her singing lessons are once a week, and occasionally she would sing in the car. But that was all the practice she did. So going into a competition was a bit of a shock. She wasn’t miles away from the rest of the singers, but some of them were incredible and Libby wasn’t good enough to win a medal. She was the only one from her school who didn’t win a medal, and she didn’t cope particularly well with that. Hopefully though, it was a lesson for her. I think it’s really good for children to fail at things, and to learn that doing well and practicing are directly related.

Thursday photo #255

Last week, I published a blog post about dog friendly days out in the West Midlands. While I was researching it, a couple of places really stood out that I haven’t visited before. One was Kinver Edge and the Rock Houses, a National Trust property with loads of space for the children to run around, as well as the fascinating homes built into the rocks. We decided to go there on Saturday and it was the right decision. It’s a lovely day out and we’ll definitely be back soon. I love this photo of the girls at Kinver Edge, their personalities really shine through. Lia insisted on wearing her witches hat that day. I still have no idea why.