This year for Easter I made big plans, I invited my lovely best friends Li and Harriet over for a big family Easter lunch along with Paul and Abigail, Looby, Iain and me, it's been in the planning for quite a while and I wanted to cook and bake up a storm, there would be spring decorations in the house and fresh floral arrangements everywhere, oh and don't forget chocolate eggs so affluent that a whole farm of magical hens must have laid them.  And then Looby got sick...

Spending the last month in and out of surgery and hospitals has meant, I haven't done any grocery shopping, I haven't bought a single easter egg and all of the other decorations are now sold out of every shop I might have thought of getting them from.

We're still here today, we don't know if we'll get home and if we do there's guaranteed to be nothing left in the supermarkets, I can't even do a pre-emptive online order just in case our going home doesn't happen, they mentioned it yesterday and then we got a no today so what on earth can you do?  

We're lucky and blessed that this isn't forever and today we've seen not just one but two Easter bunnies, I'm not sure if one was just a helper or maybe they were Mr and Mrs, you know how prolific bunnies can be, they both brought chocolate eggs for Looby though so I sort of feel better about my lack of Easter egg purchasing, as for my poor other children I think they're going to have to be happy with some spare cash (that's a hilarious thought after spending so much time in hospital, do you know how expensive it is?).

My lovely friends are still coming for Easter wherever we happen to be and for that at least I am truly thankful, If we do make it out of here I may suggest an Easter picnic, maybe at Kielder or one of our other favourite Easter picnic spots, Looby is champing at the bit to get up and out for a while and though I know I am the ultimate protective paranoid mummy at the moment I think in reality that getting out into the air for a big walk would do us all the world of good.

What lies ahead in the next 2 weeks school holidays is still uncertain, next week will be Loobys fifth week of absence from school (her very kind of head of year sent flowers today and Iain arranged them for me because I haven't actually been home since Monday) and virtually none of it has been any fun.  We have zoo tickets for the Yorkshire Wildlife Park at the end next week so we're focusing on that.  It's very much a baby steps situation but I am still confident that we can have her back to full fitness and back at school by the start of next term and definitely well enough for her school farming trip to Treginnis farm, we need to get her to those animals by hook or by crook.

Where we are right now, a progress in the life of me update

I don't know about you but I started 2015 with a heavy sigh, sad that 2014 hadn't been my favourite year in life but in the back of my mind I had a feeling of great expectation that 2015 would prove to be a much more smiley year.

It really has been so far, I've had some gorgeous family moments, some happy times at work and some adventures thrown in for good measure.

I think now I get out of bed with a spring in my step and a little woofy face at my feet, having a puppy who loves cuddles on the other side of the bed is way better than a cold empty flat space next to you.  My daily wake up now involves a beagle head or toes usually right next to my cheek and I'm lucky that Holly isn't a massive fan of mornings like me (totally perfect match we are) but once she's up and about she's dragging me off to the park for a few miles of wandering, walking and sometimes me chasing her trying to get her to come back after encounters with spaniels, she really does have a spaniel fixation!

This year I have given up sugar (barring a couple of nights out but you can't be a saint all of the time) and I'm a dress size smaller and a stone lighter than I was on my birthday (1st Feb).  I've also managed to make my business pretty autonomous and get Sundays off thanks to the ace photography skills of my associate Stacey.

I've explored places near and far and all mostly because of Holly, well you have to walk interesting places when you're doing 12,000-15,000 steps a day!  Oh yeah, I should mention the steps, I went from walking 8,000 steps a day to nearly double that and have lost inches, I wish I'd measured how many!

All in all we've come to nearly April and I'm happy and pretty content with my lot in life, there's more to be done of course, there always is, I want to lose somewhere in the region of another stone though my target is only 8lb away and I want to continue to become fitter and healthier.

I want to continue to build my already successful business into something entirely awesome, I have a great team in the shape of Stacey and Sue who does the admin and I'm pretty sure we can conquer the North East (in a photography sense) by the end of this year.

I'm going on holiday in 15 days, more walking and stomping and rambling and ambling, all through the Northumbrian countryside, I can't wait!

So here we are, Holly will be 10 months old this week, that's 5 months she'll have been with me, it's unbelievable to think it's been so long and at the same time it feels like she's been a family member forever, she keeps me on my toes on a daily basis but together we have the best adventures and I'm so thankful she came into my family.

5 Places to go and things to do on a dog friendly holiday to Berwick-upon-Tweed

I've been thinking dear reader, dangerous I know but it's only a few weeks until the girls and I go for our 4 night holiday to the Berwick Holiday Park, I'm excited about this because it's the first holiday with Holly the Beagle, this of course means that as I'm the only parent and someone has to stay with Holly at all times that we wont be doing any of the usual holiday park type shenanigans as Holly isn't allowed in any of the indoor areas, it's probably just as well that I intend to do all of the cooking, to be fair, I think it might be a tricky place to do sugar free if I didn't.

So I've been scouting around the internet for some dog friendly activities/pubs/coffee houses, I have a Pinterest board of dog friendly I save things to so if you're looking for somewhere dog friendly in the North of England do go and check it out.

Here's the places I've found so far that I fancy checking out - 

The Berwick-upon-Tweed Barracks and Main Guard is owned by English Heritage and pretty much they're mostly dog friendly, it's interesting, historical, the kids will probably complain but you can't have a holiday without a little heritage in my opinion.

The Berwick Castle and Ramparts  are also dog friendly and owned by English Heritage, I'll probably plan to do both in the same day but we'll see how long it takes to persuade the girls to come with me.

The Audela restaurant looks amazing and checking on trip advisor offers good reviews and confirmation that it is dog friendly, something which the website doesn't say, it looks like they do some really great British classics and a lot of the food looks healthy and sugar free so I don't think it's going to take much to persuade the girls or Holly to check it out.

The Queens Head hotel also seems to be dog friendly going by reviews on tripadvisor, I just wish that their website would confirm.  I do think I will be checking it out as it looks like a really lovely place to go for coffee with the girls

One thing I have just done is purchased a murder mystery treasure trail around Berwick from Treasure Trails Northumbria now that's an interesting dog friendly and family friendly activity which will hopefully pique Abigail and Loobys interest and it should hopefully fill in a couple of hours, you can get a pdf version but I chose to get the postal version because I love real life things you can hold in your hand.

So that's the first 5 places/things sorted out and if you have been on a dog friendly holiday in Berwick-upon-Tweed please do suggest some places I should go with Holly, I of course can't wait to be down on the huge expanse of sandy beach which lies down some steep steps from where our Caravan is situated.

On finally finding balance and Easter Holiday plans and photo shoots,

Thanks to F H Hardy Florists in Morpeth for some beautiful Ranunculus I've been playing around with this week

I don't know about you dear reader but I've had one of those weeks where I've actually stopped myself from procrastinating and actually worked through the to-do list to the point where it's to-done!

I'm actually at a point for about the first time in 10 years where I can see the future and where I think I might actually have some balance in my life and it's only taken me, an associate, an assistant, a cleaner, an accountant and a gardener to get me to the point where I can see the middle of the washing pile and in business where I'm not obsessing about being only a few weeks behind.

It's an amazing thing when you realise just how many things you undertake not only as a business woman but as a mum, all of those roles you undertake without question and there's a stark realisation that if you categorised them all you should be on a much better hourly rate!

I think one of the most important things I've learnt in business is that you can't do everything yourself and some of the most successful business people I know have the skill of delegation.  

I'm finally at a place where I can plan and strategise about my personal future and the future of my business, I'm really not sure what conclusions I'm going to reach but it's lovely to have a bit of space and time to ponder these things.

I do believe that last night I should have had the best nights sleep, I still didn't but that was mainly down to the realisation that I'd forgotten to take all of my daily meds at 2am!

So here we are on the dawn of a new horizon and the verge of the Easter holidays, now you may be wanting to have a photo shoot over the Easter holidays and we have the following remaining availability - 

Good Friday - Saltwell Park - 10, 10.30, 11, 11.30, 12.30, 1, 1.30 and 2pm

Easter Saturday - Jesmond Dene 11, 1pm, 1.30, 2pm

Easter Monday  - Tynemouth Longsands - 10, 10.30, 1, 1.30 and 2pm

Half hours are £25 and if you have a larger family 60 minute sessions are only £40 and they all come with a complimentary print, web gallery and 15% off for the first 7 days your gallery is live.

The Saturday sessions are with me, the Friday and Monday are with Stacey.

I'll also be available from the Tuesday to the Friday and then Saturday 11th April, Stacey will be available on Sunday 12th and then I'm away from 13-17th April, we've a wedding on the 18th and on the 19th Stacey will be available in Saltwell Park with availability from 11.30 onwards.

It's a brilliant time for photo shoots as by Saturday it will be spring and I for one am delighted about that!

This weekend I'll be on the beach at Tynemouth and I can fit in people at noon or if you fancy Jesmond Dene then Stacey has 1 session remaining at 10.30am in Jesmond Dene.

If you would like to book any of the sessions or you want to get in touch about anything else just drop me a quick email and I'll look forward to chatting with you.