I love a good BBQ, so does Looby and Iain, so much so that this year we bought a fire pit and if there's even a hint of a vaguely sunny day we get out there and we start a barbeque, sometimes though Newcastle upon Tyne doesn't exactly have a sunny climate all year round and so I was thrilled to read about Cabana Brasilian Barbeque coming to Newcastle and even more thrilled when I got the invitation to the launch night!

When I arrived with one of my very best friends Harriet I was actually surprised just how busy it was at 6 in the evening, the music was playing, the place was packed and there was a fabulous Brazilian buzz all around.

I wanted to take more photographs of the decor, the ambience but it was just so very busy that I soon went and pinned myself to the nearest seat and barely moved all evening.  That's not to say everyone was the same, once the dancing girls arrived (erm, I want a body like that when I grow up) the party atmosphere had people twirling and dancing and being happy, and when you add to that Caipirinha, the national cocktail of Brazil, well now you are talking, I adore tequila so this is a restaurant I can get on board with!

The food is mainly skewer based and that suits me just fine, it means that even on the rainiest of days you can go out for lunch (they do a special at lunchtime which is super reasonable) and feel a little bit of Brazilian sunshine in your soul.

Cabana is the second restaurant to arrive in the newly redeveloped sparkly old co-op buildings on Newgate Street, everything old is new again and both Cabana and Turtle Bay, the Caribbean food based restaurant have been great additions to that part of the city.  It's such an exciting time in Newcastle if you are a foodie and the great thing about these new restaurants which are springing up all around us is that they're new, they're different and I think they're all going to thrive, we Geordies love good food, a good night out, a great cocktail and a bit of a party experience.

I actually didn't take many photographs of the food because they were bringing them around on platters rather than leaving some on each table but I can totally recommend the BBQ Chicken, the dough balls and the raindrop doughnuts with Nutella in the middle.

When I decided to walk home at nine the night was still pretty young but after a few of the aforementioned Caipirinhas I thought it was better to leave early and not have a hangover the following morning.

Cabana also offer a kids menu and that's bound to be a hit, the next time I go I am definitely taking Looby, I think she'll love it, it's just so bright and happy, it's the perfect place for she and I, it's just a shame you can't take your dog!

How to get a better nights sleep, the Resmed S+

Holly Bobbins has lots of talents and one of them is the ability to sleep wherever she is, sometimes she even likes to be tucked in like a todder (see first photo) but I have the worst sleeping patterns, last night for instance I woke up 14 times according to my Resmed S+ sleep monitor, just to put some perspective onto that, I think my score last night was 68/100 erm, not so good!

Why am I telling you this, I hear you asking, well before Looby went to hospital, when it was still winter a collaboration happened with the lovely people who make the S+, they were about to launch and offered to send me a sleep monitor to see if it could help me get a better nights sleep.

So fast forward to coming home and sleeping in hospital had been so bad that it had reset my sleep patterns and I found I was suddenly able to get 11 hours of unbroken sleep, now I obviously wouldn't recommend this as a course of making you get a better nights sleep and it didn't last unfortunately as you can probably guess from the first lines I wrote.

So, let me tell you about what's going on with my Sleep+, it's a nifty little box which sits beside your bed and all you need to do is take it out of the box, plug it in, make sure it's aligned with your chest when you lay in bed and then connect the app on your smartphone.  It took me about 5 minutes to set the whole thing up.

 

Once you have it set up and you've answered some questions about where you sleep, your age, health etc you press the button to start sleep and every day you're asked how much alcohol you've had, how much caffeine you've had an how much exercise you've done that day as well as how stressed you were that day, for me it's always 3-4 cups of coffee, mostly 20-30 mins of exercise, mostly no alcohol and very nearly always slightly stressed as I have anxiety!

Once that's all done you can choose if you would like a helpful sound to get you to sleep and do you need a smart alarm, I like waking up to the sounds of the birds in the forest every day, it wakes me up in a half hour window when it thinks it's best, I have to say I usually get annoyed with it if it's even a minute before the time I wanted my alarm to go off but that's just me, haha!

In the morning when you end your sleep, the fun begins, you get all manner of information in the form of pie charts about how you slept, you get an over all sleep score which is scored out of 100 and then the sleep mentor gives you tips about what you could do so that you get a better nights sleep.

Now a couple of weeks after I received my S+ they offered to send me another for Iain, Iain has a melatonin imbalance which is quite common in people with Aspergers, his sleep scores range from 50-70 and this week he's started to take the actions that the sleep mentor suggests (much to my actual shock, it's not easy to get teenagers to do anything you ask).  We're now wrangling over who takes Holly Bobbins for walkies as the S+ keeps suggesting that he gets some exercise, this of course doesn't help me in my quest to do 10k a day!!

I think the S+ is a great machine and I still feel I haven't had enough time to tell you if it's going to work or not, I do follow the suggestions every night but I think these things take time and what I'd love to do is write another article 6 months from now so I can really tell you about the changes in our lives it's helped us to make.  Iain has never slept well or had what you would call normal sleeping patterns so if it manages to help him do that then we really could put it in the "life changing" box.

I know there are other sleep monitors but this one is unique because you don't have to stay attached to it, I have an Apple watch for example but I can't wear that at night because I need to charge it every night.  I would say that you have to keep your phone beside your bed plugged in but I always charge it overnight anyway.

I want to also thank the S+ for helping me actually have chats with my teenager, every day when he wakes up we now swap tales of our nights sleep, what our scores were and what suggestions we had for the day and I can tell you, anything which provides a reason for a teenager to talk to his mother is not a bad thing at all ;)

The Resmed S+ is available here and costs £129.99, I was sent two of these monitors in exchange for writing a review but as always these are my very own thoughts and opinions.

Best cocktails in Newcastle? Head to the Science Bar

There are so many places serving cocktails in Newcastle now that it's hard to know where the best places are, well if you want something completely different and a little bit science themed or even science fiction themed, you need to head down to the Science Bar which is just next to central station in Newcastle upon Tyne.

I went along to sample a preview of their new cocktail menu which launches this Thursday, yes that's right, only 2 more days to go and then you too can get down there and sample the wonders of the Einstein or the Asimov.

The Science bar is just a little bit geeky and you know what, I love that, in a world where all cocktail bars look exactly the same I love the fact that there's really nowhere else quite like it.

I can quite imagine hanging out with friends on an impromptu Sunday evening night out and whiling away a couple of hours chatting about life over the coolest cocktails in Newcastle.

I love science and science fiction, I would say I love it but i'm not a geek if that makes sense, well maybe I'm a little bit geeky, I'm certainly a Whovian, I adore Doctor Who, I love sci-fi movies and watch lots of sci fi on tv, oh wait, maybe I am a geek after all?!

One lady who certainly knows her science fiction from a science fact is one of my very best friends Harriet and she came along as my last minute plus one and watched closely judging whether the science facts about each drink were truth or just a little made up.  I'm pleased to report that mostly of their science fact is actually well researched and if they have been just a little creative it's all in a good cause.

I'm going to leave you now with some photos of cocktails, the green one with the lime in had tequila in it and that was the only one I managed to bag all to myself, I'm a huge fan of tequila as anyone who knows me well will know.  I only ever get accidentally drunk these days as I am way too old for hangovers but if it does happen you can guarantee there was tequila involved (Holly Ball at As You Like It, I am looking at you!)

I always think that cocktails are an art form, well when you decide to mix that with science and chemistry it's another thing completely, these drinks take months and months or research (and hangovers no doubt) to get just right so the least we mere mortals can do is get down to the Science Bar from this Thursday and check them out!!

Need a photographer during April?

Once again I find myself half way through the month before I've had a chance to actually sit down and write my list but that day has come, Looby finally returned to school today and I returned to a desk which looks like it's got a mountain under it, so much going on that I am willing myself to catch up on, collaborations with Resmed (can I just say how much I adore their  S+ sleep monitor and the sleep mentor is helping me get a better nights sleep every single night) and I'm whipping up my own personal list of things to do with some amazing coconut oil sent to me by the lovely people at Vita Coco, Rome, as they say was not built in a day though and it's very much a one day at a time thing currently.

April though, the month of showers, also the month when spring really hits the North East of England, I noticed on my daily walk with Holly yesterday that the buds were starting to open on the trees, there are daffodils in Heaton Park carpeting the ground and the sound of the birds chirruping is almost deafening when compared to the stillness of the winter months.  Everywhere I travel to I see lambs gambolling in the fields, new life is all around, the magic of spring.

Now it may be that you are looking for a photographer in Newcastle, maybe you are getting married and still deciding on who you might want to shoot your wedding or maybe you're finally getting around to organising those family portraits you keep putting off, well it just so happens that I know a very good North East photographer, yes of course it's me and I have 3 little offers if you need one.

15% off all midweek weddings, I'm looking to shoot just a couple more this year so if that's you get in touch.

For the rest of the month you can get a 45 minute session at Tynemouth, Jesmond Dene or Saltwell Park for only £30 instead of £45, it's the perfect excuse to get outdoors!

I've also extended the all inclusive mini sessions to run until the end of April, just £125 for 30 minutes with all of the edited images via a digital download, a most splendid offer if ever there were one.

To enquire about any of those offers email me 

Looby, after successfully returning to school yesterday is about to depart for Wales on a farming trip from the 22-29th April and so I am looking to fill that week with a suitable travel assignment, if you are looking in and you think you may be able to use either my writing or photography skills for your travel based assignment please Get In Touch!

If you've just found yourself melting in a pile of cute from some of the adorable newborns at home sessions above you'll understand why I love my job so much, newborns at home covers any babies under the age of 6 months, they're unlimited in time although as a guide they can take anywhere from 1-3 hours depending on the individual babies, I really do specialise in capturing babies with their older siblings, not an easy task and I've likened it to being a police negotiator and it's definitely a skill I have which others might not so if you have a new baby due and you've already got kids then I might just be the photographer you need to capture the early days at home.  Photographing toddlers with their new siblings is so special when it works and in the end it always works.


I hope your April is full of springy lambs and floral arrangements or ranunculus and anemones, I often lament that I can't get any in February and March whilst the people of the south are welcoming spring, every year it seems I forget just how long spring takes to get from one end of the country to the other.  One thing is certain though, spring always comes...

The View From Sutton Bank, North York Moors

This week has been long and damp and to be honest I'm looking forward to the return to work next week, Looby and I have managed some days out and it's been lovely with her being officially well again, 6 weeks of our lives we'll never get back, worse for her than me of course but we will certainly always remember this time in our shared history.

On Wednesday a trip to Yorkshire was just what the doctor ordered for me, I long to walk over hills and vales, as a travel writer who hasn't been anywhere for over 6 weeks I'm starting to feel a little stir crazy, you see I long for travel, my feet are perpetually itchy, I spend hours looking at destinations and trying to plan trips as well as pitching for assignments to companies and editors for travel writing/photography. But with 6 weeks behind us it's been difficult to do anything other than live in the moment from day to day never knowing what's around the corner and not daring to even think of a trip in case Looby got ill again.

Being at the top of Sutton Bank in North Yorkshire is like being at the top of the world, rolling hills and verdant sweeping countryside down below, the whole of North Yokshire lying at your feet, open to the elements it can be sunny down below and still it's windy and fresh so high up.  This bank of myth and legend where cars would get stuck driving up it during the 70's and 80's on day trips to Flamingo Land, I'd driven up it many times over the years but never had I actually taken a breath and stopped at the top to admire the beautiful views.  

I'm delighted to say that it did not disappoint, the day was stormy and the skies were threatening, petulantly stomping their feet wanting to release their contents over the valleys below.  I'm still not sure how we escaped a soaking but as I watched the clouds emptying as I stood on the highest point I felt at one with the heavens above, shafts of light cutting through the dark turbulence of the skies around me.

To take a moment in time just for me is a rare thing indeed but just for a while, I broke with the constraints of the day and simply enjoyed all that surrounded me and it left me re-engaged with nature, with the elements, it left me craving even more for travel and adventures new, near and far, we live in such a beautiful country that I'm always happy to write about British travel but at the moment my soul is craving for sunshine and new overseas horizons.  I had planned to take a break when Looby goes on her school trip to Wales but it's pretty much financially dependent, I have a couple of weeks to get business, life, schedules and finances back on track before my girl goes off to deepest darkest Wales for her farming experience week at Treginnis Farm, she's going to love every minute, she craves for animals and experiences of farming as much as I crave to travel.  We both are outdoor adventurers deep down I think.

I'm not a landscape photographer, I'm a travel photographer, there's a huge difference so if my landscape photographer friends are looking in then I apologise, I should have been there at dusk or dawn instead of two in the afternoon but just like the things I do differently when I am shooting portrait photography in Newcastle I think I bring the same to travel and landscapes, I simply shoot the way I see and, I always see in photographs.