Wasn’t it cold this week? Even though I love the colours at this time of year, I hate that it’s becoming so cold. Although it’s tempting to utter ‘winter is coming’ every five minutes, I’ve resisted the urge and just advanced the heating instead. How was your week? I spent three days in a row thinking it was Friday, so by the time Friday actually came, I was well and truly relieved. I’m summarising my week in #littleloves style. Pop over to Coffee, Sleep, Work, Repeat for more of the same.

Read…
I finished reading The Skeleton Road by Val McDermid, posting my review on Friday. This story gives a vivid account of the terrible atrocities that occurred in the Balkans during the 1990’s. It is a murder mystery with a difference, that gives plenty of food for thought about how such things could have happened in the modern day. I was a teen during that time and didn’t fully understand what went on, so I feel guilty, in many ways, that I lived my life at the time in such ignorance.

Watched
The Kennedy’s
Have you seen it yet? It’s hilarious, well in my opinion anyway, particularly as its set in the 1970’s and the references to that era and the quirks of the time make me laugh. Even if you weren’t around during that decade, you can’t fail to laugh at a mother sticking a sanitary towel to her daughter’s cut forehead because she didn’t have any bandages in the house.

Wore…
It was so cold this week that I ditched my thin mac-style coat in favour of my winter ski jacket. I just hated feeling so cold. The heating also went on and by Friday, I was reluctant to go out to pick the kids up from school. Of course I did, I’m not that bad, but it definitely feels like autumn is here.

Heard…
A lot of chatter about strangers approaching school kids in white vans, cars, clown masks, you name it. There has been some strange goings on in the county and I don’t know what’s happening. The men in clown masks were targeting year seven girls. Weirdos. The other incidents, no doubt happened, but with the children being so active on social media, they have whipped each other up in to a frenzy of fear. Don’t get me wrong, I think they should all be aware of the possible dangers, but there’s something about these incidents over the last couple of weeks that suggest a level of hype that wouldn’t have necessarily happened had the Internet not been around.

My daughter, who’s in year seven, has found herself tensing every time a white van passes her by and I kind of feel sorry for all those genuine people out there who suddenly seem to be implicated if they so much as utter a word to a stranger. Let’s hope this all calms down and the children learn from it what they need to without being scared out of their wits.

Made…
Firm friends at the What I’m Writing blogger’s lunch. It’s been a few weeks in the planning, but thanks to Maddy Bennet, from Writing Bubble, who runs the What I’m Writing linky, we managed to organise a get together lunch at Brown’s Brasserie at Butler’s Wharf in London. I don’t think I was alone in the amount of running around that I had to do in order to get away for the afternoon, but I was determined not to miss out and I’m so glad I made it.

We’ve all ‘met’ over our blogs and shared so much about each other on line, that we know each other quite well already. There was no doubt that we would all get on and it felt as though we could just pick up the conversation as though we were all old friends. An afternoon in London, lovely food, a few glasses of wine, great conversation and a lot of laughter is just what you need sometimes.

And lastly…
One child is on half term already, so I’m on borrowed hours next week. I’m squeezing in some work around a day out in London and a shopping trip on Friday (alright for some!). I think the other two are going to be extremely miffed at having to go to school when their sister is at home, but what can you do? We’ve managed to get through the first term of three different schools, managing new timetables and routines. It’s been fine, but all three are exhausted and ready for a break (including me).

Hope you have a great week.