Journal

Some days, it feels like we leap forward towards our desired goals. Others the steps are SO tiny it is barely noticeable we’re making progress. It’s always in looking back that it’s easier to see how big the leaps have really been. If there was one thing I learned about publishing my first book, ‘Samuel…

Last year, as I tidied my office with the help of my magic elf (aka Sophie, the Tidyist), Sophie found a bundle of printed off stories stuffed somewhere silly. Somewhere where it was unlikely I would ever discover it in order to crack on and actually do the writing. ‘What shall I do with these…

I’m writing this after having worked on an illustration detail for my second book – the first time I’ve worked on the book in a long time. I’ve allowed everything else to become a priority over the book recently, and that is ok. In line with the topic matter of the book, I’m having to…

My Wild Woman My wild woman is calling me,beckoning from the woods,a woodland nymph running free,free of musts and shoulds. She needs time alone, away from the fray,She needs to shake and move her hips,To shrug off the day to day and play,Pour sweet nectar down her throat, her lips. My wild woman knows what…

In reflecting on the oddity that was 2020, I realised that some of the best moments of compassion, connection, and understanding, came from when I was silent. When I paused, tuned in and really listened. As a person with a LOT of words in my head, that regularly pour out of my mouth (and, as…

Ooof. Life has got terribly serious of late, hasn’t it. One need only take a peek at the news from between fingers clamped over our eyes to lose all of one’s sense of joy and delight in an instant. It feels like I have to delve really deep to rediscover my inner child at the…

In the middle of November last year, I visited my extraordinary osteo for what I’ve dubbed ‘maintenance appointments’ – i.e. visits that avoid the ‘crisis appointments’ that have happened at least three times since I’ve had children. You know the ones: you pick up your child up at the wrong angle and CRRRACK, your back…

Last year, believe it or not, I discovered that hoovering my house brought me huge comfort in an uncertain time (in the outside world, naturally, but also during a period of really tricky bedtime battles with the boys). It also, as it turns out, brought inspiration. A surprise! Soothed I think I’ve cleared out all…

Pfffft. Dammit. I’ve gone and called myself out. Again. It struck me that I’ve unwittingly been in the throes of resistance, but in a much subtler form than usual (normally it rears its ugly head in a more startling, and therefore obvious, fashion): Yesterday, like many, we completed day one of ‘homeschooling’ (with a 2yo…

Happy New Year dear reader! May 2021 contain flourishing creativity and practices which bring you comfort and delight, in whatever form(s) that takes for you. I will be sharing some of the things I intend to do with the (VERY!) blank slate that is this year – albeit working within a constantly changing landscape, not…