Reader, ‘tis the season. As the mists and mellow fruitfulness begin to gently settle themselves on the hills in the place I was born, here we greet an altogether different season. Here we watch the hurricanes, and here it is the season of fear.
I imagine you too will have been watching the hurricanes this season. Harvey in Texas, where the flooding was as big as everything else in that great state. And Irma across the Caribbean where this weekend the tiny islands that make up paradise were left naked and utterly defenceless against the viciousness of the strongest storm ever...
So, I may have taken the summer off, but my little blog certainly didn’t. My little blog has been working rather hard in fact – or I should say, some wonderfully clever creative people have been working rather hard, and the result is this pretty new look for Littles, Love and Sunshine.
I’ve loved every moment of creating this blog and writing again for the first time in years – from day one it’s given me so much. So about a year after starting it I felt like it deserved something back – a look of its own.
To help me with...
At the end of June when we hung up your school uniform and kicked your little black shoes into the corner of the cupboard, I thought the summer would last forever. I saw the unstructured days stretch ahead of us as an unknown quantity and felt just as daunted by them as you were excited.
And then we woke up on day one, and it was 7.30am. And I didn’t have to pack your lunchbox, or chivvy you into your uniform, or make either of us look presentable until we were good and ready for our day, and we had nowhere...
Summer holidays, and with a break in routine and family coming to stay in our three-bedroom house, I thought it would be a perfect time to start transitioning my two girls to a shared bedroom. I imagined lazy evenings of reading bedtime stories with one precious girl in the crook of each arm, goodnight kisses and waking in the morning to find the two of them snuggling together, the picture of Instagramable sisterly affection. The older one has always been a great sleeper, the younger is not – so I thought, now she is 18 months old, she may learn...
A September morning and a too-big school dress, a neat little ponytail, knee-high socks and shiny black shoes walking little legs through the school gates for the first time, her tiny hand held tight in mine. The first morning of school, and both of us brand new.
It’s been a year of so many firsts and we’ve navigated them all with a little help from each other and our friends. The first meet and greet with the teachers, now beloved friends and trusted partners; the first choosing of a locker (did I elbow another parent out of the way as I...
To my little sister,
Lately my big sister game has been off. Well, not lately. It’s been a while. I think that perhaps you know this but that, like everything between us, you understand. You don’t make me feel guilty about the messages that go unreturned or the phone calls that find me distracted at the other end of the line as I scrub yoghurt out of the toddler’s hair. Our conversations now always seem to be snatched in the moments we can carve out of our busy lives, but I’m painfully aware they’re more on my timeline than yours. I’m...
A beep on my phone, a message from my BFF across the the world, and the words that showed just how well she knows me: “So I know it’s an outrageous idea but…”
It was an invitation to join her and three other friends for a girls’ weekend in New York City. An escape from my perfect, beautiful life. A chance to leave responsibility behind and pound the pavements with some of my favourite women, shop at my leisure, drink cocktails on the rooves of tall buildings, laugh til my sides hurt, sleep through the night, and spend three glorious days...
To you on Mother’s Day,
Just for today, assume you are perfect.
...
