24 Hours in London - Reasons to be Cheerful #R2BC

This week I'm dedicating my reasons to be cheerful post to a great 24 hours last weekend spent with my Mum in London, belatedly celebrating Mothers Day. We've done this the last few years and it is a really nice treat to look forward to.

We start the weekend off with me heading over to meet Mum at Waterloo and enjoy a good cup of coffee at Costa, of course having a right old natter to catch up on what has been going on since we last spoke. The weather is then far too nice to head down to the underground so we walk along the South Bank and take in the street performers and the great atmosphere on the way to Westminster tube station.

There we pick up the tube to go to High Street Kensington as we are staying in the Holiday Inn just off the High Street and only a few minutes walk from the tube station. It proves to be an excellent hotel and I'll write up a review, even though I paid for it as my Mums Christmas gift.

A Week of Reasons to be Cheerful

Home sweet home and the sun is shining!

It's time for our weekly dose of cheerfulness and I am feeling a lot more like myself than I did last week. Sadly my lovely aunt passed away, so I'll be heading to her funeral on Tuesday but I'm so thankful she is no longer in loads of pain.

Here's my week of cheer -

Thursday - I had a good session with the little boy I coach through the charity TLG. Then in the evening I headed to Tesco whilst my girls were at Guides and I got a new coat for the Spring. It is raspberry coloured and I love it.

Friday - We headed out for a meal for my friend Annie's birthday and the food was exquisite. I had a chicken breast stuffed with spiced lamb and spinach and coated in a mild curry sauce with pomegranate seeds, sultanas and sunflower seeds.

Super Lucky to be Here: Happy Mothering Sunday #isurvived

JJ, my boy who made me Mummy

Happy Mothering Sunday Friends. I wish every woman out there an amazing day, be she a mother herself or a mother figure. This day isn't only to be celebrated and enjoyed by those who have given birth it is also for those who selflessly offer their heart and soul loving others in the way a mother often does.

This is the 16th Mothering Sunday that I have celebrated. Of course JJ isn't actually that old yet but my hubby bought a card from the bump (AKA JJ) back in March 2003, seven months before he was even born. I remember being so thrilled to receive that first card and some flowers (if I remember rightly) as it was the start of my maternal journey, having thought previous to this that I might never have children.

I do remember feeling very special when I was pregnant but I had quite a lot of sickness for the first few months and I just looked extra fat rather than glowing with a perky bump. I did then get about four good months with JJ just before he was born but then stupidly I decided it would be great to have him in September rather than October, as was his due date. So I cleared and cleaned the house and then started to gut the garage. I remember I worked like a Trojan and it was very satisfying, well up to the point when I saw my midwife that afternoon and she started to worry about high blood pressure, excessive oedema in my ankles and belly, and protein in my urine.

Yes, it turns out I had pre-eclampsia. I've no idea if all my 'nesting' added to my getting this condition but it surely didn't help it and I was taken off to the hospital that evening for monitoring and a scan. It was decided that they wouldn't let me go too much over my due date and thus I was booked in for an induction on 3rd October 2003 when I would be 40+2 weeks.

Whilst my induction with JJ was a bit of a debacle and took me quite some time to emotionally recover from, I am still enormously grateful that we have the NHS in this country and that when JJ's heart rate kept decelerating, I could have the C-section without any delay. Then when the spinal blocks and epidural didn't work, there was an anaesthetist on hand who was able to give me a general straight away. Luckily JJ was fine and he hadn't swallowed any meconium as was feared and over the next few weeks I healed too.

Great Personal Service at the Mercure, London Kensington

Last weekend to celebrate Mothers Day, my lovely Mum and I headed up to London for 24 hours together, just us, no kids and no real agenda. We've done it before and had an amazing time and we vowed this year that it will become an annual thing.

24 hours (or 27 to be precise) doesn't sound much but it is amazing what you can fit in. I met Mum at Waterloo and we headed straight over to Leicester Square to the official half-price theatre ticket booth to see if we could bag some good ticket for an evening performance. After success booking for Beautiful. the Carole King musical we enjoyed a toastie and coffee together watching the world go by in this busy part of London.

The rest of our Saturday was filled with checking into our hotel and having a relax there, some serious shopping on Kensington High Street, a fabulous dinner at Prezzo over on New Oxford Street and of course seeing the amazing West-end production of Beautiful. It really is an amazing show and both Mum and I highly recommend it.

Sunday was a much more chilled day where we got up late, enjoyed a full English breakfast at the hotel and then had a walk around Kensington with a little shopping and of course coffee before I dropped Mum back at Waterloo and headed back to my family.

Mercure, London Kensington
But enough about our time together this post is actually about our stay at the small and intimate Mercure Hotel in Kensington. This 82 bedroom hotel is situated on the Cromwell Road and that makes it super easy to access. It you are travelling by tube it is between Gloucester Road and Earls Court and then around a 7 minute walk from either but because you are in the Borough of Kensington and Chelsea it is a really pleasant stroll as the buildings and area are so beautiful.

Reasons to be Cheerful - Happy Mothering Sunday #R2BC

Lucky me, the girls made me breakfast in bed

Happy Thursday friends,

How are you doing? I'm having a funny old week. there is nothing particularity wrong but I've had that horrible feeling that sometimes crops up. Do you know what I mean? Where you just feel something isn't right and is a bit off-kilter but you've no real idea what is causing the way you feel. No matter, I'm going to press through it and not give in to the doldrums.

This coming Sunday
This week's #R2BC post is all about celebrating Mothering Sunday. Firstly I am really looking forward to this weekend when I'm away in London with my Mum. Just the two of us for around 36 hours doing whatever we feel like doing. We are staying at the 4 star Mercure Kensington hotel and planning to hit the theatre, shops and at least a couple of good restaurants. To be truthful whatever we do will be fine by me as we always have a lovely time in each others company and this breakaway is long overdue.

The last time we had a weekend in London together was in 2014 as we planned one in 2015 but my Dad got taken to hospital and we had to cancel. Then in 2016, we had a weekend away with my girls to a Haven caravan park, which was nice but nothing beats time just the two of us in 'the big smoke' as my Mum would say!

Creating a Memorable Mothers Day with Tesco

Mum and I in 2014 when we had a Mothers Day away together in London

My readers will know that I pride myself on being organised and ahead of the game but it appears that when it comes to gifts for special days like Mothers Day I am in the minority. Tesco revealed that more than half a million (1) time-strapped Brits will buy their Mother’s Day gift on the day itself, rushing to shopping aisles just over an hour before midday, at 10.53am on Mothering Sunday.

It saddens me a little to think of all those people probably heading to their mother's house for a nice Sunday roast (that Mum has cooked) and this is when they stop to think about getting her some flowers or chocolates to say thanks for all she has done for them. Of course, those thanks shouldn't just be on Mothers Day and it is only right to show your mum that you appreciate her any time of the year but it is great to have a special day dedicated to mothers everywhere.

Out for Mothers Day Lunch at

It's come to the end of a long but enjoyable day and I'm thankful to my children for all the hugs, messages of love, homemade cards and little gifts I got today. I'm also grateful to my husband for doing the homework with the girls and giving me a little time to myself earlier.

It has been my kind of day, there has not been anything massively fancy but we have done things that I've enjoyed. I got up early and breakfasted with my three babes, they smothered me with presents and good wishes. We all went to church parade this morning and I received three cute little posies of flowers. We then headed over to the Windmill Brewers Fayre for lunch and then back home where I read and studied ready for a course I am running on Wednesday.

Following a chilled afternoon at home we headed to our regular church for their cafe style evening service and it was fabulous. A grilled chicken kebab and a movie with my husband have topped the day off. I can go to bed happy.

I think days like Mothering Sunday can be difficult for some as the expectation of what might happen is huge. Will my children remember? Will I get great gifts? Will my husband look after the kids? Can I relax all day and suit myself? I have to be honest and say I try not to build my own expectations up and thankfully my family do OK.  Yes I have stacked the dishwasher and I've made the kids food but I'm OK with that because what I try and remember today is that I'm their mother and it is these things I do with love that mean they want to make me cards and give me breakfast in bed.

Happy Mothers Day

Dh has been teaching the kids valuable lessons in the kitchen

I had the most delightful day yesterday and you know what? I want to write about it on my blog, not because I want to show off to you, nor because I want to divide mothers into those who have great days and those who don't but there is a really simple reason why I want to write about it here. And that is because this is my blog, my personal memory of three children growing up.

When I first wrote on this blog in 2008 I said I was writing this blog for me, it is something for me to look back on and to share with family and friends. My Mum does not live close enough that she will see the cards the kids made for me but I know she will be pleased to look at them and that matters.

So I really am very sorry if you had a bad day yesterday and it is not good if you felt pressured to have perfect children and a super-fun day. But really no-one else puts that pressure on you except yourself, if you feel this day is full of commercialism and you don't want to be part of it, don't.  You are an adult and you can make that choice and in doing so you teach your children to be assertive and to go with what is important to them, instead of going with the crowd.

I love the tissue flowers the girls made me, they had stickers on them with beautiful bible verses on them which mean a lot. They all made me personalised chocolate bars at school and just look at that butterfly card JJ made, that will be cherished forever.

Yesterday the most expensive gift I received cost £3 and I promise you I was 100% content. I just had the most wonderful day but that does not mean I did nothing - I cleared up the breakfast things, I put a wash on, I folded washing. I do not see Mothering Sunday as a day to make my husband a slave to me, we are a team and I'm lucky that he did help the kids cook me breakfast in bed and then he cooked us all a wonderful roast later in the day but we work together. We also had a lad from church come over for a couple of hours to play as that makes him happy and that has to be more important than me being able to say I sat on a couch and did nothing all day.

Mothering Sunday is a long held day in the Christian calendar, originally it was about all servants being given the day off work so they could return home to their 'mother' church and spend the time with their family. Along the way to church the children of the families would often pick wild flowers and then display them in church or give them to their own mothers. Today for me, Mothering Sunday is a day when we celebrate those who mother, that could be the Sunday school teacher, grandparents, friends, God parents, voluntary leaders of groups such as Rainbows and Brownies - it is all the people who mother or take on mothering roles.

For my children Mothering Sunday is the day when they show me how much they love me. No they do not need a special day to do that but do you know how excited they were to keep their special handmade gifts a secret from me and then to cook me breakfast and serve it to me in bed? In allowing them to do that they learn gratitude, love and a servants heart, all things I want my children to know.

Thank you dh, JJ, Miss E and Miss M for a lovely day yesterday, I really appreciate each and every one of you.

A special mention goes to my own Mum, who is wonderful. We have a truly fabulous relationship and she taught me how to be a mother. My overriding thoughts yesterday were of her as her own Mum died just a month ago, so how raw must that have been? But she took time to remember the great times they shared and she went with her sister to the crematorium and paid respects to the Mum she adored. Then  my brother did his bit and took her out. Looking forward to seeing you soon Mum. xx

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