It's 2014 and I'm back!!!

It's quickly creepy towards the middle of January already and I have not written a post since mid December!!!!  I've gone from rushing around like a headless chicken (pre-Christmas) to being so laid back and in the holiday zone that I don't even know what day I'm on at the moment.  I've been itching to get back into the blogging swing, but procrastination has sucked me in whole and my house has never been vacuumed so many times in one week!!

The best place to start, I think would be to wish you all

Christmas was very relaxed and quite understated in our house, which actually made it the perfect day - apart from the fact that it poured with rain ALL DAY!!  My mum and dad were with us from London which made it extra special and the kids were so super excited, it made all that the mad pre-Christmas prep worth it.  It was the first time that Mr D and I have hosted a proper Christmas lunch (even though it was only the seven of us) and if I can be totally honest it was bloody hard work!!!  You spend ages doing the shopping, preparing the food, cooking (most of the day) and when you finally sit down for that long awaited Christmas lunch the kids
a) don't like most of it,
b) eat up in the less than 10 minutes and can't understand why we're STILL sat at the table and
c) want to know whats for dessert before we've even got half way through our starters!!
Luckily Santa's haul kept them all occupied and I loved sharing the kitchen with my mum!!  Dad and Mr D made awesome cocktail makers and washer upers too!

I hope you all had a fun and fabulous Christmas.

Mum and dad have now headed back to London (sob) after a fabulous three weeks together, and Mr D is heading back to work on Monday.  This means that I will soon be back in charge - and need to find some kind of routine FAST!! It's amazing how easy it is to slide into days full of impromptu plans, beach mornings, afternoon cocktails and nana naps!! (yep that is pretty much all I have achieved in the last month and it's been awesome).  I've not taken this much 'time off' in a really long time ('time off' as a loose term of course as we all know that there is no such thing as real time off until the kids leave home - or so I'm lead to believe) and it's been really good for me.

I love this one of my three with my parents!!

However - reality check is here and I need to blend myself back into the real world again - which can't be too hard ...... can it??

I often find New Year a little over rated and I've decide not to do 'resolutions' as such but rather to make a plan with an end goal and stick with it.  Which I'm still working on by the way - so will have to keep you posted on that one I'm afraid!!

I did have a sneaky look back at last years resolutions to see how well I did and it did give me a bit of a chuckle!!!  Here are some of them.

1. Give up ironing.   Mmmmmmm still working on that one - although I have significantly cut down - does that count.
2.  Lose weight.   Mmmmmmmmm still working on that one too.
3.  Get more organised.   Mmmmmmmmm possibly still working on that one too.

I did however learn not to take on too much and to be a lot more selective with the things I decide to do.  I've also learnt that there is a balance between working (in my case blogging on Mrs D plus 3) and looking after the kids, and it is so important to keep that balance just right because the tinniest tilt can seriously offset family life.  Everyone's 'balance' is difference and I think I have finally worked out what mine is.  I just need to put it into action in 2014.

I've got SO many ideas for this year, and I would love it if you would stick around.  Your support in 2013 was amazing and I'd just like to thank you all again for that.

And to finish off my FIRST post of 2014 I'd love to know what you learnt in 2013 that's going to set you up for 2014??

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