I AM BAAAACK! Life update.

Hello lovely people!

Ok, I know I didn't last too long at this whole blog malarkey last year. Things kind of got a bit crazy in my world - LOTS of things happened and I guess I didn't know how or if I wanted to share everything that was happening. It was good and bad at times and whilst I find the internet a great place most of the time, it can also be quite daunting and as I am new to blogging I am just not ready to spill every single part of me and my life for the world to see.

All of that said, there are some pretty amazing and fun things that have happened since I last blogged!

Baby Jaxon was born! You might have read my posts on Hannies baby shower and the crochet monkey that I was making for her baby "blueberry". It turns out that she was indeed cooking up a little blueberry muffin to introduce to the world. I have met him a couple of times since his arrival and have seen lots of pictures! He's 9 months old now. (Time goes soooo fast)! You will be able to see posts and updates over on Hannies Blog.

Dan and I had a weekend at Brands Hatch for the BTCC final rounds. If you had asked me a couple of years ago I would have laughed in your face at the thought of staying in a field on a rainy weekend to watch cars whizz around a track but now I am completely hooked. Ok, maybe not so keen on the wet weekend thing but I absolutely LOVE watching the cars and soaking up the atmosphere. So much so that we have got more tickets for this season and I have my own fantasy dream team (yep I really do!).

Brands Hatch BTCC Qualifying 2014. (The calm before the storm).

I became a 30 year old! Correct me if I am wrong *Please correct me* but I think that means I have entered "the middle ages" (frown)! I have found myself buying anti wrinkle products and "firming" creams! I realise now that I don't have the gorgeous, "perfect" skin that my nearly twenty year old cousins have and I am jealous of that but I also think that no-one is "perfect" because we all have a different versions of what we believe is perfection. 98% of me is happy with who I am and that 2% that isn't is just explained in that I am a female and I haven't yet met a female who is 100% happy with herself!

Tears of love and happiness on my 30th Birthday surprise weekend! - I still get overwhelmed at how amazing it was!

I have been given a referral to a more specialist hospital to try and get some progress. This is my third year of having a diagnosis and things are still not brilliant. The support from the Ann Conroy Trust has been incredible and last month I met someone for the first time who lives with the conditions. I was nervous and dreaded the thought of talking about illness *I didn't want to focus everything on the negatives*. Joanne was wonderful, just like a breath of fresh air. We talked a bit about the conditions but then spent a lot of time talking about other things like family and things we enjoy. I think I have a new friend in Joanne, it's great to talk things through with someone who really understands everything that I have felt and still feel from the emotional side to the physical side of things. It was also really good to talk about how it affects our loved ones and how similar it is for them too.

Spending more time with friends has been a big thing for me and Dan. Lots of things have happened in the last few years that have made us really appreciate the love and warmth from our closest family and friends. Sometimes it is easy to become so wrapped up in the negative parts of your world that you forget what fun is but having great people around you that don't need to ask questions or analyse anything makes you realise that you are a human being and that you are allowed to laugh, have fun and occasionally offload when the baggage becomes a little bit too much. - I'm mainly talking about illness here. I am not someone that wants to constantly be asked how I am. I love that my friends don't ask me anymore. They know that if I feel that I NEED to tell them, I will. contrary to what some would believe, I'm not stupid and I don't wait until it's too late to do anything about it. Being ill shouldn't prevent you from having friends over or spending time with them or having hobbies! Finding new skills is actually a gift that comes out of being unable to do some other "normal" stuff! *BIG SMILES* - I think I might be able to write a whole post on this!

Change of hair colour! I have gone and dyed my hair - yep you read that right! If you have read the first post I ever wrote you might remember me talking about how I am possibly the most indecisive person I know. Well I finally decided after about 2 years of toying with the concept that I wanted to go blonde! well ok I'm not blonde, blonde à la Barbie. I've opted for a more caramel blonde which is roughly three shade lighter than my natural medium mousey brown colour. My sister dyes it for me and my regular hairdresser is very impressed with the colour. I started off with the nice'n easy shade 8a but have moved to the shade 8 just because I thought the 8a was too dark.

My updated hair sytle and colour! Out with the side parting and in with the centre!

So far this year I have had two trips to London. Firstly to see Wicked the Musical. (I'm going to blog about the shows I've seen some other time and talk about them in depth, lets face it... they deserve a post of their own!). This was one of my Christmas pressies from Dan. It was our first time driving down which suited me well because I tend to relax more in the car than I do on a train. We went with two of our friends and we saw the matinee which also suited me. I bought a very special little boy a very special present from Harrods while we were in the big smoke too. I was going to order it online but as we were down in the area it was the perfect excuse to go and make my first ever Harrods purchase. I felt very grown up! I have been saving for the gift for a while even though I hadn't known what the purchase was going to be until we got there. My original idea got brushed away when I was actually there and seeing all the other lovely things they had on offer. I can't really go into too much detail about that purchase unfortunately but maybe one day I will be able to! While we were in London we had our first sample of Ben's Cookies. They are literally the nicest, scrummiest cookies I have ever had in my life! I don't normally like cookies at all but Ben's Cookies are big, chunky, soft, melty delicious squircles (uneven circles ie they aren't all uniform so look rustic) of cakey cookie dough that come in a variety of flavours. Again, I had a huge dilemma of choosing which flavour I wanted! I ended up with a white chocolate and macadamia nut one, a hazelnut praline one and a good old standard milk chocolate one. Don't panic, I didn't eat them all at once. I ate the white choc and nut (my fave) one while I waited for the show to start and then bought two home and enjoyed them BOTH the next day! oink oink!

The next trip down was for Dan's Birthday to see Stomp. It was just the two of us going this time and of course we had to have another trip to Covent Garden and Bens Cookies. We went to a really lovely restaurant for lunch while we were there. I had a gorgeous home made quiche (so nice that I bought two home: one for my parents and one for Dan's mum). As the show wasn't until the evening, we did a bit of sightseeing and went to the natural history museum. We've both said we want a day in London just for the museums! The weather in London was beautiful and for some reason the underground made me feel incredibly ill. Well, I wasn't 100% to start with so I think the tube just made things worse so we opted for walking at our own pace for most of the day. We walked and rested and stopped to take things in whereas before when we have been in the big smoke we have merged with everyone else and gone at the London pace! It was truly wonderful to go down a gear and just meander. It's amazing how much you miss when your head is down and you are zipping around. See, this is a "bonus" of being ill! I saw architecture and greenery that I never knew existed in our capital city!

Before the show, we went to Five Guys for some food. It was an experience!!! a gazillion flavours (slight exaggeration) of coke in one self serve machine (can you imagine what that was like for an indecisive me?! - Did I have a weird flavour of diet coke? NOPE I just had diet cherry coke, the type you can buy in a bottle - DOH! Dan on the other hand had Orange diet coke. It didn't smell too good but then again, I'm allergic to anything orange (not an exaggeration)! I recognised someone when we went in... He spoke to me to ask if we knew what we were ordering and I was convinced he looked like he knew me too. - AWKWARD! Then I realised when I sat down that it was Kye Sones from xfactor 2012!! Ok, yeah I know it's a long shot to think he knew me but he was extremely friendly when he approached me and Dan that I could only explain it that it was as if he genuinely knew me/us. Anyway, I tweeted him whilst we were eating (cringe) and said something along the lines of "Sorry if I just looked at you gone out, I thought I recognised you - I was right, I do!" followed by "now too embarrassed to come and say hi". What an absolute dork!

This is what happened next...

Meeting Kye Sones from xfactor 2012.

He was lovely, said that he knew we recognised him instantly when he turned round to talk to us. We chatted for a bit (even though I felt incredibly awkward) and he said he's really excited to be doing lots of music work and that the future looks like it's going to be fun. He told me I should tweet this pic but I still haven't! Blogging it is better, right?

 

I had a short break away in Cornwall over the Easter weekend, it was my first time staying in a static caravan so I will do a whole write up about that in the next few weeks.... keep your eyes peeled!

 

I have just got home from spending a few girly days away with one of my best uni friends. - We got up to some fun and took some videos and pictures and I have permission to blog about that too! It's mainly make up related! VERY EXCITING!!!!!! We're also planning a secret project for another of our friends so we're having to be VERY careful! - So much love and laughter to be had!

 

So, that's about it for updating you. I have a trusty Cath Kidston note book with me now that all of my ideas are poured into. It literally has pages of bullet points and squiggles of ideas! I need to adapt the slower pace again because it's all good and well enjoying the fast life every so often but by 'ek it catches up and that's no fun at all!

 

If you ever have any questions for me, please write them in the comments and I will reply to them as and when I can.

 

Love and Hugs.

Hannah.xx