Let's be friends.

The last few weeks have been tough, and there's not a sign of it lulling soon. Husband is so busy with work at the moment I barely see him, just an evening here or there and when he's here, he's not etc etc blah blah.  Also its pretty normal for us to spend the evening watching tv, both on iPads or laptops or phones, texting, emailing, tweeting and the odd sentence or banal piece of information passed between us here or there.   So, in a spark of inspiration I decided we needed a 'no technology' date at home this week.

It was nothing special but was very much so. We didn't pick up a phone or touch a computer, had dinner at the table (as opposed to our laps on the sofa) and we didn't stop talking.  It was lovely.  It all went back to normal the next day but dems da breaks.  It'll happen again soon.

But this week has had other little sparks of magic in it too.  A mummy at school I've never really spoken to stopped me in the street to introduce herself and say hi, another from toddler group made a beeline to speak to me and then requested me as a friend on Facebook. I had an amazing conversation with a lady at toddler group about her faith which really focussed me and I had an invitation to an evening out with other mums.

All these events may seem small but felt like such a huge gift to me this week, even though I've never found it hard to make conversation with strangers (part of the job) and have a certain amount of confidence, moving away from where you grew up is tough.  Yes most of the people in my village have known each other for years but Ive realised it doesn't matter, people (most of them anyway) are naturally interested and want to like and be liked by other people and it just takes someone to make the first move, say hi and there you go, a relationship starts and a friendship can blossom from there.

Even though Husband is away working today, the picture below captures my (however brief) feeling of contentment this afternoon with the little ones bonding have a cosy time (with the cat) watching Annie.*

* This didn't last long, it descending into CHAOS when he then started pummelling her with cushions, me shouting and he got put on the naughty step