Dear Reader

Dear Reader, Grandparents are such wonderful things, of which I don’t truly believe we appreciate until they aren’t sitting in their chair by the fire anymore. I loved my grandparents, as we all do, as a child. They were the people that gave big snuggly cuddles, spent lots of money on you and fed you until you were about to pop. Those are the things you loved and those are the things you remember. But the things I believe we truly miss when they’re gone are the bits you don’t really remember. One of my grandfathers was in the Navy and he used to tell these really long winded, possibly slightly embroidered stories. It was very Uncle Albert-esque and at the time, I wasn’t particularly bothered, I would listen and be polite but I can’t remember any of them now. I laugh and make jokes about how long and silly his stories were but in my heart I miss them with a deep sadness. I wish he were here to tell his tales to me now that I can appreciate and understand them, so I can write

...Do You Want To Lose Your Mind? Dear Reader, I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that you have been talking about my next subject as much as anyone else has...Clowns. Poor misunderstood clowns. Not so much clowns but the people inside the clown costumes. I mean good grief... When the craze first started in America I saw it mentioned on Facebook, I had been reading an article just before I saw it about Stephen King's famous novel 'IT' being made into a film once again. It had just finished filming so they were attempting to create some hype around it. Now for those who do not know, the leading character in Stephen King's 'IT' is a clown called Pennywise. He is really quite scary, feel free to Google if you wish...in the morning, and he morphs into the shape of whatever children fear the most. Following the last months siege of clowns, I would assume that this is quite possibly what children are most afraid of currently. After seeing the article about

Dear Reader, Yesterday I found myself looking up at the building that my mother used to live in with her parents and brother. I stood, my eyes drinking in the old red bricks, the huge windows and the stairs which I could see through the window in the front door. I had heard about this stairs from stories from my mother. My grandfather was a butcher, the building was his shop Read & Co. and the stairs lead up to the house. At Christmas, when overrun with orders they would have to stack the turkeys up the stairs with little name tags on them. When the customer arrived to pick up their turkey my mother and her brother would have to run up and down the stairs trying to find the right customers name on tens of turkeys. The thought of it always made me laugh. I wasn't sure what I was meant to feel, I had never been there with my mother and had only heard about 'Chapel Street' through stories. Suddenly I was here, standing in front of the window she used to look out of,

Dear Reader, I have recently started helping out at my local Brownies group, I was once a Brownie myself in the late 90's early 2000's and fellow Brownies of that era will be saddened to hear that alas, the mud brown culottes did not last. As a 23 year old, being surrounded by around 20-ish 7-9 year olds is slightly daunting. Some of the girls are sweet and shy, some talkative and wanted to tell you all about their lives no matter how lengthy and unrelated the story, and some are just wonderfully nutty. All, however have the power to lift or dive bomb an adults confidence at the blink of an eye. I call it the rise and fall of self confidence at the hands of small people. N.B. I do not consider myself an adult but one must act the part when one is in charge of said children. Even if you want to cry following an empowering talk with a young girl about skin care when she tells you "yeah you have a massive spot on your head". I have learnt a few things about worki

Dear Reader, I wasn't planning on writing a blog today but I've been at work and felt enamoured to write about brands that I love that are doing their bit for the world and the people in it. So my company is running an event next month called The Healthy Living Show, our website is www.healthy-living-show.com if you felt so inclined. So basically we're bringing healthy food, drinks, products together and inviting the public to come and buy their products. It's a mixture of foods, clothing, make up, fitness, eco products, charities and many more but the main point is about living a healthy life. Be that vegan, vegetarian, paleo, organic or just being eco-friendly; I call it happy healthy living. Anywho, back to my point...I'm an avid tangent goer offer, the key is to remember the point that you were attempting to make. Chances of which are vastly improved by the fact I'm writing all this down. As I was saying, back to my point, today I found a brand that

Dear Reader, I have always been afraid of the dark, I don't recall a time as a child when I wasn't afraid to lie in bed in the darkness of night without the comfort of a light in the hallway. I suppose it must have arisen somewhere at some point but I don't have any memory of it. Stephen King once wrote "The thing under my bed waiting to grab my ankle isn't real. I know that, I also know that if I'm careful to keep my foot under the covers, it will never be able to grab my ankle." I'm sure that, at some point, dear readers, that you have too been scared of something lurking in the dark corner of your room even though it makes no logical sense. But I think at that time in the night, logic doesn't tend to come into the equation.  I wrote this story piece about a year ago, maybe it will resonate with you or maybe you're lucky enough to never have been scared of the dark. But either way, I hope you like giving it a read.  Dar

Dear Reader, One of the books I’m reading at the moment is ‘Stephen King; On Writing’ and he writes a piece about how sometimes you have parts of a story and you just can’t quite make them work. He calls it the ‘teacup and the handle’, you can’t have a teacup without a handle nor is a handle any use without a teacup. I attempt to write short stories, dear reader, and I often come up with teacups with no handles or handles without the teacup. Bits of stories that you just can’t make work or can’t figure out which direction they’re supposed to go in and so just come to a halt. I can’t tell you that my short stories are good nor can I tell you that they’re awful because to be honest, I’m not sure I know. Can any writer turn around and honestly say that they think one particular piece of work is truly awesome? I have no idea whether my writing is any good at all. I really need to give my old English teacher, Mrs Mack, a call and get her to pop round for a cup of tea and a good

D ear Reader, Maybe I’m not creative enough, or maybe I just don’t have that artistic flair but I genuinely have no idea what I’m doing when it comes to clothes (or shoes for that matter).  I used to get most of my fashion tips from Noel Fielding and Keith Richards …and considering neither of those are women I would say that we’re already off to a pretty bad start. I’m a girl, so naturally, I am a keen believer in shopping as a hobby but I tell you what, there is some form of anxiety that washes over me in certain shops. A massive feeling of not-belonging-ness, especially in ones like Topshop. I think this has a lot to do with that fact that I’m not, or don’t believe I am, fashionable. It’s as though I feel everyone else in the shop can smell it on me as soon as I walk in, like a fresh kill to a hyena. Somehow they can sense I don’t belong with them, the fashionistas, the one’s who know what’s going on in the world of clothing. Who else remembers when skinny jeans first ca

Dear Reader,  I’ve recently been attempting to garden, and when I say ‘garden’, I really do mean that in the loosest sense of the word. I’m not even entirely sure that what I do qualifies as gardening but nonetheless… My ‘gardening’ consists of buying pretty plants and potting them in pretty plant pots. This requires only a small amount of knowledge and hard work. But does make you feel like you’ve contributed somewhat to your green fingeredness and can thus be just a little garden proud. Though, really, I’m just desperately hoping the plants don’t die. There is definitely something rather lovely about seeing something you’ve planted by hand grow into a beautiful flower, fruit or vegetable. One thing that bugs me though, why on earth is gardening seen as an old person’s hobby? Why do I feel boring for enjoying it? However poorly I may be doing it and however little knowledge I may have, it’s peaceful and requires care. You’re helping a living thing to grow, there’s som

Dear Reader, Learning what to do in life. Do we ever find the perfect job or do we just bounce constantly from one to the other until we find one that we hate the least? Or worse, just give up looking all together? I look around at people in offices, shops, or people just walking on the street and wonder whether they really like their job, LOVE their job. How many of us can say that? How many people are there out there who are doing the job they have always dreamt of? And how do you know when you’ve got the perfect job? I’ve only really known one job all of my life, does that mean it’s the one for me or does it mean that I have just accepted that it’s all I know? I believe I’m good at my job, I enjoy it, but I question whether there is something else out there that might be better, that I could be really good at. How do we know when we’ve reached our full potential? And how many of us really try? Do we just get to a point where we decide that we’ve probably got it as good as it’

Dear Reader, Here begins my blogging chapter. I will be the first to admit that I'm not entirely sure what I'm doing, however I know that I have always loved writing and so begins the blog. I'm new to this, so be kind. It's rather more public than the short stories that I write in my little green book next to the bed, but maybe this is more similar than I think. Maybe I'll post one or two of my short stories, if I feel brave enough. There's something rather Carrie Bradshaw about all of this, maybe we're all secretly hoping that someone will read our blog and sweep us up to become the next brilliantly clever and witty columnist in The Times... I have yet to decide what I may write about in the coming posts but I imagine it will be a mix of seriousness, silliness quite probably mixed in with too long a sentences and a little nonsense. All of which I hope you, dear reader, will enjoy. Fingers crossed. And if you do happen to be reading this and work fo