Hi everyone, hope its been a good week so far.

After all the rain recently, and with my South African Sister-in-law and my gorgeous nieces up for a well overdue visit from London (thanks to lockdown), we decided to take a punt on the unpredictable weather, and head to my favourite local beach near Southport for a picnic and a paddle… even my teenagers were keen, and that rarely happens!

All the clouds literally blew away on the breeze and it turned out to be a beautiful sunshiney day. My nieces and youngest daughter Sophie, spent the afternoon burying our teenage son Jack up to his head in sand. Georgia, my daughter who is 16, took a friend and spent it sunbaking and helping me to take some brilliant shots for Island Home - they are far better at it than I am ! Georgia took this shot of me (reluctant model) with our gorgeous Mosaic cushions in natural and sky grey that I have featured on the blog this week… isn’t she clever? (G would be appalled that I said that), she’s even made the back of my head look photo worthy…

I also couldn’t resist taking a photo of the lovely hand painted sign that one of the locals must have put up as you enter the beach. I’ve put it on the front photo of the blog so you can all have a look. To me, it says everything there is to say about how we should treat our gorgeous beaches, no matter where you are in the world “leave nothing but your footprints on the beach”.

I think everyone must be starting to take this message to heart, as I can honestly say… the beach, and water was the cleanest that I have seen it in a long time, which is really heartening to see. The day went far too quickly and after the obligatory ice-creams, it was time to head home. It is days like yesterday that memories are made of… plans made in haste, taking a gamble on the weather, packing a picnic and off we go. Our kids ranged in age from 19-7 but for once they all got on brilliantly; must have been the unexpected sunshine ( and the odd treat from Grandma). Sometimes, and often these days more rarely, simple things work best. Yesterday was one of those days… hoping for a few more of them before the end of summer.

Bye for now…