When life is moving at a million miles an hour I find creating little photos for my Instagram feed is a way of surviving it all! My feet didn't touch the ground last week, I had photo shoots, meetings for my development job and party preparations! Sammy's birthday was at the start of the half term and fortunately my in-laws came to the rescue and took the boys to their house for a mini holiday so I could squeeze in as much work as possible. I had the great pleasure of working for a very talented lady Julia, who has launched a new smoothie business locally. I came away completely inspired by her life choices, her relationship with food and her wonderful family dynamic. I will hopefully share some sneak peeks later this week. 

I've finally moved into my new office above the garage. It still smells a little like fresh paint and the walls are still bare but I have a proper space to work now, free from too many distractions in the house! I can't wait to show you all in a little tour soon. One of my favourite things is the drop down wooden table that the previous owner used for her art materials. She was a talented painter and I can still envisage her jars of old paint brushes along the window ledge.

It makes a fabulous backdrop for photos because it is flooded with light and I can play around without annoying Rich with petals on pieces of scrap paper over the house!

This was my #capturingcolour week.

And the #capturingcolour gallery was filled with creative compositions, texture, snap shots into people's hobbies, moments with their little ones and artful arrangements.

I was surrounded by wood this week, wooden signs for the party that we made from an old fence panel that was destined for the fire, tree slices that I used as cake stands from a local chap I found through Facebook, and setting up the garden on Saturday made me really appreciate just now much I love pottering at home and how I wish I was more green fingered.

I am determined to try and learn more about the beautiful plants and flowers that keep popping up around the house. I really want the boys to have fun in the garden this Summer, not just on the slide or trampoline but be involved. Tend the vegetable patch, help me cut the flowers, tidy up the pond which looks like an overgrown swamp land! I am getting a lesson soon from a lovely lady in our village who is growing all the flowers for her daughter's wedding this weekend. 

That is my dream for the boys, to watch them walk up to the village church, just like she will on Saturday! 

So this photo from Lucy @mscraftberrybush just had to be my favourite to feature this week. I can just picture her pottering at this table, an effortless backdrop for beautiful photos outdoors. Lucy's blog was one of the first I read when I started blogging three years ago and her attention to detail and elegant styling inspires me so much. 

Come and join in a brand new week of MOOD BOARDS! I am busy plotting away now for the design sessions at Brit Mums Live with my co host, the super talented Teri from The Lovely Drawer. We want to get everyone excited about creating mood boards to help guide you with your blog design and understand how they can be so effective and fun!

It's a conference to inspire, make new friends, squeal and hug old ones and above all soak up everything the Brit Mums community has to offer. Have you got your ticket yet?! 

So get practising! 

#capturingcolour is a weekly theme on Instagram. Tag your MOOD BOARD photos this week. Favourites will be featured next Monday :)

Yesterday we celebrated Sammy turning six. 6 years of this incredibly bright, witty and forthright boy in our lives. His sense of logic and thirst for knowledge, astound us on a daily basis and there is nothing I love more than spoiling him on his birthday. I love that our family and friends come together in the most happy of occasions to all sing the same song, cheer and clap, just as you do when they are 1 or 100. 

The sense of togetherness, of bringing together the important people in their worlds, to give them a real moment in the spotlight, where all they can do is smile like a Cheshire cat. His birthday has lasted the whole week of the half term holidays, starting with a weekend with his little cousin Yasmin, a mini holiday to my in-laws in Poole, and the most simple of birthday days in the garden.

The sun shone, we played. And that was all. We didn't leave the garden, bar Granny going to pick up the requested birthday lunch of fish and chips, and we watched as the three of them cemented their special bond, playing hide and seek in the long grass and exclaiming "weeeee" as they all took turns on the new slide.

It was an ordinary day. It was the day he wanted. Just us, in the garden, no work, just play.

We ended the week with a little less simplicity and a little more fanfare! He may have loved his simple birthday but when it comes to parties my boys are all about the bigger the better! Phew! Because I just adore throwing these parties for them. It was a camping party extravaganza and when he came with me to pick up some last minute bits on Friday afternoon he said, "Ooh Mama what theme shall we have next year?!" And that is why I love this boy. For his sense of innocent joy, anticipation and excitement. He relishes the simple days and the extraordinary days. He's just like me, the build is all part of the fun. Every detail is noted, he sat with me looking at Pinterest for inspiration for his cake decorations, he helped me set out the buffet table. He memorises the little things, the things that seem over the top. And that's why I do it, because he will pour over the photos, he will randomly on a car journey recall one tiny detail and he will thank me again quietly, weeks after the event, for such a lovely time. 

So even at 6am, when I was barefoot in the garden in my PJs on the morning of his birthday, when Granny was trying to keep him in bed a little longer (She had slept on a mattress in their bedroom with them as a special treat - what a Granny!) it was worth it. Worth laying out a trail of presents, pound shop finds, a few bits I had got in a charity shop still in their packaging and a few new things, to the new tree house fort we had all clubbed together to buy. 

He hadn't even got round the corner and he was shouting "This is the best birthday ever!" 

Sammy - you have a feisty temper, you wear your heart on your sleeve. You have the best and worst our our personality traits and yet I know you will grow up to be the most wonderful young man. You don't know you are cool, that the girls like you, that your floppy hair and enormous brown eyes are going to give us all sorts of trouble in the future! The night before his party he had a bad dream and we played musical beds as usual. And I must have stirred at around 6.30am, when it was light outside and I could see the sun rays coming through the cracks in the blind, and I just looked at him. He sleeps with his mouth closed, his skin is slightly sun kissed from a week in the garden and on the beach with Grandma and Grandad, and he looked so handsome. A spattering of freckles on his soft skin, his fringe just touching his eyelashes on account of a missed half term trim. And I said to Rich as we were manoeuvring the dining room table through the conservatory doors, I just took a minute to look at him, to take him in. To snap a mental picture of this innocent boy who is so healthy, so fit, so desperate to learn, achieve and grow. He is vying to be a big boy and we are longing for him to stay small. To relish this time being so young, to soak up everything life has to offer being 6. 

His teacher has a few pet names for the class. There's Popstar (Poppy) and Super Sammy.

And that's what you are our boy. Super Sammy.

In all the birthday excitement the day passed without a photo of the four of us. But yesterday at the party we hopped on the "totem pole" chair (That's been hidden in the garage since we moved) and my sister snapped this photo. She looked up from behind the lens and said. That's your Me and Mine shot!

And suddenly here we are. The end of May, with a 6 year old. A boy who has lived in 3 houses, will have gone to 3 schools come September when they start a new adventure, and who we couldn't be without. 

The months ahead are packed with planes, trains and automobiles. No lazy weekends at home at all, but the bags under our eyes will hopefully have time to heal with a precious first family holiday just the four of us to Turkey and we are squeezing in a few other holidays, more happy birthdays including one in Paris and one in America, and making as many memories as possible. Last year taught our family the hardest lesson and I am determined to make the most of what we have. Being able to visit my brother in America because my Mum works for BA, have complete trust in my in laws to leave the boys with them so Rich and I can have some desperately needed time being just as husband and wife for a day or too, and spending as much time with our best friends as possible. June is packed with blog conferences, meeting new friends and catching up with old ones. People I talk to every day online but rarely get the pleasure of a proper hug. On those crazy weekends haring across the South West we still fit in lazy brunches, with a house full today we were still in pjs at 11am. The down time is there, it's just not always at home. It's in our homes from home, in Southbourne, in Poole, in the South East and beyond. 

But this week was all about you. Super Sammy.

I owe so much to this Me and Mine project and I know I am way behind visiting all the lovely blogs who join in. I promise to catch up. It's a pleasure to see everyone's families. Pop over to Jenny's blog to see what her beautiful family of four have been up to this month. 

May, I rather liked you. Pop back to see the party photos later this week! 

I guess it might be something to do with living in a project house, but ever since we moved I have taken to creating little arrangements around the house. I realised I did it in our last house but here it feels all the more important. That in amongst the chaos and crumbling paintwork there are  patches of niceness. 

I wish I knew how to properly arrange flowers. The posy making workshop I went on was a real eye opener and I have all these receptacles and vessels just waiting to be filled with a nice block of oasis. I love that arrangements mean so many things to different people. I join in a few hashtags religiously and love the inspiration I see from all the creative accounts. #gatheredstyle on a Tuesday hosted by @aquietstyle, #fridayfaffingcompetition on... you've guessed it Fridays with @katherinedorrington, @juliabesidethesea and @am_i_dreaming_now and on a Thursday #byarrangements with @sarahnotes, to name just a few.

This was my week of arrangements.

The #capturingcolour gallery grows each week and the way in which we all see colour differently just blows me away! Here were some favourites. Pop over to my Instagram feed for the account details. 

But my absolute favourite had to be this pin board. Captured by Amanda in her teenagers room. Doesn't this take you right back to your teens?!!! When you didn't realise what a skill it is to create a mood board like this?! Companies pay creative consultants thousands and yet the next generation of talent could take on the world! Amanda has a beautiful gallery, so fresh and soulful. Go check it out here. 

My sister kindly came to stay over the weekend and blitzed my new office. 5 bin bags later of half broken, half ripped paper and odd bits left over from parties, I have a proper space to work in. I'll be sharing some photos on the blog next week, after some finishing touches. All the old walls have been given a fresh coat of white and the pine woodwork is now sparkling and clean. No more yellow it's a white fest! But the old beams have been untouched and the fold down wooden table the previous owner used for all her paints is still there. And it's fast becoming my new favourite prop. 

So this week come and share your creative interpretations of "ON WOOD". Think wooden surfaces, garden tables, fences, wooden spoons anything that you can capture on a wooden surface. 

Just take a look at the gallery and all the beautiful images joining in already. 

I am busy this week gearing up for Sammy's camping party, managed to persuade the Scouts to loan us a tent for the garden and have 20 red spotty hanky party bags on sticks to make up tomorrow night, after a day shooting for a local smoothie company Flower Field Smoothies. How exciting!

#capturingcolour is a weekly theme on Instagram. Tag your ON WOOD photos this week. Favourites will be featured next Monday :)