1 : 1

The ratio for good days to bad so far this year.

This morning I had Phoebe by myself as Leanne was working again, Phoebe had a sleep in as we stayed out past her bed time on New Years day, she woke at 9 and was immediately in a bad mood crying and lashing out, by 10 am she was back in bed to calm down.

Half an hour later she woke in a much better mood, although she still seemed quite quiet which was odd for Phoebe, a bit of playing and reading books later and she perked up somewhat, she also began to demonstrate to me her new favourite word, replacing pointing at everything and saying 'da' with 'no';

'do you want to go in your buggy?'

'nnnnnnnnnnnnnooo'

'do you want to eat some lunch?'

'nnnnnnnnnnoooo'

'do you want to read your book?'

'nnnnnnnnooo'

I can see this will be fun!

Once Leanne finished work I decided to pack my stuff up and head home with a break in the weather, not that I wanted to go up the road that is, the roads had a light dusting of snow, but nothing I couldn't handle, I made Edinburgh in little over an hour, however this is where my problems started.

I joined the A90 a few miles before the Forth Bridges and got stuck in solid traffic, parked up on the dual carriageway, half an hour later the traffic began to crawl along although the road which was covered in ice and it took me a further hour to get over the bridge, from there the roads were covered in snow to Kinross plus with the snow storms it felt like I was driving through space!

Eventually the roads cleared and I drove up to Dundee without any issues, although as soon as I reached Dundee the roads became slippery and snowy once more, this time it lasted all the way up to Aberdeen, at one point I managed to scare myself a little on some black ice as i passed Stonehaven.

I returned home safe in 5 1/2 hours, when the same journey in good conditions usually takes a little over 3, also being back home has highlighted how sad it makes me to come back, especially after an extended stay like I have had over Christmas.