The school holidays have a way of slowing life down, don't they? This week I've taken a day away from work, not to do anything extraordinary, but simply to spend time with my grandsons. We headed out for ice cream, a trip to the park, lunch together and a wander around the garden centre to choose budgie accessories. Next week, one very excited little boy will be welcoming his very first budgie.

As we sat together over lunch, I happened to glance down. His young hand was resting so naturally on mine.

I took a photograph.

When I looked at it later, it struck me that the photograph wasn't really about coffee or lunch at all. It was about two hands. One small hand, full of adventures still waiting to happen. One hand that has lived through decades of joy, heartbreak, mistakes, lessons and love.

For a few quiet moments, those two hands were simply together. And I found myself thinking that perhaps this is what life is really about.

Not the big milestones we spend years chasing... But these ordinary moments that quietly become the memories we treasure most.

📚 Behind the Pages

A Little Corner in Green Hammerton

Today I called into Green Hammerton Café, where Liz and Katie work; they are the characters in my latest novel (their picture is on the cover). I called for my usual iced latte and, as always, ended up staying much longer than I'd planned.

Jim and I found ourselves chatting about the plot for my next novel. In fact, he was so enthusiastic that he insisted I should make him one of the characters. I have a feeling I'd better choose my words carefully from now on!

Then something happened that I never could have planned.

The lovely team told me that a lady who is travelling to Nova Scotia next week had been in (where the two characters set up a new life). She'd picked up one of my books, some bookmarks and my author cards and is planning to leave them there during her trip.

I stood there for a moment thinking about it.

The story I imagined while sitting here in Yorkshire is about to make its own journey across the Atlantic to the very place that inspired it.

Life has a funny way of writing little chapters of its own.