This day a year ago, I sat down with a vague idea to start a blog. My first post, the gist, outlined 'where I was at' - recently preggers, going through the closure of my business (so therefore, unemployed!), worried about becoming fat, growing an extra pair of boobs (in case you don't believe that happens, it happened to my friend who had a baby a month after me. So there!), piles, etc, and wanting to be happy and healthy.

My mission, which I planned to document, was as follows...

a) to be healthy and happy in time for Reuben's Birth;

b) to make some money/get a job; and

c) to streamline my life – meaning everything from successful and painfree business closure to uncluttered cupboards and a Gok-style wardrobe.

Firstly, I now see that I clearly take my time every year to think through my resolutions. I needn't have panicked and thought I'd missed

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Well it's been 2 weeks since my last post. Even straight after having a baby I blogged more than this!

I guess the combination of Christmas with the anniversary of finding out I was pregnant has rendered me speechless! Often it's Mike who goes into his Christmas grump but comes out the other side quoting Delboy "...this time next year..."!

Now it's my turn. Even before I started over-indulging, I had started to contemplate my new existence and have been thinking over and over how I would articulate it in a post. I've never had a plan. When I finished Uni I was offered a job without looking for one, so I didn't need to think about that. Then I had a fun (read drunk) night with best pal Alex and our business was born and we did that for 3 years. Then I got pregnant and we shut the business down

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My knick-knack sorting I started yesterday is far from over but I'm taking a quick break to do an ode to Sailor Girl (my old business) and some of the things that will forever remind me of the lovely office we created and the fun we had. Here are some of the knick-knacks...

Clockwise from the teapot...

We loved our spotty teapot and matching mug set from Whittards and somehow I managed to talk Alex into letting me keep them! At one point one of the handles fell off a mug and for some reason Katie (@ktttt) stuck it back on with spray glue, then it got put away, then Alex ended up with the handle in her had and a mug of hot chocolate in her lap. Ah, happy memories (although not for Alex).

We went through a Marie Antoinette phase and we bought this lovely metal jug and fake carnations to

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January 2012

My name is Hannah Parker, I'm 28 and I live in Blyth, Northumberland (originally from the midlands, if you'd told me 10 years ago - or 3 come to think of it - that I'd be living in a small, fairly rundown seaside town in the North of England, I wouldn't believe you) with my husband, Mike, and step daughter, Gabriella, who is 5.

I have recently found out I'm pregnant and I have (about a week ago) decided with my friend and business partner, Alex, to close down our business. It is for exciting reasons but nevertheless I am also unemployed.

In true New Year fashion, my mission for the next few months is to sort my life out so that...

a) I am healthy and happy in time for Bday (mid-August);

b) I have made some money/got a job so we are not completely skint; and

c) I have streamlined my life

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