urgh is it really 7:40am? Last night was full of alarms going off, crying children and one very hungry very chatty little girl.

Its been a long night as I am not the best sleeper anyway and being in here means I hear everything. I seem to be getting better at switching off and as the title of my blog suggests I am not unfamiliar with lack of sleep.

Elizabeth finally came round fully earlier this morning and there was no way I could tell her to go back to sleep at 3am when she was being her politest and cheekiest. She managed to eat and drink something which is really good. The night shift nurse who has looked after Elizabeth these last two nights finds her very funny when she says "no thank you" to having her medicines.

One of the best memories so far was when she properly woke up earlier yesterday evening at around 10 oclock she asked me for some strawberry milk but they don't do it on the ward. She told em I had to go and get some. I said that this would mean leaving the hospital and leaving her alone so she turned to the nurse who was with us at the time and with a batting of her eyelids and her cutest smile she said "You will look after me won't you"

I think she is going to be just fine.

Today has been a hard day but I am still sat here next to Elizabeth's bed with a small smile on my face. I can almost tangibly feel the positivity and love and support that is pouring in our direction from friends and loved ones as well as from complete strangers. Until you are in this situation where you are on the receiving end of this huge outpouring of love you can not even begin to feel the difference it really makes. We have seen our community do some amazing things recently from the outpouring of supporting and thoughts heading to Multiple Mummy or the physical effort to help I want my Mummy to make her council house livable. Through both of these I have watched and admired, I have passed on my support, I have offered to do what I can but until now I never knew that those words, those comments actually mean so much.

I said to one blogger today that I didn't like the messages saying that people are sorry for me or that they feel for me but I now realise the reason I didn't like them was because they made me feel. They made this real and they hit me hard in my heart and they made me cry. Complete strangers pouring their hearts out and giving me a shoulder to cry on.

Now is not the time for tears, I did that yesterday when I typed my first post, I am surprised there is no spelling mistakes as I could hardly see my keyboard through the tears. Today is a day of positivity, today we know that Elizabeth has  been diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL). We know that they are happy with her, we know how they are going to treat her, we know the drugs they will use and the side effects they may bring. We know that she should be in remission in four to five weeks, ok so the next few years will be hard but I know I can cope with anything because right here online I have you. I used to write as though no one was reading but I know differently, I know you are reading and I know you are feeling this journey with me.

So for now I am positive, positive that we will get through this and positive that somewhere in the future a mum will be sat at her computer googling this awful disease and she might read this and know that other people have been there and that there is more support out there than you can possibly imagine.

good night and think positive thoughts

x

I didnt know whether to write this yet but I need to write it, I need to get today out of my head and into words.

Two weeks ago today, Elizabeth seemed a bit tired, a bit hot and well a bit under the weather. We went to Lollibop, we went to Butlins, we went to Peppa Pig world each time we thought that she seemed a bit more whingy, a bit more tired and just generally not right. Last Friday I took her to a NHS walk in centre, they said she was coming out of a viral infection so I left. On Sunday I noticed bruises that were very dark purple, on Monday they had spread out and we blue and green but they were huge.

First thing Tuesday morning I got her into the doctors, once again they said she had a viral infection but when asking for a second opinion because of the bruises the second doctor recommended a blood test. I was given a number to phone and was told the next appointment was on the 2nd October! I was not having that, I phoned the local hospital for there blood department (I always have to go to the vampires who work there for my bloods to be done) but they didnt do paediatric blood tests, I phoned paediatric outpatients, I phoned paediatric a & e. No-one could help me so I went back to my doctors. I got an appointment for this morning for the healthcare assistant to take the blood test but then received a call from the receptionist to say because she is under 6 she wasnt able to do it. I then received a call from the doctor who had been talking to a specialist at the Royal Manchester Childrens hospital and they wanted to get her into pediatric a & e to take the blood and wait for the results.

That was this morning, this evening we are sat in the Oncology and Hematology ward. Elizabeth had Acute Leukemia.

Yep I was shocked too. A routine blood test that I pushed for is actually Leukemia. I am lucky that she is actually well in herself with only the tiredness and bruises showing up this awful disease for now she doesnt know that she is really ill which is a blessing. Elizabeth has had a hard day today being prodded and poked but tomorrow will be harder. Tomorrow she will have Bone Marrow taken as well as a lumbar puncture and the first dose of Chemotherapy. Tomorrow I will find out what type of Leukemia she has. Tomorrow I will wake up next to my daughter in hospital. Tomorrow I wake up as a parent of a seriously sick child.

Im not sure what the next few day or weeks will bring but I know that you my readers and my community are there for me and for that I thank you. I know I can tell you everything and you will be there for me. I know you will read and you will think of us and pray for us. I know this because you are a fantastic bunch of people who show so much love and so much care for people you have never met and in you I find the strength to sit her crying the tears I have held back because right now whilst my daughter is sleeping there is people messaging me support and I find that to be like there is someone standing behind me at all times with a supportive hand resting on my shoulder. I am going to try to sleep now, good night.

Ok so I am on TV a lot. I feel like I signed my life away when I agreed to go on the show Four Weddings. I didn't realise that nearly 3 years later we would still be being repeated again and again.

I had a few people on twitter interested in the fact I was on TV so i thought I might as well share it all with you.

Back on October 30th 2009 I married hubby in a fun and weird way. We had a halloween wedding and all of our guests dressed up and we ate weird named food and generally had a good party. I really enjoyed watching my wedding again today and it brought back such great memories. The rest of the show however was not so good. I will never go on TV again as you never know what they are going to do in the editing studio and taking things out of context can really make things seem a lot worse than they actually are.

Anyway for those of you that want to see our wedding here it is

When I was challenged to recreate 5 recipes using the Morrisons Savers range I thought I should give it a go, especially seen as I have been interested in the range for a while. I bought all of the ingredients for these recipes and apart from the Apricots and Chilli powder which were both out of stock the ingredients came to £15.74

Cornflake Clusters with Dried Apricots

A really simple recipe that needed just a little extra milk. I had to replace the Savers apricots because there was no savers ones in stock. Those small bags cost 35p each so still really cheap. I did use all the chocolate too as it just didn't seem like enough.

Cheat's lemon drizzle loaf

This was gorgeous and so sticky it was brilliant. It was also really easy to make so Elizabeth made this for me. All I had to do was zest and juice the lemon.

Cowboy Barbecue beans mixed with bacon and hot dog pieces

I threw in all 8 hotdog sausages rather than just 4 and if I was making this just for the kids again I wouldn't bother with the bacon which will make it cheaper. The kids scoffed all of this.

Minted Greek Cheese, Pea and Potato Salad

This recipe also needed some olive oil added to it from the store cupboard. It was really tasty and the mint sauce went really well with the lemon and the salad cheese. Eaten alongside the Lemon and honey chicken it really complimented it.

We were sent a £10 voucher for Morrisons to help towards the cost of buying these ingredients. The recipes can be seen below.

One of the other treats we have done over the past week for Alison's birthday was to step into the giant dome and be magically transported to the Night Garden. After watching last years show we knew we had to go back again.

We were not disappointed as soon as the large domes could be seen the girls got very excited and couldn't wait for the show to begin. We had tickets to see the Ninky Nonk show which was brilliant I almost wish we could have had two sets of tickets so we could go to see the Pinky Ponk show too.

The girls absolutely loved the show but unfortunately my cameras battery was dead which I didn't realise before we went so I cant show you the look of delight on their faces. I can tell you that they didn't argue or moan for the whole 45 minutes that the show was on which I think is a bit of a miracle at the moment as the summer holidays seem to be taking their toll on them.

We loved the way they manage to use puppets alongside full sized characters and blend in the puppeteers so that they end up being part of the show in a non obtrusive way. The girls really enjoyed pointing out their all of the characters and their favourite character had to have been Makka Pakka who they say is very cute.

They are nearly at the end of the tour but you can still see it at Manchester and Birmingham. Full details can be found on the In The Night Garden Live website. We received a family ticket for the purpose of this review but all thoughts and words are my own.

Yesterday I went to Paultons park to visit Peppa Pig world for a girly day out to celebrate Alison's 3rd Birthday. With my two girls and four of my nieces we headed off for a rainy day of fun.

Taking some advice from other bloggers I know we went around Paulton spark first and didnt have to queue for any of the rides, we took a lovely picnic with us for lunch and then made our way to Peppa Pig world.

We managed to get onto every single ride within the space of three and a half hours and although the rain tried at times to ruin our day it didn't succeed. I was very impressed with the rides height restrictions, the smallest of my nieces are just over 90cm and this meant they were able to go on all teh rides in Peppa Pig world and loads of rides in Paultons park. We also did Adult share as there was 4 adults to 6 children so sometimes some had to wait for more adults to come off to go on again, the staff were great and very helpful when we needed to do this.

The average queue time in Peppa Pig World was about 30 mins even on a rainy day where as in the rest of Paultons park we hardly queued at all and even if we did it was for just one turn of the ride. It is a brilliant day out though and all the added extras like Peppa Pigs house, Madame Gazelles School house and the statues dotted around the park mean that even when waiting in line the children had something to look at. We will definitely be heading back to Peppa Pig world and back to Paultons Park but hopefully next time it will be a nicer day.

We were given 2 free entry tickets to Peppa Pig world but we paid for all the rest.

My previous post focused on the Wave hotel but there is more to Butlins than just your accommodation. This post is just going to be a gallery to show you some of our favourite moments from this holiday.

You may have noticed I have been away for the last week, then again maybe you didn't but we just spent the week doing some amazing things. We went to Lollibop, we stayed at Butlins and we went to Paultons park to visit Peppa Pig world. All this because one little girl was turning 3.

I have already written about going to Lollibop and this time it is Butlins turn. The entertainment was as amazing as ever but the highlight to this week was staying in the Wave hotel.

Below is a quick video review but first I wanted to tell you about a few things that didn't make it into the review. First is the staff, our old friend Chris from the Coast restaurant is now a Duty Manager at the Wave and nothing was too much trouble but then nothing was too much trouble for any of the reception staff. In fact one of them had that written underneath their name on their badge.

To give you an example of how helpful they are we went to Butlins without wrapping Alison's presents. I also forgot to take sticky tape or scissors. I popped down to reception to borrow some and they didnt have any sticky tape there rather than give up the lovely lady phoned all the other hotels and then guest services who had some. She even offered to get someone to bring it over but I decided to walk across instead.

The second thing that didn't make it into the video review is the Urinal Games, now I really wanted to go in there with a water gun and have a go but there just wasn't the opportunity for me to do that. I did however have a sneak in to have a look at it after hearing from the hubby how cool it is. Chris even said it meant that the toilets were a lot cleaner as the men tended to aim a bit better.

So here is my very first video review

Taking your 13 year old brother to an under 10s festival could have been a very bad idea apart from two things Dick and Dom being idiots on stage and the Skylanders Arena Tour.

As some of you will know Skylanders gave me a family ticket to give away and they also gave us some tickets too so we had a huge family day out to Lollibop. My younger brother, Elizabeth and I spent quite a while playing Spyros Adventure on the Xbox 360. The girls loved playing with the little figures and climbing all over the large Skylanders that were in the arena.

We cant wait to get the game to play at home as well as looking forward to Skylanders Giants. We have stored away our Dark Spyro that we picked up at the arena tour ready for when we get the game.


Thanks for the tickets Skylanders and thanks for corrupting my daughters into the Spyro games (I loved Spyro as a k