Today, we took a trip into London. The boys stayed with their grandparents and, as a birthday excursion, my lovely husband took me to the South Bank for lunch and an exhibition. It felt terribly grown up and civilised to have an entire date day all to ourselves. He had planned a long, leisurely lunch overlooking the Thames in the Skylon restaurant; a visit to the Hayward Gallery for the remarkable Light Show exhibition and (because he knows me so very well) a quick visit to the nearby I Knit knitting shop on Lower Marsh.

It was an overcast and gloomy day and the skies matched the matte grey concrete of the South Bank. I was struck, however, by the frequent flashes of luminous, often fluorescent colour which broke up and enlivened the monochromatic landscape.

Days like these are few and far between for us, but that only makes them all the more precious. We returned to the boys refreshed, revived and somehow feeling like ourselves again.

Thank you, my love.