1. receiving letters from jason’s brother, who’s currently serving in afghanistan. in his letter to jase he described an awful situation he’d had to deal with a few days ago, and just before it wrote ‘please don’t let rosie read this next bit. it’s not something she should have to hear.’ it touched my heart. jason’s mum raised her sons to be gentlemen.

2. cracking on with my christmas shopping! is there anything more happy-making than putting together little bundles of gifts for your family? i don’t think so!

3. the shifty look ted gets when he’s chewing on his favourite bone. he doesn’t want me to take it away, so tucks himself into a tiny corner to try and hide it!

4. feeling like an essay powerhouse yesterday afternoon! granted i only wrote 550 words, but i did it in one sitting! and that, for a member of the ‘write twenty words then spend an hour on twitter’ brigade, is an achievement…

5. watching ted’s ongoing love affair with his puppyfriend sadie at the park. i think he’ll be asking her out any day now…

6. maybe, hopefully, potentially getting a new car tomorrow! fingers crossed it’s still available, because it’s perfect! (and double fingers crossed my current car survives the journey up there to get it!)

7. seeing the pond freeze over for the first time this winter. i’d forgotten how pretty the ice looks :)

8. catching up on nat’s beautiful blog. it really is one of my absolute favourites.

9. rewarding yesterday’s essay success with a trip to our lovely local garden centre. only next time, remind me not to head out in the middle of rush hour. please?

10. being on time for all my university classes this week! if someone wanted to send me over a congratulatory medal or something, that’d be okay…