KATIE'S BLOG: Sunshine, friends, coffees & dog walks

After all, he had been marooned in the loft for over an hour and counting, desperately trying to figure out why we had no wifi and I’d given him strict instructions not to come down until he had sorted it.  Can you imagine the scenes – NO WIFI (heaven forbid!)

So while he was getting increasingly annoyed up there, Bobbie boo boos (boozies for short) and I swiftly left the house to meet up with 3 of my girl friends as well as Tily, Flossy, Bamba and Archie (yup you guessed it our little pooches) for a walk and a catchup.

The last day of glorious sunshine smiled down on us, as we grabbed our takeaway coffees and merrily trotted through the green and pleasant land that was the local park, chatting away about…. well our work, kids, husbands, life the universe and everything!.

Ok so to any passer by, I’m embarrassed to say, we probably looked like a typical group of very suburban, middle class, middle aged women with our matching white/beige cross breeds; cavachon, cavapoo, wichon, shitzpoo (or pooshit?) and poochon, but I didn’t care.  If I could bottle that hour and prescribe it to myself once a day for the rest of my life, I would be a very happy and healthy lady.

Whenever you hear a Doctor talk about the importance of good mental health – usually involving walking in nature, you sometimes wonder if they are just quoting a load of obvious phrases to pay you lip service.

Well it seems I may have made a hasty assumption, because that hour this morning, not only cleared my head and put a smile on my face, but also reminded me that it's the simple things in life that make us happy.

There really is nothing quite like walking in the sunshine with your girlfriends and dogs with a coffee in one hand, laughing, crying and basically putting the world to rights.

And weirdly enough, as I swiftly returned home to the chaos of builders and kids moaning about the lack of food and wifi in the house and faced with a pile of washing and ironing, somehow I didn’t mind seeing to it all nearly as much.

So next time you are feeling a bit frazzled, no matter what the weather, grab a dog, grab a friend, grab a coffee and get out there and walk and talk, then come home and see if life feels just that little bit brighter!

But whatever you do, just remember to make sure you let your husband out the loft – did I mention I’d accidentally knocked over the ladder on my way out this morning?! OOPS.