We’ve had another mammoth slog today, still working towards our dreams.

There is no doubt that this has been the hardest, most gruelling period of my life – I know we’re working towards something really positive but boy, there are moments when I wish I’d just been content to spend the rest of my days as a corporate whore.

I know DM is amazed at some of the things he’s realising I can do – even now, I’m surprising him as he watches me work. (He is working too but he stops every now and again to take in what I’m up to.) Today alone, he’s seen me do two things he’s confessed to having no idea how to do himself and watched me doing them with apparent ease.

The truth is, it’s not with ease, it’s with practice – both things I’ve done before a few times. Even so, they’re things that few women ever do….though one of the two tasks, my Mum gave me the best tip for how to be successful at it of any I’ve ever had and her tip works a treat.

Tomorrow, after I finish work (my day job that is), is the acid test of this part of the grand plan. We get to see whether anyone is buying what we are offering. We get to know if these months of slog and effort have been worth it.

In fairy tales, the girl meets the boy, they fall in love and live happily ever after. In real (well my real anyway) life, you get to kiss a few frogs who DON’T turn into princes, fall down a few holes, work as hard as you can – so hard that sometimes you think you’ll never get everything done and then maybe, just maybe, if you are really lucky you go into a period of good things.

That happened to me in Southall – I did three jobs (a full-time day job, working in a pub four nights a week and a job in a record shop on Saturdays) to afford that crumbling wreck of a flat that was my first home. I slogged and slogged to save to pay the deposit for it. When it was mine, I slogged again, this time as ‘builder’s mate’ to my wonderful Dad who worked tirelessly on it to help me to make it liveable. When it was done though, I realised it was THE BEST decision I ever made. I had a lovely place to live, it was all ‘earned’ through blood, sweat and tears and I made a lot of money when I moved on. It was the right thing to do and it set me up for much of my adult life. I keep thinking back to those days and remembering wondering how I would ever manage and how I would ever achieve that dream.

For many years, I put my dreams on the back-burner until they resurfaced a few years ago and I got fired up again. My determination to follow those dreams has been under the cosh for a long time now. Since this journey into the unknown started, David and I have faced into blow after blow. Now my tools are the tools of rebuilding, both the fabric of our world, making some headway towards our grand plan and mending the belief that our dreams can be achieved and can be our reality.

No fairy tales in my world, just hard, hard graft and belief in our ability to attain our goals. We’re building ourselves a future.

I cannot believe how different the life and the weather were last year - sunshine in every department.