Managed to slip into Romsey Abbey yesterday, avoiding the £2 tax levied by the quilting club who were exhibiting there, and therefore not looking at any of the brightly coloured and beautiful quilts flung all over the stone walls, floor and any other receptacle. Was hunting for more White-Whites, but clearly their line didn't reach Romsey. Popped into a quilting fanatics shop (was with Anna, who while not a quilter, is keen on fabric) and it was heaving with quilters, all of whom have reached a certain age and girth. It was a small shop, and not really thought through in terms of the size of customers squeezing between each other and the swathes of fabric with pictures of lemurs.

I have successfully negotiated a writing contract for a top salary with a national magazine, ok, I have joined the reader panel of a small local magazine. But I am looking forward to writing for a known audience, and the discipline that will bring to my thoughts. Writing a blog is challenging, I feel, because for all I know, Nelson Mandela, Margaret Thatcher and Martin Luther King are amongst my readership. Maybe not MLK then if you're fussy about the afterlife. I am careful not to say too much that would destroy, for example, our 'special' relationship' with our cousins across the pond. From my days writing letters for Amnesty, I learnt how quick the US are to go to court, and am very careful not to get myself put in gaol. In Kate Adie's book, she uses the English spelling, gaol, which I like and will emulate here. I see myself and Kate as similar in our careers as journalists. Neither of us set out to be journalists, you see, but had it forced upon us.

My other reading matter is called 'B******s to Alton Towers' and is a tour of stupidly quaint English tourist attractions. Number 1 on the list was Blackgang Chine, which regular readers will know is one of my personal top list of places to avoid before you die. Or die while there, falling off a cliff.

I spent from 10pm til 8am mopping up sick or wiping or bathing A or attending to her being sick. For a 4 year old, she is damned good at running for the loo, and staying put til its all done, but bless her, we were up a lot in the night and by morning there was nothing left inside to come out, either end. She tried. So, a stack of laundry today, but a three hour sleep this afternoon for her, worn out little darling, after she held down some water and some milk. I slept in her room with her: so not much sleep, but I am very proud of how brave she was, and very amazed at all those mums around the world, who, today, will watch that scene played out in their own babies' but without ceasing, until they just fade away and die. There is nothing like that helplessness of being a parent but not being able to do much except hold them, to engender solidarity with those mums like me who don't live inside the NHS safety net, with clean water and good food. And to spur us on not only to prayer but to action.