If I could have 1 thing from the Harry Potter series...

It's the author J.K. Rowling's birthday and as she's famous for writing the Harry Potter series, this got me thinking about what I'd want if I could have one thing out of the Harry Potter books.  So if I could have one thing, I think I'd want to have a patronus. (It's a sort of shield that you create to ward off unhappiness and despair. They usually take an animal form and are a bit ghost-like.) In a way, I think  we all have a sort of "patronus" in ourselves in the form of hope and resilience. However, I also think that it would be really nice to have a sort of magical being to protect people from evil. If I were to get a patronus I think I'd want a phoenix because they survive from the ashes and keep going! I think the best thing about patronuses is that they never let you lose hope.

Be strong!

"Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength."- Arnold Schwarzenegger
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As it's the start of a new week, be strong and carry on! 

Before you learn to fly, learn to fall

When I was really young my parents taught me to ski and one of the things I found I was most interested in learning about is how to get up after falling down skiing as I was very good at falling down. (If you really want to know, to make getting up after falling down skiing easier, hold your arm that's facing down the hill out so it's facing diagonally down the slope and over your skiboots. This puts your weight over the middle of the skis, and means you won't have to push yourself up so much. Then take you uphill arm and put your hand on the snow as close to the uphill ski as possible and push yourself up.) In a way, this showed me that in order to get anywhere, you really needed to know what to do if things went wrong. More importantly, it showed me how important it was to know how to get up again when things went wrong. That's something I've carried with me in my life. I was reminded of all this when I heard a song by Paul Simon called "Learn How To Fall." I really like it because it speaks to how falling down helps us to fly later on. So my message for today is even if you fall, never let it stop you from getting back up again and doing what you want to do!

Something I'm very glad my parents did for me

"There are many little ways to enlarge your child's world. Love of books is the best of all. "-Jackie Kennedy
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I'm really glad my parents instilled in me a love of reading. It's made all the difference to my life. When I was younger I seemed to always be reading something, plus my mum and/or dad used to read to me before I went to bed which was really nice. It really did enlarge my world as it kept me wanting to find out more things about  people and places and just general facts. I hope everyone reads something each day especially to kids! It just makes life better!

I wish you strength, courage, and much love

"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage."-Lao Tzu
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/l/laotzu101043.html

In the spirit of the quote above, I send you lots of love now and always.

Trains!

Fun fact: the Surrey Iron Railway (the world's first public railway was opened today in 1803 in south London.  Although I take trains (e.g. subway) on a fairly regular basis, I also like trains because they are connected to my family. My granddad worked for British Rail for a long time. He was a pretty funny man in that once he was in a train when he saw some smoke and pulled the fire cord to stop the train and when he was interviewed afterwards all he had to say was: "I always wanted to pull that cord!" So I say, here's to my granddad and trains!

Travel in photos!

"Travel becomes a strategy for accumulating photographs."-Susan Sontag
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/s/susansonta100173.html

I'm really glad photographs were invented for trips. One of the favorite trips I've been on was to Hawaii because it is beautiful and there's a lot of history there which is fun. Plus, I was able to go with a very good friend and her family which made the trip even better and I'm glad I have pictures to prove I went. Even when I can't travel to other places, I also really like getting postcards because they give me some ideas about where I should go next. Pictures and postcards are the best!

Me in Hawaii