Greetings!

Hello, I am Debbie, or Deb, or Debra - I answer to all of them. I live with Philip, my husband of one month and my almost 20 year old son, Joseph. We have a tiny little house, not much more than two up and two down, on the edge of London, England.

I love my little house. It needs decorating, and it is cluttered up with too much stuff, but for many years Joe and I lived in a flat, and I longed for such exotic pleasures as being able to have a proper washing line to dry the laundry on outside and to grow sweet peas, my favourite flower. Joe longed for a house because I had promised him a dog if we moved, so we also share our house with Star, his black Labrador.

I can sign, and for a few years I worked with Deaf children, but in January 2010 I had to stop working due to illness and a few months later I was diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. CFS affects many aspects of my life, but I try not to let it limit me too much and I hope eventually to recover. It does mean I have had to slow down a lot, and I can't do as much as I would like to.

I was a single parent for seventeen years, since before Joe was born. Parenting alone was very hard at times and sometimes isolating, but also very rewarding. Just to make life even more challenging, I educated Joe at home from the age of eleven. It was daunting at first but turned out to be very enjoyable for both of us. Joe and I have always been very close. When I was 40, I found Philip and later that year, he came to share our home. I am so lucky that Philip and Joe get on together very well and Philip treats Joe as his own. On 23rd April this year we were married and Joe was my Man of Honour.

I am the oldest of two children, my brother is four years younger than me. He lives just a few minutes away, as do my parents. We are a close family and see quite a lot of each other. I also have extended family, aunt, cousins, grandparents, all within less than 45 minutes drive away. We have always lived in this area, though I have longed to get away for as long as I can remember. When I was young I used to want to live in the hustle and bustle of the City, and now I am older I would like to live closer to the countryside, but not necessarily in it! I know myself well enough to realise I need things to do, nice restaurants and decent public transport.

I do indeed still have my list of dreams handy, Jen! I remember when we were doing the Mondo Beyondo course and were asked to write our dreams down, I found it very difficult to do. It took me days to write. Having been a single parent and not having not had much money for many years, I always tried to make a point of not coveting what I thought I would never have. I wouldn't look at houses in estate agents' windows, or browse in furniture stores, I wouldn't even watch holiday programmes on the television. I just got on with life, cleaning, cooking, bringing up Joe, home educating him, I had not even thought about what I might like to do, and found it very hard when asked to 'dream' on paper. I didn't feel that I had any dreams. I certainly didn't really have any big ones.

I did come up with a small list of little dreams eventually, and was looking at it just the other day. Some of them are starting to happen. I know some of yours are, too! It's amazing how once an intention is set, things seemingly start to percolate away by themselves.

One of the things on my list was to start a blog, which I did some months ago now. That was a big enough leap for me, I didn't dream that we would be starting another one together now, and I am really looking forward to seeing where it takes us!