Mummascribbles – Mummascribbles meets…Sally Akins – Mummascribbles

This week we meet Sally from the Sally Akins blog. Thanks so much for taking part Sally

Tell me a little bit about yourself and your family
I live in Newport, Shropshire, which is about 15 miles away from Shrewsbury. I’ve lived in Shropshire for pretty much all of my life, and moved to Newport about 14 years ago. I live with my husband Mark, we’ve been together for nearly 16 years now and got married in 2001. We have two sons who live with us here in Newport, Ollie and Lyle. And I mustn’t forget our chihuahua, Charlie – he’s been a part of our family since August and he is just absolutely gorgeous!☺

What do you like doing to be you, when you are not parenting, working (if you do), or blogging?
It doesn’t feel like I have much time to myself at the moment! Lyle is home educated, so between parenting, all the work that goes with blogging, and looking after Charlie, most of my time is already taken up.. I’ve really got into reading this year, I set myself a challenge of reading 40 books and I’m nearly there. I’m also a big tennis fan, so I like to watch that when I get chance.

What is your biggest achievement to date?
I found this question really difficult to answer – I guess that it’s not a very British thing to blow our own trumpets, is it? I think actually my blog is my biggest achievement so far, because I’ve had to teach myself so many new skills and juggle so many different hats.

From your own experiences, what do you find the hardest part of parenting and what is the easiest/most rewarding part?
I found the early months very hard going. Ollie used to wake up every hour throughout the night until he was about 6 months, and there were some nights when I was so tired, I felt like crying. It gradually got easier as the boys got older. I remember the first time that they could get their own shoes on and get into the car without needing me to do up safety belts – it felt like a major milestone.

The teenage years have their own difficulties, but I’m finding parenting easier and more rewarding now.

Parenting in itself is no mean feat; how do you juggle everything you need to in order to get everything done on a daily basis?
Routines help a lot. I like to know that certain jobs will be done at certain times and on set days. For example, each of the boys has a set day that they have to strip and remake their bed, school uniform gets ironed on a Sunday, that sort of thing. The only problem with that is that when something throws me out of my routine, it takes me a while to get back into the swing of it again!

Why did you decide to start blogging?
I’ve been writing on the internet since 2002, when I used to run a  website about cloth nappies. I closed that website back in 2009, but I really missed the writing part. I started SallyAkins.com in 2012, but it was a bit stop/start for the next few years. I started again seriously at the start of 2015, and I’m really loving being a blogger now.

Tell me a bit about your blog?
I write at SallyAkins.com about food, beauty and over 40’s lifestyle. I include new recipes, book reviews, lots of beauty product reviews – anything that I think will interest people like me really. Each week I do a roundup of some of my favourite blog posts, and I also host giveaways on the blog. This year I’ve given away some gorgeous beauty products, I really enjoy hearing from the winners when they receive their prizes.

What do you want your blog to achieve and where do you hope to see it go as it grows?
I’m pretty happy with how the blog has been progressing so far this year, and I hope that it will continue to grow like this. I think I’m getting better as a blogger as well, so I hope that I continue to get better. I’ve been working with some really great brands in the last few months, so I’d like to see those relationships continue to develop and hopefully work with more brands in the future.

What advice would you give someone who is thinking about starting a blog?
Actually, I wrote a post on this recently called “5 things I wish I’d known”. But my main tip is to get started right now! It takes time to build a blog, find your voice, find your readers – so the sooner you get started, the better.

If you could have dinner with three people (dead or alive), who would it be and why?
The simple choice would be my Mom, my Dad, and my paternal Nan who all died some years ago. It’d be lovely to have the chance to spend a few hours with them all again.

The more cheerful choice would be Roger Federer, Ayrton Senna and Niki Lauda –  3 sportsmen who I really admire, and I would love to spend an evening talking sports with them.

Tell me three random facts about you

1. I proposed to Mark on 29th February 2000

2. We got married on our own in Mexico

3. I am scared of bridges (seriously!)

You can find Sally over at www.sallyakins.com and also on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest