I am just like any other girl, a sucker for bromance.

We had a great afternoon yesterday with our good friend Chris. Chris writes a photo blog called Gingerjamphoto.com and can always been seen about with his camera attached to him, its like an extra limb. We love spending time with him because he is a genuinely nice guy and is very thoughtful. He always makes a lot of effort playing with the boys and they love it when he visits too. One of the other reasons i love catching up (as selfish as it sounds) is that because he always has his camera with him he always gets some great shots while were out and about. They are natural shots too, most of the time he is snapping away and you don't even realise, he's like some sort of photographic ninja. Its not that I'm a poser just that not having access to photo's of myself when i was younger anymore i crave great family pictures of us all and Chris knows how to capture that.

We headed down to Ironbridge, the plan was to have a walk about and take Opeie to the park and we thought that Chris could get some pictures of the Iron bridge itself. The weather was amazing and it was such a nice way to spend a bank holiday. Ironbridge is one of our favourite places and its perfect for those sunny days.

After pottering around the bridge we headed down to the park as Opeie was itching to get the ball out and Chris being the lovely bloke that he is had brought the boys some bubble camera's and old school planes for throwing. Laura used this as an excuse to get hold of Chris' camera which gave us chance to fully embrace what Mrs M calls our 'Bromance'. I love the guy what can i say.

Opeie was having a great time running round the park, throwing aeroplane's and blowing bubbles.

After an hour or so of park fun we headed back to ours for a spot of lunch made by that lovely lady of mine while us three boys ran around the garden, read books and played with the rabbits. Mrs M was booked in with her personal trainer after lunch so after dropping her off us three boys headed off for a walk up the Wrekin. Opeie resumed his favourite place on my shoulders and away we went.

While we were walking Chris spotted some Bluebells and asked if me and Opeie could go and sit in them while he took some photos. Me and Opeie being the posers that we are were happy to oblige. Who's going to turn down lovely father and son pictures? not me that's for sure. Opeie loves flowers so he was in his element, Although the cute sniffing and picking soon turned in to 'Hulk Smash", he's definitely my boy that's for sure, Oops.

We had such a great day with Chris. Not having a family outside of Mrs M and the boys means that i really appreciate the friends that go the extra mile to make the effort. The boys love him too which is great. We've been friends for quite some time but its only been the last year that we've all become close and i feel so lucky to have a great friend that's always there for a chat and loves spending time with us.  Our Bromance is sure to blossom!!

To see more of Chris' great pictures be sure to visit his blog gingerjamphoto.com, it's always nice for us to read about our days out from an outside perspective.

Here's Chris' take on the afternoon... http://gingerjamphoto.com/bankholidayfun/

"At the touch of love everyone becomes a poet."

Today we travelled into Birmingham to pick up some print work for Mrs M. We arranged to have lunch with Chris too which was great. We were excited about having a catch up with Chris (or my 'Bromance' as Mrs M calls him) and we were excited about having lunch at TGI'S as we hadn't eaten there since we were in Florida earlier in the year, but more importantly i was mainly excited because the German Christmas market was on and that meant one thing...

The German Market will always be really special to me and Mrs M, it was on when we first met each other and it played its part in our very romantic first date and many nights out after. There was something about the atmosphere and the cold weather that made our nights out so perfect. Whenever the Christmas market is on and were there i get butterflies, probably sounds silly to most people but meeting Mrs M completely changed my life and she really helped me out over a pretty dark time in my life. She has definitely made me a better person, i realise that every day but around Christmas and being at that market it just hits me more.

The christmas we met it was very very cold and the one night we had been at the market standing outside wrapped up drinking nice hot blueberry mulled wine when it started to snow. It was such a lovely night and i remember standing there thinking how lucky i felt to be standing there with Mrs M. Since then every year we have been and collected our German Market mugs and that was what i was so excited about today.

We almost missed our Christmas mugs last year because of Seth being Poorly and having to head straight home as soon as we got there but luckily we got a chance to go again before it closed. This year we got in early but were planning on going there next weekend to spend some time with friends and fully take in the festive atmosphere.

Until then we will be using our mugs but not for mulled wine unfortunately, Mrs M favours her Madagascar Vanilla red Rooibos tea and I'm more of a Twinings Earl Grey kinda guy myself.