I was sat in my armchair on Monday evening, with the thigh warmer resting on my knees and my emails open before me. Casually I scrolled through blog posts, spam, a few personal emails and more spam before stopping at a post alert from WordPress, titled “Weekly Writing Challenge: A Few of My Favourite Things.” Now usually I don’t join in on these challenges. I’m not sure why, call it a lack of faith in my writing if you like. I never feel like my writing is ever up to scratch and definitely not under scrutiny. I kept the email though and decided to think about it for a while.

Every day I’ve gone back to the email, read it, thought a bit about what I could write and then closed it again and moved on to something else. Today was no different, except that the twins are asleep napping, their older brother is happy playing and I have a moment to myself.

So what is my favourite thing?

I’ve had a good long think about this all week. I’ve looked at the various objects around my home, the books that I love and cherish, the elephant ornaments that I have strewn around different rooms and the clothes hidden away in wardrobes but nothing really leapt out at me screaming, “You love ME, write about ME!”. You see I’m not really a great collector of ‘things’. I tend to only buy what we all need, besides the copious amount of toys that gets accumulated with three children. I hate ornaments with a passion because not only do they attract dust like some kind of magneto effect, but they also just sit there. Looking messy. Looking very attractive to little people. Looking too attractive to the hands of little people. Then getting broken by said hands.

It wasn’t until I sat down about ten minutes ago that I realised what it was that I struggle living with out and that thing is my laptop.

This little machine that sits warming my lap is my favourite thing. My little friend has been with me for a very long time. Dedication, careful maintenance and some TLC has ensured that my laptop has continued running, even when it has had coffee poured over it, sticky fingers bashing at its keys and building blocks thrown at it.

When I’ve been at some of my lowest points, opening it has helped me to find a way to overcome my difficulties. I met The Beef, whilst gaming on it – without whom I wouldn’t have my beautiful children. I keep a roof over our heads, by paying the bills on it. I’ve made some wonderful friends and have bought some  interesting things on it. When my fear of going outside has been too much, it has brought the world inside to me. I have broadened my horizons and enriched my life with it. When the stress of my three children has got to me, I’ve even hidden in the toilet and played solitaire for five minutes on it. I hook it up to the T.V., curl up on the sofa with The Beef and watch movies on it. When it stops working, I cuss, swear and shout at it. I even discovered the blogosphere on it.

I could go on but you get my drift.

This little thigh warmer, that’s sat making my lap rather hot now, is what has given me you and you me. Without it, you wouldn’t be sat there, reading this and the fact that you are reading words that I have written is probably the most wonderful thing of all.