Sophie Latifa

There are some things that don’t seem to lose their magic, no matter what age we are. A few weeks ago I saw a swan gently floating down the river with five or six cygnets trailing behind her, and I just stopped to admire her. There’s something truly magical about watching swans and their cygnets that doesn’t seem to lose its wonder. It’s hard to pass them by without a second look. When you see these babies with their mother, nature demands you stop what you’re doing and take a moment to...

While on maternity leave last year, I created for myself a daily sanity walk . Many will be familiar with the daily sanity walk of a new parent. Mine was a 5 mile loop down a thicket path with a dense area of bushes and trees one one side, and a river to the other, heavily populated with swans and cormorants. With my son snuggled up in his bassinet, this was the one outing I managed to complete each morning before returning to my living room to continue the precious, yet monotonous routine of...

Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh , how many times have we heard about these gifts? Are they just words we hear again and again during Christmas sermons or nativity plays, or do they re-define how we think about giving meaningful gifts? You might be like me, and find it hard to start really getting my head into the Christmas season until at least December 1st, and even then I’m probably more of a last minute gift-er than someone who really plans ahead (much to my detriment). But this year my...