Katie & Jane: Our First Year in Business!

The 1st January 2014 is a significant date for Katie & Jane; our first birthday!

On reaching this milestone and nearing the end of our first year we wanted to reflect on the past 12 months, our best & worst bits, the moments that mattered and the important things we've learnt.

In November 2012 Jane & I were reading everything we could get our hands on to fill our brains with positivity & confidence. One of our favourite inspirations was Sir Richard Branson (of course!) and little did we know when reading Screw Business As Usual by the man himself that just under 10 months later we would be featured by the team at Virgin Unite as entrepreneurs and be working with Virgin Trains. What a great first year journey!

When we started with our social media mission 12 months ago, we knew we would be competing in a saturated market so we had to do things differently. We went with our intuition that in the near-future, the percentage of social media management taken in-house rather than outsourced to agencies would increase and felt there was a place for researched, bespoke and tailored social media training (without the jargon!) for in-house teams so they could make informed decisions about social media. We were sure that training delivered by the two of us who had not only created & delivered social media strategies but also managed & ran the social media activity on the ground could be very valuable for a company. Only time would tell if our intuition was right!

Without losing our passion for this concept, we pushed on through the naysayers and people we met who told us we should be running Facebook & Twitter accounts for other people’s companies and are now proud to have worked with a variety of companies this year, from exciting start-ups, national brands and the likes of Virgin Trains and Inner Me  who understand the value of placing social media knowledge within their own teams rather than outsourcing. So... our intuition was right!

In other areas of the business, we are very proud to have self-funded Katie & Jane and it feels great that we have worked together to reinvest in our business for long term growth, not just on the social media side but with app development too. One of the greatest reliefs of the year has to be that Jane & I really are a great team, we thought we were, but this year has absolutely proven it. We both are in tune to the same goals, so we both work with a steely determination to get there – and we have a huge amount of fun on the way too!

Although we both want tomorrow, today, we are learning how to balance moving forward at pace, while making sure we reflect on our learnings and keep our focus too. We keep positive, bounce back from setbacks and always stay true to ourselves. So many people seem to equate business success with financial gain, but honestly the freedom of creativity, building your own dream instead of someone else's and creating something that someone else is prepared to invest in are the monumental achievements that keep us striving forward.

We have learnt so much about the app world this year, from our tracking and monitoring of current trends, to mastering the search for a great developer that ‘gets’ your project and goals. There have been setbacks along the way on our journey so far, but we haven’t given up and our first app will hit the App Store in early 2014. Seeing it for the first time was our most memorable highlight of the year. A huge amount of work has gone into creating our first app (of many!) and it’s currently in beta testing and looking very good! Being a team of two Virgos, with Jane’s unbelievable eye for detail and our high standards it's taken a while for us to be completely happy with it and we want to make sure we bring out a product we are proud of, so stay tuned!

Last but definitely not least, we both love our blog. It was a surprise to both of us how much we’d get out of writing about our work, life and play. We love to hear people tell us what they've gained from reading our blog and it can get slightly addictive looking at our reader numbers! We're really looking forward to writing many more posts in 2014.

We're also really excited to be kicking January off to a great start at Birmingham’s Innovation Centre as part of their e4f (Entrepreneurs for the future) initiative, so here’s to 2014 and year number two!

Happy New Year,

Katie x

p.s All of our images in this post are taken from our Instagram channel!

Entrepreneurs for the Future: Katie & Jane invited to e4f!

We’ll be kicking January off to a great start having recently been invited to work from e4f – Birmingham’s Entrepreneurs for the Future initiative, based at Birmingham Science Park’s Innovation Campus.

Joining the likes of DigiVoodoo, Yogi, My Campus Ride and e4f graduates, Sync Interactive, we will be making the most of the co-working initiative, networking with other entrepreneurs in the tech space and meeting some very inspirational people during the first two months of 2014, we can’t wait!

e4f helps start-ups that use technology in innovative ways to launch, develop and grow their businesses by nurturing them in a dynamic community space, to find out more visit: www.e4f.co.uk

Katie x

Merry in Malvern: Stoking the Fire, Herding the Sheep and Sleeping Among Shepherds Huts!

Each year my closest group of friends and I make sure we get together a couple of weeks at Christmas before our lives get too busy. This year we decided to head to my friend Rowena’s home town of Great Malvern for a cosy Christmas getaway, and we weren’t disappointed!

We arrived late on Friday night, with just enough time for a catch up by the open fire at Rowena’s childhood home and have a little look outside at the gorgeous Shepherds Huts that have been lovingly restored by Rollin, Rowena’s Dad. Rollin has dedicated so much time and commitment to renovating them and it hasn’t gone unnoticed... only last week he was featured on George Clarke’s Amazing Spaces and you can catch it on 4oD here.

On Saturday we were woken up early by the sound of Rowena shouting outside, it was hard to tear myself away from the beautiful morning view as I opened the curtains, but (after taking an obligatory picture) we rushed downstairs to find that a herd of sheep had broken through the back fence and were having a great time running around the garden!

After gently herding the sheep back into their field and a good full English breakfast with Rowena’s old school friend, we put on our winter woollies and headed out for a trek up the Malvern Hills. We parked at the foot of the hills next to a lovely new cafe called Cafe H2O at the Malvern Hills GeoCentre where we indulged in a cup of tea and a delicious teacake and studied the interactive maps available of all the potential routes. We decided to take on the highest point of the hills, and walk the Worcestershire Beacon.

This isn’t the first time we’ve walked the hills, we also did this back when were at University, which as we walked at pace, brought back some wonderful memories. Emma told us about her Three Peaks challenge for charity, and we all decided that in 2014 we need to embark on a challenge as a group. So, there is nothing like making something happen than to write it down for the world to see – in 2014 we aim to climb Mount Kilimanjaro!

We finally reached the highest point after a few stops to take pictures of the breath-taking view which looks out over Worcestershire and Herefordshire before we made our way back down again. All that walking and talking left us a little frazzled but nothing a little Christmas Market couldn’t sort out! We made our way into Malvern Town Centre where we browsed the many independent stalls and paid a visit to the Great Malvern Priory to find carol singers and Christmas storytellers!

Great Malvern is a gorgeous getaway from city life and I’d thoroughly recommend it to anyone looking for a countryside retreat. If you get chance while you are there, pay a visit to the gorgeous Grange Farm Nursery, an award-winning garden centre located in Guarlford where you can buy a whole host of trees, shrubs and beautiful plants. As I drove down the long & windy roads of Hanley Swan on my way back home, I left Malvern feeling totally relaxed and ready for a Christmas full of friends, family and fun!

Have a lovely Christmas,

Katie x

Virgin Unite Loves our Pinning Skills!

This month, Virgin Unite featured Katie & Jane on their inspirational website after they chose our Pinterest board 'Feel Inspired' as one of their favourite entrepreneurial boards.

We were reading 'Screw it, Let’s Do It and Screw Business As Usual' by Richard Branson about this time last year, as we were at the crucial tipping point of taking the leap out of the 9 to 5 and into the rollercoaster world of working for ourselves.  Little did we know when reading it back then that only 12 months later Katie & Jane would be selected as one of Virgin Unite’s featured entrepreneurs.

We've really enjoyed populating our 'Entrepreneur Interviews' blog section after speaking to Nataly Kogan from Happier, Inc. Nikki Cooper, creator of Inner Me and Becca Reeves from Hattie's Wines over the past few months so this is a real highlight to celebrate the end of our first year of business.

Follow the link here to read about our journey, find out a little more about the great work done by Virgin Unite and of course see our winning Pinterest board!

You can watch Richard Branson talk to Pinterest Co-Founder and CEO Ben Silbermann via Google Hangout here where they share an insight into their own entrepreneurial journeys.

Jane x

A Walking Weekend in the Cotswolds

Every Winter we pack the car (and the dog!) and head to the Cotswolds to stay in a gorgeous little traditional cottage. Our favourite place is the small town of Winchcombe in Gloucestershire so, if it's available, we book Windsor Cottage from Owner's Direct and drive there for a few nights stopping to stock up the kitchen at Daylesford Organic near Kingham along the way! I especially love Daylesford at Christmas.

Winchcombe is a picture-perfect Cotswold town with sandy Cotswold stone buildings, beautiful countryside and cobbled streets. The weekend consists of relaxing in front of the cottage's real log fire (a luxury I unfortunately don't have at home), pottering around Winchcombe's independent shops and enjoying delicious local food, but the main reason is to spend time walking along the picturesque Cotswold Way with the dog!

Winchcombe is perfect for exploring as it sits on six long-distance footpaths, including the famous Cotswold Way; a 102-mile trail up and down hills with beautiful views for miles and miles around. The town is a member of the Walkers are Welcome network of towns and even holds a walking festival every May. Winchcombe's 'Welcomes Walkers' website is a fantastic place to get further information and download self-guided walks. We used three of the walks ranging from 4 to 10 miles and despite a few turnarounds (we're great at getting lost on foot or in the car!), found them very useful.

Another reason we love Winchcombe is that although it's got a 'small-town' feel it's got everything you could wish for from independent shops to small supermarkets and a number of lovely pubs and restaurants. It is also close to Sudeley Castle and the remains of Hailes Abbey so there's lots of history to take in. Whilst on one of our walks we stumbled upon artist Damien Hurst's restoration project, the 300-room Toddington Manor where he plans on displaying his artwork.

After all that walking, the perfect place to retreat to was the Wine and Sausage at the White Hart Inn in the centre of Winchcombe. We had a well-deserved drink in the window of this lovely, traditional pub every day and enjoyed a meal of sausage and mash one evening. They only use ingredients sourced seasonally and regionally to the Cotswolds (and it's not just sausages!) and also have a 'wine shop' within the bar for reasonably priced, carefully selected takeout wines.

Despite quite a bit of whinging from my other-half about the number of miles we walked, we all had another lovely stay, enjoying the fresh air whilst recharging our batteries in probably my favourite place in the UK. I'm already looking forward to next year!

Jane x

Highlights

• Winchcombe itself is really a highlight - we've stayed in many other places in the Cotswolds and Winchcombe has to be the best
• Lovely walks and scenery - with the range of walks available there's something for everyone from a quick jaunt to a six hour trip!
• Lighting a real fire - I love the smell of real fires and the cottage provides all the wood (and firelighters!) needed

Must-Dos

• Explore the Cotswold Way taking in the views over the Welsh and Malvern Hills and local towns
• White Hart Inn - a must-visit when in Winchcombe

Win a Social Media Advice Session with Katie & Jane!

Last month we launched our Facebook eCourse for business, and we’ve had a great response. To motivate those who take our course to complete all the lessons and upload a final project, students will be in with the chance of winning a free social media advice session with us!

Our eCourse on ‘Creating an Effective Facebook Strategy’ is packed with 12 video lessons (short ones, with no jargon!) where we bring our real-life social media experience and knowledge to you. There are also downloadable toolkits, class notes so you can go over what you’ve learnt and a wealth of helpful bits & bobs to ensure you are on the right path with Facebook for your business.

The social media advice session can be on anything related to social media, whether for your business or even for you! Simply enrol onto the course today for £14/$23 here.

If you have any questions about the eCourse tweet us at @janiexx & @KatieAMcD or email us at smile@katieandjane.com

Have fun!

Katie x

Simple Social Media Advertising Tips

We often get asked during our social media training sessions about advertising, particularly on Facebook and Twitter. It's clearly something people are confused about so we wanted to share with you some frequent questions and a few key tips on getting the most from advertising on social.

Why pay for adverts through social media?

From our experience, the brands we've worked with have really benefited from social media advertising, not only achieving objectives (like more Facebook likes or engagement) but have been able to use feedback from adverts in real-time to direct social activity and help plan future initiatives.

We particularly find social media advertising effective as you can reach a mass audience of targeted people very simply and quickly. You can see exactly who is engaging with each advert and what posts are more responsive than others, almost instantly making it more effective for managing budgets too. Also, the great thing is you control the adverts (and budget!) and your audience growth and objectives are based on real data.

It's no surprise that by 2017, social media advertising revenue is set to grow to 11 billion dollars becoming a massive part of advertising buying efforts! 

What's the difference between advertising on Facebook and Twitter?

The obvious difference is you'll probably be targeting different people and you will have different advertising objectives for each platform although the creation of the adverts itself is pretty similar.

Set your objectives...

On Facebook there are a number of types of adverts you can run to meet different objectives. You can optimize adverts for website conversions, page likes, website clicks, post engagement, app installs, app engagement, offer claims and for event replies.

On Twitter it's more simple - you can advertise a specific key message through Promoted Tweets or gain more followers through Promoted Accounts.

Selecting where the advert will appear...

With Facebook adverts can appear in News Feeds or on the right-hand side of the page. Facebook will give you the best option according to the objectives set.

The creative element should be taken into account here as this is where you can upload images (on Facebook) and create different forms of copy (see tips below).

Targeting...

Targeting people by demographics such as location, gender, interests, language or workplace, etc is easy on Facebook so go in with a set target audience in mind.

Over on Twitter there are two types of targeting; keyword and interests & followers. Keyword means you can target those who tweet about, search or engage with a particular term. Interests and followers allows you to target by broad interest categories (like beauty for example) or target those who follow accounts that tweet about categories.

Budgets...

Finally on Facebook you can pick a daily or lifetime budget and decide how you want to pay for actions. For example, you can pay for likes or for impressions. This all depends on your objectives but don't worry, Facebook will help with selection.

On Twitter again, you can set lifetime or daily maximum budgets. If you go down the Promoted Tweet route you set an amount you are willing to pay for every reply, retweet, favourite, click or follow. For Promoted Account adverts you pay per follower.

Do I need to pay someone to create adverts for me?

In a word, no! If you have large budgets to play with and are unsure about creating your adverts of course we'd say to talk to an expert but by no means do you have to. Facebook and Twitter have made it very simple to create your own advertisements and even give you lots of tips and feedback. The process is very straightforward and once you've done one test (maybe with a very small budget) you'll have lots of fun creating and managing your own adverts.

A note here... we've seen some brands allow 'experts' to manage their adverts on social media (there's really no need!) and get exploited in some way, whether it's taking a big percent of the budget for 'fees' (not if you create ads yourself!) or by not understanding the target market or objectives and getting hundreds of likes from Portugal when the company only trades in the UK! Remember, setting up the adverts in one way means every new like the page receives will be paid for so targeting is important, paying for likes in Portugal was very frustrating for the brand!

Key Tips...

• Set objectives before you create the adverts whether that's on Facebook or Twitter. Create a purpose for promoting your content maybe it's to increase Facebook likes, encourage more users to visit your website or to increase awareness - objectives are key and will help you when setting up the adverts
• If possible, create adverts around campaigns, even if it's a small-scale Facebook competition - this will give users even more reason to engage with your advert and give them something to invest their time in online
• Include Facebook advertising in your marketing budget but remember you don't need to spend thousands a month to see results. We've worked with brands before who have moved a very small percentage of their budget into Facebook advertising and gained a lot of traction
• Use a number of creatives... try to use around four different images in one advertising campaign (Facebook will rotate these automatically for you) and use a number of copy alternatives even if it's changing a few words around. This will help you to test what your audience responds to better

Hope that's helped in the seen-to-be confusing world of social media advertising but we promise... it's simple! If you have any questions just email us at smile@katieandjane.com

Visit Facebook Ads and Twitter Ads to find out more.

Jane x

The Best Things in Life... in December

We're nearly at the end of 2013 and our blog has been 'open' for six months now which has flown by! Over our 'Best Things in Life' posts every month we've talked about many of our favourite things from Pilates to The Sunday Times, Sophie Dahl to Alpro Soya Milk and here's December's...

Katie

Best Things in Life...

Bradgate Park & Swithland Wood Country Park in Leicestershire is my favourite haven to visit in the winter, and this weekend I’ll be visiting the Christmas Fair. I love walking around and seeing the deer and peacocks and exploring the ruins of Bradgate House during December, and it looks even more gorgeous in the snow too!

A weekend with friends in Great Malvern - December is a great time of the year for me because although my friends live all over the UK (mainly in London, but as far as Spain too) as we embark on the festive season lots of plans are made to make sure we spend as much time together as possible. We even extend it into January too as a helpful pick-me-up after the come down from Christmas. I have just returned from a weekend with my friends in Great Malvern where we walked the hills, stoked the open fires and even herded some sheep! Stay tuned for a blog post all about it soon.

Advent calendars - I’ve been very spoilt already this year with not one but two advent calendars! My Hotel Chocolat Advent Calendar is such a luxury to look forward to each day, it’s the first time I’ve tried it and each milk chocolate is delicious! Of course, my mum never fails to make sure we have an advent calendar even though we are adults now, this year I was given a Disney Princess one… I think I’ll have to increase my spinning classes this month!

My favourite Christmas ritual is...

On Christmas morning every year for as long as I can remember we have visited my Nan to share Christmas gifts and watch as one by one our aunties, uncles and cousins arrive to see her. My nan turned 90 last month and on her birthday, as two generations of sisters sat together watching Coronation Street and indulging in Birthday Cake, I asked her if she could give me one piece of advice from her 90 years of life experience and she looked me straight in the eye and said ‘be honest’. I’ll carry that with me for the rest of my life.  It was also a funny moment too as we’d all been lying to her for months about her surprise birthday party and with a glint in her eye I wasn’t sure if she was trying to catch me out!

My happiest 'Katie & Jane' moment of 2014 was...

Featuring on Virgin Unite - I remember reading Screw it, Let’s Do It and Screw Business As Usual by Richard Branson last year as we were at the crucial tipping point of taking a leap out of the ordinary and into the rollercoaster world of working for ourselves.  Little did I know when reading it back then that only 12 months later Katie & Jane would be selected as one of Virgin Unite’s featured entrepreneurs. You can see us on the Virgin Unite website here.  

Jane

Best Things in Life...

My morning runs with my friend Lucy who has sort of turned into my personal running coach! It's amazing how she motivates me to get up at 7.30am on cold mornings to run 3 miles (I'm not a morning person!) and it's great how we talk (or at least try to!) the whole way round to make it fun. If you want to start running I encourage you to find a Lucy!

Not on the High Street - There is no hiding I'm a big fan of Not on the High Street (read my earlier post here) - not only for its unique, personalised products but also its inspiring founders. This Christmas I have purchased nearly all of my presents online from my favourite shop and they're starting to arrive from each individual seller from all over the country... exciting!

Mary McCartney's cookbook 'Food' - Mary's cookbook is all about vegetarian home cooking using recipes from her late mother and some delicious editions of her own. Meat-eaters and veggies alike will love it, my current favourite recipe is Chocolate Brownies which I add macadamia nuts to. Mary is a photographer so the book is packed with gorgeous, inspirational images too.

My favourite Christmas ritual is...

Putting up the tree is probably my favourite time at Christmas... I love putting on my Christmas songs, drinking eggnog and roping everyone in to help. I cook a big meal from Nigella Christmas to say thanks and we all watch a Christmassy film (Elf!) amongst the new twinkling lights. Read my blog post here for my 'Seven Steps to Creating the Perfect Christmas Tree'.

My happiest 'Katie & Jane' moment of 2014 was...

Seeing our first app Countdown Keeper for the first time! After so many months of waiting for our app to be developed, having it on my phone to test was the best feeling ever. We have invested so much time and effort into Countdown Keeper from the design to the wireframes that it's so good to see our vision actually on our phones! Now, we can't wait to share it with the rest of the world!

For the Knackered Cows & Grumpy Bullocks Out There… A Cowshed Full of Christmas Gifts!

Born in a shed in 1999, Cowshed has quickly expanded from a spa set in the gorgeous surroundings of Babington House in Somerset to a suite of global store locations all over the world offering natural and honest bath, body and skincare products.

With British heritage still very much at the heart of all Cowshed products, every thing is created using the very best organic, wild crafted and fairly-traded plant extracts and essential oils. The team at Cowshed believe that there are few things in life better than an English country garden, and we wholeheartedly agree!

      

Each of the products carry playful names including Knackered Cow, Moody Cow, Grumpy Cow, Lazy Cow, Gorgeous Cow and many more cheeky ones, allowing customers to shop by mood. This enables the products to work on enhancing moods with formulations built on thoughtful scents, mood-lifting colours, botanical ingredients, indulgent textures and herbal remedies.

Cowshed offers a huge variety of indulgent treats for the body, but you can also browse their Living & Home section including handy travel products and colourful notebooks, or if you want to try an organic baby range, check out their cute Baby Cow products too. 

With Christmas gifts in mind as we are approaching the festive month of December, we thought we’d share our top picks, and better still each of the products we’ve picked are included in the Cowshed 20% discount for Christmas!

If you are tired of the traditional Christmas cracker, why not shake it up a bit this year and try the Cracking Cow, a cracker filled with two little Cowshed bath & shower treats, this could also work for a fun stocking filler too!

If you know someone who is on-the-go a lot for work, why not treat them with this gorgeous travel candle gift set, to set the mood in the hotel room after a long day! The scents include Knackered Cow for relaxation, Wild Cow for invigoration and soothing Lazy Cow.

Upgrade the Lynx aftershave gift set this year to the cheekily named Bullocks for Men Duo Set, ideal for a man in your life that could benefit from a little grooming. He needs to know the set includes a ‘Bracing Body Wash’ and a ‘Soothing Moisturiser’, you need to know it’s enriched with Essential Oils of pettigrain and grapefruit to revitalise with hemp seed to soothe and restore. 

To see the full range of Cowshed products, click on any of our images above or head to their website here. You can also find out all the happenings in the ‘shed’ over at the Cowshed blog too! 

We love that one of our favourite Birmingham eating spots, Fleet Street Kitchen stock the bathrooms with Cowshed products only; it really makes a difference and adds an extra special touch to the overall experience. To find out more about the new trendy restaurant in the heart of Birmingham you can visit their website here.

Katie x

Seven Simple Steps to Creating the Perfect Christmas Tree

It's National Tree Week and it’s nearly the magical month of December and there is only one tree on our minds... the Christmas tree! We thought what better time to write a post about my favourite Christmas activity (yes even above opening my presents!)... decorating the Christmas tree!

My Christmas decorations usually take a traditional path mixed with modern... red and gold with tartan blended with bursts of deep purple (my favourite colour). So although there are so many different ways to decorate your tree, I've put together my tips for a stress-free decorating session...

Step One:

Put on your favourite, comfy Christmas outfit, dig out the Christmas songs and pop them on and finally pour your top Christmas drink... mine is a Snowball (sorry!) - I love eggnog!

Step Two:

Unpack the dreaded Christmas decoration box putting all decorations in piles of either the same type of decoration, I normally have three of each at least, or the same colour. I like to keep my favourite few in a pile together as they need pride of place at the end along with my tree topper.

Also don't forget to untangle the lights prior to starting, being careful not to tread on any as I usually do.

Tip for January: wrap lights around an empty kitchen roll tube, making a cut in the side to pop the end through (it helps!)

Step Three:

First up are the lights, for a six-foot tree I use three sets of clear lights; two static and one (longer) twinkling set as the lights are probably my favourite Christmassy item. To get perfectly positioned lights imagine the tree split in half and use the two static sets to fill the halves and then the twinkling set spread across it all.

It's best to rope in someone else with one taking the end and the other feeding them through, carefully winding each set of lights around the tree in a spiral shape, not forgetting about the back as, although not as prominent, the little lights do shine through.

Once all sets are on, I like to finish it off by pushing some towards the trunk and bringing others to sit on the ends of the heavier branches to give a bit of depth. I love the look of the tree at this stage and some years I have been tempted to leave it with just lights on but no... decorations are lovely!

Tip: At this point, switch off all your lights, ready for the unveiling at the end!

Step Four:

If you use tinsel it's time to put it on. Some people love it, some hate it - I love it, my mum hates it but, seeing as I'm always the decorator, I put it on! I only use about three strings of tinsel in one neutral colour (gold on mine) and split the tree into thirds this time with some on the top few branches, some in the middle and the majority in the thick bottom.

Step Five:

Now for the decorations... if you have bows or ribbons, put these on first spreading them evenly throughout the tree. The key to any 'perfect tree' is to spread similar decorations across the tree so they pick up the light at different points and give people more to look at hence the splitting of decorations at the beginning.

Next take all your 'basic' decorations (plain baubles, ones you have a lot of or your least favourite) and add them to your already pretty tree, spacing them out front and back, top and bottom. I like to do this in colours so I get a good balance.

Finally, get out your special decorations ready to find the perfect places for them. I have a few favourites, such as little gifts from my fiancé or those picked up on my travels from India to Denmark, and although don't exactly fit with the colour-scheme, they simply cannot stay in their boxes! I dot these mainly at the front of the tree so visitors can admire them on first glance.

Tip: A friend of mine who is spending her first Christmas in her new house wanted to know how many decorations was recommended for a six-foot tree... apparently it's 60. I've never counted mine but I'd say 30-50 is more than enough.

Step Six:

Enter the tree topper... the icing on the cake! When you're happy with your tree, add the last piece whether it be a star (like mine) or a homemade angel, this signals the end of the decorating! I'm usually tired (and fed up) by this point but ready for the final step...

Step Seven:

Put on your favourite Christmas song, take a sip of your Christmassy drink (you deserve it!) and switch on the lights... et voila - your perfect Christmas tree!

Now after all that effort, if you ask someone nicely they may tidy up the empty boxes for you - just remind them of just how gorgeous the tree is!

This has made me very feel very Christmassy and excited about putting my tree up in December!

Jane x

Hot Yoga: Going Barefoot into the Unknown…

This year I set myself a goal to try Yoga, especially Hot Yoga, for the first time. Little did I know that it would have such a profound effect on everything in my life!

Jane is an avid Pilates student, and I knew that Yoga might help a host of things including posture, balance and core strength. I had a knee operation a few years ago and so there was some work to do to readdress the strength in this part of my body.

When the Amazon Local offer for Barefoot Birmingham dropped into our inboxes in the Summer, we knew this was our chance to finally try Hot Yoga.

Barefoot Birmingham is a beautiful, unique and calm Yoga & Wellbeing studio in the heart of Harborne, only a couple of miles from Birmingham City Centre. The team pride themselves on offering a ‘big, beautiful, warm, sweet-smelling studio’ to guests and it really stands out as a clean and spacious place to visit, especially when you compare it to a brightly lit, smelly environment that some gyms and hot yoga studios (that Jane has tried) can be sometimes.

Our first Hot Yoga session was incredibly hot, due to an influx of new guests waving the Amazon Local offer! However in the weeks that followed, we experienced perfect class sizes, pose-by-pose education and inspiration from the instructors, our favourite being Nicola Rowan-Brooks, and with each session I could feel small improvements in my strength and balance.

That was a great thing, feeling strong, especially when normally you can hear me saying ‘my upper body strength is awful’ or ‘I’ve pulled my back again, I need to have better core strength’ Both Hot Yoga and Dynamic Yoga provided me with a solution to address these issues, while feeling like I was enjoying myself!

I know it sounds too good to be true, but here’s the most unexpected thing; it improved so much more than that. The time I spent in class actually had a positive effect on my mood, my stress levels, my focus and my clarity of thoughts. This year has been a whirlwind roller-coaster for us both and we are coming up to a very busy finish to it, so my mind is currently like this 24/7:

The meditation element in Hot Yoga aimed at stilling the mind, was so valuable in calming my thoughts and crushing the swirl of worries, things to do, things to remember, things I’ve promised, places I need to go, people I need to visit, and that’s just the tip of the ice berg – I’m sure I’m not alone! (Well, I know Jane is definitely the same!) When you start out in your own business, it completely takes over your life, in a great way, but your life and work becomes inseparable.

The overall experience of being a Barefooter was seamless, you can book online, arrive 15 minutes before the class, and the studio even provides showers, face wipes, tea, water and free yoga mats if you’re not ready to buy one yet. One of my favourite touches has to be the sign on the wall as you leave the studio "Everything is Okay". They have a wealth of classes I’m yet to try including WeekendWind-Down Yoga by candlelight on a Friday evening. 

You can find out everything you need to know, become a member and view the class timetable here: www.barefootbirmingham.com

We hope you are inspired to give it a try, at least once! 

Katie x