My father has always told me . . . ''my boy, time is more important than money". "Wow, thats hard to believe dad, I thought that money was the most important thing in life!!" No, my dad would tell me..."time is more important than money. You can always get more money, but you cannot get more time. Make sure that you have time to do the important things in life, like time to just sit and drink coffee and time to play tennis and time to go on holidays. Rather live in a normal house and drive an average car but make SURE you have time to go on holidays!!'' Another man I admire once said..."just make sure that you have something that money cannot buy and death cannot take away from you." For me that is my family and my faith.

Okay, for a holiday we have got time AND money involved!! Long before this summer arrived I had decided it was time for a family holiday. My children are growing up so fast and I want to get every moment I can with them before they fly away, so I just booked the days off in my diary and said "right, thats it! there is our family holiday!! And promptly got offered five days of work in the first week. I stuck to my guns and said "no thank-you, I am not available."

So we went on our family holiday, to Val d'isere in France, 800 miles there and 800 miles back!! and all I can say is that it was FANTASTIC, INCREDIBLE, MAGICAL. Some close friends of ours very generously allowed us to use their flat for free which made it all possible.

The photos will speak for themselves but here is a list of what we did: hiking, running, mountain biking, horse riding, tennis, golf, archery, boating, water slides, white water rafting, mountain climbing, tree obstacle course. I was like a sergeant major with a list each morning of the days activities!!

My dad was right, I will never get that time back and I know I made the right decision with it.

Make sure you have TIME, your life will get as busy as you allow it to. Quite often, LESS IS MORE!!!

(Tuesday, 21 September 2010)