The little moments.

I don’t know about you, but I think that life is worth celebrating. So far, 2014 has bought a lot of good moments and a fair few bad ones, but I feel that the bad moments only make the good moments feel sweeter, because you appreciate them more.

Freixenet sparkling wine asked me how I celebrate the little moments, and coincidentally, I often celebrate them with sparkling wine! Drinking wine is basically a celebration in itself, am I right? (I am.) It was Matt’s birthday last week, and despite a birthday being rather a big moment, I made the most out of every little part of it. Surely the best birthdays are a collection of little moments of wonderfulness, right? I’d spent months planning some surprises, and everything went off ridiculously perfectly – hooray! Here are my top 3 little(ish) moments:

1. The breakfast
On my birthday, Matt made me waffles in bed, so it was up to me to reciprocate with an equally awesome breakfast. As peaches are his favourite fruit, I decided to make cinnamon pancakes topped with caramelised peaches and mascarpone. They were pretty much amazing, and the best part is that I got to try them too. The recipe is coming soon!

Obviously, we had to have a little fizz with our breakfast too – if you can’t on your birthday, when can you?

Tasty, but neither gravity-defying or pretty.

2. The presents
As well as buying a few of his favourite things (fizzy Haribo peaches, hello!), I got Matt this beautiful leather man-bag from Spartoo. Now when we go out for the day, he can lug my DSLR about instead of me! WIN.

3. The surprise
I organised a surprise trip to Alton Towers. This was the most perfect part, I think. There was no traffic, the weather was amazing – and in late September, that’s never a guarantee – and the park was incredibly quiet. Matt didn’t twig what we were doing until we were literally pulling off the M1 and he spotted the Alton Towers sign, and his reaction was perfect. I LOVE a successful surprise! Mainly because I’m super competitive, even with myself.

I booked two-day tickets for us both, which are really good value – there’s only a few pounds difference between 1 and 2 days. Rather than stay at the official hotel (which is so overpriced!) I booked The Dale, a little B&B in Alton village and we had a lovely stay there. Comfiest beds ever, and the landlady even decorated our room for Matt's birthday! We also had an incredible meal at the Royal Oak pub – I’ve never had a baked camembert as good as that one... there was a garlic crust. A GARLIC CRUST. The cost of our B&B and our steaky, boozy dinner still came in at less than booking a night in the Alton Towers hotel – definitely a win.

The Congo River Rapids can be a very stressful time.

Because the park was so quiet, we really got our money’s worth. We only had about three hours there on Monday, but still managed to go on all the big rides once, and then on Tuesday we did pretty much every ride on the park, with return trips on a fair few – although after three goes on the Smiler, my head was a bit befuddled!

What are you celebrating at the moment?