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Last weekend was the fifth annual MAD Blog Awards, the UK’s largest and (almost certainly) most exciting awards for Mum and Dad bloggers.

You’d think after five years, we’d have this thing down pat. That the evening would run like a finely oiled machine, with no surprises whatsoever. But you would be wrong.

Thanks to an excellent team, some fabulous sponsors and an absolute dream of a venue in the Royal Garden Hotel Kensington, we had a fabulous night. But there’s always the Blogger Factor. By which I mean, you can never predict exactly what a group of bloggers on a night out will get up to. But it’s almost never the thing you expected.

So what really happened that night in Kensington?

There was a lot of hugging. Big, squeezy bear hugs. Not by me, I hasten to add. *shakes head emphatically*

hugging

Lindy danced with Pikachu. There are a lot of reasons why Lindy is one of my very favourite people in the world, but these photos? I think they come pretty high on the list.

Dancing

Some people might have done some things that look extremely questionable with hindsight. Some of those people might be called Colette.

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There was a lot of smooching. The guy in blue seems to have been involved in most of it.

smooching

We proved that there is simply no such thing as “old enough to know better”.

know better

And everyone, without exception, looked gorgeous.

gorgeousladies

But most of all, we laughed.

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What I love about the MAD Blog Awards is it’s always such a fun-filled occasion.

And that’s how it should be, maybe.

Because blogging – even when it’s very serious and emotional and powerful – is something most of us do because it brings us enjoyment. It brings us a creative spark, and friendship, and achievement and all of those things deserve to be celebrated. So thanks as ever go to everyone who helped make it such a very fun night, and to all of my amazing team who not only help pull together these events so brilliantly, but also make my job so much more fun than it would be otherwise. To Becky, Lindy, Liz, Victoria, Kiran, Alison and Victoria – my endless gratitude and see you all in 2015, right?

(all photos courtesy of the awesomely brilliant Tom Arber, and I’m not only saying that because he let me hide behind him as Dr Ranj’s jokes got progressively less and less family-friendly as the night wore on…)