A FAMILY faces Christmas without their mother after she lost her brave seven-year battle with cancer.

Now her husband, Colin, and their son and daughter say they will follow the plans she had made for the festive season while in hospital.

Wendy Blacklock, 37, had been in remission from the breast cancer which first struck her in 1997.

But the disease returned earlier this year, and despite defying the expectations of doctors, who gave her 48 hours to live on October 16, she died with Christmas only days away.

Mr Blacklock, son Conor, 13, and daughter Ailis, ten, from Wallsend, North Tyneside are facing up to Christmas without her.

In recent weeks, Mrs Blacklock spent her time planning the family's Christmas, including a dinner at home on Christmas Day, and a meal with her husband's parents, Vic and Elaine, on New Year's Day.

Mr Blacklock, 40, a bus driver, said he would try to stick to what she had prepared.

"I would have had to cook it anyway. I was always the cook," he said.

He said his children were coping with their mother's death, partly because they had always been told the truth about her condition.

"I told the children everything. I never hid a thing from them," he said.

"Children have a way of coping with things. I think they'll be helping us, more than the other way around."