Tomorrow you start in Reception, The calendar tells me it’s so. It’s been scribbled in red for months now, But wait: where did that time go? I bought your uniform, your shoes, your PE kit; Spent hours labelling all of your clothes. We’ve tried them all on in the front room, But tell me: where […]
Family: To the nursery teacher who called to say my son had settled, thank you
To the teacher at my son’s new nursery, who phoned to tell me he had settled almost immediately after a particularly awful drop-off this morning, thank you. Thank you for knowing that, an hour after I walked away from him – as he cried and kicked and screamed his way through another defiant display on […]
Family: My Kids Watch Too Much TV, And I’m OK With That
I have a funny relationship with screen time. When I had my son, I would tot up the minutes he sat and watched TV so that he didn’t fall into whatever bracket The Scientists were currently saying was Too Much. I read the articles about the damage Too Much did to children these days and […]
Family: A Letter To My Little Boy, Whatever The Weather
There was a moment when I knew, beyond any doubt, what it meant to be your mother. But it wasn’t the day you were born. It wasn’t the first time I knew about you, even – a long-awaited pink line forming in front of my eyes as I sat, perched on the edge of the […]
Family: 8 Things Worth Buying Before Your Toddler Starts Preschool
The Boy is starting at a new preschool this September. It’s just across the road – at the primary school he’ll *hopefully* start at the following year – so the idea is that by sending him for a couple of days a week over the next year, we’ll ease him in to the whole thing […]
Family: I Remember The First Time
My youngest has just started putting words together this week. She’s 1-and-a-half, and ‘I do it’ is the current favourite – uttered at least 800 times a day, mainly when I’m in a rush to leave the house (and ‘it’ is putting all her clothes on, backwards). We had ‘Happy bu-day to you’ today, which […]
Life: Harambe The Gorilla – Let’s Sue The Four-Year-Old
You’ve heard about Harambe, the poor 17-year-old gorilla who was shot and killed at Cincinnati Zoo over the weekend when a child fell into his enclosure, yes? You’ve seen the Facebook memes with the sad-faced primate, the #JusticeForHarambe tributes all over Twitter, and the stories splashed all over the news. Hell, you might even be […]
Family: The Things We Do For Love
I just spent £20 on a toy dog no bigger than the palm of my hand. No wait. I just spent £1.20 on a toy dog no bigger than the palm of my hand. And £18.80 to have it sent in the post. FROM OHIO. Yes, that’ll be the one in America. Did I mention […]
Family: Don’t Applaud Me For Not Being On My Phone Around My Kids
I wish my nails looked like this. Alas, not my hands. Or my phone. Yesterday at the park, an older lady complimented me. “Well done you for paying attention to your kids,” she said as she passed, “and not staring at your phone like they all do these days.” The “they” she was referring to […]
Family: You Are Enough (A Mantra For Mothers)
It’s a learning curve like no other – The day when you become a mother. The days are long, the nights are hard, A sleepless stare’s our calling card. A thousand voices chiming in, It’s hard to hear above the din. But this I know – this much is true, This time is yours, it’s […]