Forget day-spas. Forget personal shopping experiences. Forget makeover counters. If you want to feel like a supermodel – more attractive, thinner and more glamorous than anyone else in the area, I highly, highly recommend a visit to Butlins Skegness. Originally we’d planned a cottage in Cornwall. This will be our last family holiday where we aren’t tied … [Read more…]
Today I am excited to bring you my first ever guest post on the blog. Take it away, sir. *** I never wanted to have children. I just never saw them as part of my life. I saw them as something that would interfere with the things I loved most in my life (great food, … [Read more…]
We live on a new-build estate, which currently doesn’t have much in the way of facilities. Excitingly, a new Miller and Carter restaurant opened up last week actually on the estate (number of facilities in our area since the restaurant has arrived: 1) and, even better, they were offering 50% off to go to one … [Read more…]
The underground wind whisked around me as it always had, as it always would. The scent of London’s tube network is unique; part soot and grime, part ambition and possibility. It still smells of home. Navigating the tube remains second nature to me; I don’t need to refer to a map to know that the … [Read more…]
I wish there were a device that would let you save a day and come back to it at a later point; not from a schmaltzy, sentimental perspective, but purely practically. For example, today. I would have liked to have skipped today, BUT gifted it to myself in the future, perhaps when I have horrid … [Read more…]
“I have the best news, EVER,” EldestGirl triumphantly announced last week. Thoughts of fast-track scholarships to boarding schools flashed briefly through my mind, followed by free ponies and a lottery win. Before remembering she was four years old. “Next week,” she continues, “it is my week to bring home Duffy Bear.” Fuck. Duffy Bear is … [Read more…]
In some ways, YoungestGirl has had a better parenting experience than EldestGirl did. Since she was born, I haven’t been out of the house to work (though I do work from home a reasonable amount, so she doesn’t get 100% undivided attention). I am able to make our day-to-day schedule meet her needs more than … [Read more…]
At EldestGirl’s gym class this week, one of her classmates had the world’s most epic tantrum. I didn’t see what sparked it, but it was a full-on, out of control, screaming, legs thrashing, hysterical meltdown. Her mother, with a newborn in her Maxi-Cosi, looked like she’d seen it all before, and after trying (and failing) … [Read more…]
Despite the awful pregnancy, dreadful labour, terrible emergency Caesarean Section and slow recovery, the thing that most put me off having another child was the Second Year of Doom. For those of you unacquainted with the Second Year of Doom, this is when your (until now) coddled and healthy one year-old baby starts some form … [Read more…]
Dear Ms Nunn Thank you for your letter dated 13 March 2017. It is always gratifying for our institution to receive letters from the public. Unfortunately, I must decline your request to be sent a pet. Our zoological society exists primarily to enhance important conservation work and to educate the public about understanding and respect … [Read more…]