Closing Time

I am closing down this blog. My family duties do not leave me enough time to update it in a meaningful way anymore.

Thank you to all of you for reading.


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Sing Song

There is something about being a Mum that makes you sing. I don't know how it happens or why but all the other mothers I have spoken to do the same thing. We all entertain our babies with silly songs made up on the spot.

I sing about nappies. I sing about the changing mat. Every one of his stuffed toys has its own theme tune.

It's a good habit as it helps him to engage with the world and it's entertaining for him too.

The only problem is that I can't switch it off.

As I go about my day songs come unbidden to my mind trying to get out. For example

'Bunji-jumping feta,
Jumped out of my fridge,
Forgot to use a bunji cord,
And now it's on the floor.'


It doesn't scan or rhyme but the tune was pretty catchy.

I worry that my brain is forever changed and that I'll be walking round the streets serenading the trees long after my son has left home.

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Baby dream feeds

Whenever anyone asks me how often the baby gets up in the night (and they always ask that, it's the automatic new mummy question) I always say every two to three hours. This isn't strictly true. I get up every two to three hours. The baby basically sleeps through.

The baby is a dream feeder. He doesn't cry but fidgets and stamps his feet on the mattress until I pick him up. I pick him up, feed him and put him back down, often without him flickering an eyelid.

I wonder what this must be like for him. He is comfortable in his bed, he feels a bit peckish in his sleep. He wriggles a bit and then he is magically flying through the air. Suddenly a nipple is in his mouth and he quickly has a full stomach. He then magically flys through the air back to his comfy bed and a deeper slumber.

It's a good life.



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Why I love the person who invented online food shopping.

Shopping. It's never fun really is it. I enjoy the choosing things part and the accumulation part. I like buying shiny things and tasty things and pretty things. Obviously shopping for nice boxes of chocolate is my favourite type of shopping.

What I don't enjoy is the action of shopping. The trailing round, the trying to find things. The crowds and the noise.

This is why online shopping is perfect. It has all the benefits and none of the negatives. It has revolutionised my life and in gratitude to the person who invented it, whoever that might be, I shall list the things that make it fantastic.

1. You don't have to go out. For a semi reclusive women with a small child this is like mana from heaven.

2. You can do it in bed. The only thing better then this would be if you could pay people to carry you round the supermarket in a sedan chair.

3. It's quick especially if you are prepared. I use an app to plan my weeks meals. It generates a shopping list. I put the items in my online shopping cart and 'boom' it's done. Warp speed.

4. No traveling home. Physically going to the supermarket for me means a long bus journey or if I can pursued my husband to give me a lift, a slightly less arduous journey with a slightly irritated husband. When I shop online I can roll over and go to sleep. That's it. Put the iPad down and the world is yours.

5. I don't end up with any 'extras'. When I go round the supermarkets I am drawn in by the hypnotic displays and special offers. I leave with several extra chocolate bars, a chocolate sponge and a tub of clotted cream. Online armed with my app generated list I can have the discipline of a nun. I don't, but if I wanted to I could. Honest.

6. I can bulk buy. At the supermarket bulk buying is too much hassle. It's physically difficult and pushing a trolley filled with 18 packets of vulgar wheat makes you look like a survivalist hoarder. Online some one else has to do this for me, so I can buy two jumbo packets of the washing powder which is on special order even if the boxes are bigger then me.

I love you person who invented online shopping.


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Parenting Vouchers

Apparently there is going to be a trial scheme which will offer £100 vouchers in Boots the Chemists. Parents can redeem the vouchers for a series of parenting classes. It is hoped this will help so called problem families to raise the children better and in turn prevent anti social behaviour.

It will be interesting to see the outcome of the scheme but I do think it is a case of bolting the stable door after the horse has bolted.

I think a good family is based on a strong marriage or partnership and to my knowledge the state currently provides no classes to help people achieve this.

If people able to access such classes they would be able to iron out issues such as how they wanted to run a home, what they expected from one another and if they wished to have children, how these children were to be raised.

Surely this is a more proactive way to tackle the issue.


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Why does 'homemaking' seem to belong to the religious right?

Since I decided to become a housewife I have spent a lot of time researching how other housewives live, both for advice on how to run my own home as well as from general nosiness. I have found a wealth of, largely American, blogs dedicated to the subject. Many use the term homemaking which is a phrase I try to avoid as I find it slightly twee and patronising. I find much of the content of these blogs useful both practically in the advice on how to run a home and emotionally in the way they capture the sometimes difficult position of being a housewife in a career driven modern world. In many ways I find these blogs comforting and often feel that the women who write them understand my life. However I have found one thing that they often have in common disturbs me greatly and that is their adherence to what I consider to be extremely right wing political views. It is not uncommon to find aggressively homophobic posts nestled amongst posts about cleaning rostas and child care advice. The authors are big on defending their version of family values against what they see as a threat of increasing rights for homosexuals. Some blogs are also extremely critical of contraception and family planning. Even the milder, less prejudice bloggers often identify themselves as right wing, posting in favour of Republican candidates or their policies. This got me wondering why. Why is it that so called family values are so intrinsically linked with right wing politics? In the UK traditional family values are often seen as the ideological partner of the Conservative party. From what I have seen from coverage of American politics both sides claim family values as a core ideology, yet homemaking, homeschooling and stay at home mothering is dominated by right wing women, at least in the blogosphere. I can't understand how we got to this position. In the UK for example when our modern political parties were forming there was a class divide between them. Very broadly speaking the poorer classes supported left wing parties, the richer the right wing ones. However all classes at the time shared strong family values. Marriage with a wife at home was the norm. So why have we split off in this direction? Are their other women out there who share my apparently mosaic political leanings or am I an anomaly?

Reflections on the last four months.

This is just a quick post as alas my time is short. I haven't blogged in such a long while largely because of the baby but partly because I dreaded looking over my resolutions list that I made before I gave birth. I was sure that I hadn't lived up to it. However I was pleasantly surprised. I'm not doing too badly. Our home is more organised and neater then it has ever been. It is even starting to feel more homely as I have put effort into making it look more personalised. We are also beginning to get baby into a bit of a routine and ourselves too. So I now feel a renewed sense of energy and desire to blog!