Roll with the punches

Life can get complicated can’t it? And I’m sorry fellas, but us girls have got a lot on our tiny, diet sized plates. Kids, work, relationships, maintaining an acceptable level of appearance in all family members, being responsible for keeping the houseplants alive (not something I do well at the best of times), it can all add up to a bit of a mess if you don’t stay on top of things.

You’re on a treadmill, juggling plates of spaghetti (then scraping the sauce off said spaghetti because son number one is currently not eating red food), just about keeping those plates spinning and not falling over in the process, when suddenly along comes another plate out of nowhere and somehow you have to find a way to make it work. Catch the plate and try to make it spin, without letting everything else slide. It’s like trying to pat your head and rub your stomach at the same time. It can be done but it takes a few moments to get it right (admit it, hands up if you are patting your stomach and rubbing your head right now. Just me? Wow, that was embarrassing).

I’ve had a right week of it. Half term is not easy at the best of times for us mums, but trying to juggle work, the remnants of a virus (and resultant egg sized gland looking like I’m growing an extra head on my neck, I’m thinking of naming it), getting started on new writing projects and still lots to sort out as far as my “new life” is concerned, adds up to a lot of stress, and a whole heap of things clamouring for my attention.

But there are only twenty four hours in a day. Eight of those should be spent sleeping I know, but usually those eight hours are spent trying to get kids back to sleep, writing the stories down that appear in my head and worrying about what I need to get done in the next twenty four hours. I just get to sleep and it’s time to get up and do it all again.

Sometimes we all just want to jump off the treadmill. Just shout “stop” and calmly step off for a moment, just to catch your breath. But that treadmill will never stop, and as any of you who have tried to get off a moving treadmill can agree, the likelihood is you will end up falling on your arse and getting smacked in the head in the process.

So I have decided the best way to approach life is the same way you would approach that treadmill with the plates (not that I’ve ever attempted to run on a treadmill holding plates of spaghetti but it’s a good analogy so stay with me here). When it seems like things are getting tough, concentrate on your breathing, keep putting one foot in front of the other, hold those plates high and you will find your second wind. It’s only a matter of time before those feel good endorphins will start pumping, and you remember how much you love to run.

I have messed you lovely readers around a bit these last few weeks, by not posting my usual Monday blogs, and sometimes even missing Fridays. And I’m sorry for that, my treadmill just sped up a lot and I had a few extra plates to catch. But I’m slowly gaining my footing, getting a handle on my new plates and catching up with myself and I’m grateful to those of you that have stayed with me. I’m doing more head patting and tummy rubbing, and less head rubbing and tummy patting (come on, at least one of you must be doing it by now. Still just me? Ok).

Snow!

OK so we’ve had a little snow today. Which means that all anyone will talk about all day is the snow. How much we’re going to get, and how the world doesn’t have to stop for a centimetre of snow, “send in your pictures of the snow!” etc. Oh, how we love to talk about the weather. So, in light of my recent writers block, I may as well jump on the bandwagon and put forth my ten pence worth.

I was having my shower this morning when son one burst in and shouted “SNOW, no school today!” I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was on a bit of a go slow in case I got the word that school was closed and I could put my pyjamas back on. But school website stated “business as usual.” Bugger.

Trying to get the kids ready for school was serious “pass me the Rescue Remedy on second thoughts I’ll have something stronger” territory. There was the excitement (and resultant chaos) that only a child can feel for wearing wellies (son number two’s being three sizes too big as I refuse to pay out for a pair in his size when his feet appear to be growing at 10cm a week), the kerfuffle of trying to find lost hats (which was never resolved), and having a row with son number two over his refusal to have his cosy toes attached to his buggy (because he wanted to look at his wellies).

Trying to move an already unwieldy pushchair through snow is not something I have ever had to face before. While I appreciated the work out (I needed it) I did not particularly enjoy having to half drag, half thrust the buggy, mostly at a diagonal angle, through untouched snow. Yes, in more relaxed circumstances, it should have been fun. But stressed, late and without the proper clothing for such an inhospitable environment it was about as fun as a funeral. Son number one fell over in the snow barely a few yards from our driveway, going from “yay, snow!” to “I don’t like snow” and whimpering like a puppy the whole journey, all the while me trying to push down my guilty feelings of seeing his poor bare hatless head and son number two’s blanket-less lap.

I can understand why infant schools remain open despite the snow. Kids at that age make tiny little fluffy snowballs, thrown with a gentle arm at things like lamp posts and wheelie bins. Snow to them is about joy and fun. Older kids, particularly boys, are a lot more vicious in their approach to the white stuff. I am still mentally scarred by the feeling of a snowball, shiny and hard from lots of squeezing and polishing, hitting a cold, bare cheek with enough force to knock you over onto an icy playground. And I will never forget the horrid shock when someone roughly grabs your coat and puts snow down your back, while everyone else stands around laughing, then having to put up with a cold, wet shirt and bruised ego for the rest of the day.

Yes, we’re all adults and should be able to cope with a little snow. And we all have a vision of being at the park with our sledges, having a lovely day frolicking in the snow, making snowmen and coming home to steaming cups of hot chocolate with marshmallows. But as usual, reality rarely lives up to the day dream. I know from experience that dragging two cold wet boys through an inch of snow on a sledge, catching on sections of bare tarmac below, son number two repeatedly throwing himself out of the sledge (losing his ill fitting wellies in the process), and both of them bored and wanting to go home and play on the Xbox before we’d even got there, is not all it’s cracked up to be. So, on reflection, I’m glad the school has remained open.

But I do love the idea of snow, and I will always have a sense of excitement when I open my curtains to a white blanket. I have hope for my fantasy snow days when my kids are older and more able to enjoy it, and I won’t have quite so much responsibility as far as protective clothing is concerned.

When life throws you eggs...

Sometimes life throws a few eggs. Sometimes it throws so many eggs that before you know it you are lying on the ground, covered in eggs with a gang of cats licking at your skin (and my cats wouldn’t think twice, they will eat anything). But we all have a choice in how we deal with the eggs (and the greedy cats), and my choice will always be to get up and do something.

Being proactive when all you want to do is sit around in your pyjamas and cry while watching Toy Story 3 (is there a more unexpected tear jerker? I think not) is not the easiest of paths to choose. But it’s when you are faced with the big challenges in life that you really find out what you’re made of.

With much sadness and regret, last week the man and me decided to part ways after 13 brilliant years together. My life went from stable to uncertain in a split second, as I lost everything I had dreamed and worked for my entire adult life. Poof. But I choose not to focus on the loss of a dream, but to instead use this opportunity to reinvent myself, make way for new dreams and focus on the positives (I’ve seen Toy Story 3 a bazillion times anyway). And most of all to take this time to teach my kids, and remind myself, that there is always a choice.

The mind is the most powerful and dangerous tool we have at our disposal and sometimes it feels like we have no control over it. I have given my mind its fair share of liberty over the years, allowing it to wander freely and take me to the darkest of places; places that I hope never to have to return to again. But the fact is, we all have free will, and we can choose to fight back and let it take us somewhere more special than we had ever believed existed. It might not be a fair fight, and there might be times when it seems like being happy ever again is impossible, but you can choose to go on, one foot in front of the other, not for others, but for you. So at the moment, when I have little of my old life left to grab onto, I’m trying to focus my mind and channel it to take me to a good place, a positive place, and it’s that paradise on the horizon that is keeping me going.

Whether we have made a bad decision and put ourselves there, or whether the eggs have come flying out of nowhere, we are all free to choose how we cope with things. It’s up to us to decide to walk into the sunlight.

Life can get pretty dull when you have everything you want, there is no need to try, you don’t need to push yourself, and there is no reason to. But when the tough times come, and you think all is lost, it’s a rare and beautiful chance to prove to yourself and the world that you can face a challenge and be victorious. I’m not ready to be eaten by the cats, I don’t care whether I’m 34 or 74, I won’t just lie down and get licked.

Today is the first birthday of this blog. A year ago I was bumbling through life, not really knowing where I was going, and I think that’s evident from the first post I made. So much can change in a year, for good and for bad, but one of the best things in life is that all those good and bad things are open doors to a new world. It’s up to you whether you decide to take yourself to somewhere fantastic or not.

You might think you’re backed into a corner, and you might think that there is nowhere to turn, that nothing you do now can change the hideous situation you’re in. But there are always options, you just have to make the decision.

Omelette, anyone?

                                                  

A little thank you…

I want to take this opportunity to thank all our wonderful family and friends who are loving us and supporting us through this difficult time. A very dear friend (who has faced more than her fair share of tough times) recently told me that good and beautiful things sometimes happen when it seems most unlikely. And one of the most beautiful things to come out of all this has been the reminder of how lucky we are to have so many wonderful people looking out for us. All is not lost when you have so many people who care.

But most of all I want to thank the man, who is the best friend a girl could ever hope for. xxx

Snowdrop

I saw my first snowdrop of the year today. I don’t really ‘do’ flowers, but snowdrops are my very favourite flower because they come out of the darkest time of year to give you hope of the spring ahead. Proving that in the coldest of nature’s harsh winters, life and beauty can survive.

Snowdrops don’t flaunt themselves in the summer with garish colours, displaying themselves for all to see. They wait until the last leaf has fallen from the tree and the world looks empty and bare. Then they quietly and serenely push through the hard ground, hidden under hedgerows, delicately pure and white; modestly demonstrating their strength with their persistence in the face of adversity, elegance in the face of decay.

So if like me, you are having a crappy day today, just look for a snowdrop and know that you can flourish in even the darkest of life’s moments. Like a snowdrop, you can be strong, and proudly hold your face up to the winter sun. Because spring is coming and everything is going to be OK.

Girls night out

I went out on a very rare girls night on Saturday, the man took the kids away for the night so that I could have the house to myself and us girls could have a lay in the next morning, undisturbed by screaming children. All of us mums, being able to wake up with a hangover in peace is almost more of a treat than being let loose on the town in the first place.

Going out these days provokes far more anxiety now than it did when I was going out every weekend, or even every night. Just getting ready is panic inducing.  We just want to blend in and look like everyone else, and not like we’re thinking “I feel more comfortable in a baby sick covered t-shirt”.  Then there is the underwear dilemma. Wear a thong that allows your, albeit wobbly, bum to be unfettered by panty lines but allows your mummy tummy to poke out over the top of your jeans, or pour yourself into a huge pair of Bridget Jones style “shape makers” that make your stomach look like nice and flat but give you VPL that could be seen from space (not to mention the inevitable panic when you are drunk, need a wee and not quite sure whether you will manage to unbind yourself on time). It’s a tough call.

Anyway, underwear decisions made and having trashed my bedroom in the process, we had a few drinks at home before getting a cab to take us into town. I always feel kind of sorry for taxi drivers picking up groups of drunken women. The peace of his taxi is immediately ruined by heads popping between the seats shouting “Oy oy, we’re mums on a night out! What’s your name love? Ian? Hi Ian, ah thanks for taking us out, it doesn’t happen often. Did we tell you we’re mums and don’t get out much?”

Another worry for women of a certain age is that groups of women don’t tend to talk to other groups of women on a night out, other than to ask for a light (or in my case talking to young girls “Ooh sweetie you must be freezing! Wish I could get away with wearing that. Don’t forget to drink some water before bed dear.”). It’s not like being in the queue in Tesco where you can talk to the lady in the queue behind you about the advertised “one in front” policy which never seems to be in force. I like to talk to everyone, but will admit to feeling intimidated by other groups of women. You can never be quite sure whether they are going to be nice to your face and then turn round to their friend and say “Did you see the panty line on THAT?”

No, women on a night out talk to men. Because men aren’t intimidating, and believe it or not, most men don’t notice whether you have a huge panty line or not, they are too busy trying to work out whether or not they can pull you and whether or not they could get anything better if they did.  And most men who are out on the town love to chat to groups of women, it’s their reason for being there. Until they realise you are married/have a boyfriend/are old enough to be their mum, then they tend to pop off pretty sharpish. But not before they have done their duty of telling you how you don’t look your age/can’t believe you have kids/are gutted you are spoken for.

So we staggered between a few places, had some drinks, got some compliments off lads young enough to be our offspring. One of us realised she was accidentally ringing her mum in her bag (“please don’t call again, it will wake your son up who I’m babysitting”) and tried to convince her mum that she wasn’t actually that drunk (while the rest of us shouted “OY OY!” down the phone), before someone suggested the local strip bar. Always up for anything we boldly went in, had a drink and my friends paid for me to have a lap dance on stage with the stripper of my choice (I’m glossing over this because a) I know my mum is reading and will be trying to crawl inside herself in embarrassment and b) everyone knows what a lap dance looks like, and I fear spelling it out would not be the classiest of moves). So another tick off my bucket list (hey I’m 34, I need to start ticking things off) we headed for the local club.

The trouble with having only one nightclub in a town is having no competition, it doesn’t actually have to be that good to be full of people. So you are rinsed with a huge door and cloakroom fee, which you regret as soon as you get in there and start to think that maybe it’s time to go home. But being sensible mums (I’ve paid for this and I’m going to get my money’s worth goddammit), you can’t quite justify leaving, so you hang around hoping to get some kind of value for money. Which frankly, ain’t gonna happen when the music is courtesy of the Venga Boys and you spend the entire time outside having a fag anyway.

So we stayed until our 2am curfew (“Oy Ian, book us in for 2am would ya? Ta Love”) during which time, one of us fell asleep in her woo-woo and I told as many people as possible about my lap dance (classy). Falling into my front door, spilling kebabs as we did so, we declared the night a success. It was brilliant, did we mention we are mums and don’t get out much?

No fear

Yesterday was my 34^th birthday, yay! Careening wilding towards middle age (when does middle age start anyway?) and I am officially (after a debate with the man about when a decade becomes early/mid/late) now in my mid-thirties.

I don’t like pondering on my age, so I simply don’t do it. It’s not something I can change, and yes we would all love to be 21 again (although I was actually quite depressed at 21 having still not learnt to be happy in my own skin, so I’ll take 25), but why be down about leaving behind wrinkle free skin, a level of personal freedom that you just can't appreciate and being able to seriously wear a crop top in public, when there is so much more to look forward to in old age? Having perfect teeth (false of course) and not needing to worry about fillings, being able to get away with huge social faux pas without a murmur of complaint from anyone else and spending the day watching telly and grumbling about the new presenter on Countdown, entirely guilt-free.

So anyway, I hadn’t expected much from my birthday. There comes a point when you just have to accept that your birthday isn’t as big a deal as it was when you were five. You can’t expect the same number of presents or a huge birthday party and chores still need to be done. And you don’t go to bed plump from birthday cake, or with a smile on your face knowing that kids will be talking about your party at school all week and you don't get to wear a pound shop plastic princess crown for the day, because birthday’s as an adult are no different from any other day. But the man outdid himself this year, and organised a morning of rock climbing for the two of us at Reading Climbing Centre.

I’m not great with heights. In fact I have rather a long list of fears. Heights (although technically not heights, just falling from a height), flying (although technically not flying, just being in a plane when it plummets to the ground) etc… all the usual phobias many of us are plagued with.  But the man knew that I really wanted to give rock climbing a try. Not because I thought I would particularly enjoy it, or be good at it, but because I wanted to prove to myself that I could do it, despite being shit scared.

So when we arrived at the rock climbing centre, we were given harnesses and these weird shoes to put on and shown into a huge hangar full of climbing walls up to the ceiling and very serious looking people of all ages, all looking incredibly blasé about the fact they were hanging on a wall 40ft from the ground. There were a few bouldering walls (lower walls for climbing with no harness - “no way am I going on that with no harness!” was my instant response) and a large number of 40ft walls. We were immediately led to a small (!) 20ft wall to practice on. I was first up. There was a point half way through when I suddenly realised that I was actually wearing a harness and climbing up a wall, and not sitting at home watching The Fabulous Baker Brothers as I had been telling myself (my new happy place - food + posh totty = food pornography for women), and I panicked slightly. But I ignored that and got on with the job in hand. The feeling of relief when I quickly got to the top washed over me and I sat back in my harness and abseiled to the ground, grinning like a crazy person. Having proved we could do it, we were then told we would be climbing the big walls and I honestly thought the instructor was joking. And you want me to go right to the top? Er, no you’ll never get me up there!

But a strange thing happens when you are climbing and you think you won’t make it. There’s a kind of distance warp, where you’re so focussed on what you’re doing that you kind of forget where you are and how high up you are. You just climb, one foot at a time, one hand at a time. And suddenly, all muscles screaming for mercy, you reach that final hold and realise you made it to the top. And that’s when you can look down and see for yourself just how far you’ve come.  

Wearing a harness, I climbed 4 different 40ft walls, and I even managed to get myself to the top of one of those bouldering walls, without a harness. But I'm so glad I did. The feeling of pride and excitement that I had actually done something I thought I wouldn’t be able to do far outweighed the discomfort of being terrified or the embarrassment at having my arse stared at by complete strangers for a whole 60 minutes.

We can’t choose whether or not we’re scared.  But we can make a conscious choice about whether or not to continue in the face of that fear or allow it to stop us in our tracks. There’s no point in fighting fear, because frankly it’s not going to go away when you are 40ft up from the ground dangling from a rope, but you can go on despite being scared. One foot at a time, one hand at a time.

Thanks to Reading Climbing Centre for a great lesson, and thanks to the man for taking me. xxx

Little kids are just like teenagers, only smaller

My good friend Laurie Sontag at Manic Motherhood wrote this http://lauriesontag.com/?p=846 brilliant post last week about how teenagers are just like three year olds only bigger. It got me thinking, little kids are just like teenagers, only smaller…

They don’t speak, they grunt

Son number two, who is yet to perfect the art of speech, usually gets his point across with a series of “urr urr urrrrrr”’s and “nnn, nnn nnn’s”, often as a request for food. Son number one, a little older, regularly forgets his manners and morphs into Kevin. “Get me a drink” “Turn the telly over” “Come here now” are favourite demands. But right now, while they are little, I am willing to make the effort. I say the usual “what’s the magic word?” before answering their command. But after years of thankless slavery as a mother and being talked to like a piece of crap, I am waiting for the day when I can grunt back “Piss off and get it yourself. I’m not your slave anymore.”

They are more like you than you think

Fighting a stubborn two year old is hard enough without your mum merrily pointing out that you used to make the exact same face when you refused to put your shoes on. And I know there will come a time when my kids come home with a bizarre haircut that I can’t stand and mum will be at the ready with the picture of me with an elfin crop that I thought was so Demi Moore at the time, but in hindsight made me look like the Star Wars kid from You Tube. But tiny kids are just little mini me’s. Last week BFF was stunned when her son, also two, responded to her presentation of a flannel to wash his face with the much used mummy expression “don’t even think about it”. You can’t really argue with that.

They never sleep when you want them to

After a few years of motherhood you soon forget what it actually feels like to go to bed and wake up feeling refreshed and renewed. Little kids often can’t sleep through the night because they’re “scared”; want a drink or need to express more random requests like an overwhelming desire to sleep on the floor rather than in their bed. I relish the thought of the moment they want to sleep all day, and I honestly won’t care whether it’s in their bed or on the floor. Just being able to sleep past 5am is a luxury I am quite excited about. But as one friend recently pointed out, teenagers are no different from little kids except their routine is back to front. They stay up all night, then spend the entire day in bed when you want them to get up and clean their stinking pit of a bedroom. Which brings me to…

They are minging

Little boys are gross. They are gross from the minute they discover they can pick up all manner of hideous things with their curious little fingers, and then drop them when something more interesting comes along, right through to teenagers who wear the same pants day in day out and never clean behind their fingernails. I have given up wishing for a perfectly clean and tidy home, but there are times when I try to regain control. I once found a crusty old cheerio behind a load of books, encased in a deep layer of dust and of indeterminable age, but this didn’t detract son number two from swiping it up and happily munching away on it. There was a smell I couldn’t quite place coming from under the TV cabinet, so, approaching with caution, I investigated. I discovered, along with Mummy Pig and Miss Rabbit, 2 small plastic soldiers and a couple of dice (or die, whatever); a mouldy apple with two bites taken out of it, a vast amount of dust and I kid you not, a chocolate chip cookie stuck to the wall, defying gravity. Learning from the Cheerio incident, I kept son number two well away from the freak cookie and only narrowly saved him from feasting on the mouldy apple. Which brings me to my next point.

They will happily eat crap, but refuse a lovingly prepared healthy and delicious meal

No one wants to have fussy children, so we all work really hard in the early days filling our freezers with millions of tiny frozen cubes of liver casserole, salmon mash and a vast array of vegetable cocktails. But then suddenly your lovingly prepared meals are met with a solemn shake of the head and a bizarre list of rules; nothing can touch on the plate, nothing white, I don’t like potatoes I only like chips, I’ll eat cheese but only on pizza, I will only eat peas on a Wednesday, etc. Similar to teenagers who refuse your meals before rustling up random and disgusting concoctions in the toastie maker, then leave you to clean it up.

So yes, teenagers and little kids are very similar indeed. But at the moment I can always ask for a kiss or a cuddle and get one, and snuggle up on the sofa with them in front of innocent telly programmes, soaking up their adorable cuteness. Can’t see them letting me cuddle up to them when they are trying to watch Cribs and eat their tinned spaghetti and banana toasties.

How to be a good mother or I’ll take a large helping of social pressure with a side order of guilt please

I watched a programme the other night on Channel 4 called How To Be a Good Mother. Always wanting to improve on my confused mothering technique, I tuned in, expecting to get a few tips on how to counter nappy rash without having to do nappy off and ending up skidding on a poo, spilling a hot coffee in the process. Or get a fussy child to eat more than one kind of vegetable. But rather than the how-to I had expected, it was the story of six women doing some wonderful, and sometimes downright barmy, things in the name of motherhood. And they all felt that they had got it just right. But if I’m honest, I didn’t learn anything that helped me, just that I’m kind of glad that I didn’t eat my own placenta.

By far the strangest of these women was the placenta lady. She makes placenta prints (which is exactly what it sounds like), umbilical cord charms (wrapping a portion of umbilical cord into the shape of a heart then drying it out and hanging on ribbon for people to display in their homes), and finally cooking the placenta, then drying it out and grinding it up into capsules for the mother to take every day as a kind of hormone supplement. She apparently took a bite of her own placenta and was even paid to go one ladies house straight after the birth to whip up a placenta smoothie, which the mother then downed with glee. Aside from the placenta mania, this woman has received a lot criticism for saying that those mothers who have had caesarean sections do not have as strong a bond with their children than those who have had a natural birth. She said that, as a result of being a caesarean baby, she can’t look her own mother in the eye. So she has got to this age, had two children of her own and NEVER looked her mother in the eye? I believe that everyone has a right to their opinion but this was yet another unthinking sweeping statement that does nothing but make those women who couldn’t have a natural birth feel crap about themselves, bravo lady. Seriously, well done.

There was another mother, a “continuum mum” (google it, I did), who practiced elimination communication. No nappies, just being so at one with your child that you somehow know when they want to wee or poo. Sounds dangerous to me, but apparently works if you are willing to sleep with your child (with no nappy on?), not use a pushchair (even when walking to Asda for shopping) and dedicate every moment to looking out for that telling poo face on your child. If using nappies makes me a bad mother, then I’ll take it on the chin, and the thought of carrying son number two around ALL THE TIME makes my back ache, being the solid little wriggling lump he is. This mother was also so adamant she was doing the right thing that she had a pop at working mothers, believing that any detachment whatsoever from your child is harmful. Again this woman seemed to have zero tolerance for anyone not doing things the way she did.

As always when I watch or read something about how other mothers do things I was left wracked with guilt and depression. Have I done everything wrong? Would my children be worse off for having me as a mother?

I think it’s great that some women don’t use nappies, and that some women breastfeed so long. It’s even great to eat your placenta if that’s what you want to do, I wouldn’t eat it because I don’t like offal, but that is just personal taste (and I do draw the line at the umbilical cord charm, I don’t care how pretty it is when the veins catch the light), and I certainly wouldn’t judge any other mother for the choices they make. Overall I think all mothers are brilliant in their own way. But what makes me so angry and frustrated is the way many mothers, some of these included, are so adamant their way is the right way that they slag off anyone doing it different to them.

There is no right way of being a good mum. Being a good mother does not mean breastfeeding or formula feeding, it has nothing to do with staying at home or going back to work, and just because you eat your placenta does not a good mother make. A good mother answers their children’s needs, does what she can to keep her kids and everyone around her happy, but is also flexible, in that she can adapt to the changing needs of her children, realise that she doesn’t always get it right and be open to new ideas.

We all want to do the best for our kids. We all want to be excellent mothers, but the fact is ALL mothers fuck up their kids to some degree, however “good” we think we are, it’s just a matter of how much. And we won’t know that until they grow up and look us in the eye, or not.

Keep it simple

The first ever grown-up self-help book I owned was purchased aged 19, when I was first venturing into the world of work and finding it hard to juggle housework, levels of “stuff” and becoming an adult and having to do things like buying my own stamps. It was a massive book, Dorling Kindersleys K.I.S.S (Keep it simple series) Organising Your Life. It was very informative, full of new and exciting ways to write to-do lists, then organise tasks according to priority and time needed, in number and letter format. The irony of such a huge tome described as “Keep it simple” containing an incredibly complicated format just to write a few things down was completely lost on me in those days. But I was reminded of that book this week after a conversation with Big Bro.

My big bro is a bit clever really. You learn a lot about someone when you grow up together, in fact he probably knows me better than anyone.  He has an admirable knack of pointing things out to me in a way that I understand, without winding me up, getting me stressed or sounding like he’s putting me down. Like when he explained to me that my thought process is like a bomb going off, sending thoughts and ideas flying off in every direction, whereas many other people think in a more logical fashion. That little nugget has helped me out many a time when I have felt like no one really gets me.

And he’s gone and done it again. In a conversation we were having where I basically had a moan and said that I don’t have enough time to get half the things done I SHOULD do, let alone those I WANT to, and generally feeling a bit overwhelmed by life, he said “Look, you have a complicated life. What with the kids, housework, your blog, your baking, cooking, working out, and now your part time job… you don’t make life easy on yourself. Just try and keep things simple. You will probably find that life is much easier.” It was a light bulb moment, or an A-Ha moment if you are an Oprah fan (nothing to do with the 80’s pop band, whatever happened to them?).

I thought my good old bro had shown me a real revelation and couldn’t wait to discuss it fully, at length and in lots of detail with BFF (because that’s what girls do). So imagine my surprise when I discovered that this idea was apparently a common observation.

“Ohmigod bird, seriously at last. I’ve been trying to tell you that for, like, ever!”

“Really?”

“Yeah don’t you remember when you were insisting on making all your own bread because it made you feel like you were really providing for your family, AND it would save you £200 a year, and you were trying to do it at the same time as making Son 1’s complicated birthday cake, and I said just pop to Tesco and buy a loaf and you refused?” [I don’t have a bread maker so making my own bread was a bit of a mission]

“Er…”

“And the time you were visiting relatives and rather than just buy a bunch of flowers on the way there like other people, you insisted you just HAD to make them some cookies AND then make a gift bag out of coloured paper with a cellophane window to present them in?”

“Yeah but…”

“And then last week when son number one was going back to school the next day, and it was the first day of your new job, you decided that on top of everything else you needed to do that day you also had time to rip out the airing cupboard in the boys room?”

Hmmmm, I have to admit she had a point. The more I thought about it the more complicated I seemed to have made my life. I had 32 clementine in my fruit bowl, slowly getting more and more dried up and I fully intended to make most of them into 5 of Nigella’s clementine cakes (Nigella has great recipes for using up old fruit rather than throwing it away). Making the clementine cakes would involve 2 dozen eggs and over a kilo of ground almonds, another shopping trip, not to mention cost, mess and time, then what the hell would I have done with 5 clementine cakes anyway? My freezer is already full with last weeks batch cooking exercise (in order to stop me from having to cook every day I had a great idea to fill my freezer with homemade ready meals, meaning that I spent 3 days chained to the cooker, creating a huge amount of mess, plus the added stress of cooking up the sixty quids worth of meat I had purchased before it went off, on top of my normal - already did I mention pretty busy - life… simple? Erm, no).

So the last few days I have been trying, as much as possible, to keep it simple. No more getting up at 6am for an hour work out before the kids get up (meaning early nights, special trainers and more washing), I’m back walking son number one to school, and now son 2 to preschool too. An hour and a half of walking a day more than makes up for that hour of exercise.

Life is complicated. And there are some things that you just can’t change. Kids need constant care and attention, as do relationships, work is essential but most everything else is just trivial complication which we don’t need. Keep it simple.

The clementine’s went in the bin. Sorry Nigella.

This was my one hundredth post! J

I'm Back!

Happy New Year! Bet you wondered if I’d ever be back on the blog, well here I am. But don’t blame me for my long absence, blame the schools for only just going back. Jeez that felt like a long school holiday.

So we’re back proper and it’s all change. Son number 2 is now at preschool (God help them) and for the first time in five years I have two mornings a week when I don’t have to deal with nappies, jigsaw puzzles with three missing pieces (and the distress caused by said missing pieces) and incessant Fireman Sam on the telly (silence is golden, nothing but the whirr of a laptop, bliss).

It’s kind of weird being so free, but also exciting. I can now start looking at building a career of my own. I get bored easily and need a regular switch up to keep me motivated, 5 years in the same daily routine has been unheard of for me since my school days. So I need this. I need it so badly I am like a greyhound desperate to get out of the trap. But old habits die hard, and as desperate as I am to do something for ME and for MY career, I have to resist the urge to take the opportunity to do some uninterrupted housework (I have never been a good housekeeper so why try and change that now, square peg, round hole). I may get bored easily but that is why I love to write, the endless possibilities for new opportunities and in fiction at least, plenty of new characters to get to know. So here I am, writing, and looking for new ways that I can make a career of it (or at the very least entertain people and earn some cash).

I don’t believe in New Years Resolutions. Saying that you are going to start dieting on January the first or have your last fag at midnight is just a recipe for disaster if you ask me. There is still all the Christmas chocolate to get through (is it me or is there more and more chocolate every year? I feel like my childhood was virtually Dickensian in its lack of festive fayre, my kids practically have to wade through a sea of Roses just to get to the toilet) and frankly who wants to spend the last few hours of a party gagging for a fag? But I still love the feeling of newness you get from a New Year, and the endless possibilities for change. Which is why my New Year Resolutions last for an entire year. That is I make a decision that this is going to be the year I…

Last year it was this blog, Book (wine and moaning about men) Club, and getting fit. This year I will be building on last years triumphs but mostly focussing on my career, earning some cash and fun, fun, fun.

I worry I am getting boring in my old age. I have learnt however, that I need to accept my limits. Through a lifetime of trial and error I now know my limits are: 2 glasses of wine, one vodka tonic or just stick to the Appletize because my hangovers (and resulting shame) after any more than that are just not worth it. But I have a sneaking suspicion that I may be a bit of a Fun Bobby (those of you that don’t watch Friends – Fun Bobby was Monica’s boyfriend who turned out to be an alcoholic and was no longer fun when he stopped drinking) when it comes to alcoholic beverages. Maybe I’ve been drinking socially so long I have forgotten how to let myself go when I don’t drink? Maybe I need to work on my confidence.

So anyway, what can you expect from Write or Wrong I’m Doing It Anyway in 2012? Well, there are a few things I really want to try which I’m sure won’t escape comment on my blog (horseriding – it’s never too late to learn, pole dancing, ahem sorry pole FITNESS – ditto, and indoor rock climbing – you will never get me on the edge of a cliff but I kind of like the idea of those indoor rock walls, warmer and frankly, safer). 

The biggest challenge in life is not to stagnate; when you stagnate you may as well be dead. It’s so easy to let life pass you by because it seems too much hassle or too scary to change things. Trying new things and constantly looking for ways to change is the only way to keep things interesting. And if you don’t try new things, how can you know what you like and what you don’t like? What if it turns out I love riding in the countryside with the wind in my hair and a strong steed between my thighs (don’t be rude, I was being poetic)? If I’d never have tried it I’d never have known, and what a shame it would be to miss out on a lifetimes worth of something I love.

So my New Year’s Resolution this year is to try everything. Take all my opportunities and have some serious fun. Even on an Appletize (served in a wine glass because that makes you feel like you’re having a “proper” drink).

Happy New Year to you all, I wish you the very best in all your new endeavours.