newmummyblog

  • Daddy Blog: Why I Lie To My Kids

    Like all good parents, I encourage my children to always tell the truth. Well, the three year old, anyway. The baby doesn’t say much other than no, woof woof and no (again) so he’d be hard pushed to come up with a convincing lie. Especially as we don’t have a dog.

  • New Mummy Blog: Why I'm Sending My Son To Nursery

    When I had to choose child care for baby number one at 11 months old, I felt like I was performing the ultimate betrayal. How could I be handing her over into someone else’s arms, hardly bearing to give her tear-stained face a backward glance as I half-ran out the door to catch my train?

  • New Mummy Blog: Shopping With Children

    Eventually, appropriately attired (ish), the baby’s in the buggy and the toddler’s out the door and we’re ready to go. Upon arrival, the toddler protests when I say she can’t go in the trolley because I’m pushing the buggy and can’t push a trolley at the same time. Somehow I manage to steer buggy and toddler vaguely in the direction of the bakery aisle without too many collisions.

  • Daddy Blog: How I Lost Control Of My Castle

    They say an Englishman’s home is his castle. Whoever ‘they’ are, I’m guessing they don’t have kids. Because since mine came along, it’s become abundantly clear I’m not king of this castle. Not even close.

  • New Mummy Blog: Please Stop Judging Our Babies

    There’s an anti-SATS movement that’s gathering momentum at the moment, with parents and teachers across the land organising a ‘kids strike’ for the day of the exams in early May.

  • New Mummy Blog: Bowing To Birthday Party Pressure

    We have a big birthday looming. The big… three. Silly me, I didn’t realise that it was such a big deal, until the soon-to-be-three year old told me.

  • New Mummy Blog: When Your Laidback Baby Finds His Inner Drama Queen

    I’ve always been pretty grateful my second baby is my ‘easy’ baby. While number one wanted constant attention, constant holding, constant feeding, number two was happy to wait his turn, happy to entertain himself, happy to, well, just be happy.

  • New Mummy Blog: A Night Away From The Kids (Expectation Versus Reality)

    Expectation: You’ll be totally fine knowing they’re in the safe, experienced hands of their doting grandparents (they managed to keep you or your other half alive throughout your entire childhood after all). It probably won’t be read, but at least it’s distracting you from the niggling worry that your children will be having so much fun with the grandparents that they won’t even notice you’re gone. Expectation: You’re going to sleep and sleep and sleep.

  • New Mummy Blog: Things I Hide From My Kids

    They’re still only tiny but I try to be pretty open and honest with my children. I want them to grow up able to express themselves and how they feel comfortably and confidently. If they ask a tricky question, I’ll try and answer it.

  • Daddy Blog: A Dad's Guide To What Not To Say To Your Wife

    Engage brain then open mouth. It should be a simple enough mantra to follow, like mirrors, signal, manoeuvre, or no diving in the shallow end. They’re all pretty useful guidelines to staying alive.

  • New Mummy Blog: What Motherhood Means To Me

    It’s the little, everyday things that really sum up motherhood for me. They might not be the biggest or the most obvious, but they’re real life:Being more excited about how excited my daughter will be when she sees her Snow White costume for World Book Day than I’ve ever been about anything I’ve worn myself. Except my wedding dress. Possibly. It’s a close call.

  • New Mummy Blog: The Things I Never Knew Before I Had Kids

    Little people are full of surprises. The things I’ve learned since having kids aren’t limited to how to cut tiny fingernails, disguise veg in a pasta sauce or recite We’re Going On A Bear Hunt from memory.

  • New Mummy Blog: We're Under Instapressure To Be The Perfect Mum

    It’s entertained me through long, sleepless nights with a newborn, kept me connected with friends I don’t get to see as often as I’d like anymore and welcomed me with open arms into the mums-of-Instagram community. This community is made up of some wonderful, savvy and hilarious mum bloggers/grammers whose pearls of wisdom and honest #parentingfails save my day, and my sanity, on an all too regular basis.

  • New Mummy Blog: Same Word, Different Meaning

    Sometimes it feels as though I have had to learn another language to navigate my way through life with two small children.

  • New Mummy Blog: The Art Of Toddler Negotiations

    In a house in the full and sticky grip of the terrible twos, getting out the door on time is a power struggle, not a morning routine.

  • New Mummy Blog: The Best Advice I Can Give

    I received an email the other day from one of my closest friends, currently pregnant with her first child, asking for baby-related recommendations. Naturally, I promptly started compiling a mental list of the products, gadgets and hacks that I would have been lost without.

  • Daddy Blog: A Warning For All Dads of Girls

    I’m a dad of two: one girl and one boy. Both barely more than babies - she’s two, he’s one (yes, we’ve got our hands full; yes we did know what we were doing) - so I’m no expert by any means. But there are a few things I’d like to share on the subject of raising a daughter.

  • New Mummy Blog: Playgroup Rules For Parents

    It’s Wednesday morning and I’m sitting cross-legged on the dusty floor of a cold and slightly smelly church hall surrounded by approximately 30 kids, all under the age of four and all belting out I Had A Little Turtle at full volume.

  • New Mummy Blog: The Great Nature Nurture Battle

    I am raising a little princess. A mermaid princess most days, but actually any Disney princesses will do. Belle, Snow White, Rapunzel, and Elsa of course - they all get their moment of glory.

  • New Mummy Blog: Why I Cried On My Son's First Birthday

    On my child’s first birthday I woke up and burst into tears.

  • New Mummy Blog: Why Life Is Pretty Good For My Second Baby

    There’s one thing I would change about my pregnancy with my second child. Actually, there are lots of things I’d change - the morning sickness that continued right up to two days before giving birth, the sciatica, the insatiable cake craving, the feet so swollen only flip flops would do (in December). But these are just part and parcel of the magic that is growing a new human. Totally unpleasant but totally utterly worth it.

  • New Mummy Blog: The Worst Things I've Bought For My Kids

    My Frozen-obsessed toddler has an Elsa nightdress that she adores. There was the teeny tiny snow globe, perfectly child sized, complete with the teeny tiny and ever so cute bunny enclosed in glass. It’s so heavy it could probably knock me out cold with one blow, never mind the baby, who often gets precariously close when the toddler is acting out Let It Go.

  • Daddy Blog: How Being A Dad Has Changed Me

    I have a friend who prides himself on not changing his life in any way when he had a kid.

  • New Mummy Blog: My Children's New Year Resolutions

    It’s the first day of the year and already it feels like the baby and toddler have colluded to produce a long list of new year resolutions. And none of them are parent friendly.

  • New Mummy Blog: All My Kids Want For Christmas

    It’s more than just their two front teeth, apparently.

  • New Mummy Blog: Four Reasons Why Children And Christmas Don't Mix

    There is nothing more tempting to an almost-one-year-old than a twinkling, glittering Christmas tree with an assault course of presents underneath. Pretty it’s not but at least they’re not drawn into an endless game of cat and mouse with the baby for the 12 days of Christmas and beyond.