Parenting

New mums get so much advice. Sometimes it's useful. Other times it's just uncalled for. Here are the top 9 things I would tell any new mum. Get out of the house by yourself or with a friend ASAP I believe that taking my daughter out to lunch with my sister in law when she was less than a week old helped me in the long run. It prepared me to get her ready to be somewhere that didn’t have a time limit so that I knew what I needed when I did have a time limit. It made it [...]

I had a few unusual family traditions growing up. It was a family tradition that my mum worked on Christmas day. And now that I’m 31, she still works Christmas day. My brother and I used to race against each other to “pinch, punch, first of the month". Our family vacations consisted of going to my nan’s house in the country a few times a year. Sure we had big family holidays. But they were never overseas. And they were only every four or so years. Creating family traditions But now that I am a parent, I have an idea [...]

Please stop asking me when I’m going to have another child. It’s really none of your business. But because you insist on asking me, I come up with something that sounds gracious. I’d never tell them my real answer. When we found out we needed assistance to have a child I made a promise to myself that I would never ask anyone when they were going to have a child or if they were going to have another one. Maybe they have experienced infertility. Maybe they have experienced a loss. Maybe they chose not to have children. It really is [...]

Birthday season is upon me and the majority are first birthdays. Between friends, family & parents group, there are about 10 in the span of 2 months, not including my own daughter. On top of all the first birthdays, I also have my mother in law’s birthday, my mothers birthday and my husband is turning 30. Then after all of those, it's Christmas! So what do you even get for a one-year-old? I’m sure they have enough clothes. I’m positive they don't need any more toys. And if they are anything like my daughter, are happy to play with the [...]

Years ago a friend of mine used to always update her Facebook status with a long list of mundane things that she had done for the day. Vacuumed, mopped the floors, changed the bed sheets, washed the towels, washed two loads of clothes, folded all the clothes and put them away, mowed lawn etc. You get the picture. Sometimes posts like that appeared several times a day, each time with new things added to the list. She thought she was a super mum. And I get it now. Now that I am a mum, the household chores often fall by [...]