Category: Uncategorized
4,000 reasons not to ski with young kids.
Once upon a time there was a young girl who threw her salopettes and factor 50 lip balm into a case and gallivanted around the Alps on skis. She was always on the first lift up – keen as mustard. Trendy head band teamed with a minor headache just creeping into her consciousness- a satisfying memory of dancing until dawn because: Apres ski.
Not a run was left un-carved. Well perhaps the blacks and maybe most reds…
Ahem: Not a blue run was left un-ploughed.
Oh the crisp fresh air in ones lungs, mountain passes chalked up.
***
Fast forward ten years: That young girl is now part of a knackered couple who decided to take their darling treasure-chests skiing…
“Won’t it be dreamy! Snugged up with hot choc, a roaring fire, snow capped mountains!” This Middle-age insta-porn swam around my head.
“The girls will build snowmen! They will learn to ski… Maybe they will be naturals” I mused. “And one day they will be ski-champions, all because we took them from such a young age!”
How clever we are being!
Clever is one word for it. If by clever we were infering ‘stable genius’.
Rounding up our kids to go to the supermarket is challenge enough; let along navigating our way around a mountain range in search of ski schools loaded up like abomanble snow-donkeys.
- Four crash helmets.
- Four (Razor sodding sharp) pairs of skis.
- Four pairs of poles to go with those skis: That’s EIGHT meter long poles people.
- Four jackets (it was 23+ degrees most days and jackets were redundant after 10am).
- Two backpacks filled with enough snacks to fuel an Alaskan out-post for an entire season, possibly two.
All the while clapping one foot infront of the other in the worst creation imposed upon the human race: the snow boot.
We sweated and stumbled our way to the gondola each morning to a chorus of “WE HATE SKI SCHOOL”.
Super.
Sounds clever so far?
Oh yes, we were feeling very clever as the sweaty panic swept over us when it became horrifyingly apparent that I was going to have to ski down four runs with a two-year-old between my legs to get to the damn-ski-school (God bless Ski-School).
At one point I had a back pack on, two helmets clipped and hanging from each hip, snow ploughing down a green. My non-toned, unprepared thighs burned quite unlike anything my gym-phobia being had experienced before.
Every fibre of my sorry-for-itself body was asking me W.H.Y was I straddling one child whilst dragging the other on the end of a pole, along a slushy white cold path… I was the very definition of a
w i d e l o a d.
Alpine-chic.
This was neither elegant or clever.
“At least the girls learnt a new skill – what fun!” friends asked.
The three-year-old tried to master skiing along a gradient of 2 degrees. And try she really did. With her helmet which sloped off the back of her head, a coat the swallowed her whole and my sunglasses. Because we forget hers.
She absolutely rocked those aviators.
This one time, in the eye-of-ski-hell, Dan and I took Darcie on a green slope. Easy! Just the three of us!
“Take a video! Take a photo!”
More like:
“Stay fucking upright and don’t loose the kid.”
It turns out a six-year-old needs a little more practice. Who knew!
Oh the fun we had uncrossing her skis and twisting her body back into a slightly more humane angle.
But, those child free moments, that 1.5 hours of ski time we carefully measured out each day were a joy.
I don’t want to go Karl Pilkington on you, I’m a positive person…
However our alpine-sprint to the lift from ski school was a hyperventilating shoop shoop of Michelin-man neon.
Cries of “Have we got time to go again?”
“That was over too quickly!”
And
“My legs! My fu*king legs!!”
What legs?! Apparently ten years makes quite a difference to ones flexibility, staminia and ability to control a ski at the end of each foot.
Fancy, we spent all of this wonga to make ourselves unimaginably, inexplicably exhausted. On top of the usual Parent eye-bags.
By the end of the ‘holiday’ my husband and I looked as though we had walked to the north pole.
Sill want to have a go?
- Do ski in ski-out and save yourself the click-clack horror of juggling your ample equipment, equipment that doesn’t come with handy carry handles, and cannot be hung on the invisible snow-buggy.
- Book with a company which collect the kids for ski club from your door. In my fantasies these exist… Mark Warner must have thought of this.
- Be fully catered. We were, and it was blissful. My Hanger was kept well at bay and it was by far my favourite bit of each day!
Shut the front door: 2017
I’ve just sent off ToddlerMonster’s ‘big school’ application.
It’s the last thing I will do with any coherent sense this year.
I didn’t consciously leave it until the dying monuments of the year before I hit send, but now I come to think about it, it’s fairly fitting to be sailing out of the year with a school place on the horizon. *Wishes teaching profession Bon chance*
The school-app thing has given me a little nudge to pause my shorthand exam revision and tap away to you for the very last time this year.
It’s an odd thing studying as a Muma; I have my first shorthand exam next week, and revision passages and exercises are taking up as much of my time as I can parentally justify.
So far this morning I have had several study breaks.
And Not to watch Neighbours like the good old uni days.
-I’ve continued my good work as toilet assistant.
-Created a sylvanian village, most notably developed a nursery extension.
-Ordered 500,000 paw patrol plates, napkins, cups, balloons and party bag alternatives in blind panic for The 4th Birthday next week.
-Prayed it will arrive in time.
-Pinned several paw patrol cakes that I don’t have a hope in hell of replicating.
Before journo-school broke up for Christmas we all quizzed our tutor on shorthand exam scenarios:
“what if someone sneezes and we miss a bit of the audio?”
“What if a police car goes by and the sirens drown out the passage we are taking down?”
But at no time did anyone ask, “What if 2 under 7’s streak through the classroom screeching “IT’S MINE, IT’S MINE, DON’T BITE ME”.
No one asked that.
And I can tell you, if that happens during the exam, then I go this.
My kids have me prepped.
An atomic bomb could go off and I’m fairly confident I will not take a blind bit of notice.
2017 has been totally bonkers and for once it’s been that way not just because I am keeper of small people.
I set off the year hoping beyond hope that I might get my writing published somewhere, anywhere.
Hoping that this might be the year I try to make a path parallel to parenting.
ToddlerMonster’s school application was looming and I wanted to set myself up for a life of writing after the full-on full-time parenting was somewhat assisted by the 9am-3pm world.
I get a bit giddy, you know, that excited pukey-pit of your stomach feeling, when I consider that I might actually pull that off.
It’s becoming more believable that one day I may just be paid to write.
And have a J O B.
Doing something that I don’t resent.
Doing something that I… kind of love.
Signing up to start my NCTJ Diploma in Journalism was a total leap of faith.
It feels quite mad to write this but as I sit here in the dying hours of 2017 I can say that I now regularly write for a newspaper, host a news show on the radio, and help out at a flipping massive radio station along side a truly inspirational journalist.
I honestly have to pinch myself.
(However, I am also still a terrible cook. I offered my husband a ‘fresh’ pizza from the freezer last week. I set fire to my kitchen last month, and continue to be unable to drive in heels. – We can’t tick all of the boxes can we now…)
Lidl’s ‘random’ aisle used to be the most unpredictable, exciting part of my week.
It’s surreal and I’ll be honest, the juggling act between wannabe-journo and Muma is incredibly tough.
The logistics of child care, alone, are mind blowing.
I had no idea what working parents were going through until now.
But 2017 has shown me that one thing’s for sure: It’s ok to be a parent AND go after a dream.
There’s room for both.
Just about.
As long as you have an understanding nursery.
And fantastic family and friends.
God only knows what 2018 has in store:
I think I’m ready.
Hang on, I’m not sure…
I want to be the Mum that let’s them decorate the tree
The trouble is…
I love my perfectly perfect pastel themed Christmas tree.
With soft lighting- you know, the glowey yellowey kind.
Carefully chosen tree trinkets hang at equidistant intervals, the pale pink is never next to a pale gold, is never next to a pale silver.
You feel me?
Yup, I’m basically Monica Geller come December 1st.
This has become a problem since having the kiddliwinks.
Because
I want to be the Mum that lets them decorate the tree.
Honestly I do.
That Mum that endorses excessive use of Tinsel inbetween the homemade Santa hat and snowman masterpieces a la nursery school.
But I love my pastel hew.
I love clearing away the family photo frames on the top of the mantel piece and selecting which of my over-priced, over-sized wreathey long foliagey things should take pride of place that year.
I want to be the Mum who, as Sarah of Unmumsey famously put it, shouts: “The theme is Christmas!”
And it is.
-In the toy room, behind a nice big closed door.
I have learnt that Christmas is allowed to throw up its sickeningly tacky, heart wrenching sentimentality in this room.
We used to go over to ‘Granny’s’ as the girls came to call her, and Christmas-up her living room every year.
We loved it.
I think she loved it too.
Our toy room now has Granny’s tree in pride of place.
And on this tree goes all of the homemade offerings that have been painstakingly crafted, not at home, over the years.
Scraps of paper with stubby bits of cotton wool hanging on for dear life are shoved into the centre of the tree with all the precision and delicacy of a hammer-throw.
Constrictor style tinsel sucks the life blood from this psychedelic fire hazard, with baubles that spell out Harrods 2010 (how posh!) stick men Santas and too many clashing baubles for my brain to process:
Shiny Red next to sparkly red next to cracked red under red tinsel with some of that purple, foiley, whispy stuff statically-stuck to every.bloody.relic.
Lines and lines of coloured lights, some even in the shape of trees, struggle to shine through the offensive layers – wrapping Granny’s tree all up in a firefighter’s nightmare.
But.
I’ve grown to love letting the kids loose in this room.
Mostly because I can close the door on it.
But occasionally I gaze at it when the kids are in bed and think ‘this is what Christmas means to them.’
Colour, chaos, and no equidistance.
How it should be?
Probably.
But Christmas.
Unattainable ‘Magazine-shoot’ Christmas.
It doesn’t exist.
It’s happiness. It’s noise. It’s finding the green triangles have all been eaten when it’s finally your turn at the quality street.
It’s squeals of delight as hoards of Poundland tat slowly take over the lounge.
It’s cheap crackers and shoddy jokes. It’s queens speech and Slade.
It’s Merry December to us, the grow-ups: the overworked, knackered elves of Christmas.
What a beauty…
Pretty much the only review I will ever do for ‘stuff’
This is a one-off.
Which makes this a one-of-a-kind, if you will.
Because.
Christmas.
I like to get a head start on Christmas shopping. Which isn’t difficult seeing as you can sit a-la P.Jarm ‘n’ hot choc in hand, tap tapping away these days.
Ticking off those gifts one by one, without the threat of cold hands, rain-induced hair-frizz, and no moaning from my offspring as I drag them from shop to shop. Or worse – rushing around like a mother possessed to finish in time for school pick up.
No extortionate car park charges.
Need I go on about the merits of being a Sofa-Savvy-Shopper?
Probably not.
Mumas have all got this.
A few weeks ago I was approached by Personally Presented to choose something from their website and review it.
This couldn’t have been better timed.
You see, it was during my ‘list phase’ (everyone has a list phase, right?!).
Ordinarily I would have fired off a quick ‘Thanks but no thanks, I have zero time, I am training to be a journalist and am working many, many M A N Y hours for F R E E right now.’
But.
Oh the pretty things.
Oh… the one thing I desperately have been looking for. (‘Desperately’ might be a little OTT)
Was right there.
On their website.
(A really lovely, pretty and easy-to-use website.)
Jewellery boxes. Personalised jewellery boxes. Matching personalised jewellery boxes.
Anyone out there with daughters who share my pain if one of them should acquire an item (something important like, say, a jelly bean) and the other one doesn’t?
All hell lets loose.
They must have exactly.the.same Everything.
Or “It’s not F A I R” fills the air at grenade decibels.
I can’t handle that. So it’s matchy-matchy all round for us.
Anyway, back to the jewellery boxes…
Not twee. Not childish. But, not grown-up either.
My requirements were specific, but there were plenty of options to scroll through and choose from.
Glass ones. Painted ones. All could be personalised.
The website is a little like Not On The High Street actually, but it’s a family run business which I just think is rather nice.
There was free shipping, and as soon as my order was received I had a confirmation email, and then another when the boxes were dispatched.
I had them in my hand just two days later.
You can’t argue with that.
Beautiful quality, and matching – all but their names on the top.
A big tick for my gift list, and I really cannot wait to give them their special presents in a months time.
Keepsakes for their precious things.
Personally Presented have given me a code for you to get 10% off of your orders until the end of November, so put your (slouch-sock) feet up, cuppa in hand and add to cart a few personal gifties this Christmas.
Your10% off code: muma10 at Personally Presented
Enjoy!
Happy shopping! Xx
*This is a sponsored post and Muma on the Edge received goods in exchange for this review.
** If they had been awful goods I would have sent them back and not reviewed.
*** Therefore, this isn’t a load of BS.
Until you walk in her shoes…
It’s an undercurrent, it bubbles away just below the surface of society.
It rarely makes it’s way into coffee shop chat, actually it rarely makes it way into the darkest secret swap.
This word is loaded.
Fewer words can draw out as much emotion in us.
Abortion.
I am currently on my journalism ‘journey’.
Cringe if you must.
Our remit is to always be looking for stories:
Angles, mostly.
I came across a story last week: Ealing Borough council were to vote on granting an ‘exclusion zone’ otherwise known as, a Public Spaces Protection Order, around a Marie Stopes abortion clinic.
A group, Sister Support, had launched a petition which gathered thousands of signatures.
Crucially enough signatures to get the council to sit up and consider their wishes.
These wishes were simple.
Allow women seeking medical help the dignity and right to walk into the abortion clinic without being taunted by people chanting prayers outside the entrance.
Allegations of women being streamed on Facebook-live entering or leaving the clinic had been made. Being confronted by the protesters had left many patients of the clinic deeply upset.
For 20 years.
How many women, possibly wracked with confusion and despair, have had to walk past these protesters just to reach the treatment they are legally entitled too?
Come on Ealing. Make a stand.
Shocked over the images of these ‘chanting elders’ I felt the need to investigate on a more local level. On the south coast we have a clinic in Brighton and Eastbourne run by BPAS.
A charitable organisation.
I contacted their spokesperson and asked how important this exclusion zone is, and why it is needed.
The response was chilling.
Brighton was by far the most targeted of the two clinics. Placards baring images of aborted foetuses, shouting indignities, attempts to humiliate and ‘call out’ any woman who dare to cross their path.
Often the chanting of prayer and the shouting can be heard in the waiting rooms of these clinics.
Women who are vulnerable.
Women who are making one of the toughest decisions of their lives.
Do they deserve this?
Ealing council doesn’t think so.
They ruled in favour of implementing the exclusion zone on Tuesday, October 10.
A landmark decision that could, should, create a domino effect nationwide.
Not wanting to be unbalanced I also contacted Abort 67.
Abort 67 define themselves as being a ‘pro-life’ organisation who seek to educate women about abortion.
I wasn’t sure how I would feel speaking to someone who organises ‘Public Education Displays’ as they are so-called.
As a trainee Journalist and not yet a bonafide, experience-savvy Journo, I knew this would be a real test.
One must remain neutral.
I am merely reporting the facts.
Don’t get emotionally involved.
Their argument was surprisingly compelling. I listened while this passionate woman explained that her group see themselves as educators, and not protesters.
Abort 67 are filling an education-void by showing images and sharing information:
Abortion ‘The Untold Facts’.
Not quite a blockbuster.
Nonetheless it was fascinating listening to the other side of such an emotive argument.
With such conviction.
I asked what her thoughts were on the proposed exclusion zone around the Marie Stopes clinic in Ealing.
Citing ‘freedom of speech’ as one of her fundamental human rights in this country, she felt appalled that they may be silenced.
* * *
Abortion has been legal in this country since 1967.
Fifty years later, one clinic can now ensure that their patients can arrive in peace.
Free of judgement.
A fundamental human right?
This Muma Went To Court…
“I sentence you to 10 years imprisonment… Take him down!”
I shit you not, real life judges actually utter those words. Not just the ones off the telly box! Obviously those amongst us that have ever graced a court will be familiar with the Netflix-esq setting and those loaded setentenses which go hand in hand with the slightly overdone wood panelling.
I on the other hand,I am ‘just a mum’. I’ve never received the golden ticket calling me up for jury duty (as much as I have willed that summons to drop through the letter box – especially in those early years of motherhood. A legitimate break from Mumming? Yella.) I have never been naughty enough to find myself in the goldfish bowl of a dock, and never has it ever occurred to me to exercise my right to witness justice being done, to pop along to our local court and take a pew.
Until now of course.
Part of my journalism training is based around court room reporting. Basically learning what you can and can’t write. Pretty crucial as a little slip up could see this muma enjoying a child free break on the inside… (However tempting that might be during my kids’ rabid slagging matches mostly thanks to multiple Sylvanian family custody battles).
Well I wasn’t going to wait until our class were escorted to a magistrates court for a speeding find or the like. I thought I’d go in big guns: so last week I headed over to Crown Court.
Bold, right?!
This posed a number of issues; smart clothes were suggested on the website so I dug out my funeral coat and decided that putting on lip gloss was fundamentally ticking that ‘smart’ box.
The Crown court in our town has been there since the year dot. Wondering if I looked more Crim or barrister I asked the kindly security guards where I might find the ‘menu’ for the days proceedings. (Menu?! This isn’t the sodding Harvester! Why did I say that?! Running order, list, itinerary! Any of those would have better helped mask the blaitnet imposter syndrome plastered all over my face).
Anyway, I chose a court after being given the options like I was ordering a fry up:
“Well there’s a murder starting in Court A, a Sexual assault in court B, and if your quick you’ll catch the beginning of the rape trial in C!”
Christ.
Proper baddies, sorry, alledged baddies, were everywhere.
On the other side of what can only be described as the BFG’s mahogany double door was one of the most elaborate court room movie sets I’ve ever seen. Men in wigs, dark wood panelling, ladies in wigs, a Judge, capes, and a mahoosive glass dock right in the middle of it all. With an alledged baddie inside.
This is probably the right time to tell you that I love drama. A drama magnet if you will. I love nothing more than ‘information sharing’ with my friends, and getting the inside scoop on anything I can.
Suddenly here I was, hearing the ultimate secret.
The usher of the court did give me a slight death stare, but we quickly moved passed that as I asked her 101 questions during the ‘rise’ (when the judge left to hang out in his chamber, how Game of Thrones of him!)
My jaw dropped as the judge summarised this particular man’s crimes (this was a quickie before the main trail of the day, stack ‘m high…) He described how this alledged baddie had injured another so badly that the victim would need care for the rest of his life. How not only had he committed this crime and pleaded guilty (which he got a pat on the back for), he offered no explanation as to why he stabbed another, and showed no remourse.
The accused just stood there in a hoodie, slouched to one side when the judge asked him to stand for sentencing. How could a fellow human be that evil?
He had not one member of his family there, not one friend. What must his mother think!
No one else watched him get sentenced to 10 years inprisonment. I was the only joe bloggs to see him meet his fate that morning.
I felt sick. (Point taken that I need to harden up before I take to the press bench!).
I just couldn’t believe my eyes. Or ears.
I watch endless crime programs, a good court room drama is always a particular favourite of mine. But this was real life. I wasn’t wrapped up in my blankly with my old slippers on the sofa. This baddie’s next 10 years was being served up right in front of me.
I did spot the judge notice my astonishment. I have been blessed (?!?) with THE most expressive of faces.
Nothing is hidden amongst my fine lines and acne scars. Which is a major problem when playing poker. Or in court…
As fast as he was taken down (literally, they took him down the stairs in the dock!) and the barristers switched over it was time for another. In walked the next one. Up to the dock he went. And another after him.
It occurred to me that I wouldn’t be hard pressed to find a story in these parts.
I saw a jury sworn in. They looked just like the jury from broadchurch. How realistic I thought!
***
The school playground that afternoon felt like willy wonker’s chocolate factory by comparison.
Fluffy marsh mellows floated past as innocent giggles wafted by.
And then the toddler daughter started to demand a third snack whilst we waited in the drizzle, and cried when I couldn’t produce a rabbit out of a hat. My school daughter cried becasue it was ballet day for toddler daughter. Toddler daughter didn’t want to go to ballet either.
I put on my best judge voice, and marched them up the road – still in my funeral coat.
I went back for more the following day. .
“Did you eat popcorn there Muma?”
“No darling, I barely breathed”
