When Max was tiny, I thought parenting a newborn must surely be the hardest thing in the entire world. The sleepless nights. The constant worry that I was going to do something wrong, and, I don't , know, break him, somehow. The reflux. Oh my holy hell, THE REFLUX. So, it was ...
As we all enjoyed our day at Auchingarrich Wildlife Centre in Perthshire so much, as soon as we got home, Terry and I started looking for somewhere similar - but a little closer to home - to help us in our ongoing mission to keep Max entertained and out of ...
One night last week, Terry and I decided to take Max for a walk down to the playpark at the bottom of our street, and, on the way home, Terry made a comment about how much busier the street will feel once the ongoing building work is finally done. (Oh yeah: ...
Last weekend, Max officially turned 18 months old, and I turned 172. Or that's what it feels like, anyway. A year-and-a-half of parenthood has both passed in a flash, and crawled by so slowly I've sometimes wondered if time was going backwards. It feels like just a few weeks since I ...
Before I had Max, I often used to hear people talked about 'baby brain' - a kind of extreme absent-mindedness apparently brought on by pregnancy and birth. "That's not a real thing," I thought, with all of the confidence of someone who had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. ...
He didn't have to have the surgery. I can't even begin to tell you how relieved I am. I mean, I'm going to TRY, obviously, because I'm me, and I'm wordy, but well, let's just say I wouldn't have been remotely surprised if I'd woken up this morning and discovered my ...
Yesterday morning I had a ton of stuff to do, so Terry volunteered to take Max to a toddler playgroup he'd heard about in the village, while I got myself ready for the day. He'd told me they'd be out for at least an hour, so when I got out ...
(*Not actually true.) (*Close, though.) So. we're having a fantastic time here in central Florida, and not even the weird splotches of fake tan on my foot can dampen my enthusiasm for being back in a place where it's sunny all the time, and the local ZARA is open until 11pm every ...
One of the things that has been abundantly clear to Terry and I since Max came along is that days out with toddlers are not the same as the days out we had before. By way of illustration, here are some photos of a trip we took to Hopetoun House ...
Picture it... ... we've just got back to Eagle Brae after a day's adventuring, and, as we get out of the car, we suddenly realise there's a whole family of deer standing right outside our cabin, almost as if they'd been waiting there to meet us. (Well, I'm assuming they were a ...
In retrospect... ... I should probably just have titled this post 'Things I Think at Soft Play', shouldn't I? Because there can't be THAT many other parents out there worrying that they'll be attacked by a bunch of angry plumbers when they leave, can there? Like, two or three AT MOST, ...
In the end, it wasn't loneliness that made me do it - or even the belief that it was essential for Max's development. No, it was plain, old-fashioned boredom. Boredom, I think, is one of those things you're not really supposed to admit to as a parent: in fact, the received ...
Earlier this week, I posted one of those 'Ask Me Anything' widgets over on Instagram Stories, and one of the questions I got was something I've been thinking about quite a bit lately: What are your thoughts on baby groups? Do you go to any with Max? So, here's the thing: I ...
This January, for the first time in as long as I can remember, I'm starting the new year without a fancy new planner, a pile of fresh notebooks, and a long list of goals. It's not because I don't want any of those things, I hasten to add. Don't worry, this ...
Like putting up a Christmas tree and going to Disney World, taking Max to meet Santa Claus was another one of those things Terry and I assumed we wouldn't bother doing until Max was old enough to be able to understand/appreciate exactly what was happening. "We'll be totally laid back parents," ...