Spectacularly Bad Parenting Advice

Buffet Parenting The amount of spectacularly bad parenting advice out there is astonishing. When I was pregnant with my first child and then a mother of a tiny baby, I would carefully gobble up any morsel of parenting advice. A lot of the time, I would greedily devour most of what I read or was told as I was mostly

You Know You Have a Toddler When Blog Post - Eloise 2nd Birthday

You Know You Have a Toddler When You Say These Things

Happy 2nd Birthday, Eloise “Eloise, please, for the last time, get your head out of the toilet.” As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I realise my baby daughter has grown up. I now have a toddler. This new stage in Eloise’s development means many things for me as a parent. It means toilet training, hence the

Parenting Cliches Blog Post - Nearly Five Dylan

Parenting Clichés are SO Irritating!

The Days are Long But the Years are Short Tomorrow, my gorgeous son Dylan will turn five years old. Where have the past five years gone? He has grown up before my eyes. I can’t believe how fast time has flown. I can’t believe my first-born baby is five years old already. I can’t believe I am stating all the

Turns Everything Blog Post - Shopping Trolley

Having Kids Turns EVERYTHING on its Head

The ‘Now Scary’ List A couple of months ago, my four-year old, Dylan and I were in the car and just about to back out of the garage to go for a quick trip to the supermarket. My almost two-year old was all the way upstairs, with her Daddy. Except she wasn’t. I don’t know why I got out

Husband Blog Post - Andrew and Eloise on Beach

My Husband Would Rather You Didn’t Read this Blog Post

February The shortest month of the year has just been and gone. With both Valentine’s Day and my husband’s birthday nestled in February it is a month where a focus on Andrew, our relationship and love seems unavoidable. Uniquely Mr. S I fell in love with Andrew a long time ago but have found over the years many of

Jumping out of a Plane Blog Post - Julie Skydive 1

What I Learned from Jumping out of a Plane

Similarities Jumping out of a plane is a lot like giving birth – it is an overwhelming sensory experience, it is painful (not physically, just on the wallet), and in both instances you ask yourself ‘what the heck was I thinking?’ The Top 40 Bucket List A tandem skydive was the very last activity in my year of ticking

NANOWRIMO Blog Post - Julie the Writer at a Cafe

Surprising Lessons from NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo – No, it’s Not a Rude Word I have just written ‘The End’ on the first draft of my very first novel. I wrote it during National Novel Writing Month. This is a mouthful so it gets abbreviated to NaNoWriMo, which really is only slightly less of a mouthful. Each year, in November, thousands of writers all around the

Family Language Blog Post - Money Dollars

My Family’s Secret Language

The Conk When I was growing up, in our family, the third game or round we played to work out the overall winner – if for example I won one and my sister one the other – was called ‘The Conk’. Yes, ‘The Conk’. I guess it is some shortened form of conqueror but I don’t really know and I

What Kind of Parent Am I?

Personal Labels Over the years I have taken a number of personality and behavioural surveys and profiles. You too may have done some of these at work or as part of a team building exercise or perhaps on a lazy afternoon when flicking through an old Cosmo magazine. Here are some of my results: Myers Briggs: ISFJ DISC: C and