When you raise kids with someone, I guess it’s pretty obvious that there has to be an element of “team playing” in the role. I’m not talking about being consistent with behaviour, or praise, or whatever – I’m on about the more back-to-basics stuff. The DOING stuff. The bits of being a parent and living in a house that are vital, but often overlooked because they’re just so, well, OBVIOUS.

When I first became a mum I was on maternity leave for a year. The first part of the year was all newborn baby sleep deprivation, adjustment and trying desperately to get out to meet other mums. The second part of the year was all about setting up a new direction in my career, building a portfolio so I could start freelancing. 

Within that year, we made some pretty massive changes to our roles on this “team” we’d created.

The (self-proclaimed) Northern Love Machine was the one “bringing home the bacon”, so to speak, and I did much of the stuff at home. But when I started working again we needed to reassess how we did things. I just didn’t have the time to do ALL the washing, ironing, cleaning, cooking, shopping, toilet scrubbing alongside work AND raising a tiny baby. That was when the NLM started doing more around the house and looking after Frog for periods on his own, so I could crack on and get some work done.

We haven’t always got it right though. There have been times when we’ve both felt unappreciated and over-worked, downtrodden and taken for granted. I’ve written before about feeling annoyed that everything with the house always seemed to fall to me, just because I was a woman. It’s a subject that has come up again, since then, but I think it’s generally because (like me) the NLM is often so busy, he just doesn’t realise stuff needs doing.

The last couple of months have seen another shift in our roles on the team. Before the summer, I was out of the house for work by 4.30am Monday to Friday, meaning the NLM did the whole morning routine before he went off to do a full day teaching kids in a secondary school. Over the summer the routine changed again when I left that job, we relocated 200 miles away, and the NLM was on school holidays. Recently, I’ve been readjusting to working from home again and doing the lion’s share of the house stuff. The NLM’s new job means he’s out of the house by 7.15am most days and doesn’t get back until gone 6pm most nights. He spends evenings planning lessons, marking and preparing for the next day of teaching.

Up until last weekend I was starting to feel that familiar pit of resentment in my stomach. I still had work to do, but was having to juggle it alongside all my other responsibilities as a mum.

The NLM’s long work hours mean I do the morning and the night routine. I do tea time and all the washing and cooking. It’s up to me to fill in forms for pre-school and make sure Frog has a packed lunch to take with her. I do the ironing, the cleaning and make sure the fridge is stocked and the meals are planned. I spend afternoons crafting or running around the park or getting out the play dough with my three year old. Come 7pm, I am exhausted, but that’s when the second part of my working day begins, when I fire up the laptop and get typing.

It didn’t feel like much of a team, to be honest.

But then, on Friday night the NLM and I had a chat. “I have a huge deadline on Monday morning and I can’t get all my work done in just the evenings this weekend”, I told him. So, at 10.30am on Saturday morning I trundled up the stairs and locked myself in the office until 10pm that night. Meanwhile, the NLM got out the poster paints, the play dough, the glue and made a trip to the supermarket. On Sunday, we swapped. I took Frog to the beach, cooked a roast, did the washing and put her to bed while the NLM worked.

While weekends are important for family time, sometimes it’s just not possible to fit an activity in that we do all together. From an outside perspective we were very separate all last weekend but, actually, I can’t remember the last time our role as a “team” worked so well.

How do you work as a team in your house? Do you have set roles and responsibilities within the home?

The post How do you define “team player” as a parent? appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

It’s been an incredibly fun, challenging, inspiring, exhausting 18 months – and I don’t regret one second.

Learning to juggle what is effectively two full time jobs (I’m self-employed) alongside motherhood, a relationship with my husband, seeing my friends, drinking wine and waving a wet-wipe at the dust in my house has been – at all times – eye-opening.

I’ve experienced the tiredness that can only come with getting up at 3.45am every morning, commuting 45 minutes to work, coming home, looking after a demanding toddler, working until 10.30pm and doing it all again the next day. And I’ve survived. More than survived actually – I’ve enjoyed it.

People who work in radio often joke that “there’s nothing like radio”. Truth is, when I left my permanent job in radio to go on maternity leave with my little bundle, I didn’t really miss it. I had achieved all the challenges I set myself in that job and I was ready for a new phase in my life.

It wasn’t until I started covering as a freelancer that I caught the (so-called) “radio bug” again. I remembered what it feels like to suddenly look at the clock and realise you’ve spent four hours laughing and chatting without even realising it. I remembered how good it is to make people feel happy, simply by talking about something or playing a tune on the radio. I was hooked again.

It’s a great medium to work in and I’m sure I’ll miss the daily banter and the ridiculous things I got up to while in the studio. But I’m ready for a change. I’m ready to take life at a bit more of a “normal” pace and discover evenings with my husband again.

I’m not saying that’s it for me and radio. The door is not closed. I still love it and I know I’ll go back. I’m lucky enough to have worked as a presenter, journalist, researcher and producer in my career so far, and I know I’ll return to one of these roles again in the future.

But, for now, I’m going to concentrate on my other work projects that will see me writing and editing full time, from home. I’m going to enjoy taking my toddler to nursery myself, before settling her into a new pre-school in our new home 200 miles away in Devon. I’m going to just be, without the rushing from one thing to another at 100 miles an hour.

When you’re self-employed, it’s easy to take on every project that’s thrown at you. And when you have a financial target in mind, it’s easy to forget to give yourself a bit of breathing space. I don’t want to make that mistake so, for now, I’m setting my sights on a couple of pretty huge and exciting writing projects, which I will be working on from home.

Oh – and I also have the small task of finding a temporary home to rent for the next few months while we buy a house in the idyllic corner of Devon that we have set our heart on.

Wish me luck – I think I’m going to need it!

The post From Radio Mum to WAHM appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

When I was pregnant I lost count of the number of times I came across a certain myth. “Your career ends when you become a mum” was right up there with “babies sleep through the night by the age of six months” and “if your tummy sticks out at the front, you’re definitely carrying a boy”.

I became pregnant with my daughter when I was 26 years old. It was a planned pregnancy, despite what many people assumed. I was not married. We did not have a mortgage. I had not reached the “right” stage in my career to “take a baby break”.

But we wanted a family and it felt like the right time to create one.

I knew then that I still had things I wanted to achieve in my working life. But I also knew that wouldn’t change when I became a mum.

I still worried though. With every raised eyebrow at my swollen belly and, “But it’s still so early in your career to have a baby break” I worried. I didn’t have a rigid plan. There was no definite timetable of what I had to achieve by a certain age.

When my daughter was born I looked at her and knew the world had changed. Former priorities crashed away from me. Everything else melted but her.

That ambition to get to national news by the age of 30? That no longer seemed like the high point of happiness. I still wanted to achieve, but I knew the thing I wanted to get right more than anything else was being this child’s mum.

And that leads me to where I am now.

When Frog was nine months old I decided not to return to my former job. With the benefit of space, I realised I’d done everything I wanted to do in my three years in that role. I was ready for something else.

Having time away from work doing new things helped me see other opportunities I was blind to before. Becoming a mum actually opened doors to avenues of work I had never really considered.

And so it was my baby that spurred me on. Still is.

I started a blog, started pitching to editors, started getting commissions for writing work. I spent many long nights building up a portfolio, hitting brick walls, trying to make new contacts.  I did interviews while my baby slept and wrote and wrote and wrote. But that wasn’t enough. I started contacting other radio stations. I had meetings. I booked myself for nearly three weeks of shifts without a day off, right up to the day before my wedding.

The responsibility that came with being a mum and providing for my daughter was enough to light the flames of ambition once again.

Now I want to achieve for her AND me. Any work that’s going to take me away from spending time with her has to be both fruitful AND rewarding, otherwise what’s the point?

I think I have more ambition now than I ever did pre-baby. I have a drive to succeed, to show her what a woman can do if she wants. I have the freedom to know that if it doesn’t work out then it doesn’t matter, because being her mum is the most important job I will ever have. And that is liberating.

It’s that drive that gets me out of bed at 3.30am every day. It gets me through the commute when most people are still asleep. It keeps me up late writing and pitching new ideas and setting up meetings with new clients. It stops me taking any job for granted.

And you know what? I NEVER had this urge to get on when I wasn’t a mum. I was ambitious, yes. But I couldn’t have coped on 5 hours sleep a night. I couldn’t have been so efficient with my time. I couldn’t have been so resourceful.

I know I won’t always work these long hours. One day there may be more children. But I do know one thing: the hopes of your working life don’t HAVE to fade when you become a parent.

In fact, for some, parenthood will signify the beginning.

Me, being jumped on by my toddler.

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Some mornings I’m jolted awake by the 3.30am alarm call for work and my head screams don’t get up yet – just one more minute!

The exhaustion of the early starts, the long afternoons entertaining my beautiful but fearsome toddler and the evenings writing have taken their toll. There have been moments when I’ve thought I can’t stretch any further – and then I do.

The car breaks down on the motorway at 4.30am – stretch./ It needs scrapping – stretch./ I have 24 hours to find a new car – stretch./ The new car breaks down on the motorway at 4.30am – stretch./ It’s fixed, yet breaks again on the motorway at 4.30am – stretch./ The toddler gives up sleep – stretch./ A client asks for just one more thing at the last minute – stretch.

And then the elastic snaps.

I have a chest infection at the moment. It’s the miserable jolt I needed.

I can’t go on like this, trying to be Super Woman or Super Mum or Super Whoever. I’ve lost proportion of the things that matter in my life. The reason I’m working up to 70 hours a week. The people I am working this hard for.

My family.

So over the last five days, I’ve taken a step back. I’ve drunk in Every. Single. Moment with my chatty girl. We’ve played and laughed and read stories together. I’ve even got the paints out.

I’m determined not to miss out on this time in my daughter’s life. I’m determined to appreciate her and actually enjoy spending time with her, rather than absent-mindedly scattering a few pieces of a jigsaw puzzle on the floor or half listening to her 2 year old jabber as I prepare supper.

And since turning my phone to silent and not checking my emails every second I’ve found a huge release in pressure.

It helps in every area of life; as I give more of myself to Frog, I feel less guilty about leaving her to do a job I love. As I feel less guilty about doing a job I love, I enjoy it more – and do a better job. And so it goes on.

I’m left with moments like these. Moments where my daughter screams with delight and laughter as she has a waterfight with the little boy who lives next door.

Rather than sigh at the thought of chasing her around the garden to wrestle the wet clothes off her, I smile.

It’s moments like these that make getting up at ridiculous o’clock worth it. It’s moments like these that make me happy. It’s moments like these which I’ll take with me when I’m gone.

It’s moments like these that matter.

The post Missing out appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

But it’s these very hands, these tiny hands, which have made my own hands what they are now.

Because, without these mini fingers in my life, my own hands would not have found their current purpose.

I use these things on the end of my arms every day, all day.

They grip the steering wheel of my car as I drive to work. They hold a pen and tap a keyboard as I negotiate a radio show. They stroke my tired toddler’s back as she slumps against me for her afternoon milk. They change nappies, chop vegetables – are often burnt during the cooking of supper – and are inevitably scalded checking the temperature of the nightly bath.

These hands have changed.

Before my daughter they were often manicured, occasionally massaged with olive oil (Madonna does it, apparently) and regularly smothered with softening cream.

The pads of my fingers were barely worn, simply being used to type radio news bulletins and write the odd website article. Never had the nails of these hands experienced a child’s fecal matter up close. They’d never been urinated on or vomited on or bitten by a teething baby.

These hands were unlived in. Fresh. A blank canvas.

And here they are. A mother’s hands. A working mother’s hands. Wiping, typing, driving, cooking, washing, nurturing and patting.

My hands. Worn, lived in and a bit shabby around the edges.

I rather like them, actually.

***

This is my entry for this week’s Gallery, where the theme is Hands. Head over to Sticky Fingers to see the rest.

The post An ode to the hand appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

Photo Credit: Alan Light

My inner Oprah Winfrey needs to be channelled. She’s sitting on the sofa today, demanding I take notice of her life coaching advice.

I can’t ignore her any longer.

She tells me to stop for a minute. Just a minute. And take a moment to recall the events of the past year. She tells me that, rather than berating myself for not achieveing the mountain of tasks on my to-do list this week, I should take stock of what I have achieved.

She tells me to look at the bigger picture.

Apparently, I need to remember where I was this time last year. I need to remember that I was yet to get married. I was in a haze of last-minute planning for said wedding. I was attempting the beginnings of a blog, a freelance career.

Taking stock and looking back, I’m reminded that this time last year I was in blissful ignorance about the battle that lay before me as my child attempted to learn to walk. I had no idea of the appointments, chasing appointments, referrals, physio assessments, physio treatments, Googling and anxious conversations with family.

And here we are, walking.

I’m reminded of my never-ending nerves over money and the “what ifs” of my freelance career not working out.

My inner Oprah tells me to take note of the increasing commissions. The commissions to write for big websites and magazines that I used to see as “The Big Boys”. Now I’m one of them. I’m a “Big Boy” (now, there’s a thing to write *snigger*).

The regular writing clients I once dreamed of, telling myself it would never happen, have arrived at my door. They are here, paying me to do a job I love. A job I didn’t even dare dream I would do when I was at university, dreaming of being “A Writer”.

No longer am I touting for cherished radio shifts. I don’t need to tout. Not at the moment, anyway. I have a regular gig. Talking. I earn actual cash from talking and laughing on the radio. And writing. They let me write for them too.

My beautiful blog, begun on a whim to see if I could still write in the haze of baby brain, is paying me back tenfold. The love I’ve cherished on it has reciprocated with new friends, a holiday, paid opportunities and fabulous products. (I apologise if the gushing Oprah is taking over a little – she’s in her stride now.)

Again, the me of this time last year doesn’t believe it.

My non-toddling toddler is toddling. I earn money writing and talking. I get to flex every creative bone in my (rather wobbly) body.

Oprah has done good.

I’m doing OK.

Now remind me of this tomorrow.

The post Oprah gives it to me straight appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

Sometimes I feel like a kettle.

Not just any kettle, but one of those old ones. The ones that sit on the hob and make a loud whistling noise when the water’s hot enough for a cup of tea.

Yesterday was a typical Kettle Day.

I have to describe it like that, as it’s the only way I can think of what happened last night without getting upset. It wasn’t funny at the time.

I was tired, my daughter was tired, we were both tired.

Having been up for work since 3.30am and only having my usual 5/6 hours sleep, I wasn’t in the best frame of mind to deal with the hugest tantrum known to man. This tantrum lasted from 4pm until 5.40pm.

And when I say tantrum, I’m talking the works.

Not just screams and the constant pull on my shirt with, “Mummy, mummy, MUUUMMMY!” as I tried to dish up a hot supper. But the throwing of said dinner across the room with shrieks of “YOGHURT! NOW!”

I didn’t recognise my gorgeous child. Tiredness had taken her and replaced her with something else.

Her face was red, angry. The screams were so loud I could see people outside on the pavement walking past our dining room and looking round, trying to work out where the noise was coming from.

I stayed calm. On the surface. Expecting my husband through the door any minute I took the food away and began to run a bath.

Still with an angry, screaming child hanging off me, trying to ignore my constantly bleeping phone telling me yet more emails were waiting to be dealt with, I took a deep breath.

Still no husband.

With the bath ready, I attempted to strip off my daughter and sing her a song to distract from the noise coming out of her mouth. As I took off her t’shirt she launched herself at me. Hitting, scratching, shouting, “NO MUMMY! NO MUMMY! NO MUMMY!”

Remember that kettle? It’s getting hotter and hotter.

Still no husband.

Resigned to doing bathtime by myself, I tackled the gravy in my daughter’s hair, while she lunged at my face and cried and cried and cried. Still the phone is bleeping.

I can feel myself getting smaller and smaller. The kettle is starting to whistle.

I sing to my distraught and angry toddler as I dry her hair and retrieve her pyjamas. And as I attempt to get a nappy on her, the kettle shrieks.

My husband is still not home. At this particular moment, on this particular day, as I battle my early start and constant work deadlines, bleeping phone and angry angry angry child, this feels like the end of the world.

The task of getting a nappy on my little girl rises before me like a huge mountain. It’s a battle that can’t be won.

And I lose it.

I shout, “STOP” over and over again as my daughter throws herself at me. Biting and pinching and scratching.

The phone bleeps.

And I see myself. On the floor of my toddler’s room. Exhausted. Broken. Shouting.

And I hate myself.

And I cry. Great, heaving sobs.

And I throw the nappy to the other side of the room and just sit there, looking at my daughter in between the tears, while she looks back at me.

Tears coursing down our faces. Drained.

And at that moment, my daughter shuffles over to me and puts her arms around me. She’s not crying any more. She just kisses my cheek and strokes my arm.

The nappy goes on. We read a story together. We sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and bedtime is over, just like that.

No fuss. No getting out of bed. No calling, “Mummy, mummy, mummy”. Just peace.

So, just as my husband walks through the door, I slump.

Feeling like I’ve failed at motherhood today and been beaten by work, I take myself to bed at 6pm.

The phone bleeps.

And I fall asleep.

The post Breaking point appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

Photo credit: picture by Chris_J

I was a different shape before I became a mum. My boobs were a little fuller, my bum was a little rounder.

I had made a conscious effort to “get fit”, going to the gym three times a week and killing myself at spinning classes. But I was no fitness fanatic – I was just aware there was too much flesh in places that had, before, been smoother.

On having a baby, my body changed.

The boobs became bigger, the belly became wobblier. But, overall, my actual weight wasn’t much different. And that’s how I know never to measure my body’s shape by how much it weighs. My body just doesn’t work like that.

I can have “fat days” where the scales tell me I weigh less than the week before. I can have “thin days” where my favourite jeans slide on without so much as a wiggle, but the scales tell me I’m heavier than I once was.

Since taking on a job in January that involves getting up at 3.30am and being on the go until 10pm, my body has steadily changed yet again.

I cope with tiredness by eating. Everything. Breakfast at 5am, another breakfast at 9am, a rushed snack from the petrol station on the way home (and you know it’s not going to be a salad), another snack with my hungry toddler in the afternoon, a meal around 5pm and more snacking.

Biscuits, cake, chocolate, crisps – these are all my friend. As is anything that can give me a quick sugar rush and fool my body into thinking it has enough fuel to get through another 6 hours without sleeping.

This is not good.

Slowly, I’ve noticed a bit of a double chin developing. My hips are no longer hips, instead sporting extra padding in the form of “love handles”.

Breakfast radio is not good for the figure.

So, around a month ago, I decided to do something about it.

Realistically, a gym membership is out of the question. With working at a radio station in the morning, running around after my toddler in the afternoon and all my writing work in the evenings, I am time poor. There is no time to preen myself like there was in the old days.

So I turned to the internet.

Twitter came up trumps. There seemed to be lots of buzz around @ThinkingSlimmer. Rolling my eyes and stifling a yawn, I inwardly scoffed, “As IF. Another faddy dieting thing. Whatever.”

But then we did a radio show about fad diets. I remembered this Twitter account and contacted the people behind @ThinkingSlimmer. Sandra Roycroft-Davies appeared on our show and I was intrigued by what she had to say. Rather than encouraging a diet, Sandra told me it was possible to retrain your mind to learn new habits.

For me, these habits mean not thinking about food ALL THE TIME. Not diving into the petrol station for a daily sausage roll to keep me company on the way home. And putting myself further up my list of priorities.

I started listening to one of the company’s “Slim Pods“. The ten minute piece of audio was very much like some form of meditation. Lulling me to sleep within minutes, rather than the former tossing and turning scenario. Waking from a deep sleep at 3.30am every day, I haven’t felt dead. I’ve actually been ready to face the day.

And I’ve stopped eating sausage rolls.

Instead, I still eat at the times I used to eat, but rather than crisps and cake, it’s been soup, toast, fruit, water. The kind of stuff my body actually needs to run on, rather than the stuff that tricks it.

And Sandra? She’s been lovely. The odd phone call to remind me to stop saying “Yes” to everything. The odd email to reprimand me for staying up too late working. Just like my mum really.

I have no idea if I weigh less than I did a month previously. But, for me, it’s not about that. I no longer have to breathe in when I put my jeans on. I’m sleeping better. I’m eating better. I feel better.

But I’m not going to stop listening to the audio before bed. It’s an ongoing thing – I need more than a month of listening to help me give up habits that have taken 6 months to form.

So the sausage rolls aren’t quite safe yet.

***

Disclosure: This is a review post. All words and opinions are my own. I was given a free copy of the Slimpod for review purposes.

The post The quest for body beautiful appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

The child I know.

When I look at Frog, I see a happy, fun, incredibly independent little girl. I don’t see a toddler that can’t do what other toddlers can.

But when I collected her from the childminder’s today, that wasn’t the case.

Although my nearly-22 month old was beyond excited to see me, the childminder said she’d spent most of the day watching from the sidelines. Because she can’t walk yet like all the other kids, she’s often happy on her own in the corner, reading a book. That’s not what bothers me so much as the next thing the childminder observed: she’s not talking. At all.

Now, this surprises me, because the little girl I know – the one who I spend all my time with at home – doesn’t shut up.

This is the Frog that my neighbours know, the Frog that chases (or attempts to chase) the boys and dogs and cats that live in our little close. This is the Frog that wanders into the next door neighbour’s garden (granted, still holding my hand) and helps herself to a toy, pair of shoes and the trampoline, all the while calling to her favourite friend “Arrfuur“.

She’s certainly not quiet.

But she’s not like that when I’m not around, apparently. Or at least, not at the childminder’s anyway. There, she holds her hands in front of her face when a stranger enters the room. She’s silent most of the time, only uttering the occasional word under her breath.

When I proudly reeled off the latest developments in her speech – attempts at counting, animal noises and colour recognition – the childminder looked at me blankly. “She doesn’t do any of that here”, she said.

So I’m worrying.

As every other working mum I know, I’m wondering if I’m doing the right thing going off to work every morning. I’m only spending afternoons with her. Is this wrong? I’m wondering if she’s unhappy at the childminder’s, or if she just had an off day today and needs to settle back in after the Easter holidays.

I’m worrying that she doesn’t like it there and would be better off at nursery. I’m worrying that she’s got problems socialising with other kids. I’m worrying that she’s shy and that this will hold her back later in life.

I’m worrying. Nonsensical worrying. Damned worrying.

Tell me this is normal.

The post Tell me this is normal appeared first on Mother's Always Right.

Occasionally I’d do a load of washing – back when I only needed to wash a couple of loads a week – and collapse for the rest of the evening on the sofa.

I had no idea what busy was.

As a comparison, I’ve done a little exercise. This is what my life looked like yesterday:

6am: Get up. Tiptoe to bathroom. Shower in record speed.  Realise we’ve run out of shampoo. Steal some of the baby’s. Realise we’ve run out of shower gel. Steal some of the baby’s. Emerge smelling like a Johnson’s Baby Factory.

7am: Get baby up, armed with a cup of warm milk as bribery.

7-7.30am: Wrestle with baby in attempt to change nappy / clothes / make her look generally presentable.

7.30am – 8am:  Sort out breakfast, preferably something non-messy like toast and fruit. Realise there’s no bread left so plump for Wheetabix instead. Ten minutes later remember why toast was preferred option. Spend five minutes trying to get dried Wheetabix off the crotch area of my dress. Give up. Realise baby is covered from head to toe.

8am: Look at clock, realise we’re late. Throw a babywipe halfheartedly at baby and spend five minutes wrestling her into a coat and hat.

8-8.30am: Drive to work. Arrive at work. Realise baby is still in car with me and not at the childminder’s. Turn around and drive to childminder’s. Drop baby at childminder’s. Drive back to work.

9am: Arrive at radio station flustered, but just on time. Nip to the toilets to have another go at that Wheetabix. Give up. Realise it’s in my hair too.

9am – 12pm: Do work. (Make some phone calls, read the news, make some more phone calls, check some emails, tweet a bit, read more news etc etc.)

12-3pm: Do some reporting from the field. Get lost. Receive text from childminder saying baby is grumpy. Reply to text. Feel guilty. Find required location. Do some more work. Drive back to the radio station.

3-5pm: Work again. Editing and writing this time. Finish bulletin scripts and check in on baby to find she has a biscuit and all is well.

6pm: Arrive home. Sit on sofa with exhausted and grumpy baby. Feel guilty.

6.15pm: Sort out lunches for following day. Unstack dishwasher. Feel resentful it’s not already done. Put load of washing on.

6.30pm: Give exhausted and grumpy baby a bath. Watch as her dad gets her into her pyjamas. Realise I’m still wearing coat. And shoes. Take off coat.

7pm – 10.30pm: Eat cuisine meal of pizza in front of laptop. Work. Reply to emails. Finish off a feature article and some copywriting. Do some social media work for a client. More emails. More work. Feel guilty again.

10.30-11.30pm: Remember baby’s DIY Advent Calender is still not finished. Feel like terrible mother. Spend one hour sewing and stuffing the pockets with second bag of chocolate coins. Feel guilty for eating first bag.

11.30pm – 12am: Attempt to broaden mind by reading some of new novel. Get past first paragraph and fall asleep. Awaken to husband’s trumpets of wind as he gets into bed. Stay awake as husband falls into deep, snore-filled and windy sleep. Succumb to trumpet fumes and fall into second slumber.

To do it all again tomorrow…

The post A day in the life of a freelance journalist (and mum) appeared first on Mother's Always Right.