As the best man said “we’ve known each other since we were kids, and I’m very honoured and proud to be standing here today” , we all turned towards his wife, inclining our heads and expressing a silent “awwwww!” . Partly as we were genuinely moved by the best man’s
The bags are packed, the kids are packed and takeaway coffees are in hand – we’re on the road to Rosslare to take the ferry to Roscoff. I’m beyond excited to be going on holidays and not remotely worried (read: reasonably worried) about the potential
School’s out for summer, and for parents all over the country it’s a significant milestone in any year. For our family, until now, this time of year meant just two things: lighter traffic in the morning and holidays jumping to twice the price. But for the first time, we experienced end-of-term properly
A short post about a five-year-old girl who wants to be her own boss from now on – in a week of transcripts, here’s one of our conversation last night: C: Mum, I’ve had enough of you telling me what to do. From now on I’m going to decide everything
So I’ve learned two important things since writing the below post last April – it’s a story about tripping over a laundry basket and spraining my finger, being unable to drive and therefore taking a bus to work. This gave me some unexpected time for browsing Facebook and Twitter on my
Today we went to a birthday party – all five of us. My eldest has been giving out about this upcoming birthday party for the last two weeks, saying she wouldn’t know anyone, she’d be older than all the other kids (the birthday girl is a friend of my four year
So. Hosting children’s birthday parties. I can’t possibly be the only person who finds this extremely stressful? When chatting about this to other parents, I sense that they don’t find this quite the ordeal that I do. Or perhaps some are better than I am at hiding the fear? I feel
Today is my birthday, and I arrived home from work to an eerily silent house. As I looked around in mild confusion, two excited girls, one bemused little boy and one smiling childminder jumped out from behind the counter and yelled “surprise!” There was a cake on the table – this is
Do you ever do something because it’s the right thing to do, and afterwards wish you’d taken an easier, less selfless route, as your well-intentioned plans backfire all around you? I don’t mean big life choices like whether or not to take a year out to work for Doctors without
Working from home: no to mascara and high heels, yes to school runs and meals with kids, and best of all reduced guilt…. Lots of people work in jobs that are not suitable for working from home, and plenty of other people are not allowed to by employers. But if you have children, and have ever
My husband and I don’t do weekend lie-ins on alternate days, though I know lots of people who do. For us it just hasn’t worked well for lots of reasons, not in the least because I’m a very light sleeper, so it’s not a given that my lie-in would include much
Breach of trust, on every level. Like thousands of people who watched Prime Time last night, I’ve spent the morning trying to focus on work but my mind keeps going back to the images of children being slammed down on mattresses, tiny toddlers being punished despite being far too young,
As a mother to three children under six, most of my adult conversations every day are with other parents, most of whom have kids in childcare. Over the last few days, a recurring topic is the news story about RTE’s Prime Time sending undercover researchers into two Dublin creches, and gathering video footage
This is not a light, self-deprecating, jokey post – I really lost it with my five year old today, and I’m feeling bad about it. I shouted at her, marched her up the stairs, and told her that she wasn’t going to the party that she was invited to this
On Saturday morning, as happens in houses all over the country on weekend mornings, my three kids bundled into our bed, at various times ranging from 5am to the somewhat more civilised 8 o’clock. The baby was snuggled into me, and Clara, my five year old was cuddled up with her
I should have been in bed, it was heading towards midnight on Sunday, and I was due up at 4am to head to the airport for a work trip. As usual I was feeling 90% apprehensive – worrying about leaving the kids, anxious that the baby would wake during the night and not understand
It’s hard to fit everything into the working day: morning rush, getting kids ready for school, getting self in somewhat presentable state for work, long commute catching up on e-mails and texts, work for eight hours, sort out optician appointments for kids, do online groceries or submit health insurance claims if
So it’s the end of the Easter holidays and parents all over Ireland are breathing a sigh of relief – some because they are at home with their children all year round and it’s a little more difficult to keep everyone entertained during school holidays, and some because they’re at work and find it
It’s Good Friday, and I haven’t thought about work once today – I love that. We took the kids to Powerscourt House and Gardens – well OK, the House followed by an “adventure” exploring the trees and grass verges on the way back to the car, via the garden centre.
Last night I wrote my first blog post, about the challenges facing working mums, and the universe subsequently laughed at me, in a “you ain’t seen nothing yet” kind of way, then unleashed a properly challenging day on this working mum: My baby was up from 3am onwards, feeding like a newborn,