Having your gorgeous little one Christened is still an important milestone for many families. And even if you’re not religious, you might want to throw a ‘welcome to the world’ soiree for your new arrival. Some will opt to have just a few family members around for the occasion, while others will go all out […]

10 years ago

I have been celebrating Mothers Day since I was pregnant in 2011 with my son Jacob. I was three month’s pregnant and my partner Alan gave me a Mother’s Day card with an ‘Almost!’ scribbled in pen on the front. It was such a lovely touch and compounded my excitement in finding out that I […]

10 years ago

We are in the process of building a fort around our house. The combination of a very yappy West Highland Terrier plus two small kids in the house has become all too much for us. Nap time and bed time efforts – some of which can take up to three hours to get under control – […]

10 years ago

There are a tonne of things about parenting that you will have zero concept of until you have kids. You get on about your life in a carefree, can wear-high-heels-all-day-if-I-like kind of a way and vaguely wonder why you haven’t seen your mate out as much since she popped that baby. Later on, after you become […]

10 years ago

There was a bit of a running joke during my pregnancy that I was going to opt out of having my other half in the labour room with me, and replace him with the presence of my fabulous mum instead. All ‘joking’ aside, I really did consider having her there up until almost the last […]

10 years ago

My kids watch a fair bit of tv, too much sometimes. There are days when I’m a bit blasé about it and other times when I insist on switching it off and coercing them towards the playroom for some imaginative play. I know they’ve had too much screen time when crappy behaviours start to creep […]

10 years ago

One major topic of conversation (between CLOSE friends only!) when I was pregnant, was whether or not I was going to be ok with my husband Alan ‘being down the business end’. When I was having our first baby, I wasn’t so sure and to be fair, neither was he. Would he be grossed out […]

10 years ago

I am on the verge of a ‘Stop Calling My Name!’ nervous breakdown. I know I will miss it when my son and daughter no longer want to have anything to do with me when they are teenagers and I am “sooo embarrassing“. And I know that when that happens, I will be writing another piece […]

10 years ago

Last month, I spent a lot of time lugging bags and boxes from one house to another as we moved back home having had some work done to our house.  I also shovelled muck and stones around from one end of the garden and wheelbarrowed them to another one sunny morning. And then there was […]

10 years ago

Yes, the whole ‘pink is for girls and blue is for boys’ thing bothers me. It didn’t, necessarily, until I had my son and I had to have all those conversations with myself about the kind of parent I hoped to be. I hoped to be the kind of parent who was fun. I hoped to be […]

10 years ago

Pilates? Yoga? Swearing off the vino? Yeah right. Here are my seven (realistic) New Year’s resolutions of an Irish mother… 1. Stop fantasising that Hugh Jackman might show up to fit that bin you picked up from Ikea for under the kitchen sink eight months ago. He’s clearly a busy man and also, he’s married, […]

10 years ago

There are lots of contentious food items at Christmas (did someone just say ‘brussels sprouts’?!) and the poor, innocent Christmas pudding would appear to be one of them. No matter how much I try to dress up a pudding, whether it be with custard, cream or delicious brandy sauce, some of our friends and family […]

10 years ago

Oh I do like to take recipes for sweet things and add booze to them. If you ask me, you can pretty much improve the life of any fudges, cakes or ice creams with the addition of a dash of whiskey, Baileys or rum. With the weather turning so bitterly cold this week, I think […]

10 years ago

They say that women are really easy to buy for at Christmas, and MUCH easier than men, right? We literally like everything – clothes, make-up, jewellery, perfume, box sets, holidays, gadgets, vouchers, tickets – you name it, we are wide open to receiving your well-planned gifts and are very grateful for them. Alas, having done […]

10 years ago

As anyone with a small child or two will tell you, people just love to stick their oar in and offer parenting advice where none was requested. Random strangers on the street tell you that you’ve bought the wrong buggy, have your child wearing the wrong thing, they look over-fed, undernourished, happy/sad, up/down and whatever […]

10 years ago

When we strip away the materialistic elements of our lives – the ‘stuff’ we think we need, the ‘things’ we have to have, the ‘image’ we want the world to have of us – at the end of the day, the one thing that matters the most is family and the love that it brings. […]

10 years ago

I wouldn’t describe my four year-old son as a shy child, but he certainly has had his fair share of shy moments. As he attended a creche from the grand old age of one, and has been dragged by his long-suffering mother to playdate after playdate, you could say he is fairly well socialised. He […]

10 years ago

Our daughter had a crazy 24-hour bug last weekend that seemed to come out of nowhere, swooped in and took over our Friday to Saturday night and disappeared off again just as quickly. It was great that it didn’t last too long but while we were in the thick of it we were really concerned […]

10 years ago

Alas, I am in the middle of another parenting failure moment. Most of my personal parenting fails are born from some weird romantic notions I get in my head about how perfect and dreamy certain days or events are going to go, until the bonkers reality comes crashing down before me. For example, I was […]

10 years ago

We all worry about the extra weight we put on when we are pregnant, whether we like to admit it or not. I tell every new mum I meet not to worry about it at all until their baby is at least one years old but I know that it’s easier said than done. Even […]

10 years ago

As with every stage of a person’s life, there are events that occur which shape and change the way that you proceed. Re-locating to a new home, changing jobs, bereavement, relationship changes can all leave you re-evaluating how you live your life and often you find yourself making decisions about how to change it. Having […]

10 years ago

As someone who spent the first half of the year living with my parents while our house was being renovated (that was me, my other half, the kids and the dog living with my parents by the way), I am madly head-over-heels in love with our home again now that we are back in it. […]

10 years ago

When I first became a parent and was completely overwhelmed with the workload, the lack of sleep, the appointments, the new logistics of going about the world with another human being stuck to my hip, I could often be found exclaiming, ‘I don’t know HOW my single friends are doing this!!’ My other half and […]

10 years ago

I have just signed off on my wedding invitations.. and it kind of took all year. First, we needed to decide what the tone was going to be and given that we’re getting married at the zoo (yes, really!) we went for fun and light-hearted. Then we had a tiny issue of being undecided about […]

10 years ago

We wrote about little Omran, the child in the back of the ambulance after the air strikes in Aleppo, with tears running down our cheeks at every touch of the keyboard. That isn’t an over-dramatic statement, it is a fact. Only the coldest heart could have felt unaffected by his little face, his bloody head, […]

10 years ago

When I think about my son starting school this coming week, I think of it as a journey that we undertake as a family. Both his dad and I have been prepping our son by chatting to him every day about what he can expect from school and how great it’s going to be. I’m […]

10 years ago

I have a request in for a ‘Transformers’ birthday cake in two weeks’ time. Which Transformer, I do not yet know, although I’m sure I’ll get to the bottom of what my son really wants in the next few days. Nothing worse than having the birthday kid ratting you out to his mates that your […]

10 years ago

When I was growing up, I loved to read. My dad was the one who really introduced me to the fantastical world of books and I distinctly remember getting lost for hours in Enid Blyton after Enid Blyton under the covers in my bed. I just couldn’t wait to finish one so that I could […]

10 years ago

It’s the last weekend before the school term starts back, and amidst all the kerfuffle around getting uniforms ready, packing bags and planning lunches, it might be nice to take a little moment tonight as a family to just.. gaze at the stars. Our five-year-old is currently obsessed with the stars – he wants to […]

10 years ago

Single-handedly taking our two small kids (5 and 2) for a swim is a challenge that I do not take lightly. I know that I must be in the full of my health to achieve this family outing: I must be rested, feeling positive and have an otherwise flexible schedule on the day in question […]

10 years ago

It is reported that an eleven-year-old boy has been before the courts in the UK after images of him twice sexually assaulting his sister were found on his mobile phone. The boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, appeared at Bodmin Magistrates’ Court in Cornwall after admitting to two counts of rape at an earlier hearing. He was supported […]

10 years ago

Poor Britney Spears – a beloved songstress who we were obsessed with in the 90s and Noughties who just never seemed to be happy. The sweet little Mickey Mouse Club graduate rebelled from celebrity and fame with distressing scenes of public meltdowns and THAT head-shaving moment of 2007. As a then mother to two boys […]

10 years ago

As a family who are not going abroad on holidays this year, we have been doing our very best to get creative with our kid’s school-free time. We have visited every local park available to us, we have scoured the beaches for ‘pirates treasure’ and cosied up with hot chocolates afterwards. We have done one […]

10 years ago

The imagination and creative capabilities of children never cease to amaze me. Jonah Maxwell moved from Killiney to Chicago in 2011 with mum Jenny, dad Dave and brother Danny when he was 7 years old. The transition was a big one for the whole family but Jonah says he experienced some bullying at his new […]

10 years ago

Ah homework! The source of much consternation at the dining table in every family home. Every parent has their own unique approach and rules to how homework has to happen: either as soon as they get in from school and then they can have playtime, or they let them chill out after school first and […]

10 years ago

In horrific news, a mother in the US has being charged with homicide by child abuse after locking her four-day-old son in a refrigerator. In February, the newborn baby boy was left in the closed fridge for three hours after which time the South Carolina Mother, Angela Blackwell, took him out and called for medical […]

10 years ago

So, here we are. We’re at the point we were hoping not to be at with our children – our eldest starts school next week and our best available option for him was a Catholic School. Even though he isn’t Catholic. There are three schools in our immediate area that are convenient for us to […]

10 years ago

I don’t know about you, but I have a running commentary going through my head that sometimes reaches my mouth and spills over into ‘out loud’. I have recently caught myself muttering about “the state of the fridge” and “I must get that shelf organised” and “where did that new Lego come from?!” under my breath as […]

10 years ago

I’m not sure I have a ‘parenting style’ so much as I have a personal style. That style changes and evolves with every passing day and adapts to new situations constantly. With my kids, I am always on the lookout for the best way to handle different situations and challenges that present themselves, turning to friends […]

10 years ago

“Jacob starts school this day week!” I roared at my friend down the phone on my way to work this morning. “Then why do you sound so.. HAPPY?!” came the (tongue-in-cheek) reply. Well, the fact is, I AM happy about it. My son will be five in two weeks time and he is SO ready […]

10 years ago

If you are a working parent in Ireland, you are entitled to a certain number of day’s ‘Parental Leave’ in the event that you need time off to attend to your child for any reason. How Many Days Can I Take? Parental Leave is allowable at a total of 18 weeks per child which can be […]

10 years ago

It is becoming increasingly difficult to humanise war. We are so consistently bombarded with images and reports of war-torn cities, of bloody bodies being carried from the rubble, or refugees fleeing their native homes and begging to be allowed refuge and relief in other countries. We hear all of the negative murmurings of those who […]

10 years ago

This makes me so mad. The Irish League of Credit Unions has just released the results of a survey they conducted about the number of parents who are getting into debt in order to put their kids through college (60%, shockingly). I get that college fees have to be paid and our secondary school graduates need […]

10 years ago

Like many other people, we have a family WhatsApp group and it is HILARIOUS. My parents both have had smartphones for a couple of years now and the only ‘smart’ thing they really use it for is to keep up with family news on WhatsApp. One of my brothers lives in the UK with his […]

10 years ago

Pity me! Pity me! Alas, I am a mother with a first-born on his way to starting primary school in a few weeks time. For the love of all that is good and holy, send the tissues and the wine. My little man and I have had it good up until this point; we’ve spent […]

10 years ago

Dealing with tantrums is an unfortunate occupational hazard of parenting. When we signed up for the job of raising gorgeous babies, we imagined singing them lullabies to sleep as they got older and then, one day, we’d wave them off to Big School with a brand new shiny backpack on their shoulders and wish them well. […]

10 years ago

Harmonie-Rose from Bath in the UK was a healthy baby until she contracted the meningitis B virus at 10 months old. She spent the following four weeks in intensive care and her parents were told that she had a 10% chance of survival. Despite the odds, Harmonie came through the other side but had to have […]

10 years ago

Let’s be clear: not a single solitary one of us can ever have enough magic in our lives. In 1997 (almost 20 years ago, by the way!), J.K. Rowling literally handed the glorious gift of magic back to the world with the publication of her very first book, ‘Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone’. Since […]

10 years ago

Being a parent can usually be fraught with self-doubt as you find yourself landed with the biggest responsibility of your life: you are responsible for the welfare of another human being. You fret about their sleeping and eating habits, worry if they’re getting enough exercise, if they’re happy overall and if they’ll grow up to […]

10 years ago

Brought to you by the Department of Social Protection In case you hadn’t heard the best news all week: paid paternity leave has been introduced! From September 1st, expectant dads can apply for two weeks’ paid leave after their child is born and receive a minimum rate of €230 per week in paternity benefit payments. Paternity Leave […]

10 years ago