taking our photos

Hello all, well, sadly today has been pretty miserable, but we did have a break in the rain for the school Spring Fayre (why not a Fair?) this morning, so that was good.  After the Fayre we all went down into town to get our photos taken for our passports.  We haven't left the country since 2003, so we all need to get them sorted!  It is an incredibly palarver applying for passports, but I guess it needs to be.  But I'm not convinced it needs to cost so much money!  Getting our photos taken today cost £20 (and that was with a discount!), although the man did a very good job (and the results are A LOT better than we'd get in a photo booth).

Now the children are just naturally gorgeous, so there was no problem with them.  The big girl wasn't too happy to be separated from her glasses, the boy is looking a bit fluffy, and the little girl looks rather glum, but they're all fine.  In my opinion anyway!  They'll get new ones in five years.  It does seem a bit wierd that they take photos of wee babies to last five years, but I think my children will probably still be recognisable from the photos in five years.

I, of course, was another kettle of fish.  I mean, it's just a photo.  you have to look like yourself.  But I didn't want to look like myself.  I'm going to have to use this photo for ten years!  I want to look like the last photo on my passport (which was taken in 1997 so it's unlikely).  So this morning I set to work with my makeup bag and a trowel, and marched downstairs to be confronted by the little girl:  "what have you got on your face Mummy?"  Sigh.

Me, hardly touched up at all...

The man in the shop showed me a mirror before he took my photo, although there wasn't much I could do.  I hate having my photo taken where I'm not smiling - need something to make me look like I've got bone structure, rather than just a beige balloon with a wig on.  So he took the photo, and it's not actually that terrible, but I hate it (of course), so you're not getting to see it.

Talking to the boy later, he reckoned I look silly with makeup on, and compared it to facepaint.  He thinks we shouldn't be allowed to wear makeup in our passport photos if we're not allowed glasses, and he's got a point.  However makeup helps me feel like I've at least made an effort.

There's a fab video from Stuff Mom Never Told You about why women wear makeup.  Cristen talks about 'the beauty premium': check out the video, but basically, women do better at work, and are better thought of if they wear makeup.  So they wear makeup.  I work as a full time Mum, so my career prospects aren't affected by makeup, but my confidence definitely is (although I must say that Cristen (who is gorgeous anyway) imho looks much lovelier without makeup).

Lynn modelling her fabulous whatsit

Thinking this through I thought that I should challenge myself to put a photo of me just as I was when I was writing the blog - no makeup touch ups... and I did!  But, I did the whole looking sideways thing (supposed to make you look thinner apparently).  I took four photos before getting one I was happy with, and then I doctored it - not massively, just a filter, a vignette, and a frame, before releasing it.  I hadn't realised I don't tend to wear my glasses in photos - only realised when I got comments on them!  Thanks everyone, I love my glasses, but I can't usually find them!

This time next week I'll be at a friend's wedding.  I've been stressing about what I'm going to look like for ages.  I will definitely be wearing makeup.  I will probably have crimped hair (if makeup is my armour crimped hair is my shield), a fabulous whatsit created by Lynn.  There will no doubt be lots of photos, but hopefully I shan't be in many of them!

If you wear makeup, what does it help you do?  What do you do for a sartorial confidence boost?

seeing lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

The little girl is very excited

Hello all, you may recall, a while ago we were celebrating having success with potties.  Following our initial success we had a period of constant bugging, and a sticker chart, and in an incredibly short period of time the little girl has cracked it!  She had been told that her reward for completing potty training would be a day trip or her choice, and she decided she'd like to see a lion.

Well it's been raining for ages (although we did have sun last Tuesday), but we checked the weather forecast for Blair Drummond (a Safari Park near Stirling) today and it said it would be cloudy but unlikely to rain, so off we set!

The rain poncho.
She posted one through floorboards,
and hid the other in a maze

It rained constantly.  We had to buy a rain poncho for the little girl... although she did her best to ditch it.

We thought we'd start off with the safari bit, in the hopes that the rain would stop.  The kids loved seeing the animals close up, and the little girl got to see a lion.

Camels posing.

After that we went to see the sea lion show, which was great fun.  I know some people don't like them, and see them as exploitative, and I guess they are.  But it was a great way for the kids to learn about sea lions.  And they had a great time.

Loving the sea lion show

After that we were cold and hungry, so headed over to the restaurant with everyone else in Blair Drummond that day.  The queue was very long, but there seemed to be enough tables to go around, and the food was fine (although obviously lacking in vegetables), and not too expensive.  They also have lots of picnic areas and places to cook barbecues, so you don't have to use the restaurant.

a busy lunchtime

After lunch we sought shelter from the rain in the fabulous adventure play castle.  There are absolutely amazing play facilities at Blair Drummond, and we managed to have lots of fun even though it was raining.  We have been before on a sunny day, and we could have stayed there all day.





My kids especially enjoy digging for treasure by the pirate ship.  However, both times we've been we've had a lot of trouble finding doubloons.  Last time we were unlucky until they closed the ship play area for a while, and then there were millions of the things.  This time we spent a good half hour digging and only found one!  The big girl found it, but was good enough to share her bounty (you swap your doubloon for a lucky dip prize - she got animal shaped rubber bands).

There are lots of animals to see on foot, and the little girl loved feeding the animals (although the donkey managed to cover her in mud).  The boy liked the marmosets, which get to run around the place.

They also have a selection of fairground rides, which were all well maintained, and not too much to ride on.  The little girl loved going on the gallopers, and the boy and Kenny had a great time on the dodgems.

We did go over to see the lemurs, but they were all in one big ball, frozen and dripping, and we didn't fancy the boat to see the monkeys and get poo thrown at you.  To be honest, we were all tired out.  So we got everyone in the car, did a quick tour of the safari animals again, and headed down the road.

Kenny managed to stay awake, but he was the only one!  It was a great day out, and I would highly recommend it.

Last time we went to Blair Drummond we managed to find discount vouchers, and do look out for them, because it is a really expensive entry fee (although worth it).  Sadly you can't use your Tesco Rewards here.  We did get 10% off by buying the tickets in advance online, but watch out, these tickets are only valid for a month.

a good day out

Blair Drummond is near Stirling, and is easy to get to if you live anywhere near the Central Belt.  As we went by Stirling Castle I told the kids about the windows they'd cut low down in the walls for a toddler Queen Mary to see out, but they weren't bothered... so I'll maybe leave it a while before we go there.

Have you been to Blair Drummond?  What did you think?  Where do you think we should go next?  

loving the tunes

I'm blatantly stealing an idea off of a friend today.  Steve did a blog post on his Shores of Night blog about some of the music he writes to, and it made me think about the music I live my life too.  

Music is like smells to me.  Hearing The The is just as capable as a waft of Spiritual Sky patchouli of whisking me back to my bedroom in 1990.  Before I had children I listened to music constantly, but then the boy came along, and I needed to be able to hear, and I learnt to value silence.

Music is still very important, but what I've listened to has changed massively. Now I avoid swearing, and blatantly sexist nonsense.  This has meant no more Darkness (most of the time), and no more Zodiac Mindwarp (after being asked what 'lipstick flickers 'round my lightning rod' meant - oops).  Other stuff has gone too, but these are the two I miss the most.

So what are we listening to?  Well, first up is my favourite cleaning song:

Jesus Built My Hotrod by Ministry

This song, and the others that are underlined, have links to the videos on YouTube for your listening/watching pleasure.

I'm not sure this song would be allowed if I could tell what they were saying, but I can't so it's in!  It's fabulous for throwing blocks into a box, scrubbing glass doors, etc.  Ministry generally are good for this, as is White Zombie/Rob Zombie (the kids especially like Dragula).

Next up it's the first 'specially for kids' song we found that we actually liked:

Go go Ninja Dinosaur by Four Tet

This is from the fabulous 'Colours Are Brighter' CD, which I recommend you buy because it's for charity and that.  There are lots of good songs on it, including a particularly smashing pie eating song from Franz Ferdinand... although looking at the price of it on Amazon, you might want to try another way!  We also like nearly all of the Moshi Rox! CD (my favourite is Sweet Tooth Stomp), and, of course, Gangnam Style, by Psy.  Sigh.

Chelsea Dagger by The Fratellis

This is my ring tone (for most people).  It's also our go-to CD for car journeys on sunny days.  Probably because I got the CD just before we went on holiday in Essex (fabulous hotel, shame it was in Essex).  I love this, it's so joyous and sexy and fun.  The rest of the album is great too, and I love the fact that whenever my 'phone rings the kids all start singing 'well you must be a girl...'

Paranoid by Black Sabbath

This is the CD in the boy's CD player (the big girl's got The White Stripes at the moment, and the little girl doesn't have a CD player yet).  Paranoid is full of songs which Kenny plays for the kids while they're having a moment of madness before getting ready for bed.  It's also remarkably polite.  Why?  Did rock get ruder after this album?  This was released in 1970, and thank goodness for that.

There are lots of songs I could put on this list, but I feel I should finish up with a goodnight song.  Every night, after getting washed and into PJs, the children have a story each, and then, when they're snuggled up in their beds, they get a song.  Kenny tends to make up songs, but I prefer to sing songs I know.

Little Green by Joni Mitchell

I know, this bit is mainly about Joni Mitchell, but I'd rather
look at Steve Tyler... sorry.

The album Blue was released in 1971, and is one of my Mum's favourites.  When I was away from home for the first time, and feeling stupid and alone, I drank a lot of cheap wine and listened to it (on vinyl) again and again, until I had memorised the whole album.  This isn't my favourite song on the album.  That would go to A Case of You ('constant in the darkness, where's that at?'), but Little Green makes me feel grateful for being able to be a mother to my children, and I generally do feel grateful when they're going to sleep.  It's also a lovely song to sing.  I haven't sung them Aerosmith's I Don't Wanna Miss A Thing, it's a bit too creepy... but I do think it.


So that's it.  It's not very Goth is it?  There is plenty of Goth, believe me, it's just not made it in!  What songs are important to you?

staying together

Do you remember a little while ago I did a blog post about women being a reserve army of labour, and how I'm glad to be a full time Mum?

I love this photo of me with my parents... it's so Goth,
even though it was taken in the '70s!

I got lots and lots of feedback from that post.  It really caught the imagination of the good women at Mothers at Home Matter, which was great.  My Dad also read it.  He was glad that I enjoyed being a full time Mum, but, being my Dad he's obliged to worry about me.  He wondered if I shouldn't work, just to keep my hand in, just in case, you know.  What he was skipping around was the word 'divorce', and he would be worried about it, because it happened to him.  So it happened to me too.

Our wedding day

When I was nine, my parent's marriage, which had been faltering, finally ended.  We moved so they could live in different houses, with a lot less money.  My parents had shared custody, which was unusual at the time, but is what the Government is angling for happening all the time now.  My parents did the best they could, and I think my brother and I turned out alright, but I still concluded I never wanted that to happen to me...

Well, it turns out that marriage is not easy, especially when you have small children.  It's difficult to remember why you're together when there are chores coming out of your ears, people are screaming at you, and you've had nowhere near enough sleep.  Sometimes there are days when you maybe do stay because you can't afford not to.  Or because you don't have the time to arrange anything else.  And that truly sucks, but you can get through it.  There are lots of things you can do to get through it, most of which involve cutting each other some slack and trying to have some fun (this is a great source of some ideas).

But even then (yay, stats coming) 40% (ish) of marriages will end in divorce.  Some people are more at risk than others.  You're more at risk if:

• this is a teenage marriage
• you're between your 4th and 8th wedding anniversary (is this a children bump do you think?)
• you're working class
• you're childless and from different backgrounds
• you work separately from your partner for long periods of time 

Our friends Iain and Babs will get married later this month!

But the great news is that the divorce rate is going down.  Maybe it's because people are getting married older, or because it's OK to cohabit now, or because we can't afford to get divorced, or a mixture of all three.  Whatever, it's great news because divorce is horrible and it hurts like hell.  It is totally necessary sometimes though.  I'm going to keep hoping it doesn't become necessary for me, and I'm not going to take action now expecting something horrible to happen (apart from getting life insurance and critical illness cover).  Instead I will keep trying to make our marriage, and our family a good place to be for all of us, and thank our lucky stars we've been able to move to seaside town where we get to see much more of Kenny.

Wish us luck (and right back at you)!  What are your top tips for keeping a marriage together (keep it clean please people)?  

doing the photo-a-day challenge

April 2 - Blue

My very lovely friend, Sheila, who has four children, a job, a blog, a photography course, and runs a toddler group, all while smiling (phew!) introduced me to Fat Mum Slim's Photo a Day Challenge last year.

She mainly uses Instagram, as do lots of other people, but I have been following it since then, and I use the camera on my phone, the Pixlr-o-matic app (you can use that online too), and I post my pictures on Facebook.  You can share your photos in the FMS Photo-a-day group on Facebook too, which I do when they're any good.  There's always lots of good, inspiring, and interesting photos on there.  People from all over the world take part, so you get to see snapshots of people's lives all over the world.

April 28 - My Sunday

Chantelle, who lives in Australia, and is a professional blogger, provides the challenge, and also writes lots of interesting, helpful, and easy-to-read blog posts, on things like how to make your blog better, how to cook delicious food, and what's going on with her.  She manages to come across as a friend to everybody, which must be really weird for her when she meets someone who follows her blog!

I love the Fat Mum Slim blog, but the thing I like best is doing the photo a day.  I am sure I've talked about this before, so sorry if I'm being dull, but it's got me to stop just taking photos of my kids (although there's still plenty of that), and it's got me really thinking about presentation.

April 24 - I saw this person today

I think it's improved my photos no end.  And it's also helped me to see the usefulness of a little bit of practice every day.  So, if there's something I want to do better, I'm trying hard to do a little bit of it every day.  I started blogging at the beginning of the year, trying to write something every day, to get into the habit of writing.  You'll no doubt have noticed that I don't blog every day any more.  But I do write every day.  I'm working on a story, which is currently called 'The Earning of Stone', and is taking up a lot of my time... if it does ever become a book, it'll have a map in the front.  Sometimes there are other wee stories that come out, and I tend to put them on the Stories from the Frozen North blog.


Of course, if a little practice every day makes you good at something I must be a brilliant laundress... and I just watched the clothes on my whirligig get rained on, so that's clearly not working.  More practice required!  Would you care to join me for May's photo challenge?  Here's the list.

The May list for the Fat Mum Slim Photo a Day Challenge

the reserve army of labour

I'm a Mummy Blogger, and a Full Time Mummy, but long ago, like lots of other Mummies, I went to University.  Can you guess what I studied?  Apart from drinking?

For my BA I did Applied Social Sciences and Women's Studies.  It was a great course.  Really interesting, but a little bit practical too.  I don't know exactly what you're supposed to do with it, but I reckon there are lots of things.  I've found it really useful for doing sociological research, running a charitable organisation, and for being a Mummy, so far.  

One of the things we learned in Women's Studies was that in times of financial difficulty, or constriction of empolyment opportunities, women form a reserve army of labour (it's marxist feminism/feminist marxism people!).  Their work is needed in boom times, or when the men go away to war, but when it's not needed any more then they're pushed out of the workplace, and pulled into the home.  Previously this has been done with sexist legislation, like not allowing married women to work, for example, or ensuring that men's pay was higher than women's, but now we're not allowed to be so overt about it.  And yet everything I hear seems to indicate that it's happening again, now, in these times of hardship.  So how is the push being accomplished this time?  I'm not sure that it's something that one would notice on an individual basis, but the fact that there's so much of it going on, means it's worth having a look at, right?

Let's start with a case study:  Me.

Cuddling and carrying stuff
Hard at work as a full time Mum

When I first had a child I was intending on going back to work after my maternity leave, but then the reality of motherhood hit.  Nobody could love him like Kenny and I, so we felt that we were best placed to care for him.  At that point I was the main earner, and Kenny wasn't making the most of his skills in his job.  We knew we wanted more children, and I'd already been bumped for a promised promotion after I'd revealed my pregnancy. I'd looked around me at work too.  There were no mothers in my team, there was no workplace creche, and there was a culture of long hours which wouldn't work if I wanted to see my children.  When we saw a job Kenny could do which would be a great career opportunity for him, but would mean I couldn't go back to work, we decided it would be best for our family to focus on his career.  

Now we're three children later, and the youngest is going to be starting nursery soon.  I had thought that this would see me going back to the workplace, but to be honest, I don't see how that would work for us.  We have moved around the country helping Kenny get established in his career, and we still need someone to look after the kids, do lots of housework, and deal with holidays, sick days, and head lice.  It's easiest if it's me, so I'm trying to find ways to do things with my brain that fit around doing all this.  Working for myself, if I work at all, seems to be the way to do this, because even flexible employers don't seem to be flexible enough.


I don't think my story is that different to lots of other people.  It isn't that there is an overt push, just that working doesn't suit.  I'm very lucky to be in a marriage wherein we can afford for me not to work.  There's a lot of people not so lucky, and yet even for them, work does not work when there are children.

The incompatible-with-children workplace culture seems to me to be the great push at the moment.  Sheryl Sandberg may be urging women to 'Lean In', but Google don't provide a creche at work, and long hours are how it's done (Mrs Sandberg may have had tea with her kids, but after that she left them with the nanny and went back to work).  In the 1970s we were looking forward to a four day week, so how have we ended up with this long hours culture?  It doesn't make any sense to me.  If there aren't enough jobs to go around, why does it take so long to do them?

But hold on a minute, is paid work better than unpaid work?  I don't actually think it is.  I mean, obviously we need money, and we have to get that into a household somehow.  But a home is about more than money.  And do you know what?  Being a full time Mum is a great thing to be.  I'm making people!  Not just producing them, but nurturing and encouraging them to be the best they can be.  This may not be paid work, but it is useful, and good.

Which brings us to the pull.  How are women being encouraged to leave the workforce?  In the 1950s, magazines made a big fuss over new-domesticity, and that's happening again now, in the form of The Great British Bake-Off, thrift chic, and a huge interest in crafting (last seen in the 1970s).  But all this is tempered by the low status of women's work in the home.  Apparently we should all want to go and do paid work (and presumably pay other women to do the work in our homes).

We once had a woman come into a toddler group  I went to.  She was employed by the local council to help people gain employment through training.  She came to give all of us full time Mums a talk about how we could get some basic maths, english, and IT skills on her courses, which would enable us to find work.  We could work in a shop, or be typists or something.  Oh the glory!  It didn't seem to have crossed her mind that anyone there could have chosen to be a full time Mum!  Or that anyone who did choose to be a full time Mum could have more than two brain cells to rub together.  She wasn't alone in this.  I've regularly been told that I'm wasting my education, being a full time Mum, and I'm often asked when I'm going to go back to work.

Well, I am working.  I am keeping a happy-ish home, creating people, and using my brain, and my education, all the time, whether designing junk robots, writing blog posts, or helping the kids with their homework.  I'm enabling my husband to go to work and earn the money we need.  When I have more time to myself, I might do more writing, but I would rather spend the time I can with my children than go out to work and pay someone else to do it.

Do you do paid work or unpaid work?  What would you do if you could?

in the big smoke

We went into Glasgow yesterday; I needed to finish my outfit for the wedding we're going to next month, and we needed to get a load of stuff for our children, who have responded to the rain and Spring sunshine (spring has finally arrived!) by growing like weeds.

I hate shopping for shoes and clothes because it's just depressing being repeatedly told they don't stock them in my size.  I know what shops to go to now, but I don't know Glasgow, so I don't know where they are, and when they're concessions in larger stores I have no idea.  So I wasn't looking forward to our day.

But I had nothing to worry about.  Kenny was with me, and the kids too, and we had so much fun.

We started off looking for shoes.  We went into Russell and Bromley, where we were asked to put our scruffy buggy hidden out of the way of the shoppers, which was ok, but then the boy picked up a shoe to show me and noticed the price... He called over "Mum, this shoe is £175, so two will be £350!"  I was impressed by both his quick maths skills and his incredulity (if not by his shoe shopping skills), tee hee.  We left that shop and went into Office, where I found the perfect shoes.  Here they are.  They weren't £175, which is good because they're made by Blowfish, which usually means they'll look fab and fall apart quite soon, but they're red and they remind me of my wedding shoes.

We stopped off for a quick lunch of sausage rolls and pasties, and a spot of people watching.  The boy was amazed with the river of people going up and down the hill, and the little girl kept on asking in amazement "what are they wearing?"  She had a point, to be fair, I'd seen pictures of the fashion for ridiculously high heels, but I didn't think people actually wore them for walking in! 

I bought some very expensive makeup, which I rather liked, and I can only justify by saying that the woman I bought it off looked absolutely amazing, and I've only ever seen makeup ladies that looked scary before.

We stopped off at John Lewis to get more school uniform, and some rather fabulous shoes for the little girl, then went to look at 'phones for Kenny. The little girl had taken to playing with window displays, so her big sister was distracting her by taking photos of her on the phones - only Carphone Warehouse actually had the 'phones out and on so you could look at them; in all the other shops they were just fancy plastic bricks with screenshot stickers on, which isn't a great deal of use when you're trying to choose, imho.  

The little girls antics were driving me mad, so I deemed it nap time, strapped her into the buggy and said we'd look for sweets, and set off with the boy to find a cover-up for my arms. I was very pleased to find an Evans inside BHS (by which point little girl was asleep), and find something that looked ok.  I tried it on and asked the boy:
     "What do you think?"
     "Think about what?"
     "This top?"
     "Erm..."
     "This black top, here" - waving it, showing the tag
     "It's exactly the same as the top you're wearing" - laughing
     "No it's not!  The stitching is different." 
     "It's exactly the same!"  - laughing his socks off

Reader, I bought it... and he was right.

Enough!  We set off for home.  I had so much fun shopping, with funny, fun, life affirming people.  I am so lucky to have the family I've got, and I really enjoyed our day.  Let's not do it again for a while though, eh?

Do you like shopping?  What can make a good shopping day for you?