Around this time last year I was 7 months pregnant and was mulling over whether to bother doing an NCT refresher course or not. I had had L in France in 2006 with no NCT or any antenatal preparation at all really – not that it made much difference as I ended up with an induction and an epidural and she was born pretty quickly, so I wasn’t sure if there was any point in doing NCT with our second.… Read more
When I was growing up we were banned from having pets, the excuse from my parents was that five children was enough to be dealing with. I always used to think this was unfair, unreasonable and just plain untrue. Then I joined the world of adulthood and got my own pets.… Read more
Yesterday I had one of my best days EVER with L, our 6 and a half year old.
The smiles say it all
Hubs was working, I had a rare day with no children to mind, so I suggested that L and I head to Legoland just the two of us.… Read more
A few months ago I decided to not return to my full-time job as an account director in a digital marketing agency in London. Instead I opted to work as a childminder, looking after our two girls and an additional two children of similar ages.
I got mixed responses – some people thought I was crazy (and I’m sure there are many more who haven’t voiced it), and quite a lot of people supported me in my new life, where I’ll be around for my children.… Read more
I recently read a very interesting article in The Guardian about how children these days rarely spend time playing outdoors, in comparison to previous generations. Whilst this is undoubtably true for many children, I am happy to say that L spends more or less the same amount of time outside that I did as a child.… Read more
10 years ago today I said “oui” and “I do” to my husband in French and in English (just to allay any doubt!), so I’d like to dedicate today’s blog post to him with an open letter. (I will post about our wedding next week when we’re back home and I can access photos and – dare I say it – videos, for a trip down memory lane.)
To my frog*,
I can’t believe that it’s been 10 years since I stopped calling you my nearly husband and started calling you my husband.… Read more
I recently read a very interesting blog post by Stressy Mummy which talked about testing and ranking school children, and on separating children into sets, and it got me thinking about the differences between the French and the British education systems for secondary schooling.
In the UK children are generally separated into different sets per subject depending on ability in that area, which is usually based on tests or exams taken.… Read more
Before I had children I didn’t cry much. I mean I cried over the usual stuff, break-ups, death etc, but TV, books, films and so on didn’t make me cry. I’m one of those weirdos who didn’t cry at Dead Poets Society, and I did use to wonder if I had an important part of me missing.… Read more
This has been the subject of conversation for a while now amongst my friends and me. Aged 30-40 with children and often home-owners, most of us don’t have wills in place, but do we really need one? And what happens if the worst comes to the worst and something happens to us, our other half, or worse, to both of us?… Read more
You may or may not know that the Franglaise family moved house a couple of months ago (from one side of the street to the other, as you do!) and it got me thinking about how I’m a bit of an expert on house moving.
I moved from the UK to France in 1998, which was a simple move as I took one (BIG!) suitcase on the plane, but once I decided to settle in France I started to cumulate possessions and my moves got more and more complicated.… Read more