My Mother always said I was like a lemming (I never quite understood that malapropism) but in her eyes, I was the loyal offspring with the homing instinct who would always turn up whatever. And I always did and I suppose always will. Because today I just had to be there, where she lived and immersed in that place where she spent her last years.

For weeks, the Mothers’ Day hype has been built up around us – card shops, chocolate shops, supermarkets, commercial emails, it’s unavoidable – it is absolutely huge.

We mourn the loss of our own lifegivers daily, but on this day of the year it could not be more poignant, especially when other families appear so complete. I feel very deeply for my friends who have recently been bereaved, for the first year without your Mother is definitely the worst. But does it ever go away? After five years, I would say not. Every year, the hurt is a little softer but the bombardment of commercial messages is unbearable. It highlights the absence of someone you love so cruelly.

I’ve had countless emails about how to ‘Spoil your Mum rotten’ or ‘Treat Her’ or ‘Discount Flowers’ or ‘Make sure it’s chocolates’. There are times when I have wanted to stand up and scream out loud:

‘MY MOTHER IS DEAD!
JUST LEAVE ME ALONE CAN’T YOU?
DO YOU THINK I NEED REMINDING ABOUT MOTHERS’ DAY??!!
GIVE ME A BREAK PLEASE….ISN’T THERE AN OPT OUT CLAUSE TO SAY I DON’T WANT EMAILS ABOUT THIS DAY???’

But of course, I haven’t, well not publicly anyway.

My Mother retired to a seaside town and took my autistic brother with her. Life was slower, more lenient on the vulnerable, plus the sea and fish and chips was very seductive to someone in her twilight years.

It seemed right that this year we would celebrate Mothers’ Day there. I don’t know what I was expecting. Shepherding a 10 year old around and a blind autistic adult is humbling to say the least but we made the most of it and had a brilliant meal on Saturday night at a great Italian restaurant near my brother’s house.

Then it was the day. Mothers’ Day. The day started out ok. We woke up early, had breakfast, went down the beach. After a knocking on a few barn doors, we found a restaurant that could seat us for lunch. I’d forgotten that restaurants got booked up – it’s been so long since I’d wanted to do anything on this particular day of the year, I felt my eyes well up as I recognised my propensity towards foolishness was fully in play.

We ate lunch, it felt right, we were together as a family and it did not feel bad. We made our toasts and while I knew we were not the happiest of tables there, we were alright though. We waved goodbye to my brother, after packing him into a taxi with his white stick and left over pizza.

Then as Miniminx and I made our way to the station to go back to London, we walked through a supposedly safe pedestrian shopping area. I was on the phone to my sister, who was sick and still in bed, and telling her about the lunch when out of nowhere, a crazy guy on a mountain bike appeared. He was a maniac on the loose and I shouted to Miniminx to get out of the way, there was no time, he hit her. He didn’t stop. He hit her! There was an uproar, not least of all from me; he span off, people screamed. She screamed, I screamed. It was horrific, like we had been attacked by a predatory prehistoric bird – how on earth could this be happening?

This sacred day had been shattered. It was as if someone had detonated a bomb. I held my baby close, like a frightened small bird – checking her over so as not to cause her alarm, no blood, nothing broken, thankfully she was not injured badly. A knock on the head, a whack on the arm, she’d remained upright. Shocking. Thank god my brother wasn’t there – he’s had a detached retina operated on several times over the last few years – we’d have been in an ambulance immediately if it’d been him.

A girl from the flower stall ran over to give us flowers ‘I hope that makes it better’ she said. Another lady tried to reassure us ‘There’s only one or two bad ones here.’ The security guard was with us, also female, calling in the cctv footage from all around. This drama unfurling was something that we did not want to star in, we wanted to skulk away quietly and unnoticed, but all of a sudden we were in the spotlight. How cruel. ‘Not want you want on Mother’s day love is it?’ said the security guard lady.

We were shepherded towards Lidl to give our details, the man that took us had a large scar on his head and had been hit by a similar incident – he told us he’d been in hospital for months and had an abcess on his brain. At this point I found it hard not to be sick.

The biker, who had been caught on CCTV, was ‘detained’ minutes later. We walked away shaken, horrified and desperate to get home.

So much for remembrance. Our day had been brutalised but I was determined not to have it ruined. We went to the sweet shop with all the funky day glo sweets – it was closed – she cried. We went to grab an icecream and wandered towards the cab rank to get a taxi to the station.

Ensconced on the train in relative comfort, we were both glad to be oh the way home.

‘Mummy shall I tell my teacher what happened?’
‘Darling – remember why we’re here, don’t let it take over the weekend, let’s get over it.’
‘But shall I tell my best friend what happened?’
‘Well why don’t you look at the whole weekend and pick out the good things?’

Or why don’t we just go boil our heads in buckets and have done with this one horse town, I’m not sure I’ll ever go back there now, my Mother doesn’t live there anymore, she’s within us and so what, my brother lives somewhere quieter, I ranted thought to myself.

But then I thought, hang on a minute – we were really looked after, people were much more caring than they would have been in London. With all these women helping each other, would that really have happened if it had not been Mothers’ Day?

I don’t know but they say blessings come in disguise.

Thanks to everyone today for helping us today. It has meant a huge amount. I hope those flowers last a while. We’ll be back for ice creams this Summer.

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If letting children loose in the kitchen is your idea of a nightmare, you need to think again. Helping them to make dishes for themselves is a great way to spend time together and makes mealtime much more interesting. It’s also a really important life skill and I’m always grateful to my Mother for teaching me the basics of cooking (even though I can never look a rock bun in the face again!).

One of the great people I met at the team wholegrain event was Lesley Waters. I spent a bit of time with her talking about cooking and nutrition.

Lesley is a TV regular and I was keen to find out from her what are the 10 dishes I should be teaching my daughter to cook from scratch.

What I love about Lesley’s practical tips is her enthusiasm and also that the dishes are relevant. We talked about my daugther’s likes and dislikes and Lesley was full of brilliant advice. She’s keen to encourage children to get involved in cooking and eating healthily.

So over to Lesley for her make cooking fun advice.

1. Pizza
Home made pizza is a great one because they love making it and you can make a wholegrain base and add various toppings. I can vouch for this – it’s a brilliant idea because it keeps kids entertained and they love adding the toppings and shaping the dough.

2. Bread
Make bread from scratch – that’s a lot of fun for children and they can really get their hands in dough. If you have a breadmaker like we do, there’s still a great sense of anticipation as the machine does it’s job. We add seeds, olives and herbs to the bread to make it more unusual.

3. Soup
Home made soup is a really good one to try and you can add lots of vegetables. We make one with chicken stock and noodles and add cubes of chicken and carrot and finely sliced baby courgettes and miniscule garlic. I’m going to let Miniminx loose in the kitchen to create her own though.

4. Risotto
Risotto is very easy and you can add lovely vegetables like butternut squash; we add peas.

5. Pancakes and Popovers
Eggs are a problem food in our house – boiled eggs are dissembled but not eaten, omelettes and Spanish tortilla snubbed so I have to sneak them in some other way. Lesley says make batter and then use it for savoury pancakes and batter pudding which you can fill with fruit or something savoury.

6. Fruit
Smoothies are another great way to top up fruit intake and if you’re having problems with getting kids to eat their five a day with anything resembling enthusiasm, kebabs are great fun – load them up with fruit and dip chocolate sauce

7. Fajitas
Children love fajitas because they can add their own fillings and roll them up. Using chicken you can add a veg sauce or a healthy hoummous to go alongside chopped up carrots and peppers and grated cheese.

8. Pasta
It’s quick and simple to make pasta and you can also teach children to make a bolognese sauce to go with it. We’ve tried to make pasta from scratch at home and it ended up as a modern art project, it tasted unreal but we still laugh about it. I think we’ll try again though.

9. Meat
Burgers and meatballs are good for children to make and if they don’t like the texture of minced meat there are ways to make it smoother and more palatable– add grated carrot, breadcrumbs and egg and roast in the oven

10. Cous cous
Lesley says that kids love cous cous and bulgur wheat because of the element of surprise and discovery when adding hot water to the grains. You can get your kids to chop up tomatoes and cucumber and herbs to add to the mix and you have helped them make a nutritious side dish.

This is by no means a definitive list but it’s a great starting point and should help to inspire a little, if not a lot. In fact, Miniminx and I did make salmon fishcakes from scratch the other night and I found the whole experience quite uplifting. She sliced the garlic and lemon for the salmon which we baked and then she mashed the salmon. We made mashed potato using a potato ricer which she loved and then proceeded to make shapes out of them – she also liked tasting the mash and fish during the preparation which in it’s own way meant she was feeding herself. They tasted really good.

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Frazzled and bombarded by daily media outcries about obese Britain, us Mums can’t do right for doing wrong it seems. So it’s fair to say my enthusiasm towards nutrition had fizzled out slightly. I know the basic rules and I cook all the time but I’d got stuck in the routine diet rut.

But that’s been reignited by my daughter’s 10th birthday and concern that from 10 years onwards, a lot of things are going to change and how should I best feed and prepare her for this?

So it was very timely that I was invited to the Team Wholegrain morning. It’s a totally refreshing mindset too – I’m sick and tired of the robotic 5-a-day mantra which we have thrown at us daily and I’m really glad to see that wholegrains are getting a look in too.

Yes, that’s me with Annabel and like A Modern Mother, I’m a giant in comparison, but her expertise in child nutrition towers over mine and I was in awe of her. I had bought a couple of her books when Miniminx was younger and I’m delighted that she takes the preteen age group seriously too.

Annabel Karmel Tips on Food and Cooking for and with 10 year olds

1. Annabel’s top secret is that well fed kids will always want to come home – her own chilren are living proof, they all come home for great food and they’re 18-21!

2. If you want your children to grow up with the ability to cook proper food for themselves you have to teach them. Getting children in the kitchen is not just about making cupcakes – make sure you teach them to make useful nutritious things like scrambled eggs says Annabel.

3. Having problems with making healthy salads work for your child? Annabel says make a dressing and use it as a dip to get them eat the salad – they will love it.

4. Don’t ban food, make healthy food so tasty that they want to eat it. If they’re full up on healthy food, they won’t ask for junk.

5. Don’t make a big issue if they’re feeling fussy – wait till they’re hungry. It’s much easier to feed a child with an appetite.

6. When they come home from school and they’re really hungry at this age, give them something healthy; fruit and or veg and dips. If you give them a healthy plate of snacks, they’ll eat it.

7. In a nice way quietly control them and get friends over who like healthy food so they’ll eat it with their peers, they won’t even notice they’re doing it and they’ll want to fit in with everyone else.

8. Once in a while it helps to get someone else to feed them to avoid the pressure of nagging about what to eat. And they might try something different.

9. You can have healthy junk food – instead of buying it though, it’s much better to make your own chicken nuggets or pizzas and the kids can help too. You can make great use of wholegrains here too.

10. And finally on fruit, I feel vindicated! If your child like mine runs a mile from fruit, Annabel suggests making fruit purees by blending fruit and freezing it into icepops. I’ve been doing this for years so I’m glad to know that it’s a good tip!

Thanks for the organisers for inviting me and the very lovely goody bag, I also have some more interviews to share from the day which I’ll be posting over the next few days…

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I have the parental equivalent of a school girl crush on Miniminx’s teacher. She’s pretty and young and the kids adore her. She breathes an air of dignity and calm which I find unusual.

I wonder what makes a good teacher. I asked my daughter
‘Why do we both like your teacher so much this year?’
‘She’s understanding Mum’
What a statement. That’s quite something for a child to say and I think she’s right. She has the charisma and gravitas to pull off the role. She’s like a Horse Whisperer, she’s been teaching the kids yogic breathing before the register so they all start the day calm and collected. She lets the children bring their favourite books from home.

Her teacher last year was also pretty and young, but I didn’t like her that much. She would regularly update the class on her marriage plans, she came across as immature and couldn’t control her class. It was a disappointing year.

Miniminx’s teacher the year before last was a man, he was neither pretty nor young but I adored him and still love to chat to him whenever I see him in the playground. He was the first male teacher she’d ever had and, along with other Mothers, was a bit concerned at how she’d react to this new classroom influence. She came home upset within a few days and said that the teacher had shouted because some of the boys were playing up.

‘What did the boys do when he shouted?’
‘They shut up’
‘But why?’
‘Because he told them he was teaching a class and that they should behave.’

They never played up again. The tone was set. He never had to shout again. It was an interesting journey and calm out of chaos ensued. He helped me find ways to help my daughter overcome her shyness and find her own voice. He encouraged us to look outside school for stimulus and over that academic year, she progressed.At the end of the school year we all clubbed together to buy him a gift token to his favourite curry house and tickets to his football team – he was chuffed to bits. We were unaware at this stage that he was going through an adoption process with his partner and has since cut down his hours to co-parent.

There’s also a sports teacher, who is even less pretty and less young, but he’s hilarious and I always have the mental snapshot of him from a wet and windy Summer Fair a couple of years ago, he was standing under a waterlogged gazebo singing karaoke. And the song? Why Does It Always Rain on Me? by Travis.

But what next?

I know many people who quote a teacher as the inspirational influence over their chosen career, or the champion who helped them overcome parental adversity. I certainly had mine, my Art Teacher battled with my persuaded my Mum to allow me to apply to Art college.

In primary school, I see teachers chasing Ofsted and I’m disillusioned and worried that my daughter will not reach her full potential. I know that several parents are paying for tuition to help their children get along, coincidentally, their children are also in the athletic squad. Am I not being pushy enough I ask myself. Is there some invisible membership I don’t belong to?

What do you all think? Is pushy parenting the only way to get our children into the right place or places or do we have to roll with it and let them find their own way?

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I know you couldn’t bear me to get all teary-eyed and nostalgic but I can’t help myself… I think this makes quite a cool birthday actually, and while I claim to have made it myself, I’ve had a bit of help from Elvis, The Ramones, Alvin and the Chipmunks and a few others so please sit back and enjoy…

So first up, you know how much I love the Ramones and they’ve got something to say to you

And, Elvis? But of course, he’s just got to say something on your special day; just a quick word mind

And we love singing cats, so no birthday would be complete without this

And no birthday greeting would be complete without a dose of Alvin and the Chipmunks now would it? (although I do prefer their version of All The Single Ladies)

So maybe you might know what Sesame Street is after you’ve see this little clip….

And then of course the Beatles!

If you can work out the garbled words, you’re a better girl than me, but I loved this one anyway!

But I know you couldn’t have your day without the Jonas Brothers either

Kiki wishes you happy birthday – and you know it’s the only time I will tolerate whistling!

Have a lovely day, it’s definitely going to be a great year for you darling!

Let’s have fun!

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You can put those questions aside now – here’s a really great way to set your seedlings off to a good start this spring

eco seed planter

Economic and eco-friendly too, you could drop a large hint to your little one’s for a green-minded Mother’s Day gift.

Using old newspaper you can create perfect little pots for your seedlings. Just wrap strips of newspaper around the wood and press into the disc to create a seedling pot in seconds.
£10

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I was sent a preview copy of the movie Motherhood which I watched the other night and wished I’d watched it with a group of Mums, and Mums who blog too. There are some priceless moments in there that will resonate with a lot of you.

Uma Thurman plays the central character, Eliza Welch, she is a writer turned blogger with two children and a disengaged husband. She’s stressed, leaves the house in her night clothes and still manages to pull off quirkly glamour. She is all too human and we discover she smokes, swears and doesn’t pick up dog poop.

Eliza is “The Bjorn Identity.” ‘mommy blogger’ who navigates the ups and downs of competitive, strung out parents in Brooklyn. There’s a great cameo from Jodie Foster in the play park who is hounded by both paparazzi and mamarazzi – the latter who travel around childrens’ play parks, with kids in tow to spot celeb parents.

The whole premise of the film is that Eliza is drowning in a Sylvia Plath 2.0 style career block – she has two young children that take all her time and energy but she wants to exert some intellectual muscle through writing – it’s a very familiar tale.

This hectic gallop through a 24 hour period sees Eliza fall out with friends, neighbours and at one point, herself, and veer out of control and lose the plot.

Watch out for the scene where she dances with the delivery boy – I can imagine at least two of my friends doing that!

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It’s the countdown to my daughter’s birthday and on March 1 Miniminx will reach double figures. That’s a whopping 10 whole years on the planet.

It’s quite a milestone and an unexpected one too. I had expected this feeling when she became a teenager and not so soon. But we all know, each year brings new challenges and adventures and there’s always such a great sense of wonder about all potential of this little ball of energy growing up in front of our eyes. So there it is, the first decade is really such an achievement, especially when I think forward. I may try to imagine what the next ten years will hold for her but I also know that what’s coming is going to be fun and at times a white knuckle ride.

Time is both kaleidoscopic and telescopic in this instance and anything but still. I feel emotion well up as I recall the day of her birth and then there’s the intermingling and muddling of vivid memories with keepsakes; summer holidays, the first tooth falling out, starting to walk, funny things said, sad things experienced, ballet, snorkelling, being ill, laughing together, a broken arm, tiny trainers, golden locks of hair. A cherished life can be overwhelming if pondered over for too long, better to live for the moment I think but birthdays do afford some timely reflection.

For the first time today I thought that one day we would be sitting in a pub together sharing a drink, that my baby will become an adult. It didn’t scare me, I could almost see it as I walked past a cosy pub near our home.

And my gift?

She’s a Leaper – that’s a leap year day baby. We don’t bring her birthday forward to February 28, instead we defer to March 1, unless of course it’s in the right year. Some may say she is actually only going to be two and a half this year and she herself has often written off ghastly behaviour claiming that she’s ‘only 2 or so years old’. I might use this ‘fun’ little calculation myself when the time suits!

Remember this though, Miniminx will be a spritely 10 years old in 2040 – some might say she has all the luck – so my gift to her by giving birth on February 29? Well it’s eternal youth of course.

How lucky she is.

Now ladies – what’s yours?

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But sadly I can’t find it on youtube or search. Maybe it will take some time.

It makes me feel very upset that no matter what anyone does, these problems are hidden.

I know quite a few people who would shout very loudly that I am a mad b*tch for pointing this out.

In fact I know people who would prefer that my daughter never even watched this video because it would be tantamount to making her view of the world twisted and warped and bitter.

How do we as parents deal with a subject like this sensitively? That’s a personal issue, but it would be nice to have wider access to videos like this.

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It’s a light, a very cute and gorgeous light and it’s White Rabbit, I just had to have it…

Well, this is going to be the year of Alice in Wonderland isn’t it? And all thanks to someone recommending me a shop on twitter; Rockett St George thanks to @Miss_Cakehead.

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