“Captain’s log. Stardate 031118. I have been lost in cyberspace for over four hours and rescue seems unlikely. The wall lights I’ve been trying to buy for the stairs and landing have eluded me for almost an entire calendar year yet still I search for them, typing every known combination of the words “brass”, “glass”,…
After the best summer in living memory (for me, at least; those older have enjoyed banging on about the summer of ’76 which was, of course, hotter, longer and tougher) we find ourselves hurtling into autumn. The leaves are starting to fall, the nights are drawing in and we’re all desperately trying to not talk…
I’m having one of those evenings when I feel as though I’m most definitely losing at the whole parenthood game. The tedious bedtime battles continue and the longer the battle goes on for, the more wound up I get. Honestly, it’s like being a negotiator in one of those Hollywood hostage scenarios – I try…
If you’ve ever wondered how hardy kids’ clothing is, then let me tell you that it does not withstand being repeatedly sandpapered. A couple of weeks ago we went to visit Mr AMR’s cousin and she had a ramp in the garden for her little dog, who is quite old and can’t jump up and…
(links marked * are affiliate links, for more info see disclaimer below post) I’m a bit broken this week. Lack of sleep (I thought we were past those days) and tediously long bedtime sequences have stretched me to the end of my tether. Or stretched my tether? What even is a tether? Whatever (tether), I…
This month has been dominated, both emotionally and practically, by the arrival of Angelica’s Big Girl Bed. It has taken up a lot of time, this Big Girl Bed; first, choosing it (I was torn between buying an antique and getting a new one), then working out what else we needed to go with it…
It’s the 3rd of the month, which means life update day. It has been published on the 3rd of every month for well over a year – I changed it to the 3rd when Ted was born (on – you’ve guessed it – the 3rd!) and before that it was on the 17th, which was…
I had such an overwhelming response to my video on infertility a couple of months ago; so many people emailed me and left comments talking about their own experiences. It’s an incredibly difficult and delicate subject to broach, really, because it’s not something that you particularly want to talk about when you’re struggling to conceive,…
Those of you who read The Uphill – the parenting and family blog I write “in my spare time” (haha) – will already be familiar with my life updates. I do one every single month without fail, always on the same day of the month, and I’ve been writing these little round-ups of my family news, baby…
When Mr AMR and I first had Angelica, we vowed never to take a holiday abroad for at least five years. Just getting to Sainsbury’s was enough of a faff – getting her into the car seat, getting her out again for a feed and a change, stopping for another feed halfway down the dual…
Don’t panic, but this might be the last monthly update on The Uphill in its current form. I’m considering merging my two websites together, so that beauty and style content from A Model Recommends sits alongside life updates and family stuff and posts about being a Mum. I sometimes feel as though I spread myself too thinly across…
I think, for the first time, my self-imposed monthly update deadline may have beaten me. I do not have a single ounce of energy to type up my thoughts or think of witty things to say about poo (or the fact that the other day I got poo all over my tracksuit bottoms, which is…
These sports markers give me such horrendous PE flashbacks; the gym teacher (Miss Lawton) barking instructions at us as we stood shivering in the cold, watching her jog along in her shell suit, throwing the coloured markers down on the grass as she went. “GIRLS! This will be your star-jumping route – the GREEN markers…
I must stop writing these updates at the last minute – although, why change what is now such an established habit? I think that the majority of the monthly updates I’ve written (and I’ve done one a month, without fail, since July 2015) have been hurriedly typed at a minute to midnight, cold sweat trickling…
This is my third and final post with Huggies Pure Wipes and I wanted to talk about how nappy-changing time can be one of the most important times of the day in terms of connecting with your baby and having a bit of fun. If you have an absolutely jam-packed schedule of child-watching and food-cooking…
Just a quick post: some higher-tog sleepsuits for those with f-f-f-f-freezing houses. (To be fair, it’s not that bad now that we’ve worked out the heating, but it still gets a little bit nippy in the small hours!) Most babies and toddlers are just fine in the 2.0 tog sleeping bags in winter, especially with…
This is where I’m supposed to write “how time flies!” “I can’t believe Ted is a year old already!” or “it seems like only yesterday that Ted was a tiny newborn wrapped in a little blanket!” But actually, the past year has felt exactly like a year. Perhaps it’s because so many other things have happened at…
A new feature for you, to supplement the written monthly updates that you read here on the blog; Parenting Highs and Lows will be a chatty, rambling video about all of the good and bad things that have happened over the course of the month – struggles and triumphs, positives and negatives, failures and successes. Because sometimes,…