My husband had a wonderful time yesterday afternoon outside clearing up leaves and attacking shrubs with the hedge trimmer. At Easter we were guests on a National Trust family working holiday to Stackpole in Pembrokeshire which I wrote about for The Independent. The youngest loved the day our group spent chopping down shrubs in the woods […]
The best flight ever
We went to the Dionysos estate in Turkey with Exclusive Escapes for the October half term holiday. I’m writing about the trip in print, but wanted to write here about how we got there because it was my best experience of air travel since my first plane journey 25 years ago. When I heard that […]
The Story Museum, Oxford
Oxford’s Story Museum aims to celebrate and promote children’s literature, and is due to open in the city centre in 2015. It should be a great success if its patrons are anything to go by: the fabulous authors Philip Pullman, Michael Rosen, Michael Morpurgo and Jacqueline Wilson. At the moment the museum runs outreach programmes in […]
Birling Gap, East Sussex
Birling Gap is one of my favourite places. It’s between Brighton and Eastbourne, but is unspoilt and beautiful, and owned by the National Trust. It’s part of the Seven Sisters chalk cliffs and has seen some perfect days out throughout my life, the most recent being with my Mum and kids a couple of weeks […]
Kayaking for kids
My kids and I were in Pembrokeshire this week with some other Mums and kids, and my friend Lizzie and her two eldest went sea kayaking at the National Trust’s Stackpole Quay and had a great time. We weren’t organised enough to book ahead, and so there wasn’t space for all of us, sadly. I’ve […]
The Harry Potter Studio Tour
My family loves Harry Potter. It feels like our eldest grew up with him, and the day the Deathly Hallows book came out we had to buy two copies because neither of us could wait to read it. (My husband felt this to be an appalling waste of money and still hasn’t forgiven me 5 […]
World Book Night
I just found out that it’s World Book Night, and that’s made me really happy because: a kind lady gave me a new book to read which I have never read and think I will love (The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho); on the back of the book it says ‘This book is a gift. It […]
National Trust Standen for kids
Standen is a beautiful Arts & Crafts National Trust house in West Sussex, and I went there last week with my sister and our children. I know the National Trust has been harping on about all the things kids should do before being swallowed up by screens, but I’ve never found Trust properties (of the […]
Sea Kayaking in Pembrokeshire
Putting on a wetsuit is exhausting, especially when you put it on back to front and then have to peel it off and reinsert yourself the right way round. But it was my first time, so I knew no better. Once suited, I had to put on a waterproof jacket, life vest and helmet before […]
How to make an Easter bonnet
The youngest’s school Easter Bonnet Parade is looming. This, like World Book Day and other such occasions, must have been dreamt up by an alpha mum who can effortlessly fashion a costume out of scraps of leftover craft materials she happens to have lying around, and whose extrovert child loves nothing more than turning up at […]
