What's on your bottom step?

I'm sure I'm not the only parent who seems to spend half their life picking things up off the bottom step and carrying them upstairs. How is it that everything we own seems to live upstairs and yet always ends up downstairs? I sometimes think life would be so much easier if we actually just lived on a massive bottom step. You know, cut out the middle man and all the picking up and running up and down stairs.

I'm usually the one who puts things on the bottom step. It starts after breakfast and continues all day. Something gets put there and is picked up and taken upstairs the next time I'm passing. Actually, that's a complete lie. It has been know for stuff to reside there for days before I actually pick it up and take it upstairs.

Sometimes I play a game to add a little frissance of excitement to my day and leave stuff there on purpose to see if anyone else thinks to pick up the latest pile-in-waiting as they pass by. They generally don't.

Anyway, to make my point, here are 10 things which can regularly be found on my bottom step.

1. New packs of nappies which have been unpacked from the latest trip to the supermarket.
2. Bathroom cleaning stuff (I know, I know, I should just buy more stuff and leave it upstairs).
3. Small cars, random flashcards, trains, Buzz Lightyear and dozens of other toys which have, yet again, escaped from their upstairs storage boxes.
4. Piles of clean laundry or sometimes not even a pile, just a messy heap of clean clothes. I know, I know, I should have a laundry basket. I do. But it is usually somehow upstairs.
5. Piles of slippers, pjs and dressing gowns which are waiting to go back up to bedrooms after I - once again - dressed the boys in the sitting room (despite my pledge to break this terrible habit at the start of this year).
6. Packets of baby wipes.
7. Random sticks, stones and other bits from the great outdoors which have become lifelong friends on our latest walk.
8. Biscuit crumbs, raisins, bits of toast, clumps of mud.
9. Hats and gloves which have been hastily discarded and dumped there.
10. Naughty children and occasionally an exhausted mother who has given up the battle and decided to spend some time on the naughty step herself.

So, what's on your bottom step?

What's on your bottom step?

One Smart Fish: World Book Day

Today is World Book Day; an annual event promoting the enjoyment and reading of books in over 100 countries throughout the world. As a parent, I've often said that if I only teach my children one thing in life, I would want them to have a real love of reading and books. We have read to both our boys from when they were very tiny babies. I still have their first favourite books which were:

We have read literally hundreds of other books since and I'm so delighted that both the boys now have a real love for cuddling up with a pile of books for me to read to them.

We recently read a fantastic new book 'One Smart Fish' by Chris Wormell.

This is a brilliantly illustrated book which tells us about the cleverest fish in the ocean who longs to walk upon the land. He invents feet and walks out of the water! His adventures give the other fish big ideas and they all start trying to walk as well. 'One Smart Fish' is an ingenious way of introducing the concept of evolution. It is humorous, engaging and so bright and colourful it kept my 2 year old's attention as well as my 4 year old's. They both particularly love the page with the picture of the BIG fish and the one of the scary shark. They scream out loud every time we turn to that page! They keep asking for 'One Smart Fish' again and again and I'm more than happy to read it. The book is priced at £10.99 and is my top tip for World Book Day.

One Smart Fish: World Book Day

Excuse me, is this your child?

I’ve never been entirely sure of the purpose of indoor play centres. Is it somewhere for mum or dad to have an hour off-duty while a ball pool and a giant snake masquerading as a slide mind the kids; or is it somewhere for the kids to have fun and for their parents to have fun with them?

It's probably a bit of both for most parents, but I'm starting to get a bit fed up of going to these places to mind other people's children. I’ve lost count of the number of times I have ‘rescued’ someone else’s child from the top of a slide or rocked someone's toddler on the rocking lion or taken a wailing tot around the tables of chattering mums to see who the child belongs to.

Of course, this happens to us all; you only have to turn your head for a few seconds for something to happen and you feel like the worst mum on earth when someone else brings your crying child to you while you're paying for a scone and a latte.

But if you chose to turn your head for five, ten, fifteen minutes or longer, then that’s an entirely different matter altogether. I am just stunned at the number of times I see parents arrive, send their child off to play, shoo them away repeatedly when they come back to their table and generally do their best to ignore them for the duration of their time there.

I actually enjoy playing with my children at these places; shouting encouragement to them to come down a new slide or climb to new level and generally interact with them. Of course, play centres are a great change of scenery and a brilliant way to let the kids burn off some energy and I'm not condemning anyone for enjoying a coffee, a flick through the celebrity magazines or a much needed natter with friends.

But do I really want to spend my mornings looking after or disciplining other people’s children? Erm, nope. I have enough of a struggle looking after and disciplining my own! So parents please, please, remember that your children are your responsibility – not the play centres and not mine.

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Read more about me in my interview on the internet's first BlogCom 'How Did You Get There'

Excuse me, is this your child?