We nodded knowingly when reader Juliette Robertson shared her ‘mum moments’ with us. Something tells us they might just strike a chord with you too…
Posted: 14 December 2011
You’re alone in the car and still happily singing along to a Tweenies’ CD.
You point out a passing tractor to your friend/partner/colleague as a point of interest.
You have friends round for drinks and realise you have no ice cubes because every ice cube tray is filled with puréed vegetables.
You return from holiday and discover there’s not one photo of you or your partner, but there’s one of every animal you looked at in the zoo and every sand castle you built.
Your friends stay for the weekend and the only spare bedding available is branded with Barbie or Spiderman.
You take marmite and jam sandwiches to work after discovering just how nice they really are.
You make room in your handbag for a spare pair of child’s pants by leaving your make-up bag at home.
You struggle to find a free date on the calendar for meeting up with your best friend because the kids have five parties, two school trips and one photo session lined up for the coming month.
You save more cereal boxes, egg cartons, yogurt pots and toilet rolls than you throw away.
Having three of your kids’ friends over for tea – one with a nut allergy, one a strict vegan and the other with a phobia of all things green – just isn’t a problem any more.
Cotton buds, once only used for subtly applying eye shadow, are now for getting milk, food or play dough out of the remote control.
Instead of washing off the wax crayon drawing of you – carefully crafted by your 3-year-old on the hallway wall – you frame it and wonder what you’ll do when it’s time to redecorate.
You frequently take up the challenge of washing, drying and ironing your 3-year-old daughter’s favourite items in under two hours, because she ‘has nothing else to wear’.
Three years after the birth of your child you find the umbilical cord stump in a baby keepsake box – and still can’t bring yourself to throw it away.
You don’t think twice about recording over unseen episodes of ER with Fireman Sam or Postman Pat.
On the advice of your daughter, you go out wearing jewellery more suited to a dinner party than a supermarket trip because, ‘it makes you look like a beautiful fairy princess, Mummy’.
You serve your husband’s supper on a plastic plate in case he falls over the toys on the floor and drops it.
You spend the garden voucher you got for your birthday on fresh sand for the sandpit.
Even after a frustrating day, you collapse on the sofa thinking how lucky you are to have such a wonderful family!
You’re quite prepared to use all 12 of your pantomime voices to distract your toddler from having a monster tantrum in the supermarket and put a smile back on his face.
You realise you supply a detailed running commentary for everything you do, like a top radio broadcaster for the Olympics: ‘Let’s just pop to the toilet, put on our shoes and then we can call into the shops before going to Grandma’s.’
Your handbag is replaced by a backpack and you brag to your friends that it may not be the most fashionable, but the space and pocket arrangement it has far excels anything else on the market.
