Yes, it's nearly 2010, and I for one am looking forward to it. Are you? Don't know why but the start of a year, let alone a decade, always feels like an optimistic and inspirational time to me. It's a bit of a 'clean slate', an opportunity to leave past mistakes behind and focus on new hopes and dreams for the future. I don't really believe in making New Year's Resolutions. Instead, I like to make a list of the most important things I want to achieve during the year, including places I'd like to visit and people I'd like to see. Then, on those rainy winter days when I'm feeling a bit lacklustre, I can refer back to it and plan a trip or take steps toward a goal. It works for me ... well, most of the time anyway! What works for you?

As a mum with a bit (okay, a lot) of a ’sick’ phobia, I’m not terribly keen on winter, especially those long rainy days when everyone’s cooped up indoors and the children don’t even got five minutes outdoor play. Sending the kids to school or nursery or any kind of group activity at all feels like sending them to swim in germ soup. And as adults we can’t always escape the bugs either. A friend of mine recently described the London Underground as “a petri dish of illness”! Nice.

So I’m always on the look out for anything that might help boost our immune systems and keep the germs at bay. Here's a useful list I came across whilst trawling the web the other day:

http://www.ourbigearth.com/2009/10/09/top-10-immunity-boosters-for-kids/

This article doesn’t include things like vitamin C and echinacea that we all know about already. It’s got some quite interesting stuff that I’ve never heard of before, and that I’ll definitely be trying. We’ve had some fantastic results from ‘alternative’ remedies and treatments in the past, to the point that they’re normally my first port of call.

Last week, for example, my eldest daughter started complaining of really bad earache. Desperate to avoid the antibiotics that seem to often get doled out for these things, I rang our local homeopathic clinic and asked for advice. A couple of hours later, having done a bit of a dodgy handover at the school gates (cash in exchange for a little packet of white pills) I started giving my daughter the remedy. By bedtime the earache had disappeared and the next day she was completely fine. Yes, of course, the earache might have gone away by itself … or it might not! For £2.75, I preferred not to take the risk.

Anyway, see what you think and, if you try anything, let me know if it works.

My dad, bless him, makes a habit of always arriving for a visit armed with all sorts of obscure newspaper cuttings for me. Some of them will be adverts for hideous household gadgets from the back of the colour supplements, others will be heavyweight intellectual articles from the broadsheets that I don’t feel I’ve got the braincells for anymore … but just occasionally there’ll be something that I really want to read. And that I never would have discovered without my dad! It’s a fairly rare occurrence, but it means I can never just bin the cuttings without looking!

Anyway, the latest article, dutifully cut from the Telegraph magazine, was on New Model Schools (http://www.newmodelschool.co.uk). You can read a slightly condensed version of it here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/6543637/New-not-for-profit-private-school-chain-is-a-class-apart.html

I’m honestly not sure what I think about these schools, and I guess you have to visit them yourself to form any kind of valid opinion. I love that they’re small and personal, like an extended family. I love the emphasis they appear to place on creativity, good manners and respect. I like that they support teachers to focus on teaching, and free them up from administration and after-school clubs … although of course this means that parents have to do a lot more! (But then, if your school fees are half what they would be for a ‘normal’ independent school, perhaps you’re happy to be very hands-on?) I’m a lot less comfortable with the fact that they’re owned by a Right-wing think tank!

Having spent a good chunk of the last few months investigating all sorts of different options in terms of schools for my children, I’ve got to the stage now where, if I had loads of money and nothing else to do, I’d love to start my own school, ‘pick-and-mix’ing the best bits from all the various approaches I’ve researched. So it’s really interesting to see the way that NMS have grown organically from a tiny seed of an idea, with a handful of children, into a model of how things could be done.

In the words of Robert Whelan, who came up with the original idea:

“The challenge is to the prevailing political idea that the answer to educational problems is lots of money and centralised control. We want to show that the first is unnecessary and the second destructive. We don’t think NMS will ever be massive, but it doesn’t have to be to show that it works.”

Seems that lots of parents around the country are all coming to similar conclusions and starting to do their own thing – see these articles:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article6879294.ece

http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/bristol/low/people_and_places/newsid_8317000/8317780.stm

http://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/news/4715963.Swanage_parents_poised_to_start_own_school/

So, just in case I ever do start a school of my own, tell me what your ideal school would be like …

I am almost scared to admit it, but in the last few weeks I have developed a new ‘guilty pleasure’. I don’t think you’ll ever guess what it is!

Okay then, I confess, it's Peter Andre. Here's my excuse ...

Having moved into a new house with no cable TV or freeview, and having not yet signed up to Sky, I have been restricted to far fewer channels than normal. Not a bad thing, you might think, except that it meant ITV2 got a look in … and that’s when I got into trouble! I caught a bit of ‘Peter Andre – The Next Chapter’, just a little bit, by mistake … and before I knew it I was hooked. There’s something about an emotional man who’s great with his kids that gets me every time.

I am so ashamed. I’m supposed to be an intelligent middle-aged (aaaagh!) woman. What’s wrong with me?!

Somebody please help. Or, alternatively, ‘fess up too. It surely can’t just be me?

In my ‘here’s the news’ post I mentioned that many working fathers want more time with their kids, according to a recent report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC). Interesting, given my last post about the (in)equality of the sexes, that dads want less time at work and more time at home whilst many mums want the opposite! Surely the obvious solution is to give everyone the opportunity to work part-time, in a flexible family-friendly manner, so that both mums and dads can have hands-on parental involvement and career satisfaction?! It seems so obvious, but I’m sure it’s one of those things that’s easy to say and far more complicated to do, not least because the people who would have to go out of their way to implement it probably don’t really need it. I’m thinking of your 50-something MDs with children who are more-or-less grown up and wives who’ve always done the ‘wife’ thing! (Yes, I know, gross stereotyping – sorry!).

Anyway, came across these other articles in the Guardian that talk about the subject in a bit more detail:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/oct/20/working-fathers-report-parents

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/oct/21/men-work-paternity-leave

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/oct/20/working-father-case-study

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/audio/2009/oct/20/working-fathers-childcare

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/oct/25/employers-part-time-work-parents

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/nov/13/women-career-mothers-girls-schools

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/nov/17/school-girls-expectations-gender-gap

Make sure you read the comments as well if you can, they’re fascinating. And all I can say is, who on earth would be a politician?! Everyday life is complicated enough without having to sort out the nation as well.

But then, thinking about it, perhaps I’d quite like to be a politician as long as someone else would do my shopping, cooking, cleaning, washing, ironing, packed lunches, party invites, Christmas card writing, etc, etc, etc. Would you?

Three things I’m grateful for from the last 48 hours or so:

* A really lovely family celebration in honour of my sister and brother-in-law’s 40th birthdays (you’ll have to guess whether she’s older or younger than me!) – no squabbling between children or adults, a cause for celebration in itself!

* A text from a friend suggesting a coffee – didn’t get it until too late because my phone was playing up, but it’s the thought that counts, and we got together today instead.

* My beautiful children who, despite their sweet teeth, will happily eat a whole range of veggies, no nagging required. How do children survive who don’t?!

I was having a chat with my dad the other day and we got onto the subject of the equality of the sexes … or should I say, the lack of it?! It’s a favourite subject of ours, and usually leads to an argument. Much as I love my dad, he is of the generation that expects girls to be girls, boys to be boys, and wives to cook the tea! I have always thought that he would have been far happier with me if I’d floated through the fields in a long white dress, hair flowing, all fresh and virginal like the Timotei girl. Kind, gentle and, dare I say it, submissive. Instead, I wore Doc Marten boots with hotpants and hung out in nightclubs with a pint in my hand (in my student days, I hasten to add!). I was anything but submissive. I think he found me a bit scary then and, truth be told, probably still does.

Anyway, we were having this discussion and I started ranting about how unfair it is that women still end up making the majority of sacrifices when it comes to having a family. In most cases, it’s the woman whose career goes down the pan because she takes time off to look after her (their) little ones. It’s the woman whose body bears the stresses and strains, and who loses her confidence because of that amongst other things. It’s the woman who ends up taking a far lowlier job than she deserves just so that she can work in and around her family and be there for school drop-off and pick-up. It’s consequently the woman who sacrifices her status and financial freedom, not to mention her pension contributions, etc, etc. Which is all okay-ish whilst you’re a happy family unit with a supportive partner who appreciates what you’re doing and sees his money as your money. But what happens when that happy family unit breaks down? Suddenly, it’s the woman who can’t get a mortgage and finds herself in rented accommodation on benefits. It’s the woman who still ends up doing the lion’s share of the childcare, because ‘daddy’ is busy working and ‘mummy’ can no longer command a salary to compete with his. In the worst cases, it’s the woman who has to fight to even get a few quid from her ex for their kids.

Now I know that that was a bit of a one-sided rant. And I know that it’s not always the case, that there are plenty of mums who manage to maintain successful careers, plenty of mums who don’t want to, plenty of dads who feel hard done-to and would like to spend more time with their kids, even some women who do very well out of their divorces. I know all that. But I still think that it is very VERY difficult for mums to bring up their families in the way that they want to and maintain their status within society. Let’s face it, the two things don’t really go hand in hand, do they? For a start, few mums would choose to never see their children, and few well-paid high profile jobs are part-time.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, my dad gave me a challenge. He told me, very politely, to stop moaning and do something about it. I think his actual words were “Someone with a brain like yours should apply it to finding a solution”, which was a back-handed compliment I guess! I told him I thought there were probably a lot of far better brains than mine already working on this issue, but then I realised that that was a bit of a cop-out.

So, this is my challenge, and I need your help please:

* What can we do to ensure that British society offers equal opportunities for mums and dads in relation to both work and parenting? What needs to happen?

Let’s put our heads together on this one. Post your thoughts and suggestions as comments below. I’d love to hear them and I’m sure everyone else would too. ‘Mumpower’: perhaps, together, we can achieve miracles?!

Three things that I especially appreciated about yesterday:

A real show of support from my daughter’s headteacher.
A pleasant afternoon with my dad.
Special snuggles with my little ones as they were falling asleep.

All in all, an unexpectedly good day!

These were the wise words of money saving expert Martin Lewis, who I happened to hear on the Jeremy Vine show on Radio 2 this lunchtime. It was an interesting discussion, in which he basically advised people not to go crazy with the present-giving and to focus on giving meaningful gifts, like time, instead. “No presents?!!”, listeners responded in horror. “What kind of a person doesn’t give presents to their family and friends at Christmas?!” But Martin made some fascinating points:

Traditionally, the giving of gifts has been a form of social banking that has moved money from the older, wealthier members of a community to the younger ones who are just starting out – for example, when presents are given in celebration of someone’s wedding or ‘coming of age’. At Christmas, when we all give presents to each other, the social banking function is no longer fulfilled – if you spend £10 on some bubble bath for me and I spend £10 on some chocolates for you, I’m effectively buying my own bubble bath and you’re effectively buying your own choccies!

When you buy someone a present, social niceties generally mean that they feel under pressure to buy something for you too. Fine if you can both afford it, but what happens if you’re better off than they are? Your generosity can actually end up creating financial hardship for them, as they spend money they may not have on a gift for you. Probably the last thing you’d want, but do you stop to think about it? Martin was suggesting that we give more careful consideration to our gift buying and, instead of throwing money at the situation, make more of an effort instead. The old-fashioned kind of effort, involving homemad marzipan fruits for grandad and a framed photo for grandma, that kind of thing.

I expect you can listen to the whole discussion on BBC iPlayer if you want to, but the comment that stood out the most for me was the one I’ve used as the title for this blog post: “Christmas is NOT a retail festival”. So how come we’re all rushing round like headless chickens trying to track down Go Go Hamsters and the like?!

I, for one, hate the thought that the retail giants (and probably their marketing and PR agencies too) are getting rich on the backs of ordinary hardworking mortals just wanting to make their children happy. Even if it is often self-inflicted, I can’t stand the pressure to always give bigger and better, to ‘up the ante’ every year. I’m disturbed by the great long Christmas list that my 5-year-old has already written, after hours spent poring over the toy catalogues. And I’m scared of disappointing her if I don’t deliver. Of course, the reality is that I – or should I say Father Christmas – probably will come up with the goods. Why? Because it’s quicker, easier and a whole lot less risky to pop into Argos with a credit card than it is to make something myself. I may not feel cash rich but, as a busy working mum, I definitely feel ‘time poor’. With the best will in the world, I’m not quite sure when I would be making that personalised patchwork quilt that I’d so love to give each of my girls? Probably at 3 in the morning. And can you imagine the horror of a crestfallen little face, as they realise it’s not a Go Go Hamster or a Playful Puppy or a Cicciobello Poorly Baby, it’s a bit of a mummy botch job?! Or would they “feel the love”? What do you reckon?!

Who’d have thought it? I am writing this whilst tucked up warm in bed (the only place to get warm in this cottage!) with just my mobile for company. It’s quite amazing what you can do with an Apple iPhone. If this works, you can look forward to lots more late night posts … well, until I get a life that is!