Do the words ‘family holiday’ instantly ignite stress, worry and anxiety? Well, for me they do! “How far away is the holiday, how secure is the hotel, will there be any swimming pools for the kids to fall into” and the list goes on and on! (Not to mention “Are we nearly there yet?” followed by me banning the question!)

However, I have come across a saviour on the net which is an award winning family holiday company, Tots to France. They also own Tots to Italy if your kids prefer pizza and spaghetti!

Their aim is to make it much easier to take your children away on holiday. They visit every single property that they put on the site and look at it through the eyes of a parent to make sure that it is baby and childproof.

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My little boy Kian aka Evil Kenevil currently has no road safety awareness, in fact it’s fair to say he has even less than our dog Baloo which is saying something. As August is National Road Victim Awareness month, I was staggered by the facts that some 30 million people have been killed on the world’s roads since 1896 when records began, and every year sees a further 1.2 million killed and 30 million injured! Those statistics are enough to shock anyone into reinforcing road safety to their children.

Yes, I know, pretty serious stuff but it’s one of the things that I think, as parents, we worry about the most. How many times have you drilled into your kids “Stop, look left, look right, look left again and go”? I still remember the little hedgehogs in the road safety advert a few years ago.

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So I guess you’re wondering what’s been going on in the Kilburn household in the past seven weeks since the dramatic but happy news that I was 23 weeks pregnant!!

Well after the initial shock had settled me and hectic dad to be rushed round to tell all the family and they popped open the champagne - not that I was able to drink any of course!!! And then of course I had to tell work - nobody warns you how many forms you have to fill in and decisions you have to make!!! And because I was so far on in the pregnancy the decisions had to be made urgently!! Stuff like: when are you finishing for maternity?, how much maternity leave are you going to take? are you going to take any unpaid leave? is your job safe to do whilst you are pregnant? etc…. My brain hurts!!!
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Over the last few weeks I’ve come across so many stories about the end-of-year proms which are happening up and down the country at the moment that I can no longer ignore it, I have to write something!!

At first I thought it might be a one-off school, where the parents had got a little carried away and decided to splash out and spoil their kids with a ‘the sky’s the limit’ motto. However, I’ve come to realise that this is now a nationwide craze! Children arriving in limousines and landing in helicopters, dressed in £600 outfits and caked in makeup at the tender age of 11 is apparently becoming the norm over here in the UK.

It’s a bit frightening really and many people I’ve spoken to about it are split. Some say “its just one day in the year when they can dress up and have fun so why not?”, whereas the other half say “if they have this now, what have they got to aspire to?” After reading numerous comments from parents questioned in the articles I’ve seen, it also appears that the main driving force behind these ever more extravagant displays of excess is the parental one-upmanship.

I’m all for children having fun and going to a party together but whatever happened to hiring out the village hall and buying outfits which don’t cost an arm and a leg to buy, such as this gorgeous girly dress?

What do you think?

So the big news in the Kilburn household and the Hectic Mum office this week is the news that I am now a Hectic Mum To Be!!! Having felt very tired for the last few months (my mum thought I was anaemic) and also putting weight on, I failed to realise exactly what was going on until the 16th person asked me if I was pregnant!! Right, I thought, I’ll take a test just to prove them wrong!!   But, I ended up proving myself wrong. Having broken the shocking but happy news to my husband I booked an appointment at the Dr’s for a second opinion! She confirmed I was pregnant and estimated I was about 16 weeks!!! (more…)