Just trying to keep my balance…
I went to U2's last ever Irish concert, in Slane in 2001. It was the best concert I was ever at, made all the more special knowing it was their last one ever. Oh, except for the one I saw in Croke Park some time in the middle of the noughties, before we had kids. ...
Have you ever been the last one to read the book everyone's raving about - The Girl on the Train or Gone Girl maybe? Going to Cambrils Park in Northern Spain was a bit like that for me - at least a dozen people had told me how fantastic it is, and I arrived worrying that ...
Until my mid-twenties, I thought hayfever was something limited to children, limited to summer, and limited to people who sat around in fields of hay, rubbing sheaves of dry grass in their eyes. That last one is a slight exaggeration, but really I didn’t think of it as debilitating, and I didn’t think it would ...
When I go on holidays, and I do what lots of people do – I put photos up on Facebook. It’s the modern version of the postcard isn’t it – “Having a lovely time, wish you were here!” So here’s the Facebook version of one holiday, as told through the photos I posted on social media: There was ...
The alarm goes off. I fumble under the pillow, trying to press any button I can find. There is no way on earth it's morning. I refuse to believe it. I try to find the button that snoozes rather than turning it off, because even though it's clearly impossible that it's morning, I have a ...
"Don't turn on the outdoor tap!" "Don't climb over the gate!" "Come out from under the table!" "Stop digging in the flower beds!" It struck me recently that I spend a huge amount of time telling my five-year-old what he can't do, and they're very often things that in an ideal world, he could spend all his time doing. ...
Friday night. We told the kids it was time for bed and switched off the TV. My husband picked up the small boy and swung him around a bit to make him laugh but mostly to carry him up the stairs because it's easier than telling him four hundred times to go up himself. My ...
Anyone who knows me in real life will know that I'm not exactly horizontal in the chilled out stakes. I'm somewhere between about 45 and 80 degrees. And depending on the situation (organising a kid's party, organising a barbecue, trying to get out the door when we have a babysitter...) I'm really quite the opposite ...
Sun and showers and sun showers, school runs snaking in and out between parked cars, windows down, temperatures up, singing voices raised, tempers frayed. June is everywhere and we are exhausted. It's time to wind down towards summer holidays, but at this time of year, it always feels like it's ramping up instead. Not the homework, ...
I need to make a confession. I hate driving. I avoid driving beyond my local comfort zone if at all possible. And I never, ever (deliberately) drive on motorways. On a number of occasions in the last few years, I've decided that I need to be brave, and I've made journeys to places far, far ...