Joanne the Coach

Book giveaway: What Not to Expect When You're Expecting by Zoe Williams

Yesterday we welcomed author and Guardian columnist Zoe Williams.

Today we have three copies of Zoe's latest book to give away

 

THE PRIZE

Three winners will each win a copy of What Not to Expect When You're Expecting by Zoe Williams. Published by Guardian Books and released on 7th June (RRP £7.99), it'sa  refreshingly frank and funny take on motherhood written by one of the Guardian's most popular columnists

What Not to Expect When You're Expecting is a straight-talking corrective to the sea of advice that engulfs pregnant women and new mothers. It considers such issues as the overbearing public guidelines on what not to eat or drink, 'women shouldn't be treated like three-year-olds, airily instructed in the way of things with no proper explanation,' weighs up the relative merits of different childcare routines, 'It doesn't make any sodding difference. There are easy babies and difficult babies, and, before you know it, they're no longer babies,' and even considers the correct response to the question, 'Who's fatter, my sister or me?'

 

HOW TO ENTER

To enter, simply leave a comment below saying what you think are the worst and best parts about pregnancy

 

EXTRA CHANCES TO WIN

You can have an extra entry if you like this blog on Facebook - state in your comment if you're claiming an extra entry.

 

RESTRICTIONS

UK only. One entry per person.

 

CLOSING DATE

This giveaway closes at midnight on Monday 18th June. Three winners will be chosen at random and the books sent out as soon as possible after that.

You can find more competitions to enter at ThePrizeFinder - UK Competitions and Loquax Competitions

In conversation with Zoe Williams

I first encountered Zoe Williams over a dozen years ago. I was working for Carlton TV as a producer for Thursday Night Live (a current affairs shoutathon presented by Nicky Campbell and Andrew Neil), and Zoe was a columnist for the Evening Standard. She appeared on the show a few times, despite the fact that the audiences could be really quite rude (the whole thing was like Question Time with the brakes off and an open bar).

Zoe Williams

Since then both she and I have gone on to have two children and write parenting books. Zoe is now best known as a Guardian columnist, but her work has also appeared in the Spectator, Marie Claire, Grazia, Red and the New Statesman.

I am best known for running a terrible competition and giving away a foot grater.

She was last year’s Columnist of the Year at the Workworld awards and is shortlisted for Feature of the Year for this year’s One World Media Awards.

I tweet a lot and drive a red Mini.

So, karma-wise, all is even in the Universe, which is as it should be.

Zoe's latest book, What Not to Expect When You're Expecting, is released soon, and it's a stright-talking book for pregnant women and new mothers.  Here she talks about what pregnant women need to know, and what she really thinks about Mumsnet and mummy blogging.

 

There are so many parenting books (and I can't complain about that having written one myself) - what does yours offer that's different?

ZW: It's funny, the exact same question came up a lot from  Guardian readers, many of whom were totally furious: "women have been giving birth for thousands of years! You seriously think we need YOU to tell us how cute your baby is?" I really puzzled over it, because my first thought was, "Man, they're right. What have I done?"

But in fact, I think it's like writing a book about falling in love, or cooking fish. Just because it's part of life doesn't mean that it's not a new story from everyone who tells it. If anything, I hope the difference in my book is how terrible I was at everything - the terrible moods, the awe-inspiring weight gain, the total refusal to listen to experts, on any matter, without shouting at them. I really hope anyone pregnant who's feeling cranky and bad about  herself can read this and think, "thank God I'm not that bad".

What's the one thing pregnant women need to know that they aren't currently usually told?

ZW: Oh, I'm very big on breastfeeding: two things pregnant women need to know. First is that it's amazing, if it works it's like being in heaven. Second is that it's not that big a deal. Most of the health claims are overstated (as you can read in my book!) So if it's not like being in heaven, don't kill yourself trying to do it.
 

And are there any parts of pregnancy that those who've gone through it need to keep schtum about? Or is all knowledge power?

ZW: Well, my sister had a two-year-old when I got pregnant, and was pregnant again herself, so it was fresh and present in her mind, and if she'd lied to me about it, I would have been able to tell. But the truth is, when people tell you frightening things (like, "you might poo yourself, but you'll be so out of it you don't notice" - and you think, how out of it would I have to be?), your  mind finds a way to explain them away. So I just listened to my sister and thought, "oh, she's always been the weaker of the pair of us, I'm sure I'll be fine" Ha! Like hell!

Do you think the expansion of the online world has helped or hindered mothers in general? I think that forums like Mumsnet and Netmums can be great for connecting people, and for quickly finding advice from people who've been where you are now. But they can also be the source of enormous judgementalism, over-thinking of simple issues and avoiding the real world.

ZW: I think the major things about the online world are exactly as you say - it makes you feel very supported, in a very particular way. People identify with each other really strongly if they've both got the same very specific problem (like, say, your daughter is anally retentive, or your son prefers Gordon to Thomas the Tank Engine, even though Gordon is clearly a dick) and are infinitely more useful to one another than the half-baked memories you get off your family (my mum told me that I'd gnawed a baguette down to the middle when I was six weeks old. So of course, when I had a six week old of my own, I assumed there was something terribly wrong with him, because he couldn't even hold his head up. My mum had obviously meant six months. The internet would never make this mistake).

But sure, as you say, you can get terrible tirades from strangers, and these seem to crop up more in parenting conversations than any others. My rule of thumb with that is that I would never put a point of view on t'internet more strongly than I would put it if I met someone at a party, and if anybody else does, I just don't listen to them because I don't think they've thought hard enough about how they're coming across.

In June Zoe will be speaking at the parent blogging conference BritMums Live. So what does she really think about the term 'mummy blogger'? Some people are very proud of the tag, whilst others find it incredibly patronising and hate it. And if Zoe wasn't writing regularly for The Guardian, would she blog?

ZW: Oh, it's funny the blogging idea - exactly the same slightly patronising conversations happen about foodie bloggers, and how they're not proper professionals because they take pictures of the food instead of describing it, and all they ever call anything is "tasty". But I think for someone deciding whether or not to go to a restaurant, a blog is often much more useful than a conventional review.

Speaking for myself, I have always found describing things, especially stressful or unknown or infuriating things, incredibly cathartic. Just the act of turning it into a story seems to take the sting out of it, even if the story pretty much always ends with me realising I'm wrong/ over-reacting/ under-reacting/ something. So I would always blog, if I weren't writing for the Guardian, and if blogs didn't exist, I'd probably write a lot of letters.

 

 What Not to Expect When You're Expecting by Zoe Williams is published by Guardian Books and released on 7th June 2012, RRP £7.99

I have 3 copies of the book to give away - check back here tomorrow to find out how you can win one

Review: Start-Rite shoes and online fitting service

When it comes to my most un-favourite parenting tasks, shopping for shoes is down there with combing for nits and wiping snotty noses - just really no fun at all.

Start-Rite Angry Angels Diva shoes

 

So I was really pleased to be asked by Start-Rite to try out their online fitting service. I am a big online shopper but I've never bought children's shoes online before - I always assumed that queueing up in a noisy, too-warm shoe shop was one of the delights of parenthood, like stretchmarks.

But we gave it a go.

The actual measuring part is very easy, you don't even need a tape measure. You print out a sheet from the Start-Rite website, and cut off a marked strip to wrap around each foot to get the width. Your child then stands on the printed out page so you can see the length of their foot. These measurements then get put into the site to generate your child's size, and the system then tells you which shoes are in stock at this size. The site also has a video you can watch with more shoe fitting tips.

 

My daughter's shoes, from the Angry Angels range for older girls, were even easier - just print out the sheet, stand on it and there's your size.

 

So that's the theory, but did it work?

Well, almost. My son's trainers fitted like a dream. There's a good bit of growing room around the toe, but not too much and the shoes stay on well. He is really chuffed to bits with his footballer-style trainers (RRP £34), and I am quite pleased that the antibacterial footbed will stop them getting smelly. The picture here shows them after six weeks of wearing - they're a bit mucky because they've been on a school trip (as indeed has their owner) but they're not at all scuffed and have continued to fit well.

 

Start-Rite Boys Trainers

My daughter's shoes, it has to be said, were on the big side. This is where, if we'd been in a shoe shop we could've tried half a size down or another style. And whilst we could still have exchanged these, it would've meant posting them back and waiting for a replacement - always a danger with online shopping. So we decided to keep them and wait until her feet have grown a little.

The style, which you can see above, is lovely - it's called Diva (RRP £25), and has a satin feel with a cute ribbon bow on top. They're a great compromise for when you need a fairly smart pair of school shoes, but your daughter only cares if they look good.

 

Over all, I would give the online fitting service 8 out of 10. It's not 100% foolproof, but it's a good option if you can't or don't want to go to a shoe shop. I wouldn't do it if I was in a rush, but I feel much more confident that it can work well, especially when you're measuring the width as well as the length of the foot. My son is now unlikely to see the inside of a shoe shop until he can pay for them himself. My daughter, I suspect, will have other ideas.

Thanks to Start-Rite for sending us these shoes to try out the service.

Would you like to try out the online fitting service too? Check back here tomorrow when Start-Rite will be giving away a pair of shoes from their fantastic Angry Angels range.

Review and giveaway: French Kids Eat Everything by Karen Le Billon GIVEAWAY CLOSED

  THIS GIVEAWAY HAS NOW CLOSED. DON'T LEAVE A COMMENT, IT WON'T BE COUNTED

That is the most offensive book title I have ever seen, said my child when the review copy of French Kids Eat Everything arrived in the post: I mean, it's putting down all kids who aren't French.

Hmm I thought I can see where you're coming from, but then again you do regard pasta with pesto as highly exotic.

Part memoir, part cook book, part nutritional rallying cry French Kids Eat Everything: How our family moved to France, cured picky eating, banned snacking and discovered 10 simple rules for raising happy, healthy eaters by Karen Le Billon is a feast for the mind in many ways.

We're off to this place in France in the summer, and given that neither of my kids are what you might call culinarily adventurous, I was interested to read this book for ideas on what to expect, and pick up some pointers we could apply at home.

French Kids Eat Everything traces Le Billon's family, who moved from Vancouver to spend a year in France and in doing so found their eating habits transformed.

In contrast to Le Billon's children, French children seem to happily tuck into a huge variety of food. The author researches how this comes to be and how she can apply it to her own picky eaters. A big stumbling block seems to be Le Billon herself, who freely admits that she's a reluctant cook with fairly narrow tastes and a hardened attachment to snacking.

I was reminded of the chapter on fussy eating in Toddlers: An Instruction Manual, which says:

"If, deep down, you know that your own approach to food and trying new things is less than positive, then don’t be surprised if your child picks up on this. And if that’s the case, then the place to start making improvements is within your own attitudes rather than your child’s. Be honest – does your child see you eating a varied, balanced diet? Are you up for new food experiences, even if it’s something you don’t expect to like? Does all the family regularly share meals together?"

Le Billon distills what she learns from French ways into 10 rules, though some of this will seem like common sense rather than a uniquely French approach. What makes this book stand out is the way in which it shows Le Billon attempting to apply these rules to her own family, a journey which is often far from plain sailing. She's a mother who has struggled like a lot of us, and is sharing the lessons this has taught her.

Controversially, part of the French way involves the attitude that it's OK for kids to be hungry sometimes, with even little babies left waiting for the next scheduled milk stop. There's absolutely no snacking, no eating on the run or in the car - French parents would be horrified at the way most UK parents carry a snack on every school run.

I liked this book very much and found it to be a fascinating, engaging and thought-provoking read. I don't think it's just one for parents of picky eaters - anyone who has an interest in children's nutrition will find it worth reading. And anyone whose child has erupted in the face of something green on their plate will find this an invaluable source of ideas for a new approach.

 

GIVEAWAY

I'm delighted to be able to share this fascinating book with you. I have one copy of French Kids Eat Everything to give away.

To enter, leave a comment below saying what was your favourite food as a child. Closing date: Midnight on Monday 21st May.

EXTRA ENTRY

Optional extra entry if you like this blog on Facebook - state in your comment if you're claiming an extra entry.

 

I will pick a winner at random after the closing date and post the book to them as soon as possible after that. No regional restrictions, will post the prize anywhere in the world. Though if you're in France you probably don't need it.

 

 

You can find more competitions to enter at ThePrizeFinder - UK Competitions and Loquax Competitions

Guest post: Confessions of a pregnant travel journalist

Today I have a guest post from the marvellous Cathy Winston, who's a travel journalist, lemur juggler and blogger at the multi award nominated MummyTravels 

Cathy's known for reporting from exotic trips, so has that been affected by her current pregnancy? Does having a plus one on board necessarily slow you down? This is what Cathy says:

"I love travel. I really really love travel, and having carved out a career as a travel journalist, I’m lucky enough to get to indulge it under cover of work, visiting over 50 countries so far (and counting). I’m also lucky enough to be pregnant. Which, according to almost everyone I meet, means I’ll have to give up the travelling. The only problem – I don’t want to.

But even as I’m putting my fingers in my ears, going ‘la-la-la I can’t hear you’ to everyone’s dire warnings, I know there’s a few concessions I’ve got to make. All right, quite a few.

For starters, large chunks of the world are suddenly off-limits because of a threat so tiny, it’s invisible to the naked eye. Malaria. I’d been so busy smugly congratulating myself on updating all my travel vaccinations before getting pregnant that I’d forgotten about the mosquitoes - until I was in the middle of making plans for one of my dream trips, visiting Burma with my Burmese sister-in-law showing me the sights.

Most anti-malarials have a barrage of side effects so horrific that the only thing that’s worse for the baby is getting malaria itself. Depending on the areas you’re visiting, there’s one which is OK ‘if you have to’ take it – but even I couldn’t convince myself that desperately wanting to go equalled having to visit. And while I’d probably have been OK, it wasn’t a risk I could take.

Also off my list was everything from tree climbing and canoeing and boat trips (as a lot of operators won’t insure you) and almost as depressingly, having to forego the almost limitless free drinks and wine tastings that seem to come as standard on press trips. My vague first trimester excuses about medication must have seemed as thin as my smile. Oh and out goes shellfish, various cheeses, rare steak and a string of other gourmet treats.

Thankfully, I didn’t get morning sickness too badly so after the first exhaustion lifted, I packed in as much as possible before the bump grounded me – racking up a respectable total including the Cayman Islands, Belfast, Israel and the Azores.

I’ve even managed to find a few mild adrenaline thrills which are pregnancy-friendly, including swimming with stingrays off Grand Cayman and floating in a geothermal pool before eating volcano-cooked food in the Azores. Maybe not quite on the same level as my previous exploits, including the world’s fastest zipwire in Italy, an Edge Walk on Toronto’s CN Tower and canyoning in Jordan, but enough excitement to keep a smile on my face.

And while my third trimester means flying and ferries are now out, cars and trains are still in, so to tackle my itchy feet I’ve found myself casting a closer eye over the best of the UK.

As for not travelling after the birth? I’m already plotting to branch out into family travel. Well, babies look fairly portable – and this one’s already had plenty of experience of planes!"

Cathy Winston blogs at www.mummytravels.com and is on Twitter at @mummytravels

For today's trick I will hover under a baby's bottom

Was there ever a time when you bunged out a book and it just floated to the top of the best seller lists? Probably not. Even Dickens had newspaper serialisation.

 

And I've got my head in a butt! OK, not quite in, but certainly under one. For some reason this pleases me greatly.

Anyway, you can read the full version of the article above in the April issue of Mother & Baby magazine, where I'm on page 16 spouting forth about why Elimination Communication is A Bad Thing. And plugging my book. As you do.

And I have been continuing to bother the bloggers with extracts and tips from the book which they have been kind enough to run as guest posts.

At Mummy's Space we answered an important question once and for all - what's the right age gap to leave between children?

And at This is me - Sarah mum of 3 we told you how to teach your child to share. Yes it can be done.

At Ramblings of a Suburban Mummy we looked at when to discipline your toddler.

Speaking of discipline, at WAHM-BAM we discussed the merits (or not) of smacking.

Over at Life, Love and Living With Boys we looked at the changes you might expect to see in your toddler's behaviour when a new baby arrives.

It was the sharp end at A Working Mum as we considered what to do about toddlers who bite.

At Yellow Days we asked how achievable it is to have time to yourself when you've got a toddler.

At Trials & Tribulations of a Brummie Mummy we had some practical strategies for dealing with tantrums.  And there were more tips on tantrums over at Emmy's Mummy. It's a big subject.

Rainy Day Mum is all about fun, so this post is from the chapter on play and explains a common toddler play pattern.

And you can see more guest posts on lovely blogs here.

Essentially I am going to continue in this vein until everyone with a child under 5 has bought a copy of Toddlers: An Instruction Manual (paperback or Kindle, your choice!) and we have raised a shedload of money for Home-Start. Have you bought a copy yet? Go on then, you might as well, if only to shut me up.

How to piss off a parent blogger

 

I was chuckling all day today at the tale of the blogger who got sent one shoe out of a pair to review.

So much so that by the end of the day I was wondering if it was some sort of reverse psychology PR stunt to make the shoes seem more interesting and desirable. Why didn't I get one shoe to review? I can hop. I can balance. I can do basic Irish dancing.

PRs, this will not do. What are bloggers supposed to moan about on their secret parent blogger forums if you're making us laugh instead of annoying us? So here is my definitive cut out and keep guide for PRs on how to piss off a parent blogger:

• Start your email Dear Mummy Blogger - parent bloggers LOVE that, particularly if they are men.
• Follow up by getting the name of the blog wrong. Mail merge is your friend here.
• Then say I love your blog, I've just spent all morning reading it followed by a sentence which shows that you have never actually clapped eyes on it in your life.
• Offer products for review which have no discernible relevance to the blogger in question. Quite a rich seam of parent bloggers will go apopleptic if you offer them nappies when their youngest is 24.
• Offer content for their blog including four links to your client's site, and make a big deal about how you're not going to charge them for this service. This saves the blogger from having to write their own posts which they hate doing really.
• Play Blogger Beauty Parade - ask too many bloggers to an event, then ditch the ones you don't want or simply go silent as the grave when they get in touch.
• Alternatively, offer something really cool to do or review, and when it looks like your blogger has got super excited and told their kids about it, just disappear and never mention it again. It's not like they'll bear a grudge or remember your name.
• Send an invitation at 4pm on a Friday for an event at 10am on the Monday. Tell your blogger they can only bring one of their children to your event. It's OK, they've all got a favourite.

Stay lovely!

 

PS Anybody got a single shoe they need reviewing? Will consider one sock or some chocolate covered nuts that you've licked the chocolate off instead. #prrequest

Working mother confessions - A mother's work meme

 

A meme! I never get tagged in memes, and I have so much to meme about. So thank you very much to The Daily Mum for inviting me to join in this one. A Mother’s Work Meme started with mother.wife.me and is currently winging its way through the blogosphere .

Here are the rules:

   1. Post the rules. OK, I've done that, now what?
   2. Answer the questions in as much or as little detail as suits you
   3. Leave a comment on mother.wife.me so we can keep track of the meme
   4. Tag 3 people and link to them on your blog
   5. Let them know you tagged them
   6. Tweet that you're taking part using #amothersworkmeme

Questions:

   1. Did you work before becoming a mum?

  2. What is your current situation?

  3. Freestyle – got your own point you’d like to get across on this issue? Here’s your chance…

And, most importantly…. here are my taggees:

Sarah Ebner - Schoolgate at The Times

Mme Lindor - Salt & Caramel

Janice - A Working Mum

(don't worry guys I won't be offended if you haven't got time to do this 'cos you're working 'n stuff)

 

Aaaaanyway....

   1. Did you work before becoming a mum?
Yes I have always worked, mainly in a self employed capacity and mainly in media. Before I had my children I worked in TV as a producer on many chat shows. Probably the most well known were GMTV and This Morning. After I had my daughter I carried on doing sporadic shifts, but TV is very much a long working hours business and anyway what I really wanted to do was write. So I trained as a life coach and started building up work I could do from home and combine better with family life.

Being self employed means you are entitled to Maternity Benefit but little else. I deliberately timed having my second child for just after the benefit was due to go up. I don't think I ever totally stopped thinking about work for any length of time - being self employed means you are always on the lookout for the next thing and have to keep visible. So even if I was technically on maternity leave I would still be doing things like media interviews which didn't earn me any money but kept my profile as a coach up.

 

  2. What is your current situation?
I work flexibly, mainly from home. Over the last few years I have built up my writing more and more, but I still coach as well. I coach people from all around the world via phone. I also do consulting, broadcasting and a bit of public speaking - whatever comes along and pays the bills really. Currently I am finishing off my second book which is about fear of driving. Once that's been sent off to the publisher then I plan to do more feature writing.

Right now I work throughout the school day, stopping for the school run to pick up my 8 year old, then carry on in the evening and at weekends if I need to. I never mind working at odd hours because this is what means I can be there for my children when they need me. The big challenge is during school holidays - I've found it's unrealistic to expect to put a full day in and leave the children to go feral. They moan a bit about me working from home, but I point out that they would like the alternatives even less.

 

  3. A rant about working mums in TV

I always found that the TV industry was utterly crap in terms of the value of 'presenteeism' and a long hours working culture which rarely gets questioned. This is why women in television seem to disappear - you don't get many women with children in senior jobs in TV, certainly not outside the BBC. When you consider that many programmes are made for a family audience, it's ironic that the people making those programmes often have very little family time for themselves.

The world has moved on considerably in terms of working from home and other flexible options, but from what I can see the TV production industry has not embraced this, leading to many experienced people to leave. And then they go off and do creative things elsewhere, leaving the TV industry poorer for it.

 

Free activities for kids: grafitti The Guardian

Previously we looked at free activities to fob the kids off with, but it's hard to play Hunt the Pixie in winter, so here's an indoor activity to try with your children - it's called grafitti The Guardian.

We did this yesterday and the sports section turned out particularly well:

Admittedly I did pay £2.10 for the paper, so it's not a total freebie but I read it as well, and it kept the juniors quiet for ages. So as budget activities go it's a winner. 

Other newspapers may also be used for this activity. Magazines can work well too:

 

The next evolution of parent blogs

First the parents came, and they blogged about their kids and it was good (actually, some of it was a bit tedious, but why let the facts get in the way of a good story?).

And then the kids grew up a bit and said - WTF Mum and Dad! Why did you tell the world about that time I peed on you?

And the parents scratched their heads and said - Fair enough, I did sell you out for a sponsored post about pizza.

And so a new era was born

I give you - parent and child, blogging together in laptop harmony. Apart from when they fight about SEO.

My 12 year old and I have started what seems to be the UK's first mother and daughter blog. There are a few others sprinkled around the world, but not many - yet.

Yes, I know what you're thinking - it all sounds hideously twee and vile. But rest easy, it's not. At least I don't think so. So far we have posts about teeth, music and how to tidy your room. It's high grade weird and regularly surreal. Which, in my world, is a good thing.

So hustle on over and say hello to Eljae - a blog from El and Jae (no prizes for guessing which one I am). We may be the first but we sure as heck won't be the last.

I won't stop blogging here though. It's good to have a virtual space of your own.

 

 

 

Now, did I tell you about the time my kid peed on me......?