This 'ere blog...

I've been a little obsessed with this whole blogging thing recently, not necessarily my own, but the huge number of voices out there - the mommy bloggers. And not just mommies, but mummies and mums, and moms and mamas and papas and daddies and maybe even grannies and grandpas. (what about it Mot?) I'm irresistibly drawn to the beautiful blogs that talk about homemade jam and home-crafted soft toys, the ones that are illustrated with photos of sleeping babies in a slant of sunshine. They draw you in with their kaleidoscope of colours, so warm and comforting, you don't realise you are being sucked in to this illusory vortex until you open the fridge and find not beautiful cupcakes or home baked cheese straws but a bag of spinach that smells like seaweed and a tub of moldy ricotta. Put simply they inspire me, but then make me feel like a failure. (The same can be said of Martha Stewart's Living Magazine - do yourself a favour, don't buy it).
So it's refreshing to find the blogs that wittily ef and blind their way through parenting with anecdotes that make you laugh out loud. I suppose, or rather hope, that this blog falls somewhere in the middle. If there happens to be a picture of a baby in the sunshine it's not because I'm smug that a) the baby's sleeping or b) the sun is shining. Rather, I know how enticing these pictures are...and they preserve a moment that all mothers have shared - the awe at their beautiful child. But in this house serenity is a fleeting visitor. I don't delude myself. I have boys giggling about farts most days, a toddler in a fury over vegetables and joooce and my singing, a gaggle of strollers by the front door (what IS the correct collective noun for those things?), and a husband who loves 'a good fug' ie, a hearty clutter of toys, newspaper and size 11 shoes. I know I'm richer for it, but sometimes it takes some remembering.
One thing I realised in my blog searching this week, was that it was quite annoying if the blogs you like aren't updated regularly - the writers were probably busy doing something worthwhile like, I don't know, parenting - how very inconsiderate. Anyway, my resolution is to try and post more often. I realise that is something you just do, you don't write about it, but I'm just declaring my intentions. And while we are at it, I got a little fixated on finding blogs on expat parenting - just to see if anyone else was missing 'home' or struggling with where 'home' was any more, or if anyone was as infuriated as me at being told to use half a cup of chopped onion in a recipe. I mean, what is that about? Surely it's a small onion or half an onion but not half a cup of onion? (More ranting on this another time...) I didn't actually find much so I'll have to provide my own dialogue - with myself. Thanks for joining me!