Andy is now 17 and leaving for college. The most heart-wrenching bit for me was when his mother stood in his empty room preparing to face the prospect of the dreaded empty nest syndrome…..my son is the same age and it really hit home – just how fast they grow and move on….although having said that, in the UK I’m not sure we can expect (hope?) to lose our children at such an early age – they move back in or simply don’t leave at all these days. I’m quite sure if I dared strip his room and move another of my children in the minute he leaves for his gap year or university he’d kill me.

The characters were as fabulous as ever. The new ones, an evil care bear called Lotso provides wonderfully mafia-esque drama and a menacing baby that I thought would give children nightmares comes good in the end. A thespian Hedgehog is brilliant and the scenes featuring Ken are just hilarious.

The main theme appears to be how to accept change, let go and move on in a mutually agreeable way. A good life message as ever and one that resonates, judging by the amount of sniffles I could hear in the audience at the end of the film.

Looking forward to Toy Story 4 – the midlife crisis years.

Just a few years later and she now has the best selling board game in the UK according to The Financial Times. I texted her on Sunday – she’s in the US for the summer “buy the Weekend FT – amazing article and yr game got No.1 slot!!”. She hadn’t seen it. ” OMG PLEASE keep me a copy”. Just an amazing story and I’m so pleased she’s done so well.

I was having coffee with another friend this morning and it’s made me realise that she too may well find herself with a best seller on her hands in a moment or two. Having had 20 years experience in the drinks industry she has developed a new drink of her own. Her main focus was on a gap in the market for women. She has invented a new girly sparkly light alcoholic wine that is very fruity and tastes a little like an alcoholic Schloer – just so easy to drink and my daughter LOVED it, rather worryingly. Being one of four sisters her starting point was finding something lovely to drink whilst being around a table surrounded by other women: -

“I’m a passionate believer that women are women’s greatest allies; women need other women – in good times and in bad. A strong girlfriend or group of girlfriends can get you through things you’d never quite manage alone, and if you mess up along the way, they’ll still be there for you afterwards. What’s more – you’ll get to laugh about it, and those laughs help keep everything in perspective.”

They’ve just launched in both Britain and Ireland and I think it will do very well. There isn’t much for us women to drink at lunchtime or early evening that isn’t too heavy. We don’t want beer or cider but wine makes us too pissed to pick up the kids. So this is perfect. She said she’s got a few bottles to send to anybody who wants to try it. Why not send her a message via their website – or let me know and she’ll send you a sample bottle: http://www.carnabybrown.com/

In the “Sunday Telegraph” yesterday was an article about Danielle Lineker and her role as a stepmother. It looked at the negative popular culture view of the stepmother who since ancient times has been our favourite hate figure:- “Better a serpent than a stepmother” said Euripedes and how Danielle and a host of others are finding that it works best to be their stepchildren’s friend rather than their surrogate parent.

It looked at ways to get it right. How to create a life-long bond with a step child and the key appeared to be the co-operation from the child’s real parents and mainly about how getting the support of the real mother is essential.

I am quite sure that it would be in my children’s best interests for me to have a good relationship with their new stepmother, but does that really mean that I have to be involved? Our situation is a little more complex than most.

I got my second text from my X’s new wife today. I won’t bore you with the details – she mainly chose to tell me about Builder Bloke’s flaws, however the main point was that she wants to meet me to discuss the “truth”.

I really don’t think I’m ready to do that. My relationship with my X has nose-dived in the last few months and Builder Bloke thinks that meeting her is the worst idea in the world.

My aim, as ever is to do what is best for my children. I will meet her if I think we can develop a working relationship that helps them, however, to say that I am a little reluctant to put myself in the firing line again is an understatement. The last time I met her was when she inadvertently acquired my X’s number from me and now they are married.

HELP!!

Does anybody out there have any experience of this sort of situation? Does it really help the kids if we get on or would it be just as clear cut and simple if we had no contact whatsoever?

I did reply because I think it would have been rude not to, telling her that I was happy to meet after their honeymoon, once my X and I had resolved our financial dispute. BUT I DON’T WANT TO.

Yet.

Interesting to see it’s being launched digitally on the world wide web. This is clearly the way forward and because a friend of mine has been involved in the set up, we thought it would be a great idea to get some parent bloggers to join us and the First News team (including the editor) for an informal session in September to discuss any views and comments we might all have about the programme.

It would be great to be involved and know that we can actually help influence how and what our children will be watching – we could maybe even take our kids too. So let me have your thoughts.

Here is the link to their player:-http://www.firsttv.tv

Please forward the link to anyone you think might be interested. Thanks.

It’s hot. Just gorgeous. We went to watch Bastille Day fireworks yesterday – July the 14th celebrations meant a very buzzy atmosphere everywhere:-

This is a guest post from Tamsin, writer over on the UK parenting deals website, PlayPennies.com (http://www.playpennies.com/).

I asked Tamsin if she could share her thoughts on what the new budget will mean for families and she has very kindly sent me over the following very informative information:-

There’s been a lot of talk since Tuesday 22nd June. The day that George Osborne announced the emergency Budget and outlined the things that were about to change, and these changes are not all good. The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Mirror and the Mail have all clearly said that families are among the hardest hit by this new budget.

While it’s definitely strange (well, to me anyway) that families are being targeted so definitively, this is no time to rock back in horror. It’s time to prepare for those financial hits and to be ready for whatever comes next.

I interviewed Mr Aggarwal from Aggarwal and Co (http://www.aggarwalaccountants.co.uk/about/index.html), a reputable chartered accountancy firm in Kent. When asked what he thought about these new measures in terms of families and he said, “It’s going to take some time to get through all the documentation that we’re now receiving about the Budget and I just can’t comment as to exactly how people are going to be affected.”
For him, it’s a week of slogging through heavy paperwork to fully understand the it. For us, it’s a week of terrifying headlines. So what exactly does this all mean? Middle income families have had their tax credits reduced, child benefit has been frozen for three years, the pregnancy grant will be abolished by April 2011, the Child Trust Funds are gone, and the £500 Sure Start maternity grant is being canned. Also the chancellor has said that single parents will be expected to go back to work when their youngest child goes to school.

This isn’t a pretty picture for parents at all, especially stay at home mums and single parents. Now it’s going to be harder than ever for women to choose to stay home with the children as the cost of living goes up and two incomes are almost essential.

The Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) released a statement to the press on 23rd June (http://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/press_20100622) and Director of Policy, Teresa Perchard, said that, “The reality is that the proposed changes to personal allowances will be of little benefit, for example, to working families on the lowest incomes who live in rented accommodation. Although these families are in work, they are also likely to be in receipt of housing and council tax benefits and since both are means tested, any rise in take-home pay will result in a loss of entitlement to these benefits.”

So yes, the Budget has made most families sit back in dismay but all is not lost. I briefly chatted to a member of CAB, Katie Lane, and she said one thing that really made me feel a lot better, “See someone from our organisation, or your accountant, and find out exactly how your situation is going to be affected. Each family has unique qualities and issues and so each will be affected differently.”
Before you start stuffing money under the mattress, speak to an expert and get an accurate assessment of your situation and work out exactly what the costs are going to be for your family. Then it’s time to cut corners, save money and find other ways to make up the difference. With clever strategies and good advice perhaps we can emerge from this “emergency budget” without too many wounds.

It’s so difficult as a mother to let go – I wouldn’t let him go last year away just with mates, but I am a firm believer that they have to go and do stuff on their own, work it out for themselves, be part of the big bad exciting world – no cotton wool kids for me. Might even let him cycle on the pavement without a helmet when he gets back. I left home when I was 17.

BUT you can see why I wanted Spain to win the world cup. Because he’s there and I texted him after the game and he replied “mum, it’s AMAZING” and I can only imagine just how wonderful it would have been to be in Spain yesterday. All that joy and love and our boys would all have been caught up in all that wonderful emotion. Just lovely.

I’m away from my desk briefly. With friends and kids and it is fab. I’ll put some pictures up soon – see if you can guess where I am.

I had a panic yesterday because I couldn’t access my blog at all and because I am useless I had to email my WGM (web god man) and he could tell from the tone that he needed to look straight away and then he called me on a Sunday and said he thought that I’d been HACKED!!! Mad panic, but secretly a little bit pleased because although I don’t understand what it means, I thought it all sounded quite important and a bit sad for the hacker when he/she found that they hadn’t accessed top secret information about the bank of England, but, well, precisely nothing worth breaking into at all…..

All seems to be back to normal but if you come across any strange (shitf*ckbollocks) sort of strange behaviour – you know, rude comments or swear words, please let me know.

I can see the appeal if you can vaguely sing – you don’t have to do an audition or even read music. The songs are learnt by ear. You just pay a £90 a term fee and go along and sing your little heart out. 95% of the members are women unsurprisingly.

But look at this video – the entire audience are part of the choir. This particular song “Something Inside So Strong” is their charity song with the proceeds going to Refuge:-

Their debut album was released yesterday and is already top of the Amazon chart.

“Britain’s “mummy bloggers” are becoming a powerful force in the digital media market with dozens of brands signing up as sponsors of the first official UK conference for the growing numbers of your mothers chronicling their lives online”.

I had to read one of my blog posts out which was a very good way of distracting myself what else was going on….because at precisely the time that I was on stage, my ex-husband was taking his vows for the second time.

Here is a picture of Judith O’Reilly of “Wife In The North” speaking:-

India Knight speaking:-

And me:-

The competition saw 268 entrants whittled down to a final 3 by a judging panel including Professor Robert Winston and Countdown mathematician Rachel Riley.

What a great idea and I thought I’d let you all know in case anybody is interested in getting their teenagers to enter next year – especially as it’s a worthwhile cause – all ideas have to be socially responsible.

The winning ideas are:

Adventurer Explorer Grant
Luke Duggleby, 22 from Bristol, his idea is to bring internet and services that will significantly improve educational needs to a vocational centre in Uganda. You can see Luke’s live pitch here http://www.lifeacademy.uk.com/entries/view/a0c3161f51ef4b9a900681a7b85270ea

Online Venture Explorer Grant
Rowenna Davis, 25 from Southwark, her idea is to provide young people with an online platform to understand their local government and stand for councillors. You can see Rowenna’s live pitch here http://www.lifeacademy.uk.com/entries/view/13bf5e648274446bac2bc6d97bda4f91

Creativity Explorer Grant
Nick Palfrey, 23 from Plymouth, his idea is to develop learning spaces using simulator or video game technology so that 3D models of proposed schools can be explored by students, teachers and parents with amendments made and sent back to architects. You can see Nick’s live pitch here http://www.lifeacademy.uk.com/entries/view/b7d0df6568334198b22d89b7f8780c93

All entrants had to pitch for a grant in one of three categories
Adventurer Explorer Grant for travel, adventure or environmental projects
Online Venture Explorer Grant for budding technology and business entrepreneurs
Creativity Explorer Grant for creative, media and arts-based ideas.

Leila Martine, judge and director of Windows consumer business, said: “Internet Explorer 8 Life Academy was an opportunity to encourage talent and provide a platform of support to 18-25 year olds. Internet Explorer has grown up with this generation and the aim of the project is to help them explore their future potential and bring a socially responsible idea to life.” I believe the £10,000 grants will do just that and look forward to assisting the winners in their ambitions.”

Professor Robert Winston said: “All 12 finalists who pitched their ideas on the day were strong contenders. Although it was hard to pick the three winners I feel (Insert name) gave a great pitch and wish him/her the best of luck.”

Rachel Riley, Countdown mathematician, said: “It was amazing to see people of my age with such interesting and socially responsible ideas. We’re the first generation to grow up with the Internet and it is such a great tool to help make ideas a reality.”