Think you're ready to be a Parent? Take this quiz to find out if you're really ready for a baby!

You've bought the cot, washed the teeny tiny baby grows in Fairy non-bio and read What to Expect When You're Expecting from cover-to-cover but are you really ready for the joys of parenthood?

Having been there and bought the posset-stained t-shirt, I have put together 10 scenarios to help you find out.

Enjoy! And if you like, please share with your soon-to-be-parent and parent friends. They could probably do with a laugh. Thank you.

Scenario 1: Taking a pregnancy test

Women:

1.    Pick up pregnancy test.

2.    Select other random items such as wine, condoms and WD40 to confuse cashier.

3.    Take test.

4.    Stare unblinking into middle distance for ten-minutes.

5.    Prepare dinner.

Men:

1.     Carry on as usual until you hear a shriek.

2.     Stare unblinking into middle distance for next 18 years.

Scenario 2: Two weeks before the birth

Women:

1. Carefully pack overnight bag with essential items for you and baby. 
2. Re-pack overnight bag, marvelling at your preparedness and forward-thinking.
3. Erase all memory of overnight bag.

Men:

1. Step over partner’s overnight bag in hallway.

2. Go to partner’s drawers.

3. Put oldest and most inappropriate underwear (anything red and black or adorned with Nat's Hen Party Magaluf 'On it 'til we vomit' 2010 is good) into a Tesco carrier bag.

4. Take to hospital.    

Scenario 3: Birth Day

Women:

1. Put on an outfit you might wear when you are bedridden with Norovirus.
2. Eat some very out-of-date food.
3. Use your largest mixing bowl as a portable vomit urn.
4. Attempt to dry shave legs and make important telephone calls between disabling stomach cramps.
5. Ask partner to drive you to a destination 10-minutes away.
6. Try not to vomit, defecate, or punch anyone in the face during the journey.

Scenario 4: Prepare for the magical time at home following your little one’s birth by:

1. Not opening the curtains, putting out any kind of bin for two weeks, forgetting to feed the dog and filling your hallway with empty cardboard boxes.
2. Sleeping for only 40-minutes a night.
3. Throwing a party inviting all your closest friends, relatives, neighbours and some people you have never spoken to, ever, from work. Do not give a start time.

Scenario 5: Operating a baby car seat 

1. You can simulate the precision required to connect the buckles of a baby’s car seat by asking NASA if you can practise the pilot-controlled Lunar Excursion Module (LEM) docking procedure.   

Time allowed before deep space meltdown: two-minutes.

Scenario 6: Technology

Are you ready to share your cutting-edge gadgets with a small child? 

1. Mobile phones – Alternate between dunking in toilet water and orange juice every three days. Delete all contacts apart from your manager’s mobile number. Call this repeatedly. If someone answers, rustle paper and make ‘ba ba’ noises until they swear and hang up. 

2. Tablets – Remove all protective covering. Smear with honey, Sudocrem and body fluids.

Download European apps of singing vegetables at a £1-a-go. Do not stop until your bank makes contact about unauthorised overdraft fees. 

3. DVD players – Break off all small doors. Jam jigsaw pieces and sausage rolls into holes where doors used to be.

4. Favourite DVDs  and CDs – Decorate with felt tip. Now use them as ice skates.    

Scenario 7: Train Journeys  

You can recreate the awkwardness of getting a small child in a buggy onto public transport by placing a chimp in a supermarket trolley.

1. Pick the train time you want to get. Don’t get this. Or the next one. Watch the one after that pull away.

2. On train, put your chimp trolley directly in the path of anyone entering or exiting train.

3. Half way, announce loudly that you need a poo and that it's coming right now.

4. Make remaining train journey without chimp eating ticket, cramming face between headrests or becoming the focus of everyone in the carriage.  

Scenario 8: Childhood Illness

If you are an ‘I haven’t been to the Doctor since I was a nipper’ type of person, you’re about to get reacquainted with your GP; Kids are one-stop-disease-shops. 

Points to remember:

1. Expect a contagion outbreak every other day. From the common cold to thread worm, kids’ illnesses are the gifts that keep on giving.  

2. Despite brand new immune systems, a child with Chicken Pox will usually be back to their bouncy self in two to three days. You, however, will be flat out for two weeks, mentally divvying up your possessions between friends and family in between death throws.

Scenario 9: Lifts

Think calling a lift is easy? This is how toddlers like to roll:

1. Call the lift.
2. Press the button ten times until it jams.
3. Call the other lift. 
4. Wait until doors open, bounce through gap and ricochet off walls.
5. Press lift intercom.
6. Ask Security if they are Buzz Lightyear.
7. Grin, point at or poke adult of your choice for duration of journey.

Scenario 10: Questions

The good thing is you have about three years before children can articulate. 

It is essential you use this time to research the bigger religious, political and social questions because very soon you will have your own mini Jeremy Paxman shadowing and barking questions at you every minute of every day.  

Common themes include:

Death: what is it?

Sex: what is it?

God: what is it?

Prepare for any answer you give to be followed by ‘why?’ and any subsequent discussion to end with ‘because it just does’.  

Right, any questions?

The road to Mandeville is strewn with sick

It's a major boob when people involved in a car accident at the entrance of Wycombe hospital are forced to travel 45-minutes to their nearest A&E for treatment.

Wycombe has a population in excess of 133,000 and yet for some ludicrous reason the decision was taken to shut our A&E two years ago.     

This means anyone injured or seriously ill must be transported by ambulance or car to Wexham Park Hospital in Slough or Stoke Mandeville – both a toe curling, over hill and dale, 45-minutes away.

Official NHS statistics show that dispensing with our A&E has increased the number of people waiting for treatment for over four hours by five times at both Wexham and Stoke Mandeville hospital.

Perhaps even more scary (and as yet to be documented – surprise!) is the inevitable rise in deaths and babies born in lay-bys that the closure has undoubtedly caused.

Road to Hell

Last month my partner developed a kidney stone.  His second one this year, I am familiar with the routine.  

It starts with vigorous back rubbing, followed by some moves like Jagger then the cushion-biting death throws kick in.  

I realised that my plan to drop my daughter at nursery before hot footing him over to Stoke Mandeville was dashed when Jagger put in an early appearance.

Ushering Matt and my four-year old daughter into the car I started the long, winding journey to Stoke Mandeville in morning rush hour.

We weren't even clear of Prestwood when the guttural man-screaming started.

Trying to save my daughter post-traumatic stress therapy I tried to reassure her that Daddy just 'had a tummy bug' and cranked the volume of 100 giggly wriggly toddler songs as loud as it would go.

Approaching the main roundabout in Great Missenden the vomiting started.

Overcome with pain (kidney stones are the male equivalent of giving birth apparently *raises eyebrow* - but that’s another blog) Matt started to throw up out of the passenger window.

The first round exploded onto a sulk of schoolchildren waiting for their bus. The second lot - and if this is you, I can only apologise – hit a cyclist head on - all to the cheery strains of ‘Hickory Dickory Dock’.     

     
When we finally arrived at Stoke Mandeville I abandoned my sick-soaked partner at the entrance to deliver my daughter (albeit with a five-mile stare) to nursery.

Later that morning I then made the journey again to collect a much more subdued Matt from A&E.

Rambling from the effects of Tramadol, Matt muttered something about being called back in for a scan but that it was likely to be sometime in the next 48 hours.

Sure enough as soon as we arrived home in High Wycombe there was a message from the hospital asking Matt to come back for his scan. That was journey number three.

Annoying? Yes (especially if you're in tremendous pain or a passer-by being sicked on). Life-threatening? No. 

But what of those poor Wycombe folk critically injured, seriously ill or in labour? What happens then? A 45-minute journey is simply too long.

Any fool can see that shuttling patients cross-country won't cut costs (hello - fuel!?) or help a patient’s outcome – at best they might throw up on pedestrians, at worse, they might not make it at all.

Something needs to be done.

What do you think? 

Funerals - An inadequate way to say goodbye?

Nothing sharpens your focus on what’s important in life than a friend or relatives’ funeral.

I expect anyone who has lived in Buckinghamshire for any length of time will be familiar with the sweeping drive up to Chilterns Crematorium.

Last week I attended the funeral of my dear old neighbour, Stan.

At 89, Stan passed away of a heart attack whilst under observation for an un-heart related illness in hospital. So although it was expected, there was still a bit of shock value to his passing, he’d have liked that. 

A former soldier and about as cockney as they come, Stan was a genuine character of our cul-de-sac.

I’ll personally remember him for his great sense of humour and kindness – he walked my aging shih tzu every day for years - only ever accepting a fiver on a friday for a beer as payment.

He also once nursed my ailing fairground goldfish back to health in an orange bucket - which he found hilarious as it took us ages to actually spot the fish.

He was a colourful eccentric, leaving Christmas lights on all year round and driving every morning (choke fully open) to get his morning paper. 

His porch was like Blackpool grockle shop. Covered with all manner of tantalising trinkets, from dangling plastic spiders to odd flower pot men fashioned out of old wood and pots. The poor district nurses popping in at night must have had the bejeebers scared out of them.

Living directly opposite, he’d watch me dither about every Tuesday evening, playing ‘wheelie bin bingo’ before hollering out the right colour.Stan also seemed to know the Wycombe District Council’s Wheelie Bin rota by heart.

And he was always right, even on Bank Holidays.

The Funeral Format

Sitting in silence, save for a few muffled sobs, as the curtain symbolically closed around Stan’s casket I couldn’t help feel the inadequacy of the British funeral.

No reflection of Stan’s daughter’s heartfelt eulogy or his granddaughter’s poignant reading of the poem ‘Stand Down Soldier’, there was something amiss in the format.  And perhaps that’s exactly what it is, a funeral format.

It’s a great leveler to know that life will probably come down to a 20-minute presentation about your achievements, two songs (one likely to be Wind Beneath my Wings) and a finger buffet at the local boozer.

The truth is that unless you verbalise or put in writing your last wishes no one is actually going to know what you want.

Having had that conversation my partner, I now know he wishes to be buried like a dog. 

This came about through the death of my neighbour’s beloved German shepherd, Maggie, several years ago.   

'Baggins' as she was affectionately known, died suddenly of a heart attack whilst out trotting on her daily walk.

No warning, no illness, no injection in the paw, just here one moment then crossing over the rainbow bridge the next.

Hearing the news and knowing what Baggins meant to her owners, a number of us gathered at their home. Her body, still warm, lay in the back of their car; there had been no time to get to the vets.

Although in shock there was an air of a job to be done.  Almost without speaking, the men folk (very Downton-esque, I know) went to the bottom of the garden and started to dig.

They dug for hours in the cold Autumn drizzle. Huge mounds of earth piling up each side. In the end the hole was deep and wide enough for a human. 

Wrapped in her old blanket, they carefully laid Baggins down in her muddy forever bed. The first few spades of earth were cast by her owner before the rest joined in.

This gesture changed my partner’s view of funerals forever. Upon his passing he wants the same treatment. And despite it probably being a jail-able offense, I understand.

There’s something beautiful and cathartic about digging the final resting place for someone you love.

It's dirty, it's hard work and above all it's real.

Forget sanitised funerals, pan piped Eva Cassidy songs and finger buffets, let’s get stuck in.    

What do you think? I'd love to know.

The Dos and Don'ts of Blogger Wooing

So you’re blogging. Congratulations. But no blog is an island. Neither should it be. 

Unless you’re Hugh Grant in About a Boy. 

Or one of those weird islands that no one visits.

To make your blog an island that people want to visit, stick around and even buy from the gift shop then you need to build your name.

The first important step of building you name is to woo other bloggers.

By having your site mentioned on other people’s blogs you create all important back links to your blog. As well as helping to raise your profile, Google likes back links as it says ‘hey, this guy is worth listening to’ – helping to improve your site ranking.

So how do you go about building relationships with other bloggers? 

Here are some important Dos:

Make a list – First things first. Make a shopping list of blogs you would like to be mentioned on. More than 10, less than 50.

Before you jump in and send any kind of pitch as to why a blogger should feature your product/mention your venue/plug your blog subscribe to their blog and follow them on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook.

Listen – would you butt into a three way conversation about best children's DVDs by suggesting the new Paranormal Activity film? No.

The next step is to listen.

Listen to each blogger’s conversations individually. What topics does this blogger specialise in? What do they get excited about? Who have they previously featured as guest bloggers? Do they include a list of requirements for submissions on their site? (lots of bloggers do - if so, take note).

Get to know the blogger and their themes so you can align your pitch to their exact needs.

Follow – when you have a good idea of a blogger’s niche then it is time to act - but not with your pitch. A simple 'Hi there', a constructive comment on their latest post or a retweet saying why this post is useful should get you noticed. Don't do it too much, you're following, not stalking. It just means that when you do pitch you’re not cold calling.

Engage – Once you know about your blogger and I mean really know only then it’s time to pitch. Firstly, make sure the story that you are pitching is newsworthy – so you've decked out your new reception? You've added an oojamaflip to the whats-it, so now your thingy goes really fast? Sorry but save it for your newsletter. 

Bloggers want fresh, new, exclusive (ideally) content, after all that’s how they tantalise and increase their subscribers.

Once you have your story, keep your email short, keep it punchy and outline clearly why the blogger’s readership needs your story.

Yes, you may be contacting 20 other bloggers with the same pitch but, if it matters then take the time to personalise each email, including the blogger’s name.    

Follow up. Yes it is ok to follow up. Once. A week later. But never pester. 

If the blogger isn't interested don't be disheartened, if it is a very popular blog then they will receive hundreds of pitches a month. Wait a few weeks, have a re-think and try again with another fresh angle.

Next time I will cover the Don'ts of wooing bloggers. If you want to make friends with bloggers to increase your coverage I am an award-winning copywriter and blogger in Buckinghamshire. Email me on melissa_blamey@hotmail.co.uk

10 things toddlers do that drive you bananas

If you were in Asda today, you might have heard me. I was the blonde fishwife bawling at the three year old to come back/put that down/don’t eat that.  Besides it being easier to take a goat to do your weekly shop, here are 10 other things toddlers do that drive you nuts:

1. Drawing on stuff – walls, the dog, themselves, you, sadly nothing is off limits to a little Salvador Farley armed with a Sharpie. The key is to have lots of scrap paper (birth certificates are good), Cif and gin for later.

2. Hiding stuff – your everyday survival kit - car keys, bank cards and mobile – are under constant threat of becoming toddler treasure. Like magpies who hone in on purely essential items, there is one rule: if they can reach it, it’s fair game. The truth is you've got to stay one step ahead: if you need it, hide it. If you've lost it, check your shoes.

3. Eating stuff – If a toddler’s five-a-day included chalk, bogies, insoles, sel-o-tape and dry dog kibble they would be extremely well nourished. This morning I caught my three year old chewing on a repeat prescription. Please, stick to the edible stuff kids.

4. Saying stuff - Me: “Oh, look, it’s Uncle Alex.”

Toilet roll used as bath toy

Uncle Alex: “Hello, Poppy how are you?”
Poppy: “I don’t like Uncle Alex. He’s got a hairy nose hole.”
Brilliant.

5. Not saying stuff:  Kids who have grasped the concept of talking, do so, a lot. If they’re anything like mine, they prattle, all-day-long. Except when it comes to talking on the phone, then their mouths shut faster than a decent shop on Wycombe high street.
Holding phone out, pleading voice: “darling, please say hello to gramps, it’s his birthday...he’s in hospital...on the Liverpool Care Pathway...please....?” 

6. Touching stuff - I understand the desire to touch is pretty strong in toddlers. But really, everything? From train toilet seats, duck poo and dog’s bottoms, to buying apps you don’t need and calling your work while you are ‘otherwise engaged’ in the bathroom, it is never enough for a toddler to look, it needs a jolly good poke, followed by a press ‘send’ just to make sure.      

7. Weeing on stuff – I had witnessed the phenomena of ‘mums being weed on’ by little boys so was quite glad to have a slightly more 'contained’ little girl, except when it came to toilet training. Holding my little one over a public toilet one day, she projectile peed all over my new Zara jumper.

Top tip: carry a spare top and immerse them as far as possible in the loo to 'minimise seepage'.

8. Falling off stuff – we’ve graced the presence of various Buckinghamshire A&Es three this year. Always unprepared, always without change for car parks and the fetid water they call tea, always to be told she’s ok, always to leave feeling like a new parent twonk.

9. Breaking stuff – I maintain an invoice of items my daughter has ruined/broken on my laptop (including a laptop) and plan to hand it to her 18th birthday, like an anti-disney princess story.  

So far the list comprises:
X 1 X-box – reason: play dough shoved the disc drive
X 1 laptop screen – reason: danced on
X 1 car CD player – reason: used as a money box
X 1 pug dog – reason: fed raisins (ok he’s still with us but the vet did say it was touch and go)
X 1 Guerlain bronzer – reason: smashed into a million pieces, mixed with water and made into teddy food
X numerous CDs – reason: used as ice skates

10. Your stuff - what does your toddler do that drives you bananas? Do tell...

Say hi at www.melissablamey.com

Follow me on Twitter @melissablamey 

The Break-Up

Yes. I admit it.

I haven't done it for six months. Six, long, could-have-travelled-around-the-world but-watched-every-episode-of-Come-Dine-With-Me-Instead-months.   

Between writing, shopping and wiping mushed in custard creams from the antimacassars (don’t have any really but fyi they are those square cloths that Nannas put over the back of their sofas to stop your head soiling their upholstery), at the end of the day, I simply haven't had the energy to do it.

I'm amazed it's still there and hasn't fallen off to be honest. But the other day I checked and there it was. It even looks the same.

I mean, it's sulking but who wouldn't if no one had paid you any attention for this long?

Anyway, enough is enough, there are only so many excuses you make, it is time to pet the neglected elephant in the room.

This is probably going to be ugly. Shall we? 

Hello Blog.

Blog: Oh my god, it is actually you. I didn't recognise you.  I see you had to reset your password it has been so long.

I know, I know. I'm sorry, ok? No one is more disappointed than me. Anyway, I'm here and I am bursting with ...

Blog: Woah, woah back up there Paris Chiltern. You log back in, sorry, break in - I had the locks changed for a reason you know AND your new password is obvious by the way - and expect me to publish when you say? I mean where have you been? What, did the Crazy Horse cabaret not work out for you?

Hey Madam. I’ve been busy. Really busy. A proper busy bee. But I wasn't so busy to realise that I do actually need you.

Blog: You need me?

Yep. You are a string to my bow. The pork pie at my picnic. My unexpected item in my bagging area. You complete me.

Blog: Well seeing as you put it like that. Let’s do this thing big girl. Oh and don’t even think about changing my font. This isn’t a re-branding exercise. Oh and kick some of those spam monkeys to the curb before you start. “I love your blog, it made my life better...read mine at cheap filter cigarettes.com,” gah. Jog on you virtual pigeons pecking at the cyber crumbs of my blog cake.    

I’ll go get my virtual feather duster.

....

It’s hard starting a blog, keeping it up for a while and then, whoops, there you go, four months has passed since your last entry. 

But anything that requires discipline (the gym, a diet, for me, reading a book) is tough.  But in the end, whether you blog for business or pleasure it helps you. If you, like me, have neglected your blog, it’s not too late for you two to work things out.

Five things to blog about when your blog cup has run dry

What’s for dinner? Yep, people are fascinated by the ins and outs of everyone’s lives including what they eat. 

“Mmm, what are you having?”
“We’re having dairylea on toast because I can’t be bothered to go to little Tesco and that in my mind constitutes a warm meal”
“Brilliant”.
“I’ll give you the recipe”.

Learnt something new? I found out what antimacassers are today. No, really? Yes. Tell your audience about something new you have learnt. Easy peasy.

Where’s the dog? No that’s not one.  I am actually wondering where the dog is. In fact I might call my next post 'where’s the dog?'. 

What are you decorating? Maybe nothing. But it’s nice to dream. Write about it.

Say what? I love blogs and books that focus on the inane spoutings of children and people in supermarkets.

For example, our three year old pronounces the word helicopter as 'helitotter' and there is much comedy to be found in faux emergency conversations:

“There are two adults stranded on the north rock face, we’re going to need a winch, alert the helitotter team immediately."

And then next week (ok maybe two weeks) I’ll give you my latest blog – five things that toddlers do that drive you crackers. 

Have you had a break-up with your blog? How did you get your writing groove back?

Come and say hi at my shiny new site www.melissa.blamey.com

No Disassemble! Number Five - Our Shed - is ALIVE!

It’s big, it’s cumbersome, it’s housing arachnids with bodies the size of cup cakes. But when it is time for your faithful shed to go to the great wood chipper in the sky, what exactly do you do with a shed that doesn’t want to die? 

I inherited our shed from my mum who inherited it from her grandfather. Having carefully housed three generations of Blamey garden ‘gubbins’,  last week I looked out at our tired, saggy roofed shed squatting at the bottom of our garden and decided that it was time to euthanize our old friend. 

For a start the roof felt had gone, the boards were rotting and no matter how many litres of Country Brown fence paint I slapped on it in every spring, by autumn the wood was peeking through. This combined with the smell of wet dog and old tea bags that filled your nostrils every time you went in no longer made it a garden haven but a place to avoid.

Having decided that the shed had fettered our view for long enough, I looked around for a shiny new number on the internet.  Which I quickly found.  There she was – ‘Blooma’ - all sparkly and nubile with shiny windows, the promise of 10-year rot free guarantee and – and! – Someone will put her up for the bargain price of £30. Sold! To the lazy lady in the corner who’d rather read Heat magazine and paint her toenails than faff about for half a day putting up a shed.     

But with beautiful Blooma arriving in the next five days I faced the conundrum of what to do with the old shed.

A quick shove and a swear

Looking at its dilapidated form, I decided that all I needed to do was set aside one balmy evening for operation ‘Shed Demolition’, give it a decent shove, a good swear and the whole lot should come clattering down in perfect Green Bin sized planks.

So armed with a hammer and a bottle of pinot grigio I set to it.  A bit of tugging, a large crack – which drew one of our neighbours to his back door to give me one of his best ‘what are you doing now looks’ – and half the roof came away.  Thinking this will be done in time for Teen Mom 2 and a nice cup of tea – I set about trying to break down the walls.  However, after much shoving, some kicks, several hammer blows and lots of stepping back to take large swigs of pinot and size up my opponent, I realised that it wasn’t going to budge.

Like an opening scene from Holby City, I tipsily decided to call in back up in the form of a sledge hammer and pick axe.  But despite swinging both at the walls as hard as I could the sledge hammer bounced off the wood and out of my hand, whilst the pick axe just made neat two inch rodent sized entry holes in the wood.

Realising it was much sturdier and tougher than I had ever imagined, at this point I decided to what any sensible person would have done and began to unscrew the walls from the remaining roof.

Finally confronted with a large shed jigsaw we  - my long suffering partner, Matt, who has witnessed all manner of my wine fuelled DIY demolition projects over the last seven years – from blowing up the pampas grass with petrol, to sledge hammering an asbestos lined  chimney breast -  had to decide what to do with our shed.

Too big to be tipped, too knackered to be sold we decided to teach it a lesson and set it on fire.

For three nights shed carcass burnt on our vacant vegetable patch.

I now know that you don’t mess with 25 year old sheds. They’re stubborn, they’re angry and like Number Five they are much of the ‘no disassemble!’ school of thought.

I have learnt my shed lesson, have you?            

Just time to tweet this before I call the fire brigade....