Melusine and the sea
STORY | Melusine and The Sea (a wee tale for wee people by Jen Selk) Melusine lived in a little place, overlooking an enormous sea. And she didn’t like it. She was afraid of the water. She ...
Welcome to the cult of bedtime
PARENTING | So I initially wrote this on my phone. With my thumbs. From 9:30-10:30 PM at night, in that first window of free time I have after my child, The Smeetch, has (dog willing) finally ...
To all the toys I’ve loved before
PARENTING | My Smeetch is in the midst of a series of love affairs. She takes up with, then abandons, stuffed animals and other soft toys at a rate that feels staggering and terrifying. It is ...
Same pattern on the table, same clock on the wall
BLOG | Happy fucking birthday to me! And to this website! Have you noticed it looks a little different these days? Yep. A mere 13 years after launching, I have finally gotten around to getting ...
Happy Mama’s Day!
MAMA LIFE | Happy Mama’s Day! This bullshit holiday has wormed into my black and shrivelled heart. Good lord, I am such a SUCKER. Like, I never thought I’d be the sort of person who ...
Smeetchy at the Movies: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (TV special)
MOVIE | Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer toddler review. Look, the 1964 Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer TV special is batshit. There’s no other way to put it. It’s whackadoodle. ...
This is two
BLOG | Smeetchy turns two. It’s hard to believe, hard to accept, hard to comprehend. Back in the summer I know I said that the last ten years have fairly raced by, and that is true, but it ...
Smeetchy at the Movies: SING!
MOVIES | Sing! toddler review. I really didn’t like Sing! I mean, I could have liked it, maybe, if I hadn’t been trying to watch it with a squirmy baby-toddler-creature who had ...
Smeetchy at the Movies: The Secret Life of Pets
MOVIES | The Secret Life of Pets toddler review. Why do small children have such horrific taste? Last month, I had so much hope. My child (now 22 months) had seen her first film, Finding ...
Then and now and then again
BLOG | For the past few weeks, I’ve been thinking about blogging – trying to blog – about the past 10 years. That’s probably why it’s hasn’t really been working. How do ...
Smeetchy at the Movies: Finding Dory
MOVIES | Finding Dory toddler review. Well, it appears I haven’t had enough to do. Or rather, I’ve had way too much to do, so I decided to panic/procrastinate/put my head in the sand ...
You may ask yourself, how did I get here?
BABY | Elizabeth Murray was born on a Sunday. She came into the world just after six am, weighing around six and a half pounds. And at this very moment, she is nearing six months old. (Now we are ...