I’m a veteran of Georgette Heyer, Jane Austen, and every frilly-frock drama produced by the BBC since 1992. I know the lineage of the British monarchy better than I know my own family tree. I just got back in the land of Netflix after a week’s holiday where I didn’t open my laptop (!). I’m […]
A warm welcome to the brilliant and amazing Sisilia Eteuati, reflecting on the story of Esther. An earlier version of this appeared in Samoa Planet. Facebook memories determinedly pop up reminding me of all things pre-Covid – many of which I miss. One thing I don’t miss is how hard my eyes roll when I […]
One of my few areas of willpower is that I can avoid starting to watch a show that comes out weekly, so I can binge it when it’s all out. I know. It’s a superpower. So I just watched all six episodes of HBO’s The Undoing (on Neon in New Zealand). It’s gripping and well […]
You know I have pretty high standards for kids’ TV shows and think most of them are crap for various reasons – violence, sexism, meanness, etc. My kids watch plenty of TV – we’re not screen-free by any means. But I am pretty strict about letting a new show into the rotation. First I check […]
One of the joys of following the church calendar, if that’s the tradition you follow, is that the community makes room for all kinds of seasons. There’s a time for fun, and a time for seriousness; a time for Lent and a time for Easter. One of the joys of having no pre-set calendar for […]
Just in case you are under the impression that I, the Self-Appointed Patron Saint of Lent Resources for Kids, am currently utterly absorbed in meaningful, transformative Lenten practices with my small children… think again. I’ve managed a few things, but good golly, not a very large percentage of all my wonderful ideas for households. As […]
Pancakes are political Would you like to know your neighbours better? Do you like delicious food? Do you want to change the world, one small action of kindness at a time? Well, do I have the festival for you: Shrove Tuesday! When I was a little girl, our elderly neighbours had spare keys to our […]
I’m delighted today to welcome Stef Rozitis, one of my favourite parenting + politics thinkers, to help us help our kids tackle the climate crisis with calm confidence. Stef is an early childhood teacher and academic, a climate change activist and a mother of some really thoughtful men who cared about the world even when […]
We are BIG podcast fans in our house. I listen to podcasts everyday, and my kids most nights. As well as supplementing (or replacing…) a live human being reading a story at bedtime, we play them in the car, and just this week I had the genius idea of putting them on for each kid […]
Do you have a sewing machine hanging around unused at your house? Perhaps you know an elderly relative or friend who is no longer sewing and would like to see their beloved machine put to good use? Give an underused sewing machine a new life! In 2019, just with the power of the internet and […]