Hello and welcome back!

Sorry I haven’t posted in a long time, but summer took over and then as soon as I returned to London, within 24 hours, a series of misadventures occurred: I lost my phone (gasp!), my cleaner didn’t show up on Monday when I had a mountain of sandy clothes and suitcases (double gasp!!) and my nanny quit (triple gasp!!!). It has been a stressful return back to London, to say the least. But I am positive that it can all be seen in a positive light. Firstly, a lost phone is a forced digital detox. We all know that we spend way too much time on our phones: texting, phoning, instagramming, photo-taking. So this is an enforced tech abstention, which really should be an annual ritual like going to Mayr’s clinics.

Then, the nanny issue happened. That dreaded moment when your life literally starts to fall apart: your nanny leaves you. Even though for reasonable and valid issues (looking after relatives etc…), it is still dreadful. Yes, I know, upper-middle class problems all the way, I really shouldn’t be complaining, but it is heartbreaking. It leaves you bereft and crestfallen, like a break up. It feels like your perfectly controlled and stable life is being hit by a tornado and that respectful relationship you’ve spent so much time creating and crystallising is breaking up.

You want to ask them ‘why?’ ‘Don’t go!’ ‘let’s try to make it work,’ even though you know the reasons are valid and understandable and there is no way to fit the needs of both parties. And then there are the children, who believe that your nanny is part of the family and you know that tears and tantrums are around the corner when the nanny leaves. Not to mention the process of hiring the new nanny: finding her, interviewing her, training her, and then finding out that she had other plans/has been hired/wants more money (one friend just told me yesterday that she had hired a nanny for September and 2 weeks before she was meant to start, cancelled on her. We were nanny-commiserating at Nannies Anonymous).

Anyway, nanny searching is stressful, tiring and emotional. But on the positive side, I probably needed a change anyway because my children have different needs, but it is still difficult to let go. She nudged me in the right direction, so here we are, on the edge of the abyss looking down on nanny agencies, gumtree, word-of-mouth, Facebook nanny pages and aupair world.

On a completely different note, I am probably not going to write much on the blog in the near future sadly because I have been working on an exciting project (well, for me anyway), and as soon as it is ready to be public, you will be the first to know. Of course, I may fall flat on my face with it, prove an embarrassment to my family and friends (and maybe lose all my family and friends), but it is something I have been wanting to do for a long time. But most bold and exciting projects are risky and have a large chance of failing (am thinking of all the entrepreneurs whose success rate is less than 10%).

So here we are at the beginning of a new school year, full of frazzled mums and dads doing the school run (myself included), but also feeling really positive, despite my misadventures. Good luck with it all and have a happy new school year!

xx

NHYM

http://www.nottinghillyummymummy.com

@NHyummymummy