24 Apr 2024
March Journal | How Is It Easter Already?
I got some news at work mid-January that is dominating everything right now and it’s really stressful, but also just really annoying. I make an active point to keep work at work, but this is flowing into my home life, flowing into my plans, flowing into my mood. I want to be able to not think about it when I log off and I can’t. It feels like, until it’s resolved, we’re living in a bit of a limbo and it’s giving me an odd sensation that 2024 hasn’t really got going yet. I have a feeling I’ll get to New Year’s Eve and be like ‘huh weren’t we only here six months ago?’
Still, despite not quite understanding how it can already have been and gone, Easter weekend is one of my favourites of the year. It’s like a much more chilled, sunnier, chocolatier version of Christmas. An air of celebration in the air but without any pressure. It is acceptable to do absolutely nothing and absolutely everything, and I really enjoy it. We went to the first ‘Foodie Friday’, the monthly street food fair that happens in our town throughout Spring and Summer, had a roast with my parents, did an easter egg hunt with Alfie (hence the 99p Oxfam purchase), enjoyed the sunshine, had drinks with our neighbours and ate plenty of chocolate.
It reminded me to keep focusing on the good stuff and that it’s okay to enjoy them even when something stressful is hovering over you like an irritating black cloud. April is a rammed month, with both good and stressful things, but, in the moment, I’m going to try and not let the stressful stuff dominate over the good memories to be had.
Moments
Meeting at Wimpole for a catch up with our friends and their baby. Alfie loving the pigs and tractors.
Alfie’s sheer joy over the travelator in Sainsbury’s. Toddlers really do make you see the joy in the mundane.
The kindness of transport drivers when they see a little boy excitedly watching; this month, a train driver has waved furiously and beeped the horn as Alfie stood on the side of the tracks, a bus driver has let Alfie sit in the driver’s seat and a market trader has let Alfie sit in and ‘drive’ a tractor.
A family holiday in the most spectacular house in Camber Sands.
The excitement Alfie has when he sees a ‘traaaactor’, ‘loddy’ (lorry), ‘tweet tweet’ and ‘chuuuurch’ – mainly because he can say the words.
Being woken up in the morning by Alfie pulling my eyes open. It’s annoying, but also pretty adorable to open your eyes and see his big brown eyes and messy bed hair approximately half a cm from my face.
Glorious magnolia trees.
A free afternoon tea.
After discovering the existence of chocolate digestives, Alfie can now say ‘tuit’ very determinedly. Still can’t say ‘mum’, but sure, whatever.
Easter chocolate; just the best.
Doing an easter hunt with Alfie and him really getting into it.
The loveliness of easter weekend (see above).
9 Mar 2024
One Minute Book Reviews: Winter Reads
Shall we talk about some books?
Good Material by Dolly Alderton
We started the year with a good’un. A relationship break-up told from the male perspective: failing comedian Andy can’t understand why his ex-girlfriend Jen stopped loving him and why everyone around him seems to have grown up when he wasn’t looking. Completely adrift, he clings to the idea of solving the puzzle of his broken relationship. Really enjoyed this, it made me both chuckle and tear-up. Felt it perfectly captured both heartbreak and that time in your thirties where it feels like there’s a dramatic shift into adulthood, and friendships can seem much harder to maintain, but the male perspective was a fresher take on the themes. 4.5/5
Sourdough by Robin Sloan
A quirky little novel about Lois, a software engineer stuck in the daily grind, the only highlight of her day the sourdough sandwich she orders every night from two brothers running a hole-in-the-wall eatery. When the two brothers have to leave San Francisco due to visa issues, they leave their sourdough starter to their favourite customer and Lois must keep it alive and thus, her sourdough baking journey begins. This was a charming read, but I enjoyed the first half a lot more than the second. It went off on a slightly odd, fantastical tangent which I wasn’t entirely convinced by. 3/5
We Had To Remove This Post by Hanna Bervoets
A novella about a woman working as a content moderator for a social media platform. Her job involves reviewing offensive videos and pictures, rants and conspiracy theories, and deciding what needs to be removed. She spends all day viewing the very worst of humanity, but she’s made new friends and found a girlfriend amongst her colleagues so it’s not affecting her that bad. Or is it? I liked the premise of this and felt like it achieved the unsettling, low-level disturbing feeling the writer was probably aiming for, but the ending was so abrupt (almost like the author had simply just stopped writing) and unsatisfying that I was left feeling like I’d only read half the story. 3/5
All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
I am ashamed to say I have had this book sat on my bookshelf for years, it has moved between three different homes, and I can’t believe this unread treasure was there all this time. The intertwining stories of a blind French girl and orphaned German boy trying to survive the devastation of World War II. When war breaks out, Marie-Laure and her father flee Paris to Saint-Malo where they accidentally become a part of the resistance. Meanwhile, Werner’s talent for building and fixing radios is enlisted to help bring down the resistance. Ultimately a story about all the ways that people, against all odds, try to be good to one another. The writing was beautiful, and I loved every detail. Honestly, I thought this was an absolute masterpiece of a novel. 5/5
Piglet by Lottie Hazell
A word of warning: the food descriptions in this book are mouthwatering, so please do read with snacks to hand. Piglet (an unfortunate childhood nickname) has curated the perfect life for herself with her job as a cookbook editor, her upper-middle class fiancé, Kit, and her house in Oxford. But then Kit confesses to a betrayal thirteen days before their wedding. Torn between the life she has always wanted and the ravenous feeling that she is not getting what she deserves, Piglet and her perfect life begin to unravel. Told almost entirely through exquisitely described cooking scenes or excruciatingly detailed vignettes (the wedding dress scene, oh my god), the story examines class differences, a woman’s sometimes complicated relationship with food and the lies we tell ourselves. A very impressive debut. 5/5
The Food Almanac Volume II by Miranda York
From various writers and artists, a lovely collection of stories, recipes and illustrations for each month in the kitchen. A great gift should you have a foodie in your life (or for yourself if you’re the foodie). I enjoyed this just as much as Volume I and am hoping for a third. 4/5
Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano
Dear Edward is one of my favourite books of recent years so I was keen to pick up the author’s latest novel. Seemingly inspired by Little Woman, it tells the story of the four Padavano sisters growing up in Chicago in the 1970/80s. Julia, the eldest sister, marries William Waters, a rising basketball star, and has their lives perfectly planned out. But when William has a breakdown that Julia cannot understand, it is her sister Sylvie that becomes his confidant, and the ensuing betrayal will tear the sisters apart and affect generations to come. The author does characterisation so well; they were all believably flawed and human, and you can’t help but love and root for them. A beautiful family-saga. 5/5
Happy reading folks x
29 Feb 2024
February.
A trip up north. After a weekend staying with cats, Alfie now shouts ‘TAT’ and ‘MEOW’ every time he sees a cat, or a picture of a cat.
Driving down the motorway and seeing a family in the car next to us all laughing.
32 years around the sun.
A Thai massage. Not what I ordered but exactly what I needed.
Sushi lunch date.
Making my favourite Guinness cake because if you can’t bake your favourite cake on your birthday, when can you?
Pancake day!
Nine years together.
A woman with a neon pink umbrella on the greyest, wettest weather day.
The first hints of spring; magnolia buds, white blossom, daffodils.
A lunch date with my gal, the best kind of catch up where it’s like no time has passed.
Lighter evenings.
New babies joining the gang.
Baking with my boy for the first time.
Alife’s first babyccino. The milk moustache was spectacular.
Alfie calling birds ‘tweets tweets’.
16 Feb 2024
Twelve Months Of Stories: On Motherhood, Writing, Being Selfish
We discussed it endlessly, went around the houses, had a lot of back-and-forth etc etc, before eventually settling on me working three days a week. It was a precarious balancing act of what we could afford, what availability the nursery had and what was our actual preference (in that order). We arranged three days of childcare and then I finally sat down with work to put my request in. We registered our child at nursery before he was even born and still didn’t get the days we wanted so at this stage, I assumed getting approval from work would be the easy bit.
And then I was told that I could come back part time, but it had to be two and a half days a week. For reasons I won’t bore you with, this made sense from the perspective of my employer and the way my job works but I hadn’t accounted for it, and I felt the pre-emptive blow of having even less money than we’d planned for. I was too busy thinking about the money that it took me a while to realise that this would mean I would have one afternoon a week where I was neither working nor looking after my son.
Funny how sometimes life just presents you with opportunities. At first, I claimed I would absolutely use that afternoon to be the best “housewife”; I was going to get on top of the washing, do the food shop, keep the house tidy… (sorry husband!) But then I realised that, if I was willing to be selfish, I could use that one afternoon a week to write. Something I love, something that I have needed to do since I was a child in order to feel most like myself, something that I’d had such little opportunity to do since my son was born.
That first week, slipping into my favourite café with my laptop, completely alone, I was both exhilarated at doing something just for myself and overwhelmed with guilt. Was I a bad mother for doing something so luxurious whilst my son was at nursery? I wasn’t earning money (although I was paying the nursery fees regardless), I was technically available to be looking after him. Should I not be doing something more… useful? Probably pretty typical thoughts of a mother under the expectations of a 2023 society. So, here’s what I learnt (because I didn’t cave to those thoughts and spent 99% of Wednesday afternoons sat in a café writing during 2023): that one afternoon a week was the single best thing I could have done for my mental health and my ability to be a loving and calm parent. I am in such a better place than I was this time year and I massively credit that with having just a small slice of time to pour into my favourite creative outlet and the thing that keeps me feeling grounded. I learnt that regardless of what you do, the society we live is always going to push mother’s to be 100% self-sacrificing so you may as well do the thing that keeps you sane. Because a sane and happy mother is far better for a child than a mother who can’t breathe because she’s trying to keep up with unrealistic and exhausting expectations. No one is a bad parent for taking time for themselves. In fact, they are often much better parents as a result. And I can’t emphasise this enough: if you pay for childcare and do something other than working your day job, that does not – in any way shape or form – make you some kind of neglectful parent. Chances are, you’re paying for that time regardless (we pay 52 weeks of the year regardless of holidays, what time we pick him up, bank holidays, illness, whether we’re working or not working). Bloody hell, if you’re paying for your child to be in nursery when they’re ill or old Charlie is having his coronation, you may as well pay for it to have some time for yourself. I know I am lucky, I ended up with this time by accident and it makes no difference to our finances whether I use it for myself or pick up my son from nursery early. But I also refuse to feel any sense of guilt for that luck. My only wish is that my husband could have the same thing.
I set myself a challenge: one short story a month for the year, post the messy, first draft online to hold yourself accountable. I hadn’t written that much in years (covid, pregnancy, newborn baby) and the idea of sharing early drafts is terrifying for any writer, let alone putting it on the internet. But I did it. It was a real lesson in what you can do when you only have a tiny amount of time once a week. I could not procrastinate, because that time wouldn’t come round for another seven days. I wrote quickly, and furiously and messily. My favourite café learnt my name and order and asked me how I was. I met other writers and discovered a local writer’s group. I remembered why I love the act of making up stories, writing down words so much. I remembered that Kate, pre-motherhood Kate, was still there and had a lot of shit she still wanted to do. She’d just been a bit tired and all-consumed by this brown-eyed, blonde-haired whirlwind that had landed into her life one Christmas Eve.
I don’t know how long this option will be available to me, but I intend to cling onto it with both hands for as long as it is. Thank you to everyone who has read and been so kind about my messy first drafts (and if you want to catch up on them, you can do so here). I haven’t quite yet worked out what my Substack page will be in 2024 but I do know I am going to keep posting, so you can probably expect more stories and more food writing as a starting point. I’d love for you to join me.
31 Jan 2024
January.
Sushi lunch for mum’s birthday.
Baking two birthday cakes.
Easing into the year.
Lots of freshly baked bread.
Pale winter light.
Candles that smell like baked goods.
Toddler birthday parties.
Brilliant British television.
Finalising and booking my sister’s hen do.
Tabby McTat on repeat.
Catching up with my auntie.
Book vouchers burning a hole in my pocket.
Dinner in London with an old friend.
The loveliest afternoon at a National Trust place with old friends and our babies.
Catching up with family friends.
Flowers from my sister after a rubbish week at work.
A lunch date in Cambridge; pizza and bookshop browsing.
Cosy, gentle, slow after the busyness of December.
21 Jan 2024
One Minute Book Reviews: What I’ve Been Reading This Autumn & Festive Season
Hey there!
