I’ve never been one to worry about how I appear to others. Actually that’s not true. I worry a lot, but try hard to make it look like I don’t.
I'm determined not to become a lipstick mummy, so enslaved to make-up that I have to set an alarm clock to plaster on what I’ve only just finished taking off from the night before.
Currently I aim for the casual ‘take me as you find me’ effect, which, more often than not, is an eclectic combination of clothing, lipsyl and hair grips.
I hope this will be forgiveable as all writers are known to be eccentric.
However, age and grey hair are catching me in a pincer manoeuvre and I fear it might be time for second thoughts. My inner hippy-chick has turned hen without me noticing and I can no longer get away with Lidl’s moisturiser.
My glamour rethink began with a potential week of nothing. Half terms can suddenly catch you unawares and for once, well as always, I’d planned absolutely zilch.
So I decided to take the children to London to stay with friends who I haven’t seen in ages. I was wandering around Kew Gardens with my friend and our six offspring when she told me about the incident of the parent singing at her eldest’s school nativity.
She’d thought he’d sung well, but that it was slightly bizarre that an adult would be singing at all at a children's play. That's until she opened the programme and discovered the singing dad was Aled Jones.
Another time she was in the playground talking to a vaguely familiar, but shabby, chap, passing the time of day, trying to remember how she knew him. It was only later that she realised he was an A-list actor.
I was slightly put out - partly because my eccentric earnings as a writer can’t match her household income and school fees, but more that there is no-one meteorically famous in my children’s playgrounds.
In a bid to bolster my flagging spirits my husband pointed out to me that there is a Z-lister. I was puzzled for a minute or two until I realised that he meant me, because I have my weekly picture in the paper
Is it being only Z-list that bothers me? No, it’s now that I know I am on a list (hooray, I’m on a list, even if it is just my husband’s) I'll have to embrace the lipstick legions if I’m ever even going to get up to Y.

London is the Mecca of entertainment in my children’s eyes. It’s the sheer number of people that fascinates them, combined with the Tubes, museums and adults behaving in what they see as a bizarre manner. They haven’t quite grasped that homeless souls do not necessarily have a choice, and instead see them as a curiosity.
They want to interrogate them about why exactly they choose to live under a particular bridge, what’s in their shopping trolley or the name of their dog. While I feel the sickening dread of potentially difficult situations, I also believe that we should all experience the world and do not want to shut down my children’s natural inquisitiveness before society (and stranger danger) does it for them.

With half term upon us, now is the time to ask: Is it is possible to enjoy a family day out when members’ ages range from three to 40?
A couple of years ago we visited the Submarine Museum in Gosport. It was a rushed visit with a swift tour through the sub and then a ram-raid of the museum exhibits, all accompanied by the kids clamouring for food.
Like I do with alll trips to places of interest with small children, I came away feeling that I had missed the interesting parts and had just been one part of a whirlwind. It was hard to see the point of ever going back.
Recently, however, we watched a re-run of submarine movie The Hunt for Red October. An ex-boyfriend of mine is in the film, and since I didn't get anything for Valentine's Day it's a good way to gently remind my husband that there's competition.
After seeing the film, the children badgered me to go back to the submarine museum - so we did.
As we entered the claustrophobic bowels of HMS Alliance this weekend there was an ominous quote pinned to the wall. 'See that?' I hissed at my husband.
'There is no margin for mistakes in a submarine. You are either alive or dead,' he read. 'Same as marriage,' I muttered.
In a bid to regain my favour he took charge of the youngest, who exists in a state of persistent boredom in enclosed spaces and whose only cheerful outlet is trying to catch hold of scarves and throttle people.
Leaving the Gosport strangler and my husband to grapple at the back of the tour, I went hunting for the other two. The middle child was happily pushing buttons and flicking switches in the control room while the eldest was interrogating the periscope.
The lights dimmed to red, a klaxon wailed, the guide shouted: 'Dive, dive dive!'  and, in the midst of a sonar simulation and depth charge attack, the youngest was hugely disappointed to discover that we weren’t actually on the move. While I would gladly have torpedoed her and her imminent tantrum to the Isle of Wight, my husband thought better of it and took her outside.
Tour over, brain gorged with no room to spare, the guide asked for any questions. It was then, as my boy and two other older gentlemen engaged in a lively discussion to do with CO2, atmospheres and pressure, that I realised I have a Sub-boffin on my hands.
Luckily my middle child is far more interested in twiddling knobs than learning about regulators, so she and I enjoyed a splendid time in the hands on centre where we played at flooding the sub’s chambers and identifying whale noises.
So does the Submarine Museum offer fun for all the family? Yes, especially if you’ve a husband who’s trying to crawl back into your affections while wearing a scarf.

Does anyone know how to train a fox? My son attends a Wildlife Club at his school and parents were invited along to meet hedgehogs. In the course of the discussion I discovered the reason for the resident rat in my neighbourhood was due to a decline in urban foxes , which are natural predators of the rat. Our local fox has dog-like aspirations, standing outside the sitting room wagging its tail on a nightly basis. I need to train it to be more feline in its approach to life. Suggestions on a postcard please.

Hosting a dinner party, when the children are at home, is demanding and I’ve yet to learn how everyone else makes it look easy.

I was entertaining this weekend which is something that I am reluctant to do as I can’t cook very well. In fact, I am rubbish. My recipes always start off as Jamie Oliver with a handful of this, and a squeeze of that, but end up as Gordon Ramsay (as in lots of swearing. Mine is because the food tastes so bad). My hand are definitely a different size to Jamie’s and never create quite the full flavour I’d anticipated.

All my local friends are great chefs with immaculate minimalist households and have made the transition to a more mature existence with ease. I find myself still stuck in the macaroni cheese student school of life and cooking. I therefore employ a strategy of plying guests with alcohol (in lieu of a starter) so they’ll be starving and my errant flavours won’t even touch the sides of their mouths.

I hope that these people like me for who I am, but even so, I can’t help but want to keep up with the Jones’ and, in preparation for my dinner party, was faced with cooking and cleaning. This is the deadly double C combination that most parents with the third C (that’ll be children), dread, especially when their partner disappears out for the day.

Apart from the children’s helpful suggestions for an intriguing menu, such as beans on toast followed by cheesy pasta, I found the day to be trying as the only thing minimalist thing about my offspring is their height. I needed to go deep with my cleaning but the pint sized saboteurs had other ideas, following me around surreptitiously. As I was distracted by scrubbing toothpaste off the floor behind the bath (well, you never know who might look there) they made a police station in the still sparkling kitchen, a Bedouin camp in the newly dust free living room and a pulley system on the outside steps in case anyone needed hoisting into (more likely out of) the house. They’re uncontainable, rampant maximalists.

Finally worn out by ruining all my efforts to be a Jones, they were delightfully asleep before the guests arrived which was just as well. I discovered the next morning that they’d hidden a walkie-talkie in situ and were planning to disrupt conversation with a choice commentary on the attractiveness of the guests.

I can only conclude that the secret of every Jones’ fine dining experience is to amputate their children for a weekend.

Continuing with the culinary theme, my youngest has just discovered that meat comes from animals and has spent every mealtime of a carnivorous nature imitating the previous owners’ signature sounds. Her love of pork and voyeurism has encouraged her to share her new found knowledge with one and all, oinking at other peoples’ ham sandwiches. I’m not overly impressed with this; funnily enough neither are the strangers whose sarnies are targeted for a snort. In a bid to confound her this week we’re just going to have fish and woe betide anyone who introduces her to a marine soundtrack, I endure enough wailing already.

Has anyone else noticed the similarities between teenagers and the elderly? They hang out at bus stops and huddle mid-pavement so it’s blocked. And both groups drive in the wrong direction up one-way streets, grinning maniacally at you when you flag them down.
Of course I'm talking about a minority here. But all it takes is one or two bad eggs to spoil the carefully-cultivated image of elderly people as genial, wise and kind to small children.
I am talking specifically about the Gosport High Street drag racers here.
You know who you are. You're the ones with mobility scooters who, front baskets wildly spewing fresh fruit and vegetables, rev up to full throttle and race the length of the market.
Presumably you tot up points for every shopper who is swept sideways by you careening past at 8mph. If the pedestrian drops their groceries that’s a bonus, especially if the scooterer can squash said food with its back tyres. I reckon you get two points for a tomato and three for a grape as it’s smaller and requires precision manoeuvring. If ram-raiding pedestrians doesn’t clear the way, you employ your crutches in the same way as scythes were used on Roman chariots, taking the feet out from under any innocent bystanders.
It's easy to spot these easy riders by by the following clues. One: they wrap their heads entirely in crocheted hats, scarves and earmuffs, apparently to keep out the cold. In truth it’s to avoid detection by CCTV.
Two: they have carefully customised their mobility scooter. Points to watch out for are England flags cunningly fixed on with garden twine at the perfect height to take out an eye'. Three, they’ve probably run you over and all you’ll have seen of their passing is the back of their quilted jacket with gang membership emblems cross-stitched across it.
I suspect that the reason these subversive few all have tartan blankets across their knees is because they’ve got someone else riding shotgun, injecting nitrous oxide into the battery to get up that final bit of hot speed for pulling out on roundabouts at 9mph.
These OACs are letting down the OAPs. And what does OAC stand for? Old Age Chav, of course.

My children and I came across several bikes laying across the pavement outside our local convenience store. Youths milled everywhere, waiting their turn to enter the ‘only two teenagers at a time’ One Stop. My youngest was in a buggy so one young man, seeing our path was blocked, ran over and started shifting the bikes out of our way in a heroic manner. Unfortunately his fine gesture was rather undermined by his choice use of the f-word to berate his accomplices for their dire parking skills. “What did he say?” my children pleaded for knowledge as I covered their ears. “The F-word,” I hissed, leaving them guessing what it was was - and wondering why something like 'friend' or 'fish'' could be so upsetting.

'Golden time' has been introduced recently in my middle child’s school. At the end of the week the children get to choose an activity of their choice to round off school with a cheerful note.
My child tells me she been 'speed stacking' for the past few weeks. Getting information out of her about what she does daily is as easy as wing walking on an Airfix model that’s stuck together with flour and water, so I haven’t yet actually discoveredwhat this involves.
Could it be building human pyramids? Something to do with hay bales?
Actually no, as I finally found out when the school gates swung open so invited parents could see Golden Time in action for themselves.
It turns out speed stacking involves a collection of heavy-duty plastic cups that need stacking in combinations of towers and pyramids, then taking down again. Left hand, right hand, both hands are used. It's great for coordination and there’s an electronic timer, but even so I couldn't see what the fascination was.
My youngest child had a go and happily muddled up all the cups before my middle child encouraged me to try it. Still unconvinced, I had a go.
As I did this, the electronic whiteboard in the classroom blared into life with a rocking soundtrack and showed highlights of the world speed stacking championships.
 the competitors a blur behind reeling plastic. Suddenly speed stacking became hip. I got ready to begin. Twenty-three seconds later and I was ready to squish any infant child who came in a three-cup radius as the compulsive nature of the stack overtook me.
Speed stacking is moreish. I was aghast that an hour zipped by before I’d mastered my two-hand technique.
Later on, back at home, I settled back on my settee waiting for my after-children-are-in-bed cup of tea when a crashing sound came from the kitchen, followed by a strangled yodel from my husband. A fitted kitchen cupboard had descended from the wall, speed smashing cups and glass everywhere. At least I was able to fairly quickly stack the debris.

I’ve discovered that I can’t take my children swimming. For health and safety reasons, there have to be two adults present to take responsibility for my eight, five and three year olds - even in a ‘baby’ pool and even though the two eldest swim. In two weeks' time when my youngest turns four, I’ll be able to take any combination of two, but not all three. Only in three years, when the middle one turns eight, will we all all be able to go. We can get around this when my husband’s available, but just how are single parents supposed to teach their children safety in the water?

I’ve always been led to believe that headlice don’t like grubby hair. They only go for clean, fresh, silky, shampoo-ad flickable locks.
You know the kind I mean - the type of hair that children sport in American movies, ie the long mullet mops that all the pre-teen boys seem to have.
Movie children's hair is gloriously shiny, never with spiking peaks from a sweaty night’s sleep, and matches their on-screen parents' swishing locks.
Ever since my children were born I’ve restricted hair washing to once a week. To my mind this deters the nits, and italso saves me the dreaded shrieking that accompanies the washing and drying process. As a result, none of my children would ever make it on to the big screen.
So when my eldest appeared in the kitchen scratching his Beatle-esque locks one morning, I grimaced. Could it be that my defensive plan wasn’t working? Sadly yes. One quick inspection and a crawling jungle was revealed.
It took more than an hour to comb through all three children - an hour of plucking, picking and scraping away the feisty little beasts and their eggs. From the revoltingly large to the squirmiest minute ones, I battled on amidst complaints of child cruelty. Worse, I was accused of being a killer of nature; they wanted to keep the lice as pets and were outraged that I was drowning my prey in a bowl of antiseptic.'There goes so and so,' they cried, naming each and every one in a bid to make me empathise.
Although I am loathe to use the chemical concoctions unless absolutely necessary, I quickly remembered that conditioning the children’s heads before combing would be much more effective, on two counts. One: the suckers can’t hang on to conditioner . Two: It had to be easier to tame the childrens’ mops with a bit of lotion in there.
Three weeks and three litres of my horribly expensive conditioner later and I was beginning to think the infestation was under control. But by this time my skin was crawling. There’re only so many tentacles I can squish before I get the goosebumps. I was itching in sympathy, I thought, until I ran the comb through my hair and revealed an infestation of my own.
Nits preferring clean hair? It's a tall tale, no doubt invented by an embarrassed parent.

 
Some superstores are fining people who unnecessarily park their cars in spaces reserved for families. These parking bays are much wider, designed to allow easier access to passenger doors. They are close to the stores’ doors so that there is less likelihood of traffic accidents while negotiating the car park. I’ve only managed to find a family space once or twice over the past eight years; there are very few and hugely popular. This leads to the question of why so many people park in them when they don’t have young children.
Could it be that they too need a bit more space to open their doors than the normal stringent, car denting area on offer? Wouldn’t it be simpler in the long term, with the growing trend of our nation, to redesign all car parking bays and make them a smidge wider?

Why do parents give their children pocket money? There are three schools of thought on this. One is that it teaches children financial responsibility.
Another is that it removes from parents the guilt of buying junk which breaks within minutes. The third is that it can be used as an enormous stick to control behaviour.
I have never been good at handing over money on a weekly basis. Even when I made a concerted effort at it I found that every slight breach of household rules led to me deducting pennies.
It got so bad at one point that the children started owing me cash; you could say that I belong firmly in the group which uses pocket money as an enormous stick.
After a swift New Year summit with my husband at which we agreed to new budgeting and parenting policies I’ve come to the conclusion that my current approach of buying ‘pocket money’ toys at random isn’t working and that I need a firm plan in place.
So I made a list of chores for the children to earn their money on a weekly basis. Ten chapters in, I remembered the new parenting policies involved being nicer. So I removed the  lengthy directions on hoovering, floor scrubbing and toilet cleaning, and have now left them with jobs like making and smoothing their beds (not just stuffing the duvet back onto the frame and claiming the job’s done) and ensuring that all items of dirty clothes make it to the laundry basket daily. I’m thinking about offering an allowance to my husband for this once as well.
In my mind; pocket money is now earned rather than lost and therefore becomes a positive incentive. I am going to offer monthly trips to the shops, reducing the risk of pound store purchases, and it will also neatly educate the children in financial responsibility.
My only problem remains teaching them the value of money. When informed of this money earning policy, the middle and youngest daughters hatched a plan to pool their first month’s cash and buy a horse - 'a real horse that neighs and everything'.  If anyone knows where they can get one for up to £8, please don't let them know.

TK Maxx drives me mad. I can cope with sorting through confused rails. I can handle merchandise piled higher than Portsdown Hill. I can deal with the errant nature of the stock, like zillions of shoes in two sizes only. But what I cannot stand is the staff. Do they give the majority a surly pill? Or only employ those with a personality bypass? Maybe I’m not designer enough to elicit warmth; my requests for a discount for a garment with its buttons missing and for a neckline tag to be removed from a dress (so my child could try it over her head) were met with grudging indifference. I never come away feeling I have been happily helped. Forget shop assistants - they'res more like the shopping resistance.

As an eager but shocking singer, I survive carol concerts by standing in the centre of fellow mumblers and lip syncers. You’ll know us by the guilty but understanding looks we share along the pew, and the jiggling of our over generous collection offerings as a way of making amends. We’re always at the back, of course.
This year, however, I came up with a cunning plan of standing next to someone who sings loudly and well, so that my vocal enthusiasm could ride in the slipstream of their ability and set my inhibited songstress free.
I decided to action the plan for the middle child’s Christmas service. I invited a singing friend to lunch safe in the knowledge we’d then sit next to each other in the church and I could unleash my harmonies.
You may have guessed from this that I am no Zella Fitzgerald.
Years ago I tried out for the school choir. There were a hall full of hopefuls, all of whom made the cut except for me and three others.
This took some doing. Surely my voice wasn’t that bad? When self-awareness came along, helped by karaoke, I had to concede that it was. Friends insisted that I chose crowd-pleasing anthems instead of the Flashdance theme tune. My voice was damned.
Performances now are solely for my children, as they appreciate my vocal abilities. Or maybe it’s the way I weave their names into festive tunes, and change the choruses so they incorporate toilet humour. Either way I do enjoy belting out a few numbers and was really looking forward to singing in public once again, without the fear of bursting anyone’s ear drums. What could be better than a few carols to ease my path back into performing?
Unfortunately, as my singing friend and I had a leisurely lunch, we had to run for the church. We forgot to take our programmes with the words and ended up very near the front. Not to worry. I opened my lungs triumphantly after so many years in the wilderness to join in with the exultations of the choirs of angels. Meanwhile she peered over the shoulders of the people in the pew in front looking for divine lyrical inspiration.
It didn’t come in time, she left me strangling a solo Bethlehem over and above the programme waving lip syncers around us. Foiled and foxed by my own plan, I’m retreating back to the crowd pleasing anthems. That’ll be Jingle Bells then.

I have lost the letter ‘A’ from my life. I struggled for 30 minutes to remember the word 'anthropologist' this week and ended up googling culture, studies, and civilisation to find it. Every time one of my children popped out, a quarter of my original brain mass did too, so now I am running at 25 per cent - not exactly energy efficient. What worries me more than anthropology is that I forgot my youngest this week. I left her momentarily in a school playground, so there’s another letter gone. At this speed I am going to end up with a severely depleted alphabet. While I still retain 24 letters I am going to write a letter to Santa and ask for one of those brain training things.