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Like father like son - is a desire to write inherited?

The other day I stumbled upon Elmore Leonard's website and for fans it has everything you could possibly need to know. I've only read his children's book but once I clear a bookshelf or two I'm going to have...

Posted by Susan Humphreys on August 1, 2008 9:00 AM

Storyteller competitions for all ages - Telling Tales

Fancy yourself as the next Brothers Grimm or Hans Christian Anderson? Well if you are a great storyteller like them why not enter one of these competitions I've discovered....

Posted by Susan Humphreys on July 19, 2008 9:00 AM

Peach of a show

That, said beaming nine-year-old Jessica, was really, really good. The second 'really' is the one that counts, lifting a reliably entertaining family show into some kind of childhood superleague, a rather special theatrical experience. Yes, as a hardened old...

Posted by Sid Langley on June 15, 2008 2:38 PM

People were concerned when an Asian family moved in

It was August 1974, I arrived with my family at West Denton area. As were taking our belongings inside our house, we saw some neighbours were concerned that a family with an Asian background had come to live with them...

Posted by Hari Shukla on June 10, 2008 2:45 PM

Monster hit

Another day, another museum, another big success - monstrous, even. Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery's major show for the summer, Myths and Monsters, was packed today - that's Sunday, May 25, only the second day of opening. It runs...

Posted by Sid Langley on May 25, 2008 7:58 PM

Cup Final...what Cup Final?

MY second uncle is over from Australia at the moment so the family organised a get together yesterday. "On Cup Final Day?" my two moaned as I insisted they come with me to meet "someone none of us even know"...

Posted by Bad Dad on May 18, 2008 12:10 PM

A question of marriage

I had this conversation with my five-year-old son this morning. "Can I always live with you mummy?" "Well you might not always want to live with me, honey. You will meet someone you love and have a family of your...

Posted by Tara Cain on April 17, 2008 8:25 AM

How do you cope being ill with a toddler?

It's been almost two weeks since my last posting - sorry about that - but I've been ill. And being ill when you've got a not-yet-two-year-old in the house is, I've discovered, an art in itself. There was l lying...

Posted by Jo Ind on April 10, 2008 2:45 PM

Competitive Parenting

The women in our antenatal group, including myself, would claim we were not competitive. We would all agree that children develop at their own paces and that it is invidious to make comparisons between them. And yet when would meet...

Posted by Jo Ind on March 11, 2008 3:17 PM

Multi-tasking for mothers

In the two minutes it takes to dash to the washing machine from the bathroom with a reeking bucket of poohy nappies, Arch has managed to open the child-proof cap on the big bottle of mouthwash and drink its contents....

Posted by Jo Ind on February 26, 2008 4:52 PM

Supermam helps out with a Christmas dilemma

Supermam Claire Walsh is a mum of two lively youngsters, pictured above, and children’s centre at Stockton’s SureStart. Every Friday in the Gazette's Family Life she helps solve your family problems - great or small - with guidelines on...

Posted by Julie - Administrator on November 27, 2007 8:01 AM