Snow was falling, snow on snow...*

*yes, I know it's a Christmas carol but read the post and you'll see why it fits...

I pity Moscow's street cleaners; it's snowing outside. Again. Just this morning as I was driving along the highway I noticed that the banks of dirty frozen sluck* had disappeared from the middle and the edges of the road. We could even see what will one day be grass again in it's place - amazing!

Now, this transformation didn't happen overnight. Well - it did, actually, but not unassisted. There are somewhere around 10,000 street cleaners working year round to keep the streets of Moscow clear. In the summer they become litter patrols, gardeners (Moscow has a lot of municipal landscaping), and drive the fleets of trucks that spray the roads to keep the dust down. In the winter, well of course it's all about the snow. It strikes me that this job must be particularly thankless; the only time it gets noticed is when there's a problem - which admittedly, is rare.

In any case I can just imagine them, late last night probably, shovelling snowy shit (sorry but there are 35,000 wild dogs in Moscow and as I was tweeting with Tim over at 'Bringing Up Charlie' recently, they do not carry their own baggies to clear up after themselves) into the back of numerous lorries to clean up the city in preparation for Spring, and congratulating themselves on a job well-done as they finished this particular stretch of road. And then today?

This happens.

I mean, I find it depressing enough...

In other news, I've been guest posting over at Slummy Single Mummy's blog. Want to know what I REALLY think about the female natives here? Go check it out...

* Sluck; my new word, do you like it? It's a cross between 'slush' and 'muck' , which is what snow here becomes after it's been hanging around in the city after a couple of months...

Guest Post: Slummy Single Mummy on the lies we tell our children

Every now and again the opportunity comes up for me to run a guest post on The Potty Diaries. I normally give an unequivocal 'no' in reply; this is my blog, I like to write the content. Call me controlling, or just come right out with out it and call me anal, I don't care; this blog is the one area of my life where what I say goes. But when Jo at Slummy Single Mummy offered to write a post for me, I deliberated for about - oh, I don't know - 10 seconds, before biting her hand off.

I love her writing. Plus, she won the undying affection of myself and some other 'veteran' bloggers at our first face-to-face meeting during the 2010 CyberMummy conference when she rocked up with a nearly full bottle of wine she'd half-inched off a pr, announcing that she had decided to share it with us because we were 'the coolest'. Since we could all give her at least 10 years and had been feeling somewhat like school prefects at 3rd form disco, you can imagine that went down quite well...

Enjoy!

A good friend phoned me the other day.

“I’ve ruined Christmas!” she wailed, never one to underplay the drama in a situation.

“What have you done?” I asked, in a muffly I-answered-the-phone-with-a-mouthful-of-sandwich voice.

“Derek asked me straight if Father Christmas is real and I told the truth!”*

“Oh dear,” I said, trying to sound sympathetic whilst at the same time keeping half an eye on twitter. “It’s so hard isn’t it? Belle asked me to absolutely promise that I wasn’t the Tooth Fairy this week.”

“What did you do?” my friend asked.

“I lied.”

...

I don’t know if it was the right thing to do. Belle certainly didn’t seem happy with my response.

“Swear on my life Mummy that you’re not the Tooth Fairy,” she said.

Awkward pause.

“I swear on your life that I have never dressed up as a fairy and taken a tooth from under your pillow.”

Not very convincing.

“I DON’T BELIEVE YOU!” she shouted, folding her arms across her chest and turning away from me. “Mummy’s aren’t supposed to break promises. How will I ever trust you again?”

The questions had come on the back of a visit to see Santa in his grotto, a visit which Belle had treated with a good deal of scepticism. “How can that be the real Father Christmas,” she asked, quite reasonably I thought, “when I saw a sign earlier saying he was going to be somewhere else in town this afternoon?” It was a fair point. “Besides,” she added, “I could see the line where his beard was stuck on.”

This bit wasn’t fair at all, as his beard was real, and one of the most impressive Santa beards I have ever seen. She wouldn’t have it though, even when I zoomed right in with the camera and showed her the individual hairs growing out of his chin. (In a photo afterwards, not on the actual man).

They grow up so quickly don’t they? A couple of years ago she was completely taken in by a visit to what was genuinely a teenage girl in a Poundland quality fake beard, and yet now, faced with an elderly man with impressively bushy white facial hair, who almost had me convinced, she’s doing everything she can to pull him apart.


It’s a tricky one, because actually I still really want to believe in Father Christmas myself, and I want to keep the magic of things like the Tooth Fairy alive as long as I possibly can. Pretending that you believe is surely almost as fun, so isn’t it OK to try to keep up the pretence? Or should you be honest with your children, even if perhaps they don’t really want to hear it?

When did your children stop believing?


*Not his real name. Seriously, who would call a kid Derek??

You can find Jo blogging over Slummy Single Mummy, amongst other places...

Guest Blog Day - Raid the Fridge!

I'm taking part in Little Mummy's Guest Post Day today, so you won't find me here, but wittering on about the contents of my fridge here instead, where Mummy Mishaps has been kind enough to lend me her blog. Back shortly, and in the meantime, enjoy a post from a completely different blogger!

Ok, so I am ‘babysitting’ Potty Mummy’s blog for the time it takes you to read this post!! We have agreed to swap posts as part of Little Mummy’s Guest Post Day! Despite not knowing you, I will be telling you all about the contents of my fridge – yikes! Shame this was not done at the start of the week when it was full of really healthy stuff J

Anyway, before I begin sharing my fridge secrets with you, let me tell you a little bit about myself. I am a 30 something first time Mummy to a 10 ½ month old baby boy and since having him I am a full time stay at home kinda girl now. I live in North Devon and am really enjoying my new role. I have only been blogging since April, but have already met some wonderful fellow bloggers, and am really enjoying writing my posts and sharing them. My blog name is Mummy Mishaps – so called because I am a tad clumsy and usually end up doing stupid things due to my forgetful and baby brained ways (well, got to use that as an excuse while I can!).

So, if you are ready then I will start my Guest Day Post.

Now my fridge actually looks quite tidy – I would like to point out that this was not done for the purpose of this post, I actually cleared it out last weekend so that was good timing! Now the fridge is split now in to 2 key areas – Burton’s food and food for me and his Daddy. Burton’s food is usually found on the 3rd shelf down and in the vegetable drawer, afterall, he has the healthiest diet of the three of us! So on his shelf you will find yoghurts, babybel cheese and homemade meals (in this case a bowl of beef casserole and some rice pudding).

The rest of the fridge is full of what we adults eat and considering it is almost the end of the week it is still looking quite full. Normally by now it would be looking a bit sorry for itself, which would create complaints by the OH as to why are we out of such and such. To which I reply “because the on line shop is not due until the weekend”. However, I am pleased that for once that is not the case otherwise this would be a VERY short post. So here is a list of what my fridge contains (in no particular order):

Main Body

3 types of butter – unsalted (for Burton), Clover & I Can’t Believe
Dairylea
Philadelphia
Camembert
Mature Cheddar
Red Leicester Cheese
Strawberry Jam
Mayo
Tomato Puree
Garlic Puree
Organic Yoghurts
Rolo Desserts
An opened jar of roasted peppers
Horseradish
Branston Pickle
Minced Beef
Gammon Joint
Pancetta
Turkey slices
Ham

Door:

Heinz tomato ketchup (my fridge will not accept any other brand of ketchup!)
Salad Cream
M & S salad dressings – honey & mustard and scillian lemon (yeah I know – showing off here!)
Semi skimmed milk and gold top milk

Vegetable Drawer:

Half a sweet potato
Blueberries
Strawberries
Cherry tomatoes
Asparagas
Half a banana

Chilled Drawer:

Apple juice
White wine

I wonder what the contents of my fridge say about me and my family….hmmmm? What do you think? Probably similar to a lot of you I would imagine. I would like to add that normally there would be more vegetables in our vegetable drawer, but being almost end of the week I have run out and need to replenish it (remember – on line shop due at the weekend!). I tend to make our family meals from scratch, and it is important to me to use the best ingredients wherever possible especially for Burton.

So there you have it! I hope you have enjoyed this ‘cool’ (ahem!) post and if you would like to check out my blog you can find me at :

http://mummymishaps.blogspot.com/

Thank you to Potty Mummy for allowing me on to her blog, and thank you for taking the time to read this 