Mummy’s carefully laid plans of perfectly figging up the pudding, while sitting by the fire reading aloud from A Christmas Carol to her rapt rosy-cheeked audience, are suddenly in tatters. I liked when Ellen stood up to the Head teacher and Michael (Louisa’s Father) Shouted at her, made me smile. And I most certainly will not slump on the sofa at the end of the day, glugging wine and muttering ‘FML’ repeatedly. Well, she miraculously learnt to walk again, and her joie de vivre and positive outlook caused that to happen, but she still got run over! I am sure that any parent will recognise themselves or their children in the book though I'd just like to point out here that I definitely did not have the copious amounts of wine and gin which Mummy drinks.

I reminded myself that I must be glad for Jane that even if her boyfriend’s parents had ridiculous taste when it came to naming their children, that at least they went some way to making up for that by being obscenely rich.I knew I should have put a kirby grip in, like Lucy Worsley, and then he wouldn’t have any excuse to do things like that. My self-pity party came to an end as I attempted to separate the snarling cloud of fur into three dogs. This book highlights some of the nightmares and of course the fun times parents can have with young children.

Toby had been given a hard no, as it was his grandparents’ golden wedding anniversary on 27 December, and he’d been told in no uncertain terms to get his arse on a plane no later than 23 December. Gills Sims has written this in a really true to life format where you empathise with the main character throughout, at no point did I feel she was in the wrong! Sims is the author of Why Mummy Drinks which was the Sunday Times Fiction Bestseller of 2017, Why Mummy Swears published in 2018, and Why Mummy Doesn't Give A **** published in 2019.Ellen's best friend's husband has left her too and all the other mothers at the children's school seem to be coping perfectly. Gill’s interests include drinking wine, wasting time on social media, trying and failing to recapture her lost youth and looking for one of the dogs when he decides to go on one of his regular jaunts, while trying to stop the other one eating unspeakable things. Yes, this year is definitely going to be much better – I am absolutely not going to shout at the children, let them stuff their faces with crisps or goggle away on the iPad.

I couldn’t deny that it was a nice prospect not to have to work through the complex negotiations with my immediate family – and Simon’s – about who, what and where was happening. I do hope this in no way interferes with your doubtless careful and intricate plans and that it does not inconvenience or irk you. Reading this in small chunks may be best (I read it in a few days as I had lots of reading time while snuggling a not-sleeping toddler) to heighten the enjoyment. Maybe if I'd read this before becoming a mother I may have seriously thought of finding a contraception that liked me.

I’m trying to make salt dough decorations for nursery with Edward so I’m a lovely festive crafty mummy and he’s just informed me he’s eaten all the Rudolphs while I was on my phone. Never in all the years I’d sat outside clutching a cigarette and a large glass of wine, looking up at the stars and fervently muttering, ‘Starlight, star bright, first star I see tonight, I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight, oh I WISH THEY WOULD ALL FUCK OFF,’ did it occur to me that I might be wishing away Jane and Peter too, and that they would also fuck off and leave me one day.