I just happen to have caught a whiff of some recent ructions within the higher echelons of the UK mummy blogging community. It all sounds very unpleasant and hurtful with several high profile bloggers bowing out as a result. Like many things in life it would seem that the higher up the ladder you get the more political and complex life becomes.
I was also very sad to see that the mum behind Mila's Daydreams has had to put a stop to her original blog concept as photos of beautiful baby Mila were being stolen by utterly unscrupulous advertisers amongst others. I could understand the attraction as her photos were truly unique and gorgeous, but how awful to realise that the memories of your newborn which you were kind enough to share were in fact being exploited for financial gain.
Then there has been my own recent experience of being hacked into. Somehow some sort of South East Asian technology website has managed to infiltrate my email and blog and as a result some random and quickly deleted blogs have been posted in my name. To be honest I think I'm actually more offended by the terrible spelling and grammar being published in my name than by the identity fraud itself.
So it is apparent that blogging does have its pitfalls.... but then I get a little message from Carrie wondering about the unusual activity on my blog. I encountered her as we were both mentioned in the lovely Jana's blog - a fantastic, feisty, attitude strewn heavyweight USA mommy blog. Carrie is a gorgeous mom of three and her blog centres on her family's journey to hopefully overcome her five year old daughter's leukaemia. Hannah is currently losing her hair, but as Carrie says - with trademark positivity and good humour - this means the drugs are doing their work. I always feel humbled when I read her blog and marvel at the way she manages to maintain grace under such pressure, and I am grateful to my little blog that it has opened up the opportunity to meet lovely people from far away only to find common ground and interest. I suppose the biggest leveller of all is the fact that we are all just doing our best to live good lives and love our families and friends.
And so to move onto the spooky part of my blog. I love Halloween, and to celebrate we are having a little party on Sunday. Here pumpkin preparations are underfoot:
There is one childhood Halloween party game which I always remember playing. It revolved around being blindfolded then guessing which part of Nelson (aka a volunteer grown up) you were touching and which culminated in putting your finger into a bowl of wet squidged tissue paper and being told you were putting your finger into his empty eye socket. Ah, I recall with memory made vivid by engrained childhood trauma how we screamed and had nightmares for weeks. Happy days.
Here is a similar game I have found. Clearly it may need to be modified for the littlest witches and vampires out there, but I may be trying out a few of these on Sunday!
