The Mumpreneur Diaries: Business, Babies or Bust - One Mother of a Year. Mosey Jones
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island we can retreat to on holiday to spend the profits.
I call the Husband full of excitement that we are on the way with a proper business idea, one that will make money and have employees and be famous and everything. He puts on his best ‘indulging the little wife’ voice and asks, ‘How exactly is this going to make money, and who will be looking after our children while you’re building this empire?’
I’m on too much of a high, and possibly a little drunk, to care that he isn’t exactly bowled over by our magical money-making schemes. In fact, in my mind we’re practically in profit already.
Wednesday 27 February 2008
I’m still basking in the glow of my new-found mumpreneur status. At last I feel as though there is actually a business from which I can make some real money. I spend the day researching the competition, and find there isn’t any – well, there is an identical service in west London, but as that is over 40 miles away and this kind of thing is a bit dependent on help being practically round the corner, I don’t think we need to worry about them. It does mean that we can pinch, or rather be inspired by, the things they have already set up. Bonus! I’ve been trying to come up with a mission statement for our new mumciergery as well. We also need a decent brand name because mumciergery is, frankly, a bit weird.
I take a break from empire-building to go and collect Boy One from pre-school. His teacher greets me with what I take to be an admiring look as I troop up with the baby in a sling. ‘That baby is still practically a newborn,’ I imagine her thinking, ‘and here she is already back in the groove. What an inspiration!’ Perhaps I just exude success…
Walking home reflecting on her obvious admiration, I can’t resist a quick preen in a nearby shop window. Quick flick of the hair, and I’m a picture of yummy mumminess framed in the dark glass, with Boy One frolicking beside me and Boy Two angelically asleep tucked against my side. That and the two dinner-plate-sized orbs of leaking milk darkening my top. What I had taken for admiration was obviously indulgent pity as she thought to herself, ‘Bless her, she’s so sleep-deprived and hormone-addled that she hasn’t noticed her milk’s come in again. Maybe the poor love’s in such a state she’s plain forgotten to feed the baby.’ Not Superwoman, then. Bugger.
Sunday 2 March 2008
Mother’s Day. I remember the Husband talking about Mother’s Day shortly after the birth of Boy One. In obvious shock at someone having driven a bus through his wife’s lady-parts, he said to the midwife: ‘Now I understand what the fuss is all about. I’m never going to give my mother a crap present again. And I’d better make sure our son looks after his mum too!’ Three years and one more son and heir down the line and what do I get for this special day? Nada, nothing, zip. So that’s the birth in January, Valentine’s Day in February and Mother’s Day in March – three months, three Hallmark moments missed and I’m not impressed.
I’m only slightly mollified by the fact that my old book’s biggest selling season is just before Mother’s Day so it should have been flying off the shelves as desperate dads and children snap up anything with ‘mum’ in the title to dispense their duties for another year. Our skiing holiday is imminent so it’s comforting to think that the vins chauds and après ski aperitifs are being taken care of.
Friday 7 March 2008
Finally the long-awaited skiing holiday rolls around. But it also reminds me how little time has actually passed. Barely six weeks ago we were rushing out of the delivery suite to post Boy Two’s passport application. In the interim I’ve found two new careers and discovered that I can – almost – function on three hours’ sleep in every twenty-four. Things look rosy. Even the prospect of spending ten hours taking five separate trains across Europe with two small children can’t dampen my spirits.
Of course, the Husband’s precarious work situation is overshadowing things a little. Both the doula and mumcierge ideas could bring in a decent part-time income but on their own they won’t be enough to sustain our growing (grown? I’m really not in the market for a third) family if his (the main) breadwinning income is taken away. There’s still a very real possibility that I’m going to be back at my desk in less than three months. But now is not the time to think of such things. Instead it’s time to think of cutting through fresh powder and ignoring the fashionistas’ advice to slap on the sunblock. Even if it stops at a tide mark round my neck, I’m determined to get a tan.
Sunday 9 March 2008
First day of the holiday and instead of trooping straight up the hill, the Husband has curled up in an armchair, resembling a deflated Michelin man in his salopettes. He’s trying to steal Wi-Fi. It seems we can’t live without a permanent umbilical cord to the outside world. Miraculously he finds one. Webmail should, must, be read. And it cheers up my nonskiing father-in-law no end to discover that he can get the boxing results as a reward for being tied to fibreglass and thrown off the top of a rock, then left to hurtle down a sheet of ice with only a small, spiky forest to use as brakes.
Wednesday 12 March 2008
So far on my relaxing holiday I have:
Cooked five dinners for six people.
Used the medieval torture device known as a breast pump to extract two feeds a day for the baby, to be delivered into his gaping maw by my mother-in-law while I’m up a mountain.
Answered twelve emails covering, variously, names for the mumciergery, the impossibility of getting a criminal records bureau check and the consequent absolute necessity of one, queries regarding the potty training article (apparently, in one of the case studies where a boy had learned to do a poo in the big toilet, I’d put his age at 33. They wanted to check this is what I meant. I mean, it wouldn’t occur to them that the extra ‘3’ was a typo or anything).
Fallen over three times – twice when Boy One snow-ploughed into me at speed, having learned how to start, but not how to stop. The third was when the Husband also used my ankles as a braking device, scything into my legs with his skis and rearranging my kneecaps.
That I have had only one hour-long crying fit after all this is, I think, a good thing.
Monday 17 March 2008
We survived yesterday’s epic journey home from the Alps despite Boy One’s constant diarrhoea on the Eurostar. Fortunately he is still in night nappies so we had something to catch the accidents, but inevitably the nappy supply ran out somewhere under the Channel. We resorted to padding out his underpants with bits of newborn nappy that we hoped Boy Two would not require before we reached home.
Our happiness at being back home is short-lived, not least because of the three separate credit card bills waiting for me on the welcome mat. I always feel the worst bit about going on holiday is not knowing what you’ll come back to. I fantasise about break-ins, fires, floods and unpayable bills languishing on the mat. On this occasion we avoid all but the last. As I hide the offending articles from the Husband I pray to the god of re-mortgaging, hoping that our recent switch between banks will see much-needed funds land in our account soon.
At least I don’t need to worry about a slew of demanding emails because I’ve pretty much kept up with them while we’ve been away. Some might say you’re wrecking your holiday by never leaving work alone, but I say that I’d wreck it anyway by worrying about what was going on in my absence.
What I didn’t bank on was other people holding on to their bad news emails until I got back. While we’ve been away, someone has published a ‘How to’ book on becoming a mumpreneur that is almost identical to the one I have in the pipeline. No funny business, just a coincidence that someone else had the same cracking idea, but about four months