Hope Skinner, founder Nanny Shecando

Pushing up daisies.

Musings from Miss Charlie…

You know, you’re pretty young to be an adult.

Well yes I guess you could say so. I am on the very young side of “adulthood”.

So then how come you get to be my nanny?

Well to be honest, the best part about me being young and also being your nanny is that I get to have so much fun with you! You wouldn’t be so happy if I looked really old and didn’t like jumping on the trampoline or didn’t like your jokes. A person who looks after you and is called a “nanny” is very different to your nanny and poppy who are daddy’s parents, even though we have the same name.

Good point! You know, you’re pretty smart for a “young adult”. How old are you again?

(Insert a 2-minute guessing game of “higher”, “lower” of ages ranging from seventeen to forty and finally settling on the jackpot of twenty-two).

Twenty-two! That’s like, sooooo old! Are you sure you should be jumping on this trampoline?!

… Jeez thanks Charlie. You’re just full of love today aren’t you. I better be careful. At this rate you’ll have me lumped in with the oldies and pushing up daisies before I even hit my prime. And here’s me thinking I could just cruise along. Watch-it, blink and you’ll miss it.

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School Holidays: 10 Things The Kids Are Looking Forward To

Oh no, oh no, oh no. No, no, no! This was my reaction this morning when I realised that today was the last day of term. It seems that our beloved Friday Fun Day has coincided with that time again; school’s out. You see, as of 40 minutes ago, school holidays officially started. Of course the girls are all super excited. Me, well, maybe not so much.

10 things The Kids Are looking forward to these School Holidays:

Froot Loops // Yes I’m sad to say that ‘eating Froot Loops’ currently holds the number one spot

Going to the horses // and having daily horse riding and dressage lessons, getting all messy in the mud and enjoying the fresh country air

Play dates // oh so many play dates. I should just give up on all cleaning and tidying now. It won’t even last 5 minutes with a house full of kids

Pool parties // the benefit of having an indoor heated pool means that all your friends want to come to your house in winter

The Justin Bieber movie // oh gosh. Please, no.

Arts n Craft // and attempts to burn down the kitchen with the kid friendly baking sessions

Board games // bring on the epic long battles of Monopoly

Snuggles on the couch // and all day Twilight movie marathons

No uniforms // being couch potatoes and staying in their pyjamas all day

The outings with me // visits to the Zoo, the National Maritime Museum (for the twins) and the Science Museum (for Miss6), picnics at the park and even some retail therapy

Things That I’m Not Looking Forward To These School Holidays:

Losing my peace // and quiet during the day. And for an entire two weeks. On the other hand, I do get some more company. Even if it does mean more of the same nonsensical chatter. I can do that, no problem. I’ve been told once or twice that I’m a little miss chatterbox myself!

Well that was a rather short list for me. I suppose I’m craving the company from the kids. Who’d have thought! It’s going to be a jam-packed couple of weeks but one hell of a fun roller coaster ride. Everybody better get on board!

Seeing as it’s Friday Fun Day colliding with the last day of the school term, our afternoon is going to be pretty spectacular. Bring on the ice cream, chocolate, these fresh baked berry muffins, afternoon dance sessions to Katy Perry and Beyoncé, takeaway pizza for dinner and much more. Jealous? I know you are! I may just have to reward myself with a glass of wine tonight (or four) for getting through the school term. Care to join me?

Do you have a routine for the holidays? Do your kids look forward to them all term? Are you usually knackered by the end of it or do you love the extra company? Wine.. red or white?

Doing It For The Kids

Being a good role model, not so easy at times.

Recently I had the pleasure of attending a school function for the girls and then joined the family for dinner at a restaurant afterwards. I was really touched to have been invited out to join the family. It’s nice every now and then to be reminded that the family (but the kids mainly) really do appreciate my contributions.

The school function just happened to fall on a day that I wasn’t working. I know what you’re thinking, as a nanny you actually got a day off?? But I did. So I took the time to put a little more thought into my appearance. I went to a little more effort than the usual ensemble of thrown together clothes that 95% of the time is covered in various forms of dog slobber and/or baby-sick by the end of the day. I even ended up wearing boots that had a bit of a heel. Nothing out of the usual to me, but it seems I made quite an impression on the girls.

Shortly after all three girls arrived home from the school event they mysteriously, and voluntarily I might add, disappeared up to their respective rooms to change for dinner. As The Twins descended the two flights of stairs down from their rockin’ top floor pad (it’s going to be so perfect for when they morph into moody teenagers) I couldn’t help but notice they seemed to be negotiating the stairs with quite some difficulty. A closer look informed me that they’d managed to put together a clothing look that kind of resembled my own outfit, complete with some serious high heels (OK they weren’t kitten heels but wedges can still be gnarly!). I smiled and helped them both down the last few steps, complimenting their grown-up outfits and not thinking much more of it. That was until Miss Charlie attempted to descend the stairs herself a few minutes later. She’d managed to change into the most sparkly outfit I’d ever seen. It was so shiny I had to blink and wished I had sunglasses to shield my eyes. Even worse were the shoes she’d managed to squeeze into, should a six-year-old even own high heels? Surely there’s an issue of morality at play here? I quickly took her hand and marched her back upstairs to her bedroom where I sweet talked her into moderating her outfit just slightly into something a little more age appropriate.

We all enjoyed a lovely family dinner, lots of laughs and bubbling conversation (of course everyone talking over the top of each other and vying for attention, that’s normal right?). As I bid them adieu and made my way home, I began to think that I really must pay more attention to how I conduct myself. Having mainly worked with boys in previous families, I’ve not really had the experience of being a true role model. Yes I’ve maintained and upheld a code of ethics, instilled rules and decent behaviour onto them and lead by example. I’ve played devil’s advocate at times and moderated arguments of “right” and wrong”. But I’ve never had to think about my actions as a female, as a woman, as a big sister and how this might influence the young girls around me. I was reminded that I am now a role model to these girls; Miss Charlie at six and The Twins at 11 look up to me.

So girls, I gladly accept the role as “mentor”. I hope to do you proud and exceed your expectations.

And a little word of advice from me to you, just something I’ve experienced from time to time:

High heels hurt your feet!

They really do. Yes they make our legs look pretty and give much-needed height at times, but sometimes they’re just not worth it. So try to hold off on them as long as possible, ballet flats look just as cute. Oh and one other thing, a classy woman never ever takes her heels off and walks bare feet. Never ever, no matter how much your feet hurt. Just don’t do it. Just smile and wave girls, smile and wave.

Under house arrest on a rainy day

Putting a kink in my plans…

It’s a rainy miserable day here today. Ordinarily I’d kind of like it, an excuse to stay inside the house and do nothing much at all, an opportunity to do a little more uni work than “nanny” work. But I’m not feeling it today. My alarm went off at 6am this morning, complete with a reminder to get out of bed and go for a run. I’d deliberately put my phone on the other side of the room so that I had to get out of bed to turn it off. I’d succeeded in achieving the first part, the getting out bed part. Except for the fact that I promptly got back into bed. And there went my plans for an early morning run. Awesome.

‘Never mind’ I thought as I raced to work with only a few minutes to spare (naturally I had not thought to set another alarm as I sleepily jumped back into bed), I’d go for a run later and take Bubba along with me. It made sense in theory, an attainable goal. Except for the fact that the rain decided to return after weeks of sunny, hot days that made us all think summer had come really early this year. This was the first hiccup to my newly formed plans and not long after came the second. Before I knew it I had found myself stuck inside under what seemed like house arrest.

One of The Twins had decided she was going to be “sick” today. Ordinarily I’d be caring and full of concern and waiting on her hand and food, if it weren’t for the fact that this was not an out of the ordinary type occurrence. It seems that Immy has developed a trend of suddenly falling sick right before she’s supposed to leave for school in the morning. Like literally, she’s jumping up and down and bubbly and chatting my ear off and then 10 minutes before she needs to get the bus she’s suddenly on the couch clutching her stomach in pain and begging to stay home.

So I’m just going to call it, FAKER!

Putting my reservations towards the validity of her ailments aside, it’s started to make me think. Is she facing some tough times at school? Is she fighting with friends or in the process of changing groups? Is she being subjected to bullying? Is she experiencing some kind of anxiety that is making her feel sick in the stomach and giving her stress headaches? Are The Twins separated at school, do they share different interests? This would be a surprise seeing as they’re practically inseparable at home but nonetheless a valid prospect. Is there a particular teacher giving her a tough time? If she were a few years older then maybe her desire to stay home would be much more realistic. She’d no doubt have copious amounts of homework and assignments and be facing the torment of boys and girls getting all mushy, the bitchy girls and the popular girls and all of the other horrible stuff that goes on in high school.

So instead of getting all worked up that she threw a spanner in the works for my plans today, I decided to spend some quality girl time with her. It seems maybe she could use a friend and someone to talk to that’s not Mum and Dad. Because let’s face it. No girl wants to talk to their Mum and Dad about these kinds of things. Whatever it is, I hope we get to the bottom of it now before she hits high school and things get a lot trickier to deal with.

What are your thoughts? Is it normal for 11-year-old girls whom are star students to want to skip school?

Shine Bright Like A Diamond

Shiny things, are best when small. And pure. And in small packages.

I always look forward to the 3pm pick up. Even though it means that the day is all but over, that the witching hour will be soon upon us and that I can completely forget about trying to complete any unfinished jobs from earlier in the day. That half hour period when I pick Miss Charlie up from school is always the best.

Together we make up a convoy of pram & baby, bouncing, jubilant puppy dog pulling on her lead, human pack-horse carrying the too-heavy school bags and various other school related paraphernalia and finally, Miss Charlie dragging her feet along behind. It’s a slow progression down the road from school to home with stops along the way to indulge in an afternoon treat at the milk bar, maybe a run through the park with the dog and whatever else takes her fancy. Usually she chatters away about all of the new things she learnt at school that day, often amazing me with some new form or concept towards life and its inherent values. I have to admit, and I’m not at all biased, she’s a pretty switched on six-year-old.

This afternoon was no different. As we wound our way through the mums and kids along the foot path en route to the park, Miss Charlie ducked and weaved and successfully jumped her way to the front whilst I was caught trying to manoeuvre the pram and bags without tripping over my feet and the dog. She then rather rambunctiously announced to all those within about a 2km radius (kids don’t often understand the concept of quiet, tactful voices) that:

“she loved being little.. you can fit past everyone and never get squashed. Fat people can’t do that, their bums are too big!”

Well speaking from someone who is also pretty damn little, I can completely understand where she’s coming from with this one. Except, I have to admit that her timing for this loud outburst was somewhat lacking… we’d just bypassed a large family whom looked as though they could do with a little less t.v. time and a little more playground time.

– Oh and also, purely from an observational point of view: tights, are definitely not pants. Just saying.

And so I quickly chimed in to Charlie’s rescue, attempting to perhaps ease her statement into safer grounds. I proceeded to tell her something that I’ve been told by all and sundry for most of my life, but most often from my most beloved Nanna: “Good things come in small packages.”

They sure do, the best things. To which she countered,