Last updated: June 19, 2021
My family and I travelled around the UK in summer 2020 visiting Harry Potter sights. This was a way of having a varied holiday that all the family could engage with and enjoy. Our 12 and 9 year olds are big Harry Potter fans. Some people have asked me to share our itinerary, so I’m…
Last updated: September 28, 2021
I’ve started researching the history of 49 Kelsey Lane, Beckenham. At the moment I’ve just started collecting relevant documents and links. I’m using Notion to keep track of what I find and you can see my Notion database here. If you have any information that could be relevant please let me know. If you can…
Last updated: August 20, 2021
In this post, I’ll explain how I’m making a database of all the plants in my garden and house and I’ll signpost you to the resources I’ve used, including my own Notion template, in case you’d like to try this yourself. We recently bought a new house which has a mature garden with lots of…
Last updated: May 24, 2021
If a breastfed baby or child needs to have a general anaesthetic, how long before their surgery do they need to stop breastfeeding? I’m researching the instructions given to parents by NHS services across the country. It appears that most hospitals say the last breastfeed should be at least 4 hours prior to surgery, but…
Last updated: December 8, 2023
DS1’s secondary school requires the children to wear black coats and bags, in addition to black trousers, shoes and socks. I believe this makes it harder for the children to be seen by drivers and increases their risk of being involved in road accidents. I don’t think this uniform policy is unusual – I know…
Published: May 16, 2021
This is my first post describing a fun family activity. I’d like this to be the first of many such posts and hope that I can build a library of fun things families can do together that I and others can turn to if we’re stuck for inspiration. This post describes an activity that my…
Last updated: May 17, 2021
I recently adopted a new habit – to share something of value every day. I was inspired by listening to Ali Abdaal’s video about passive income in which he emphasised the importance of creating useful content consistently over time. And while I’m not likely to match Ali’s level of productivity, I thought maybe I could…
Last updated: May 17, 2021
We’ve bought a house. It’s a special house, not just any house, probably unique. But it’s not a perfect house. It sits on its own little plot, like a tiny bit of countryside in the middle of a suburban neighbourhood. It has some pretensions to grandness – wooden pillars, “imposing” double doors and stuck on…
Published: May 9, 2021
Fellow Beckenham parents often ask me for my thoughts about the local secondary schools. Having responded to this question to someone in writing today, I’ve decided to also share my response here in case it’s of interest to others. However, please understand this is just my subjective impressions as a local parent and not based…