Who am I?

As of yesterday afternoon, both of my eldest children began their school summer holiday. Part of me is delighted. No more frantic evenings trying to get homework done, bags sorted and uniforms laid out. Nor is there any after school multi-skills activities and Saturday school of performing arts are on their summer break too....hurray! Hence why I am still in my pj's and the emptied toy chests are strewn across the orangery floor, the villain-on-wheels ( baby in baby walker) is flying across the floor at speeds Lewis Hamilton would qualify with, and the children are playing outside in the sunshine wearing raincoats under their umbrella's! No more pestering my kids for not realising the importance of being in bed on time.... I have no excuse they know it's the holidays.

Just as the up side to the summer solstice is that the days are getting shorter, the downside to school holidays is that while the children might be out, work is still in. Due to childcare expenses, my usual monthly spend will have been depleted by week one. Demands for increased television time, and fights over who's watching what are already kicking in. By Monday, I'm quite sure "I'm bored" will have been voiced at least once.Not that I'll be home to hear it....

I'm off to London. Ok not fully escaping my parental responsibilities as taking my daughter with me, I'm so excited to spend some quality mother daughter time with my precious girl. Were off to see Hairspray the musical and lots of sightseeing, including the London Eye.

I go to London often for business and leisure but I've not taken Gee (my daughter) since she was a toddler. So we have lots of exciting things planned. I have also been asked to attend a meeting for work whilst there, very exciting, sorry I can't reveal anything at present as it's all under wraps but watch this space! Let's hope Gee's boardroom skills are up to scratch as "the people" I'm meeting are more than happy she comes along.

This week I have frantically being trying to clear my inbox in preparation for both my trip and the school holidays. I have liaised and networked with various wedding colleagues across the globe, planned weddings in Jamaica, Lapland. Hawaii, Malaysia and Thailand. I have written articles and expert hints for several national wedding magazines....in between all this I played football in the park, took the kid's for modelling shots, did all the normal mum of three "stuff" and had a night out with the nursery mum's from school.

After having shared the 10ft x 8ft space, that is the nursery cloakroom, for 10 months with over 20 woman I still only know about 5 of them by name...ok so I lie I only share this space one morning each week,after nursery - Seb my eldest son, aged 4. goes to wrap around care on the other days.

After receiving an invite via a mummy friend, last week I was honoured they even knew my name let alone who's mum I was...so I accepted their kind offer of a drink and pizza.

This invitation was much to the hilarity of my husband, you see he is the only father who religiously does the school run every single day....actually I lie, the morning of the harvest festival assembly, I did take both children to school. Anyway I digress, but after having Theo in November last year Phil's offer to take over my usual Wednesday pick up was duly accepted. Combined by not being allowed to drive for six weeks following my "sunroof" delivery, it was about February before I was back into the swing of things.

I duly arrived at nursery one wet morning to collect Seb, I anchored my specs upon my head and tried to focus on the teacher calling for the children upon recognition of their Mummies! I thought, without my glasses on, that teacher was indicating Seb, my son, was busy and would be through in a moment.

There were all the mums collecting their little cherubs, all huddled together talking, an overcrowded cloakroom obscuring my view of Mrs Teacher. Then all of a sudden Mrs Teachers head pops through the throng of chattering mothers and loudly enquires to me "who are you here to collect"!

OMG the embarrassment! Without my specs I had not realised she was previously trying to subtly ask me who I was, by me just smiling back at her she had waited until she had the full attention of everyone in this tiny room before booming this out.

I'm sure I imagined the sniggers, and shuffled forward to admit that I was collecting Seb as I was his mummy! She tried to disguise her embarrassment as she mumbled something about "oh you look so well I didn't recognise you"...jeez thanks (I thought) I must have looked a car crash victim prior to this day then.

I giggled to myself as I left nursery and took Seb home. To this day I regret ever telling Phil this story, he has dined out on it ever since...."remember your son's teacher didn't even know who you were" :-)

So anyway I did go along for a few drinks and a bowl of pasta the other night, and thankfully almost all the mum's knew my name, what I did and where I lived and guess what? I still haven't got a clue about any them!