Parenting and family news, picked by parents

It’s been quite a while since the FV blog was updated, but in the spirit of the new year we are dusting it down, blowing away the virtual cobwebs and starting afresh for 2012.

We’d like to thank those loyal visitors and friends of FV who have kept the site going over the past year or so. We’re so glad that you have continued to find it fun and useful.

As before, we aim to highlight issues of interest to parents, and pick out some of the best writing on the parent blogger scene.

There will be some changes to the site structure as we aim to make the site even more useful and compelling for our visitors.

If you have an issue that you would like to see covered, or have come across an article you’d like to share, then please submit it using the links, or contact us to let us know more.

Wishing you a very happy and healthy 2012,

With all best wishes from everyone at Family Vie

Our Expert Novice is always well prepared

At the time of writing, I am 35 weeks and 3 days pregnant. If possible, I would give you the count not just in weeks and days but in hours and minutes too. I wish I could know that kind of detail because, in my mind, the proverb “knowledge is power” is key, and so with most things in life, be it the momentous occasions such as pregnancy or marriage, or the smaller every day occurrences like cake-making or selecting a new novel in a bookshop, I do my research and weigh up my options in the hope that in so doing I can make a balanced, informed decision and proceed with far less caution, safe (ish) in the knowledge that I’m well prepared.

Apparently, I have always been this way, not wanting to do anything until confident I can do it well. While my brother was walking at ten months, unfazed by the grazes and bruises he acquired through toddling, I crawled and bum shuffled until I was well over one, carefully observing how others managed to remain upright on just their two legs while patiently waiting until my own balancing skills were sufficiently honed before lifting myself up from all fours.

I read recipes several times over before I cook a new dish, and guests only ever receive well-rehearsed dinners. I photocopy forms and fill-in the practice version so as to be sure each required field is correctly understood and answered. When I was working in an office, my clothes would be laid out alongside my pre-packed gym bag the night before. I wouldn’t say I’m anally retentive, I just like to know where I stand and that I’ve done all I can to make a task or journey as simple – and therefore as enjoyable – as possible.

When I fell pregnant, the enormity of the changes having a child would bring about in our lives was not lost on me, and I found the concept of parenthood incredibly daunting. In fact, I think it was this, as much as the raging hormones, that led me to feel so down in the first few weeks of pregnancy. While my rational side could repeatedly assure me that millions of other women had successfully raised children before me, the niggling devil on my shoulder questioned my own capability as a mother, thereby inhibiting my excitement and smothering it in fear.

There is no practice run for motherhood.

Of course my friends and family told me everything would be fine and answered my many questions with patience and enthusiasm, but there’s only so many times you can bang on about breast-feeding, birthing options and, sorry, your dread of doing a poo during labour, before they’re either turned off, exasperated or, quite frankly, appalled. And so, not wanting to become a pregnancy bore, I found myself scouring for information elsewhere. In this day and age, that usually means one thing: the internet.

The results have been variable. There is such a wealth of online resource that it’s tough to know where to start, let alone fathom which sites are relevant, accurate and likely to help rather than scaremonger. Discovering Family Vie has been brilliant, as it not only highlights articles that tend to my abundance of queries but offers a platform for discussion so that news and opinion are no longer just words I read but something in which I’m an active participant. As a prospective mother with an insatiable need for knowledge, this has proved invaluable to my confidence and provided a space in which I feel free to share my concerns, learn from other people’s experience and thus cultivate my own ideas about parenting.

It is in this vein that the concept of Expert Novice was born. In line with Family Vie’s ethos of helping parents surmount the feeling of being overwhelmed by the vast amount of information available, I hope to take a closer look at some of the features highlighted on the site and explore the ways in which they’ve enabled me to feel more informed and – hopefully – more capable as a parent. This will then be opened out for debate, thereby creating an ongoing learning process, something I’m beginning to understand is one of the key elements of parenting.

I don’t imagine I’ll ever be an expert mother, but I am hoping I’ll be a good one. And it’s rather exciting (and reassuring) to think Family Vie and its readers could help me along the way.

And on that note, if anyone has any tips on bowel control in labour, do let me know. So far the best / only advice I’ve been given has been to submerge myself in water and pass my husband a sieve. Any less humiliating options gratefully received.

Time to dig out those trainers

As well as ‘Buzz on the blogs’, we’re also running a ‘News roundup,’ product reviews and regular giveaways called ‘Oh goody it’s Monday’ – no points for guessing when that happens. This week’s prize is a boozy one, so if you fancy a tipple, check it out.

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Quite a few mums (including me) have dug out their trainers this week, goaded into action by verybusymama who has got us all running the Adidas Women’s 5k Challenge on 5th September in Hyde Park. Check out her post Why Mami Runs (currently top of Trending now) for more information.

I’ll be running for the Prostate Cancer Research Foundation, a cause that’s very close to my heart. They have kindly provided me with a fire-engine red T-shirt to train in, always nice to co-ordinate your ensemble with your complexion!

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This week, Family vie visitors absolutely loved The Life Of The Twenty Something Mum’s post The Stuff I Lie To My Kids About which chronicles the kind of white lies that we all have to resort to at times.

You know, the kind of stuff they’ll throw back at us when they’re older (I’m enjoying doing that to my parents at the moment!) but that make things run so much more smoothly right now.

So ice-cream vans are musical cars, the park goes to sleep etc. Enjoy it while it lasts, I reckon I’ve only got about another six months before I’m going to have to think of a new tactic…

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Final mention goes to KiddieBase’s Banana and white chocolate muffin recipe, which stormed up the most popular chart on family vie, and is currently sitting pretty with ten votes. Personally I am not allowing myself to go there as I’m finding the running hard enough without the added baggage of chocolate muffins, but if you’re looking for something to keep the kids occupied with on a rainy day then give it a whirl.

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‘Buzz’ will be coming out on a Saturday going forward, and we’ll always feature the most popular blog posts on family vie in the previous week.

If you would like to suggest content or be a guest editor for ‘The buzz in the blogs’ then please do contact us

Photo by Flickr user Timtak

What's it all about then?

Enter family vie. The stories you find here have been shared by parents, and then voted on by other parents, so that the most popular ones rise to the top and are promoted on the homepage. This way you can access a stream of content that’s genuinely useful, relevant and trusted.

Next time you’re looking for something specific relating to your family, visit family vie and search by category, life stage or keyword.

Or, if you just want to see what’s going on for families, you can browse the latest stories by newly created, trending now (that’s what’s hot!) , highest votes or last active.

If you want to contribute to family vie, here’s how it works.

1. Next time you’re browsing around the net and you come across an article you’d like to share with other parents, just copy the url.
2. Log in to family vie (you can create an account or use your Twitter or Facebook login)
3. Submit the story to the relevant category.
4. Give it a vote and then share it with your friends. Remember only the stories with the most votes appear on the homepage.

We’d love to know what you think of the service, so if you have any comments or feedback, please do contact us. It’s also worth checking out our FAQs.

Family vie – because parents need what parents know.

I'd just like to thank...

OK so the excitement of finally launching family vie may have gone a little to my head, but I think that this momentous occasion warrants a few thank you mentions.

First of all, thank you to my hubby (or DH as he must be known as in cyberspace), for his unfailing support and enthusiasm. Thanks too for his willingness to pick up the geeky bits that I can’t quite bring myself to get my head around.

Next up are Erica Douglas and Antonia Chitty of ACE Inspire – their encouragement, expertise and advice has gone a very long way to helping me get to this point. I wish them every success in their new venture.

The beautiful branding of family vie was created by Lisa Harland of Harland Creative. Lisa went above and beyond to deliver this brief, and I would heartily recommend her company for its talent, prompt delivery and excellent customer service.

Thanks too go to 9web, the chaps who built the site. Their professionalism and patience throughout the build process, particularly each time I came back with ‘just’ another revision, is to be commended!

Finally, and most of all, I have to thank my two darling baby boys for opening my eyes to a whole new world of opportunity.

Here’s to the success of family vie – I hope you enjoy using it and that it helps you find quality information, a welcoming community, and for you publishers out there, a fantastically receptive audience!

Image by Flickr user Heanster