Day in the Life of a Sydney Stay at Home Mum

Even in winter we're at the beach

OK, so while I wait for the Institute of Teachers to approve my teacher status, I am wiling away the hours at home with my little one. It's a sweet reminder of what the first year of her life was like, and now that she's just turned two, a hell of a lot more fun. It's also a welcome reprieve from what was a hellish year of huge challenges and changes as I trained as a teacher. I am now done! And I have a long hot happy summer stretched out before me.

While I was out...

Leopard print for the boy!!!!!!!

So I haven't posted anything for about two fat months but they have not been slow lazy sun and sex fuelled months, believe me.

While I was finishing the practicum placement of my teaching degree in Sydney, which involves me teaching four grades of pimply but rather hilarious teenagers for 80 days full time, ten hours weekly commute, $500pw in childcare and fuel bills, no income, student fees and tiresome hard to communicate with lecturers...the media simply did not let up on mothers and mothers kept on bitching about other mothers!

I felt exhausted just thinking of all the problems mothers are responsible for, including that my daughter turned up to childcare wearing wispy Balinese sundresses in the middle of winter because my husband said she wanted it, and that Sue on Puberty Blues had developed a drinking problem and a nasty habit of teenage sex.

The media was busily keeping tabs on the mothers of the world while I was swotting away. August and September saw Jessica Simpson pilloried for not shedding her baby weight in under six months, Kendra defend her by saying she was focused on her baby and couldn't run due to her large tits anyway, some unfamous British personal trainer given a tongue lashing for telling new mums to get a grip and stop getting so fat, and my favourite Kardashian, Khloe, start fertility treatment. Snooki also happily birthed a baby boy and showed him off in a bassinet replete with leopard print blankets. Awww...a must have for every guido baby.

The shock event of the month was when X grade celebrity Charlotte Dawson tried unsuccessfully to top herself after being urged to do so by several 4chan members on Twitter. I mean, this is someone who makes a living being nasty to vulnerable people, which may explain her fragility of self. A feature quite apparent in her shaky psych ward 60 Minutes interview. If 4chan told me to put my head in an oven I'd chide them for putting me in the same literary league as Sylvia Plath.

And even while I was up to my teeth in lesson plans on medieval Europe, Mussolini, women's lib and federation Australia, I still had time to start yet another novel, this time a fan fiction inspired by yet another sex fuelled debut novel, book several flights, organise my daughter's 2nd birthday party (that's an overstatement as there's nothing to organise, just a box of booze, some fairy bread and turn up at Sydney's Palm Beach next week) and read several interesting books to undermine my cultural values including Sex at Dawn, The Sex Starved Marriage, and Mating in Captivity. Darned good reads I will review shortly.

I have nothing of value to add at this late hour in the day. I think the media sums it up best by saying to mums: "if you can't cope with your kids, why did you have them in the first place? YOU made the lifestyle choice, YOU deal with it!!"

On that note, remind me to write something soon on private school mothers, and on darling Khloe and her imminent baby with Lamar, what a treat that child will be, and so dearly awaited.

Why Kim and Kanye are a Perfect Match

Our new king+queen of popular kultcha

The KnK publicity factory may be gearing up for another wedding season, or at the very least a baby announcement in about 3 months. And I think this is fantastic news.

Why? Because I know both sides of this KnK lurve story. I have been a huge fan of both Kanye and Kim and their families for years - and it's clear they are a great couple. It's also obvious they have been flirting for years but that for those funny forces behind love to work they had to engage with others before they could see their perfect partner right in front of them - wearing matching leather pants to boot.

Yeah I admit it, both are narcissists, both are in love with themselves and their image. But to dismiss this new king and queen of pop culture on that basis is to ignore the immense power they wield as a couple and to deny their respective family and cultural backgrounds which sees them perfectly matched.

They have a lot in common. Success in work and life, working ethic, material wealth, spiritual beliefs and strong family values. Both have lost their same sex parent - Kanye his mother and Kim her father. They have both been very deeply influenced by this loss, and supportive and protective of their remaining parent.

Both have had a long hard 15 year slug on the love front, including at least one failed marriage each under their Vuitton belts. Or as I prefer to call a marriage that didn't pan out, a 'relationship education' rather than a failure.

And yes, it is true, they both adore designer brands and probably spend an hour looking at themselves in the mirror before going out. But more interestingly, both dictate culture and start and finish trends. Both are style icons, both have their own multiple fashion labels, both are business experts, and both are publicity royalty. KnK are not only trendsetters, they are cultural signifiers, the ones we look to for messages about this uber fluid post modernist multiple reality culture we are living in.

And this is why I am so excited about their new sexual and commercial partnership and this is why I hope it blooms into a family empire, creating a new generation of babies: little girls dressed in Prada rapping to dad's Gorgeous, little boys playing with cousin Mason and helping stock the family's retail empire.

Both the West and Kardashian families have the same values. Success, hard work and self promotion play big roles. But the central player is family and this is synonymous with business values: loyalty, self confidence, support and love. Big love. For years we have seen Kanye popping into Kim' New York Dash store, helping with colour choices and attending drinks. Kim flirting with him. But it took Kim's attempt at marriage with a white boy who was so poorly suited to her for the two of them to finally get it together.

One more comment before I post again in a month to congratulate them on their impending parenthood. How did I know Kim's um, second husband Kris was glaringly unsuited to both Kim and the extended Kardashian klan? It wasn't just that his name was the same as her mothers, or actions and attitude, which did say a lot - especially his disgust when Kim cried over a lost diamond earring in Tahiti. It wasn't only that Khloe disapproved, which Kim should have paid attention to as she is an impeccable judge of character. (Khloe BTW wholly approves of this new partnership).

It was husband #2 Kris's comment to the Kardashian men during a male bonding golf game shortly before The Wedding. He expressed his disdain for their subjugation to their females, or less politely, his being unimpressed they were pussy whipped. I wish Kim had been there at the time, but probably she would have ignored it, like all the other warning signs, because she had a big wedding in her sights, and a baby, two things on her upcoming agenda she had made a space for mentally. Just not emotionally.

So I wish the new couple, who I already knew would get together years ago, much happiness. They clearly bring out the best in each other and Kanye reportedly makes Kim less boring, which is fantastic! And I can't wait for the baby news in a short while...

In Defence of the Kardashians

Khloe is the funniest...

When I started watching the Kardashian family in action five years ago, I saw a funny, daggy bunch of sisters fighting over trivial things. They reminded me of my family. 

I come from a family of four girls. Like the Kardashians we grew up yelling at, and jumping on, each other in a big house with broken doors. Like the Kardashians’ mum, my mum is conservative Catholic. And like the Kardashian father, an Armenian, my father’s grandparents come from neighbouring Georgia. I like to think there’s a level of warmth, bossiness and female dominance shared by families from this part of the world.

I just don’t get why the world hates these sisters. They are funny, smart and experts of PR. Major charges levelled against them are that they are spoilt, trashy, cheap, sexually promiscuous (or even "reckless"!) and talentless. That Kim’s only claim to fame is a deliberately leaked sex video. So why do they command so much attention, with a hit TV series going into its seventh season with several spin offs, various successful product lines and more branding kudos than Richard Branson?

I think they are fabulous role models and would be very proud for my daughter to turn out like any of them, but especially my favourite, Khloe. I love her to pieces, from her curves in fur PETA campaign to constantly fighting with her mum, her gorgeous husband Lamar, and almost getting fired in her Miami radio DJ job where she shone as the very talented comedian she is.

Khloe has more vagina jokes up her sleeve than Tina Fey, more personality, and more cheek than any other person famous for being funny. She also puts Kourtney's dodgy babydaddy Scott in his place and has impeccable judgement in character. The episode where she went to anger management was gold. So leave her, and the clan, alone.

We live in a world where most women are famous for their looks alone, so why is it such a crime the Kardashians are not only beautiful but also smart, rude, funny, loyal and business minded? If only some of those vapid vacant Victoria’s Secret angels could claim half as much talent as the sisters.

I just love how their pushy stage mom Kris acts all wide-eyed and innocent while coercing them into Girls Gone Wild and Playboy shoots. I love how she pretends to protect her daughters while pushing her teen model daughter into bikinis for some smoky eyed shoots. If my daughter were as sexy as hers I would be doing the same, and putting the money into her college fund. Or my entertainment fund...

And I really loved how when Rob thought he had made a scary latino ex, Rosa, pregnant he was very honorable in his behavior even while his mum and sisters were freaking out.

If nothing else, the TV series gives an excellent insight into how to get along as a family even when technically you should be at each other’s throats. Like I said, it’s a lot like my family, and I’m proud that both my rapidly enlarging family and the Kardashians can all sit around a table at the end of the day and laugh. Because that’s what it’s all about.

Now that it looks like Kim and my favorite contemporary musician Kanye will be having a baby in about eleven months I'll be watching them more closely as this is one celebrity sprog I'd love see...

On Being a Fat Chick

Snooki losing weight

I have been fat, curvy, chubby, voluptuous, a cakelover, Rubenesque, rounded and plain obese for most of my life. The thing is, I think I look great and have never considered using my appearance to my advantage. And I think that should end.

Everywhere I look I see fat chicks banging on about how life is as a fat chick, and skinny chicks bemoaning the fact they have no ass. It’s the pet topic of the underweight Ms Mamamia Mia Freedman, who can be found in most media outlets harping on about body image and promoting fat chicks in magazines.

Being fat made that fat chick from The View famous. Khloe Kardashian got instant street cred for “celebrating body diversity” in her fur shoot. And Jersey Shore’s Snooki gained an overnight fan base from flashing her rapidly shrinking ass. The retro Fat Chicks in Party Hats was one of my first favorite websites when I was a teenager.

Fashion editors and designers glance up from their strips of silk and lines of coke long enough to say “hey we’re not cutting cloth for fat chicks”, Anna Wintour doesn’t bat an eyelid (but does she ever, even during bukaki?), and the world keeps on turning, a world where chubby girls are treated like dogs every day of their school life until they become mums and everyone urges them to celebrate their curves.

But while we’re all pretending that fat chicks are the bomb, it’s about time I started making a living from my enlarged moneymaker. I can’t help it that I love chocolate. It’s a permanent fixture in my life. Last week over easter I ate over a kilo of chocolate and I really don’t care what it does for my already oversized curves. When I wasn’t married, I knew if I didn’t find a husband in Australia, where men drive utes with “no fat chicks” bumper stickers, I’d go to the USA where the guys adore curves.

The only downside of being fat – especially the year I became a mother and sat in the obese category for quite some time – were those nasty Kmart knits. Oh and the dirty looks I get at the gym. But because I go to the beach 300 days a year and enjoy slurrying around in my black lyrca uniform, or nothing at all, clothes generally aren’t an issue for me. And dirty looks are something I got used to a long time ago.

So here you have it: moi, fat mamma famous for being fat? Nice to meet you.