PA
1. Giving your kids terrible DIY haircuts
My local hairdresser charges £15 for a child's hair cut. Fifteen pounds. Per child. Not only is £15 for a child who thinks pink Barbie T-shirts are the height of fashion a complete waste of money, but dreadful DIY haircuts are currency later in life. Get the scissors out and remember to take a photo – the mere threat of showing them to their friends will work far better than any grounding or stoppage of pocket money.
2. Laughing when your child falls over
Having kids is slap stick central and there is nothing more comical (well apart from putting socks on a dog. Seriously, try it. Funniest thing you'll ever do) than when your child runs into the wall or falls off the back of the sofa. Even if they are bleeding - it's still funny. Oh come on, you know you laughed too.
3. Blaming your kids
Half eaten packet of biscuits in your shopping trolley? Must be the kids' fault. House a complete tip when people come round to visit? I just tidied up half an hour ago, I don't know what's wrong with my kids today. We have to put up with all the cleaning, washing and spending that goes along with kids the least we should get out of it is a ready made scapegoat in times of embarrassment.
4. Eating your children's sweets
Children are fantastic, they are the perfect excuse to have a constant supply of sweets, biscuits and chocolate in the house. And eating the occasional packet or two for them is really only helping them - think of their teeth and dig in.
5. Lying to your children
Having children is basically an agreement to lie to the ones you love for the rest of their lives: Santa, the Easter bunny, tooth fairy, I missed you too, you're my favourite, you must have eaten them all (see above).
6. Not liking their friends
Let's face it, as opposed to your own children who are wonderful little bundles of fabulousness, other people's children are horrid, aren't they? Okay, so all children are quite horrid, but you're kind of contractually liable to love your own. Everyone else's, not so much.
7. Working
As lovely as children are (well, your own at least) there is nothing quite like that feeling of freedom as you wave them goodbye and go back to the world in which your chief role is not to wipe up superfluous fluids that leak from your child and be used as a climbing frame; a world in which you are known as something other than muu-uuuuum.
8. Not working
Sure you'd love to escape the little darlings for a few hours a day and yes you would like to be able to afford to shop at somewhere other than Lidl occasionally, but work? Really? When are you supposed to fit that in exactly? Those people that wonder what stay at home mums do all day have clearly never seen a one man band – each limb doing a separate job all at the same time.
9. Hiding the good biscuits/ice cream/chocolates
Whilst having children makes you feel justified in filling your shopping trolley with delicious goodies, it does not make you obligated to actually give them to your children. Let them have the nasty penny chews and save the decent stuff for yourself; behind the tins of peas or under the salad are the best spots.
10. Buying their birthday presents from the £1 shop
Buying your children's friends presents from the pound shop is a no brainer - why waste your hard earned money on someone else's child? But your own child's? Oh yes. Because the next time your child breaks the dratted thing five minutes after opening it you can rest easy that you haven't spent a fortune.
Why not try our savvy time and sanity saving tricks to make family life a breeze...