Either Brangelina doesn’t know what it’s doing or the media doesn’t. Brad’s family don’t want him with Angelina and this is putting stress on their relationship as it would on any relationship. But then another source in The Sun claims that they are doing fine – perhaps a little tired. Exhausted for sure. But according to the Daily Mail she says he’s boring and toxic and Brad says she needs to see a shrink.
What is fabulously interesting is the extent of their wealth. This from looking good and from the ability to memorise a few lines. They, says the Daily Mail, have a £205 million fortune, and several homes between them.
Who knows how much of this is true, but what we do know is that the media is indefinitely interested in this couple.

Happy? Hard to tell.

I met with my family in Kenya as I’ve already told you. I had the good luck to stay at a distant cousin, Calvin Cottar’s lodge between the Serengeti and the Masai Mara National Park. Very beautiful. Loads of animals. And an interesting entry in their visitor’s book.
I found these scribblings of Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and their children in the visitor’s book. Sweet I thought. Read More…
THE week that was brought us rain, wind, and ice-cold temperatures. A bizarre end to a lovely spring some said. Others questioned whether we should be worrying about global warming at all.
Putting my own fear of the changing weather patterns aside, I took to last week’s Big Chill with glee. Any excuse to light the fire, and cuddle up with my babes to watch the Teletubbies AGAIN. Read More…
I am on holiday. I took a few days leave to join my husband in Stellenbosch for the last week of his 6 week-long stay here for work. Lovely I thought. I will bring the three children down and we’ll visit my family and friends and have some fun. We decided to fly. Somehow, we got to Cape Town in the appropriate 4 pieces, got a car and began my holiday. I’ve had a great time. The children have been miserable. They have eaten badly, slept badly and have regularly cried “I want to go home”. I, on the other hand, have thoroughly enjoyed driving around the Western Cape “kuiering”. I’ve been to Darling, Paarl, Stellenbosch and to Hermanus to see friends and family. Soon, though, we fly back to Johannesburg. This is concerning. Read More…

Often my mornings are spent trying to unravel one, or more, wacky dream. Dinosaurs, wolves, fairies. Occasionally a real-life person features, but not often. The unravelling requires my imagination to stretch far and wide.Dr Pam Spurr says that “Not only can you learn much about their emotional state, but your child’s dreams and nightmares often tie in with their developmental stage and how they’re coping with demands at school.” Her book Your Child’s Dreams: A Parent and Child Workbook (published by Connections at £ 7.99.) sounds interesting and could help flex my imagination.
Yirre! Joe the Plumber told Christianity Today this:
You know, God is pretty explicit in what we’re supposed to do–what man and woman are for. Now, at the same time, we’re supposed to love everybody and accept people, and preach against the sins. I’ve had some friends that are actually homosexual. And, I mean, they know where I stand, and they know that I wouldn’t have them anywhere near my children. But at the same time, they’re people, and they’re going to do their thing.
I live in a house that has grown small. My husband and I bought our house when we had one child. It seemed large and spacious. We moved in and soon had another two children.
When I got home last week, after spending 10 days in a America where everything is big and wide and high my home felt particularly cramped. I noticed how full it is – with things – not my things. There are clothes, balls, bicycles toys, books, bottles everywhere I look. Even in a tidy moment, it’s untidy. Baskets and boxes of toys are overfill. The bookshelves have now become home to all kinds of bits and bobs that don’t belong on a bookshelf. The endless paper and artworks from school are left in piles around the house. My desk has become the dumping ground for unopened envelopes, school shoes, photographs, and broken toys waiting to be repaired.
At the beginning of the new year I had plans. I would create a place for everything. And everything would be in its place. The walls would be emptied of messy drawings. The sitting room would not be a playground. My bedroom would become a childless zone where I can read and nap. I would identify yet another day to hate for sorting out all those awful boxes and baskets of toys.
Most advice in parenting magazines on organising and de-cluttering is about containing toys. Make sure there are sufficient baskets and boxes and containers for all those birthday presents. When last did you have a scratch around in one of those containers? The ones here are hideous. No classification or ordering skills are used in childrens’ tidy up sessions. They are a mess.
The only thing to do is get rid of the toys, I thought. Cut back on the amount of stuff we have. I will give most of the bits and pieces away. My children will each choose a small selection of special toys. We won’t buy them toys again ever.
That was my thinking. And then today it’s my son’s birthday. He opened some of his presents. And all of them are toys. More and more toys. Toys made up of lots of little pieces of plastic. They will be played with today. And tomorrow the toys will be scattered across rooms, and by the end of the week, the bits and pieces will be in different boxes and baskets.
I am not going to win.