I am taking part in Donna from What the Redhead Said‘s Living Arrows – which is a celebration of childhood!
We could all do with a little more celebration in our lives!
To quote Donna, “The project originally took it’s name from a poem by Kahlil Gibran, “You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth” and every Monday we share a moment from our week and invite others to do the same as part of this linky.”
Week 33/52 Living Arrows
The kids!
So now RLT is walking and thrashing around, the cat doesn’t know how to cope. She usually observes him from a distance, but he has surprised her a few times this week as he is faster than he has previously been! Poor Orla Kitty! I love this picture of them in our garden on Monday evening, as it captures their relationship so well – OK at a distance!
I also hate this picture because I can’t for the life of me get these paving stones clean without pressure washing them and getting rid of the sealant between the stones – who ever thought red was going to be a colour that stood the rest of time!? hehe
Welcome to my brand spanking new guest post series, Mums and Music! As many of us don’t have the time to be going out disco dancing much anymore, this series is to give us mums the opportunity to reminisce about songs we may have forgotten, have a laugh at what we used to think was cool and take some time out to listen to something other than cbeebies theme tunes! This week I am very pleased to welcome Jade from Mummieswaiting to kick things off!
Hi, I’m Jade from Mummieswaiting, I have two young children are rarely get a chance to enjoy my music anymore (Moana has taken over!) I work 4 hours a week running a Youth Group and use the travel time to sing my heart out. I also just let go on holiday and don’t care what anyone thinks!
A song from Jade’s Childhood
The Fairy on top of the Christmas Tree
This song always makes me smile and I will play it every Christmas to show my children too. Each year in December me and my sister would lay with our heads underneath the Christmas tree and sing this song, once it was over we would remember to talk to the fairy on top of the Christmas tree so she gets noticed. One year on the eve before Christmas Eve, we had a house fire and ended up with no Fairy. Once I was old enough to have my own pay pal account I tracked an identical fairy down and now have her sitting on my tree so I can still sing to her and notice her every year and my children can too.
Song that makes Jade happy
Justin Timberlake – Can’t stop the feeling
If you know me, you will know that holidays are my passion. If I’m not on them, I’m planning them or writing about them, so it makes total sense that the songs that make me happy the most are the songs that I remember dancing to on holiday (I would NEVER dance anywhere else).
It’s so funny to think that when I was younger I hated ‘Just-in, Now-out Trousersnake’ as we called him, but now I am swinging, singing and celebrating with his music daily.
Song that psyches Jade up
Panetoz – Dansa Pausa
Yes, you’ve guessed it another holiday song! This song makes me go crazy. Me and the girls are running around the house cleaning, getting ready or just loving like while singing to this. It’s pretty impossible to not dance to and pause.
Song that makes Jade sad
Luther Vandross – Dance with my Father
This song was played at both my granddads funerals last year and also speaks to me so much. I miss both of them (and what a coincidence it was played at both) but I also have an on and off relationship with my own father, my parents split when I was 5 and I often wonder if I missed out on all the things in the song. Mostly it makes me sad to think that one day my mum won’t be here anymore and I will no longer get to do things like dance with her. Right, I have to stop there, I won’t be able to type through the tears soon.
Jade’s favourite song from film
Bette Midler – Wind Beneath My wings
I love this song so much, the film always makes me think of how lucky I am to have my mum around and the relationship that we share. I had this song played on my wedding day and myself and my mum danced to it, it will always bring fond memories.
Jade’s favourite tv theme tune
Gilmore Girls
Such a fantastic programme, its funny, serious and has so much mother and daughter relationship in it. It always makes me feel good to watch it and the theme song always gets me singing.
If you’ve enjoyed finding out about Jade, you can follow her here:
When you have young children, you’ll probably feel a mix of excitement and apprehension when you book your first ever family holiday with them. If this is your first child then you get to experience the joy and wonder of seeing a fresh pair of eyes opened up to a whole new world of international travel. Watching their intrigue, curiosity and excitement as they see, experience and engage with a new culture is a wonderful and unique experience for a parent. Travelling with any child, however, especially the very young carries with it certain logistical considerations that a parent should be mindful of in order to really appreciate and enjoy your holiday.
Preparing for an all inclusive holiday with kids should be an exciting time but it’s perfectly natural for parents to experience some trepidation when planning for the first time. Here are some tips to help it go as smoothly as possible so that you can focus all of your attention on enjoying yourself and creating memories that you’ll treasure for the rest of your life…
3 months before
It’s best to apply for your baby’s passport as early on as possible (make sure that yours and your partner’s are up to date as well). Typically these take at least 3 weeks to process, but why wait until the last minute and risk not getting it on time? Applying several months in advance will enable you to enjoy peace of mind in the lead up to your holiday. You should also organise your travel insurance (or ensure that your existing policy has been updated to include your child). Contact your hotel to ensure that they have baby friendly facilities such as cots and high chairs. If you’re flying long haul then contact your travel agent or airline to ensure that they provide you with a travel cot so that your baby can get some much-needed sleep on the plane.
3 weeks before
By now you’re probably researching your holiday destination, checking out fun things to do or fascinating places to visit, but you should also throw some logistical planning in there as well. Look for shops and supermarkets in the area around your hotel. Do they stock your chosen brand of nappies (unless you want to eat into your luggage allowance by packing them, which can be a nightmare). If you’re likely to be renting a car then ensure that the rental car provider will be able to provide you with a car seat. You could take your own as luggage but the weight could seriously dig into your luggage allowance. Taking baby food and formula through airport security can prove problematic so it’s worth pre-ordering some formula or baby food from any of the airport’s on-site chemists. Most offer this service, usually 10 days before your travel date.
With all the boring stuff taken care of, you can relax and look forward to spending some precious time with your new family in the sun. Have a great trip!
I’ve had the most awful experience of trying to report faulty goods to Maclaren Customer Service that I felt compelled to write about my experience.
Maclaren no longer will deal with customers or service centres over the phone, they will only work through digital platforms. No problem you’d think in this day-in-age, but what do you do if your local service centre doesn’t use email? This made a massive problem for me and the subsequent responses from Maclaren (or lack of) made me astounded as to how they treat customers with product issues.
I purchased my Maclaren Orla Kiely quest in January 2017, only to notice that there didn’t seem to be enough material to support the mechanism of the foot rest, therefore the underside of the buggy material was ripped on both sides. Fearful that this expensive pushchair was going to completely rip or catch something and create irrepairable damage, I contacted Maclaren through twitter who advised me to email them with the problem. I did so, to then have a generic link to service centres sent to me.
These tears started appearing shortly after starting to use the pushchair. Not what is expected of an item with RRP £295
I went to my local service centre to be told they no longer were working with Maclaren, but they had not been successful in getting their details removed from their website. Weird I thought, as I’d contacted them via Facebook beforehand and they’d never mentioned this, however, they were keen to discuss over the phone my problem (I thought I’d struggle to explain so took it to them on my lunch break).
The gentleman in the service centre advised me I’d need a replacement as it couldn’t be fixed and got out his contacts book to call the numbers he had, only to find every number he had previously used having a voice message to email. He advised that he had previously had issues with getting in touch with Maclaren, which had led to his decision to no longer work with them, sentiments which were echoed by another service provider he called for advice.
After an hour in his store and refusing my requests to send an email to Maclaren on my behalf, he advised me to go to another service centre around thirty miles away, as he didn’t have any further time to help me. This was not only unhelpful but not possible (I’ve only got a full-time job and a small child, so finding the time to drive thirty miles in the opposite direction to work and home was difficult). He was unwilling to put anything in writing, so my efforts had stalled. He took my details and said give him 24 hours and if I didn’t hear anything else from him he couldn’t help. This I felt was a tactic to get me out of his shop and it is now a month later and I am still to hear from him, so believe this was a fair assumption. I tweeted Maclaren a few times whilst I was in the service centre, as well as emailed them, but these appeared to be automated responses as they were not addressing my question of ‘can the service centre ring you as he doesn’t use email’.
24 hours later, didn’t hear anything from the service centre (shock horror) so I contacted Maclaren again through their live chat system online, wanting to converse with a real person and not an auto response which I was getting from email and twitter. The responses I got were really unhelpful. I was told the service centre could use a platform to report it, if so the service centre weren’t aware of this, neither were others he called for advice. There was absolutely no solution other than email.
The person I was talking to kept giving me the phone number of the service centre rather than a customer service phone number despite me repeating my problem quite a few times. The chat just got worse. At one point the person told me they were responsible for the German market, like it was my issue he was on the live chat for his company!
Here how the chat ended as it was emailed to me afterwards (Nicola being me):
01:29:42 PM) Nicola: he won’t use email, this is the problem! 🙁
(01:30:07 PM) Benjamin: i don’t have a number, because we don’t have a customer service number
(01:30:31 PM) Nicola: he shouldn’t be allowed to be your service centre if he can’t help people!
(01:32:19 PM) Benjamin: yes, but i don’t know the service centers in uk, i’m responsible for the german market
(01:37:11 PM) Nicola: Can you transfer my livechat to someone that can help me then?
(01:38:06 PM) Benjamin: you can send an email to customercare@maclarenbaby.com
(01:38:24 PM) Nicola: I have. I’d like to deal with someone now not in 24 hours time, please.
(01:38:56 PM) Benjamin: that’s the only thing i can do, or you send an email to claire.jaques@maclarenbaby.com who is for uk
(01:41:31 PM) Nicola: I have done that. Apologies, you’d assume a company like maclaren would have a call centre not a few account managers answering this.
(01:42:49 PM) Benjamin: this is the only thing i can do for you, that has been all my possibilities
I emailed the UK person as Benjamin suggested on 6th July and to date, I have not had a response. I know it was delivered as she had an out of office on, which stated she returned to work that date.
As I had such a terrible experience, I decided that I couldn’t face going round in circles like this again. This product retails at £295, it isn’t exactly pennies. So I contacted Boots, which is where I bought the goods from and explained the situation. Boots organised a refund for me as they stated that they no longer stocked the item.
I then went to Mothercare to try out some new pushchairs and told them of my experience. They also shared their concern of Maclaren customer service and said that they had three ongoing customer complaints that had not been dealt with adequately. If someone the size of Mothercare is having issues, one little guy like me has no chance.
I felt the entire customer service experience (or lack of) from Maclaren was disgusting. A few other people have also had issues which I found here.
There are several negative reviews of the product on Amazon too, which is a shame as it is damaging the reputation of my favourite designer Orla Kiely by association.
This is completely my own opinion, based on my own experience and I’m sure many other people have had positive experiences.
I am taking part in Donna from What the Redhead Said‘s Living Arrows – which is a celebration of childhood!
We could all do with a little more celebration in our lives!
To quote Donna, “The project originally took it’s name from a poem by Kahlil Gibran, “You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth” and every Monday we share a moment from our week and invite others to do the same as part of this linky.”
Week 32/52 Living Arrows
Progress
We’ve had a brilliant week as far as routine is concerned! Little man has needed me to be by his side when he is sleeping since I returned to work in March. The moment I tried to sneak out of the room when he was asleep, he woke up, as he seems to be a light sleeper (so I am unfortunately!). But this week we’ve had a breakthrough – he still needs me there as he is falling asleep but for five nights in a row I have been able to get out of the room and he has remained asleep! I’ve slept in my own bed for the first time in six months…. ironically in another room as the only change has been that we have given up our bedroom and make it his bedroom! Small sacrifice to pay as far as I am concerned!
Mark has been away at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this weekend with work colleagues, so I was solo parenting for a few days, we had a great few days of pottering around and having lots of giggles together. I’ve really relished the time! When Mark got back we went for a walk around our local city, Durham, to get out as a family. The weather was a bit grey, but little man enjoyed being on his daddy’s back! Mark is climbing the Alps in a month, so thought it would be good training and Durham is all cobbled streets, so no good with a pushchair, so worked out well all around!
