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A night out in Berlin

While Amanda has been pottering about amongst amazing vintage collections in deepest mid America (worryingly I can see my kids having to turn my house into a museum one day!) I have been enjoying the sun in London and Switzerland… Read More Read More

The Elsewhere Project in Greensboro North Carolina

We are back! Hope your summer was good and you didn’t miss us too much. For part of our summer break, I ended up in Greensboro, North Carolina, because Middleagedad had an Artist in Residence spot for five weeks at… Read More Read More

Pimp My Espadrilles (if we’re still allowed to wear them)

What happened to the humble espadrille? Walking through Selfridges shoe department, I was dazzled- nearly blinded, if I’m honest- by the rope-and-canvas bling that now fills this shoe category. Remember the days when espadrilles came bundled together with an elastic… Read More Read More

See This: The Dog Show at Brighton Festival

Regular readers may remember the love we have for Joanna Osborne and Sally Muir’s wonderful knitted and painted dogs (see here). When we heard they were participating in Brighton Festival with an open house, centred entirely around a love of… Read More Read More

Middleagemum.com : A Full House Again

Over the last couple of years, our household has become smaller, what with eldestson moving out and youngestson being at university for most of the time (although his summer term is only three weeks, WTF? Don’t get me started on… Read More Read More

Some things to binge watch….

So now that none of us are watching live tv – apart from Happy Valley of course, oh and the OJ Simpson thing which is so bad its good and  The Night Manager is shaping up to be quite promising… Read More Read More

Street style from Jaipur Literary Festival with Ishtailista, Part One

In Rajasthan at the end of every January, the Jaipur Literary Festival takes place, closely followed by the Wonderful Workshops craft week, both a huge draw for arty and bookish types from both India and around the globe, keen for… Read More Read More

Good Gifts for Grown Up Gardeners

While we’re out and about in a festive shopping frenzy, or indeed doing it all online this year, it’s worth taking a moment to look at the imagery being used to flog us stuff. We grown up women had the… Read More Read More

Writing With A Needle with Rosalind Wyatt

Today our regular guest blogger Julia Little, tells about the joy of re engaging with a needle and thread….over to you Julia. As Alber Elbaz said, when he recently stepped down from the creative reins of Lanvin, “Maybe we are… Read More Read More

middleagedmum.com: The Cult of Busy

‘Hi love, I’m so sorry for the late reply, I’ve been absolutely manic this week. I can’t do next weekend or the weekend after, and then it’s Christmas… maybe we could get a date some time in Jan? Would love… Read More Read More

Middleagedmum.com: Age is no excuse

There are two things that I refuse to buy into as I age. The first is the notion that age will hold me back from experiencing life to the full. I have absolutely no time for people who declare ‘I’m… Read More Read More

Want to meet Marian Keyes? We have tickets for you…..

A very nice offer here from our friends over at Gudrun Sjödén; the hugely successful author Marian Keyes is visiting Gudrun’s Covent Garden flagship store on Saturday 26th Sept (yep next Saturday) and we have five front row tickets to… Read More Read More

The Temporary Bride by Jennifer Klinec

This book surprised me, I approached it with a slightly heavy heart, anticipating it was yet another food-writer-seeks-world-travel-and-finds-herself, and although it kind of is, it’s also much more than that, as is the author Jennifer Klinec, and is worth considering… Read More Read More

Suzanne Moore on the menopause

For those who didn’t see this brilliant feature on the menopause, written by Suzanne Moore in the New Statesman. Here it is again. One of the most honest and insightful views on the never discussed subject I have read -it… Read More Read More

Middleagedmum.com: my middle aged sleep crisis

If you don’t read the Telegraph or follow us on Twitter you will have missed this feature I wrote on the Middle Aged Sleep Crisis. To be honest most of my sleep problems are currently related to the menopause, but… Read More Read More

Fabulous sun dresses that don’t cost the Earth

Sooo, here we are at that point in our British summer when it is properly, hellishly hot -yesterday was the hottest day recorded in July EVER. You discover you have nothing in your wardrobe that looks remotely like it would… Read More Read More

New Magazine Crush: Cherry Bombe

We are indebted to our roving food and craft reporter Julia Little for bringing the fabulous Cherry Bombe magazine to our attention. Who said magazines were dying? There’s been a rush of fabulous ones to the bookshelves over the last… Read More Read More

Just what is Athleisure?

Athleisure is currently a massive “thing” in the trends industry,which you may or may not (if you have any sense) be familiar with. It basically means clothes that you might usually wear for exercise, re-interperated for everyday wear – or… Read More Read More

Adventures Before Dementia: Life in the Slow Lane

What happens to a committed clothes girl when she moves away from fashion’s fast lane? We’re back with Bebe in France to find out… It’s hard to believe that it’s exactly a year since I swapped the frantic world of… Read More Read More

Age Appropriate Attire at Selvedge Magazine

The lovely new issue of Selvedge magazine is out now, and it’s the Ageless Issue, which I have contributed to with a feature (ahem, it’s a bit of a rant actually) Free For All on the out datedness of age… Read More Read More

Adventures before Dementia #2: Vive la Différence!

Second guest post from our lovely correspondent Bebe today, (did you read the first post?) with a bit more of the story on life in her new French village and how she got there. Over to you Bebe… So our… Read More Read More

Guest post: moving to Deal

Today we have a guest post, from TWR reader Kathryn, who wanted to tell us about how she moved -mid life- to live by the sea. A word of warning, you may well want to put your own urban house… Read More Read More

Guest Post: Is it time we rebranded Craft?

So, today we have the first of our guest posts, something we are doing while Jane is on her sabbatical. It’s from Julia Little, and she’s wondering if its time to rebrand the world of craft. Off you go Julia…… Read More Read More

See this: Savage Beauty at the V&A

Like you need telling….but just incase you’ve been so tied up with The Archers flood that real life has passed you by, the V&A is AT LAST hosting the Alexander McQueen Savage Beauty beauty exhibition that was such a smash… Read More Read More

Middleagedmum.com: Why I won’t be wearing flares

If you have been shopping recently, or had an eye on whats been happening on the world’s catwalks over the past three weeks, you can’t fail to have noticed that someone somewhere in the world of fashion has decided that… Read More Read More

Style Icon: Claire Underwood

The most ruthless couple in American (fictional) politics, Frank and Claire Underwood are back tonight in Season 3 of the outstanding House of Cards. If you haven’t watched it yet – I’m jealous – get Netflix now and binge watch… Read More Read More

How to run a restaurant chain, by Rebecca Mascarenhas

I got to know my Barnes neighbour Rebecca Mascarenhas by reputation before I actually met her, because she started Sonny’s restaurant in Barnes not long after we first moved here and it became one of THE places everyone went to… Read More Read More

Weekend Woman: Rosanne Cash

I was fortunate enough to meet Rosanne Cash when I went to New York last December, not at some fancy pants press party but at an afternoon sewing bee with my friend Kay, where Rosanne was busy making an Alabama… Read More Read More

Wolf Hall lighting – lets get those candles burning

Anyone else obsessed with the way Wolf Hall is lit? All that lighting and snuffing out of candles adds to the drama and makes everyone and everything look so darn gorgeous. Huge effort has gone into making not just the… Read More Read More

Wolf Hall: Why you should watch it

If like me you picked up Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall in a book shop/airport many times last year, only to put it down in favour of something less GCSE homework like, then the BBC 2 adaptation of this must read… Read More Read More