At this time of year

At this time of year ... I think of all the single parent families out there, perhaps having their first Christmas together on their own. Being a parent is a hard enough job, being a single parent is twice as hard. My first Christmas as a single parent was 25 years ago now and, as I look forward to my two grown up children coming home for Christmas this weekend, I remember that first one.

We were all a lot younger then!

I took the phone off the hook (you could do that then) in an attempt to stop well-meaning people phoning "just to check you're all right" as the children were opening presents or I was trying to cook. Speaking of which, I didn't even try to do a traditional Christmas dinner that year; the children were too excited to sit down to a proper meal so we had party food laid out on the table and helped ourselves as we wanted. I didn't expect anything to be 'like normal' (just as well, really) and it was chaotic but fun.

Since then, we've created our own new Christmas traditions over the years and you'll be glad to know that we managed proper Christmas dinners after that first year - mind you, it took a long time to get them to eat breakfast on Christmas Day.

The problems single parent families face are talked about a lot but I don't think you hear enough about the positives. The three of us are a strong team and we always have been. My son and daughter are brilliant; I can call on them at any time if I need to, knowing that they will drop everything and rush to help.

We've shared lots of things over the last 25 years - walks, holidays, special food and, perhaps most of all, books. We all love reading, especially children's books; as I write this I can see the two baskets of Christmas books that we've collected over the years. On Christmas Eve we'll take it in turns to read some of our favourites out loud.  

Despite being four years apart in age, my son and daughter have always been close. There's a lot to be said for having to do everything together because there's no other parent to leave one child with. Oh, the endless plastic animal games they used to play, slowly moving their vast collection of animals around the house, chatting all the while. Then there was the year I found them putting toys in and out of their Christmas stockings on Christmas Eve - they said they were 'practising for the morning'. They now admit that they were trying to stretch their stockings ... because that's how you get more toys!

Don't they look sweet in this one? They would have been about eight and four then, I think. The next photo is a much later one, taken on the day we went to the seaside and they started a fashion on the beach by building a set of sand steps, leading up to the prom.

I have no idea what they're doing in the next picture - just being daft I expect. It was taken at my son's graduation (but then you could probably guess that).

So, I'd like to wish all the single parent families out there a very Happy Christmas. Do things your own way, stick together and it will get easier. And to Jack and Rose - you're both amazing people and I'm so proud of our team. Oh, and remember, I like big presents!