What My Kids Actually Need

We were very privileged to be able to watch the Tour De France come through Sheffield at the weekend: it was absolutely fantastic! The kids loved the build up of the Caravane (where the sponsors' vehicles come through and throw freebies into the crowd), and the thrill of the Peloton rushing by. One of the best parts of the day, though, was when we were walking back to our car through the team coach area, and we found ourselves rubbing shoulders with the riders themselves. We were able to watch the press interviews, and get a glimpse of what goes on behind the scenes:

The glamour of Le Tour...

I've been watching Le Tour since I was a kid, so to see the race first hand was hugely exciting. The whole family was still buzzing the following morning, which made me so happy. It was great to have a major international sporting event on our doorstep: things so often happen in London, which is a long way from us. It was also brilliant that it was free! Seriously, though, over the years, so many events have come and gone - events we would have loved to take our kids to see - but they've been prohibitively expensive for us. Don't get me wrong: we are blessed with everything we need, but because we've chosen to live on a single income (with a bit of extra from my tuition), there's just not a lot of spare money in the budget for big events. Over the years, I've experienced pangs of guilt over this, and wondered if things would have been better if I'd gone back to work, or if we'd put things on a credit card (we rarely do credit: the last time I used my credit card, the bank stopped it because they assumed it had been nicked). I guess we're not alone here, and it's very easy to get sucked into believing that we've failed our children by not taking them to see the Olympics, or Disneyland, or whatever. At times like this, I find it's worth reminding myself of a few things.

Firstly, we live in a culture which equates having great experiences with spending a lot of money. If you want a good time, it has to cost a lot, right? Well, no. Some of our best times as a family have been doing things which cost a relatively small amount of cash: camping, toasting marshmallows over a fire, sledging in the local park followed by hot chocolate, spending time with friends. Seeking out less well publicised events has meant we've had some fun, too. Last year, we watched the National Hovercraft Championship races at our local country park. It was free, and very enjoyable - and there was hardly anyone else there, so we had the pick of vantage points.

Secondly, kids just don't see things the way we do. It took a conversation with my parents for me to fully realise this. They were talking about how bad they felt years ago when our neighbours went off on foreign holidays, and we spent all our holidays camping in the UK because they couldn't afford to take us abroad. The thing is, I loved our holidays. We went with good friends, and we had a couple of cheap old sailing dinghies and kayaks which we knocked about in. My favourite childhood holiday memory is of kayaking on a semi-frozen loch in Scotland at about the age of  12, with the sky blue above me, and the ice groaning below me. You can't do that sitting on a beach in Mallorca. So often, we think we're failing our kids when we can't give them what we think they should have, but we need to remember that their priorities are very different from ours.

Thirdly, it's important to maintain a healthy perspective on what constitutes a good childhood. It is actually OK that my children have never been on a plane. I didn't fly anywhere until my early twenties, and I seem to have turned out fine. It's OK that my children haven't been to Disneyland (as far as I'm concerned, it's more than OK). It's OK that my two girls have to share a room, although you wouldn't think so if you listened to the kids on that CBBC show. It's really OK that we don't eat out very often. These things are not essential ingredients for healthy child development, whatever we might be led to believe. They are not what my kids need. Which is just as well, really.