LIKE MOTHER, LIKE DAUGHTER

I am delighted to report that we have now removed the white cross from our front door (see previous diary) and have begun to mix freely in society again. We celebrated our return to the human race by visiting a model village, which, like our children, is a smaller and cuter version of the grown up thing. It totally wowed the kids, so much so that during the night Olly kept muttering "really small, really tiny" in his sleep.

The village is situated in the heart of some really beautiful Buckinghamshire countryside and is absolutely fascinating. But the visit once again demonstrated my total and utter assimilation, Borg style, into Motherhood. I’m afraid that I was heard to enquire whether the Bekonscot Model Village was actually based on the real village it was situated in. My companion gently informed me that it was unlikely as Beaconsfield village, situated as it was in the centre of the south east and being quite small, would be unusual to sport a harbour, a coalfield, two castles, a racetrack, an airport and three railway stations.

As we made our way back in my friend’s people wagon, the children demonstrating with pinpoint accuracy how to do a Mexican wave of wailing and moaning, I pondered my idiocy. I wondered, is it mandatory to make stupid remarks now that I had borne children? Is it inevitable that my children’s and husband’s eyes would forever be rolling upwards as I made yet another crass remark or inane enquiry about the real world? In other words, does being a mummy make you stupid?

Time and time again I hear of mums moaning that they used to hold down a really demanding job, but that since the birth of their beloved, they can’t remember the name of the Prime Minister, the plot of a programme they watched an hour ago or what the hell it was they just went upstairs for. But that’s just the memory failing, and I think lack of sleep and shock of childbirth are reasonable enough excuses for that. But how do you explain the dumbness that comes with mumness? You know the sort of thing: "Does BT own the Internet?" Or "Is Pop Idol Will joining Hearsay then?"

And deep down I know the real question for me is “will I eventually become my mum?” Will I make my kids feel like my mum made me feel? Hot and cross and totally teenage in Boots, as she yelled down the aisle whilst searching for foot powder "Juliet, is it just your feet that smell?" Even now, only my mum can reduce me from age 39 to 15 in an instant with one comment or silly question.

And if I am becoming my mum, is it also inevitable that other facets of her will start to emerge? I wonder whether I too will start to yell at the kids that they will "have someone’s eye out with that piece of toast" or "catch their death of cold". I know that I am already asking Steve to turn the radio down or off because I "can’t think". I’ve started wearing funny hats and taking hours to shop, by chatting to all the local shopkeepers.

Looking on the bright side, despite my mum’s insistence on my sister and I being home by 11 during the week, never allowing us to have mini-cereals or get our ears pierced till we were sixteen, she did do some amazing things for us. We were always allowed to have our friends over, she (and Dad too) took us and brought us back from any party or evening out. There was always fantastic food in the house and tons of laughter. My mum encouraged my love of art and punk music, even though she once mistook one of my mates as someone from the Round Table collecting in fancy dress. They never questioned the way I looked, or the mates I went around with. In other words they helped me be me, and despite still cringing when mum tells the woman at the M&S counter my life story, I reckon if I can be half as great as she was I’ll be doing alright. Happy Mothers Day Mum!

Juliet Jones lives in domestic chaos with husband Steve, son Oliver (aged 3) and daughter Billie (aged 2) in Hertfordshire.

NEXT INSTALMENT: MONDAY 18 MARCH