PhD Mum

After my partner proposed last spring, I had this idea that I wanted to have beer mats for my save the dates. I went on to a well-known wedding website and saw the sort of thing I wanted. I got a quote for £1,800.  Erm….no thanks. So. I made some myself. In 4 easy (but relatively time consuming) steps. Figure 1: my beer mat save the dates Now, obviously, the final results (See Figure 1) were not as professional as if I had paid £1,800 to get them done. BUT, I have about £1,700 still in my pocket now and they have that “home-made” charm about them. Which leaves me feeling a little bit smug. Each mat had the same design on the front and our names, the date, and the wedding website on the back (we are having a paperless wedding invite so the website is key). The front of the mat required two stamps, the back required one. I designed these using publisher. Here is what I ordered and the prices are guestimates from memory: 3 x Stamps (wi...

If you are thinking about or are returning to education after time away, then this is the post for you. PhD Mum Returning to education as a mum is a hard decision and there are a lot of things to consider; can I really afford it? Can I fit it in with my children? Am I clever enough to do it? Am I too old? When I was on maternity leave, I began to question everything I thought I was. I felt my brain turned to mush because my sole reason for waking up was to feed and change my son. I returned to the PhD after 6 months of maternity leave. In pretty much every way, my experience of the PhD mum journey has been amazing – that’s not to say it hasn’t been challenging – but I have experienced the support of a fantastic supervisory team, the working hours were extremely flexible, and my partner was very understanding. I think if one of these three things were not in place, then my experience would have been something completely different.   Here are my five p...