Justin Fletcher Made My Son Cry

Yes, you read correctly.

The lovely Justin Fletcher - Mr CBeebies himself - made three year old Cash cry yesterday.

So how did this happen? Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.

The boys were ill over the weekend. They had some virus or other. They were feverish, with sore throats and colds. Also, Cash vomited all over me and then all over his bed. Nice.

When this happens (after I've put the washing machine on) we make nests of towels on the sofa and switch on CBeebies. We have many programmes recorded on our PVR, mainly Bob the Builder, ZingZillas and the boys' new favourite, Iconicles. Four year old Presley in particular is mesmerised by it. He stands in front of the television as if it's his own Iconiscreen and seems to know every word to every episode. When the boys run in to wake us up every morning, they pretend they are Splish and Splash. Every squirrel they see is now called Skitter. Even Maisy's friend Cyril has been renamed.

I did an experiment two years ago.  I switched off the television and left it off for two months, only turning it back on when the boys were ill one day and I wanted to distract them. Even now it never goes on before 4pm. Then they can chose what they want to watch while I cook the tea.

Yesterday we had exhausted our cache of Iconicles episodes. I really couldn't face another, so we watched the CBeebies channel live.

The new programme, Justin's House, was on. After five minutes of watching Justin and his friends larking about Cash burst into tears. He looked terrified and said 'I don't want to watch this'. So that was that.

Were were invited to watch Justin's House being recorded.  It's filmed in front of an audience of children. On the show they all look like they're enjoying themselves, none of them are shrieking. I don't know what it was that upset Cash. I'm glad we couldn't make it to Salford now. Sorry, Justin. We still love Something Special.

We also like the new look CBeebies Grown-ups website, there is even a blog. I hope the BBC don't mind me using the photo of Justin's House. From the reaction of the parents on Twitter over the weekend, I think we were the only family that didn't love the new show.

I'll be sad when the boys grow out of CBeebies and I'll miss watching them laugh their heads off at the 'Spud the Hotel Manager' episode of Bob the Builder. I've almost perfected my Spud impression too.


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Justin Fletcher Made My Son Cry

TV: Unplugged

It's been a week since Presley and Cash have watched television. They haven't even tried to turn it on today. I pulled the plug, quite literally, because I couldn't stand to watch another episode of the drivel that is 'Big and Small'.

There has been a great deal of fuss made this week about the Australian government's guidelines that television should be banned for the under twos and limited for the under fives. You can read about it in The Times and The Telegraph.

Some have called it mummy-bashing. It's another way to criticise parents and mothers in particular for raising obese couch potatoes. On Twitter @TheNobleSavage had this to say:

"Sorry, but I'm not convinced that kids watching tv is the end of the world. Mothers have enough guilt w/out this bollocks."

Flea, Sally's daughter, has never watched television. You can read why on Who's the Mummy?.

Dulwich Divorcee has no problem with her children watching television, so long as it is rationed.

Liz at Living With Kids agrees and there are some excellent comments on her post too.

Well, I pulled the plug before all of this started, but I'm not the first to do it. Hot Cross Mum banned television for a week last month. She found it tough going for the first couple of days.

Since I started blogging I have watched less and less the idiots' lantern. In the last week I have watched 'Strictly Come Dancing' and an old episode of 'Wife Swap' we had recorded and never watched. I also sat on the sofa with my laptop whilst Andy watched 'Electric Dreams'. That's it. That's enough for me.

Presley was never that interested in the tellybox. I recorded three programmes each day from CBeebies for him to watch: 'Something Special', 'Big Cook Little Cook' and 'In The Night Garden'. He would happily watch these while I did some housework. Then along came Cash and I was busier and it was easy to leave the television on to entertain the boys. I would forget it was on.

I have to admit I did use television as a baby-sitter - something I said I would never do before I had children.

It was even worse after Cash learned how to turn the set on. He's the biggest telly-addict of them all. I kept telling myself that they didn't watch that much television. They were only watching the quality programmes: 'Nina and the Neurons', 'The Green Balloon Club', 'Mister Maker' and 'Grandpa in my Pocket'. Of course if you add up, that's a fair few hours of television each day. I'm quite ashamed.

I started to get quite sick of CBeebies, especially the cartoons and the noise. I particularly dislike programmes like 'Nuzzle and Scratch' and 'Bits and Bobs' (I'm not sure I even paid enough attention to get their names right)! Every time I turned the television off, Cash would turn it on again. 'Big and Small' was the final straw. Noise. Then silence.

I've loved being a mummy this week. Presley and Cash have played with all their toys. We've read all their books, many times. We've had massive tea parties. We've been artistic. We've sung and danced and played musical instruments. We invented the sock game. Don't ask. I think it's rubbish, they think it's hilarious. They've 'helped' me with the cooking and housework. We've watched the squirrels and birds in the garden. We haven't missed the telly at all.

So what now? I'd be happy to leave the television unplugged, but I believe in everything in moderation. Also, I've just bought some In The Night Garden toys in the half-price sale at Toys R Us. So I suppose I'll let them watch that!

Do you limit television in your house? Have you achieved a balance?

TV: Unplugged