Mum to four boys – fourteen, eleven, eight, and four years old. Raising our family in London.
ABOUT THE BLOG AND CHLOE
Welcome to Sorry About The Mess
Started in 2011 by me, Chloe Bridge – Sorry About The Mess is a blog for those seeking meaningful conversation around the subjects of parenting, family travel, and finding yourself again post-motherhood.
If you are a first time visitor to Sorry About The Mess, here are some great places to start:
- To read more about my unexpected start to parenting and where it has lead us to now, read Our Story.
- Meet the family! The Sorry About The Mess family consists of Chloe and Sam and our four boys. Click here to find out more about each individual family member.
- Or if you would like to work with us, check out my media kit and take a look at our recent brand collaborations.
About Sorry About The Mess
About Sorry About The MessSorry About The Mess is a UK family and parenting blog based in London. The blog name generally refers to my state of mind and our cobbled together plans in the early years of unplanned parenthood. But given that we have four young children, it also refers to the state of our house at any given moment!
Sorry About The Mess is where I share my many ongoing journeys. I write about the travels I enjoy with my family, I share the ups and downs of my parenting experiences, and you’ll occasionally find a post or two about whatever I’m currently watching on TV – my one true love ; ) These are my themes; travel, family and motherhood, and ramblings about life in general.
You can expect to find lots of different posts like….
- Our recent wedding – Yep, we got married after three kids, I’ve blogged all about it here, and you can also watch our wedding video (tissues at the ready – everyone tells me it makes them cry)
- Becoming parents in our mid-twenties – The shifting dynamics of having children WAY before any of our friends, and the tough times of existing on a tiny budget in London.
- Love reading about travel? Whether it’s California, St Lucia, UK breaks, or Disney World – I love to create family travel content that is visually inspiring, whilst also giving all the useful details about logistics and budgets that prospective travellers are searching for online.
- Being an ‘all-boy’ family – Why you should NEVER ask me if I’m going to ‘try for a girl’, and breaking the taboo of gender disappointment.
- Our home – we recently underwent an entire house renovation and kitchen extension – it was a lot of work, but we are so grateful to have been able to make a rather dated house more ‘us’. You can find all posts about our house and interiors here.
- Life and Motherhood – I like to write what’s on my mind, it’s great (cheap!) therapy ; ) See When One of You Wants More Children and The Other Doesn’t and Why We Shouldn’t Romanticise Motherhood for an insight into my musings.
- My experiences earning money as a blogger / content creator – Why transparency and honesty with my audience is key to me. And why ‘mummy blogging’ shouldn’t be looked down on.
- Mental health – My vlogs on coping with emetophobia as a parent, and getting help to be less anxious about it are viewed and commented on over and over again. You can also read my blog post on my experience of living with trichotillomania.
- Beauty and fashion – My tutorial on how to use The Ordinary skincare remains one of my top performing blog posts.
Never miss a post
You can keep up with the latest posts on Facebook. Follow my travels and life updates on Instagram and check out what I’m currently reading on Goodreads. I also use Pinterest regularly, pinning the places I want to go, the indispensable parenting advice I should have followed, and the interiors I wish I had the time to create in my own home.
Where to next?
Check out my blog sections on travel, my musings on life and motherhood / parenting. Or click here to watch our latest videos.
To read more about my unexpected start to parenting and where it has lead us to now, read Our Story.
Meet the family! The Sorry About The Mess family consists of Chloe and Sam and our four boys. Click here to find out more about each individual family member.
Or if you would like to work with us, check out my media kit and take a look at our recent brand collaborations.
Want to get in touch? Drop me an email: chloebridge@gmail.com
7 comments
I never normally comment on things I read, mainly because I never know what to actually write that sounds any good or that doesn’t make me sound a bit odd but your blog about feeling awkward about meeting new mums and how to talk about how Arlo came to be here struck a chord. My daughter Holly is going to be three in Jan, and I live in a small village, in the arse end of nowhere, so my “mother and baby” groups were in the nearest town, which is quite affluent to say the least. Just after Holly was born – 3 weeks! – my then partner (he’s my husband now) was made redundant, which was great as you can guess it being totally stressful, coping with a new born and worrying about living off of the rubbish stat maternity pay and paying the mortgage – I digress, sorry! I’ll cut to the chase, I made myself attend these groups, with very stuck up, married, mums with husbands who worked no less, and felt so awkward explaining that my “partner” ( hate that term) was unemployed, no we weren’t married and no Holly wasn’t really “planned”. Needless to say we only lasted about three sessions. I just hope you didn’t feel like that for too long. From the little I’ve read you sound like a great mum with a big sense if humour and from what I’ve found in the past three years of being a mum, you need one! X
Thank you for taking the time to comment, it’s nice to hear from someone who feels the same.
It’s a lot better for me now. As Arlo has got older it’s become easier to talk about how unplanned and unprepared we were without feeling embarassed about the situation. I’ve also got a bit more freedom now that Arlo is a lot more independent from me, I feel I need the mother and baby groups less and less as I can go out in the evenings and socialise with my non-parent friends once more.
Still not sure I’ll ever fit in with the baby group crowd, I think it’s just not ‘me’.
Hi,
It’s strange now because Holly goes to pre-school and most of the mums there have two or more kids, the one at pre-school and then an older one that’s at the village primary, so they all know each other and although they are far, far from being unfriendly they all seem so capable and able! They are all older then me too so maybe that’s it? They also all go to the village church and do “churchy” things which we are SO not into!
Not that there’s anything wrong with that obviously!
Did you find though that with your friends that weren’t parents you had to catch yourself from constantly doing the “talk about my baby” thing? I did and I swore I would never do that, I could almost see their eyes glaze over with boredom! Most of my friends have kids too so we are quite lucky in that respect that we all probably bore each other to tears….
Happy new year!
Hi, you have such a sweet and cheerful little boys! I really love children and I hope someday I will raise a bunch of them as you do now.
I´m studying infant education and Im sure I will love my love as I love children so much.
Best regards from Huesca (Spain)
Irene
Hi Chloe!
I never post and just read all the blogs that deeply are exactly the way I am feeling. I also start tying and then erase everything because I get nervous about sending anything, or talking about such a sensitive subject. I came across your gender disappointment and I loved it! I have 2 girls and when we found out we were pregnant with my second daughter my mother it laws first comment was “ is Andy (my husband- her son) upset?” What the heck!!! After reading about what you went though it was so reassuring that I was not alone and those feelings of never having a son are real. I did the same thing as you did. I thought how I would never walk down the aisle with my son for his wedding and so much more. I still get the….. are you going to try for a boy speech. Ughhhhh just stop already. I just wanted to say thank you for putting into words how I feel. You are so brave to do this and I really appreciate your honesty and true emotions of what you went through.
Thank for taking the time to leave a comment : ) The things people say are really unbelievable sometimes x
I’ve just read the same article as I prepare for my baby boy 3 next month. You really nailed it at the end with the question of why is what I don’t have more interesting than what I do. It all makes me really cross. The questions and comments that don’t really want an answer and especially won’t believe the answer of “no I’m happy”. Thank you for sharing such personal posts and congratulations on your wonderful, beautiful boys x