Another year is almost over, and before it’s done we get a chance to read some incredible writings of our local parenting bloggers. And they are just incredible. They will lift you up so that you can see the pure joy of raising a child. They will take you down to the depths of the sheer frustrations of parenting. But they will not disappoint.

You can read all the results of the awards, and the judges’ comments here: Winners 2023

The Joy

Our winner this year, Tamlin Wightman, from the blog With Child and I, encapsulates all that is magical and good about having a child. Her whole blog is a love letter to her little boy.

Read this extract from Happy Tears:

I looked into that face and saw myself, my everything, all the years to come, all the days and nights I need to keep you safe, the million ways your face will change and yet still show me me. It wasn’t the right time to cry and happy tears are never really well understood, but I felt it so fiercely: love and pride. When you look at me, this is what I feel. In secret or in a crowd, when I know I am yours and you are mine.

The Sadness

Depression

Our third place winner, Kate Botha, from Wearing all my Hats, shares her battle with depression in Back on the Bedroom Floor.

How strange that I can walk out of my front door and many would never know. How ironic that I can laugh and genuinely laugh or smile and really mean it, but come away with the thorn still deeply embedded in my side. How incongruent to have fun and thrive around others so they have no idea the daily battle I lose. How ironic that many will not be able to marry the two parts of me that seem so conflicting yet are true to who I really am.

Our winner in the Social Media: Text and Image category, Karabo Mokoena: Black Mom Chronicles shares her story of depression and attempted suicide, and the importance of mental health and mothering in this post.

I hope and pray that we never ignore conversations around the mental health of mothers.

I hope we don’t look at these stories with pure judgement and not curiosity.

Almost Miscarriage

Tamryn Geldenhuys from It’s a Sher thing shares a very raw and painful experience of a day where she almost lost her baby in The worst day of my life. She is a mention in Best Blog.

This day made me realise that we are in control of absolutely nothing. All we have is right now. So reevaluate what’s important to you, who is important to you and how you live your life.

Effects of Divorce

Nadia of 2girliesmummy brutally encapsulates the heartbreak in this post (Mention in Social Media; Image and Text)

Sadness is watching your kids return after a weekend with the other parent.…It’s the aftermath of having to deal with children in a broken home. It’s feeling guilt every time they don’t want to come back to you because they have more fun on the two days they are gone.

Turning their experiences into improvement

1. Forgiving yourself: Refilwe Ramatlhodi Ndhlovu turns letting her daughter down into an opportunity for grace in Checklist for Perfect Parenting (Highly Commended in the Parenting category)
2. Navigating her five year old daughter: Karabo Mokoena shares her personal experience to help us become more conscious in Do Conscious Parents Discipline their Kids? (Runner Up in the Parenting Category)
3. Leanne Johnson’s more empowering take on Little Girl Dreams is thought provoking (Highly Commended in the Inspirational Category)
4. Letting go of mom guilt – Judy MacGregor shares how she dealt with the guilt and integrated it into her life in Why I had to let go of the mom guilt (Runner up in the inspirational category)
5. Don Dinnematin turned his experience of having an absent father into being a very present one in the runner up post for Social Media; Image and Text.
6. Lisa Shipster has some good advice for kids that feel like failures in How to use the Power of Yet to give your child hope. She is runner up in Best Blog.
7. Turning cancelled holiday plans into an amazing experience with her baby is the theme of Travel winner Jaclyn Goliath in Our First Family Trip to the Winelands.

Poetry

Pri Naidoo writes the most amazing poem reflecting both the sheer physical exhaustion against the real joy of a newborn baby in this post. She is a mention in Social Media: Image and Text.

Laughter

Amy Lalouette, from Mommy’s Off Her Meds, does not disappoint, as usual. She has some side splitting posts about teaching Shakespeare (To read or not to read) and her daughter’s eventful ballet class (On Wednesdays we wear pink). She is a mention in Best Blog.

Kutlewano makes us all feel better about a messy house with her reel. She is runner up in the Social Media: Video and Reel category.

Lastly, Cherise Roberts shares the common South African devastation when saying goodbye to your maid for the holidays in this post. She is the winner in the Social Media: Video and Reel category.

So go ahead and have a good read of these local mother’s real experiences of parenting. I hope you follow their blogs and social media accounts. Read the full list of the awards with the judges comments here.

And if you have ever wanted to tell your story on the platform of a blog, but you don’t know how to set one up, now is a great time to grab my Blogging Course, which is on special this week. I’ll show you with step by step with video tutorials how it’s done.

One amazing thing about blogging – I have met some incredibly strong, brave women and I’m really blessed to read their work, know many of them as friends, and be taken into their worlds.

Thank you for writing. Read all the winners here – Winners 2023

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