Holiday Essentials

High Maintenance Mummy is 35, but doesn't mind pretending to be 38, in order to draw admiring comments on how good she looks for her age. She and banker hubby have a blissful marriage, helped only by the odd shot of botox, weekly wine deliveries and his bank balance.

They have 3 children, Ned, Bronte and Matilda, and live in a Georgian terrace in a highly desirable neighbourhood. HMM's interests include yoga, gossip with the girls and blaming everything on the au pair. Tune in monthly for her unique guide to parenting.

With Trimester 2 just peeping over the pregnancy horizon, exhausted doesn’t even begin to describe how I’m feeling – so a break is definitely in order.

I’ve no doubt it’s just what the doctor ordered for my darling Rupert, too – the long hours he’s been putting in (the recession has made virtual widows of us City wives) have left him looking positively grey.

Meanwhile, the news of our impending arrival has wreaked other odd changes in his outlook – a newfound concern for the state of the planet, for example, and an insistence that we reduce our emissions (sounds very much like schoolboy humour, if you ask me) by eschewing a break at our property in the South of France in favour of a week at our Cornish cottage.

Still, if an HMM can’t go to the Riviera then she'll be damned if she won’t pack it in her Alison van der Lande Venezia and take it with her.

No HMM can afford to be without a kaftan (pictured above, left) even if her waistline isn't being expanded by a new addition, while an oversized hat (pictured above, right) and sunglasses are simply de rigueur.

I mean, squinting is never an acceptable facial expression, but especially when it's just such a waste of all that Botox (sadly off limits now that I'm pregnant...).

Naturally, a HMFC (High Maintenance Female Child) like my beautiful Bronte won’t be happy unless she can be just like mummy, so all HMMs should make sure that their smaller selves have a kaftan of their own to wear.

And while I hear that some of the supermarket chains do a roaring trade in 2 for £5 girls’ swimsuits, I defy you to find an HMM who would be seen dead with their daughter in one.

I mean, a recession this may be, but we have certain standards to uphold – hence my little princesses will be quite the belles of the beach in their Boden bikinis (pictured above, right).

Of course, the sartorial style of the menfolk isn’t to be overlooked in all of this holiday glamour – as I mentioned, my Rupert has developed quite the pallor of late.

So time in the sun in his Orlebar Brown trunks (pictured above, left) ought to see the return of my devilishly handsome husband, while his ever-adoring Ned will happily throw sand and catch crabs all day in his Hackett swimshorts.

Yes, sad but true - the children just won’t be told that the best way to spend time on the beach is with a subscription copy of Vogue...

That's why HMMs should give the plastic tat that’s on offer in every seaside town a wide berth and arrive forearmed with buckets and spades of a more charming or at least a more practical nature (pictured above, right).

That’s not to say that practicality and beauty are mutually exclusive, as the children’s Mitty James ponchos (pictured third from top) and our Runaway Coast beachmat (pictured left) will testify.

Since sunshine can’t be ordered online, and there’s only so much Riviera that you can cram into the boot of your car, a windbreak (pictured right) is vital, not to mention wet weather gear for the children - I don’t want to pessimistic, but one simply can’t take too much for granted.

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