He’s only gone and done it. Mrshev, finalist in The MADs awards 2011 for Funniest Blog, has become an author. Clever him has gone it alone, publishing a novel using technology that wasn’t around for likes of Jane Austen or even J K Rowling. He’s self-published his amusing, wry and clever account of someone who decides to rob a bank in a very 21st century way. It seems the perfect crime, he persuades himself he has the perfect motive, and almost manages to execute it to perfection. If it weren’t for middle class guilt and guile… Oh, I’ll say no more because there’s lots of hilarious dialogue and a great twist to the end of the tale.

You probably knew you could download Kindle free to your desktop. I didn’t. But I’ve now done so and am reading Michael Shevlin’s Insecure available for £0.77 (yes, that’s genuinely a ’0′ in the right, that’s to say the left, place) at www.amazon.co.uk.

He’s a funny man, that Shevlin. Hope he’s not feeling insecure about the size of the image, above. Having mastered downloading Kindle getting a decent image proved less easy. I also hope Insecure gets turned into a movie. If Brad Pitt is on the cast list (in fact, even if he’s not) I expect an invitation to the opening night.

The Tickle Book is the perfect read out loud book for a Reception class

Reading to a class of four and five year olds is surprisingly unneverving. I’ve done it a few times at my sons’ school. Your child gets to choose their favourite book, you get to read it to their classmates. The first time I did it I breezed in thinking it would be easy. How hard can it be to attract the attention of a rabble of Reception children? Wrong, so wrong. Or naive, so naive. Trying to keep the attention of an entire class turned out to be almost impossible for this rookie reader. Halfway through The Gruffalo most of the children were saying they’d heard it before and knew what was coming next. So now that I’m a veteran of at least six reading sessions, here’s what I’ve learnt.

Don’t make your book too well known. All the children will feel they know it already and might start getting squirmy. Even worse is when they all start yelling about what will happen next.

Equally, an obscure book is probably the wrong choice too. Something that was a favourite in your childhood might be irrelevant to today’s children. Orlando the Marmalade cat, alas, didn’t appeal to one bunch of four-year-olds.

Make sure you’ve read your book before. I turned up with a funny poem once, funny that is if you got the lines to rhyme. I was nervous (hey, scores of eyes staring up at you is a bit scary) and kept mumbling and missing the punchline.

Gorgeous pictures are a huge bonus, especially if they’re in a large format book. If you’ve time at the end you can hold the book up and ask the children to spot things.

It’s tempting, but don’t do what one mum did and hand out sweets at the end of your reading. It ups the ante for other mothers like me who can barely remember to turn up on time, book in hand. Plus some parents don’t like their offspring eating sweets outside of mealtimes so you’ll make yourself unpopular at pick-up.

If you need inspiration, take a look at Puffin’s 70 Best Children’s Books.

Nigella's Chicken Schnitzel with Bacon and White Wine

Happy New Year! Inspired by reading so many resolutions from other bloggers I feel that I might break my long-held rule to ignore using the new year to make a new start (why set yourself up for failure…?) and come up with a few ideas I might actually stick to. For the first time in seven years I’m starting a new January without being pregnant or waking up through the night with a tiny baby. Which means no excuses when it comes to starting an exercise regime. Saying that, even tidying a cupboard would be one up on last year. So here they are, my attainable New Year Resolutions.

One hour of exercise a week. Running along the pavement with the buggy because I’m late (again) for nursery doesn’t count. I’m going to dig out the old Davina DVD and get moving.

A new recipe once a week. There is so much inspiration out there, from Nigella’s gorgeously pastel website – I mean what’s not to like about her Chicken Schnitzel with Bacon and White Wine offering? And I love, love, love the Utterly Scrummy Food for Families blog. It offers tasty recipes, easy ideas and tips galore. Check out the double chocolate self-saucing pudding and you’ll be in glutton heaven too.

As well as the new recipe, no more eating the children’s leftover food. I don’t even like mashed potato, so what’s the point in hoovering it up. And while some cold pastas can be delicious, there are few more revolting foods than macaroni cheese from the fridge.

Sleep. No more dithering and reading just one more newspaper article or watching three episodes of Miranda on iPlayer before bedtime. Lights out, head on pillow, then I might actually wake up without baggage that Jordan would be proud of under my eyes.

I like the new government guidelines to have at least two alcohol-free days a week. I’ll probably have to invest in a few half bottles of wine though to prevent us having to finish the bottle every night.

Oh, and write a novel before the year is out. Got to have one thing on the to-do list to keep me away from the cold macaroni cheese.

Good luck if you’ve made some resolutions – any of them better than giving up booze two days a week?