Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5 6 ··· 20 21

Original poster

The Yorkshire shepherdess and the snowflake generation

507 replies

Marcia1989 · 06/04/2021 17:19

www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-9438725/Our-Yorkshire-Farm-star-Amanda-Owen-gave-birth-eighth-child-husband-ASLEEP-upstairs.html

Sorry for link to the Daily Mail. It was the only non-paywalled article but her comments are also reported in The Times and The Telegraph.

She runs a sheep farm in a remote part of Yorkshire and has 9 kids. She thinks that parents do not raise their children to be sufficiently independent, to look after themselves. She didn't really do home-schooling with them because she doesn't want to be a helicopter parent - she expects them to just get on with it. She expects all the kids to help on the farm and they don't really do devices/TV etc. Having watched her TV series, I agree that her kids seem admirably self-sufficient and mature and I do think generally it's really good for children to have some responsibility. But, I do also wonder whether a lack of individual attention is detrimental to them. And there will be some kids who don't get on with it, and is it really right to just leave them to it?

What does everyone think?

OP posts:

Flaunch · 06/04/2021 17:21

I think her kids have had a better childhood than 99% of other children, my own included.

I really admire her. She’s got it right imo.

NeverMetANiceOne · 06/04/2021 17:24

She's just one person, raising her children the best way she feels. It is entirely up to you if you read about what she's doing and feel differently about raising your children.
I think she's probably right about some things, it's important for children to learn about looking after themselves, but then it's also important for them to know they are loved and supported.
I've never met the woman so I've no idea if what she's doing is right by her children, and I'm not going to read the article in the Daily Mail, but I assume she's not telling all reading parents that they have to do it her way?

Hoppythehippo · 06/04/2021 17:28

I think her approach is awfully difficult to replicate if you don’t live on a remote farm and I would hate to live her lifestyle. But if it works for her then good luck to her. I’m quite happy with how I’m bringing up my children (very differently to her) but there’s plenty of ways to skin a cat.

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about this subject:

Families

Kpo58 · 06/04/2021 17:32

I'm not sure that her way of parenting works in the real world. Most people don't have acres of safe space for their children to roam/get exercise on their own. Most people cannot take their children to work either.

If she tried that sort of parenting in the inner city, then her kids are likely to get caught up with gangs, run over or abducted.

Duvetstay · 06/04/2021 17:32

She really irritates me, comes over vair smug.

Although I don't disagree with some of what she says as lots of kids seem to need a lot of input from parents for stuff they could and should sort themselves. As with everything there's a happy medium. Never going to parents evening (as she claims) is really bad imo, I need to know what's going on at school, kids are happy etc.

She's a real self promotor and the income she makes comes from her media profile and that of the kids rather than the farm.

Nowt wrong with that but it's hardly a sustainable lifestyle for everyone and not the kids choice to be part of her story. It's all about her.

I live in Yorkshire and would be fucking freezing in those outfits, I don't know how she does it on the farm!!

mermaidsariel · 06/04/2021 17:33

I think she’s absolutely amazing. The kids are all so well brought up, kind caring and supportive of one another. She seems to have boundless energy and is not fazed by anything. They are an amazing family. I think having nine kids is a bit much but it’s their choice and they seem to have made it work.

LimitIsUp · 06/04/2021 17:33

I detest the term 'snowflake'. I did use to admire her - until I read her comments in the Times, I now think she is unbearably smug and not just a little bit blinkered

KateMuff · 06/04/2021 17:36

She's an excellent influencer, like rural Kardashians, she's selling a specific lifestyle to enable her to live that lifestyle. It's 'scripted reality' and her press pieces are on brand messages to advertise/draw you to her books. I know one of her children fairly well, and it's not real any more than any other influencer. They are a very close happy family however.

Geamhradh · 06/04/2021 17:39

She's not just a mother of 9 on a sheep farm is she though?

She's a STAR! TV STAR!! and her mother was a MODEL! (Capitals because everything you read about her is at pains to stress those elements)

I'm sure there are other less star-y large families living and working on farms whose children aren't snowflakes either.

What will be telling is what the children think when they're older.

stairway · 06/04/2021 17:42

She’s lucky that nothing bad has happened to her children regarding accidents etc. She was lucky that she gave birth alone and nothing bad happened like a major bleed or the baby needing resus.

mermaidsariel · 06/04/2021 17:43

@KateMuff

I would say that makes her a very clever woman. I am interested in why the image is not as it appears?

mermaidsariel · 06/04/2021 17:44

@stairway

She’s lucky that nothing bad has happened to her children regarding accidents etc. She was lucky that she gave birth alone and nothing bad happened like a major bleed or the baby needing resus.

There were complications with one of her kids. I can’t remember which one. It’s in her book.

CuriousaboutSamphire · 06/04/2021 17:46

I too know one of her kids, well a nephew does. He says that the programme is sanitized, doesn't show the hard slog, but that the family themselves are pretty much what you see, in broad strokes.

KateMuff · 06/04/2021 17:51

@mermaidsariel She is a very clever, capable, good looking, competent and kindly woman. She is also a business woman making lots of money. She has a lot more 'help' that you don't see. She has a good social life without Clive being in any way involved, lots of things

mermaidsariel · 06/04/2021 17:55

Good on her.
I do wonder if the large age gap will become
An issue though. She’s amazing for her age with loads of energy. I wonder if he will start to feel a bit elderly and dull for her.

DobbyTheHouseElk · 06/04/2021 18:04

I don’t know how she has the energy. 9 kids. That’s a lot. She seems perfectly pleasant. I wonder if her husband looks around him and wonders how his life changed so much. He was a remote farmer living alone.

IrishGirl2020 · 06/04/2021 18:05

I think she’s amazing and I think her kids have a wonderful lifestyle and they genuinely do seem to be a very happy family. I don’t mind her marketing the lifestyle to make some extra cash but what I don’t like is the implication that she’s got it 100% right and the rest of us have somehow got it wrong with our ‘snowflake’ children.

We can’t all have 9 kids or live on a farm! And she’s very lucky in that none of her kids seem to be too demanding of her time in educational or mental health terms.
I grew up in rural Ireland where there were plenty of large families living on farms with similar freedom and in many cases it was far from idyllic. There was always at least a couple of children in every large family I know who suffered due to lack of individual attention or support into adulthood and who didn’t achieve their potential because the parents were just too busy or exhausted to care.

Shopliftersoftheworldunite · 06/04/2021 18:05

8 children is hardly a desirable position to be in. If she wants to criticise people she should look a bit closer to home.

Yawn, to all of it.

MargaretThursday · 06/04/2021 18:16

The interesting thing to look at will be if any of her children choose that lifestyle for themselves.
All the children from large (4+ children) families I knew growing up have chosen to have 2 or fewer, with a fairly high proportion (of my friends) choosing not to have children.

I haven't seen the programme, but there is something to be said for the live in the country free life for children. But at the same time, it only takes for a moment of inattention to turn into a tragic accident.
I was at school with someone whose small cousin had been killed by a tractor on his farm. He was playing with the lambs and one ran across the farm track and he followed. It was a blind bend and the driver had no chance of seeing him.

picknmix1984 · 06/04/2021 18:17

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

MiddleParking · 06/04/2021 18:19

Why is it we’re meant to be bothered about the opinions of this inappropriately dressed, unintelligent-sounding nobody?

IntermittentParps · 06/04/2021 18:28

I'm not sure that her way of parenting works in the real world. But the farm IS the real world for this family.
Most people don't have acres of safe space for their children to roam/get exercise on their own. Most people cannot take their children to work either. See above.

If she tried that sort of parenting in the inner city, then her kids are likely to get caught up with gangs, run over or abducted. a) not necessarily; not everywhere is like The Wire and b) See above.

inappropriately dressed Why does someone always have to have a pop at her clothes?

HighlandCowbag · 06/04/2021 18:31

I think she is a very driven, very clever, very motivated woman. I think I saw somewhere she always wanted to marry a farmer/have that lifestyle and then she met her husband and went for it, with the age difference and her attractiveness I don't think he was going to argue.

She is no different to any other women who make a life out of raising their family/doing their job in the public eye, like Stacey Solomon or Mrs Hinch etc. She just does it on a farm, not in suburbia. The oldest child seems very able, she's away at uni atm isn't she? Or was.

Wrt to that lifestyle it can't be recreated in a town or city, but the main principles can. Less screens, more outside time, make entertainment from what is around you. I took ds (7) to meet his friend at a busy, urban park last week. Both kids plus friends toddler bored within an hour. Took them to our allotment instead. 2 hours playing, digging, planting seeds etc. Not everyone has an allotment I know but kids need more than swings and slides to engage with nature and when they do, they do enjoy it.

pabloescobarselasticband · 06/04/2021 18:32

Shes absolutely right!

middleager · 06/04/2021 18:32

How does the children's education work?

Flip

1 2 3 4 5 6 ··· 20 21