I don't mind if you dry your bras on the oven...

The end of Feb 2010 marked the end of one, if not the best years of my life. A whole year of me and my girls alone in the newly created house of burning bras. A year of steadily declining domestication into something resembling girls-only-feminist living, it's been bloody brilliant.

Now don't get me wrong we started off with good intentions, at least I did. The house was all shiny and new and exactly the way I wanted it. I hung my paintings everywhere (even the baaadddd ones), I strategically piled books on every available surface, I kept the chess pieces polished and I made the beds every darn day. I even kept the washing low enough to shut the laundry basket lid. But as the months passed by and my time was squeezed in so many directions it occured to me that the house did not have to be perfect, if anything it kept a certain charm when it was a bit messy.

So we let it all fall into a state of neglected bliss. I felt that washing up could wait a few days, no need to iron - I never have and there was no need to stress the washing machine out more than twice a week. The girls loved the new relaxed attutude which allowed them to leave their rooms as messy as they liked so long as they shut their doors and I loved the fact it was my house and I could do whatever the hell I wanted because there was no one to gainsay me. I could starfish on the bed all night, leave the sheets on until they walked by themselves from the room begging to meet some soap and water. When the girls were at their dads I could eat crisp sarnies for dinner and watch sex and the city for hours at a time and not leave the house for days if I didn't want to. I had no one to answer to.

And then in the midst of all this relaxed living the three of us found a new sort of girly solidarity together. A solidarity we would never have found with a man around. We dragged the matresses downstairs and camped in the livingroom for entire weekends - leaving only for food and toilet breaks. On half terms we stayed in bed till the afternoons, reading and watching Disney movies, we felt it was reasonable to spend a significant chunk of our food budget on chocolate and cakes, we left our hair stuff wherever we felt like, we left shoes in piles everywhere and flung clothes wherever we darn wanted... and we painted all the walls pink. It was us girls against the world, a year of perfect girly bliss that I wouldn't swap for anything.

Now despite being a grown up and therefore knowing that all things must change at some point I found myself insisting right up until a month ago that no way, no never would I EVER live with anyone else i.e. a MAN again. No way would I allow someone to come in a criticise my new system of girly squalor... no bloody way...

Hmm famous last words and all that. Whilst I was insisting that all was well with me and the boyf living in our own houses (i.e. me continuing to do exactly as I darn pleased) he, unbeknownst to me was mounting his own offensive to get us under the same roof. He thinks that now, after the fact I don't realise how he planned it all and put it in place, but I'm wise to his plotting.

It went kind of like this... firstly he charmed the children with gourmet jelly beans and Haribos, then he started washing up constantly (I loathe washing up), then he started cooking dinner for me and the girls night after night (I hate cooking and so do the girls - mine at least). He made sure the heating was on when I got home from work (I really dislike coming home to a cold house), he went shopping for all the boring stuff I forget, like shower gel and black bags and he never once complained.

He took our girly living in his stride.

He complimented the pink walls, encouraged the mess, helped us drag the matresses downstairs, got us slankets to snuggle up in for our disney movies, made us smoothies and didn't even suggest we should own an iron.

And throughout all this slowly but surely something started to dawn on me. It's not the living with someone that's the problem, it's WHO you end up living with. The boyf, strange as it still is for me to accept fits into our girls-only house. He fits becuase he does not try and change who or what the house of burning bras has become. He accepts it as it is, shrugs his shoulders, picks up our pants, washes up our chocolate crusted plates and leaves our hairbrushes, trailing hair and all wherever he finds them.

I still do exactly as I darn please, the girls still leave their rooms as messy as they like, we still have five hour Glee sessions and I still forget the washing up liquid - he just buys more.

You can't ask for any more in a man than that can you?