Music group

One of the tricky things about being a father in a patriarchal society like ours, is that you end up missing a lot of the fun stuff that goes with being a new parent. Every week, Johanna and Kirin are at one activity or another - from the 'Mummy and Me' yoga classes (very north London media types) to walks through Hampstead Heath and tea with other yummy mummies and babies in the neighbourhood (hi everyone).

On Thursdays, it's the music group. This is one of those great intitiatives funded by the government as part of the SureStart programme. A group of mothers get together to sing songs, dance, tap on tambourines and drums and get their kids generally into music.

Having heard so much about this weekly event, I decided to work at home last week and spent my lunch hour with a lot of mothers and their cute little kids. Unfortunately, on this occasion, our little kid wasn't that happy about the whole experience. Kirin seemed more content to stick the drum stick and mini-maracas in his mouth than to shake his booty. Still, he offered us a couple of nice pics.