Spinning Plates with Sophie Ellis-Bextor - Episode 13: The Yorkshire Shepherdess / Amanda Owen

Episode Date: November 2, 2020

‘Yay! Someone with more children than me! I spoke to brilliant mother of 9 Amanda Owen aka the Yorkshire Shepherdess who appears on TV sharing her life as a hill farmer whilst raising her glorious family. We met up when she was in London to talk to her publisher about her 4th book. We spoke about how she tends to book the tooth fairy for a job lot, how she prefers dry stone walling with her children to doing jigsaws with them, and she also described her perfect birth - number 8 - on her own, in front of a coal fire at midnight. Inspiring and brave. I loved talking to Amanda and am excited to share our conversation with you. Enjoy! Xx Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, I'm Sophia Lispector and welcome to Spinning Plates, the podcast where I speak to busy working women who also happen to be mothers about how they make it work. I'm a singer and I've released seven albums in between having my five sons aged 16 months to 16 years, so I spin a few plates myself. Being a mother can be the most amazing thing, but can also be hard to find time for yourself and your own ambitions. I want to be a bit nosy and see how other people balance everything. Welcome to Spinning Plates. Hello, welcome, welcome, welcome to another episode of Spinning Plates. Happy Halloween. Did you do anything spooky uh we decided to have a halloween kitchen disco around here which was pretty fun um got the old box of halloween stuff out of the

attic uh one of the few things where you pull it out the attic and it's got cobwebs on you just sort of leave them on makes it a little more spooky um and actually it was really fun just thinking about halloween and being a bit out of yourself for a minute and thinking about scary songs that have got good memories um i've been thinking so much this year about how nostalgia has played such a big part when it comes to what i'm listening to i've sort of been going back and listening to stuff i like when i was a kid and things i've got happy memories and i think it's because this year if you hear new music it's hard to make new memories. You know, like if you've got like, I don't know, let's say a sound of a summer, it'll remind you of festivals you went to that summer or a really brilliant party or a day out with mates or, you know, clubbing in your summer holidays or something.

But this year, new music just has the soundtrack, is the soundtrack to exactly the same thing we've been doing for months now. And I think that's why we'd all been looking backwards and thinking, but that song reminds me of that time in my life and that's better. So yes, with Halloween, you know, I've had some brilliant times going to Halloween parties and singing these spooky songs. So that's been really fun. And my podcast guest this week is someone, wow, I finally found somebody with more kids than me. It's funny. I don't know if you've noticed. Probably not.

It's probably me only noticing this kind of thing. That everybody I've spoken to has had sort of one, two, I think maximum three children, I think. And now suddenly I have just spoken to someone, Amanda Owens, also known as the Yorkshire Shepherdess, who has one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, nine kids. Just take a minute to absorb that. I mean, she's very generous when we spoke because she sort of speaks to me as if I am someone who has the same number of kids. I don't.

I have pretty much half what she has. It's funny because when you have a lot of children, people tend to say, oh, once you go past three, it's just the same, or you don't notice past four. I think that's not true. I've noticed every single one of my infants in terms of, you know, feeling literally like more people and literally like more madness to deal with. So I don't know if I quite agree with that so lord knows what it's like in a household with nine but hey she has the freedom of the farm which I think is such a wonderful environment for kids and it was nice to speak to because she was very

honest about the fact that you know she doesn't get down on hands and knees and do jigsaw puzzles with the kids but she'll take them out horse riding or dry stone walling or, you know, checking in on all the wildlife on the farm. And they've all got chores. They've all got jobs. So it sounds pretty hardworking, pretty wholesome, pretty honest. And I really liked Amanda. She was in London to talk to her publisher about her fourth book because not only is she running a farm and raising nine kids,

she's also written three books, which is pretty impressive. Now doing her fourth. And she has a TV programme that documents their life up in Yorkshire. So it was lovely to meet her. And thanks to Amanda for coming to see me and coming to the Big Smoke to chat. Yes, I will leave it. I mean, you know, embarrassingly, I did have tea. Of course, we both love our cups of tea.

But I did not have Yorkshire brew. So apologies for that, Amanda. She was too polite to say anything if that was an issue. Anyway, I'm going to go and have my customary cup of tea. Nice to see you again. Thanks for lending me your ears. And see you on the other side. This is a crazy one.

crazy one. Well, as you probably know, this podcast is called Spinning Plates because for me, that's the sort of analogy that best feels how I feel when I've got loads of things going on. Do you think you feel the same way? Yeah, I'm spinning plates, dropping them. There's a few go heading off in all different directions, but do I care? What's really exciting for me is that you're the first person I've spoke to who's got more kids than me. Oh, that's my cat about to have a fight. Is that fight mode?

Yeah, they're brother and sister and they hate each other. Go out with her. She's just doesn't, I've got two boys and a girl and the girl cat just does not get on with the guys. And has that always been the case? Yeah, she's really standoffish. She's a really anti-social cat.

Yeah, because, what was I going to say? I guess that's a bit like kids as well, because everyone always assumes, oh, they're just like peas in a pod. Are you kidding? No, well, I was going to say, you would know about the spectrum of different personalities. I remember when I had my, I think my third baby, and someone said to me,

well, after that, you'll basically get repeats of the same character traits because it's not possible to have more than three different things. Rubbish. And I was like, what are you talking about? Absolutely. That is the biggest load of rubbish. How did you politely answer that one? Well, I think, this has occurred to me loads of times,

I think parenthood and kids and all those sorts of things, it's one of the most personal things. It incredibly bespoke and yet there are loads of comments that people feel they can freely give that are actually about something very personal that unless you go and live around that person's house you're not going to know about it and I think there's just that comment's probably just one of billions of comments that I receive all the time about assumptions people make about the sort of house I have or the sort of kids I have or the way it must be having all of the same gender or anything. And you just get used to the fact that

unless people actually know my children, they're not going to really know what goes on. Well, I mean, I feel like, in a way, I feel like I've maybe almost sort of put that one to rights because with doing the television programme, the reality, of course, everyone... The first thing that people say to me now is i feel like i know you they don't but you know they've kind of got

that window on our lives yeah well they have and and and actually it's it probably also kind of helps you relax about your own chaos because i think especially this year more significantly than other loads of people have sort of opened their homes up a lot more haven't we like people are working at home and all this and through social media and mostly it seems people are sort of breathing a collective sigh of relief that actually we're all just doing what we can and just well exactly it is it does feel like a little bit of responsibility as well to to kind of be what you say you are i mean you know once you have the cameras in or a photographer or whatever it's very easy to slip into the you know trying to um tidy up around the edges and make everything just so but there's a limit there is a limit as to how much stuff you

can actually chuck through the other door or shuff in dress safe or hide behind the cushion yeah we you know um we are as we are and it's it's kind of important that you are genuine and what you say that you are yeah and I think if you're doing something like a tv program there's only so long you could carry continue any sort of pretense anyway like that would just be like unsustainable so exactly and i like i like the fact that that there is that interest and like what you see is what you get yeah you know if you bring if you bring one of those sort of uh fisheye lens cameras into our living room and you get you get the shot you just do not know what you're gonna get you know there'll be kids lounging about bogs goodness knows what, odd socks, big pants.

We're home to a few pairs of big pants ourselves, aren't we? Yeah, so yeah, I guess it does give you more of a relaxed attitude. It's kind of the opposite, I suppose, of what people might think. They'll say, oh, you must be run ragged, you know. But I guess things sort of level out at a certain stage and you kind of become more accepting, I think, as you go along. Do you think that happens from having a big family then? Definitely. I remember, and Raven reminds me of, you know, how when it came to clothes and dressing, you know,

everything would be just so. And standards kind of slip a little bit. And I'm kind of quite happy with that, really, because it's kind of like not necessarily about the appearance. It's about the children and what they're comfiest in and, you know, reflecting their characters and what they want. I was going to say, because also as they get older, I mean, we're talking about, you're the first person I've spoken to

who has more kids than me because I have five children which is relatively an anomaly I don't have a lot of friends who have five kids in fact I've only got one friend that has as many as me I don't know anyone with six but you have nine so you've done like almost double the amount of children and whenever people say to me oh I don't know you know because frequently I'm sure you must get this, like, hourly. See people say, oh, I don't know how you do it. I find it hard enough with two or with three or whatever or with one. And I always say it's sort of more of the same, really.

It really is. Yeah. It really is. I feel that you do kind of sort of hit a level where pretty much the chaos levels couldn't become any more chaotic and you're just you're just there you know and people will say did you always plan a big family no not at all no me neither no it wasn't it wasn't it wasn't a thing it just kind of it sounds ridiculous they just kind of happened but you kind of have to have the kind of life that allows it yeah whatever that life is

I would imagine there are enormous differences in our parenting techniques just due to the fact that we live in such different places yeah you maybe will have to I suppose keep an eye on them in in more of a way than I do. I'm very sort of relaxed, free range, because they've got space and room. But that's not taking anything away from here and where you live. But all I mean is, my children know their patch like yours will know this patch.

Oh, yeah, yeah. No, no, I don't take any offence at that. I think you're completely right. And also, you know the life that you know I was I grew up in a city yeah so for me raising kids in the city in London made complete sense to me it's where I grew up and I I'm fine with that but then every once in a while I'll take them to the countryside and I'll suddenly feel really selfish because I think kids make a lot of sense in open spaces it suits their instincts and I think kids make a lot of sense in open spaces. It suits their instincts. And I think the idea of growing up on a farm, whilst I'm sure the reality of it is at some points it's incredibly gruelling and dependent on all these factors

like weather and getting heating and you haven't got something close by where you can go and nip and grab whatever you need to grab in the middle of the night or whatever, but you've also got so much that's just so locked into nature and your surroundings. It's kind of six and two threes, though, because people could also level up me and say, well, you know, they're not living in the real world. Is that what people say?

Well, firstly, when you said six and two threes, my brain had to actually work out that they were both the same. I'm a bit sleep-deprived today. People do. People do. They will deprived today. Seriously, people do. People do. They will say, you know, you're living in some sort of rural utopia. That isn't the real world.

What a ridiculous thing to say. Well, again, I would say, well, you know, I think a farm is a brilliant place for the children to grow up. But they are getting reality, and they aren't cut off from this world. I'm so shocked anyone would say that. Oh, you'd be surprised. It's the opposite. I would have thought that a farm is a place where you actually have to properly get out there,

all weathers, there's jobs that just need to happen, there's momentum that farmers completely depend on. But how many people will say to me, yes, but what do you do about the basic things that you need to survive in modern day life? And I'll be like oh what's that then a mobile signal you haven't got a mobile signal and you've got rubbish internet how can you cope with that and I will say well you know what we live in a place where the water comes from the spring and it comes from um high up on the moor side there and sometimes you turn the

tap on and no water will come out and then you go with a shovel and find out where the frog is in the pipe sometimes the electricity doesn't work those are the basics yeah those are the basics not the internet so it's kind of like the thing people's ideas have gone skew if about what you actually actually need yeah i'm looking like kind of in disbelief over here because to me that as you said that is the graft and that is understanding the correlation of you basically get a kind of microcosm of of life in that because everything is dependent on everything else and it's all the basics of of life isn't it well exactly they are getting really good life lessons that they can translate and take to any other life wherever that should be whether it's whether it's in the countryside whether it's in the city because people say you know oh um they're not growing up in the real

world um they'll never be able to cope with real life but they're actually learning lessons where we are that that will set them up really good to be people who are hands-on and people who've got a degree of common sense and can do things through their sense of being independent you see yeah absolutely and so when with each increasing member in your brood do they are they do you find the independence sort of strikes quicker yeah definitely definitely by the time um we got to nancy number nine um you know she was using a knife knife and fork and feeding herself and i think it was with anis she must be number seven i think number seven i remember because of course we're all the children have bicycles and they're always

bicycles that somebody's had in their garage or shed and they've gone a little bit rusty and then they've come to our house recycled cycles if you see what I mean and I remember watching Annie's come past the house on the two-wheel bicycle that had no stabilizers on and thinking my goodness no one actually taught her to ride a bike she does when did she learn to do that but of course the brothers and sisters you see oh that do you ever find it where you sort of step back and just can overhear them teaching the little one something? Well exactly yeah it's a good feeling. Yeah it's lovely. It is a great feeling. You might think that it means that you miss out on the milestones but I don't think it's that at all.

It's that kind of and it's not that the milestones don't matter. It's just that it's kind of more of a gradual kind of and it's not that the milestones don't matter it's just that it's kind of more of a a gradual kind of a thing you know you don't I don't know you know for some parents they'll be able to tell you the exact age that they walked talked did whatever I can't do that well to be honest if my kids say to me what was my first word I usually just say like bus or duck because I can't remember just make it up I'm so glad somebody else does that yeah I'm saying I mean literally if things have got so sort of uh bad at our house that we have sort of like an accumulated sort of um en masse visit of the tooth fairy because it's like put it under your pillow every night until the tooth fairy can actually be bothered to come to their house it's a very

good idea well that's a tooth fairy she's like she's on like this is means business like okay she's got her extra big bag exactly and when the children are little because i've got various ones that have um birthdays in the summer we would also have birthday en masse as well i was going to say your birthday sort of spread out throughout the year they tend to they tend to bunch up through the through the through the summer so you have to make out that what you like but but basically whilst they're little and they don't know what day the birthday is it makes absolute sense to just cram them all in yeah no i'm all for that kind of thing people will be like mortified and be like oh but what about their special day but you know what i think there's a lot of things because so many things in society is very regulated and everything's got a guideline

and i think sometimes in a big family or in families in general actually that the sort of ability for you to sort of carve out your own narrative and like the idea of the big ones looking out for the little ones like the other night and some of it almost becomes like taboo about to talk about like the other night um my when you've got a big range of agents hard to find things they can all do together so i think the 11 year old and eight year old watching a movie the rating is a 12 because the 11 year old had seen it before he could tell the eight year old when he needed to stop and then when the four year old came to watch i said did you like that film that's a bit grown up as you went don't worry when they did this bit and that bit they fast-forwarded it so i didn't see anything

and it's like you know they do sort of like start to look out for each other that's good and that's how things used to be yeah that's how things used to be you know particularly with with you know um village schools and all the rest of it there would be um rather than there being 30 or 45 or six year olds in a class there would be a real age range and things have changed now where it's almost frowned upon that yeah I think you're right actually did you grow up like that were you well no i mean i come from a town i come from from um hoodersfield so a very um very typical suburban childhood so the countryside was you know and uh it's something that i a place that i dreamed of a place that i could see out of my window,

but I didn't grow up there. Did you have a big family? No, not at all. What about you? I'm an only child from my mum and dad. And then after they both remarried, I've got a brother and sister on my mum's side and another two sisters and a brother on my dad's side. So I'm now one of six or one of four or one of three. It can be whatever you like whenever you want but it did mean i always had a baby on the hip from about eight yes well i mean it um it was kind of for me

having a big family obviously meet the right man and also be a place in your life and an actual physical location that lent itself yeah as well i didn't actually share with you this before but my stepdad was from Huddersfield so my brother and sister are actually half Huddersfield so yeah we do have that connection I've been to Huddersfield many times yeah but my mum's house has got a Huddersfield plaque outside of it yes the house is called Huddersfield yeah I always I always kind of struggle when it when it comes to to mention Huddersfield as to as to saying so much about it I mean I loved um living there I had a great childhood but I always dreamed of you know I always reckoned there was two ways you could go

when you were in Huddersfield you could either go for 10 minutes and be right in the middle of town and you know busy busy busy or 10 minutes the other way and you could be out on the moors and that's the way that I wanted to go I'd go there on my bicycle I love the countryside so has that been something that's always resonated with you for as long as you can remember? Always. I didn't kind of read into it, you know. I didn't know that that was a thing, you know.

You know, it was pretty much when I got into my teens and the talk was all about careers and what you want to do in life, that it became more of a thing that I recognized so so did you have to seek out for yourself how that would turn into a livelihood absolutely absolutely I mean the signs were all there I mean I was always a reader I love reading and um the television of course I know this sounds very on topic at the moment but I used to watch all creatures great and small James Herriot loved those books and watched the tv program and for me that was the dream

and in my mind I thought that kind of Yorkshire that I was seeing reading about and seeing on the television I thought well that it was out of my reach I say, because it wasn't my Yorkshire at all, but somehow, and I think it's fate, I found myself there. Yeah, and does it seem... Do you remember feeling like when you started to... Oh, it was only recently, it was only recently that it actually kind of really hit home that I feel like I've almost come full circle, really, from seeing it on the television

and reading the books to actually living where I do and being at living at one of the places that actually features in one of the real Alf Wright James Herrick's books really oh that's a nice yeah but the thing is it's like again, again, it sort of takes time. If you imagine me as a teenager in Huddersfield Library, sort of going through the bookshelf, sort of knowing what I liked and enjoying the books on the countryside, animals, farming, all the rest of it, and kind of grasping at straws, knowing that I'd been told that I wasn't academic

enough to be a vet which of course was the immediate thing that I thought I wanted to be and kind of sort of looking for the next thing picking up a book that was called Hill Shepherd and it was a picture book and seeing these photographs of shepherds at work in Yorkshire Dales and in the Lake District and sort of thinking my god I didn't realize that that life still existed and these places still existed and sort of setting me off on the road to becoming a hill shepherd which I know I don't look like one of those today but I am um you left your pitchfork at the door i did have the mask on with the shit with the sheep on you did it's true but but if you again fast forward um well 30 years that very same book unbeknown to me i got a got a copy of it um online and got it sent to the house

i go through that book and i find a picture of my husband in it. Really? Yeah. So my husband is in that book that I was looking at as a teenager, trying to sort of find my way and sort of, you know, tick all the boxes and sort of find that place that I dreamed of going, but I didn't know how to get there. And he's there in the book.

Wow, that's amazing. When did you discover that? When you looked back? Yeah, yes. And it was like, it was seriously, it was just like, because the book must have been about 1988 that that book came out, and he was in it. That's amazing. So people talk about, you know, books

and how they can play a big part in your life. Well, there's all sorts of things that resonate. And, you know, when you talk about, yeah, the books and what you saw on TV and even just how you felt when you went out on your bike and found yourself on the moors, I think, you know, it's lovely that it managed to become something that's so massively featured in your life and who you are. I know. But you see, again, that that kind of gives me

a perspective when it comes to the children as well in that they're very individual characters there's nine of them but they are not like peas in a pod around our place there is a word they say ken speckled which is a kind of a sweet little saying but it means that basically they're not so ken speckled it means that they're not alike at all. They're very different. So feature-wise, you know, I've got dark-haired ones, blonde ones, ginger ones, olive-skinned ones, fair ones. But, and also different physical builds,

but also just different personalities. We're, you know, some of them are academic, love for school, some are mortal, they hate it. And, you know, I try to to treat them all fairly and in exactly the same manner but there are certain times when one of them maybe needs a bit more support and it's yeah I guess my job is to recognize who that is and be there for them at that moment you'll do the same you kind of have to sort of sort of tune in but I've noticed that as the family's got bigger in a way they kind of look to me less and look to their older siblings I was going to ask you that yeah if you notice that it's sort of does that sometimes feel partly quite nice that the emphasis isn't always on you as

mum but also sometimes a bit like oh I've encouraged them to you know yeah well i did i it isn't actually that moment that does that i think it was one of the children going to school um for the first time and literally just waving to me all the other children were sort of clinging to parents legs and and mine are just gone just yeah i know you know i think i think in in realistically speaking when it comes to life lessons they're the best life lessons i'm sure yeah they are because the alternative that thing where they do cling and have to be peeled off you like velcro it's really tough isn't it you feel so guilty and that awful sort of lump in your throat of like, you know you've got to do it, you've got to put it in school and do all these things,

but you just feel like, oh God, I feel like the worst person ever, you know? Well, I mean, you always have those moments. You always, always are going to have those moments. It's not a bed of roses, is it? No, it's really not. And I think sometimes I feel like from having a big family, my kids get so much from it. I love that it's quite a defining thing, I think, if feel like from having a big family my kids get so much from it I love it's quite a defining thing I think if you grow up in a big household um but it also means

sometimes I know that when my eldest when he was 14 and I told him I was having my fifth baby he was quite upset on the day was he yeah and he said oh he said it's just that there's only two of you and now there's going to be so many of us and he just felt really sad that I was sort of diluting myself again is how he saw it at the time and I had to really give him loads of extra comfort to reassure him that he was it was going to be the same between us really yeah yeah I mean I mean you come up against all kinds of issues you could never ever have anticipated and i mean we're not like the waltons you know the dynamics are always changing is anyone like the waltons i doubt it i don't think so but you know the dynamics change yeah i guess they were with with your breed as well

that you know you will have two that that really for a while really thick really get on together and then they'll pull apart a little bit as one of them maybe matures a bit more yeah but generally I can absolutely categorically say that when it comes down to it they are really all on each other's side and watching each other's back yeah I think it's also something that I mean i'm sure every household does this anyway but i think you really have to encourage that as well like in in our house i'm always that's one thing i'm really firm about is that look the world will make all sorts of judgments some of them will lift you up some things will be really hard for you but here has to be a place where within our walls you can act how you act and be yourself and no one's gonna say you're stupid or that's ridiculous or absolutely you know it's got to say you're stupid or that's ridiculous.

Absolutely. You know, this has got to be a safe environment for you to just stretch yourself out a bit and see what feels good on you. Exactly. Well, that is enormously important for them to be able to express themselves and be themselves. And I feel like I don't feel that detached from feeling like that myself because of where I've come from and where I am now and I say well look I've got my finger in a lot of pies we do a lot of things don't limit yourself but also don't expect other people to be able to do it for you we can help you along but at the end of the day it really is down to you and that with my oldest particularly you know she she she was um very focused on what she wanted to do and and going to university and what grades she needed and she did it i didn't do it i'm really

proud of her but i can't take any credit whatsoever from from from how she is she did it herself that's brilliant yeah and reuben my um well he's an extrovert boy so he'll be he'll be coming up 17 he um is not academic he's slightly dyslexic he really didn't like his school work not an academic bone in his body but not not not um stupid very clever but he had his own aspirations for what he wanted to be. He wanted to do mechanic in engineering. And I was like, right, that's great. Let's sort you out with that.

He wrote letters to the local places that he wanted to work at, if at all possible, and was offered three apprenticeships. Took one, and that's what he's doing now. Oh, that's great so some people might think success university grades not so sure about reuben because he yeah he got his results but that wasn't what he wanted to do it's kind of like you know people can be very judgmental yeah as to what is classed as a success. And for me, a success is a happy child doing whatever they want to do and fulfilling their dreams

and being happy in their world of work, making good decisions that are their decisions, not anyone else's. Yeah, well, it sounds like you had to go through a little bit of that for yourself, really, finding... Well, exactly. Yeah, so you know full well what it felt like to sort of go... I mean, it's funny, because when you were talking about

going into shepherding, it was almost like you were describing, you know full well what it felt like to sort of go... I mean, it's funny, because when you were talking about going into shepherding, it was almost like you were describing, you know, something unobtainable like becoming a pop star. Pretty much, yeah. Did you have any, like... Is there, like, a poster person of, like, a female shepherdess on your wall? Does that exist? No, there wasn't really. Not really.

I mean, there was various ideas. Of course, I suppose... Not, like, a big poster of Bo Peep up there? No, frankly... No, no, not at all. various ideas of course of course i suppose not like big poster bo peep up there no frankly no no not at all but there was there was various people who were in the media at that time that that kind of in a way i suppose inspired me there was a lady called hannah hartswell who you might or might not have heard she was discovered in the dales she was a lady who was living on her own um living living on a farm farming in her own right no running water living very very basically and basically she became she became huge because it was at the very beginning of the old flannel

wall documentary series and um and she became enormous did did all kinds of things traveled all over the world met the queen all the rest of it and again she was one of those people that that she had books and i saw the television series later on in life. And then I got to meet her. I became her friend. Oh, that's lovely. Yeah, exactly. So it's kind of like you sort of,

you feel a certain distance away from these things and then somehow fate dictates, it becomes a bit of a reality. So you met your husband when you were, you were delivering a sheep i had to pick up a sheep i had to pick up a sheep yeah that's where it all started it's all the sheep's fault it's all the sheep's fault i'd made myself i was already independent in my own way i was working as a contract shepherdess and i was milking cows so the place i was milking cows i also had a flock of sheep and they sent me um on a mission to go and pick up a tub a ram from um a farmer way back in Yorkshire because I was in Cumbria at that point

so that's where I met Clive I set off to go pick the tub up and I met Clive and it was kind of like a um a slow burn relationship we became friends first friendship and he's living in the same place where you are now yes yes he was atvensea so it was it was four years between meeting him and getting married ah and he had two children yes he has two older children how old are they were they when you met them yeah they would he was he was already separated from his wife and um robert now farms in his own right literally i think he was at the farm yesterday he broke his leg he will be he was farming about 10 miles

away from where we are so yeah he would have been 11 when we met and Rosie would have been 8 so you were a step mum in a way yeah but I kind of didn't feel like I wanted to sort of step into those shoes.

I would never call myself a step-mum in that respect because that would have felt like I was taking something away from somebody else, you know what I mean? Okay. So I was there. I was Amanda, known as Amanda. I was, you know, because their mum was still a very active role in their upbringing. Oh, yeah.

I have a step-mum and I always call her... She's always been polite to me. I don't call her mother-mum. Family's never straightforward. No, no. She's step-mum in that she's the woman that my dad married and they have my brother and little sisters. Exactly.

But I don't think being a step-mum necessarily means you are trying to say you're another mother. It's the sort of role you find yourself in. Would you say you're motherly, then? I'm motherly. What does that actually mean? Because I don't know if I am motherly. I know that sounds silly.

No, no, I don't think it's silly at all. I think there's lots of ways to interpret it, actually. I totally get what you mean, because I've got some friends that I think are incredibly maternal, and they don't have any children. because I've got some friends that I think are incredibly maternal, and they don't have any children. I also know women that have children that aren't necessarily what you call maternal. And I think I have strength and weakness.

I don't think it's a yes or a no. I don't think it's binary. I think it's a spectrum. And there are some bits where I think, you know, there'll be, like, a difficult conversation I have to have or something I have to problem-solve, and I'll think, I did really well. Am I? You're allowed to do that. And then other times I'll think, I'll actually have to go back and to problem solve and I'll think, I did that really well. I'm like, you're going to do that?

And then other times I'll think, I'll actually have to go back and find them and say, I apologise. I say, I'm sorry, I got that really wrong. I mean, I did a classic, really not very maternal thing last night where I was so, they were all,

I had three of them after bedtime and they were all, they kept kind of bickering and annoying each other and in the end I was like, you're all being horrible and I'm really looking forward to going to bed and my eldest one that was up, was the 11 year old he was horrified

he's like you can't talk to us like that oh yes I can I mean that you're all being so horrible um but I don't think that's particularly like well it's not very maternal I was just exasperated yeah but you get like that and I think that's a good thing because they get into reality I mean sometimes I've sort of I've sort of witnessed that sort of sort of I don't know that smothering icky kind of overpowering motherly I can't be doing with it well yeah and it's just it's just not my way at all it doesn't mean that I'm not loving. It doesn't mean that at all. But I just can't be that. I always think to myself, have I ever got down on my hands and knees and done a jigsaw with the children? No, never.

But what have I done? I've been out. We've been walling together. We've ridden horses together. We swim together. We do all sorts of things together. But it's just my way. And it's also about what your

life is yeah but also I think because you know how you're what sounds like the way you're talking about it that you understand that you know they can find someone else they can do that jigsaw puzzle with but there's things about them that will always just be the thing they did with their mum and that's actually that's completely fine kids I think as the mother you can make it so that you put such a pressure on yourself to be all things to all people and sometimes I remind myself it's fine if they have to ask that person that person that person to solve that exactly my areas I'm good at and then there's other bits other people are good at and that's the trap that you can fall into definitely and I think also you know sometimes

some courage it takes some courage you have to relax It takes some courage. And you have to relax on yourself a bit, don't you? Yeah, you do. Because, you know, for me, you know, the children going out the door and doing things and falling over in muck and doing goodness knows what. That's all part of our life. And I'm happy with that. Yeah. I'm happy with that. You need to be able to cut yourself. I'm happy with that. Yeah, and presumably as well, you need to be able to cut yourself.

Your first thing you loved before all the kids came along was the life that you're actually leading, the farm life and shepherding and all those things that you wanted to do. So you have to be able to retain that selfishness that says that's really important to me. Of course it is. It is. And it is their life and what they live with. But I don't, you know, people will say, oh, you know, you'll be hoping one of them's a farmer.

I'm not actually right bothered what they want to be or do. It doesn't matter to me. It doesn't matter to me. I'm not sort of looking for the golden child that takes over the farm. I don't mind. I don't care. No, I can see that i can i just want

them to be whatever they want to be and i'll say to them you know anything is achievable you can be this this and this and this but you have to do it can you remember what it was like when you had your first baby i mean did you always think i want to be a mum one day or did it just kind of happen i literally didn't know anything whatsoever about babies. I can't tell you how... I'm only laughing because you've had so many. No, but this is really terrible. And I think back, I wrote about it, actually. And honestly, it sounds like a job for social services, this.

But literally, so I have the baby. You see, my idea was, because of being a shepherd and because of working with sheep and cows and horses and livestock in general obviously I'm present when things give birth and I have to help out when required etc that's all part of the job so when I got pregnant I was like yeah this is just a natural process what's the biggie you know just get on with it now of course it all fell um in it was 2001 so it was foot and mouth that was what was going on in the countryside so it was it was pretty much locked down it was pretty much locked down to an entirely different

level of how it is now and we were pretty much cut off on the farm with nobody coming in or out or anything so I was like right well that's absolutely fine I'm expecting a baby it's not a problem I don't need midwives coming out I don't need to be checked I don't I hate these graphs I hate these tick boxes check boxes all the rest of it I'm not doing it so it sounds very much like earth mother to sort of say that I kind of sort of turn my back on all that but it just was practical it was just what what made sense to me so I said right well all this is going on um basically I'll ring up when I think I'm gonna have the baby and a midwife will come out and I'll have a home birth well Well, that didn't go down very well because living where we do, it's two hours to the hospital.

So I was kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place whereby they would say, yeah, we understand that you want to have a home birth, but the fact of the matter is you're a long way from the hospital in case things go wrong. I was like, oh, you know, it'll be fine. Nature. Yeah, you can laugh, can't you? Yeah. you know it'll be fine nature yeah you can laugh can't you yeah so so basically the morning comes and and i'm like oh i'm not feeling too great and i'm sort of i've got these and i'm thinking yeah

i think i think this is this is the time the baby's coming so i i it was it was um april the 12th 2001 i rang up the midwife and said, she must disinfect her wheels before she comes down because I don't want to bring foot and mouth to the farm, et cetera, et cetera. But I think my time's here. And so she came down to the farm and looked at me and said, well, this is amazing. You've only got a couple of hours and there'll be a baby here. You're dilated, you know? And I was like, great. What's all the fuss about, you know and i was like great what's all the fuss about you know yeah okay um but the only thing we didn't know was uh the baby was um not in the right position it was coming face first it was now i'm not quite sure the exact term i think it was ossiput but basically it was called

sunny side up okay so basically the instead of looking up like that and it's a very very painful position for a baby to be in when you're giving birth yes that definitely doesn't sound very comfortable it wasn't it wasn't and it also explained why i wasn't actually having contractions i just had this sort of like backache excruciating so the baby's neck is basically craned backwards yeah oh wow oh wow oh it's green green life head on absolutely so two hours come and go clive was carving a cow at the same time so you can imagine how this is going he's outside carving a cow and he keeps coming back in to have a look at what's going on he was feeding me those like um jelly dinosaurs to give me energy i always remember that shove one in and back out to my cow

anyway it was kind of like competitive birthing if you know what i mean anyway so you and the cow yeah me and the cow so the cow basically carved it had its calf and he come in and he was like well i don't know what you're messing about basically my cow was carved and it's up footed and it sucked and you still haven't done anything yet. Oh, I love a supportive family. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Anyway, basically, of course, baby was stuck. Oh, my goodness. Completely, totally and utterly jammed. So my idea of staying at home and it all being fine turned into a blue lie.

Oh, you poor thing. It must have been terrifying. Yeah. It wasn't good because it was two hours in an ambulance and, of course, because they couldn't monitor baby, I couldn't have any pain was two hours in an ambulance. And of course, because they couldn't monitor the baby, I couldn't have any pain relief. Oh, my goodness.

And what I didn't realise was that when a baby gets stuck like that, your body actually goes into a permanent contraction. So I was writhing and they were holding me down. And my midwife was being travel sick because the ambulance was rocking and rolling on this. If you imagine those lovely Dale's Rosa. So you can imagine, it's like worst nightmare for the first baby. Did you think you were going to survive it? Because actually, when you're in pain like that,

you sometimes go, like, I don't think I can do it. It was horrendous. When I got to the hospital, I remember, Clive set off in a Land Rover to follow the ambulance. He got lost. Two hours later, I turn up at the hospital, and literally they wheel me in and they say, right, we're going to have to do a section,

because the baby, just like cows and calves, if when a cow is calving or if when a yow is lambing, the birth fluids are, like, stained with meconium. Basically, it means that the unborn calf or unborn lamb is stressing because it's basically poo. Yeah. And it stains the birth fluid. That's exactly what was happening to me.

So everything, I knew what was going on because they were like, oh, the baby's in stress. And they had to hold me down to give me an epidural because, of course, I was moving all over and they brought my husband in to hold me down to get the needle in. Oh, my goodness. I know. Wow.

So a week in hospital, Raven was absolutely fine. Did you have a C-section? Yeah, had to have a C-section. You see, that ruined the rest of the idea of having a home birth, of course. Sorry, I was kit course sorry no that's fine that's my life exactly i'm surprised i didn't crawl past the back of you or something like that um no it pretty much that was that put paid to the idea of ever having a home birth again because once you've had a section it's another one of those things oh once you've had a section you

you'll never be able to give birth naturally ever again she says eight babies later so have you had all the others naturally yeah all the others naturally and all the others bar bar one have all appeared either at home or en route to the hospital really oh wow but yeah my first one if you if you were going to say i was going to learn my lesson you would never have said after an experience like that, that I would have had another eight. No, but then I don't, I think there must be something at work when you just want to have another baby. Because I had my first, like nine weeks early, pre-eclampsia. I was rubbish at being pregnant.

I felt rubbish. And I thought, like one of my first questions when I'd had him was just like am I allowed to have another one and then I had the second one kit he was 10 weeks early same thing happened to me again and I was like what the chance is happening again and I just every time I said oh it shouldn't happen again I would be like well I'll go for that then I'll go for that chance that's gonna be all right that's what you have to that if you imagine ideas and even medicine changes I I've gone from injecting myself with blood thinners because everyone's convinced I'm going to die of a blood clot

to actually having to take medicines to make me clot because they think I'm going to bleed to death. So you're like, hang on, they're the opposite things. And you had a premature baby, didn't you? I did. I had another at 31 weeks I had that him at home and I was your second baby yes and I thought I thought that he was dead because I was I was I was at home and literally it was so quick upstairs blood and then baby and there was no sound whatsoever and it was just it the river was in flood, so they couldn't get the ambulance across the river.

I mean, we really, really live out in the sticks. Yeah. And again, it's two hours on the way to hospital, and I remember I was almost in a daze. It felt like it hadn't happened to me. And I was looking across at Ruben, he was three pounds, and they had an oxygen mask and they were kind of

trying to scrunch it up to make it fit his tiny face and then he had a pneumothorax one of his lungs collapsed I know all about that and I got the phone call in the middle of the night to say one of his lungs

has collapsed and then I got another phone call to say his other one had collapsed it's quite scary isn't it it's horrible when you look back on it to say, you know, one of his lungs has collapsed, and then I got another phone call to say his other one had collapsed, and, you know. Yeah, it's quite scary, isn't it? It's horrible when you look back on it, but somehow you kind of sort of, I don't know, put it aside, don't you? Yeah, and I think, well, I don't know if it's the same for you,

but I think that's exactly what happened with my second as well. And I think everybody, I didn't want anyone to feel sorry for us. I didn't want anyone to think of for us I didn't want anyone to think of Kit as a patient so I would always try and put the forward like we've had our baby and he's had this is what's happening at the moment but one day he'll come home and I think there were a couple of wobbly moments where I thought am I being a bit naive here but by and large I think you know I've still like I've had a baby he's here he's lovely so i think i kind of wanted to always set set the tone that i wanted people to say congratulations yes not looking worried you know

exactly with when it comes to practicalities you see the more children you have the more it impacts on on how much you can sort of put into the baby, I suppose, in a way, physically. By the time I got to Nancy, number nine, and she was early as well, and she had to stay in hospital, I had to go, right, you know what? I'm going to come every night when we finish the work on the farm, and I've sorted all the kids out, and I've sorted out everything that I need to do. I will drive 70 miles, by then they'd moved moved where the hospital was I will come sit we'll do feeding all the rest of it express some milk all the rest

of it and then I'll go back home and because and and people were like but but you're not staying at the unit there with her well you know they didn't say it but they probably thought well you know what kind of mother is she I don't know about that i don't know about that well i think you quite i think you do you think that people might be thinking that yeah i think but i think that's probably also our own way of balancing it out because you've got your other eight at home and they need you too exactly and that's when it gets a bit complicated doesn't it it does it really does i mean when i had my second and he was in hospital i the first one i used to go at least twice a day and then when i had kit i only went once a day because i had a four-year-old yeah exactly you've got other

things going on and you have to kind of keep it real and i think the thing is working with livestock and animals you do keep it real yeah well i was going to say do you think you've taken any sort of lead from oh enormous yeah enormously i can honestly i think probably when you're giving birth it's the time that you're closest i suppose to to nature without any interference from anything people have these big aspirations of how they'd like it to be you know whale music the jazz all reality isn't that is it it's like you're not gonna look good or anything like that but I would as time went on I kind of started reading the signs and it was when I watch a when I watch a yow when I watch a sheep and it's gonna lamb obviously it it kind of has a bit of a nesting instinct but we would say oh look she's

panching and panching means to go around and around and around and around and I'd find myself doing that I'd be kind of doing circles kind of like not necessarily uncomfortable but just kind of I don't know what I was doing but it was it was probably something pretty primeval that goes back a very long way. Because a lot of animals take themselves off, don't they? Like cats do that, don't they? Do sheep do the same thing? Yes, they do.

Yes, they do. And you see, because of the way we shepherd and because it's outside and it is back to nature and the majority of our sheep will have one lamb, you don't have to be as physically involved with them i mean out of a thousand sheep on our farm probably somewhere in a reason maybe 20 25 30 will actually physically need helping to give birth the rest of them just do it themselves you can see where i got my idea from here so so you know very much hands off which is good which is which is good so you know people might say oh you know she must be very hard very tough

she's never apart from the first one which was um um a cesarean i've never been in a position or a place to ever have any kind of um pain relief or anything in fact one of your births sounds like it was very much like that sort of, like a you, just like you took yourself in. Oh, number eight, yeah. Yeah. Number eight for me was perfection. And you see, again, I don't know what it is. I think I almost set myself up that I'm looking over my shoulder for people to sort of say, oh, you know, that's selfish or that's whatever.

people to sort of say oh you know that's selfish or that's whatever but i decided on this occasion i was absolutely totally and utterly hacked off with giving birth at the side of the road it is not ideal no matter how nice the road is get people beeping yeah oh people beeping i scrolled someone's picnic once i did actually they were sitting there outside of the road having a picnic and literally doors open it was like yeah this is this is not great oh my god so so yeah it was like right this time I'm gonna stay at home and if at all possible I'm just not gonna bother anybody I'm just gonna get on with it and I got the warning signs which by then I kind of did know got the old sort of load out I don't get contractions okay which is good how common is that I don't know I've never had apparently you've never had contract no i've had all of mine c-sections yeah i've never had i don't know but the thing that i will say is that each one of the babies that someone's actually

seen it fall out or come out or do whatever it did has all said that they've been looking up oh wow so they wonder if it's the shape of my pelvis. That means that I don't get contractions. And because, as I say, Raven was 9 pounds 2, and since then they've got progressively smaller, they don't get stuck anymore. 9 pounds 2 is quite a big baby, isn't it? Yeah, it wasn't good, and she was stuck, you see.

But since then, you know, biggest 9 pounds 2, smallest 3 pounds, and everything in between. But by the time I got to Clemmie, I was like, right, well, if at all possible, I really don't want to have to go to hospital, because by then they'd moved the goalpost yet again. It was two and a half hours to get to the hospital. And I was thinking to myself, well, if I can, I'm just going to get on with it. So that evening, went to bed, couldn't settle.

I'm sort of, you know, unsettled. It's the old sheep thing again, you know, I'm sort of you know unsettled it's the old sheep thing again you know I'm sort of shuffling about came downstairs made myself a classic cup of tea and I thought well I think I just have a hunch that this could be it this could be it could be time so I thought right it's kind of like that moment where it's now or never. I thought, you know, if I ring up, if I ring up, then all hell will break loose. You know, the hospital will be on the phone. They'll try to send a paramedic. I thought, I'm not going to do any of that.

I'm just going to make myself a comfy place. Choked some alcohol on fire. And, yep, I set myself down next to the fire it was midnight and by one o'clock i'd had her that's so me all by yourself yeah that must have been um this might sound sort of i suppose quite intimate but i have a friend who's in the medical profession who'd said look because I hadn't really dared share what I was going to do because nowadays everybody has sort of legal things that they can put it this way a midwife cannot come to me when I'm giving birth she can come to me immediately before she can come to me after but she can't actually come during the process of birth because I'm so far from the hospital,

it cannot be, they cannot, she cannot have that responsibility. If it all went wrong, she would be sued. Oh, my goodness. Exactly. What a strange... It's how we are. It's how society's gone. Oh. It's such a shame.

And I can, in a way, understand it. But no midwife could come to me until after I've given birth. They can come before, they can come after, but during that process, legally, if it all went wrong, I could sue, whatever you want. So that's another reason. Wow. But having a baby on your own like that

must have felt really quite magical and also... It was. I put my hand down and i felt i felt the head and that's when i knew i was on it i knew i was all right because my friend had said you know if there's a hand you're in trouble if there's a foot you're in trouble you've got a head and you're like fine think about all the people there are in the whole world think about how many people there are in the whole world. Think about how many people there are in the whole world. There's a lot of us, isn't there? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

There's a lot of us. And there's a lot of people in the world nowadays that don't have access to medical treatment and all the box-ticking, form-filling, checking and stuff that we have. Now, I know it's like if you go somewhere like India and you see this cacophony of humanity in all forms, you know, driving on the road and there's like a family of seven on that vehicle and there's someone having their beard trimmed by the

side of the road and a cow wandering along you're like this is just happening here all the time yeah simultaneous to everything else that's gone in my life it does make you think differently about the world it does make you feel and it can it can make you rail against it a little bit I was going to say what do you think it is that's that does has built that rebellion in in you well it is i think it's part of where it's part of where i live this kind of little bit of you kind of i don't know it gives you freedom yeah it is this lovely thing and i'd say to anybody who reads the books listen to this podcast or or watches the tv it isn't about me saying do things like this or or this is what you should do because everybody's circumstances are unique to them where they live what their situation is with their family and all the rest of it but it's kind of having the courage

having the courage to to do things your way not feel that you've always got to fit in it can it's it can be so bad to go down the road of competitive parenting yeah or competitive living full stop actually yeah do you think your friends that you knew at school and your family are they were they at all surprised by the route that your life took? No, I think it was rebellion. I have a nasty suspicion that in hindsight, when you look back, you see it as a sort of two fingers up, don't you? You can't rebel by doing the same thing as everybody else. No.

You can't, you know, hey, let's be a goth. Hang on a minute. Everybody else on the bus is a goth. It doesn't kind of stick out, does it? So like, hey, right, well, I'm going to go and be a shepherd. I'm going to live out in the wilds, and I'm going to get myself a sheepdog and a crummy old pickup truck, and I'm going to live in a caravan in a farmyard. It's like, oh, okay, let's see how long that lasts then.

So do you think sometimes the TV programme that you ended up letting people see into your world is a bit of a message to sort of teenage you like yeah here you go yeah why not there might be girls out there that see it and go that's so cool it's like like I said there's parallels with like rock and roll living the way you've described it but who likes stereotypes yeah and that's the thing isn't it so people say oh you know stereotype okay so shepherd what does that encompass, I've got hands like shovels, you can kind of tell. This is not true. Not true. You've got a better manicure than me.

I've painted over. I've painted over the groggy bit. But you see what I mean? Stereotypes really irritate, don't they? They're really great. I mean, it's like saying, people say, well, are you a feminist? Well, no, I love men and all the rest of it, but I'm myself. I do my thing.

Small, small. I would say feminists do love men too yeah but you know i'm i'm not sort of burn your bra could you imagine what would happen it it it it's um it's kind of i suppose not wanting to be whatever someone expects you to be and kind of wearing a lot of different hats hmm i've always says there's not not not much in between it's always it's like full-on it's either totally and utterly dreadfully scruffy leggings with hauling and scruffed up clothes and ripped up coat and bobble hat on round farm or it's really making an effort and being out and about there's not much in between it's always kind of like I suppose to the to the extreme and I guess it's because because you don't like

people to think they know who you are because of what you do or because of little snippets they've got of you yeah well I totally understand that actually it's funny because um I have a tattoo on my arm and it says family and sometimes it's it's been criticized and I don't mind at all but I remember once saying to Richard my husband like you know oh people aren't always that nice about it and he's like you know what he's the thing about it that's always really cool is that it sort of suggests that maybe people don't know everything about you and I thought I really love that I think that's a really special thing if you feel like you've kind of got a little part of yourself that's kind of just yours to keep really I think that's a nice feeling exactly I mean it's it's it again we're going back to to to stereotypes what people think so I I live out in the countryside. I live out in the sticks.

And, you know, it's a farming community. It's a rural community. But sometimes you have to laugh because, you know, you will read something in the newspaper, Daily Mail or whatever, whereby some poor woman has been thrown out of a cafe for breastfeeding a baby or something like that and I think that's incredible because that's in supposedly you know an urban environment where everyone's you know pretty woke chilled out civilized everybody you know doesn't bat an eyelid at anything and yet for the last 15 years or whatever i've been going around feeding babies basically with my tit out and nobody's even noticed because it's the opposite farmers people from the countryside they absolutely know that the best way to nourish a baby to bring a baby up is

to breastfeed that's all you can i have to i'm always really surprised there's any nastiness about breastfeeding. Yeah, it's weird, isn't it? Yeah. So it's like, right, okay, so in this full-on sort of woke society, someone might actually think,

oh, God, look at that. We don't want to see that. But actually, at the auction mart, where the average age of a farmer's predominantly, you know, getting on a bit,

over 60 or whatever, and everyone's dressed from head to foot in waterproofs, nobody bats an eyelid at having a baby plugged in. yeah it's the opposite way to keep them quiet as well too right I mean it's all about laziness at the end of the day I mean can you imagine me ever sterilizing anything no I stopped that after I think maybe the second baby and someone bought me a sterilizer I was like what what was it the same for you was there a tipping point with um

with having babies because i've realized after i had my third people would still say do you think you'll have another one and after my fourth they would say are you done yet and i wonder are they still saying that yeah no i had to get that it just definitely shifted from oh might you have another one to please tell me you're done is it the same for you people so people sort of kind of almost say things that I think they wouldn't dare say to other people with a smaller family yeah there's definitely things that get said that yeah what kind of thing do you do you think of when you say that well I you know they they obviously make big assumptions don't they as to

i suppose you could say plan wise there never was a plan there was definitely never ever never any family planning at all so i don't know but if i did know i probably wouldn't tell the person who was asking me no and does um clive has he sort of always been in tandem with you like Richard often pretends that he's a sort of hapless victim that the family sort of grew Yeah, I think Clive plays the same card as well he just kind of nods in the right place

and gets on with it but again it's that sort of idea again that oh it's a really new thing for men to be hands on and help and all the rest of it and be really sort of good at changing but it's been going on for ages and Clive doesn't sort of wear it as a a badge just gets on with it you just do whatever needs doing you know if I'm out doing something he'll do what needs doing vice versa do you think most people have any kind of idea of how

much hard work it is running a farm and writing books as well. That's the thing that's really amazing. How did you write the books? I'm going to go tell my editor tomorrow that I haven't quite written as much of my next book as I should have done. So is this book number four? That's impressive. It's really difficult. But do you not think that pressure makes things happen? Definitely.

A deadline is what I need. That's exactly the thing. If someone said said hey um write a book do it in your own time and just you know never do it never do it if someone says right we need the book by Christmas they'll get it come hell or high water have you ever thought about doing fiction is your new book fiction no no no it's more I suppose it's more it's like photograph based lifestyle based whatever is it kind of makes me feel a bit awkward saying lifestyle because it's like but it's kind of to do with I suppose um the kind of life we lead with the children and yeah photograph based really with a few life hacks and bits and pieces that's nice

I mean because I know you said that they know some people can be judgmental about things but I think by and large people love the idea of a happy, bustling home. And even people that haven't wanted for themselves to have lots of children. It used to be nostalgia, but now it's not. It's changed. I think you probably are aware of that as well. With this year, it's definitely sort of got people's focus changed. Definitely. got people's focus changed definitely once upon a time people would look at uh uh the farm and me and clive and the children and it'd be predominantly maybe your older people looking back nostalgically

on their childhoods and what had come before but now actually it's actually younger generation which is quite exciting really yeah can i say sort of like a return to innocence almost and being at one with like what's actually going on in seasons yes yeah and i mean it's kind of like you know it's become quite fashionable hasn't it you know seasonality and sort of provenance and all the rest of it and it sort of ticks all the boxes with what we're looking for, environment, landscape, all those things. But it's not something new. It's something that's always been there and always was there. It's just at some point, not that long ago, the emphasis changed.

It was always more, more, more. It was consumerism. And things are just going back. Yeah, I agree, actually. I think people as well like when they're as consumers people want to be more in touch with you know buying what's in season knowing what's made in this country you know the people behind the business that kind of thing I feel like that has become more of a thing I mean you mentioned this year when I was making your tea

before we were talking a little bit about um how tricky homeschooling was for I think for both of us did you find it just impossible with the range of ages as well oh I must admit I didn't really try okay that's fine people kept people did keep asking me I said oh how's the homeschooling coming on then and I was honest I said it isn't no I was exactly it isn't I did try though I got the box files and everything I was like right oh you went one step further than me. We kind of logged on, looked at it and groaned. It was like that point when one of the children was like trying to add up letters. And I was like, you can't even add up letters. You can only give up.

But again, the technology thing. People will say, oh, well, living where you do, you must be, you know. It's great not to see their kids with technology we love that no technology we hate technology it's the end of the world technology is terrible wrong technology is great it's just it's just how it is in your life where you have it and i am really lucky to basically be able to absolutely i suppose control it once you're out the door it didn't work so therefore when you're in the house you can get online you can you can go global but once you're out that door it's gone that is pretty ideal isn't it it is because i can't say to the children no

technology for you you're not having a phone you're not you're not going to use a computer all the rest of it it's all bad because i couldn't have achieved the things that i've got to do without it i couldn't send manuscripts backwards and forwards i couldn't do social media all the rest of it that couldn't happen you can't run a business without it so it'd be really sort of hypocritical for me to go no technology for you kids it's just it's just when it starts to take over your life that's a problem yeah i know i think um i think that's true i think yeah i don't see it as a bad thing either i think also the kids are so dexterous with a lot of it and actually if you let them have the opportunity of doing what they want to do they they'll only really keep doing it if it's something that they really enjoy and then they can make it something creative

so like my 11 year old likes making like stop frame animations this kind of thing and making like his little films but the next one down ray he'd rather be reading a book and that's just his his own choice exactly and that's it the minute you ban something you just make it quite yeah it's much more seductive isn't it exactly so so again technology it's wonderful it can it i mean it will really have made a difference in our lives as to what we what we can do what we can achieve but means the kids can live their life on the farm um live remotely they can ride horses they can swim they can do all that but they can also talk to their friends nice have you got any of them that aren't aren't that outdoorsy or are they all pretty

they're all pretty outdoorsy that's good isn't they're all pretty outdoorsy um some of them read more than the others they're all very different characters um really but they all have their own um chores i don't know how you are with chores with yours, but... Oh, I'm pretty bad. What do you... So do you have, like, a rota system where they've been given different responses? No, I'm not that organised. It's basically, you look after the cows, you do them.

You look after the chickens, you do them. You bring the eggs in, you do that, you do that. You know, that kind of thing. It's all very simple. So they've all got definitely their own responsibility. Yeah, they have to. They have to because, again... That's pretty great.

Again, it... You can't do everything, and it wouldn wouldn't work it wouldn't work if someone was slacking so in order to to sort of keep the ball rolling yeah and i guess also it means that they've got a sense of you know pulling their weight in the family you see that's it a sense of belonging yeah a sense of belonging so so wherever so wherever wherever they go and whatever they do, they've got this sort of tie. We always sit down every day, apart from if someone's away actually doing something, like Raven's at uni at the moment and Clive's sometimes away at the auction or I'm doing something. We reckon that every day we sit down and have a meal together

and everybody discusses what everybody else is doing, where everybody needs to be and what the plans are. And we sit down and we do that. That's so smart. I like that a lot. Because, you know, it's just this conversation. No tech at the table. Yeah, exactly the same phrase, no tech at the table. Sit there, talk to each other about what's going on so you've got a rough idea. Because, of course, you know, the more variables you you have the more potential there is for things to go wrong definitely well yeah my

my analogy for it is always that the all the kids are like their own planets and i feel like i have to keep landing on the planets and just check on how everything's going how the how the ecosystem is and sometimes you'll be like oh i need to tweak it yeah more of this more of that everything's not growing as well as it should. And other times I'm like, oh, this one's growing really well. I'm not having to do very much. Yes. There's always constant tweaks going on.

Constant tweaks. Constant tweaks. Constant tweaks. But I think you do kind of have more of an idea of what is important. Yeah. an idea of what is important yeah i think i think you look at things very differently when you have more children than when you have one you're not looking for the for the same levels of perfection i suppose when i had one child when i had two children you know they probably were dressed up a lot smarter than they are now um on child number eight and child number nine yeah i don't think i was ever too bothered about that but i do sometimes

find with a lot sometimes i think oh it would be nice to be able to be you know have more time one on one with each one i do find that sometimes i i struggle with that a little bit i think mine are on hand-me-downs oh yeah mine are on hand-me-downs. Oh, yeah, mine are on hand-me-downs. I mean more like with time, really. There's a Lego set on the side in here that I was doing with my four-year-old, and it's never the right time to finish it because doing that when there's also a toddler in there, just things like that, or playing a board game.

We never play a board game ever because there's always someone who's too little to be... I never do jigsaws, but I do dry stone walls with them, you see. That's cool. Which is kind of like a jigsaws, but I do dry stone walls with them, you see. That's cool. Which is kind of like a jigsaw. I'll do puzzles with them. I can't build the wall, but I can do a jigsaw puzzle. Yeah, but you just have to make it fit.

To be honest, surely there's similarities in the two. There is. And what about finding your own headspace? Because in a busy house, that is something that's tricky, isn't it? Yeah, that's really hard. I have to write in the middle of the night when everyone's gone to bed oh wow so do you often have hardly any sleep yes I don't need too much sleep thanks I don't think I'm looking too piggy you don't look at all I think what I do is I go quite a few days quite a few days

like on minimal sleep and then have a big sleep okay and you get like a lion and stuff yeah and that's and that's and that seems to work for me but yeah actually I take myself physically away sometimes I will um get in a pickup sometimes I will go down to the shepherd's hut sometimes I will go down to the house I have even been known to go and sit at the moor to write yeah because I have to yeah and if I do that you see I can take myself away from any emails coming in anything and I just go and just take some time out well I think that's what I've always had a bit of a fantasy and I had it particularly during lockdown where when everything got a bit much and I felt like I didn't have anywhere that I could sort of just let let off some steam I had this fantasy

of running there's like a green just opposite from my house and I thought sort of running there and I couldn't never decide if I get there and just sort of scream or just sort of lie flat on my back like collapsed I did wonder for you if having having all of that space around you kind of gives you that sort of it gives you screaming space yeah right there are some tasks that you have to do when you're in the right frame of mind. You can't write in not the right frame of mind. If you try and say, right, I'm going to set aside 30 minutes or an hour, and I'm going to write, it just won't work. You kind of have to feel like you're in that space, like you're in that mood.

And I've found that 20 minutes of being in that mood will get you far further than an hour and a half of staring at the paper not in the right frame of mind because then whatever you write you'll probably delete it anyway yeah I think that's very smart actually so so you you learn as you go along what suits you and how your mind works and that is that's where I'm at kind of at the moment. So it can be difficult. I can go a long time with pretty much... It sounds sort of too writery, too authory to say sort of like writer's block. But in a way, there's just too much going on. Yeah, I think you're allowed to say writer's block if you're a writer.

You've had three books now. I answer to many things. I answer to many things. I answer to many things. So, yeah, I couldn't imagine how it would be to not have that space to just be able to go away. What I was saying about being in the right place to do that job, to be able to write, you need to have your head in the right place. There are some jobs that you can do, and it doesn't matter where your head's at. So if you're going out round your sheep if you're if you're out around your sheep if you're gathering if you're out on the horse if you're whatever you're doing kind of doesn't matter what

frame of mind you're in because you can do that job whatever you're thinking but writing is the one that sort of big bugbear that that it is imperative thing that you're okay but having having that split of being able to get away and do other things means that it gives you that bit of space well i think yeah i think that's so impressive that you've done that not once or twice but three times already and now you're in the midst of your fourth book i mean with that and running the farm and raising the family, what do you think Amanda before kids would think of you now? She couldn't even envisage being here.

She couldn't. You couldn't. They say the truth is stranger than fiction, I suppose. And I would never, ever have put myself here. But I absolutely know that it is all to do with ravensy and where I live that has given me, I suppose, that freedom to be myself. And that's what I,

I suppose in a way, if I was going to say, I feel sorry for today's society and where they find themselves and mental health and all the rest of it, I would say that's probably the one thing that particularly during this year and the pandemic and lockdowns,

that people have needed space and room to breathe, isn't it? It's not even about saying nature just being able to get outside and and be able to sort of feel the weather i just can't imagine for one minute not having that it's it's been so undervalued and maybe this year maybe the tide has changed and maybe people are you know gonna to see it for what it's worth. Well, certainly we've all got more of the significance of what we see out of our window.

Definitely. Lots of people wouldn't call themselves outdoorsy. But you need it, don't you? Yeah, you really need it. And I can see so much of what you talked about is all about, as you say, that need to be allowed to be yourself and have that freedom. Be allowed to be yourself and have that freedom be allowed to be yourself exactly i think maybe in a in an urban situation it's so easy to always be looking over your shoulder and seeing what everybody else is doing and sort of

you know um i suppose comparing is that what you felt like when you were growing up in Huddersfield? Well, of course. You know, somebody's... Somebody, you know, can dance and has got the certificates or do music or learn another language or whatever, and I feel like where I am, I've been able to kind of separate myself from that. Even looking the best on the school run. All that stuff.

You know, not that long ago, a local radio station rang me up and said, Oh, have you heard the news? One of the local schools has put a ban on parents bringing their children to school wearing onesies sounds ridiculous and we're like oh we'd just like to hear what you've got to say about that and i was like i'm not even commenting on that i said for for a start they're taking their kids to school for goodness sake get over it don't matter if you want to take your kids to school in a onesie

i don't care it's so you know it's it's kind of like this idea that people might think, oh, she's old-fashioned and, you know, living the kind of life that you do. It's sort of back to basics. And, yeah, family values and all that. But it kind of also, on the other hand, gives you such a freedom. And that is what I like. That is what I like. And that is what I like that is what I like and that is what I think people people would like for themselves yeah and it sounds like that's what you're encouraging your children to hope so

yeah independence you know particularly now nanny state and all the rest of it kind of greats a bit doesn't it yeah definitely yeah but I think I think you know sometimes it's a literal thing needing to physically move yourself somewhere you feel you have that expression to be yourself and the freedom and sometimes it's actually just about stopping thinking about that in your head I mean it's easier said than done and I think yeah that's one of the beauties of getting older and then raising a new person to try and find the same thing for themselves. I think getting older, I think you're right on that one as well. It's nice, isn't it?

Yeah. I like it. I think so. You just all of a sudden feel, it's not a kind of, I've been there, done it, I know. It's not that. It's kind of like more of a chillness, I suppose. But do you think you're farming till the end of your days? Yeah.

Yeah. Well, doing whatever I'm doing till the end of my days I do you know a bit of this and a bit of that again we're back to the stereotypes you have to be adaptable you have to be adaptable and not stuck in your ways but I think you do embrace the modern and the traditional by you know the the farm life but also with the tv things and that's great you see that makes you appreciate doing the other one makes you appreciate the other one yeah you know it's one awful dreadful day when it's kind of like um a two hat kind of a day or balaclava even i don't know what the plural of balaclava but yes i've got kids that actually don't complain about balaclava don't complain

about wearing balaclavas when when the alternative is like frostbite um yeah you know you have a day like that and i think you have to sort of um get outside feel the weather feel the cold sort of the drip on the end of the nose to appreciate the warmth when you get back in again you kind of need to be there to appreciate the other one. Yeah, I think that's really true. So that's it. So living in the town and from where my roots are gives me appreciation of where I am now. Yeah.

It sounds like you are in a very happy spot now. Thank you. Oh, thank you. So there you have it that was my lovely chat with amanda owen aka yorkshire shepherdess uh mother of nine uh runner of farms writer of books um an all-round lovely woman and i think i thought it was just so lovely to hear and refreshing to speak to someone where their passion their dream that seems so unattainable was you know being growing up in a town like Huddersfield and thinking I want to work um being a shepherdess like that's so cool to me um and inspiring to think that you know for me I suppose the equivalent was you know being at school and

thinking I'd like to sing on stage but um you know obviously that's a very sort of obvious kind of an unobtainable day job when you're growing up but actually you know you don't you forget about all the other jobs you've sort of got to find your own way to and and for Amanda it was being a shepherdess and now she lives that life and works really hard and and I think reaps lots of benefits from it and it did make me think I'm very selfish with my kids in that I raised them in the city because I grew up in the city and I love being in the city but whenever I take them outdoors and they're roaming in the middle of a big green somewhere or climbing a tree or hanging out a wildlife I think oh I've been so selfish children

just make a lot of sense when they've got a bit more space to roam so yes I'll have to try and I don't know rectify the balance a little I might have to go and visit Amanda on her farm and hang out and give my kids some chores then they'll know what hard work is uh anyway thank you so much for um for coming here and and seeing us uh and um yeah I really enjoyed talking to Amanda and I loved all the stories. I mean, how amazing was it when she gave birth to her eighth baby on her own in the middle of the night by the fire?

That's just extraordinary, isn't it? What a thing. That's very special, kind of magical, but also very brave. Anyway, next week. Oh, next week's a good one. I am speaking to Gina Miller miller gina miller is she's sort of like a superhero really uh she's she's poised she's smart she has a very good

sense of right you know what's fair and what's just and right in the world and she's not afraid to fight for it so she you might know her because she took the government to court over the unconstitutional way of going about leaving and initiating Brexit. And so she took them to court and it ended up, you know, being a much, much bigger deal than just purely taking government to court. It actually affected her life, her family, death threats, you know, an overhang of which still is with her to this day. But it has not dampened her spirit and nor should it i found her phenomenal and i'm very excited about sharing our chat with you uh and in the meantime happy november i hope you're enjoying these autumnal days as best we can

and lots of love and i will see you in a week. Thank you.