The Parent Pod - An Exciting New Collaborative Project! | Sparkles and Stretchmarks: UK Mummy & Lifestyle Blog

As much as I love writing and as much as I know it will always be my biggest passion, I've been in the mood for some new challenges lately and so recently, I've taken myself back to my YouTube channel.

I've started to upload regular weekend family vlogs, capturing my everyday life at home with the children - and I try to force myself to be in them too, rather than only focusing on the kids which is the easy thing to do (though they do feature more heavily because lets face it...they're a damn sight cuter!) and I feel like it's helping me to become a little more confident each time I force myself to stand in front of the camera.

And I have also taken another big step - along with some other lovely blog friends of mine, I have decided to launch a brand new channel - a channel by parents, for parents.

The aim is to create a supportive YouTube community for parents with no business agenda (there is no money involved in this channel, its just a group of people coming together to create content and get their voices out there) , just "normal" mums & dads sharing their own personal advice, tips and support on all aspects of life as a parent - from potty training and post natal struggles to handling your child going off to high school and how to tackle talking about drugs, we want to cover all of the bases and make sure that there is relevant content for everyone - no matter what age your children are, no matter what your background - we're a diverse bunch of people and we hope to be able to create a community to support all parents alike.

I'm excited about this project, and I want to make it into something really positive.

And we don't want to just be a channel of people talking at YOU....we want to be a totally open, immersive and involved community - we will regularly be opening up guest vlog slots, asking for new contributors to projects, and setting up monthly "Talking Points" where you can involved...even if you're not a blogger or vlogger yourself, we want to find ways to get EVERYBODY involved in this together.

Our Channel - The Parent Pod - launches on September 1st.

It is run by a core group of people including myself along with Emma from My Pretty Mummy, Aby from You Baby Me Mummy, Bex from The Mummy Adventure, Kay from Mummy B, Hannah from Hi Baby Blog, Pamela from Life With Munchers, Alex from Lamb & Bear, Rachel from Blogging Mummy, Lucinda from Teacher2Mummy, Emma from Sophie Ella & Me, Lucy from Hello Beautiful Bear & Leanne from A Slice Of My Life Wales.

But like I said...we are not and never will be a closed channel, and we want to involve as many people in this project as want to be involved.

We would love you to get involved with us by subscribing to our videos HERE or liking us on Facebook HERE where we will be putting out more information about how to join in with us.

You can also follow us on Twitter @The_Parent_Pod for updates on our latest videos and callouts for projects.

Here's a little look at our Channel Trailer....