A Spoonful of Sugar: A Nanny's Story

by Brenda Ashford Narrated by Jean Gilpin

Overview

Brenda Ashford is the quintessential British nanny. Prim and proper, gentle and kind, she seems to have stepped straight out of Mary Poppins. For more than six decades Nanny Brenda swaddled, diapered, dressed, played with, sang to, cooked for, and looked after more than one hundred children. From the pampered sons and daughters of lords ensconced in their grand estates to the children of tough war evacuees in London's East End, Brenda has taught countless little ones to be happy, healthy, and thoroughly well bred. In this delightful memoir, Brenda shares her endearing, amusing, and sometimes downright bizarre experiences turning generations of children into successful adults.

From the moment Brenda first held her baby brother David she was hooked. She became a second mother to him, changing his nappies, reading him stories, and giving him all the love her warm heart contained. Knowing a career caring for children was her calling in life, Brenda attended London's prestigious Norland College, famous for producing top-notch nannies. It was a sign of privilege and good taste for the children of the well-to-do to be seen being pushed in their Silver Cross prams by Norland nannies, who were recognizable by their crisp, starched black uniforms with white bib collars, and their flowing black capes lined with red silk. And what skills were these trainees tested on daily? Lullaby singing, storytelling, pram shining, bed making, all forms of sewing, cooking simple meals, and dispensing first aid-including knowing the best way to help the medicine go down.

In A Spoonful of Sugar, Brenda recalls her years at Norland and her experiences during the war (after all, even if bombs are dropping, there's no reason to let standards slip), and recounts in lovely detail a life devoted to the care of other people's children.

Sprinkled throughout with pearls of wisdom (you can never give children too much love, and you should learn how to sew a button, for goodness' sake), this delightful memoir from Britain's oldest living nanny is practically perfect in every way.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

Trained formally in the prestigious Norland Institute that once graced Pembridge Square, London, Ashford spent 62 years raising England’s children, recounting in this charming, sentimental memoir how she loved every minute of it. Her chronicle opens during the 1930s, when she was growing up in a large loving family in Surrey, the second daughter of a prosperous shop owner who fell on hard times; describing herself as rather naïve and unintellectual, Ashford was allowed to quit school at 16, and with encouragement from her mother, attended Norland’s as a “bursary” student, beginning in 1939. She was fitted with a starched uniform (a source of great pride) and immersed in a rigorous curriculum over many months involving nursery management, sewing, laundry, and hospital training, among other domestic and child-care arts, all executed with impeccable neatness, alacrity, and love. Her first jobs involved caring for the young London evacuees removed to the countryside during the Battle of Britain; these segued into employment at numerous grand aristocratic homes in Devon and Kent, involving plenty of quirky parents and needy children, all described in the sweet as pudding, unflappable English tone of the beloved elderly nanny who had a knack for calming children and instilling confidence in their beleaguered mothers. Of a sadly vanishing generation once acquainted with plimsolls and junket, who drop old-fashioned advice for the myriad uses of olive oil and create toys out of anything handy, Ashford is surely a national treasure. (Apr.)

From the Publisher

"For anglophiles and Downton Abbey fans, a memoir of 62 years of nannying."
-The New York Times

"Ashford presents a delightful compilation of memories, child care tips and insights from a radically different time and place. . . .  A snapping good story by a true British treasure." -Kirkus Reviews

Library Journal

Britain's beloved oldest living nanny tells all; she's cared for more than 100 children in 62 years.

Kirkus Reviews

Reflecting on her 62 years as a nanny, Ashford presents a delightful compilation of memories, child care tips and insights from a radically different time and place. Contemporary mothers will discover the trove of practical advice just as useful today as it was in 20th-century England. At the age of 92, she has been heralded as Britain's longest-serving nanny. Ashford began her "nanny boot camp" training at the prestigious Norland Institute in 1939. "I never dreamed when I graduated from the Norland Institute at eighteen that I'd still be looking after babies when I was eighty!" writes the author. Ashford's career included caring for children of aristocrats, working in a war nursery, caring for a rather shifty family with dubious associates and working at a "sprawling family farmhouse…set in acres of beautiful grounds." Ashford ably weaves together her personal observations on social and cultural changes and her child care stories. "As we entered the 1950s a nanny in a uniform seemed strangely outdated," she writes. "Society was changing, and I had to be seen to be changing with it." The author never married, but rather devoted her life to creating the happiest homes she could for her families. For a decade, Ashford was what she called a "troubleshooting nanny," moving from house to house, helping new mothers get back on their feet and establishing a stable routine for the household. At 80, she came out of retirement, helping a young mother who had once been one of her charges with her two children. Ashford recounts a life filled with love, devotion and hard work--a snapping good story by a true British treasure.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940169208917
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	04/02/2013
Edition description:	Unabridged

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