Happy Easter. If you’ve spent the week preparing for this extra long weekend and haven’t had a chance to read The Early Hour, here’s our roundup of the week’s most read articles for your Easter Sunday reading…
It’s Easter Sunday. You might be away on holiday, up early with the kids, attempting – but failing – to lie in or something else entirely. But whatever you’re doing, the four summaries below – of the week’s most read articles – will give you something to read and a little bit of inspiration…
1. Meringue Girls on Baking, Motherhood and Work/Life Balance
We spoke to co-founder of the HUGELY successful, massively inspiring and rainbow addicted Meringue Girls, Alex Hoffler. Alongside running their bakery and providing meringues and other sweet treats for events, Hoffler is mum to 20-month-old Indi. We asked her how she manages running a business with a toddler in tow.
We heard about Hoffler’s entrepreneurial roots (her mum’s a business woman too), feeling most productive in the morning: “I power on through until lunch, and then have a bit of an afternoon panic that time is running out, and I still have a to do list as long as my arm” and her bad day mantra.
Read all about Alex Hoffler, the Meringue Girls and motherhood here.
2. The Founder of Barber’s Gym on Fatherhood
If you were to go looking for a doting dad, you might not go looking in an east London gym but you SHOULD because in Barber’s Gym, on Hackney Downs, you’ll find the owner – Darren Barber – who has made it his mission to play as big a part in his daughter Frida’s life as possible.
He talked us through the long, difficult birth, the early days: “Those first few weeks are hard to recall as we were tired and in some kind of autopilot mode, but I have a very positive recollection of becoming a father” and the greatest challenge of fatherhood being…. sleep.
Read more from Darren Barber, of Barber’s Gym, here.
3. Managing Expectations: in Business and in Life
Are you optimistic about everything, assuming it’ll live up to your expectations, or cautious – not getting too excited in case it doesn’t happen? In this article, the editor Annie Ridout looks at when it’s good to lower, or manage, our expectations.
She suggests that in your personal life, it might be wise to go in expecting slightly less than you’d ideally like. But in business, it’s more complex: you need to ensure your customers have high expectations of you, but you need to be realistic about what you can expect from colleagues and employees.
More about this glass half full, glass half empty debate here.
4. Adoption: IVF, Miscarriage and Racial Rejection 
When Ranji and her partner tried to adopt – following failed IVF and a series of miscarriages – their Asian/Christian heritage meant there weren’t any matches for them. But they persevered and were given a son and daughter.
In this honest interview, Ranji talks us through the gruelling process, difficult early days and their more recent relocation to Paris. She knew that uprooting the kids would be hard, but she didn’t realise it would be this hard…
Read about Ranji’s experience of adopting her two children here.
Happy Easter to you all. And before you go, let us know how you’re spending your weekend…