Mas and Spas

MAS AND SPAS by Gilly Smith

Its always hard to find time to relax as a parent,but are yoga and spar retreats an option?

It’s a tough job being a parent. We get little thanks for the 24-hour room service and pampering we offer our little lords and ladies, and any time out is usually spent doubling up as cleaner. When we invited a tribe of stroppy egos to share our lives, the idea was more of a managerial position than the slavery that followed – and we’re knackered. We deserve a New Year break. Go on, imagine a little pampering yourself when you’re leafing through the travel brochures; a three or four day break? Maybe even a week of yoga or spa treatments to remind yourself of the old days, to return that haggard expression to the blissful line-free smiles of pre-baby yesteryear? Yeah, right. You’d be thrown out of the Proper Parent Playgroup for leaving the children behind. Any anyway, by the time you’d had your second facial and poolside pedicure, your heart would be aching for one of those jammy cuddles that make parenthood so worthwhile.

Taking children to a spa or yoga retreat might seem to be a contradiction in terms – no-one wants to have their meditation broken by a screaming baby – but this is the age where our needs become gaps in a market ready to be met by an increasingly entrepreneurial culture. Tania Smith of Mamaheaven is one such entrepreneur, and runs eco-yoga retreats for mothers and babies under 18 months at Penrhos Organic Hotel in Herefordshire. She is already having praise heaped upon her by grateful mothers.

www.mamaheaven.org Specially tailored yoga retreats for mothers with young babies. Enjoy a couple of days in rural England with organic food and wine and a spot of yoga to boot.