Why a Blue Australian Dog is Saving My Parenting Sanity

In a time when there is so much TV on at home. When all your previous screen time rules have gone out of the window. When you try to justify to yourself that YouTube kids is about “company for the kids” and your kids watching other kids play is ok as it’s “play inspiration”. And then we discovered Bluey on Disney+ which has not only made me feel like the TV quality has improved massively in our house, but has lifted my spirits, made me laugh out loud on many occasion all supported by a wonderful musical score which never fails to uplift the entire house (in fact we have created our own little family dance to the theme tune).

Bluey is an animation series telling the story of Bluey, a blue Australian dog, and his sister Bingo and their parents, a very loving and supportive, yet totally normal, family. Each episode is 7 minutes long and in the UK we have the first series of 52 episodes. (In Australia and America they now have a second season and a third has just been commissioned).

Each episode tells positive, uplifting and often funny stories of family life. It reminds me of times of ease, fun, friends and connection. Each episode has its own individual musical score which always helps create calm in our house and mean you never feel like you’re always hearing the same kids songs despite the amount of times this is played in our house. In fact the album of the show has just been released in Aus and it’s gone to number 1, the first children’s album to do so. And it’s number 42 in America. Much to the frustration of my husband, we cannot get the album in the UK. He’s even written to the production team to find out why!

So if you fancy a laugh while feeling like your kids are watching some more quality programming, then I highly recommend Bluey not only for its entertainment value but also for helping me and my husband understand kids play a lot more, helping us to connect with our inner child’s play a little more.