The 1st Musical Mini

MUSICAL Minis is celebrating its 21st Anniversary next term which has prompted me to look back as to why I created it and thinking back to the first Musical Mini. Matthew, my nearly 22 year old son, was the reason Musical Minis was launched and he was the original Musical Mini.

Prior to having Matthew I had studied psychology at Warwick University, worked on the cardiac unit at Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital as a play specialist and married Rob. I thought I would return to work after maternity leave as I really did love working at the hospital - the children were so remarkable and carried on as if nothing was wrong with them, even after open heart surgery they wanted to get up and play whereas adults realising they were meant to be weak would be much less energetic. Heart transplants were just being carried out on children and I enjoyed visiting other leading hospitals to find out how they were supporting the children through this traumatic period. However, with the birth of Matthew I soon knew that I would be unable to leave my own child to be with other children all day. Also now being a Mum I knew I would have too much empathy with the parents which would make my job really difficult. Luckily as I had a NHS salary the money was not great so I could manage without it - especially as I would have had to pay for travel and childcare.

Being a stay at home Mum I took Matthew to toddler groups and an activity class. Matthew loved the songs at the start and end of these sessions and I realised how much he learnt from them. I carried on singing them to him at home and even with my awful singing he loved it. His language development and coordination significantly improved. I set out to try to find a class that used music for him to join.

The classes I found were all very musical. Babies had to listen to half an hour of varying music each day at home. The mothers had to submit the music on a tape to the teacher to be scrutinised - if the music wasn't right it had to be done again. These classes weren't going to be right for me and Matthew. I was looking for a fun class - I had no interest in him being a musical prodigy; if that was the outcome great but I certainly wasn't setting out with that aim. I discussed what I was looking for with friends I had made who had similar age children to Matthew and discovered they would be interested in finding a group too.

Matthew was now coming up to his 1st birthday. Whilst I loved being a Mum and spending time with him I was also growing a bit bored. I missed being surrounded by a ward full of children. I had made many new Mummy friends who I met up with regularly, however, I just didn't feel fulfilled with endless talk about nappies and baby food. I was in a bit of a rut - I wanted to remain a full time Mum but I also needed some extra purpose in my life to keep me and my mind active. This combined with my desire to find a fun music group for Matthew led to the launch of Musical Minis.

Once I had decided to run my own group everything fell into place really easily. I found a local hall, experimented with how I thought the class should be run, invited a member of staff from the exercise class I took Matthew to to join me and mentioned the launch to the Mums I had met with babies. From this point the business just grew. I had two more children, Alex and Emily who were born into a life surrounded by Musical Minis. The one local class we started with developed into 12 over a period of a few years. We had requests from around the country to start Musical Minis there, mainly from Mums who had attended the classes and then moved out of the area. Eventually, 7 years after Musical Minis had started we launched the franchise - once everything was set up legally e.g. the trademark, the music, contracts.

Nearly 21 years later Musical Minis is still thriving. It has grown from the little low key class I wanted for Matthew in the local Girl Guides hall to a business operating around the UK in about 200 venues each week together with numerous Children's Centres and Nurseries. It started off with a handful of children and now regularly has over 2,000 attending each week. Despite this growth the fundamental programme has remained the same - a fun interactive activity for children and carers which encourages child development through the use of music.

The original Musical Mini, Matthew, has undoubtedly benefited from the classes. He had a happy fulfilled Mum who was available throughout his childhood to take him to school, collect him, share milestones with him etc. He was a well rounded child with good social skills, cognitive  and emotional development. He did very well at school and has just graduated from Cambridge University after studying law.

Musical Minis will be launching celebrations after the Summer for all the current children attending classes. I'm really pleased and proud that a business I created has survived the test of time. Over the years tens of thousands of children have attended our classes. I would love to know where they are today and what they're up to.

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