There is no more fruitful source of family discontent than a housewife’s badly-cooked dinners and untidy ways.

-- Isabella Beeton, The Book of Household Management, 1861

photo credit: obo-bobolina

Welcome to Beyond Beeton - a guide to household management.

Beyond Beeton is a post-modern guide to household management comprising information on budgeting, cooking, eating, weight loss, housework, work/life balance, shoes and surviving the corporate world - all smothered in a generous serve of failure, hypocrisy and sarcasm.

It was inspired by Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management and is based on my attempts to juggle a career, marriage, household, budget, unrelenting love of food and shoes and efforts to get back to my pre-marriage weight.

About Isabella Beeton and the Book of Household Management

Original Titleplate, 1861

As a young bride, Isabella Beeton wrote a series of monthly articles on cooking and household management for The Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine, published by her husband, Samuel Beeton.

In 1861, at the age of 25, Isabella Beeton compiled the articles and published The Book of Household Management Comprising information for the Mistress, Housekeeper, Cook, Kitchen-Maid, Butler, Footman, Coachman, Valet, Upper and Under House-Maids, Lady’s-Maid, Maid-of-all-Work, Laundry-Maid, Nurse and Nurse-Maid, Monthly Wet and Sick Nurses, etc. etc.—also Sanitary, Medical, & Legal Memoranda: with a History of the Origin, Properties, and Uses of all Things Connected with Home Life and Comfort.

Despite the minutiae of some of her instruction, Isabella Beeton was arguably progressive for her time; encouraging women to be well-read and educated.

About Me

I'm in my late(ish) 20s and I live in a little inner-suburban house in Perth, Western Australia with my husband and two slightly insane cats.  We don't have any kids and I like it that way for now (sorry Mum).

I have a great job which I enjoy and precariously balance with playing house.

When I'm not working, cooking or arguing with my husband, I'm likely to be found eating or drinking too much, reading cookbooks in bed or planning another holiday.

I enjoy meeting new people and you are always welcome to contact me.

Before doing anything silly, please read the disclaimer.