She has expressed the greatest keenness in answering some of the questions that we have received at petticoated.com, so I have handed this page over to her for this month.
Susan

Dear Nanny,
 
My youngest son is very fussy about his food. What can I do to encourage him to eat his greens?
 
'Worried' of Wimbledon

Dear Mrs Worried of Wimbledon, you English ladies have got some really strange names, do you know that? I can help you. Where I come from we discovered the answer to this question during the knowledge revolution of the 1990s. We got a information superhighway now that will take three mules across, and still leave room for the ploughman and his lunch.

What you have to do to make the kid eat his cabbage and turnips is cook them first. Strange, huh? Chop them up, put them in a pot of water, and stand the pot over a fire for a couple of hours. Add some salt if you come from a rich family. Then mash it all up and he'll love it!
Nanny Slagg

My Dear Nanny,

I am at my wit's end with my two children. They are darlings really, but they seem to have got their genders mixed up. My son returned from a trip to London, where he went shopping in the King's Road, wearing a velvet jacket with a very common-looking ruffle around the collar. "What do you think Mumsy, isn't it just scrumptious?" were his first words to me. Now he's keen to take up fox hunting because he wants to wear pinks, but I think he's on the wrong track there.

On the other hand, my daughter really is the most terrible tomboy. When she was having her picture taken for 'Country Life' she refused to put on the beautiful pearl necklace I gave her to wear. "Mummy, I simply won't! Pearls are just not the 'thing' this season!" she said. And only last week she went to the local Young Conservatives' meeting wearing jodphurs, if you please.

I just don't know what to do with this pair, and would be grateful for your advice. Our family goes back to William the Conqueror by the way, and we do have a responsibility to set a good example to the poorer people.
Yours sincerely,

(Lady) Felicity Fysh-ffrench.
Wiltshire

Well listen Lady, if you're at your wit's end you couldn't have travelled very far. My old grandmother from the lower east side of Bucharest used to wave her hand in the air and say, "Arggh, everyone's family goes back to St. Hedwig, unless they're from Pluto or somewhere. Don't take any notice of that heorseit!"

Change the children's wardrobes and bedrooms around. Let the kids have some fun.
Nanny Slagg

Dear Nanny Susan,

You have presented quite a bit of information in your esteemed magazine about the petticoating of boys for disciplinary reasons, and there has also been mention of using petticoat discipline on girls. I think that my daughter could be a good candidate.

My husband and I have always tried to encourage her to be a respectable young lady, so you can imagine the shock we got when she came home last month dressed all in black, with her hair lank and dyed purple, face caked in dead white make up, and wearing fangs. I know it sounds ridiculous but she also had a bit of joke-shop blood dripping down her chin.

"Don't be so old-fashioned Mum, it's the gothick look. All the girls are doing it".

I don't know about 'gothic', to me she looked more like a corpse than a cathedral. It's so embarrassing for us when friends visit, and now she wants to buy a pair of pet rats. Do you think that petticoating would help in this case?

Mrs A. O'K.
Dublin

Well, you can forget the 'Nanny Susan' bit for a start. The old girl's visiting her Scottish relatives, and has handed over the page to me, Nanny Slagg at your service.

That sounds like one sweet kid that you have there. I would be proud to have her as a daughter. How long has it been since girls dressed the way girls were meant to dress? Just to show you what I mean, let me tell you about what happened to a couple I knew in Moldovia.

They had raised their daughter to be a proper young lady with all the graces, and then one day when she was about 16 years old, into the house she walks wearing her permed in soft bouncy curls, and wearing a dress with a little lace peter pan collar and a pattern of white with pink flowers, and a soft pink cardigan, and under the skirt she's got on oceans of swaying pink and white petticoats, and nylon pantyhose.

"What do you think of this Mum, it's the latest look. Isn't it WILD?" she says, spinning around.

Well  the poor mother nearly fainted. That night she just lay in bed, awake all night trying to figure out where she'd gone wrong. But it wasn't her fault. It's the kids today, they're all  out to give their parents heart failure. I wish we had good girls in Roumania like you obviously got over here in England.
Nanny Slagg

Dear Nanny,

I know that petticoat punishment works, because it keeps my 12 year old son in line, I can assure you. But what about spanking? Once he is fully petticoated he calms right down, but I still think that a good bottom warming with skirts pulled up and knickers down, properly completes the punishment.

I am asking this because from your answers to some letters you seem to be against warming up badly behaved bottoms.
Thank you for your advice,
Mrs J.D.

No point thanking me Missus, l haven't given you the advice yet. We know quite a lot about warming bottoms where I come from. Over the last few centuries we've warmed up quite a few witch's bums, and that's a fact. You have to start with a fire. Make sure the faggots are really tinder-dry, then they burn better. Tie your son to a stake, and invite over a few neighbours. And write to me and tell me how it all went, and whether that no good son of yours has given you any more trouble.
Nanny Slagg