The Waltons Sextuplets At 30: Catching up with the famous family as they return to the TV screen - Mirror Online Thank you for subscribing! Could not subscribe, try again laterInvalid Email With six daughters all aged 30, dad Graham Walton knows there is every chance there could be wedding bells in the air at some point. And as three of them are already engaged, that moment may come sooner rather than later for the 63-year-old. So the painter and decorator has prepared himself well by writing wedding speeches for all six of them – even though none of them have actually set a date for their big day yet. Graham said: “Be prepared for anything that happens… that’s what having six girls has taught me.” As father to the world’s only all-female ­sextuplets , Graham has been the sole man in a house full of women since wife Jan gave birth to Hannah, Luci, Ruth, Sarah, Kate and Jennie on November 18, 1983. The girls grew up under the watchful eye of TV cameras since they were born in Liverpool. But at 18 they decided to live more private lives.

Now they are returning to our screens for a new ITV documentary, The Waltons Sextuplets At 30. Babies: Walton Family Sextuplets (Photo: Sunday Mirror) And Graham has enjoyed every minute of those 30 years – even enjoying a sideline career as an after-dinner speaker delivering a talk called My Life With Seven Women. He said: “It’s just a bit of a laugh because no one has six babies , do they? Not all at once anyway.” Today, only Luci and Hannah live with their parents in the family home in Wallasey, Wirral. Graham converted the three-storey Victorian house himself so each girl had their own bedroom. He said: “But they were in and out of each other’s room most of the time. They’d swap clothes, swap beds, swap everything…even swap boyfriends later on. I’m only kidding.” Graham told how he misses the ones who have left. He added: “I don’t mind if they come back. It’s an empty feeling when nobody’s here. “I don’t like the silence so I put the music on. I like the noise.

You get used to the noise over the years.” Hannah moved back with her mum and dad to save for her own home. The ­optician’s manager and supply teacher, who is single, told of the moment she realised hers wasn’t your average family. Walton Sextuplets are nine years old (Photo: Daily Mirror) She said: “When we started our first day of school there were photographers and people outside the gates. That’s different isn’t it? When I’m in the opticians all the old ladies come in and ask questions. They want to know what we’re up to.” HR admin assistant Kate is also single but lives in a flat about 10 minutes away from Graham and Jan and said she has no plans to settle down. She added: “I just don’t feel ready for that now. I’ve been on a couple of dates but I haven’t got time. I’m too busy. I just keep going out and having fun.” Ruth is the latest sister to get engaged after civil service worker Rob proposed on Valentine’s Day. She was the one who felt most strongly about having a private life and refused to do any more filming when she reached 18.

The call centre worker said: “When you’re a teenager you’re very into yourself and don’t like people being intrusive. “I used to go out and people knew who I was. They’d say not so nice things. I just didn’t like it.” GP admin assistant Sarah, who is engaged to restaurant worker Kieran, 31, describes herself as “one of the quieter ones”. The first of the Walton girls to buy her own home, she said: “When I moved out I did notice a big difference. “From it being a chaotic house to a fairly quiet one. It came as a bit of a shock to be honest with you but I’m used to it now.” To mark their 30th birthday last November, all six girls got a matching heart tattoo. Jennie was behind it. She said: “It’s always been about the six hearts and they represent each one of us. They are all interlined like us.” Jennie is the only one of the six sisters to venture away from Merseyside. She lives in Leeds with boyfriend Matt, 27. The pair met when they were both working as entertainers in Spain. She runs a confectionary business.

She said: “My sisters are always with each other and I miss out on all that. “I’m on the phone constantly, texting or ringing all the time. I speak to them about 20 times a day.” Luci has been engaged to bakery supervisor Paul, 31, for the three years. She moved back in with Graham and Jan, 61, while she saves for a mortgage. The air stewardess said: “I’ve never minded having a long engagement. I’d rather get my house first then do it. There’s no rush.” After Graham and Jan got together they knew it would not be easy to start a family. At 16 she had been told she was unlikely to conceive ­naturally. Doctors gave her fertility drugs but when that failed, they looked at adoption. Jan said: “We got a letter from the adoption agency to say we’d been accepted as parents of the next baby or twins. “Gray was quite ­horrified. He said: ‘Let’s start at one at a time’.” Kids: Janet Walton with her sextuplets But as they waited for more news of adoption, the couple struck lucky on their 13th round of fertility treatment.

However, there was a massive shock in store when a scan revealed Jan was carrying not just one, but six babies. Jan, a fundraiser for the neo-natal intensive care unit where the girls were born, said: “These days multiple births are more common but no one knew what the outcome would be.” The girls were born at 31-and-a-half weeks by Caesarian within just four minutes of each other. Graham took a year off work to help Jan care for them and has fond ­memories of that time. He said: “Jan used to say we must go out every day, just because we’ve got six ­children it must not stop us from doing what ­everybody else does. “We had papooses so we’d have one baby each at the front and two each in double buggies. It was ridiculous, really. “When the girls were little you needed eyes in the back of your head. You’d turn around, go ‘one, two, three, four, five… phew, that’s it.’ “We were counting heads all day so by the time you got home from these places your head was spinning.

We’d be counting in our sleep.” But despite keeping a close eye on the girls, the couple did once manage to lose one – at the seaside. The Waltons Sextuplets, Lucy Walton, Ruth Walton, Jenny Walton, Hannah Walton, Kate Walton and Sarah Walton (Photo: Sunday People) Graham said: “When they were about three we went to Southport for the day. We were all walking down the main street and decided to go in a sweet shop but Sarah with her head in the clouds carried on walking. “I got in the shop and went, ‘one, two, three, four, five… there’s one missing.’ “I ran out quickly and saw a woman holding Sarah’s hand and walking us back. She said to me, ‘Oh here’s your little Sarah. I’ve seen you on the telly but I never thought I’d find a Walton.’ That was the only time and it was minutes but it was a panicky moment.” After 30 years, Graham has clearly got an awful lot of memories and funny tales to tell about his girls. Which will give him plenty of material for those father of the bride speeches when one, or all, of them finally gets round to trying the knot.

* The Walton Sextuplets at 30 is on ITV, tonight, Thursday April 17, at 9pm We're testing a new site: This content is coming soon The Waltons sextuplets new era of merry chaos - the grandchildren | Daily Mail Online comments Both of them agree it was a momentous day. But Janet and Graham Walton, parents of the world’s only all-girl sextuplets, can’t quite reach a consensus on what was most remarkable about the October morning last year when they became first-time grandparents. Graham remembers the drama and farce. ‘Janet was delayed getting to the hospital because of what I now refer to as the Axminster Incident,’ he says. ‘A roll of carpet fell off the back of a van in front of her as she was driving into Liverpool. She was panicking about being late.’ Scroll down for video The Walton girls, pictured with their parents Janet and Graham.

Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah, born in Liverpool in 1983, are the only female sextuplets in the world to have survived Meanwhile Sarah, the first of their sextuplets to bless them with a grandchild, was caught up in a minor palaver at the hospital. ‘Sarah was being taken to the operating theatre for her Caesarian section when the scrub nurse — or was it the surgeon? — got stuck in the lift with her,’ begins Graham. ‘That lift story’s just wrong on so many levels,’ interrupts Ruth, who, like her father, is a natural joker. ‘Sarah wasn’t stuck in it at all.’ RELATED ARTICLES Share this article Share ‘Well, someone involved in the operation was trapped in a lift,’ insists Graham, while Janet — serene, calm and unerringly competent — rolls her eyes and smiles. She remembers only the everyday wonder of her granddaughter Jorgie’s birth. ‘I’d seen Sarah early in the morning, and an hour and a half later there she was holding her baby, a beautiful little girl with really big, dark eyes and lots of dark hair. ‘It’s a miracle, isn’t it?

I took the first photo of Jorgie half an hour after she was born. The Walton girls, pictured here aged 5, (left to right) Luci, Ruth, Jennie, Hannah, Kate and Sarah ‘She was perfect, so tiny. She weighed 7lb 6½ oz at birth. Sarah was only 2lb 5oz at birth, so her little girl was three times as big as her mum. Yet I couldn’t believe how delicate and small she looked. ‘I felt a tremendous surge of protective love. It flooded into me the moment I saw the pictures from her first scan. ‘I texted all the family: “It’s a girl!” (Well, the Waltons don’t do boys, do we?) I even learnt how to send a group message. Graham and Janet Walton pictured with their six daughters in 1983, shortly after they were born. After Janet's multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, she spent the rest of her pregnancy in hospital Apparently, everyone keeps telling Janet, there is ‘no one more experienced at motherhood than you’. ‘But when my girls were born, I knew absolutely nothing,’ she says. ‘I’d had no time to prepare.

I hadn’t even seen a midwife or been to an antenatal class. The instant my multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, I was whipped into hospital and I stayed there until the birth.’ Janet and Graham had given up hope of conceiving a child of their own. In fact, they were poised to adopt — believing the fertility drug she had been taking would never work — when she became pregnant with six girls. Janet, Graham and their daughters are seen here aged 11, getting ready for their first day of secondary school. Janet and Graham had given up hope of having children when they found out Janet was pregnant The sextuplets, Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah, born in Liverpool on November 18, 1983, remain unique — no other set of female sextuplets has ever survived — and the world has watched them grow to adulthood with thrilled wonderment. Those of us who have experienced parenthood on a more modest scale can only marvel at the epic task that confronted Janet and Graham after they were born.

When Jorgie was born to Sarah and her fiance Kieran, a restaurant manager, on October 7 last year, Janet’s mind cast back to the day, 31 years earlier, when she became a mum. Sarah (left) with mother, Janet (right) and baby Jorgie. Until recently Janet was working as a fund-raising administrator for the neo-natal unit at Liverpool Women’s Hospital, where Jorgie was born in October 2014 ‘Jorgie was born on a Tuesday, and by Friday she was home. In contrast, it was six weeks before our girls came home — they’d been in the special care baby unit — and we brought them back two at a time,’ Janet remembers. ‘From the start, it was absolutely full-on. Daunting. ‘Looking back, I don’t know how we managed; honestly I don’t. ‘We lived through those early years in a blur. We had no time to think. We were just doing. And the only regret is that there wasn’t enough time to enjoy them as much as we’d have liked. The instant my multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, I was whipped into hospital and I stayed there until the birth.

Janet Walton ‘When Sarah says: “Jorgie was awake in the night. I’m so tired!” I don’t say anything, but I remember back to our girls’ early years. For two years, Graham and I only slept for a couple of hours a night. It was very difficult, a constant round of nappy-changing and feeding. And we couldn’t learn from our mistakes because we experienced everything at once: the weaning, the potty-training, the first steps. It was a constant onslaught.’ ‘We worked out that we used 11,000 nappies a year,’ chips in Graham, 64, who took a year off from his job as a painter and decorator when his daughters were born, to help look after them. Now, equipped with three decades worth of anecdotes on sharing a house with seven females, he also gives after‑dinner talks. ‘We used to get through cases of talcum powder,’ he says. ‘It was as foggy as Victorian London in our house when they were babies. But they don’t use talc now, do they?’ He seems mildly put out that those days when the air was dense with powder will for ever be consigned to sensory memory.

But it gets him reminiscing. Graham Walton (pictured with his six daughters and wife), now gives after-dinner talks on what life's been like living with seven women in the house ‘Just because we had six babies at once, it didn’t mean we were imprisoned in the house,’ he recalls. ‘We got out. Jan and I both took a double buggy and a baby each in a papoose. If anyone was visiting, they’d push the third double buggy. ‘I loved those early years so much. I couldn’t say one phase was better than the others. But there was always so much to do, we didn’t enjoy it as much as we would if we’d had one at a time. With grandchildren, you have time.’ Looking fondly at his granddaughter, he adds: ‘Whenever I see little babies, I wish I could go back and do it all over again.’ Graham and Janet (pictured) say that having six babies didn't stop them from leaving the house when the girls were little, they would use two double buggies and a papoose each to transport the sextuplets Janet, 62, looks stricken.

She has just retired from her job as fund-raising administrator for the neo-natal unit at Liverpool Women’s Hospital (Jorgie was born there) and is looking forward to the novelty of devoting some of her spare time to just their one cherished grandchild. ‘There’s nothing quite like being a grandma, is there?’ she says. ‘I think you do have the best of them and I feel privileged. ‘Right from the start I’ve had a bond with Jorgie. Janet drove Sarah (pictured with Jorgie) and her fiancee, Kieran, to their first scan at Liverpool Women’s Hospital, where she worked until recently ‘Kieran and Sarah came round when she was just a few weeks pregnant and said: “We’ve got some exciting news.” There was this big love-in, lots of cuddles, when she said she was pregnant. And because I worked at the hospital, I drove them in for Sarah’s first scan at eight weeks. Kieran popped his head round my door and said: “Come and have a look at this.” It was such a miracle. I saw the scan picture. There she was: a proper little baby. I had a cry.

‘Hopefully I’ll be there for some more milestones. It was fabulous to see Jorgie’s first smile; I think she recognises voices now. She seems to change every day, and she’s so content. ‘She’s joined the library, she goes swimming — it tickles me — Sarah takes her to a little baby group with other new mums. She already has a busy social life. The sisters (pictured) grew up in a seven-bedroom house in Wallasey, Merseyside, where their parents still live. Apart from Jennie, who lives in Leeds, all the girls still live close to their parents ‘The first time I babysat I was a little bit apprehensive, but it’s instinctive. You just remember what to do. And I tell Sarah: “There’s no right or wrong way.” I never push my views. ‘I chat away to Jorgie when I’m looking after her: “Auntie Kate will be coming later,” or “I wonder what your Mummy’s doing now?” It doesn’t really matter what you say as long as you’re engaging them.

‘And I’ve already bought her a book of stories and nursery rhymes because there’s nothing more rewarding than snuggling them down in bed and reading to them.’ Honestly, I just don’t know how they did it. Everyone says: “It’ll be nice for Jorgie to have a brother” but I definitely don’t want six. I couldn’t cope! Sarah Walton When I visit, all the sisters have convened at the family home, the warm and welcoming seven-bedroom house in Wallasey, Merseyside, where they grew up. It’s the third time I’ve visited them and I never fail to think how different, how fiercely individual, they all are. All but Hannah have moved away now. But apart from Jennie — who lives with partner Matt, a catering manager, in Leeds — they all live within a stone’s throw of Mum and Dad’s. ‘I can’t remember a time when the house ever felt empty. There’s always someone dropping by for tea,’ says Jan, who seems perpetually to keep a vast vat of food bubbling on the hob. Meanwhile, Jorgie, sweet-tempered and quick to smile, is being passed between her doting aunts like a parcel in a party game.

‘She’s just enveloped in all this love,’ smiles Jan. ‘I’m sure she’ll develop great social skills, too, because we talk to her all the time.’ Sarah, practical and sensible like her mum, worked as an administrator in a medical centre before she had Jorgie. Now she’s taking a year’s maternity leave. She and Kieran have just bought their first house together. ‘Eventually we’ll get married,’ she says. ‘I wouldn’t bother if I were you. You can live in sin with my blessing and save me a few bob,’ jokes Graham. Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate and Jennie (pictured here with Sarah in 1987) are all thrilled to be aunts to Sarah's baby, Jorgie, although they have mixed views on who'll be next to have a baby When his girls were newborns, any visitor was presented with a baby and a nappy to change because the practical tasks were relentless. Jorgie, by contrast, is overwhelmed with attention. ‘We try to give everyone a turn to cuddle,’ says Sarah, who reflects on what life must have been like for her mum and dad with the six of them and only two pairs of hands.

‘Honestly, I just don’t know how they did it. Everyone says: “It’ll be nice for Jorgie to have a brother” but I definitely don’t want six. I couldn’t cope!’ wails Sarah. ‘You would if you had to,’ says Graham. ‘Granted, it would be a bit frightening, but you’d just get on with it.’ Despite growing up in such a large family, Jennie, Sarah, Luci, Hannah, Ruth and Kate (left to right, aged 11) all agree that having six children of their own would be too many The consensus among the girls is that six children would be far too many, even if they came along one at a time. ‘I can’t wait to have one — or maybe two. But no more than that,’ says Ruth who works in PR and reception at a shopping centre and will marry Rob, a civil servant, later this year. Luci, funny and exuberant, is a cabin crew member with an airline, and has been engaged for six years to Paul, a bakery supervisor. But she isn’t ready for motherhood yet. ‘No way!’ she protests. Hannah, cool, calm and organised, is a primary school teacher.

She has a partner, Steve, manager of a recruitment agency, but she’s living with Mum and Dad; saving up, biding her time. Sarah (pictured) takes Jorgie to a baby group with other new mums so she has a busy social life already! Kate, often miscast as ‘the serious one’, actually has a quiet and quirky sense of humour. She works in human resources and says: ‘I’m not really very maternal.’ But she’s still single. That could change. Quick-witted and sparky Jennie, who runs her own sweet shop, says: ‘You have to find the man you want to spend the rest of your life with before you have babies, don’t you?’ Janet presides serenely over the hubbub of chatter. ‘When I had the girls, people said: “It couldn’t have happened to a better person. You’re so sensible, organised and calm.” ‘Perhaps I’ve been a bit too sensible with Jorgie. She had so many pretty clothes, so I bought her a savings bond — and a cot. All the girls will get a cot. We’ve always tried to treat them fairly.

‘But now I’m thinking: “One day, before I die, I’ll do something mad, something utterly out of character.”’ ‘How about a tattoo? Or sky-diving?’ offers Jennie. ‘Oh, I’m not telling anyone what it’ll be,’ says Janet cryptically. She’d better be quick about it. This time next year there could be another batch of grandchildren on the way; another frenetic round of babysitting and nappy-changing. Meanwhile, I ask what her hopes are for her adored first grandchild, and she replies: ‘I’m looking forward to her being part of my future, to noticing all the tiny changes that happen every day; to having time to savour and enjoy every minute I spend with her. ‘I wish her happiness, health and a long, fruitful life. And who knows?’ she smiles, ‘Perhaps six little brothers as well.’ Six Little Miracles: The heartwarming true story of raising the world’s first sextuplet girls, by Janet Walton with Robert Ettinger, is published next Thursday, by Ebury Press.

Walton Sextuplets: Family photos show sisters 27 years on | Daily Mail Online comments As the world’s only all-female sextuplets, they share the closest possible bond and have faced all of life’s little hurdles together. For many years the Walton sisters – first-born Hannah, who was followed by Luci, Ruth, Sarah, Kate and Jennie – celebrated their similarities and would pose together for photos in the same school uniforms. But now, after spending much of the past decade out of the limelight to live more privately, the 27-year-olds are all keen to stress their individuality. Happy family: Janet and Graham Walton's daughters (from left) Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah Enlarge Meet the family: The sextuplets as newborns cradled by their parents Graham and Janet. They were born on November 18th, 1983 Two of the sisters, who were born within four minutes of each other on November 18, 1983, are now brunettes. And while the other four still have their blonde locks, there are three different shades between them.

The siblings have also struck out in different directions for their careers, with some working abroad and others taking jobs in the UK. Yet four still live in the eight-bedroom family home in Wallasey, Wirral, with parents Graham and Janet, a fifth will be returning this summer and the sixth lives just down the road. RELATED ARTICLES Share this article Share Mrs Walton, 58, said: ‘Jennie was a bit of a leader because she climbed out of her cot first, Luci was shy as a toddler but has made up for that now, Sarah was the quietest, although not now, Ruth is quite bossy, Kate is academic and Hannah is very articulate and organised. ‘But they’ve always been close and they talk to each other all the time. And we still have meeting around the kitchen table, which we had for any big decision, such as parties, birthdays or school.’ Hannah, who was the lightest baby at 2lb 1oz, is studying for her PGCE teaching qualification to work in a primary school. She is currently single and enjoys shopping, reading and meeting friends in her spare time.

The sextuplets' mother said: 'Jennie was a bit of a leader because she climbed out of her cot first, Luci was shy as a toddler but has made up for that now' Mrs Walton continues: 'Sarah was the quietest, although not now, Ruth is quite bossy, Kate is academic and Hannah is very articulate and organised' ‘When we were younger people would get us confused but not so much now. You can tell we’re sisters if we’re all lined up. I don’t think we look as alike now,’ she told the Daily Mirror. Luci, who was 2lbs 15oz at birth, worked as a holiday rep in Spain for two years before becoming an air stewardess. She lives five minutes from home with her fiancé of three years and likes going to the pub with friends. ‘I used to be really shy but I’m not any more. I think the repping I did sorted that out,’ she said. ‘Me and Ruth are very similar and probably most alike as we like to go and have a good drink.

But I think me and Hannah look the most alike.’ Ruth, who was 2lb 11oz, is an admin worker who returned home 18 months ago after being made redundant. The Liverpool FC fan, who has a long-term boyfriend, said: ‘I don’t feel special – I just have five sisters who are all the same age. Extraordinary bond: The sisters' childhood was documented on film until they were 18, but this is one of the first times we have seen them since Six daughters: The Walton girls were the world's first surviving all female sextuplets We’re all quite different. I like to go to the pub, watch the footie and play a bit of poker. I’m a bit of a boy really.’ Sarah is an administration worker at the Central Park Medical Centre in Liverpool and is saving up to buy a home with her boyfriend of four years. The keep-fit fan, who weighed 2lb 5oz at birth, said: ‘I’m naturally a very clean person so it is hard being in this house.

I like everything in its right place.' Admin assistant Kate, who works in the human resources department at Liverpool John Moore’s University, is also at home saving money to buy her own place. She is single and her interests include fashion, bowling and cinema. ‘Jennie, Luci and Ruth have all got the same sense of humour and are quite loud. Then me, Sarah and Hannah are the quieter ones and more sensible,’ said Kate, who was born weighing 2lb 13oz. Jumping for joy: The six sisters in their secondary school uniforms Jennie, who was the heaviest baby at 3lb 8oz, works as a children’s entertainer in a Majorca hotel but comes home for the off season. She and her boyfriend have been together almost four years. ‘We are completely different people, from our hair colour to the way we dress and what we do,’ said Jennie, who enjoys shopping and drinking with friends in her free time. The odds of having sextuplets are extremely low, with one occurring in every 4.5 million pregnancies. But many end in miscarriages and, even if the babies defy the odds, the mortality rate is high.

In more than 90 per cent of sextuplet births, one or more will die before their first birthday. Home sweet home: The sextuplets having a pillow fight and as babies, with their parents, in front of their home in Wirral As a result, the Walton children attracted worldwide attention when they were born. The girls were conceived using fertility treatment and their parents took a year off work to care for them full-time. Mr Walton, 60, described living with seven women for much of his life as an ‘eye-opener’ but revealed he expected everything to change ‘dramatically, with weddings and babies likely to happen soon’. However, he added: ‘If they all moved out tomorrow it would be dreadful. I love the noise and the shouting and have loved every minute of them growing up.’ * The Walton Sextuplets: Moving On will be shown on ITV1 on Monday June 13 at 9pm On marriage and children, the Walton sextuplets are playing a waiting game - Telegraph Relationship Advice and Romance On marriage and children, the Walton sextuplets are playing a waiting game The sextuplets have just turned 30 - and none of them are married.

But waiting for the right time or right man could have a backlash... Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah Walton Photo: Rex Comments Did you see the latest picture of the six Walton girls? Incredibly, the world’s only-surviving all-girl sextuplets have just turned 30 – blimey, imagine how old that makes those of us who remember their birth. An ITV documentary next week will bring us up to date with the lives of Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah. What strikes me is that not one of the girls is married, or has children, although three are engaged and all have careers. Their mother, Janet, now 61, is desperate for grandchildren, but her daughters are in no hurry to oblige. “A lot of people think we should all have been married and settled down with kids already,” says Ruth. “But there’s no rush, is there?” That remark could not have been uttered at any other time in human history. Janet, who was 31 when she conceived the sextuplets with the help of drugs, was considered to be in the last-chance saloon of motherhood in 1983.

Her daughters, seemingly unbothered by a family history of fertility problems, think they can take a more leisurely attitude. The Waltons may or may not be deluded, but they are bang on-trend for their generation. The mean age of women at the birth of her first child has been increasing progressively from 24.1 in 1963 to 26.2 in 1993. The latest figures are for 2012, when the average age is 28.1. To put that in context, when we first meet Elizabeth Bennet’s best friend, Charlotte Lucas, in Pride and Prejudice, we are meant to feel sorry for her. Poor Charlotte is stuck on the shelf and has to marry a fool like Mr Collins to avoid the stigma of lifelong spinsterhood. Charlotte, dear reader, has reached the ancient, gnarled age of 27. In 2014, any educated woman who has a baby by the age of 27 is considered freakishly retro.

Related Articles Why adultery could aid a happy marriage 14 Feb 2014 Undoubtedly, women should rejoice that they have more control over when they start a family, and that, as a result, they can pay for their own ticket to the ball. Why wait for Prince Charming who, if he’s clean, well-dressed, sensitive and reads books, turns out to be gay anyway? Still, I detect a backlash. A book called Marry Smart by Susan Patton has caused outrage in the States with its brazenly 18th-century approach to bagging a good husband. Patton, who was educated at Princeton, laments the fact that she did not find a mate there among the plentiful, clever single men. She urges young women to spend 75 per cent of their time in college looking for a man and to get married before graduation. Patton has hilariously high expectations of early unions – the vast majority will end swiftly in divorce. But she certainly offers a refreshing antidote to Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg, who advises young women to “lean in” to their careers, precisely at the time that the alarm starts clanging on the biological clock.

And I do like Patton’s warning: “Be aware of marrying a dumb guy for good sex. The sex won’t improve, and he’ll never get smarter.” Her frequent farmyard analogies – “Men will not buy the cow if the milk is free” – are dismayingly outdated for young women raised with feminist expectations of sexual equality. But, as I never tire of pointing out, Mother Nature does not share the views of Germaine Greer. Patton is quite right to point out that the supply of decent, suitable men diminishes as you get older, that there is no endless carousel bringing Mr Rights for you to choose from. That, if you want kids, Mr Good-Enough-with-Lots-in-Common will do very nicely, particularly at an age when you can still get pregnant without the trauma of IVF. Truly, we do our daughters a disservice if we tell them otherwise. Walton sextuplets, please note. ------------------------ THIRTEEN YEARS IS A LONG TIME TO BE A 'GIRLFRIEND' L'Wren Scott (Andrew Crowley) Hanging is a particularly decisive and masculine form of suicide. Women generally resort to less aggressive means, such as an overdose.

There is at least a chance you will come back from that. So there can be little doubt that fashion designer L’Wren Scott intended to take her own life in her Manhattan apartment on Monday morning. Shortly before, Scott had texted her assistant asking her to “come by” later. The assistant said that L’Wren must have wanted her to find her body quickly because she would not have liked the beautiful apartment “to get messy or smelly”. Fastidious to the last, then. There is poignancy in that, and in the fact that, when the news broke here, the BBC ran the headline: “Mick Jagger’s girlfriend found dead”. How inadequate the term “girlfriend” sounded, as it must surely have done to Scott, who had been the Rolling Stone’s lover since 2001. Thirteen years is a long time to be a man’s “girlfriend”, especially when that man has described you as “someone I’m sort of seeing”. Thirteen years is a long time to be a girlfriend, even when you’ve still got time on your side. And L’Wren didn’t. She was going to turn 50 next month.

Forget all those magazines telling you that 50 is the new 40. Fifty is a mortal shock, a menopausal maelstrom, even if you’ve got all the pieces of life’s jigsaw – partner, kids, home – in place. Fifty is when the oestrogen starts to dry up and you know that, if you haven’t got children of your own, you’re never going to have them. If you work in the fashion industry, as Scott did, and you’re dating a 70-year-old Peter Pan, then you are also painfully aware that youth and perfection are the currency, and that your own currency is being devalued by the year. She was running perilously short of the other kind of currency, too: she owed around £4 million to suppliers. A friend claimed yesterday that Scott had planned to announce the closure of her business this week. If Scott and Jagger had been married, the debt would have been a drop in the ocean (in 2010, Sir Mick’s personal fortune was estimated at £190 million). But bear in mind Jagger’s marriage to Jerry Hall, in 1990, after she had borne him two children.

When it ended, and the assets were divided, he disputed that their Balinese wedding had been legal. Lupe Montufar, who worked as L’Wren’s housekeeper for 16 years, told the New York Daily News: “She would tell me she wanted to get married and have a family, but she didn’t want to get her hopes up or say it out loud to Mick. She didn’t want to pressure him.” According to Montufar, Scott “sacrificed a lot” to be in a relationship with Jagger. She turned a blind eye to his predilections, accepting that “other women” was the price you had to pay for being the consort of a rock god. Jagger’s publicist denied the “horrible and inaccurate gossip” that her client had split up from Scott in the weeks before her death. Jagger himself says that he is “struggling to understand” the death of “my lover and best friend”. None the less, L’Wren had given him the best years of her life, sacrificing her hopes of becoming a mother to keep him.

Did she sense that her sell-by date was imminent and, with her business about to fail, wonder if it had all been worth it? Suicide is always a chilling mystery, a desolating act, and often an accusation. In the case of L’Wren Scott, though, you feel simply, and more keenly than ever: what a waste. ------------------------ EVERY MOTHER REMEMBERS HER MIDWIFE Emotional: Sophie Wessex (Rex) Still on the subject of great performances, there were tears in our house last week when Jessica Raine left BBC One’s Call the Midwife. As Jenny Lee, Raine was the incarnation of what every woman hopes for in a midwife; cool under pressure, but never cold, and blessed with a soulful connection to each labouring mother. I know Jenny would have understood the tears of Sophie, the Countess of Wessex, when she returned to the Surrey maternity unit where she nearly lost her life in 2003 giving birth to her daughter, Lady Louise Windsor. Emotion overcame her, and she gave her midwife a very un-royal and distinctly heartfelt hug.

Whether you left the labour ward five or 50 years ago, the memories are always with you. Two new people are created on the day you give birth: the baby and the woman who has the joy and challenge of being its mother. It’s the one moment when, whatever our social status, we know what truly matters. ------------------------ HOW DO I BELITTLE THEE? LET ME COUNT THE WAYS... Don't call me bossy: Beyoncé I applaud the well-meaning but doomed campaign to ban the word “bossy” as applied to little girls. Powerful women like Beyoncé and former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice point out that calling girls bossy can have a debilitating effect on their ambitions and discourage them from becoming leaders. Bossy, however, is just one among scores of dismissive words that are used to put down a female from her earliest years. The male equivalent tends to have different connotations.

Here’s a quick translation guide to this enduring double standard: Male: A real character / Female: Right little madam Male: Bit of a lad / Female: Slag Male: Authoritative / Female: Shrill Male: Mature, distinguished / Female: Old bag, batty Male: Sporty / Female: Lesbian Male: Raconteur / Female: Won’t Shut Up Male: Gravitas / Female: WeightWatchers Male: In touch with his feelings / Female: Ruled by her feelings Male: Good father and role model / Female: Bad mother, lacking in professional commitment Male: Finger on the pulse of contemporary culture / Female: Frivolous soap-watcher Male: Mercurial / Female: PMT Male: Powerful / Female: Nightmare. Run a mile. ------------------------ LINE OF DUTY SHOWS DANES HOW TO DO IT Keeley Hawes as DI Denton in 'Line of Duty' (BBC) Was Line of Duty, which ended on BBC2 last night, as thrilling as The Killing? Certainly, the police drama seemed to have learnt a few tricks from Scandi-noir.

Half of it was so dark, you weren’t sure whether the cause was gloom about endemic corruption, or maybe someone just forgot to pack a torch. This whodunnit had so many twists and turns that one viewer said on Twitter she wouldn’t be surprised to find out that she’d done it. I know exactly how she felt. If the denouement was not quite as dazzling as what came before, the actors never failed to shine. Keeley Hawes gave a magnificently unvain performance as DI Lindsay Denton. Vicky McLure was equally electric as DC Kate Fleming, and another award should definitely go to the great Adrian Dunbar for his Supt Hastings, a good man trying to remember what goodness feels like in a world gone bad. At this rate we’ll be exporting bacon to Denmark. More please! ------------------------ UK’s first ‘natural’ sextuplets born | UK | News | Daily Express UK’s first ‘natural’ sextuplets born A woman gave birth to sextup­lets yesterday – the first born in Britain for 26 years.

By Sarah Westcott 00:00, Sat, May 23, 2009 MIRACLE: The six babies are thought to be the UK’s only naturally conceived sextuplets (Pic posed by The six babies, thought to be the UK’s only naturally conceived sextuplets, were delivered by ­caesarean section within five minutes of each other. The four girls and two boys were 14 weeks premature and weigh between 1lb 7oz and 2lb 2oz. Last night they were being monitored in an intensive care unit. Neonatal consultant Clifford Mayes, who led the 30-strong delivery team at the Royal ­Hospital in Belfast, said: “This is both a happy time and a potentially difficult time. “It is an extraordinary thing to have witnessed but you are also struck by the fact that there are little babies in intensive care.” Lead midwife Patricia Denvir said: “It was a very stressful situation for staff and for the parents, but it went very well. Both parents were composed.” Britain’s last sextuplets were girls born in 1983 to Janet Walton, who had fertility treatment.

Their father Graham Walton, 58, said yesterday: “The new parents will have to be organised. There was so much to do and think about and there was never enough time. “But all you can do is keep smiling and enjoy every minute of it.” Sextuplets occur naturally in one out of 4.5million pregnancies but fertility treatments have led to a rise in multiple births. However, the babies were conceived naturally without the aid of IVF. Dr Mayes said there had been weeks of preparation involving experts from across the country working to ensure the babies arrived safely. The birth “went as well as we had hoped it would,” he said. “The care of the babies would be the care we would normally expect for any baby.” Dr Mayes said it would be impossible for a woman to go full term with six babies – she might make 30 weeks at best – but the mother had carried them for 26 weeks. Midwife Mrs Denvir added: “The mother was very composed. Under a very stressful situation both parents were very composed and they dealt with it very well.

“It is a very emotional time but it’s also very stressful for all concerned.” Keith Reed, chief executive of the Twins and Multiple Births Association, said the case was unique in the UK and described the babies as “miracles”. He said: “This is wonderful news and everyone in the multiple birth community will be keeping their fingers crossed that mother and babies thrive. “Around half of the 11,000 multiple births each year are premature resulting in one or more of their babies being cared for in a Neo Natal Intensive Care Unit so our families understand the roller coaster of emotions this family will be on.” The news follows the case of single mother Nadya Suleman, who gave birth to octuplets in California in January. Britain’s most famous multiple birth mother is probably Mandy Allwood, who in 1996 miscarried all eight of her babies at 19 weeks. But in 1983 the Walton sextuplets were born in Liverpool. Hannah, Lucy, Ruth, Sarah, Kate and Jenny are now 25. Sextuplet father Mr Walton, 58, added: “My wife is so very organised.

We had to be, changing nappies, feeding, sleeping, at all hours of the day and night. “There was always so much to think about and never enough time to do it. “All I can say to them is that there will be lots of tears, as with any family, but there will also be lots of fun and special times ahead.” on pregnancies but fertility treatments have led to a rise in multiple births. Most read in UK Janet Walton gave birth to all female sextuplets | Incredible Weird Home › Incredible › Janet Walton gave birth to all female sextuplets Janet Walton gave birth to all female sextuplets 5 February, 2015 / by admin / in Incredible , News And then there were SEVEN! Think raising the world’s first all-girl sextuplets was a handful?

Now the Waltons face a whole new era of merry chaos — the grandchildren have started arriving On November 18th, 1983, Janet Walton gave birth to all female sextuplets Now, Sarah, has given birth to her own daughter, Jorgie Janet and Graham Walton are looking forward to more grandchildren Frances Hardy caught up with the famous Walton family to see what’s new Both of them agree it was a momentous day. But Janet and Graham Walton, parents of the world’s only all-girl sextuplets, can’t quite reach a consensus on what was most remarkable about the October morning last year when they became first-time grandparents. Graham remembers the drama and farce. ‘Janet was delayed getting to the hospital because of what I now refer to as the Axminster Incident,’ he says. ‘A roll of carpet fell off the back of a van in front of her as she was driving into Liverpool. She was panicking about being late.’ Scroll down for video The Walton girls, pictured with their parents Janet and Graham.

Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah, born in Liverpool in 1983, are the only female sextuplets in the world to have survived Meanwhile Sarah, the first of their sextuplets to bless them with a grandchild, was caught up in a minor palaver at the hospital. ‘Sarah was being taken to the operating theatre for her Caesarian section when the scrub nurse — or was it the surgeon? — got stuck in the lift with her,’ begins Graham. ‘That lift story’s just wrong on so many levels,’ interrupts Ruth, who, like her father, is a natural joker. ‘Sarah wasn’t stuck in it at all.’ ‘Well, someone involved in the operation was trapped in a lift,’ insists Graham, while Janet — serene, calm and unerringly competent — rolls her eyes and smiles. She remembers only the everyday wonder of her granddaughter Jorgie’s birth. ‘I’d seen Sarah early in the morning, and an hour and a half later there she was holding her baby, a beautiful little girl with really big, dark eyes and lots of dark hair. ‘It’s a miracle, isn’t it?

I took the first photo of Jorgie half an hour after she was born. The Walton girls, pictured here aged 5, (left to right) Luci, Ruth, Jennie, Hannah, Kate and Sarah ‘She was perfect, so tiny. She weighed 7lb 6½ oz at birth. Sarah was only 2lb 5oz at birth, so her little girl was three times as big as her mum. Yet I couldn’t believe how delicate and small she looked. ‘I felt a tremendous surge of protective love. It flooded into me the moment I saw the pictures from her first scan. ‘I texted all the family: “It’s a girl!” (Well, the Waltons don’t do boys, do we?) I even learnt how to send a group message. Graham and Janet Walton pictured with their six daughters in 1983, shortly after they were born. After Janet’s multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, she spent the rest of her pregnancy in hospital Apparently, everyone keeps telling Janet, there is ‘no one more experienced at motherhood than you’. ‘But when my girls were born, I knew absolutely nothing,’ she says. ‘I’d had no time to prepare.

I hadn’t even seen a midwife or been to an antenatal class. The instant my multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, I was whipped into hospital and I stayed there until the birth.’ Janet and Graham had given up hope of conceiving a child of their own. In fact, they were poised to adopt — believing the fertility drug she had been taking would never work — when she became pregnant with six girls. Janet, Graham and their daughters are seen here aged 11, getting ready for their first day of secondary school. Janet and Graham had given up hope of having children when they found out Janet was pregnant The sextuplets, Hannah, Ruth, Luci, Kate, Jennie and Sarah, born in Liverpool on November 18, 1983, remain unique — no other set of female sextuplets has ever survived — and the world has watched them grow to adulthood with thrilled wonderment. Those of us who have experienced parenthood on a more modest scale can only marvel at the epic task that confronted Janet and Graham after they were born.

When Jorgie was born to Sarah and her fiance Kieran, a restaurant manager, on October 7 last year, Janet’s mind cast back to the day, 31 years earlier, when she became a mum. Watch This Video The Walton Sextuplets Are All Grown Up And Having Kids Of Their Own The Walton Sextuplets Are All Grown Up And Having Kids Of Their Own Sorry this article is not available in your chosen language. The Walton Sextuplets Are All Grown Up And Having Kids Of Their Own Share Advertisement People are fascinated by families that have four, five, or even six children at once. It's incredibly momentous to have one baby, let alone six at the same time. This is what happened to Janet and Graham Walton on November 18th, 1983 in Liverpool, England. Not only did Janet give birth to six children, she gave birth to the world's only all-girl sextuplets! At the time, the Waltons were heavily publicized given the bizarre nature of the birth. Luckily, all six girls survived and thrived as young women. 33 years later, Janet and Graham have gotten their first (super cute) grandchild.

I'm guessing this may be the first of many... You need to see the sextuplets now! SHARE this article with your Facebook friends. Advertisement via Daily Mail COLLECT The Waltons were immediately hit with a major life change, one they weren't actually all that prepared for. Janet told the Daily Mail that, "[sic] I’d had no time to prepare. I hadn’t even seen a midwife or been to an antenatal class. The instant my multiple pregnancy was confirmed at eight weeks, I was whipped into [sic] hospital and I stayed there until the birth."The family didn't just stay at home all the time. In this photo, you can see their car setup. Advertisement The Waltons made it work and had lots of fun doing it. Things were so busy around the house that visitors would be given a child to carry and a diaper to go along with it. The girls were tracked all the way through grade school. Here they are at the age of five. From left to right we have Luci, Ruth, Jennie, Hannah, Kate, and Sarah.

Question: Which year saw the birth of the sextuplets 'The Waltons'?
Answer: 1983