Types of mums – are you a silky, crunchy or scrunchy mum?

Last Updated on April 1, 2024

I’ve always loved learning about different groups of things and seeing where I fit in. For example, I love personality tests, and learning how my personal traits align with the results I get when I take them.

Now as a mum there are many articles on different types of mums, even different types of school run mums that I can read to help me understand how my personality determines my parenting style.

Recently I was listening to one of the podcasts for mums that I love, and they were talking about different types of mums being the Silky Mum, Crunchy Mum, and Scrunchy Mum, which I found so interesting that I wanted to explore more here.

If you’ve also heard about these types of mums and would like to find out which type you are, then I hope this blog post helps.

The Silky Mum

The Silky Mum is seen as a break from the Pinterest perfect mum many of us have been exposed to, and instead shows us that mum life is messy and mistakes can be made.

The Silky Mum lies at one end of the spectrum with the Crunchy Mum, and is a mum who: 

• Leans towards things that make life easy
• Uses store bought medicines
• Embraces screen time
• Allows fast food
• Buys store bought snacks and plastic toys
• Uses disposable nappies
• Breastfeeds, bottle feeds, or formula feeds
• Uses a stroller, cots, and sleep training

The Crunchy Mum

The Crunchy Mum lies at the opposite end of the spectrum to the Silky Mum, and is a mum who:

• Has a holistic approach towards parenting
• Uses natural medicines
• Limits screen time
• Makes healthy kids snacks using organic ingredients
• Makes homemade dinners
• Buys Montessori approved wooden toys
• Uses cloth nappies
• Breastfeeds exclusively
• Co sleeps
• Wears their baby

The Scrunchy Mum

The Scrunchy Mum lies between the Silky Mum and the Crunchy Mum.

This type of mum uses some things from the Silky Mum, and some things from the Crunchy Mum, depending upon the stage of their family, or lifestyle.

For example, a Scrunchy Mum may feed their children store bought snacks, but make their children homemade dinners. Or they may use disposable nappies, but co sleep.

What type of mum am I?

I am more of a Silky Mum than any other type of mum discussed here.

I think there have been times early on when I’ve been a Scrunchy Mum like using store bought medicines, but making my kid’s snacks, or using a stroller but at times wearing my second son.

However, on a day-to-day basis I definitely do what I can to make my mum life easier.

My boys have a lot of screen time, we eat a lot of McDonalds, I always have store bought snacks on me, I use disposable nappies, and I live by the mantra that as a mum you need to do what you can to survive.

My thoughts on types of mums

I like types of mum groups as a way to help me understand my parenting style, and to make me remember that I’m not the only mum that does things a certain way.

As mums we’re judged all of the time, with everything we do and don’t do, and I feel that grouping mums as silky, crunchy, or scrunchy is a good way to highlight that there’s no one way to parent, and that we can be a mixture of different types of mums.

Whichever of these types of mums you most identify with, there’s comfort in knowing that there’s many others that feel the same as you do, that we’re all just doing things the best way we know how, or the best way that suits us.

Are you a silky, crunchy, or scrunchy mum?