I REMEMBER like it were yesterday being eight years old and wanting more than anything in the world to be the woman with the side ponytail in the Wrigley’s Spearmint advert.

If somebody had offered me a time machine and the chance to fast-forward to adulthood, I would have jumped at it.

All little girls, at some point, long to be grown-ups — to wear crop tops, paint their faces with garish pink lipstick and walk in high heels.

And most children certainly pester their parents into buying “adult” gadgets for them — everything from DVD players for their bedrooms to motorised scooters.

But don’t you think it’s all gone a little too far? It seems to me that we’re letting our children grow-up too fast, and nobody’s stopping it.

This week it emerged that half the children in this country between the ages of six and nine have their own mobile phone.

Not only that, but a new phone came on the market aimed at children as young as four.

How ridiculous — who do toddlers have to phone?

The new glowPhone can store up to 50 numbers (do children in nursery school even know 50 people?) and has dedicated keys for “mum” and “dad”.

The makers claim it helps active kids and parents keep in touch during their increasingly busy days. But what kind of parents don’t know where their four-year-old is? Where would a toddler be going on their own? Are they walking themselves to playschool? Nipping out to baby massage classes?

Aside from the sheer silliness of the whole thing, what about the health implications?

In 2005 Sir William Stewart published a report saying that parents should ensure their children use mobile phones only when absolutely necessary because of the potential health risks. He advised that children under eight should not use mobile phones at all.

Although there’s no evidence that mobile phones are dangerous, they’re so convenient I suspect it would only be when green gunge starts pouring out of our ears and our brains start frying we would start questioning their safety.

It’s not just phones, either. You can buy everything from baby high heels to perfume for your beloved little ones and all before they can even walk.

This is insane. Babies don’t need a signature scent, they just need love.

With both parents usually having to go out to jobs" target="_blank">work, is it the guilt of not being there that’s making them give-in to their child’s demands more easily?

I don’t know. I’m not a parent. I’m just guessing.

But what I can see is that if we’re not careful we’ll rob our kids of the most important gift of all — the chance to be a child.

Childhood is supposed to be the age of innocence. I fear it’s being turned into one long consumer binge.