All-in-One Mum

We visited Hatfield Park Farm recently which is located in the grounds of Hatfield House in Hertfordshire.  It is a wonderful place to take children of all ages to see the different breeds of sheep, ducks, geese, pigs, cattle, turkeys, chickens and donkeys that they have on the farm.  They also have a beautiful playground area. Entrance was reasonable at £4.50 each per adult and £2.00 for a child ticket (0-3 go free) and for 50p you can buy one bag of feed to give to the different animals.  The animals are friendly and you can feed them at the various designated feeding points.  I would recommend getting at least two bags of feed or at least one per child as it's hard not to feed every animal you see as they come running to the feed stations as you get closer to them. There are about four sandpits darted around the farm where the kids (and, um, adults) can play in the sand and use the toy cranes to move the sand around and build sandcastles.  This was a b...

Wow!  I haven't done one of these in ages so I thought it was about time that I did! Leave a caption for the photo below.  It's not really one of the funniest ones of the week but it is one of my favourites. Alison x 1. Look at the picture.   2. Have a think.   3. Leave a creative caption!

Potty training.  Some kids take to it like ducks to water.  Others, not so much.  Being strong willed, my daughter more or less trained herself from the age of two and only had a few accidents and thankfully left me no surprises. She is now three and wanting to get out of her night time nappies.  This means that I need to get myself organised just in case there are any accidents at night, so with one sheet on the bed and two clean ones in the cupboard, I feel pretty much sorted on that front but the key thing is to have something to stop little night time accidents from soaking through to the mattress. That is where Huggies DryNites Bed Mats come in.  We were sent a pack to sample and so far they have worked amazingly. The mats are highly absorbent with a waterproof backing and very easy to stick down to the mattress.  Simply peel off the adhesive backing on the four corners (I do one at a time) and then stick into place on your child's mattress o...

It has taken me many years to realise that life really is too short to worry about the small things.  Things that are out of your control or something that won't happen for a while, that really isn't even worth thinking about, is pointless worrying about.  That said, when other people are petty about things that directly relate to me, it makes me just slightly irritated. We currently have a communal garden area and with that living arrangement comes a Residents Committee.  When I think of Residents Committee's, visions of pensioners or people who have nothing better to do with their time other than restrict others by enforcing ridiculous and antiquated rules or simply being petty, come to mind.   That is more or less the case here.  You can clearly see I have a bit of a rebellious side here that just wants to shout "No, damn the man! We will not stand for this!". So, after receiving a letter from the company that 'manages' the maisonettes asking for al...

Nonabox is a fabulous new subscription service which delivers a beautiful box of luxury, personalised products for mother and baby, suitable for pregnancy and the first two years of a baby’s life, sent direct to your door. Each box is filled with hand selected products from some of the UK’s best brands with each  Nonabox tailored to different stages of a baby’s development.   Whether you’re in your second trimester and thinking about massage oils and newborn essentials or have an active one year old which needs entertaining and feeding, Nonabox has it all planned out.  Nonabox launched one year ago in Spain, Italy, Germany and Austria and is already a hit with over 200,000 mums.   An ever-expanding list of over 1,000 UK's mums are looking forward UK Nonabox launch and to the arrival of their first purple and grey ribbon tied box.  Containing between 7 and 10 products each Nonabox allows m...

School is out, but does education have to stop? No! Children may have homework for the summer, but education isn’t just words and numbers on paper. You can support your child’s education in new ways that mean they are learning without even realising it. One of the best ways to embrace an educational opportunity is to attend a special event at a place of interest. Roman ruins are a great place to start. Vindolanda, in the North East, often has dress-up and a wide range of fun games and activities, which mean the children get to wear costumes and play, while learning about what life was like all those years ago. Other places which may run similar events include castles such as Alnwick Castle, which played a huge role as a filming location for the Harry Potter films. Another fantastic venue for summer holiday adventures is the Zoo. If you check out your zoo’s website, you will be able to find out information about talks and exhibitions, as well as feeding displays. Edinburgh Zoo ...

I've been quite lucky lately with my blog, receiving foodie things to sample and review.  Yes, getting free things is nice and I do love doing reviews.  I'm a bit strange in that sometimes, even though I know it's a bit of exploitation of blogger's (although we agree to it) as journo's could be paid big bucks for doing things like this in the past, I'm happy to do it. I like promoting brands and products that I love or feel strongly about.  For those of you who knew me before my blogging days, I'd regularly endorse products purely because I felt people should know about them and use them too.  Yes, I am strange. Anyway, getting back to the foodie bit.  I'm a trained chef.  Worked as a chef for about five years in various places but then decided that the hours and pay were crap.  That's the only way I can put it.   Unless you have our own business or are a celebrity chef, it's crazy.  I still work long hours because that's all I know. ...

Since getting married, buying a home, getting a cat and then having a baby, I have become more domesticated.  I get excited about new washing machines and their various spin speeds and cycles.  I know how to clean most stains from various materials.  I am no longer bothered about the chore that is hand washing, and most importantly, I take care in what cleaning products I use in my home. I've recently discovered method ; a non-toxic design led cleaning brand that have beautiful products that can be used around the home to combat dirt.  They are really unique due to their emphasis on design with the various products coming in very eye catching colours and being attractively packaged so they look gorgeous around your home.  Functional and fabulous as I like to say. A bit of a history lesson... Founded in 2000, method is the pioneer of planet-friendly and design-driven home, laundry and hand wash products.  Formulated with naturally derived, b...

I’m quite happy to admit that I am one of those (sad) people that loves and is slightly addicted to Pinterest.  I am also ever so slightly fond of scrolling through the latest Ikea  catalogue on my iPad or trawling through the website, going through the various room ideas and then pinning them to  my Pinterest boards .  Liking, wanting, pinning.  Liking, wanting, pinning.  It’s addictive. My latest mini project is to get my bedroom split in two by partitioning it bang down the centre, subsequently creating an extra bedroom for my yet to be conceived, second child.  This has opened up an entire Pandora’s box with regards to design ideas for my daughter’s new ‘big girl’ room, the new nursery and then the room for myself and my husband; a place where we can retreat to when both children drive us nuts. As I scroll through various pins and web pages, my mind works at a million miles per hour.  What colour scheme?  What design style?...