All-in-One Mum

I'm working my way through a rather delicious selection of Schwartz herbs, spices and marinades.  I love my food to be hearty, balanced and full of flavour.  I also like to try new things so am happily 'making do' with what I have in the fridge. My latest creation is Smokey Texan Marinaded grilled chicken breasts with a selection of roasted vegetables and pearl barley.  Pearl barley (the stuff you usually find in hearty soups and stews) is my latest favourite accompaniment.  If I could eat it on it's own as a meal, I would.  That's how much I love it. The Smokey Texan Marinade sauce is really easy to make as you combine the sachet contents with 50ml oil, 75ml water, mix it all up then pour over the meat to marinate it.  I had chicken breasts in the fridge so I used these instead of beef or pork which are the other two meat suggestions.  Schwartz recommend to leave the meat over night to marinate but I only left it for about five hours.  It...

A recent survey of mums in the UK showed that a massive 71% of mums love to take their children to soft play sessions as a special treat.  It's a fantastic way of letting your little ones have fun and while playing, running and climbing off some of that amazing energy at the same time, no matter the weather.   Bassetts Soft & Chewy Vitamins carried out a survey of their own asking 1,000 mums their opinions on the benefits of soft play for their children.  The results of this survey illustrated in the table below. Table: Mums Opinions on Benefits of Soft Play With the above results in mind Bassetts Soft & Chewy have launched a new exciting on-pack promotion where you can claim a free soft play session in your local area with each pack with a  promotional sticker on it, which I'm sure all mums will love!   The Bassetts Soft & Chewy Vitamins are great for little ones.  My daughter uses the Early Health Orange flavour and absol...

One of the first things I did when I found out that I was pregnant with my daughter just over four years ago was search for an app that showed me my baby's development on a weekly basis.  I wanted to know what was happening in each stage and if what I was feeling physically and emotionally was as to be expected.  There were of course apps available at the time but none that combined everything I was looking for all into one. Pregnancy Planner  is a lovely new app that is designed to give you personalised information based on your due date, formulated on your last menstrual period, date of conception or given due date.  You are then shown how many projected weeks, days, hours, minutes and even seconds you have until meeting your little baby.   With each passing week the grey heart slowly fills up until it is completely pink.  I think it's a beautiful analogy for a parent's love for their unborn child, which grows steadily with every passing week unti...

My daughter loves Tickety Toc, so much so that when the show is on Nick Jr we can't switch channels until chime time is over. The Ultimate Tickety Toc Sticker and Activity Collection is one of the first in the Tickety Toc range and is a beautiful book full of Tickety Toc fun!  My daughter is 3 1/2 and she really enjoyed sticking, playing the games, doing the puzzles and building the hats, boxes and other bits.   I liked that there is a different activity on almost every page.  The instructions from the Tickety Toc characters are clear, telling you what needs to be done to complete that particular task.  Activities are the right length to hold the attention of little people. We also had a great time putting together the Tommy and Tallulah Trooper uniform hats and building the Exercise Time Trophy and other fun things together in the Birthday Time section.   There are over 150 amazing stickers, puzzles, games and activities for little ones in this clever...