Review: LEGO® Awesome Ideas Book

When I was little I spent hours and hours with my LEGO box building multi-coloured house after multi-coloured house.  The base was a thick green rectangle (what's happened to them now?) and then I built up the walls with any and every colour I had with some windows nice and evenly dotted around then another green block on top.  We didn't have a 'set' that I can remember so had to be creative.

  

Not like now, the boys have tons of sets, fire stations, police stations, train stations, numerous vehicles and a proper house, not to mention a harbour and Hulks Hellicarrier.

Sadly as the models get broken up (as they do with a 7 and 4 year old) they don't always get rebuilt, as this happens all our pieces go into storage drawers.

  

Then we moved house and decided that would be a perfect sort out opportunity, well we got part way, we started to bag up the sets but only managed a few.

Now the instructions are all boxed away as we are re-decorating the boys rooms and (after climbing over boxes) I was able to bring their LEGO downstairs to play with, but they were lost.  You see that's the problem with buying sets now, my boys don't have the experience of building for the fun of building.  Which was why it was perfect timing for the DK LEGO® Awesome Ideas* book to land on our doorstep.

'boys' toys vs 'girls' toys

Twice this week I've had a conversation with someone over gender stereotyping in kids and where we draw for the line.

Personally I don't see the problem with my boys playing with the traditional "girls toys".  When they went to the childminders the first thing Noah would head for were the baby dolls and the pushchair.He spent hours playing with it, taking it for walks etc.   They both enjoy getting the tea-set out at home to play shops or picnics.

They enjoy watching Frozen and play endless games where they are Elsa or Anna (fighting over who will be who)...... they wear my old uni fairy wings and wands, my 5 year old has even been known to prance around the house wearing my bra when he was younger.

And who could forget how much fun they had when Bodyshop brought make up and other goodies to the #MidsBlogMeet, they were in their element. 

or how they love to have a bath using Lush's bathbombs

Lego cake

Noahs birthday started off much like any other soon to be 3 year old ..... with a request for a Hulk cake.  Sure I could buy some icing picture off ebay (or somewhere) and a sponge cake .... or I could make it myself .... that was where the trouble started!!




With the boys we did a trial run a couple of weeks ago using red food colouring (to make a spiderman cake) - it didn't give quite the colour intensity I was hoping for....




So armed with green gel colour (which my friend advised would work much better) I set about the cake making mission.  The flavour of the Spiderman cake was lovely so we used  the same recipe.

I also bought multicoloured ready rolled icing and dug out the Lego silicone moulds.  Hulk himself was going to prove a challenge ... there was nothing online I felt confident copying so I went with a simple (well ..) marble cake with green icing, Lego man and bricks.

Blog a Day - 16th September 2013 - superheroes

Day 16 - September 16th........ National Heroes Day (Saint Kitts and Nevis)

Heroes - real or not..........

- Who is your hero? Why?
OR
- Which superhero would you be and why?
OR
.......use some imagination - there's no rules.
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ARGGG Superheroes are the bain of my life at the moment.  I have a 4 years old and 2 year old who (depending which day of the week it is) think they are either Superman, Batman or Ironman.

A blog a day in september - 15th September 2013 - make a hat day

 Day 15 - September 15th........ Make a hat day

Choose a hat, make a hat, wear your hat........

and share your pictures here.

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let me just start by saying we have NOT had a good day ........ it did NOT go according to plan and now 2 grumpy boys are refusing to make hats!!!!

A blog a day in september - 4th September 2013 - Favourite Film

Day 4 - September 4th........ Favourite Film

Recommend your favourite film or films to others............

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My favourite film.......what a tough one. There are so many amazing films that have touched my life, made me laugh and made me cry......ones that will always hold memories (such as that kiss in the back row during titanic).

From my childhood "The Lion King" holds strongest memories. When I was 12 my dad took me and my sister to see it when it came out, this was a realllly rare occurrence as he never took us anywhere on his own.

our Holiday A-Z

A - Ardleigh Car Boot Sale, AA
B  - BBQ, Boules
C - clacton, Colchester, Car
D - daddy
E - escalators
F - farm
G - Great Grandma and Grandad, golf, giraffe
H - hamleys
I - Ice Cream
J - jet plane
K - kids
L - lego! London
M - motorways
N - nene valley railway
O - overground (busses)
P - playground, peacocks, Prezzo, pizza hut, punch and judy
Q - Queen
R - RAIN RAIN RAIN!!!
S - sleep (or lack of)
T - Toby Carvery, trains
U - underground (or lack of)
V - vehicles
W - walking, woods, wasps
X - xylophone
Y - yummy
Z - zoo

#Spend20K challange

Well that's an easy one.......... a house deposit!!!

The #Spend20K challange is a gauntlet thrown down by The National Lottery to celebrate the launch of their new Lotto game, in association with BritMums.
They want to know what you would spend 20K on if you won it....... and the winners (10) get £100 love to shop vouchers.

Around this area houses tend to sell for about £90,000 - £100, 000 - the liklyihood of us ever owning one on just above minimum wage with 2 children...... well actually, co-incidently,  about the same as the chance of us winning the lottery.

I hate the fact we scrimp every month to get through and spend £550 a month on rent - a mortgage would actually be lower!!!!  The chance of us ever having £10,000+ deposit for a house, then money for solicitors etc - impossible.

So yes, if I won £20K, I would put £12,000 (ish) as my 10% house deposit, use some for the soliciters etc and everything else on making my house into the perfect home.

for starters - the kids room.
I would make them the most perfect bedrooms and playroom - they are both superhero obsessed (which doesn't come cheap).

How coool would this look on the kids bedroom wall with lights in Iron Man's hands??

Or they would LOVE this one.

I love this style bed for when they have friends to come and stay.

and as for the playroom...... well they REALLY need some decent storage for their Lego (I'm sure they have more then the Lego shop itself does lol)

I like these boxes

And of course they would need a proper lego table.  I love this idea - and would solve the storage issue too.

Then I would make a start on my room...............the kitchen...........the bathroom...................on second thoughts I might need more then £20K ...................................................

So join in, what would you spend the £20K on??  A holiday?  Paying off the credit cards??

Britmums Spend £20K challenge in association with The National Lottery.

“This post is an entry for BritMums #Spend20K Challenge sponsored by The National Lottery, with more ways to win more money on the new Lotto game. Find out more about new Lotto, which starts in October, here – www.national-lottery.co.uk”