Review: Blue Kangaroo Series by Emma Chichester Clark

Back in 1998 Emma Chichester Clark wrote the first of her Blue Kangaroo books, "I Love You, Blue Kangaroo!".  A delightful story about a little girl called Lily and her favourite toy Blue Kangaroo. at least he was her favourite until Wild Brown Bear comes along, and Yellow Cotton Rabbit, and the Furry Puppies, and then more and more new toys, until Blue Kangaroo feels there just isn't room for him any more.  The book won the Grinzane Junior Award and was shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal.

4 years after the last of the Blue Kangaroo books was released Emma has a new title out and has re-released 2 of the old favourites.

Review: Weetabix Protein

Breakfast is always a very boring affair in our house.  I tend to rush off to work on a weekday, with porridge for breakfast once I get in (the benefit to an office job) whilst the kids have whatever cereal happened to be on offer that week (at the moment they are quite happy eating Value branded Cornflakes, so you can see why I'm not a fan of spending a lot of money on breakfast cereal.  When we were told Weetabix had launched new Weetabix Protein and asked to try it out we said yes please.

Review: Mega Marshmallows by Innovative Bites

Me and my boys love marshmallows so when we were asked if we wanted to try the new Mega Marshmallows from Innovative Bites the boys were very quick to reply "yes".

These marshmallows certainly live up to their name, at 5 centimetres high, they really are MEGA! 

Mega Marshmallows are a guilt-free snack for mummy too, containing 0% Fat and just 84Kcal per serving

Review: The Imaginary by A.F. Harrold

"Amanda was dead"
Like most (strange) 7 year olds this opening line was enough to draw Ben into The Imaginary, a world of love, loss, new starts, old endings and imagination.

Amanda, like most children has a best friend, Rudger,  She found him one day in her wardrobe and he becomes her companion, there for all her adventures, dangers and challengers.  Amanda's mother is quite accepting of Rudger, her friends less so.  You see only Amanda can see him, he doesn't exist.  At least Amanda thinks only she can see him until one day Mr Bunting arrives informing her he hunts imaginaries and knows about Rudger.  With the rumour being that Mr Bunting eats them Rudger finds himself alone and running for his imaginary life.

Review: The Nonsense Show - Eric Carle

My boys talk gobbledegook on a daily basis, they are extremely creative and have fantastic imaginations and they both love to read. Noah was really excited therefore when a book arrived for him (normally the books are afrom Penguin Random House, The Nonsense Show.  This book really made the boys laugh out loud as they read it from cover to cover and then started again.

Review: Brewers Fayre

I used to love Brewers Fayre when I was living at home, we used to have one on the doorstep (and conveniently one that my sister went on to get a job at).  We moved to Sheffield and visited a couple but they gradually got taken over by another company until there are none left.
  When FrankPR asked us to try out their new Autumn menu I was, initially, disappointed at the thought of having to turn down such a great offer but then remembered we were off to Chesterfield at the weekend for Ben's Birthday and they have a lovely Brewers Fayre, Lock Keeper, which sits near the Chesterfield Canal and is only a short walk from the bus stop.

So presents opened we set off for Chesterfield, Ben had no idea what we were doing so we headed off for a little walk along the canal path before turning round and making our way to the Brewers Fayre, which is conveniently sited next door to the Premier Inn if you ever stay there.

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.

Review: Pan

Second star to the right and straight on 'till morning

 We all know the story, Peter and Tinkerbell go to London, the Darlings visit Neverland, the villainous Captain Hook must be overthrown.....
..... but do you know what happened before this?  How did Peter become a Lost Boy in Neverland?  When did Peter and Tinkerbell become friends? How do they know Captain Hook?

Review: The Dinosaur that Pooped the Bed

It's been 10 months since we reviewed the other Dinosaur that Pooped books and they still make an appearance on a daily basis, Noah (4) especially loves them, I often find him curled up under the covers with them in bed when he should be asleep.  He was super excited when I told him Tom Fletcher and Dougie Poynter has released a new one - The Dinosaur that Pooped the Bed.

Made in Sheffield: Proove Pizza

Starving after our visit to the Children's Hospital, and with it being gone 7pm so not wanting to cook anything I remembered a new Pizza place had opened in Broomhill and decided we should go and pay it a visit.

Review: Kids Mystery Case Files

When I was little there was this great puzzle magazine called Quiz Kids (ohh it still exists) and I used to love it.   That and the Usbourne Puzzle Adventures series which Ben thinks are fab.  In both cases you followed a story throughout, soving the puzzles and mystery's to solve the crime.  With this in mind when I saw the opportunity for a new e-magazine for children called "Kids Mystery Case Files" I put my name forwards.

The Kids Mystery Case Files are designed to let your child step inside a mystery and turn amateur sleuth to discover whodunnit and why.  By solving puzzles your children discover clues, clear suspects and solve the case.  Here's Detective Cracker to tell you some more.....

The magazines are online, however unless your children are happy doing things in their head you will need to print the activities as they aren't interactive, saying that Microsoft have released a few tools that can be used to highlight and scribble on pages if you know how to use them.

Lets take a look inside the one we reviewed #3 Poison Pen Letters

Tesco Orchard Review: Finest Vintage Farmhouse Cheddar

"CHEESE"........ and like that the human sized mice in my house come scurrying over to see what cheese the Tesco delivery man has bought this week....blocks, sticks, grated, round, teddy bear shaped......

Personally, to me, cheese is cheese.  As I do the shopping and we are on a budget I tend to buy the huge heavy duty value 1kg mature blocks of cheddar.  But hubby has more sensitive taste buds (after all it is one of only about 6 foods that he eats) and prefers it when I buy a named brand like Cathedral City or Pilgrims Choice.    We don't really steer away from cheddar other then when we have pizza - however it's best not remind the husband about the time he tried to grate the mozzarella ball for home made pizza.

Whether it's

with salad....   

....   on shepherds pie.....

Summer Holiday: Stockeld Park, Wetherby

I stumbled upon this place a few months ago when we were looking for something to do.  Me and the kids think Mr Bloom is great and as he was appearing I tried to persuade him to make the 3h journey (each way) on public transport to go.... he wasn't amused and put his foot down.   So when mum asked me for places I wanted to go when we were camping at Sheriff Hutton I immediately thought of here, in a car it's only an hour from mine.

If you haven't been and you have small children it's definitely one to put on your to-do list, the boys (and us) had the most amazing time.

The park is split into 8 zones (9 if you count the cafe) and we explored most of them, this isn't a trip that takes a couple of hours, we were here from 12-5 and could easily have stayed another hour if we'd had the time.

Review: Sizzling Pubs, The Park

We love this restaurant, and generally if we are going out for a family evening meal this is the pub of choice.  You may remember a couple of years ago I actually voted it one of my favourite places to eat.  I was therefore eager to try them out for breakfast when I found out they had started to do it.

Me and my son got there around 9.15 today (Thursday) and were the only ones in the place. We ordered our meals (a small brekkie for me and pancakes with strawberries in syrup and fluffy cream) at 9.20. 20 minutes later it arrived!!! Now granted it was fresh but even I can cook 1 sausage and 1 piece of bacon in less than 20 minutes. Heck I could have walked to the local shop, bought it and cooked it in that amount of time.  In fact I am sure our last evening meal came faster!!   I can only assume they didn't have any hot plates switched on or prep done.  The toast turned up dry and when I tried to ask for some butter the one member of staff had vanished. The next time I saw him was very briefly as he went past us into an office when we were leaving.  We were never asked if we needed anything (other than cutlery), whether our food was ok, or offered an apology for the length of time it took.

Classic Breakfast:  egg, bacon, sausage, half tomato, hash brown, baked beans, toast with butter.  £2.49  + Cup of tea (£1)

Tesco Orchard Review: Summer Fruit and Veg - Strawberries

The boys loved Tesco's fresh juicy strawberries which we tried as part of the orchard programme and would definitely get again.  They lasted a really long time and are so versatile.

These summer buckets and spades we bought from Lakeland make the perfect receptacle for them to be eaten fresh out of........

Tesco Orchard Review: Summer Fruit and Veg - Carrots and Peas

When Tesco asked me to try their fresh summer fruit and veg range I noticed a lot of it was on 3 for the price of 2.  Having already picked up some carrot spaghetti I decided to try their freshly packed peas and carrots.   I'll admit I'm not the best when it comes to buying fresh food but carrots are one thing I will buy, all be it, these are normally whole carrots that I prepare myself.
  Peas, unless in pods or sugarsnap, are generally bought frozen.

Tesco Orchard Review: Summer Fruit and Veg - Carrot Spaghetti

Ben is becoming really picky when it comes to veg recently, peas are too green, corn on the cob too hard (he has wobbly teeth) but sweetcorn too boring (unless swimming in butter).  Carrot's are usually too hard or too soft ..... my patience was wearing a little thin.  Tesco were there for me again, carrot spaghetti.  This was something new and therefore something the boys were happy to try, they loved it.

  

Review: The Rough Guide to The Lake District

It seems ages ago I was telling you all about my budget holiday, and I suppose it was - way back in February, what with moving house and work and blogging it has just flown.

This week I've got a few days off coming up and we've been trying to work out where to go and so I dug out my holiday stuff, guide books, maps things like that and remembered I'd not told you about a lovely book DK sent me in February.  I'd mentioned to them about going on holiday when they send me the fabulous Factivity books to review and they tucked some bonus treats into the box for me and the kids, among these was "The Rough Guide to The Lake District".

This book was so helpful both planning on holiday, as it is set out in a really easy to read format and covers all the popular touristy parts of the Lakes.

Review: The Good Bag Co

I first came across The Good Bag Co in February when we went to the Lakes on holiday as they have outlets in Grasmere and Keswick.  I also bumped into them at the Ideal Home Show in Manchester.

I loved the quirky slogans such as "Chocolate is Soooo Good" , "mums are good", "cakes are good" and with the festive season creeping up on us they have many Christmas variations which are fab.  Soo many bags that would suit me down to a 'T' -

Review: Timmy Failure

At 6 years old Ben loves mystery and solving crime but trying to get him to look at this from anything other than a superhero punch up view is really difficult. I was happy therefore to discover the Timmy Failure books by Stephen Pastis which cover the founder of the "best" detective agency in town - Total Failure, Inc.

Ben loves it and keeps a copy of Timmy Failure: Mistakes Were Made on the breakfast table flicking through, laughing at the pictures and reading excerpts out to me.