by admin

We Love Books – Justin’s Annual 2013

Justin's Annual 2012It is probably no great surprise that our three-year old is a big fan of Justin Fletcher (MBE) given that I have yet to come across an under 5 who isn’t. Given that, the arrival of the annual was met with some (read much) joy in our house.

Justin's Annual 2012It’s a good annual as well. Combining decent stories (for younger children) with activities that can be both with parents and without and the ubiquitous stickers that seem to be the gold standard of any pre-schooler these days, the annual has been in play for a few weeks and is far from exhausted as yet. That, to me, tells you all you need to know about the content and quality.

Justin's Annual 2012If your children are fans of any of Justin’s many guises they will find something familiar in here. More than that they will find dot to dots that encourage counting and number recognition, tableau for stickers that encourage spatial awareness and compositional skills and a host of colouring in options.

Justin’s Annual 2013 is available now from Amazon and all good booksellers!

We Love Books at Mum Friendly

by jo

We Love Books – Froobles First Words and Fuzzy Christmas

Hey, is that the first mention of the dreaded C-word on here? It’s that time of year again, and if you’ve a child around H’s age (3) then these books may be ideal!

H and Froobles First WordsFroobles First Words is a nice simple book – and included are a set of magnetic letters – and a little sentence about each Frooble. Now, I’ve heard of the name Froobles though haven’t come across them yet properly – so this is a fun place to start. At the top of each page is a magnetic strip along with the letters greyed out – so if, like H, your little one is starting to learn to read, write and spell, this book is a really good starting point. It’s kept simple, half of the work is done for you, but H still finds it a challenge and enjoys it which to me is a good thing.

H and Froobles First WordsShe was also quite proud when she’d put together each word – nothing was too difficult and it was perfectly suited for her age and abilities.

Definitely worth looking into –  RRP £5.99, ISBN 978-1-84956-695-7

H and Froobles First WordsH and Fuzzy ChristmasFuzzy Christmas is similar to the previous book, though think more along the lines of Fuzzy Felt – you’ve a Christmas story book and a little story about each page – all you have to do is find the matching felt pieces for each page and stick them on – and like Fuzzy Felt it stays.

H and Fuzzy ChristmasH enjoys being creative, and this was right up her street. In fact, if she’d had her own way every felt piece would have been on the first picture – but as it was we went through it carefully and added to each scene. Again, she was quite proud of herself for getting it right and putting things in the right place – it’s a good book for the imagination, and really nice graphics too! RRP £7.99, ISBN 976-1-84956-963-7

Both books are published by TopThat! Publishing – and can be bought direct (Froobles First Words & Fuzzy Christmas)or via Amazon,

We were sent the books for review, all opinions are our own

We Love Books at Mum Friendly

by jo

Peppa Pig’s Treasure Hunt at the Criterion Theatre

Peppa Pig's Treasure Hunt LogoWe saw Peppa Pig’s Treasure Hunt back in April when it got to Croydon at Fairfield Halls on the UK tour – and it was a hugely enjoyable afternoon (complete with several merch stands so it was unavoidable – not too pricey though thank goodness!) – a really nice simple plot with plenty of songs and fun. Actually, I didn’t realise just how much the songs had stayed in my head until we saw Ben & Holly Live recently and I recognised them being played beforehand…

Well after a long tour of the country, Peppa Pig’s Treasure Hunt is heading to the West End for its third West End Christmas Season to the Criterion Theatre from the 6th December 2012 until 6th January 2013.

Peppa Pig's Treasure Hunt livePeppa Pig’s second live stage production proved to be a huge success on its travels the length and breadth of the UK and Ireland in 2011 – 2012, with sell-out performances wherever it went.

The Peppa Pig stage-show has a very successful track record at the Criterion Theatre, where for the past two Christmas seasons Peppa Pig has played to packed houses (2010 and 2011), breaking all the theatre’s previous advance box office records. Her first stage tour, Peppa Pig’s Party, was also one of the top-selling children’s theatre shows in 2010 and 2011.

Peppa Pig's Treasure Hunt liveIn Peppa Pig’s Treasure Hunt, Peppa Pig and her friends set off on a new adventure, a treasure hunt. Peppa, her brother George and friend Danny Dog get up to fun and games on a day out on Granddad Dog’s boat. There are clues aplenty as Pedro Pony, Polly Parrot and Zoe Zebra help them find their treasure as they all enjoy a day of adventure. Peppa Pig’s Treasure Hunt features true-to-life puppets, sing-along songs and a story that will charm and delight all her fans.

The cast is Nick Errington, Kerry Gooderson, Chris Hughes, Charlotte King, Kimberley Penna, David Sandham and Charlotte Sullivan. The composer is Mani Svavarsson, the designer is Simon Scullion, lighting is by Matt Haskins and sound by Ian Horrocks Taylor.

Peppa Pig's Treasure Hunt livePEPPA PIG’S TREASURE HUNT – CRITERION THEATRE LISTINGS
THURSDAY 6 DECEMBER 2012 – SUNDAY 6 JANUARY 2013

Criterion Theatre, 218 – 223 Piccadilly, Piccadilly Circus, LONDON SW1
Box Office: 0844 847 1778

Thurs 6 – Sun 9 December
Thurs 6 & Fri 7 at 11 am & 2.30 pm
Sat 8 at 11 am
Sun 9 at 12 noon & 3 pm

Mon 10 – Sun 16 December
No performances on Monday 10 & Wed 12
Tues 11, Thurs 13 & Fri 14 at 11 am & 2.30 pm
Sat 15 at 11 am
Sun 16 at 12 noon & 3 pm continued/
Mon 17 – Sun 23 December
No performances on Mon 17 & Wed 19
Tues 18, Thurs 20 & Fri 21 at 11 am & 2.30 pm
Sat 22 at 11 am
Sun 23 at 12 noon & 3 pm

Mon 24 – Sun 30 December
Mon 24 at 11 am
No performances on Tues 25 & Wed 26
Thurs 27 & Fri 28 at 11 am & 2.30 pm
Sat 29 at 11 am
Sun 30 at 12 noon & 3 pm

Mon 31 December – Sun 6 January
Mon 31 at 11 am & 2.30 pm
Tues 1, Thurs 3 & Fri 4 at 11 am & 2.30 pm
No performance on Wed 2
Sat 5 at 11 am
Sun 6 at 12 noon & 3 pm

by jo

Review – Popchips

If you read things on here regularly, you may have spotted I’m doing WeightWatchers. This has meant a whole lifestyle re-evaluation, cutting out things I don’t need and substituting them with things that are as good – my three biggest weaknesses being pizza, chips and crisps. I’m still working on the pizza as nobody seems to stock the vegetarian WeightWatchers ones, I’ve spotted some WW oven chips I’ve not yet got around to buying, and crisps-wise I’ve been looking at what’s out there that’s a low amount of points. More often than not I’m relying on WeightWatchers own brands, but I’m looking for more low-calorie tasty foods – and along came Popchips.

Currently you can only buy them in Waitrose, WH Smiths and a few other stores (but only Waitrose supermarket-wise), and the good news is that each pack comes in at a very nice and low 3 points – the salt & pepper one comes in at 2! So if you’re looking for snacks and weren’t sure what to make of what’s out there, try Popchips!

PopchipsThere’s six flavours in total – Original, Barbecue, Sour Cream &  Onion, Salt & Pepper and Sea Salt and Vinegar – plus there’s a brand new flavour we’ve not tried yet, Thai Sweet Chili (and I see America has some Sweet Potato ones). Oh, and they’re yummy too. Very yummy. Very very yummy. So much so I may be more than a little bit addicted.

So, what’s to know about them? They’re not fried, and they’re not baked – they start with the finest ingredients, add a little heat and pressure until they pop – and there you are – a popchip. After that the natural seasoning is added which makes the yummy flavours listed above.

Each pack has approximately 18 chips, and each pack is less than 100 calories. They’re less than half the fat of fried potato chips, there’s no cholesterol (which is something I need to be keeping care of), and there’s 0 grams trans fat.

What else? There’s no fake colours, no fake flavours, no preservatives and most importantly of all, no wiping greasy hands on your jeans (which I’m not so big on these days, though H is).

Popchips are good – check them out!

We were supplied a box of Popchips for the purpose of review – all opinions are our own!

by jo

World Book Night – Time to Apply!

World Book Night 2013

April 23rd 2013 is a day I wont forget – it’s my birthday. It’s also World Book Night – a chance to have 20 copies of one of the books above to hand out to people locally. There’s an interesting choice this year – and for once I don’t think I’ve read any of them – though there’s time to put that right before I get my application in.

What do you do? You put in the application from now onwards until sometime next year. You’ll find out around February time if your application has been successful, and if it has then you’ll also find out which book you’ve got.

Then what? You pick up the books from the place you chose to get them from (I went for Sutton Library and they looked on very confused, though had some other titles out on a table so I grabbed ‘Touching The Void’), add your BookCrossing info in the front, then on the 23rd just take a load out with you and hand them out to people.

Don’t they think you’re a bit weird? Yes. I was handing out Pride and Prejudice last year and people were REALLY suspicious. You get over it after a while, as at first you feel like a pushy salesperson who isn’t selling anything – and eventually you just go “look! It’s free! Read it!” and thrust it into their hands, so they realise there’s no catch. I left a few at local Children’s Centres as they too looked at me oddly (it’s a good job I don’t get too paranoid about these things) and left my very last couple in a bookshelf at our local station for random people to pick up – they’d gone within a day (and someone else locally had done the same – and had the same book as me!).

So this year I’m hoping to get together with some other locals and either hand them out as a group, or get a table in a cafe or something. If World Book Night want me back, that is…

You can apply here at the World Book Night site. It’s free, the only thing it takes from you is your time.

by jo

Giveaway – DC Super Friends: Haunted Heroes

We reviewed the excellent ‘Trick Or Treat – Halloween Peekaboo‘ from Night and Day Studios just a week ago, and now we’ve a super quick giveaway – it’s for an app – DC Super Friends : Haunted Heroes – which we’ve not tried as it’s probably just a bit too old for H (it’s suitable for 4+), though it follows plenty of familiar themes – jigsaws, colouring and sticker activities – and it’s iPad only. Now I know Halloween was last week, but this looks pretty cool – look – Superman, Batman, Green Lantern and more! Proper retro DC Superheroes too, I have to add.

DC Super Friends: Haunted Heroes

The local Halloween festival is underway but the children think the haunted house is full of real ghosts! It’s up to the Super Friends to investigate, but are these heroes haunted by something more sinister? This is a Halloween themed story with child-friendly versions of some of DC’s superheroes!

Experience the adventure in this DC Super Friends Reader App!
► Word highlighting for younger readers.
► Read along with professional narration.
► Record your voice reading the story, or have your child record theirs.
► Customize your experience: Text display, audio, and autoplay mode can be turned on and off.
► Easily jump to your favorite page or activity with the visual index.
DC Super Friends: Haunted Heroes
FEATURES:
► Personalize Your App! Use the camera to take a photo with the DC Super Friends. iPad 1 users can import a picture from Photos.
► Collect DC Super Friends Points! Throughout the story, look for opportunities to earn DC Super Friends Points. Collect them all and receive an in-app reward!
► Interactive Pages: Watch animations unfold and tap mysterious hot spots for surprises.
► Stickers and Sounds: Choose an animated background and use digital DC Super Friends stickers to create your own scene with fun audio to match. Use multitouch to spin, shrink, and grow the characters! Share by email or save to Photos.
► Puzzles: Tap the puzzle icons and turn pages into jigsaws to solve.
► Coloring: Get creative with the DC Super Friends palette. Share by email or save to Photos.

From ScrollMotion in partnership with Night & Day Studios.

I have one code for this, which runs out on the 17th November – if for any reason the code doesn’t work, Night & Day will honour the winner – so not long to try win!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

by jo

Review and Giveaway – Prima Princessa presents The Nutcracker

We were sent a DVD of ‘The Nutcracker’ aimed at bringing ballet to young girls (and boys) and to help them try it out themselves at home.

Now, we’ve never had ballet lessons with H – I was a failed ballerina (I got as far as almost being on stage when I was nine) though I don’t remember any of the specifics.

H practising her balletThe DVD breaks each section of the story up into four or five parts – and after each section you work with the Prima Princessa Ballerinas to learn the key moves – nothing too taxing and perfect for your little one to want to join in. Given H is quite shy and waits a few times to try things, it was her usual reaction – she wanted to watch the DVD and the children dancing, but not join in. I was hit with a genius idea of finding an old swirly lolly and telling her she could be the sugar plum fairy, which did the trick, and we’ve since found her practicing all the moves from the DVD on her own in the room!

H practising her balletOne thing I would say, while it’s very girly based, boys do feature – though it is very much targeted towards girls – so if you have a boy who enjoys ballet it may be a bit girly. But the contents themselves are ones you can learn with (I know the difference between a saute and a glisse now)

The DVD has extras too which we’ve not had time to watch properly (she’s too obsessed with the sugar plum fairy right now), but I’d say if you wanted to gently bring ballet into your little one’s life, this is a great place to start. We’ll never make our local classes due to having other commitments, so it’s nice for her to try this out and an even bigger bonus she likes it too!

AND! We have a copy to give away! This is limited to entrants from the UK only please, and is your chance to win one copy of Prima Princessa Presents The Nutcracker on DVD.

Buy from Amazon
Prima Princessa’s Tutu Zone
Prima Princessa
Prima Princessa on Facebook

a Rafflecopter giveaway

by jo

Smooth-tastically Scrumptious Stuff

Sorry, appalling title there. So, its Wednesday, my day off work and H and I have already decided we’re doing nothing all day apart from our swimming lesson – it’s officially a lazy day. Or at least, a lazy day for a three-year old who can’t cook (yet).

A pile of fruitSo, you have a pile of fruit. A Morphy Richards Soup Maker. Milk. Although no ice cream (despite being promised some vouchers to get some… sob!), but we’ll get by.

Peeled bananas and satsumasSo the bananas were peeled and put into the maker. I asked H what she’d like with her bananas, and she said ‘oranges’. We have satsumas so I thought they’d do.

Milk addedAdd milk – we only had skimmed open.

BlendingReplace the lid and hit the blend option, and two minutes later you have this.

The end resultActually, it didn’t taste great. Orange and banana don’t work as well as I’d hoped. H left hers too… I think it needs a spot of work. Also, some banana didn’t blend, and needed to be done by hand instead.

Does anyone have any good suggestions for future smoothies out there? Or even suggestions for good cupboard ingredients that might help them taste a bit more interesting? Let me know!

by jo

Cbeebies – The Album – A Giveaway

Cbeebies - The AlbumWay back in the summer, my friend at Demon asked me which songs I thought should go onto a Cbeebies compilation, and I excitedly bombarded him with emails of songs I thought of which hadn’t been on many (if any) of the compilations we’ve got. Alas, it looks like they couldn’t get the ‘Roll up your sleeves’ song from ‘I Can Cook’ (which would have been the best thing ever) but a big huge hurrah, as this new compilation – released today – has the Cbeebies presenters songs included for the first time  – something these compilations have been missing for a while.

Oh, and MoMo’s song from ‘Show Me Show Me’ too! In fact, it’s got pretty much every current Cbeebies character’s song, so you too can dance around the room in a crazy manner to the Yacki song from Baby Jake. or just the Tree Fu Tom theme instead. Or a little bit of bopping around the room to the sounds of Rastamouse, perhaps?

Here’s the full tracklist:

Disc One
1. Justin’s House – Theme Tune
2. Baby Jake – The Yacki Song
3. Iconicles – Theme Tune
4. Rastamouse – Give It Up For Da Easy Crew
5. Abadas – My Name Is…
6. Mike The Knight – Theme Tune
7. Mr Bloom’s Nursery – Meet The Veggies
8. Gigglebiz – Theme Tune
9. In the Night Garden… – Theme Tune
10. Big And Small – Theme Tune
11. Timmy Time – Theme Tune
12. Everything’s Rosie – Theme Tune
13. Woolly & Tig – Theme Tune (I Love Woolly)
14. Andy’s Wild Adventures – Theme Tune
15. Grandpa In My Pocket – Boom A Boom Whoop Zing Zoo
16. Tweenies – Theme Tune (Hey Hey Are You Ready To Play?)
17. Alphablocks – Theme Tune
18. Cloud Babies – Theme Tune
19. Tree Fu Tom – Theme Tune
20. Something Special – Theme Tune (Hello Song)
21. CBeebies Presenters – Summer Song
22. CBeebies Presenters – Goodbye Sun, Hello Moon
23. CBeebies Presenters – Winter Song
24. CBeebies Presenters – The Big Fun Time Song
25. CBeebies Presenters – Christmas Song

 Disc Two.
1. Rastamouse – Hot Hot Hot
2. Abadas – Medley (Abadas Song / Let’s Play / I Found The Word / Goodbye Song)
3. The Lingo Show – Theme Tune
4. Show Me Show Me – Momo’s Song
5. Mike The Knight – Huzzah For Glendragon
6. Raa Raa The Noisy Lion – Theme Tune
7. 64 Zoo Lane – Theme Tune
8. Charlie & Lola – Bestest In The Barn
9. Postman Pat – Special Delivery Service Theme
10. Num Tums – Theme Tune
11. Zingzillas – Do You Didgeridoo
12. Guess with Jess – Theme Tune
13. Tinga Tinga Tales – Theme Tune
14. Balamory – Theme Tune
15. Mr Bloom’s Nursery – The Finale Song
16. Big Barn Farm – Theme Tune
17. Mister Maker – I’m A Shape
18. Waybuloo – Time For Yogo
19. 3rd And Bird – Theme Tune
20. Nina and the Neurons – Go Engineering Song
21. CBeebies Presenters – It’s The Weekend
22. CBeebies Presenters – The Discovery Song
23. CBeebies Presenters – Lunchtime Song
24. CBeebies Presenters – The Birthday Song
25. CBeebies Presenters – The Time Has Come to Say Goodnight (2012 Version)

So see, you get loads there! It’s all really ace, anyway. EVEN better than that, I have a copy to give away! Just follow the Rafflecopter instructions and maybe, just maybe this bundle of Cbeebies goodness will be on its way to you, just in time for Christmas….

The competition will finish on the 18th November, and is limited to UK entrants only. Good luck!
a Rafflecopter giveaway

by jo

BritMums Weightwatchers Back2Best Challenge – Week 7.

I know I said I wouldn’t update unless something interesting or spectacular happened*. Well in my eyes, something has. Or at least, should be. Or maybe our scales really are broken.

See, you’re not meant to weigh yourself really other than on your weigh-in day – but I did a sneaky one on Saturday morning, when I came in a whole 5lbs less than last week – so given I’d put on 2lbs, this puts me right back on track. Gobsmackingly so.

But, I must follow my own rules, so I duly weighed in this morning, and it’s now 4lbs! But still a good loss and I’m delighted. (this may also be my problem with sabotaging things I do well with to make them less good, or in other words we went to Pizza Express for tea last night before the fireworks – dough balls with garlic butter = 10 points. Sob) I barely touched the ‘overdraft’ until yesterday too.

I don’t even remember the last time I weighed this amount.

BUT – there’s something even more significant about this. I’ve made my target! This means I’ve set myself another target as it’s all about maintaining the weightloss rather than going “woo! I’m thinner, now I can eat badly again” –  as I’m still overweight – I could really use to lose another 8lb to be a healthy weight and BMI. But still – WOO!

People are commenting and noticing and it’s really nice – I kind of forget now, it’s like my eating plan is habit more than resenting what I’m doing (which I don’t, as there’s plenty of substitute foods I can eat when I need some chocolate, crisps or bread) – and I can still have a night out at Pizza Express and enjoy myself (and not feel bloated afterwards). So yeah, woo! Me!

The soup maker is definitely helping too, we’ve had soup and stews – and today we may have time to make smoothies too, they all taste much fresher and yummy than if I was to over-boil them in a pan, and I’m stuffed every time. I’ve also had two days off sick from work this week due to getting really run down and losing my voice – which in turn may have helped the weightloss… who knows..

WeightWatchers Back2Best Challenge with BritMums

I’ve been given six months of WeightWatchers Membership for the purpose of these writeups, all opinions are my own, and I bought the Soup Maker myself with my hard-earned pennies.

* not necessarily in those words