Summer Sale HAUL

Over the past couple of weeks I've been doing some summer sale shopping. I picked up one thing for me and everything else was for Mr Eliot! I bought goodies from Gap, Mothercare, Clarks, Cath Kidston, Joules & M&S. These days I get WAY more excited about buying stuff for Eliot than I do for myself!
If you fancy having a nose at what I've been buying watch my latest you tube video. If you enjoy, don't forget to give a thumbs up and subscribe for more :)

 

Toddler Stocking Fillers

 

Last year I bought a few things to fill Eliot's first ever stocking but then I became stuck for ideas. After a few tweets using the good old pbloggers hashtag I got some inspiration. Here's the post from last year if you fancy seeing what Eliot received in his first Christmas stocking.This year I've found it easier now Eliot is a toddler, and I actually ran out of space in this years stocking. I could have bought a few more bits! I filmed a little video (complete with festive tunes!) of what is going in Mr E's stocking this year which you can watch clicking here. Thank you for checking it out (if you do) and don't forget to like/subscribe, it is the festive season after all! ;)



A Festive Haul

I think I must be mad, we're moving on the 19th December, still have lots of packing to do etc, etc. But I still can't help buying things (more objects to pack), whether it's something for our new home or another cute gift for Eliot as I can't resist it. I bought a few things from a catalogue called Ace which I hadn't come across before, Primark and Asda. Most of the things I bought are festive or gift ideas. If you fancy having a nose to see what I've been buying you can watch my video here.

 

What have you been buying this festive season?

Moving Update & Ikea

Some of you will already know we sold our flat back in August and had lots of disappointments when   searching for our new home but we got there after what felt like a lifetime. As usual though with moving not everything goes to plan and I've shared our update in my most recent vlog.
On Saturday we headed to Ikea for the afternoon to browse for furniture ideas and came away with lots of ideas. One of which is that I am definitely getting a dressing table! Our nearest Ikea is currently in Croydon and it was decked out with Christmas displays and homware which felt very festive indeed!

Here's the vlog...

Thank you so much if you're already subscribed :) If you're not I'd love you to!

Toddler Autumn Holiday Lookbook

HELLO! Hope you've all had a good week :) On Friday we arrived home from our little Autumn break down in Dorset (post to follow) and I thought I'd share Eliot's outfits via vlog as I do love watching those types of video! Hope you enjoy!

Baby First Year Favourites-Toys/Entertainment

 



There are a gazillion different toys on the market for babies and children but quite typically Eliot can often prefer playing with something a bit random! From waving a menu in a restaurant around to rolling plastic bottles along the floor, sometimes it's the simple things that he enjoys most. But saying that we as the consumer, as parents are drawn to the colourful medley of toys that are aimed at our little ones. Whether their gifts from family, friends or bought ourselves I think most of us certainly end up with an abundance of toys, some fab and some not so fab. So Eliot and I have done our second 'First Year Favourites' video and we're talking about our fave toys/entertainment!

 

 

 

What have been your favourite toys during the first year?

I'm Hosting #MinuteMonday today :)





The lovely Donna from The London Mum is busy with her move so today I'm hosting #minutemonday for her. Leave your links in the comment box below, I look forward to watching ;)

These are the rules:

• Every Monday I’ll host the linky on TheLondonMum.  All you have to do is upload your vlog to YouTube and post the link in the comments section with the full link.  eg. http://thelondonmum.me/2014/06/15/sunday-vlog-lucca-italy/
• Make sure you visit 2-3 of the links posted and comment on their vlogs and subscribe to the channels.
• If you want to promote your vlog via twitter use the hashtag #MinuteMonday and just include me on your post @thelondonmum and I’ll RT all links.
• The vlogs have to be 60 seconds or less.
• Use the linky badge on your link page

Here's my #minutemonday this week

#VEDA 2014

So at the last minute I decided to attempt VEDA ( vlog every day in August). I will be mostly using my phone for the vids as it should be easier to to the whole thing. That means there won't really be any editing but I know it won't be possible for me to vlog, edit and get a video uploaded everyday using my camera.
Leave your links if you're doing VEDA too! :)

Veda Day 2
We head to East London for a freebie lunch...

Here's yesterday's little intro as I managed to delete all the clips...

Baby/Toddler Boy Clothes Haul

Eliot was a very lucky boy on his 1st Birthday and received lovely gifts from family and friends. I've done a vlog to share the clothes that he was bought...I love a clothes haul! I'm totally 'vlog bombed by one of my city kitties, Coco!

#MinuteMonday 2 Babies Love Random Stuff!

 

If you haven't heard about #MinuteMonday yet, it's a new linky hosted by the lovely Donna from The London Mum, click here for more info!

 

Here's my second #MinuteMonday clip...

 

 

I didn't post the first one on my blog last week as we had the Ofsted call at work and Eliot's birthday, so if you fancy a nose...

 

And please excuse the no make up face!





 



BritMums Live 2014

The posts are cropping up left, right and centre so if you haven't read about BritMums Live 2014 yet, where have you been?!

On the run up to the big event many of us bloggers had declared how nervous we were but it turns out it wasn't as bad as I'd imagined.

Through the wonders of social media I'd arranged to meet a few bloggers beforehand which was grand but on Friday morning my nerves started to kick in! I got in touch with Donna from The London Mum to see if she wanted to meet at Liverpool Street Station. A group of us had planned to meet at All Bar One but I found the prospect of turning up by myself extremely daunting. I am just crap in those situations, so I was relieved when Donna was up for to meeting first too.

We headed to All Bar One where we plucked up some Dutch courage with Prosecco, and thanks to Donna met some other bloggers including Katie from Hurrah For Gin and Kiran from Mummy Says. All very lovely and I discovered a few who had lived in the area I do now, small world!

With a couple of Proseccos down the hatch it was time to head to registration.  We met Gemma from Sunshine On A Cloudy Day, Andrea from Blogger Mumma and one of her gorgeous boys, baby Archie.

On our empty stomachs lined with Prosecco, Donna and I actually missed the introduction! I think we both assumed that there would be an announcement so carried on chatting to brands. But there were no notifications! As a grown adult I'm perfectly responsible enough to get where I need to be but failed massively here! I blame the Prosecco!

The first day went by in a blur of meeting fellow bloggers, seminars, crazy dressing up and the BiB awards.

I am so pleased to have met Kelly from To Become Mum, I love reading her blog and she is so lovely! I was really glad I bumped into Hayley from Sparkles & Stretchmarks, one of my blogging faves, another lovely person, who has been kind enough to give me blog advice more than once and for that I am very grateful!

 Over the two days I spent quite a lot of time with Vicki from Ellie Bear Babi who was also so lovely! I've repeated lovely far too many times but everyone I met was just that!

 Saturday was a day of more seminars, learning, being inspired and meeting more wonderful bloggers. It was great to meet Sarah from Toby Goes Bananas who I made a  'sort of pact' with about buying a BritMums Live ticket. Sarah bought hers the next day but I didn't after seeing the state of my poor bank account! A few weeks later though I did, so I didn't entirely break the pact! Over lunch I met Donna from Redhead Babyled, amongst other bloggers and again everyone was lovely!

One highlight had to be having cuddles with Andrea's gorgeous Archie, he was so well behaved (in fact all the babies were) and simply adorable!

What really made the weekend was meeting the people behind the blogs, especially the wonderful bloggers I spent lots of time with. Thank you Donna, Gemma, Andrea and Vicki for fab first time BritMums memories, roll on BritMums 2015 and the Butlins weekend/Trip to Northern Ireland somewhere between (hopefully!)

If you fancy a glimpse of what BritMums was like, watch my Vlog :)

Did you know?

Did you know we're on You Tube?! Here's my channel link.

I started vlogging a few weeks ago now. It's lots of fun but quite time consuming, although I know it will be worth it in the future to look back on videos of Eliot!

It would make my day if you popped over to check out my channel and subscribe if parent vlogs are your cup of tea!
If there's anything you'd like to see in particular then leave me a comment :)

I'm also looking for parent blogger's channels  I haven't come across yet, if you're on You Tube too do leave your link below so I can pop over and subscribe!

Here's my most recent vlog... The Super Mum tag. Have you done it yet?

The Food Shop and Picnic Fun #Morrisons Mum 1

Last week I received some rather exciting mail from BritMums and Morrisons. I'd been chosen to be one of their #MorrisonsMums to help promote Morrisons 'New Everyday Prices'.

 Over a thousand price cuts have been made on the products we buy most and the great thing is those prices are here to stay, they are not just another promotion!

 

'This is the start of a new cheaper Morrisons.'

 

 So armed with Morrisons vouchers we headed to one of our nearest stores, in Wimbledon. When we arrived, Eliot got comfy in the trolley and we began our shop. We quickly spotted the products that had price reductions via their easy to spot labels. 

Morrisons 'New Everday Prices' are marked with the 'I'm cheaper' label.
 

 I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was not only Morrisons own brand range that had price reductions but also plenty of other brands too!

 

One thing I particularly like about Morrison stores is the way their fresh produce is displayed on 'Market Street'. We picked up some lovely fruit and veg. It wasn't too long before our trolley was virtually over flowing!

One thing we quite fancied eating over the weekend was pizza, not completely from scratch because if the weather was good (which it was) we wanted to get out and about without worrying about rushing home to prep food. What we wanted were pizza bases so we could add our own toppings. There weren't any bases with the fresh pizzas so we asked a member of staff to help us locate some. He was friendly, helpful and tracked down what we were after! Shortly after it was time to head to the checkout. Our shop included some  yellow stickered reduced items as well as products with the new price cuts so we did come away with some great  deals and value for money!

 

 

There was one slight problem though, we bought so much we needed to use Eliot's pram as a trolley to help us get everything up to our flat!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Then of course there was the unpacking to do!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The following morning the sun was shining so we decided to go for a picnic. I made some cheese and spinach muffins to take along with us. And of course other 'usual' picnic food, we made ham and tuna sandwiches (not together!), hot smkoked salmon flakes, baguette, houmous, crisps, yogurt, strawberries banana, cucumber and sparkling water. All were purchased on our Morrisons shop.



 Making muffins!

 

 Just out of the oven

 

 

Getting ready to slice some cucumber and strawberries. 

 

Eliot and his packed lunch. 

 

We had a lovely time at the park and enjoyed a great value picnic.

 

Here's a video of our Morrisons Shop and picnic.

 

 

See our second blog post including our favourite recipe here

 

*We were sent vouchers to spend in Morrisons



Review-Shnuggle Baby Bath

Over the past few weeks we have been putting the Shnuggle Baby Bath through its paces. We are massive fans and have no doubts in declaring this is the best baby bath you will ever come across! What fills me with more confidence about the products by Shunggle, is that they are designed by parents. Who better to design baby products than parents themselves?!
We popped down to the Baby and Toddler Show at BlueWater today and were lucky enough to meet the lovely Shnuggle team and their newest edition to the family. Lovely people, fantastic products!!! If your heading down to the show tomorrow be sure to visit them!
To find out more watch my review.

Here it is...

 

* I was sent the product in exchange for a review.  All views are entirely my own

Final First Family Hol Vlog - Birthday Safari

Our final first family holiday vlog is live. It was the OH's birthday and we visited The West Midlands Safari Park. A great day out for all! See what we got up to :)

Part 2 Of Our Family Holiday Vlog-Countryside Goodness!

In my last vlog I mentioned where we stayed, Stoke Bliss, Tenbury Wells if you didn't catch part 1 click here. However I failed to mention exactly where we were staying, which was a holiday park called Wigley Orchard. A fantastic setting if you're looking for a tranquil break as you really are in the back and beyond. It's probably not suitable for older children as there are no activities available but was perfect for us and great as a base. Definitely worth checking out!

We did a couple of country walks whilst away, one near Wigley Orchard and another in Great Malvern. Here's the vlog...

Holiday Blues & Vlog

Hello everyone, hope you've had a good week and enjoyed the lovely guest posts on my blog.

Late last night we arrived home from our first family holiday. Now I'm feeling 'bummed out' that it's over. We stayed in Stoke Bliss, Tenbury Wells, Worcestershire right in the middle of beautiful British countryside. It was so lovely to be away from crazy city life and to enjoy the serenity of the countryside. So much so we're thinking about moving to a rural area. It was bliss waking up to birds singing rather than sirens. I've vlogged some of the things we got up to so here's part one...not very 'countryside-ish'!

My First Mothers Day - VLOG

y first Mothers Day had a bit of a hectic start! We were due in church at midday to get Eliot presented before he is baptised in May. With the clocks going forward it led us to run behind on time, leaving us a bit stressed and rushing around like maniacs! We got to church just in time and had Eliot presented. Luckily the rest of the day went more smoothly and I'm sharing what we got up to in a vlog. 
I don't know why I feel the need to read everything when vlogging, I think it's a teacher thing!

Hope all you mums had a wonderful mothers day, I've read some great posts!

First Vlog! Baby Clothes Haul

Welcome to my first attempt at vlogging, and lets just say it took a while and lots of faffing!
 One of my favourite types of vlog is a haul so I thought it would be a good one to start with after picking up quite a few bits for Eliot when away last week.

Most of you will probably think I'm mad for not slapping on a bit of make up but like I say in the video I wanted to 'keep it real'. I don't wear make up when we are just at home and I want my vlogs to reflect me/us honestly. I also didn't have a lot of time! Also excuse the babbling and odd expressions!

Hope you enjoy and would love you to subscribe!