I’m a proud Londoner and have lived all over the place since moving to London in 2001. I’ve lived south and north and even east! I’ve been lucky to live with friends, friends of friends and strangers who have become friends. My accommodation has ranged from damp basement flats in Tufnell Park, to roomy flats above an off licence in West Dulwich, a respectable house in Tooting, a tiny flat in Whitechapel, a room in a house in Clapham Common and our first home in Dartmouth Park. Rent has always taken a huge portion of my wages and I found…
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Despite having lived in London for many years I wasn’t aware that for the last 5 years there has been an annual clean up in the capital! Over the next three months a series of clean up events designed to bring Londoners together to spruce up neglected areas of the city will be hosted as London gears up to host the Olympics this summer. Supported by actress Keeley Hawes (Ashes to Ashes and Upstairs Downstairs), the P&G Capital Clean-up will be taking place across London from March to June 2012 and an army of around 1,700 community champions is expected…
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We love reading books which is why I wanted to tell you about The Book Club. The Book Club team currently reads around 700 books a month and reviews and categorises each one to make selecting books better for parents. They have a great and informative website and I love the fact that books are categorised by age. Little Sis is just entering The Cooing Stage and I look forward to her brother entering The Explosive Stage! Join The Book Club and you will receive: weekly newsletters customised to your child’s learning age over 3000 recommended books and the cheapest…
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I know I have a typical toddler. At 23 months he has a huge vocabulary and is starting to string words together. He understands most things I say but he gets frustrated easily when he can’t show or tell me what he wants. I’m really cross (with myself) that we stopped going to baby signing classes as it was fun and helped us communicate but Big Brother was bored in the classes and I, wrongly, assumed he would be talking soon. Roll on 6 months and his speech is coming along, but slowly. I wondered what else I could be…
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I have been in my favourite stomping ground over the last few days which means charity shop heaven for me! I’ve picked up some lovely bargains both for myself and the children. Besides lots of Thomas the Tank Engine books and jigsaws for Big Brother I found this book of vintage cigarette cards I just couldn’t resist. They’re displayed in a cardboard book which is missing its cover but there are some lovely images on the cards. They are all from Wills cigarette packets. My grandmother worked in the Wills factory in Swindon before she got married so these cards…
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This week I was invited to a mummy bloggers picnic to learn more about chickenpox. It was our first outing as a threesome and I think Big Brother possibly had the best day. He’s really into trains at the moment so a trip on the tube with a quick stop off at St Pancras to see the big trains was easily the highlight of his day. When we arrived at the venue he was entertained by a face painter (who kindly painted Gordon from Thomas the Tank Engine on his forehead). He played really well with the other children and…
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To celebrate St Patrick’s Day we made some four-leafed clover biscuits and decorated them with a simple line of green icing. I always know we’ve made something that looks interesting when I see my son’s arm reaching up to grab a biscuit from the plate when he thinks I’m not looking. St Patricks Day biscuits We tried a new gingerbread dough for these biscuits – Gingerbread cookie dough from Cake & Biscuits. This was really cheap and it showed, difficult to roll without crumbling, it cut badly, tearing every time I tried to lift the shapes from the floured board…
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No, I haven’t gone mad – yet. Choo choo is all I hear ALL. DAY. LONG. I’m not sure when it happened but my son is obsessed with trains. It’s the one constant in our day. He may not want breakfast, he may fight a nappy change, he might not let me wipe his runny nose, but we will play trains. We were lucky to be given a Brio train set last year. We weren’t sure when he would be ready for it so saved it until the summer. He understood it straight away and none of us ever looked…
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I was so very excited when I was asked to join the Tots100 Film Club, When we received our first email inviting us to pick our first family film I chose the Green Lantern on Blu-Ray. Ryan Reynolds in a tight lycra green suit – what’s not to love? But this should be a *serious film review* so first let me tell you the facts. Green Lantern is based on the DC Comics character of the same name and was released in 2011. Green Lantern tells the story of a test pilot (Hal Jordan played by Ryan Reynolds) who is selected…