Posts made in December, 2008
FREE gift from Hotel Chocolat
Spend £50 or more with Hotel Chocolat and you’ll be sent a gorgeous ‘Taste of Christmas’ chocolate box FREE as a thank you. And if you think ‘I couldn’t possible spend £50 on chocolates”… well, you obviously haven’t visited Hotel Chocolat yet is all I can say.
Worth £12.50 this lovely boxed collection contains solid chocolate penguins and baubles, gorgeous stars filled with nutty pralines and fruity centres, a milk chocolate vintage snowman tablet and caramel milk chocolate batons. Yummo!
Read MoreTop gift for Expectant Mums
The Maclaren Beginning Travel Bag for Mother & Baby is perfect for expecting Mums. A range of organic based oils, balms and lotions blended from orange or lavender, Beginning has been created to provide some natural pampering at a time you deserve it the most. The range smells divine, feels great to use – and looks yummy in your suitcase too ;)
This handy wipe-clean travel bag was designed for busy mums on-the-go, but we think its a perfisct hospital bag essential. It comes complete with six travel size products for mum and baby:
For Mum: Connecting Massage Oil • Alleviating Leg Lotion • Balancing Facial Mist •
For Baby: Absorbing Dusting powder • Comforting Room Mist • Protecting Nappy Change Balm •
Inside there are handy pockets to keep each bottle upright.
May we suggest you leave this open on your desktop, and wave your partner in its general direction – there’s no better treat for your hospital bag than this.
Read MoreChristmas Top Tip No. 8 – Our favourite dolls house
Dolls houses for toddlers can be tricky – and this is the most perfect one we have seen for a very long time. New to the lovely Myriad’s range, this nesting three storey house is just brilliantly simple! With two solid staircases, a climbing rope swing, 4 rooms and roof garden, windows and arched doorways, it is sturdy enough for most pre-schoolers. And also so brilliantly non-pink! Perfect with their Woodland Elves or Ostheimer figures. Complete the house with the Woodland Lodge furniture, and you have an enduring toy that has immense play value for years to come.
Panasonic Bread maker review is now live!
We’re all concerned about what we’re putting into our small people these days. But so often, the ‘good’ stuff costs so much more, you have to make compromise between your food morals and your budget. We are really pleased to be working on a series of reviews of kitchen ‘gadgets’ which make a busy parents’ life not only that bit easier, but also saving some money and above all ensuring that you feed your family the best that you can.
Bread is one of those things that we all love to eat, but either have to spend a regular chunk of food budget on purchasing the good ones, or else close our eyes to the ingredients list. And before you say ‘yes, yes, yes, but who has the TIME?’ let me tell you that I run a house, 4 children, a business – and am seriously allergic to anything which is dull and chore-like. Yet I haven’t bought a loaf of bread for 2 months (I used to go through 6 shop loaves a week feeding The Four) – and have no intention of ever doing so again.
To be honest I started this review expecting the novelty to wear off and to be back buying bread within 3 weeks, keeping the special home baked loaves for weekend treats. I also admit that I expected it to not really work out any cheaper than shop bread by the time I worked it all out properly.
I am SO converted!
It takes me 1 minute 32 secs to put a loaf in (I know, I timed it!). I do it as I go to bed most nights, and wake up to a beautiful fresh baked loaf every morning. If I use a mix, the prep time is halved.
The cost of the bread you make can vary enormously – at the moment I’m using a sack of organic flour from a very handy local flour mill. Each loaf costs me 49p. Use a mix and the cost goes up, but never anywhere near the price of shop loaves – the highest priced loaf I made was 85p, and I was spending £1.12 on shop loaves.
I started off using Carrs mixes and have to admit they have given by far the best loaves I have made – with no nasty ingredients they are the ultimate in breadmaking convenience. I had a job keeping any bread at all in the bread bin – small boys seemed to materialise from nowhere, using a sixth sense to spot when fresh bread had arrived (beware, your household usage of butter, jam and chocolate spread will rise in direct proportion to the amount of bread you make).
Once I moved away from the mixes (which you don’t have to ever if that’s what you like, but in all honesty why wouldn’t you want to explore?) I have found the machine is so versatile – and utterly reliable. I now make pizza on a regular basis, simply because the dough is so simple. I have made French bread (mmmm…), shaped rolls for lunchboxes (“oh, cool!” was the verdict), some really lush savoury flavoured breads (onion, cheese, and herb & tomato were all huge hits) and seeded breads (just for me – make, slice and freeze, then defrost as you want a slice or two), and I can even now make rye bread for the man of the house who has a wheat sensitivity.
I would say that my routine of making at bedtime probably isn’t the most practical, actually – fresh bread is amazing to wake up to, but hugely annoying to try and slice for lunchboxes when it’s still warm. If I was a sensible grown up, I would make my loaves in the day, so that in the morning when I need them they are perfect for slicing. But I just can’t seem to let go of the fresh-baked-bread-in-the-morning smell. Besides, who wants to be a grown up?
Whilst I’m on the subject of lunchboxes, I have to say that as these loaves are very tall, I find one slice of bread, folded in half, makes perfect amount of sandwiches for my 5 and 7 yr old – no longer do I get a heap of crusts or leftover bread in the lunchbox! And 2 slices is enough to fill up my almost-10 yr old bottomless pit.
My only niggle is the measuring beaker – why did Panasonic decide in their wisdom to make it measure up to 310ml, when a basic white loaf uses 360ml, and there is more than enough room in the beaker for that much (it’s right to the brim, I measured and marked myself).
The Panasonic really is a foolproof bread maker. I know there are many on the market, and I also know this one isn’t the cheapest by a long way. But I worked out that financially I would have made back the cost of the machine inside 6 months – that’s a very short payback to me. And from talking to owners of other (inferior!) breadmakers, this model really is worth every penny.
Panasonic Bread maker from Lakeland for £120
Read MoreChristmas Top Tip No.7 – Peppa Pig bath time
This bath set is great, because it’s a bit different. No standard float-in-the-bath lumps of plastic here, thank you. Oh no. This is brilliant pieces of thin, firm foam – you can either construct Grampa Pigs boat and play in the water, or else stick the pieces to the side of the bath in a tableau, and play. Ella loves Peppa, and loves having these in the bath – she barely notices her hair being washed now, she’s too busy sticking and arranging all the pieces on the side of the bath!
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