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Top 5 Baby Christmas Gifts Under £5

It’s time for some more Christmas gifts guides on the blog – this time for babies!

Babies are not the easiest to buy for, especially when it comes to toys. You can always buy things that are too old ready for when they grow up, or if you do a bit of research on gift guides like this one, you will be sure to get some fab ideas that will be more age appropriate.

1. Melissa & Doug Rainbow Stacker Lamb had a stacker similar to this when he was younger and he still loves it now. It’s such a simple toy but one that is suitable for all ages. When they are little they are attracted the the colours and shapes, and as they grow up they learn to stack them in the right order and say each colour. You can read our review on Lambs stacker here. You can buy this stacker on amazon for under £5.

2. Galt Toys New Baby Puzzle Puzzles are great for all ages. Of course, a young baby can’t complete the puzzles, but they can play with the colour full pieces and simple puzzles, like this one from Galt, are a great way of getting your little one to put pieces together and learn to match colours etc. Lamb loves jigsaws and still loves his very first one he got for his first birthday.

3. Viga Wooden Shape Sorting Box A shape sorting toy is a great gift for a baby. This is something they can play with as soon as they can hold things. They will be attracted to the colours and eventually learn to put the shapes into the correct holes. A box like this is great because it has a lid and can be easily stored! This sorting box is on offer for £4.75 on Amazon.

 

4. Rubber Duck Bath Toys Rubber ducks might seem like such a basic gift, but Lamb absolutely loves his when he was a baby! They were the perfect bath time toy. He would chew and suck on them and it would keep him quiet while I bathed him. Every baby needs a rubber duck! You can read our review on the H&A bath time buddies here. This set is only £2.80 on Amazon!

5. That’s Not My Lamb Book Of course I had to feature the That’s Not My Lamb book (and of course Lamb has it on his bookshelf!) But we all know there’s many more to choose from. We have around 5 of these in our house and they are perfect as first books, but will still be enjoyed by even 4 year olds! My nephew loves reading them when he comes to play. They retail at £5.99, but a lot are less than £5 on Amazon.

I hope you’ve found this guide useful and have some ideas for Christmas gifts for the babies in your lives! Stay tuned for my next instalment of Christmas gift guides for babies. You can see my toddler guide here or click the Christmas tab at the top of the page.

Ax

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Baby Number 2 – Top 5 Cravings

I’m one of the lucky ones, I don’t really suffer with pregnancy symptoms, not serious ones anyway. I wasn’t sick with my first pregnancy and I haven’t been sick this time, but I have had a lot of nausea, and at 15 weeks, I’m still suffering with it now.

As with sickness I didn’t have any serious cravings during my first pregnancy, other than one weekend where I spent 2 days downing pints of milk.

This pregnancy has been a little different. I’ve found myself drinking and eating new things, or things I hadn’t had in a while, and continued drinking/eating them throughout.

Here’s a list of my top 5 cravings with baby number 2.

  1. McDonalds – throughout my first trimester I couldn’t get enough big tasty’s. Junk food was the only thing that helped the nausea. So it’s allowed, right? French fries please…
  2. Iron Bru – a childhood favourite, during this pregnancy I’ve rediscovered my love for this brightly coloured drink. Mmmmmm…..
  3. Apples – I’ve found myself eating a lot of apples recently, which I don’t normally do. I love apples, but because I wear Invisalign braces my gums are soft and I can’t bite apples easily. I’m now chopping them up and having them daily.
  4. Monster Munch – specifically pickled onion. Bloody delicious. I had the same craving when I was pregnant with Lamb, which is why I think I’m having a boy.
  5. Meat – give me meat! Burgers, sausages, bacon sandwiches. I just wanted lots of meat!

These cravings have calmed down now – thankfully! I’m still loving all of them, actually I’ll happily avoid McDonalds for a while, that craving has well and truly gone – phew.

I call them cravings, but they haven’t been super strong. I haven’t been waking up in the night desperate for anything, but I’ve definitely found myself ‘fancying’ everything on this list.

What are/were your cravings during pregnancy?

Ax

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#LondonLegend Day Out With Garfunkles

We were recently invited to spend a day out in London with the team from Garfunkles. They had a full itinerary planned and it sounded too good to be true, so of course we took them up on their offer.

Living in Essex means we are only a 1 hour drive from London, more if we are heading to central London. We usually drive to the east, park at a tube stop (which costs £3 all day FYI) and grab a tube to our destination.

After chatting with the the lovely Emma, Donna and Charlotte who were also heading to the event, I was informed that parking on a Sunday was free in a lot of areas so we decided to take the risk and drive – so glad we did! No horrible tube journeys with a toddler!

IMG_5060We began the day meeting in the first Garfunkles for breakfast. I got to chat with some familiar faces and meet some new bloggers.

Lamb enjoyed playing with his favourite Fireman Sam truck, as did most of the other kids, and I got to have plenty of cuddles with the beautiful Charlotte (a kid from Me, The Man, and the Kids).

Breakfast was a little manic as the restaurant was surprisingly busy, but after refuelling on bacon & pancakes, eggs benedict and coffee we jumped in the taxis and headed to our first activitiy – Madamme Tussauds!

IMG_5059Madamme Tussauds was amazing. Lamb absolutely loved it, especially the black cab ride! Since his visit he has developed a huge obsession with The Hulk and has asked for him many times for Christmas.

IMG_5072IMG_5078IMG_5082IMG_5095IMG_5108IMG_5110If you have a superhero fan in your family, then the Marvel Superhero 4D show is really worth watching. Lamb was so impressed when he was squirted with water!

After the 4D show was the Star Wars exhibition, this is part of the premium ticket so will cost a little more. Lamb sort of knows what Star Wars is as his Uncle and cousin are seriously obsessed. He was a little scared of Darth Vader though!

IMG_5145I ended up paying £15 for a framed photo but how could I resist this! Look at his little face! I love how he’s gently resting his hand on Yodas arm! 🙂

After Madamme Tussauds we headed to another Garfunkles restaurant for lunch. The staff at this particular branch were super friendly and very accommodating to our sleeping toddler!

IMG_5146IMG_5148Unfortunately I completely forgot to take photos of our lunch! I was so hungry I devoured every last bit of my Spag Bol before I realised! Lunch was delicious and we were well rested for the next part of our #LondonLegend day out.

IMG_5157IMG_5170IMG_5159photo 4-11

As much as I’ve been to London, I’ve never been on a bus tour. The Original Tour was really good. They took us all around London and the tour guide pointed out amazing landmarks, including things like Pudding Lane where the great fire of London started.

This was a really great activity for Lamb, which at the age of 2 1/2 is really into vehicles, so loved driving around on a big red bus.

The Original Tour are currently offering 48 hours for the price of 24, meaning you can spend 2 days seeing London, as lets face it, it’s a big place and you can’t see everything in one day!

IMG_5172After the bus tour we stopped off for a ride on the London Eye. I’ve been on this once before, on my babymoon before Lamb was born! It’s such a beautiful view of London from all angles and well worth going on if you like to sightsee.

IMG_5207photo 5-8We ended our fantastic day out in London with dinner at a final branch of Garfunkles. We were al a little exhausted, and to be honest quite full from all the fabulous food we had been eating, but we couldn’t resist another delicious meal.

photo 2-13photo 5-7photo 1-14Our evening meal was delicious. I opted for Spaghetti Carbonara and it was amazing. One of the best I’ve had. We ordered chicken goujons and fries for Lamb, but as most of you probably know, he’s an extremely fussy eater so didn’t touch his meal. I can safely say it was also delicious 😉

Our day out in London with Garfunkles was amazing. We all had so much fun, even the hubby who doesn’t really like group activities! Even though I’ve been to London many times, I’ve never eaten at a Garfunkles restaurant. We thoroughly enjoyed every course and will definitely be going back next time we are in London. If there was one local to me I’d become a regular!

I’d like to say a huge thank you to Garfunkles for providing us with this incredible day out and opportunity to review a #LondonLegend day.

Ax

 

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Top 5 Places I’ve Visited in the World

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Sometimes I find myself day dreaming about where in the world I’d like to visit. I’ve been lucky to travel long haul a couple of times, but I’ve rarely ventured out of Europe. There are a few places still on my bucket list, but I’m going to share with you some of the best places I’ve been lucky enough to travel to. If you’re unsure of the places you might want to visit why not take a quick quiz by Karcher about monuments around the world – it might inspire you.

  1. First on my list is the Statue of Liberty in New York. I’ve been to Manhattan twice and I absolutely love it. It’s my favourite place I’ve visited and I would go back every year if I could. I dream of one day returning when my kids are grown up to show them the amazing sights and landmarks. lib
  2. Another from New York (sorry I couldn’t include only one landmark in this list). The Empire State Building – with a twist. We were given a tip while in NYC, don’t go up the Empire State Building, go up the Rockefeller Centre. That way you can see the whole of the Empire State Building! We did exacyly this and we went up at the perfect time – sunset. I captured some amazing photographs and saw the city light up as it got dark. Stunning.empire
  3. Thailand is the furthest I’ve travelled to. 13 hours in total to get to Phuket. I was a little nervous about visiting somewhere so far away and with such a different culture. I don’t have a varied diet so I was worried about eating the food. Turns out Thai food is my favourite and I had no problems eating every day! While in Phuket we visited the Big Buddha. A beautiful landmark of an overwhelming size.bud
  4. This may not be as famous as the other landmarks I’ve mentioned but this one holds a special place in my heart. The The Medieval Castle of Paphos in Cyprus is where my husband proposed to me! It was such a beautiful setting for a proposal. My husband wasn’t keen on doing it in public so he was lucky to find a little bench away from the tourists where he could pop the question in private. castle
  5. Finally, I can’t write a list of my favourite landmarks without including somewhere in London. A city I love. I’ve been on The London Eye twice. Once when I was on my babymoon when pregnant with Lamb, and again more recently when we went on a press trip with Garfunkles. Lamb absolutley loved it and when he sees a photos he always talks about how much he enjoyed going on it. Sometimes you don’t have to travel to the other side of the world to visit beautiful landmarks and make happy memories.IMG_5242

What are your favourite landmarks or places you’ve visited?

Ax

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Top 5 Toddler Christmas Gifts Over £20

I hope you’ve been enjoying my toddler Christmas gifts guides, so far I’ve published one for gifts under £5, one for gifts under £10 and one for gifts under £20. This one is for ‘main presents’. You know, the big expensive gift that massively outshines the smaller, less expensive gifts, but that usually gets the least attention after Christmas. Lamb has a few things that are worth getting, even if they don’t get used every day.

1. This Chad Valley First Battery Powered Vehicle is absolutely amazing. Lamb got this from his ‘Pop Pop’ (Grandad) for his 2nd birthday. I’ve never seen a product like it. It’s only ideal up to the age of 3 years, so I would recommend getting this around 18 months to 2 years so you get plenty of use out of it. Lamb instantly loved it. There’s one pedal to make the bike drive and it doesn’t go too fast that it’s out of control. You see electric bikes and cars in the toy shops and they are always for the older kids, I was so excite that my dad found one suitable for toddlers. I seriously recommend this bike.
duktig-play-kitchen-white__0086284_PE214924_S42. The Ikea Duktig play kitchen is amazing. We wanted to get something neutral that wouldn’t stand out too much in Lambs bedroom, or downstairs if we decided to keep it there for him. I didn’t want anything plastic and brightly coloured. This was perfect. We bought all of the accessories to go with it and this is a hit when Lamb has his friends over. The great thing is you can either buy the whole kitchen or just the bottom part f you wanted something smaller. The full kitchen is only £65, which is a complete bargain.

 

3. Lamb was recently sent the amazing Toddlebike 2 to review. I’ve decided to include it on the Christmas gift guide because we are super impressed with it. It’s quite small and really lightweight so the perfect first bike for Lamb to get practicing on. He took to it straight away and seemed to get the hang of turning etc. I think this is really well priced at only £24.95. I’ll be writing a full review on the blog in a few weeks but thought I would give it a quick mention now as we think it would make a great toddler gift.

4. Lamb absolutely loves his car mat. We bought one from Ikea and it was only £10 but its’s quite small and doesn’t have much road for him to drive his cars on. I definitely wish I got a bigger one that would entertain him for longer. I’ve found this Reversible Roadmap Farmlife Playmat on Amazing for only £22.18 (RRP £47.99). It’s reversible and has a road map on one side and a farm scene on the other. lamb would love this as he has an obsession with tractors at the moment.

 

5. Ok, so this is more of a summer toy, but Lamb uses his slide all year round. He got this Little Tikes Easy Store Large Slide for his birthday land plays with it every time he’s in the garden. At the moment you can get it on Amazon for around £90, which is quite pricey, but it’s bigger than some of the other toddler slides so will last longer. It can also be folded away for easy storage. No matter what the weather, Lamb is outside as much as he can playing with his garden toys.
That’s it for my toddler Christmas gifts guides this year. I’ll be doing the same guides but for babies next so keep an eye out for those if you have a baby to buy for 🙂

Ax

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