I always look forward to the summer holidays with a mix of emotions. I’m excited about not having to get up early every morning, (and by early I mean at about ten to eight, in time to make a quick sandwich for Belle and try to look involved), but also anxious about juggling work, and keeping everyone entertained.

As it turned out, this summer fairly whizzed by. Belle went off to stay at my sister’s for a week, (flying to Ireland on her own!), and then we all went over a couple of weeks later for her wedding.  (My sister’s not Belle’s.) Belle and I went to Newquay, we threw some axes, it was all going on. On the final weekend of the summer holidays, we had one final hoorah and went of to Valleyfest for the weekend.

Valleyfest is a diddy little festival, with a foodie twist, held on the edge of Chew Valley Lake. This sets it apart from all of the other festivals I’ve been to, as you have a stunning view of the water from everywhere in the site. Now admittedly, the weather was pretty shocking, but even so, it was  beautiful.

Valleyfest

We were there for the whole weekend, but were very lucky as we were put up by Tinkerbell Tent Hire, who were providing the glamping for Valleyfest. (I.e. the tents for people like me who are too lazy to knock a couple of pegs into the ground.) We were really grateful for it, as the winds did get up on Saturday night, and if we’d had been in a tent that I’d put up, we’d probably have blown away. Tinkerbell Tent Hire also hire out tents for things like weddings, so they are definitely worth a look.  View Post

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Today I have another guest post from my boyfriend. My sister and I decided we should from now on refer to him as Rupert. He is not called Rupert. If you like the cut of his jib you can follow his ramblings on Twitter.

Standon Calling festival camping

“Have you ever been to a music festival?” Jo asks.

“Of course!” I scoff.

A few seconds later, I look up to see if Jo is observing me for signs of a caveat to my reply.[I was.]

“Really?”

“I’ve been to the Proms”. I add. “And the Three Choirs Festival. They’re both music festivals”.

I’ll say it for you. What a dick. [A little harsh.] View Post

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By Annabel Middleton

There are many things that change with the dawn of parenthood; you start going to the toilet with an audience, you leave the house with an array of bodily fluids encrusted into your clothing and you wave goodbye to long weekends spent in a debauched haze at the myriad festivals on offer every summer.

This is one of the bits that my partner struggles with most.

He was very pleased then to discover that there may be a way to recapture some of the fun of festivals past, maybe with less debauchery but still music, food and the occasional beer – the glorious annual Wychwood festival.

Camping at Wychwood festival

Known for its super friendly atmosphere and nominated for ‘best family festival’ every year since it began, Wychwood festival is the top destination for those with children still wanting to sample some festival festivities. Celebrating their 10th birthday, their 2014 line-up will be the biggest and best yet.

There is much excitement in our household as come 30th May this year we will be finding out for ourselves and packing our backpacks, rolling our sleeping bags and stocking up on wet-wipes to make our way to Cheltenham Racecourse for a weekend of frolics. Fulfilling the cliché ‘something for everyone’ there will be over 100 bands over four stages partnered with many different and far-ranging workshops, performances and activities to entertain and excite all family members.

Have a go at mastering circus skills, sit back and enjoy a new and exciting mime show in the family theatre or take up a new skill such as harp playing.

(Doesn’t everyone secretly want to play the harp?)

“Mr Tumble is going to be there?!?!” says my son, barely able to contain his shock that cbeebies characters can escape from the television and make it out into the real world. We are flicking through the Wychwood festival line-up and he spies children’s favourite Justin Fletcher, who is going to be providing some of the younger audience’s entertainment perhaps with his red-nosed, freckled (slightly unnerving, in my opinion) alter-ego Mr Tumble making an appearance.

Mr Tumble Wychwood festival

As if that was not enough, Waterstones will be providing a children’s literature festival covering the whole weekend with favourite authors and illustrators. Roald Dahl stories will be brought to life by the performers from the Roald Dahl Museum; who will also be celebrating fifty years of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with crafts and interactive parades.

There promises to be more chances to unleash younger artists with many craft workshops across the whole weekend, from withy weaving to local organisation ‘Squiggle ‘n’ Jiggle’ (I promise it is child-friendly) who make exciting things from ordinary recycling.

Wychwood festival

To top things off, there will be a Bubble Show from, what I think will become my personal favourite, Sam Sam the Bubble Man-the most famous bubbleologist in the world (if only I had known that was an option in careers guidance at school). Then to help tire them out so they sleep well in the tent, there are dance and movement sessions to burn off energy.

For the grown-ups there will be plenty of great bands, incorporating soul with The Real Thing, new wave Irish legends, The Boomtown Rats and acoustic mastery with Newton Falkner, plus so many, many more. There will also be more grown-up friendly workshops with crafts to nourish the mind, yoga to nourish the body and delicious food stuffs and satisfying real ales to nourish the stomach.

If you want to be part of the family event of the year then you could come join us! (Don’t worry, you don’t have to actually hang out with us).

To win family tickets (two adults and two children), worth £290, plus camping, simply tick off as many items on the Rafflecopter widget below as possible before midnight on 8th April.

Good luck! Hope to see you there!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Wychwood Festival takes place on Cheltenham Racecourse from 30th May – 1st June 2014. Weekend Festival Tickets for Children/Adults/ Concessions are from £125.00, Under 5’s go free but must register for a ticket. Camping passes must be purchased
in addition to a festival ticket. Visit www.wychwoodfestival.com for further information and to purchase tickets.

Win competitions at ThePrizeFinder.com

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Hoorah!

Less than a month to go now until I get a legitimate excuse to go for several days on the trot without a shower! There’s the music and everything too of course, but I do hate showers.

Camp Bestival have now announced their full day-by-day line-up, so as well as the live-like-a-tramp excitement I can also think about exactly who and what I want to see. Plus, if you’re not so keen on being a bit stinky then a limited number of day tickets are now on sale at www.campbestival.net.

Check out the full Camp Bestival line-up here: View Post

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Festival season is upon us.

(You can tell because it has been raining a lot lately.)

We’ve been to quite a few festivals over the years, and there are a few essentials that all families need at a festival. Wipes and wellies obviously are a must, as is a wallet bulging with twenty pound notes to pay for overpriced pies and chai teas, but one thing you absolutely cannot do without is a tutu.

Honestly, if I had a pound for every tutu I had seen at a festival – on everyone from babies to large bare-chested men in pink wigs – I’d have almost enough to pay for churros and chocolate for the whole family. (If I could be bothered to stand in the queue for half a day). View Post

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Hooray!

It may be grey and soggy outside, but inside my head the squirrels that are in charge of my brain are having a little dance and humming to themselves. It’s that time of the year where summer music festivals start announcing their line-up and this week one of my favourites, Camp Bestival, has been shouting about the fantastic acts they’ve got lined up.

Last year we had an absolutely brilliant weekend, as you can see from my Camp Bestival 2012 post. Rolf Harris was a highlight, and the laser and firework show was just incredible. Boyfriend and I are already looking forward to this year, especially as we’re going to be treating ourselves to some luxury camping courtesy of Tangerine Fields. (Because everyone needs exclusive use of a hairdryer at a festival surely?) View Post

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If you follow me on twitter, you may have picked up on the fact that I was at Camp Bestival this weekend, courtesy of the very lovely people at Ecover.

"Ecover at Camp Bestival"

Yay for Ecover!

Despite the BBC predicting heavy rain, the sun shone for the whole weekend, and Boyfriend and I had a really wonderful time. I’ve been to Camp Bestival a few times before, so understood the whole family friendly vibe, but it was interesting to see Boyfriend’s confusion, as he compared it to his only other festival experience at Leeds. ‘When are people going to start pushing over the portaloos?’ he asked at one point, after telling me a rather nasty story about a guy, not wanting to lose his place at the front of a crowd, doing a poo on the floor.

Camp Bestival, needless to say, is not like this.

I shall be doing a proper round-up later in the week, including my personal highlights, but this is just a post to say thank you very much indeed to Ecover, for sending me off on such a fantastic weekend. If it wasn’t for Ecover, I’d never have seen this legend would I?

"Rolf Harris at Camp Bestival"

Can you tell who it is yet??

Thank you Ecover!

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It’s official, the Sunday we spent at Camp Bestival was The Best Day of Bee’s Life.

We had a lovely weekend generally, helped along by the Pimms bus in the kid’s field, but the whole weekend was totally made for us all – well me and Bee at least – by our encounter with Seth Lakeman.

Bee has always been a massive Seth fan and over the last few years we have been to loads of gigs, seen him at festivals, and generally followed him about in a slightly stalkerish way. We were absolutely thrilled then to find out that Seth and his band were a late addition to the Camp Bestival line-up.

Much of the first day there was spent trying to find out exactly where and when he was playing, as he wasn’t in the programme, but eventually we tracked him down to a small bandstand on the Sunday afternoon. A bandstand! Did they not know who he is??

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I haven’t posted in a while. My longest ever actually. I seem to have lost my connection with the internet this week.

Not literally you understand, I’ve just temporarily lost the urge to keep up.

I blame camping, I always knew it was unnatural. Last weekend we went to Camp Bestival, and had a fantastic time mooching about outside, drinking Pimms, listening to music and generally not thinking about real life. We were staying the in Tangerine Fields, so avoided the actual having to put up the tent bit, so our camping experience was really rather civilised. There is something so soothing about eating cup-a-pasta for breakfast and just sitting quietly on the damp grass for twenty minutes waiting for two inches of water to boil.

So when we got home I felt rather overwhelmed with real life. We had managed to live quite happily in the tent with just a suitcase full of stuff, so to get home and see MOUNTAINS of useless rubbish all over the place was a bit disconcerting. ‘Surely we don’t need all this crap?’ I kept thinking to myself as I wondered around the house.

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