Now I’m not saying I want another baby, I promise I’m not, but I do miss buying adorable baby stuff, especially with Christmas coming. Things are just so much cuter when they are small and squishy aren’t they? A pair of jeans for a 12 year old really isn’t the same as a velvety soft pair of dunagrees in size 0-3 months.

*sigh*

In lieu of my own bundle of writhing, screaming, never-let-go-of-your-nipple joy then, I am going to live vicariously through you reader and assume that you have someone small in your life to buy gifts for. And where will you buy said gifts from?

Lucy and Belle of course.

Lucy and Belle

Lucy and Belle is a lovely new site full of fabulous gifts for babies and generally small personages – it’s all things adorable, luxurious and velvety soft. Seriously, I challenge you to put a baby in these rabbit booties and not want to gobble them up on the spot. View Post

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oversharingI have a tendency to over share.

I mean gosh, I’m sure you haven’t noticed, it’s not like I tell everyone on the internet all of the things.

I worry sometimes though that I do it in relationships and that it might be a bit much. It’s hard though isn’t it? There are so many conflicting messages. On the one hand we are told that the secret to any happy marriage is communication, communication, communication and on the other hand we are meant either to be cool, aloof ice queens, with men falling at our feet because we are so mysterious, or we are supposed to keep any sign of emotion under wraps unless it scare men off into metaphorical caves.

So contradictory is the advice in fact that I tend to just think ‘sod it, I’m going to tell him everything and then if he wants to run away he can do it now before I get too attached.’ It could almost be seen as a test; my new counsellor did say this week that she thought I was self-sabotaging. That’s probably for another post though.

So what happens is that I get full of all of these thoughts and anxieties and they all spin around together for a while. Sometimes I just tell myself to man up and keep them inside, sometimes I write them all down and then delete them, and other times I end up sending a long email or text that begins ‘So, I just wanted to tell you how I feel about…’. Then I send it and all the original fretting gets replaced with a new type.

It’s good to keep things fresh.

I have a few questions then: View Post

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This morning I went to see my counsellor. A few days ago, when my mind was feeling a little frantic, I had sent her an email, offloading some thoughts, ready for us to talk about today. When I arrived, she had turned my email into word art (this I why I think she is the best counsellor ever) and presented me with an illustration of the language I had used. On little cards she had written my top six words.

“What stands out to you about these?” she asked me.

I looked at them and three seemed so obviously to fit together, despite having been used independently in the original writing.

Just know things

“Those three,” I said, pointing at them. “I want to just know things.”

“What do you want to know?” she asked.

An excellent question.

So I’ve been thinking about it… View Post

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This weekend I am off to Blogfest, a big blogger conference in London, courtesy of my sponsors Coca-Cola. (Thanks Coca-Cola! More on that in another post.) In fact I am in London already at my hotel, (it’s currently Friday afternoon), staring wistfully at the mini bar and writing poems about it for Twitter.

Mini bar haiku

Gin and Fever Tree
Stop whispering so loudly
I will be there soon

What normally happens with things like this is that I forget that I’m going to be handing out my blog business cards to loads of new people and end up with some sort of crappy post about garden sheds or something as the last thing I have published. I arrive at the conference, immediately realise, and feel too embarrassed to even tell anyone who I am.

This time it’s going to be different.

I planned to think up something Extremely Interesting and Important to put here in order to woo potential new readers (*waves to new readers*), but to be honest the gin is whispering so loudly at me that I can hardly think, so instead I am going to post some beautiful pictures of my daughter Belle that I have just found on my laptop.

That should do it.

Slummy single mummy View Post

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Being the philanthropic celeb baker that I am (!) I am absolutely thrilled to be involved in BBC Good Food’s bake sale to raise money for BBC Children in Need.

I’ve created my very own recipe for Turkish delight chocolate brownies and as tiresome as it was having to cook and eat several trays of delicious chocolate goodness I pushed aside my selfishness and got stuck in.

I don’t think I did a bad job:

Turkish delight chocolate brownies

If you want to know how to make them you’ll have to make a donation to Children in Need to download the recipe. You can give as little as £2 and can then stuff your face knowing you’ve done your bit to help change children’s lives.

If you’re not a Turkish delight fan there are loads of other recipes available to download from real celebrity bakers or, if you can’t spare any money right now. why not share the recipe with your friends and encourage them to download it and bake you some brownies to make you feel better about your lack of cash?

Anything you can do to help spread the word and raise money for this vital charity would be fantastic.

Thank you!

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With Belle becoming something of a food critic in recent months – her eagle eyes always on the look out for ‘previous food’ on the cutlery and gum under the table – it seemed only right that I should take her along as my guest to try out the new Byron Burger restaurant in Bristol.

To be honest I am open to any excuse at all to go back to Bristol, even though it does make me a little bit sad to wander around, surrounded by young and interesting looking people, knowing I have to then go home to the barren eggs-florentine-less wasteland of Somerset.*

As soon as we arrived we were made to feel very welcome. Service throughout the meal was excellent and we loved the decor – an industrial vibe with exposed brickwork, white tiles and an open kitchen so you can be sure that no one is sneezing into your malted milkshake. We sat in a booth for the full on diner experience.

Byron burger Bristol

Byron burger Bristol

I went for the special Shady burger and Belle went for the Byron burger with dry cure bacon. You know how Belle feels about bacon. She even took a picture of it. Both were absolutely huge and totally delicious. Neither of us managed to finish them and they’d certainly be enough to satisfy even the manliest of burger appetites.

Byron burger Bristol View Post

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Do you ever wonder what it might be like to be able to travel through time? Where would you go?

I’ve always fancied getting to visit the (relatively) recent past – perhaps I’d experience the decadence of the roaring twenties and throw myself into a crazy weekend long party, Great Gatsby style, or maybe I’d see first hand how I’d fare in the blitz. (I suspect I would struggle with rationing.)

Chuck in a bit of a murder mystery (solving a mystery Nancy Drew style is on my list after all) and you’ve basically got my dream job – a sort of super human Poirot. Add in the fact that the time travel comes about as the result of eating a magical cheese and you’ve almost got the plot of a book.

Oh hang on…

Dinosaurs and prime numbers

 

Dinosaurs and Prime Numbers by Tom Moran IS THAT BOOK and it is fantastic. I laughed out loud, a lot, and not just in that manic way I do sometimes when I am home alone and things feel a bit much – it’s genuinely funny and the plot is beautifully constructed. I liked it so much in fact that on Monday evening I shall be going to meet Tom Moran as part of the Taunton Literary Festival, and now you can too! Hoorah!

To win two tickets to see Tom on Monday 10th in Taunton just enter using the Rafflecopter widget below. It’s a bit of a local competition obviously so if you do know anyone in the Taunton area who you think might be interested then please do share this giveaway with them.

Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Today, after doing some fun chores like washing the sofa cushion covers, I thought it was about time I did something purely for the fun of it, not because it was work or because Belle wanted me to or because I thought I should. I went for a little walk to a second hand furniture shop and bought myself a sewing box.

It’s one of those concertina style sewing boxes, where the sides fold out like wings, and it isn’t particularly pretty in itself. I bought it because it was packed with old cotton reels, buttons and other sewing paraphernalia and I wanted to get it home and see what was inside. It cost me £18.

You wouldn’t think there was a great deal you could deduce from a pile of old sewing needles, but unpacking all of the bits and bobs felt like building up a story of someone’s life. There was wool and nylon thread for mending, endless poppers and fastenings, complimentary sewing kits gathered from hotel stays, individual buttons still attached to labels that had been cut out of Marks and Spencer skirts and shirts – it was the story of someone who certainly didn’t buy into our modern day disposable culture.

After taking everything out and putting it on the floor, (where it still is), it occurred to me that I could take some photographs and turn it into a blog post; a post where I try to convince people that I am one of those chic, style bloggers who can arrange any selection of objects into a rectangle and immediately make them look awesome.

So I did.

vintage sewing box View Post

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I love a good Christmas market.

I’ve been to a fair few – Bristol, Bath, Edinburgh, Bruges even – and one of the things I love is that actually, wherever you go, you get vaguely the same loop of bratwurst, Russian dolls, furry hats, handcrafted wooden candlesticks and weird wine bottle holders made out of metal. There’s something comforting in the familiar, like visiting a National Trust property anywhere in the country and knowing you can bank on a nice cup of tea and lavender soaps in the gift shop.

Bruges Christmas market

Bruges Christmas market

In 2010 I went to Birmingham Christmas market. I had only recently met my boyfriend at the time – he was a student there – and we (or me at least, I’m not sure it’s something everyone does…) were in that exciting yet awkward phase of trying to do and say everything you think the other person would like, meaning that neither of you ever make a decision about anything.*

“Shall we go to the Christmas market?”

“I don’t mind. Do you want to?”

“Sure, if you do?”

That sort of thing.

We did eventually get there and it was really lovely. There is always something magical about being out in the dark, Christmas lights twinkling everywhere you look, crowds of people laughing, scoffing their bratwurst and chugging back the mulled wine. The smells of a Christmas market are glorious – food cooking, festive spices brewing – it captures the very essence of Christmas.

TOP TIP: If you do fancy a trip to Birmingham Christmas market I would recommend treating yourself to a nice Birmingham hotel rather than staying in a student house in Selly Oak where central heating is considered an unnecessary luxury.

The downside of Birmingham, in my experience at least, is that it can get very busy. We did end up in one of those shoulder to shoulder situations at times, where you can’t really look at anything as you are just trying to walk upright and not slosh your tepid mulled wine over anyone. If you fancy a bit of a quieter location for your Christmas shopping, you could try staying in Coventry instead.

Same bratwurst, shorter queues.

Do you have a favourite Christmas market?

Bee in Bruges at Christmas

Bee in Bruges

*I have to confess that I probably don’t grow out of this as a relationship grows. Something to talk to the therapist about.

Sponsored post.

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I know that it’s part of your job description if you work in PR to be as annoying and over friendly as possible, and mostly I am tolerant of this, but today I just couldn’t be doing with it. Seriously, if you send me an email today that begins ‘Hello lovely!’ please don’t expect me to respond with anything other than a punch to the face.

The email that sent me over the edge this morning went like this:

“Hi there,

I hope all is well with you! I’m already one flat white down this morning. Might go for a second coffee but I fear the jitters!

I wanted to share a lovely bit o’ content with you from the weekend…”

Ha ha! Coffee jokes! Now we are best chums right? Oh no, hang on, we’re not, because I don’t know who you are and you haven’t even used my name.

And ‘a lovely bit o’ content’?? What even is that??

I literally had no words, so as a reply I just sent this:

Annoying PRsSometimes people just need to be told.

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Regular readers will know that this is the third year now that I’ve been involved in the Tesco Mum of the Year Awards.

Every year it is an absolute joy to follow the journeys of the inspirational women who are doing remarkable things to improve the lives of others. It’s a bit of an annual wake up call for me; a reminder that there is a lot more to life than posting funny pictures on Twitter and complaining about ridiculous things like having to walk all the way upstairs to get my phone charger.

(Although this picture that I posted today is very funny.)

The shortlist for the Tesco Mum of the Year Awards has been announced this week – 26 incredible women chosen from literally thousands, 26 women who have made a difference to their communities.

Tesco Mum of the Year Awards 2015To mark the fact that 2015 is the 10th anniversary of the awards, Tesco is donating £1,000 to a charity of each shortlisted mum’s choice. Since the Awards began in 2006, Tesco has helped over 80 mums raise the profiles of their charities and causes.

I will be following the awards and am already looking forward to the winners being announced early next year. In the meantime I’m going to try and think of these women the next time I leave my phone charge upstairs.

Disclosure: I am a blogger ambassador for the Tesco Mum of the Year Awards.

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This review is from my very favourite 19 year old daughter Bee.

Hudl 2

I recently received the new Hudl 2 to review.

“What is a Hudl 2?!”, you’re all thinking, “is it something to do with penguins? Or rugby? Big, burly rugby playing penguins?”

The Hudl 2 is actually the brand new tablet bought to you by the makers of my favourite thing, Pink Doughnuts…

Tesco!

I was obviously not that enthusiastic about it when I originally accepted the offer because it isn’t a tablet made by one of those big tablet making companies so I assumed it would be a bit lame. The information said it was £129 and was great for families with kids, so it sounded like the sort of thing that would keep kids entertained and let frazzled mothers do their online grocery shopping with the touch of a button, but that would be about it. View Post

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