If you watch my Instagram stories you may have noticed a little while ago, between pictures of my cats sleeping, a few posts about Blue Coffee Box.

Coffee for me is a bit like gin. I know I like it, but 90% of the time I can’t taste the difference between one brand and another. When you hit upon something in the other 10% though, (like Sibling Gin – have you tried it?), you KNOW. It’s a class above the rest, something distinct that you have to have again.

That was how I felt when I tried the coffee from Blue Coffee Box.

blue coffee box competition

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‘What on earth is a SuperMocio 3 Action XL Mop?’ you ask!

Sounds pretty awesome doesn’t it? Well, it’s just a mop really. It’s a good mop, don’t get me wrong, and it has three different cleaning actions, which is about three more cleaning actions than I tend to have, but it’s not the mop bit of the title I want to focus on.

It’s Vileda’s free Kids Pass pack that’s the interesting bit. (Unless you’re my friend Lucy and then you probably really are more into the mop.)

Kids Pass is a very cool thing, giving families access to over 3,500 offers and discounts at hundreds of attractions including theme parks, activity parks and even holidays across the UK and Europe too. It gives you lots of ‘kids eat free’ deals at restaurants like Bella Italia and Prezzo, up to 40% off child AND adult cinema tickets – all sorts of stuff that is going to make a massive difference to your bank balance.

(You can find out more about it here, but remember that loads of the deals are exclusive, so you may not see the best stuff until you’ve registered.)

As of RIGHT NOW, you can get your hands on a free Kids Pass by looking out for on pack promotions on any of these Vileda products: View Post

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Fancy a little John Lewis shopping spree? I say little, because £50 in John Lewis isn’t exactly going to give you the freedom to sweep things off the shelves, but you’d be able to buy yourself a pretty nice treat selection.

Going to John Lewis is one of my favourite things to do. I like wandering around and imagining how my house would look if I had married money, and then remembering I haven’t and instead just buying a single plate for Instagram pictures. If I’m feeling particularly decadent I might buy a candle, or some of those pink champagne truffles in a heart shaped box.

Anyway, I’m feeling generous so I thought I’d buy a John Lewis voucher to give someone.

I know right? How nice am I??

I was looking for a picture that encapsulated a sort of generosity of spirit, but then I saw this one and I liked it, and also it made me thirsty and want some sweets all at once. It’s by Sarah Takforyan on Unsplash.

I do have slightly selfish motives too. View Post

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Post in association with Princes

I know! They go together like bread and butter right? John Lewis and canned mackerel.

But think about it like this – you go to John Lewis, you wander around for ages, gazing at all the things you’d have in your house if you won the lottery and didn’t have children/a partner who spoilt everything by leaving dirty cups on your carefully Instagram styled vintage sideboard, and then you come home, exhausted, and whip yourself up my mackerel salad nicoise and eat it on your fancy new John Lewis plates!

Job’s a good ‘un, as we say in our family, fondly mocking my mum’s partner Mitch.

Canned mackerel salad

As you almost 100% definitely read my mackerel recipe post earlier this week, I expect we’re already on the same page. View Post

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God, January is being LOOOOOONG this year isn’t it? It’s so miserable, all the rain and dark mornings.

What you need to to WIN A COMPETITION! How much better would you feel about life if a hamper of cheese turned up on your doorstep?? With this in mind, I asked the super lovely (and lucky) Di Coke to come up with some tips to help you win competitions. Di is something of a comping expert. She’s been winning competitions for twenty years, since the good old days when it was answers on a postcard, and she shares her tips on her own hugely successful blog, Super Lucky.

Here are Di’s seven habits of successful competition winners:

1. Buying random stuff they don’t need

 A successful comper will have cupboards full of toilet roll, toothpaste, tuna and crisps, bought as ‘qualifying’ products for competition entries. But in addition to these useful products, expect to see them stocking up on Tena Lady pads and random baby products too. Because if a competition offers a decent chance of a win, compers will buy the product to enter regardless of whether it’s any use to them. Oh, and they’ll buy in bulk too – just in case the promotional packs disappear off the shelves. Don’t worry though, those 40 packs of sanitary towels will be donated to a local FoodBank or Women’s Refuge once the comp’s over!

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I don’t know about you, but once Christmas has been and gone I feel a powerful urge to get the house tidied up, cupboards organised and my life generally ON POINT.

In this spirit, I gave my coat cupboard a bit of a makeover last weekend, which involved putting up some new hooks and corner shelves. It’s hard in my house, because the walls are so solid and I’m not that strong. I have to put my whole weight behind the drill, and sometimes it’s still not enough, so I have quite a few abandoned holes.* Also I’m a bit slapdash with DIY generally, and I decided to do the corner shelves just by eye. It’s best we don’t talk about those I think. Or try to store anything round on them.

So.

Let’s draw attention AWAY from the shelves and TOWARDS this shiny new competition, where you can win a selection of lovely stuff from JML that promises to be far more useful around the house than me:

JML free stuff competition

Thanks to Belle for making this cool image and to JML for donating the prize.

This PRIZE OF A LIFETIME includes:

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It’s a pillow, but not as you know it.

The Simba Hybrid pillow calls itself ‘the pillow redefined.’ It offers adjustable height, (madness!), and OUTLAST®technology, developed for NASA, which ensures you’re never too hot or cold. This is great for me as I get REALLY hot overnight, and I’m normally forever waking up and turning my pillow over to get a cooler side.

As far as pillows go, it doesn’t get better than this.

I can vouch for the Simba Hybrid pillow with added OUTLAST® and down as I’ve been sleeping on it for a couple of weeks now. Pillows have always been one of those things that fall to the bottom of my shopping list, which is ridiculous given how much time you spend lying on them – why is it that we neglect things like pillows? Given that I recently got a new Simba Hybrid mattress though, it seemed only right that I get the pillows to match.

(Don’t forget if you want to buy your own Simba Hybrid mattress you can get £50 off with my exclusive discount code.)

Just like the Simba Hybrid mattress, the Simba Hybrid pillow uses different layers to create the perfect pillow.

Simba Hybrid pillow competition discount View Post

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I have NAILED it with this competition.

You know how sometimes you organise a prize for a blog giveaway, and you’re like ‘Yessss, people are going to be PLEASED with this one’?

Okay, so probably not so much unless you’re ALSO a blogger, but take my word for it, it’s a nice feeling.

So today I’m giving away a PS4, *gasp*, worth £229, plus two PS4 games – WWE 2K18 and NBA 2K18. This would make an amazing Christmas present for the gamer in your life – perhaps a partner or kids? You would notch up a LOT of Christmas gift points with this.

(Or just keep it for you. I won’t tell.)

Playstation 4 competition win PS4 View Post

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Recently I wrote a little post about HotUKDeals, a website with a community of deal seekers, who help each other find the best bargains, on and offline. If you didn’t read it, go and have a look at how I saved £527 on my Christmas shopping.

HotUKDeals is the UK’s biggest deal-sharing community where millions of consumers find, rate and share deals so that you don’t have to do the leg work, trawling the internet for bargains. The voting system on HotUKDeals makes it ideal for Black Friday deals, as you can see at a glance if something is worth investigating – the hotter the deal, the better the offer. You can also set keyword alerts via the website and free app, so all the deals relating to matching items, such as Xbox or LEGO, come straight to your phone or email.

Today though, with the infamous Black Friday fast approaching, HotUKDeals members have put together some tips for us, to help you grab some great deals. Some of them are pretty extreme – I’m not sure I’ll be staying up all night in the name of a discount – but if you want to be top of the bargain tree then these tips should help.

ALSO…

HotUKDeals has very kindly given me a whopping £250 Amazon voucher to give away! HOW COOL? Have a read of the post and then I’ll tell you how you can enter for a chance to win an Amazon shopping spree.

Black Friday tips

So first up, here are 14 tips from HotUKDeals members to help you get the best Black Friday deals: View Post

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In association with Princes

So go on, tell me, what did you think of my overnight slippy peach pancakes?

I mean presumably as soon as you saw the post this week you whipped up a batch ready for breakfast the next day? Good. Glad to hear it.

In case your tinned fruit stocks are running low, and you’re getting worried about your next batch, then I’ve teamed up with Princes again today to offer you a super cool prize – a week’s shopping at Morrisons and a Princes tinned fruit hamper! Specifically, the lucky winner will get an £80 Morrisons voucher, plus a selection of 14 different tins of Princes tinned fruit, which you’ll know from my pancake recipe post counts towards your five a day. Tinned fruit is packed fresh at source, and helps to cut down on waste – no more festering bananas in the fruit bowl for you.

And then THIS can be your breakfast every day:

tinned peach recipe

Hoorah!

They were REALLY good.

If you’d like to win an £80 Morrisons voucher and hamper of Princes tinned fruit then it couldn’t be simpler. All you have to do is complete as many of the entries in the widget below as possible. The more you do, the greater your chances of getting to go to Morrisons, supermarket sweep style.

The competition will close at 11.59pm on 1st December 2017 and is open to UK residents only. Full T&Cs apply.

Good luck!

Princes

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When you read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory as a child, how desperate were you for the three course meal in one piece of chewing gum to be a reality? I wanted it so badly. As I read it I swear I could feel the hot tomato soup at the back of my throat, followed by the rich, roast beef.

(I stopped imagining before I turned into a blueberry obviously. No one wants that.)

I’ve always been kind of fascinated by the idea of meal replacements. In old school science fiction people of the future were forever knocking back tiny pills as substitutes for entire meals and the principle really appeals to me – I’d never have to worry about ‘accidentally’ eating 14 Oreos ever again. Everything would be so simple. I’d be so slim…

Of course despite what the stories would have us believe, a meal in a pill could never be a thing. You just can’t get the calories you need into such a small thing. Back to the Oreos for me then.

Or is it?

For the last couple of weeks I’ve been trialling a meal replacement system called Solo. Solo is a vegan, allergen free, dairy and gluten free meal replacement powder that you mix up with water to make a shake. It contains all 26 essential vitamins and minerals, 100% of your recommended fibre intake, and can in theory entirely replace regular food.

I say ‘regular food’, but Solo IS food. That’s key here. It’s not some kind of artificially produced powder, it’s made with natural whole foods – wholegrain gluten free oats, pea protein, flaxseed, coconut – real food. There are 42g of protein in each serving, so it fills you up too. I’m genuinely not hungry for several hours after a Solo shake, and I can eat pretty much anything, any time. (See above about the Oreos.)

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LESS THAN TWO MONTHS TO GO!!

I cannot tell you how excited I am already. We’re coming into that phase now where I can start drinking mulled wine at lunchtime and having mince pies for tea and it’s all totally fine and acceptable because it’s NEARLY CHRISTMAS!

Hoorah!

In case, for some BIZARRE reason, you aren’t immediately filled with Christmas cheer at the very thought of twinkling lights and overpriced Christmas gift packs of toiletries, then this should cheer you up – a competition to win £100 to spend on toys.

You’re welcome.

win christmas toys

This prize comes courtesy of PoundToy.

PoundToy is a website that has all the same toys as your big online retailers, but they’re up to 75% cheaper. They do this by cutting out the expensive high street and store costs and delivering all orders directly to the customer from their family run warehouse. They offer free delivery on all orders over £25 AND they price match against Amazon and eBay.

“The reason we started PoundToy,” they told me, “is because we identified that the big named stores are very expensive and they make incredible margins, taking the money out of families pockets that struggle at times such as Christmas. As a company that was setup by such a family, our values and company ethos is to ensure every family can have a Christmas on any budget by buying toys at more reasonable prices.”

Sounds good right? Plus the bonus here is that your £100 will get you even more toys that you might expect!

To enter, first visit the PoundToy site for a browse, and come back and leave a comment on this post, telling me one thing you’d spend your prize money on if you won. Register your comment in the widget below and do as many of the bonus entries as you can to increase your chances of winning.

The competition will close at 11.59pm on 10th November. UK entries only. Full T&Cs apply.

Good luck!

Like this competition? Enter my other one HERE to win 8 beautiful craft books!

Win £100 to spend on toys for Christmas

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