I'll let you into a little secret. My real first name isn't actually Penny. If you look in my passport you'll find that I'm actually a Penelope. Not the most common of names, but one that has a few famous owners. One of the most notable of which being Lady Penelope from Thunderbirds. Back at junior school the playground taunts were usually around being called Lady Penelope and other children teasing a boy in my class with the surname Parker about whether or not he was my chauffeur. I'd never really seen Thunderbirds at the time so had absolutely no idea what they were on about. Fast ... read more
Meccano Off Road Racer
As a child Meccano was always one of those toys that I wanted to play with, but I never seemed to be allowed to do so. We had a small kit at home and I have vague memories of my Gran having some in her sideboard cupboard, but then I have no recollection of it ever coming out for us to play with. Instead we just seemed to always play Pick Up Sticks with her at her dining table whenever we visited. My Dad always used to speak fondly of building Meccano structures and machines when he was a lad and seeing as he went on to be a mechanical engineer I guess that makes sense. I also have fond ... read more
Celebrating the weekend with Weekend Box and Snazaroo
Parenting can be tough at times. Especially if your kids seem to think that you model yourself on that Pinterest and Instagram mum, who always has a new craft activity or similar lined up ready to do at a moment's notice. Reality is that your child is likely to ask to do something, you begrudgingly agree to their crafty ideas and start rummaging in drawers, cupboards and boxes to find everything they need. Half way through the project the child, or children, will suddenly declare that they need something else to complete their masterpiece so you then start plouging through the entire contents ... read more
My Mermaid Lagoon – Marina’s Lagoon
Little Miss C is still very much of the age where she loves making small worlds and role playing with them. Often I will find shoe boxes, or other things stolen from the cardboard recycling, full of soil, sand or small pieces of paper to represent some sort of a landscape and then tiny crafted things to represent houses and other household things. Fairies, mermaids, horses and unicorns seem to feature prominently in them at the moment and so being asked to review My Mermaid Lagoon from Interplay was perfect timing. Mermaid Lagoon gives you everything you need to create a magical world ... read more
Brio World – Village School Playset
It will come as absolutely no surprise to regular readers when I say that Master C is train mad. He creates huge wooden train worlds around the flat and is always being inventive and coming up with new things to go in his worlds. He was therefore thrilled to receive the new Brio World Village School Playset to review. The Village School Playlet is a bit different to many of the other Brio World elements as it doesn't have train track running through it, yet you can assemble it next to an existing piece of track easily enough. It consists of two rooms in the school and a ladder to climb up ... read more
Review: Zhu Zhu Pets
Now just the other day I posted on here an infographic which told us that Zhu Zhu Pets were one of the toys of the decade from the 2010s. I'm using the fact that Little Miss C was only just born in 2010 as my excuse for why I hadn't played with Zhu Zhu Pets until very recently. They are exactly the sort of toy that LMC absolutely loves though and so I scored some serious mum brownie points when I opened a large cardboard box to reveal a selection of the latest range of them. Inside we unpacked the Hamster House Playset and an Adventure Ball as well as Pipsqueak, one of the Zhu Zhu Pets ... read more
Safe Breaker
When you're sent toy to review with the word "breaker" in the title then you know it's going to be a hit with the kids. They just love feeling like they're getting around something, which is exactly what they are doing with Safe Breaker. Much as the name suggests, the aim of the game is to break into the safe. Before you start playing though you load the coins into the back of the safe via the slot that is there. This includes four special coins that you put stickers on - three with diamonds and one with an alarm bell symbol. More on the reason for these four special coins later. To ... read more
Finding the right person for the job with Bidvine
St Albans is basically where people go when they leave London to have children. You only have to walk around the city centre to notice that the number of people pushing prams or buggies is far higher than elsewhere in the country, and the excellent state schools, large number of parks and green spaces and the quick commute into central London are obvious reasons for that being the case. As a result of this, Facebook is full of local parenting groups with one popular Mums group having over eight and a half thousand members. On there discussions range from how wonderful Derek’s nipple cream ... read more
British Steaks at Aldi – Peppered Steak Recipe
Steak is one of those meals that I love, but one that I don't cook very often. Not because it's difficult or anything like that, but mainly because I always look at it as a bit of a treat and hence something that can be a bit expensive. When Aldi sent me through some steak facts and a tasty looking recipe for Peppered Steak (see below) I thought I'd better rectify that matter. It did prompt some questions between me and the other half about what type of steak we both like, and also how we like our steak cooked. Compatible as we are, it turned out that both of us are in the 22% of the ... read more
Thomas and Friends – Journey Beyond Sodor
My littlest one is train obsessed, so was super excited as we headed into London on the train and then tube for a special screening of the new Thomas the Tank Engine film: Journey Beyond Sodor. Thomas cheekily takes James' trucks and heads over the bridge from Sodor to the mainland, but gets lost and then held hostage, labouring in the steelworks. We meet some new characters, some good, some bad, some weird, but it all comes good in the end, as you might hope. We had fun in the foyer ahead of the film, marvelling at the array of Thomas the Tank Engine toys available, spread out as if in a ... read more