Saving money on your energy bills is one of those thrifty things that should be easy. There are sites out there offering to help you save money on your bills by finding the best tariff based on your usage and where you live, but the key thing that you have to remember is that these sites are just helping you at one moment in time. On the day that you enter your details they assess the market and tell you what the best deal is for you that day. But what about when your current deal ends? Do you remember to make a note of when your deal is due to end? Or do you just wait until you see that ... read more
Spring Is Here! Use These Suggestions To Get Your Garden Ready For Summer
The springtime is now upon us, and so you need to start thinking about getting your garden ready for the summer. The temperature is beginning to improve, and so you won’t have to wear your coat or worry about freezing outside. You just need to work out how you plan to use your garden this year so you can start getting things sorted. There are some suggestions below that should come in handy and point you in the right direction. Use the advice from this article to ensure you don’t overlook anything critical, and your garden looks stunning by the time summer arrives. Clean your patio and get ... read more
The Rustlers Burger Hacking Challenge #RustlersHack
It's all got rather foodie here on the blog hasn't it? I can't even pretend to be some great culinary whizz in the kitchen, but all these years of eating and feeding others, plus buying a crazy number of cook books, does at least seem to have taught me something. I think I've got a pretty good understanding of what things go together and I can get quite inventive with using the contents of my fridge and cupboards to pull a meal together quickly. Being able to produce a meal quickly seems to be the key thing as my kids get older. So many evenings are spend playing mum taxi and driving ... read more
Celebrating Yorkshire Pudding Day with Toby Carvery Yorkie Wraps
I may have lived down South for a while now, but I'm a Yorkshire lass at heart and it will always remain that way. My heart is very much in Yorkshire, and my food preferences too. Therefore when Toby Carvery invited me to join them at their food innovation centre to come up with some new recipes for Yorkie wraps for Yorkshire Pudding Day I just couldn't refuse. Let's start with some basic facts. Yorkshire puddings (or "batter puddings" as my ill-informed Norfolk born other half insists on calling them) are quite simply the nicest foodstuff known to man (or woman) kind. Admittedly it's ... read more
Ladybird Tuesday: What on Earth are we doing?
No - this isn't some statement about the state of Ladybird Tuesday on this blog (although - maybe it should be!) but instead the question posed in the title of this week's Ladybird Tuesday book choice. What on Earth are we doing? is part of Ladybird's 1970s Conservation series (series 727). These books seem to have been published with two different cover versions, but I have to be honest and say that I'm not exactly sure which version of the cover came first. This title was published in 1976 and judging by the man on the cover of both versions I believe it to be just the covers that ... read more
Trying to find a home
For all of the second half of 2017 I kept saying that once Christmas and New Year were out of the way my next plan was to try and find a new home. A family home. A family home that is the right size and shape for our new family shape. I kind of have in my head what I want this home to look like, but unfortunately no matter how good the online house search engine you can't just put in there something like "it has to feel like we can turn it into our forever home". And now we're in 2018, that's exactly what I'm looking for. Of course you can search for some simple criteria. Things like ... read more
Top places to visit in Paris
Paris. The city of love. It's a place that everyone around the world knows, but when I came to visit for the first time I wasn't actually sure where to go or what to see. Since then Eurostar has given us a quick route right into the city centre and whilst I'm far from being a total expert I do at least have a good idea of my top places to visit. So, why not set yourself up finding vacation rentals in Paris and then head off, map in hand, to see what this European capital has to offer. Eiffel Tower No trip to Paris is complete without a visit to the Eiffel Tower. The country's most ... read more
The Lost Penguin – Claire Freedman and Kate Hindley
It's a little while now since Master C and I met Oliver and Patch in their first adventure. Back in that book Oliver had just moved to a big city and was lonely until he met Patch. They came together and started having some lovely adventures together whilst they looked for Patch's real owner. In The Lost Penguin, Oliver and Patch (and Ruby, Patch's real owner) are back, but this time they're visiting the zoo together. They growl at the tigers, smile at the meerkats and laugh at the funny penguins. But one little penguin catches their eye. Peep is new to the zoo. He's lonely and misses his ... read more
Ladybird Tuesday: The Postal Service
Inspired by a recent trip that B and I took to the fantastic Postal Museum in London (do go - it's a brilliant day out, especially the Mail Rail ride) I simply had to buy a copy of The Postal Service (from the "People who help us" series) when I recently came across it in a charity shop. It's a Ladybird series that I normally leave on the shelves when I see it - simply because I have to draw the line somewhere with my collection and my general rule of thumb is to only go for series that had books with matt covers on them. The "People who help us" series was given the number 822 and was ... read more
The Jungle Bunch – DVD and merchandise pack giveaway
My kids are film mad at the moment. Since they discovered the cinema about a year ago they love going, but at the same time also love sitting on the sofa at home and enjoying a film there. I therefore am trying to keep on top of recent kids DVD releases, so I was pleased to be asked to write about The Jungle Bunch which is due out on DVD on Monday 22 January 2018. The lead role in The Jungle Bunch is Maurice - the penguin who thinks he's a tiger. A tiger penguin. Yep, my mind was a little bit boggled by that too, but that's what Maurice is. Raised by a tigress he's the clumsiest kung-fu ... read more