M&S Holiday Essentials Review

You may have seen that we have recently spent a fantastic week on a family ski holiday, where we enjoyed the sun, the snow and some time away together.  The lovely people at M&S sent me a few bits to pack in my suitcase and it was lovely to have some little treats whilst we were away.

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Go Green with Tots Bots Giveaway

Today I have a fantastic giveaway, and an opportunity for you to win a set of 5 Tots Bots Cloth nappies, a Baba Sling, a voucher for Frugi, and Aleva Naturals gift set, a Calafant paint your own treehouse, a cocoon towel and a drool monkey!

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First Time Skiing

family ski holiday, snowbizz family holiday, first time skiing, learning to ski as an adult

Our holiday in France with Snowbizz was the bloke and I's first time on the slopes and I was amazed at how fast we progressed.  I won't be signing up for the Olympics quite yet, but to progress from struggling to put on my skis on day one to zooming down the blue runs by day six was exhilarating and our fantastic instructor Sam was friendly and helpful at every stage.

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Bugaboo Buffalo Review

The Bugaboo Buffalo is an all terrain pushchair with big air filled tyres, a spacious seat and the biggest basket we have come across on a pushchair.  It seemed the obvious choice for us to take on our family ski holiday and it definitely served it's purpose well.

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Easter Eggs

For us, Easter is much like Christmas.  Family plays the biggest part, with a huge roast on the main day - Yorkshire puds, cauliflower cheese and roast turkey followed by a homemade crumble.  The day is characterised by jokes with siblings, doting grandparents and very worn out children.  We chat, we eat, we play card games into the early hours and we definitely consume more than our fair share of chocolate.

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The Mummy Adventure

I do my best thinking when I am walking.  It seems so cruel that I feel at my most creative when I don't have an opportunity to record it and I often compose whole blog posts in my head that I cannot recreate at all when I finally put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard.  This is one of those.

After two years and three months of recording our lives, I thought I would explain why I called my little space on the internet 'The Mummy Adventure'.  I have touched on it in the past, but I wanted to try and put into words the thought behind the name.

I don't think being a mother is a job.  I don't see it as a role or an occupation.  I see motherhood as a journey, an adventure.  It doesn't matter if your child was planned and longed for or a careless accident after a few too many tequilas on a Friday night.  It doesn't matter if it took 10 years of trying, hormone treatments and IVF or those two blue lines appeared completely unexpectedly.  It doesn't matter if your child has your genetics or not.  That first time that you touch those tiny little fingers, the first time you see those ten precious toes, the first time you hear those little lungs announcing his arrival, that is the very first day.

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Kiddicare Sleep Diary

At 13 months I had really expected Archie's sleep to have fallen into a routine, specifically one where he doesn't wake at night, but unfortunately this is not the case.

Whilst there are nights he manages a full 13 hours uninterrupted, there are also times he is awake before I have even made it to bed, refusing to settle for anything less than milk.  During the day sleep is still not regular and whilst Dylan had his nap at a set time, Archie can fight sleep until 4pm some days, but collapses by eleven on others.

Kiddicare asked me to keep a sleep diary for a month, noting both Archie's and my sleep and moods and I started to get the message after only a few days that maybe it may be my own fault rather than Archie's that I am tired in the mornings as 2am is not the most practical of bedtimes when you have two children under 3 in the house.  

As much as I would love to get a full 8 hours each night, or even a nice solid 6, I am not prepared to do any real sleep training with Archie.  When he wakes up he knows exactly what he wants and there is no chance whatsoever he is being fobbed off with a cuddle and a rock.  If I want to night wean then I need to be prepared to listen to hours of screaming and I just can't do that yet.  On a normal night, Archie wakes only once for a feed at around 5am and I know plenty of mums who would love sleep like that.  Our nights of sleeping through seem to be slowly increasing (with a few hiccups of course), so I am ever hopefully that Archie will get there on his own soon.

If you want to see more then check out the Kiddicare Blog

Disclaimer:  This post is in collaboration with Kiddicare

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