Peppa Pig - International Day & Other Stories - Review & Competition

Isla is absolutely obsessed with Peppa Pig, if I let her she would watch it over and over again! Not to mention the numerous t-shirts, slippers, hats all emblazoned with Peppa. In order to satisfy her thirst for all things Peppa she even went to Peppa Pig World this summer and tomorrow is going to see Peppa Pig Live, so you see we have a true fan on our hands! So when we were sent 'International Day and Other Stories to review she was so excited and if I'm honest so was I because it has episodes with my favourite character - Grampy Rabbit! Who can resist a character voiced by Brian Blessed?! Needless to say this DVD has already been watched 4 times in 3 days so I think it has Isla's seal of approval. I love watching her reactions to the characters and hearing her giggle to the tales of this cheeky piggy!  

Entertainment One would like to offer one of my readers the chance to win a copy of this DVD. All you have to do is comment below with the answer to the following question:

Who is Peppa Pig's best friend?

(a) Zoe Zebra
(b) Rebbecca Rabbit
(c) Susie Sheep

Please leave contact details along with your answer so I can get in touch should you be the winner! Entries need to be in by 24th October.

And should you need any convincing that this is a great DVD, Check out the blurb.....

International Day and Other Stories

AVAILABLE TO OWN ON DVD FROM MONDAY 24^th OCTOBER 2011

Peppa Pig, the UK’s No. 1 pre-school character, returns to entertain your little ones this autumn in a brand new DVD Peppa Pig International Day and Other Stories.

Available from Monday 24^th October 2011 (£12.99 RRP, Cert U, Entertainment One) just in time for the school and nursery half term break, the DVD is packed with 11 fun-filled tales about Peppa Pig and her family with all the joy and laughter we’ve come to expect from this adorable character.

Peppa Pig is a loveable, cheeky piggy who lives with her little brother George, Mummy Pig and Daddy Pig. Peppa’s favourite things include playing games, dressing up, days out and jumping in muddy puddles. Her adventures always end happily with loud snorts of laughter.

Join Peppa Pig and her little brother George for the lead International Day episode, where Peppa and all her friends at playgroup dress up as different countries from all over the world, and 10 other adventures that will have the whole family singing Peppa Pig – Oink Oink!

EPISODE LISTING

International Day - Grampy Rabbit's Boatyard - Shake Rattle and Bang - Pottery -- Mr Fox's Van - Biggest Puddle in the World - Chatterbox - Chloe's Big Friends - Edmond Elephant's Birthday -  Gym Class

BONUS EPISODE - Paper Aeroplane

The Adventures of Isla & Noah - Fab Farm Holiday At Coombe Mill!

This September we rather bravely went on our first family holiday as a foursome! Noah was 10 weeks old and Isla is 2 and we all went to Cornwall, which isn't the most fantastic of car journeys. As the day of departure approached I had a feeling of dread! How was it going to work? Four of us in the car with all our luggage for 7 hours, what was I thinking when I booked this holiday??!!

Isla and Sheepy (yes that manky sheep had to come too!)

As it turned out my kids were FANTASTIC! We stopped twice both ways at the times when Noah needed feeding. Obviously we were at his beck and call and so had to stop for as long as it took to change and feed him - an hour both times in case you're interested, therefore making a 5 hour journey take 7 hours. Even more surprising that Isla didn't go stir crazy in the car. She slept for about 1 hour of the journey. The rest of it she chatted and sang songs and looked out the window and did some drawing.

Isla with one of the chicks

So we arrived at our holiday destination and couldn't have been happier! We were staying at Coombe Mill, which is a farm in North Cornwall, very close to Padstow and Port Issac (Doc Martin is filmed here apparently). I knew that Isla would love it from the minute that I read about it. There is a feed run 6 days a week to feed the animals on the farm and this involves going on a tractor. She loved doing this and so did I. It was brilliant walking around the farm in the fresh air and Isla loved seeing the animals up close. We fed the animals together - and we took up our scraps to the greedy piggies - who as soon as they saw the tractor would run the length of the fence to greet the farmer and his bucket of food! We also saw the deer run majestically across the fields - such beautiful creatures! Isla's favourite part of the feed run was feeding the rabbits and collecting the eggs! Collecting eggs even resulted in her eating her first ever egg - how could she not eat a boiled egg collected fresh that morning? I was elated by this as she is a notoriously fussy eater, she had 2 eggs that week!

What else did we do? We went swimming to a local pool when it was a rainy afternoon. We went to Padstow - didn't end up having Rick Stein fish and chips but we did have a cream tea AND a big ice-cream! We went to Newquay, had fish and chips and paddled on Fistral Beach. We went to Truro for a bit of a gander - this wasn't intentional we were heading for St Ives but realised we were a bit late to make the most of it and so stopped here instead. We also went to Polzeath beach to make sand castles and check out the hot surfers.

Of course she didn't write this, she's only 2!

And the time that we weren't gadding about North Cornwall was spent at the cottage which was well equipped for families. Mine and Tony's only gripe was that the bedroom was a little small for the four poster bed it had in it - the number of times we bumped our head on the overhead frame when getting up to feed Noah in the night was comical, but really that was the only thing and we are both exceptionally tall! We loved that the reception was stocked with some kids DVDs - Isla has developed an unhealthy love of 102 Dalmatians after a rainy Tuesday afternoon watching it twice! And if we hadn't of remembered our welly boots we would have found a pair our size to borrow. We also made use of the fab freezer with home cooked meals on our first night.

Noah's first ever trip to the beach!

Because we went in September after all the kids have gone back to school most families had children around Isla's age and babies. Everyone was so friendly and relaxed and sharing info on places they'd been that was good and also keeping an eye out for each others little ones and lending a swim nappy or two. All in all we had an absolutely fabulous time at Coombe Mill, Isla especially loved it and has developed a love of goats! We'd definitely go back - especially knowing that there are now Wallabies on the farm!

Here are a few more pics:

The MAD Blog Awards

On Friday 30th September I found out my fate in the MAD Blog awards for Best Pregnancy blog. I wasn't hopeful as I was up against some bloody brilliant bloggers: Circus Queen, A Place of My Own, Is There a Plan B & Simply Hayley and in case you didn't already know I didn't win, that honour went to Is There a Plan B - well deserved! However I did have a really good evening out (my first since Noah's arrival) and I did feel good about myself in my gorgeous outfit from Debenhams.

What did I get up to? I met up with some bloggers I already knew and some that I'd never met before, who all are lovely. I guzzled wine with Northern Mum. I made a terrible sorry, BRILLIANT music video with Northern Mum and Mothers Always Right which has subsequently won us tickets to the X Factor Final and I didn't turn into a pumpkin at the end of the night.

Here are a few pics.....


Jane (Northern Mum) & Molly (Mother's Always Right) - enjoyed a tipple or three.....



Kate - She Rocks! (WitWitWoo)



Liska (New Mum Online), Super Amazing Mum, Louise (Bloggomy), Michelle (Mummy from the Heart) - All lovely ladies!

Thanks to Sally for organising such a fantastic event!

New Centrum Pregnancy Care Range

Did you know that us Brits spend up to 5 years planning for a baby but we don't count looking after our health as part of the plan? Centrum Pregnancy Care carried out a survey amongst 3000 women and found some interesting data.

The majority of women in the UK planned to have their first child between the ages of 26 - 30 and over a quarter of the women surveyed said that they wanted to save at least £5000 before starting a family. Over a third of the women wanted to reach certain career goals before starting a family and where they lived was also a key factor in making the decision to conceive with 41% saying it was important to move to a larger house. Now all of the above are important things to think about and the women surveyed are obviously taking great care over their decision but the survey also found that one of the most important areas is being forgotten and that is the health of mother and child.

The Centrum Pregnancy Care survey found that 20% of women would not consider altering their diet or taking supplements in order to help them try to conceive, during pregnancy or whilst breastfeeding. Also only 1 in 10 said that they would cut down alcohol during their pregnancy.

One of the results that came out of the survey was that 1 in 6 women don't know about the importance of folic acid and aren't taking a supplement before they conceive and aren't taking one during the early stages of pregnancy. Folic acid has been proven to dramatically reduce the chances of your baby developing neural tube defects such as Spina Bifida and is easily taken in tablet form.

So how did I fit into the results of the survey? Well I would have loved to have had a baby by the time I was 30 but all the factors above weren't in place - I wanted to live in a bigger place and I didn't have the savings I felt we'd need. So I was 34 when I had my first baby and by that time we had moved to a house and we'd managed to put some savings together. I am one of the women who did know about the importance of Folic Acid but I put that down to my former obsession with magazines, I'm a bit of an information junkie and so I did take supplements while trying to conceive and also throughout pregnancy. It does amaze me that the importance of Folic Acid isn't on every one's radar but then I think we can be reminded of it all too late. Typically when a woman goes to the GP to tell them about their pregnancy, the GP will ask them they're taking folic acid and if they're not then they will be reminded to take it but that is a little late in the day at that stage.

Centrum have now developed Centrum Pregnancy Care and Pregnancy Care Plus with Omega 3 containing a unique blend of 19 vitamins and minerals including folic acid to support healthy foetal growth and help the baby's bone, brain and eye development. If you want to give your baby the best start then supplements including Folic acid are a must.

Centrum Pregnancy Care costs £5.29 for 30 tablets and is available from supermarkets and pharmacies.

My Debenhams Outfit for the MAD Blog Awards!

I was lucky enough to be dressed by Debenhams for my night out at the MAD Blog Awards. Having not long had a baby I wasn't all that confident about my body and my sense of style disappeared long ago. So it was great for someone else to look for my outfit.

I was given the full personal shopper treatment, a lovely guy called Peter ran around the store selecting a few dresses for me to try out and once the dress was selected he went off to source me some fab accessories! I particularly loved the fluffy stole from Debenhams designer range.

My final outfit was a gorgeous Debut by Debenhams Dress, fluffy stole was J by Jasper Conran, bag was Star by Julien MacDonald and coral shoes were from Faith.

I didn't realise that the personal shopper service is completely free and I truly believe that this method of shopping found me my party outfit a lot quicker than I would have done on my own. I felt like a winner on the night even I didn't win my category and that is all thanks to Peter and Debenhams. Thank you so much for making me look the part at The MAD Blog Awards.

Woah! Bye Bye Nappies!

I've wanted to tackle potty training with Isla for a while but with the arrival of Noah it's just been impossible, I haven't been able to concentrate and not had the patience for it. But this week it seems to have suddenly clicked in Isla's head that she wants to be out of nappies and if I'm honest it's me that's pulling back from it! But no, we're going for it head on and today was a whole day out in London wearing 'Big Girl Pants'!

Ever since she was about 1 we've had the potty in the bathroom and we've always encouraged her to go on it and she has used it on and off since the beginning of this year but we've not been regimented about it, it's all a very relaxed thing. For quite a while she has only done poo's on the potty as she clearly doesn't want it in her nappy but wees have not been as regular. Whenever we've asked her if she needs a wee she decides whether she wants to use the potty or not. I've always felt that it's important to remain as relaxed about the whole thing as possible so as not to have a power struggle over it.

The other thing we've been doing is reading Princess Polly's Potty - a brilliant book about Princess Polly and her journey through potty training which also involves the reader in the story. Isla really loves it and loves picking out her favourite potty from the ones pictured. It explains what Princess Polly goes through when learning to use her potty.

This week though, things have stepped up a gear and I partly attribute it to moving up to the older class at nursery. They have the potties out in a row in the classroom and the kids are encouraged to use it as and when they need. Also her best friend at nursery has started potty training so she has seen her going on it and has chosen to go and sit next to her on the potty and apparently they sit and have a little chat while they're on them! So when my Other Half went to collect Isla on Thursday they told him she'd done 4 wees that day on the potty and for us to bring her in knickers for the following day at nursery (with a bag of spare trousers and knickers in case of accidents) and they'd see how she got on the next day.

She was brilliant - no accidents, and loved wearing BIG GIRL PANTS!

So this morning, I didn't know what to do as we were going out for the whole day and I wasn't mentally ready for the challenge but I felt that if I put her in her pull ups we'd be going backwards on the good work that the nursery had done the day before. I took a deep breath and put her in knickers. We went out with the potty in tow and it was fine, even when there was an accident! I just had to remember to keep asking her at intervals if she needed a wee.

As I said there was an accident, but really I think it was more my fault as I didn't give her a reminder - and although it was an accident it became apparent that she was trying to hold it in once she told me she needed it. It leaked on her pants and trousers but once we'd reached the toilets there was still plenty more to come, so she'd tried hard not to let go! My only scary moment of the day was when we were at a bus stop near London Zoo and in this little voice she said 'I need a poo'. I just looked around and thought, 'where the hell are we going to do this?!' Luckily this proved to be a false alarm and I didn't have another poo situation on my hands!

Watch this space to see how we get on with this mission.

The Lion King 3D & BOGOF on Disney Films

The Lion King is my all time favourite Disney film and I can't wait for Isla to see it, and she won't have to wait long because it comes out again in cinemas on the 7th October in 3D! It is such a heart warming emotional story and the music gets a lump in my throat every time. A month after its 3D release at the cinema it will be out on Disney Blu-ray™, Disney 3D Blu-ray and DVD along with a special Triple Pack featuring The Lion King movie trilogy. Glad we got that new flat screen TV - it will make good viewing!

It's also worth mentioning that if you're looking to start your Christmas shopping early there is a Buy One Get One Free Promotion on Disney Films until 31st October, which is such a bargain! It includes new releases such as Tangled and old releases like Fantasia (the first Disney film I ever saw at the cinema!). Snatch a bargain while you can!