Blogging – Page 3 – Mediocre Mum

Trampoline for a Small Garden

I don’t know what possessed me to agree to an 8ft Trampoline from Asda. Our garden is tiny, at most measuring approximately 20 x 30 feet. The look on my husband’s face when the trampoline arrived said it all really as I hadn’t told him it was coming. It took a bit of persuading to get him to help put it together as he wasn’t convinced.

However, with Summer looming and no prospect of a big trip this year, I really need stuff to entertain her and she’s always wanted one. Our garden isn’t that enticing and she rarely plays out there. We did try a small Wendy House but she has outgrown that now.

Assembly

It really wasn’t that difficult to put together. It came in two boxes, with all the pieces, including a tool to stretch the springs and a set of instructions. Like with any instructions for self-assembly, they could have been a bit clearer but we managed.

I’d read a lot of the reviews beforehand and was prepared for it to take about 3 hours. It took us about 2.5 hours and very few domestics. We did have to improvise on a few occasions as a few of the punched holes didn’t line up but nothing a hammer wouldn’t sort. We did end up with 6 random plastic disks left over, but they don’t seem to be an integral part.

Design

I opted for the 8 foot design so it wouldn’t dominate the garden, but if I’m honest it does a bit, but we still have enough space to shift it around so the grass underneath survives. I love the fishbowl design of the netting as it gives kids more space, on a smaller trampoline, to wave their arms about. It’s low enough to the ground so you don’t really need a ladder. The black looks more stylish/contemporary than the usual green or pink ones. But most of all the springs are on the outside of the netting so no danger of trapped fingers or toes. A few reviews mentioned issues with the zipper but we haven’t experience that yet.

Capacity

According to the literature, it’s designed for one child up to a maximum weight of 50kg. But as you can see, which I wouldn’t recommend, my husband had a bit of a play on it as well. As a parent, I’d be happy for her and one other 7 year old child to play on it.

Value for money

The 8 Ft Plum Trampoline comes in at just under £200, you can get cheaper 8 ft trampolines, but I’d rather spend a bit more for the safety features and quality. It’s a bit heavier which means it’s not going to blow away the next time the wind kicks up but still light enough to move around the garden.

Our Verdict

It’s one of the best things we have done, we have had to sacrifice a part of our garden, but our daughter is hysterical with happiness.

She spent most of the weekend on it and we had to drag her off it this morning before school. She can’t wait to have a friend over to play soon.

Could you give a REAL Fairy a Home?

My Own Fairy Door – Review

“Everything you can imagine is real.” – Picasso

I absolutely love these Fairy Doors, put them inside our outside and invite a fairy to come and live with you. I’m all up for anything that stimulates imagination, encourages creative play and promotes writing.

I’ve just survived the school holidays and was nearly broken by the repeated pleas asking ‘what are we doing today? Who are we going to visit?’ My 7 year old daughter, an only child, has never been brilliant at playing on her own and a simple ‘go and play’ doesn’t work.

However, the morning after our ‘Own Fairy Door’ arrived she set upon opening and became totally immersed in creating a home for her Fairy. She spent a good two to three hours playing independently with very little input from us.

She made her a house

Decorated her room

And named her

Landscaped her garden

(excuse the cat hair in the photo, you know what it’s like if you leave a box unattended with cats around.)

Now we just need to wait for her to move in. Apparently, once the key is gone and there’s fairy dust on the doorstep we will know she’s arrived.

We will then need to go online and print off her a naming certificate for her.

These would make excellent gifts for some of her school friends and reasonable priced at £19.99.

Truly Magical.

Card Games for the whole family – Giveaway

Dobble is Brilliant!

As a family we really should play games more often. We have a sideboard full of games from Kerplunk to Kerfuffle plus a few traditional ones like The Game of Life. We do play cards on occasion and daughter a dab hand at Snap, Go Fish and War.

However, I had never played Dobble and had no idea how brilliant it is. I would describe it as super-charged snap. It’s both simplistic and challenging at the same time. The first time we took it out we played 8 games back to back. There are 55 card with 8 symbols on each card and there is one identical symbol in common with each card. I have no idea how they did this. There 5 mini games to choose from; Towering Inferno. The Well, The Hot Potato, Gotta Catch ‘Em All and The Poisoned Gift. We’ve only played two so far and are hooked.

It comes in its own storage tin and is very portable so we will definitely be taking it on car journeys, plane trips and camping.

Win Dobble for your Family

To enter simply use the Rafflecopter form below. In short it’s open to UK residents 18+ years of age. Full Terms and Conditions can be found at the bottom of the form.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good Luck!

If you don’t manage to win it, I’d suggest popping out and buying yourself one, Argos and WHSmith are currently offering 20% off.

This competition is listed on Loquax, Prize Finder and Competition Hunter.

Win £200 Worth of Sainsbury’s Vouchers

Childhood Obesity is on the Rise in the UK

This will come as no surprise to anyone as we have seen the features on the news. Genetics, unhealthy diets and lack of exercise are always at the heart of this discussion.

I was in a school awhile back to deliver a training session, which had nothing to do with nutrition or exercise, however, prior to my session the PE teacher was updating the teachers on a recent course he had been on and he said

‘20% of Year 6 Pupils are classes as obese’

That’s a whopping statistic which means that one in 5 kids will be overweight by the time they finish Primary School and statistics show that this is only going to get worse.

My thoughts on what’s causing childhood obesity

1) We all worry about the amount of time our children spend in front of the screen, whether it’s a TV, Playstation or Tablet according to one study I read, children spend on average 4 hours a day in front of a screen.

2) There has also been a definite trend of kids playing out less and less, personally I blame the internet for making parents feel it is unsafe for their kids to play out like we did as kids. However, the roads are a lot busier now than when I was a kid, but I strongly don’t believe there is a bogey man around every corner and it’s no more dangerous than when I was a kid, we just hear about more incidences now.

3) When I used to teach many moons ago, I found the demands of the curriculum would often mean there was not enough time in the day to cover everything and PE would be pushed aside. This is worrying as the new national curriculum that came in in September is even more demanding than before.

4) There is also a link between family income and obesity. Children from low and medium-income families are more likely to eat less healthy. I can totally understand this. Readymade meals cost a fraction of the price of buying all of the ingredients. For example, I can buy a readymade lasagne from the grocery store which is probably laden with hidden sugars and fats for around £4. However, if I buy the ingredients to make it fresh it would cost me about 3 times as much as this.

5) Even though technology is supposed to be making us more efficient, I find we are busier than ever and don’t often have the time to cook homemade meals, and I’ve been known to opt for convenience foods including takeaways.

6) And one of my personal pet peeves is the ridiculous entry procedures for Primary Schools, which often means that children do not go to the closest school, resulting in their parents having to drive.

Sainsbury’s Active Kids 2015

This is why I like the Sainsbury’s Active Kids Campaign, which encourages kids to live an active lifestyle. To date they have provided over £150 million worth of equipment and experiences. You can collect vouchers until the 5th of May 2015 and donate to your local school which they can then exchange on a range of active and cooking equipment.

Win £200 Worth of Sainsbury’s Vouchers and Signed Merchandise

To kick of this campaign they are offering one of my readers a chance to win £200 worth of Sainsbury’s Vouchers. Simply enter using the Rafflecopter Form below.

To increase your chances of winning the giveaway, you can gain additional entries by:

Tweeting about the giveaway
Submitting a Tweet or Facebook link showing a picture of their vouchers.

The giveaway will run until 12am on Saturday 11th April 2015.

Good Luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: In association with Sainsbury’s

This competition is listed on Loquax, Prize Finder and Competition Hunter.

How to train your hubby to do the School Run!

7 Simple Questions

We started back to school last week, thank god as I was on my knees and desperate to have routine back! As I work in teacher training the first couple of days back are usually busy form me, with INSET days, so I left hubby to do the school run. It’s one of the positives of him working from home, so he’s able to help out and often does the morning run.

As always, the night before I set everything out; a new Asda George School Pinafore, pristine white socks, Polo Shirt, brand spanking new Kicker School Shoes from Cloggs (no need to polish), Cardigan, the correct Days of the Week Pants (Wednesday), Book Bag and PE Kit. I thought I was fail safe, it was all strategically placed in the lounge so no need to find anything, all he had to do was get her dressed, brush her teeth and hair and make sure she didn’t have any toothpaste on her chin a baby wipe would have sufficed.

To the untrained eye, it will look like he did a pretty good job, she’s all smiles, dressed and at the correct classroom. However, I asked him to snap a photo of the momentous first day of Year 2, which he text to me during the day. But after closer scrutiny I noticed a few things.

The socks were fairly obvious and made me chuckle, they’re called knee socks for a reason and it isn’t that difficult to say ‘pull your socks up’. The headband is a dead giveaway that he didn’t brush her hair and in fact, I’m confident she must have done it herself. She often does this to avoid the dreaded mats, by simply pulling it into a pony tail and taming her fringe with a hair band, which really isn’t a problem, but makes it doubly hard to brush the following day.

As for brushing her teeth and washing her face, you can’t tell from the photo, but he hasn’t done it in the last two years so right in assuming it wasn’t done that morning. It’s not the end of the world, but with new teeth coming in it’s important she learns to care for them as she won’t be getting a new set.

I also noticed that there is no sign of her new School Bag, it really isn’t hard to miss, that we have for her PE Kit, sadly our required PE kit will not fit into a drawstring bag. Our kids have PE twice a week, one indoor and the other outside so we have quite a kit list and needed a slightly larger bag. And what happened to her book bag, it took me ages to find the damn thing?

To be fair, I wouldn’t have expected him to iron her polo shirts, but they had come straight out of the bag and when she took her pinafore off that evening it still had the ‘just out of the package’ creases on it.

I shouldn’t give him such a hard time. He did manage to get her there on time. Bless! I’m just sad I missed her first day of Year 2! Where is the time going?