Tag: children

Raising an only-child

I’ve dated two only-children in my lifetime.  One was the stereotypical only child, spoiled, lack of social skills and an introvert; however, I married the other one.  Nonetheless, I distinctly remember the first saying that he absolutely hated receiving games for 2 or more players as an only child.  My daughter is an only child and I can’t see this changing anytime soon.  So, why have I purchased 3 new games for Madame that requires 2-4 players!  Don’t worry we do play them with her but hopefully it doesn’t highlight the fact that she doesn’t have any siblings.

If you’re an only child or have only children is there anything else I should avoid or do?  She’s very independent and appears to be content.

The Land of Me – Interactive Story Book

I don’t know why I didn’t think I was going to like this, when in fact I really did.  There are 6 Chapters that you can download for children age 2-6 (Shape, Size and Colour, The World Outside, Making things, Rhythm and Dance, Songs and Rhymes and Story Time).  I absolutely love the music in the intro, the characters are gorgeous and what I like most of all is that there are over a 100 printable activities.

You follow the 3 characters Buddy Boo the bear, Eric the raccoon and Willow the owl through the Land Of Me.   At each stop, children have the opportunity to choose elements of the adventure.  My favourite is Anthony the Mexican Anteater in the desert, he’s a scream.  We made a castle out of jelly in the mud!

There’s also the opportunity to explore Literacy, with a place to add your own text, there’s also information about the creatures and places you visit and if you watch carefully, in the background, you may see the other characters getting up to all sorts.

The only negatives I found were that it takes quite awhile to download. So, make sure you do this before you sit the kids in front of the PC.  Secondly, as I’m a user of iTunes and rarely pay more than .59p for kid’s apps, I thought that £6.95 per chapter may be a bit dear.  However, you can download the first chapter for free from here.

Plus, this weekend they are offering a whopping £10 off.  All you need to do is type ‘happy’ into the discount code panel at checkout.

Disclosure:  We received all 6 chapters in return for this review

Santa Stars!

Crafts are not my strong point. Luckily, I have my own personal mentor @redtedart. She often sends me links to things that she thinks we can manage. Last week she sent me a link to these adorable Santa Christmas decorations. As usual, I didn’t have a lot of the supplies at home, namely the cotton wool, but managed to adlib. What do you think?

Gone are the days that I have a perfectly colour coordinated tree…my chocolate and gold theme is no longer.  I’m going to have a go at these next! Wish me luck!  (click on the image for the instructions)

Happy Christmas!

Christmas Day?

I’m really struggling with what to do for Christmas Day.  My family are in Canada and hubby’s family is deceased.  So on Christmas day it is just the 3 of us. Too be honest it can be a bit boring, as all our friends are busy with their families.

The morning is fine.  We get up open our presents and now that Madame is 3 she’s much more excited about Christmas it should be magical.  Then we’ll have some breakfast: salmon, bagels, creamcheese, and scrambled eggs.  I may sneak in some Champagne and orange juice or maybe Bailey’s and coffee.  Then we head out to the pub for a couple of hours to enjoy a drink or two courtesy of the Landlord.

However, it’s the afternoon that is the challenge.  I can’t be bothered cooking a slap up meal for just the 3 of us.  I know it’s just a Sunday Roast with a few poppers and Christmas crackers but it is a lot of effort.

Last week we were invited to the 5* Anthenaeum Hotel in London to celebrate the opening of their children’s themed play room in conjunction with promoting their Christmas Package; Where guests who stay for three nights between 19th November and 4th January will receive complimentary ice skating tickets to Winter Wonderland, VIP afterhours access to Hamleys, four hours of free babysitting and they have a Children’s Concierge. I have to say the four hours of free babysitting nearly swung it for me.

If we could do one night I could justify it, unfortunately you have to do a minimum of two nights.  My husband would have a coronary if I spent £700 for two nights.  However, I did have a look around on the internet and one local to us is charging £2000 for 3 nights so it actually looks like a great deal!

So, in the end, I think we will book into a local pub for lunch or I will make hubby cook!

What are you doing over Christmas?

Disclosure: we received 3 complimentary VIP tickets to Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park and High Tea at the Hotel