decorating – Mediocre Mum

Win a Canvas from Victoria Crossman Kids worth £35

From India to Paris to London

I’ve always been a fan of travelling….

When I was planning on redecorating my daughters room a few weeks ago I was going to go with white with red accents (pillows, curtains, bedding) so I chose this delightfully bold cushion from the India collection from Victoria Crossman Kids. I was hoping to give my daughters a more slightly more sophisticated grown up room.

Victoria, the designer, brings to life fun, creative and unique drawings onto a range of desirable products.

But as some of you may have seen I changed my mind at the last minute and went for a teal bedroom inspired from a Retro 60s duvet cover. So I had to relocate the cushion.

However, the cushion goes perfectly in our eclectic lounge, which does have knick knacks scattered around that we’ve collected or have been given over the years: wooden elephants from Africa, a Swedish Dala Horse, beaded doll from South Africa, an ornate decorative birds cage from Tunisia and a few diving photos from Egypt to name a few.

I’ve never been to India but it is on my list of places to go…..

The lovely Victoria and Charlotte from Victoria Crossman Kids has offered my readers a chance to win one of their ‘Elephants in London’ Canvas prints which is sure to get your kids imagination going. Can you spot all the London Landmarks?

To enter simply use the rafflecopter form below. The full terms and conditions can be found on the bottom of the form but in short it’s open to UK residents aged 18+ and closes on the 3rd of November.

Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclosure: The cushion was complimentary for review purposes

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

Decorating the tree should not be stressful???

Fess up! Do you let your kids help decorate the tree and then rearrange the decorations once they’ve gone to bed? I’m a bit obsessive when it comes to things like this. It may be the Libra in me, everything has to be balanced. Prior to having kids my tree wasn’t perfect, like Michelle Obama’s, but all my decorations were colour coordinated and strategically placed.

However, since having my daughter, the first couple of years were fine, as she was too little to get involved and was happy staring at the shiny bulbs and flashing lights. But for the last 2 or 3 years she has been fully involved with decorating the tree including making her own decorations, resulting in a tree that looks like it’s had decorations thrown at it from across the room, causing me a mild amount of inner angst. If I’m honest, the first couple of times she helped I did do a bit of rearranging when she’d gone to bed.

I’m pleased to announce and without therapy, I have not moved a single decoration this year, now that she is 5. But I have to confess, it may be because she did a rather good job herself and not that I have chilled out; maybe she’s inherited my obsession.

And on a side note, does everyone else have difficulties taking decent photo of a Christmas Tree?

Disclosure: The Warm Cone Lights were Compliments of Notcutts

Cheats way to decorate Easter Eggs!

We were inspired by the lovely Maggie from Red Ted Art to try our hand at decorating Easter Eggs. It was incredibly easy and effective.

However, within 5 minutes of finishing decorating them my daughter has broken 8 out of the 12 eggs, playing Easter Bunny. Oh well, the fun was in decorating them.

To dye the eggs

Add 10-20 drops of food colouring into a bowl
1TBSP of vinegar
125ml of luke warm water

We ended up adding more food colouring as the colours weren’t vibrant enough. The longer you leave them in the dye the darker they get.

To decorate

Once the eggs have dried, apply a selection of stickers. I found a selection from Wilkinson’s in the stationery aisle, over 1200 for only £1.50.

Happy Easter!