Don't Quit your Daydream (Even If It Feels Impossible)

Nine years ago, back in 2010 (how has it been nine years since 2010?!), I used to spend many hours a day in between working my job as a station officer at the police station with my head stuck in a daydream. I'd stumbled across YouTube and then I'd stumbled across family vloggers such as The Shaytards and The Saccone Jolys and I felt instantly drawn to what they were doing. I loved how they were capturing life in all of its rawness. How they'd make the ordinary moments seem like the moments that were worth capturing and how they had this portal of memories they could instantly look back on. 

At that point in my life, I was finding out what true happiness felt like. I had just married my childhood sweetheart and we were expecting our first baby. If there was ever a moment in time I wanted to capture and bottle up, it was then. So I felt drawn to creating my own videos, capturing my own moments. Not at first for anybody else (the sheer thought of absolutely anyone watching the videos I might create was utterly terrifying). And not as a business at first (I hadn't even really thought of it that way when I started). Just as a way of capturing that happiness I was feeling for maybe one of the first times in my life. 

My first few attempts of creating a 'vlog' on the camera on my phone didn't go to plan. I won't call them failures because those attempts led me to where I am now - earning a VERY decent wage and working for myself as a blogger and a vlogger. But they didn't go to plan and I realised that despite my passion for wanting to capture everyday life, I had to seriously work on my confidence. 

Accessible Bathroom Design Ideas

I talk a lot about home decor here on my blog, I love sharing tips that I've picked up over the years of renovating our family home. And today I've been asked bu Mobility-Plus to talk a bit about how I might style an accessible/inclusive bathroom for those with reduced mobility such as elderly family members or those with injuries, disabilities or conditions that make mobility more difficult. 

One thing I've noticed is that the options for accessible bathroom designs are continually growing and that's great to see. Not only are there many clever interesting products on the market to make independent living much easier these days, but there are also lots of choices to suit different styles so that accessible bathrooms designs can suit peoples decor tastes far better than they used to. 

When it comes to designing an accessible bathroom I think the first thing to look at would be space as that will determine things like whether or not a walk-in-bath would be an option or whether a walk-in-shower would suit the space better. 

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8 Products I Loved When My Children Were Newborns/Babies

Knowing what to buy can feel a little overwhelming when you're expecting your first child. I remember looking at tons of reviews and lists when I was pregnant with Ethan, I as a new Mum, of course, wanted the best that my budget could afford for my new baby and when I did commit and start buying for him, I found it so exciting imagining the time that he'd be here using the things that we'd got for him.

I remember fondly how proud I was when I managed to get the exact pram that I'd been hoping to get after reading really good reviews on it, for a bargain price, despite the fact that it was new. And I remember the first stuffed toy that I got for him - a little multicoloured toy cat from Mothercare. I remember placing it inside his cot that we'd built and was ready and waiting for him in his newly decorated nursery. I don't think you ever forget those little moments. 

Our Stay At The Kings Head Hotel & A Drive Through The Cotswolds

Last week we were invited to stay at the Kings Head Hotel in Cirencester in the Cotswolds and so we decided to go along just Adam and I as a bit of an early birthday treat for him as he turns 31 on Wednesday. I've wanted to visit the Cotswolds ever since I saw our in-laws go there a little while back. I am a complete country/village girl at heart and I love nothing more than the quaint and quiet village life. 

When we looked at pictures of The Kings Head Hotel online I thought straight away that the hotel seemed really different - the decor looked like it was a mix of old with new, something that appealed to me right away and the rooms all seemed unique and interesting. We were so excited for our stay. 

The Truth: Two Children Two Years Apart

1. They allow each other to take it in turns to take the centre stage. And when I say centre stage, I really mean, they take it in turns to send us a little bit more grey one tantrum at a time. It amazes me how when one stops, the other begins and then when they stop, the first one starts back up again. They're in perfect sync! 

2. They're either sworn enemies or best friends. There's literally no in between in our house. 

3. The boys in their 'we're now best friends with each other' state, seems sweet eh? But what it really is, is them becoming a little force together. And when I say force, think a tornado moving through the house, think a blender without a lid on. It gets messy fast. It gets loud fast. It's usually always best to run and hide at this point.

Fun and simple ways to enjoy spending time together as a family

As a family, we love spending quality time together. Whether it’s taking the boys to a local park or snuggling up on the sofa and watching a film; nothing beats spending time with your loved ones. The summer holidays are well and truly over and dare I say it, but Christmas is only round the corner. Whilst the little ones are enjoying their time off school, it can mean numerous days out to keep them occupied, which can mount up in cost.

Although the summer holidays are over, we have October half term only a matter of weeks away and the Christmas countdown will begin before we know it. The final months of the year are where we want to make a conscious effort to save money, as well as spending family time together. As the weather turns colder and more miserable weather arrives, we often find ourselves resorting to indoor activities such as bowling or a trip to the cinema; which as we can all appreciate, doesn’t always come cheaply.

With the winter weather now approaching, I wanted to share with you some fun and simple ways you can enjoy spending time together with your loved ones, in the comfort of your own home.

Big Boys Do Cry

I guess I could be seen as being a bit late with this after all mental health week has well and truly passed, but then you know what? Mental health doesn't just affect people one week of the year and the conversation is one that should always be ongoing.

I won't pretend like I know my facts or that I've done my research when it comes to this (I feel the results of the research would terrify me), but something that has been playing on my mind more and more lately is hearing stories of people having very sadly committed suicide. I'm terribly fortunate to have never have been affected by this personally, but hearing of people who have felt that they have no other choice but to take their own lives sparks a sadness within me that I just feel like I can't ignore, especially so when the majority of people that I've recently heard affected by it have been male and I am a Mum of two boys myself.

Suicide is such a sensitive, complex subject to approach and I'm not sure that it's my place to discuss that here on my blog, but what I do feel like I want to talk about, especially so being a Mother of two boys, is male mental health. 

More Than Just a Photo of my Child in Their Uniform on the First Day of School

It's a new school year, it's that time of year where our social media feeds get filled with pictures of children smiling in their smart new uniforms whilst stood on the doorstep of their home. A few will mumble and mutter about how they'd rather not see so many children in uniforms covering their feeds. But please do stop for a minute and allow us this moment to proudly and emotionally share our photos of our children as they embark on the next chapter of their lives and as we as their parents do too. 

It's not just the children that are having to be brave on the first day of school, us parents have to bravely hold back the tears as we guide our children - our babies who we've given everything to since before they even entered the world, into the school gates - a place not yet familiar and into the care of their brand new teacher. 

For years we've held on to their little hand, pouring our hearts and our souls into consistently guiding, teaching and protecting (and constantly questioning whether or not we're doing it right). And so suddenly the school years have arrived before us and as if by sudden we're forced to let go, to trust, to be brave. To hope that they are able to make friends easily, able to open their lunchbox contents okay, to use the toilet without help, to feel that they can ask for help when it's needed, to speak up if they fall behind with something.

Top 10 Incredible Home Decor Ideas of 2019

When it comes to designing the interior of your dream home some of us dream of having a garden or a even a pool, while others might dream of a beautiful modern interior with lots of natural elements. But no matter what design fantasies we have for our dream homes, somewhere it always falls short when it comes to completing the interiors of a home. Which is why I've decided to share a few ideas to help you get a kick-start from re-designing your old area or designing a new home. 

With something as simple as a photo on a canvas to metallic prints you can make your entire living space fresh and refined in no time. You'll be able to complete a few of these ideas within one day, but the outcome will look like it took way much time to pull off.

A Special Anniversary Weekend As A Couple In London

This month Adam and I have been married for seven years and in October we would have been together for seventeen years having met at school when were just 14 years old and so to celebrate I wanted to do something special for him and so I arranged us a couples trip to London for two nights. Adams parents, my in-laws, very kindly agreed to look after our boys and on Friday morning we set off on the train for what turned out to be one of the loveliest weekends that we've ever had.

A Day At Paultons Park | Review

We've visited Paulton's Park in Romsey several times now and each visit has been just as exciting as the last! We initially started visiting Paultons Park for Peppa Pig World when our boys were younger and Peppa ruled their world but we've found that even as they've grown and their interests have changed Paulton's Park is still one of our favourite places for a family day out in the UK because there's so much to see and do to suit all of the family, no matter the ages!

Paultons Park has been voted as the number one theme park in the UK on TripAdvisor and as somebody that has visited with her children many times I can see why! The park itself is very well maintained and the theming and little touches all around are brilliant, from the life-like animatronic dinosaurs in the Lost Kingdom to the cleverly shaped bushes all around the park and all of the attention to detail given in zones like Peppa Pig World and Critter Creek. The park is kept to a really high standard. 

Top Tips on How to Get Your Family Home Ready for Autumn

 Wow, Summer just flew by, didn’t it? It seems as if two minutes ago we were lounging in the sun, eating ice lollies and praying for a little more of a breeze – now we’re all reaching for our hats and scarves! Although September can be host to some warmer weather, this year Autumn seems to have gripped us and brought a chilly wind with it quicker than ever before. A seasonal change, means a change in the house too – both in temperature in décor, but how can you get your family home truly ready for the Autumnal season? Well, here are some top tips on how you can do just that.

How We're Encouraging Healthier Screen Time Habits With Our Boys

When it comes to screen time and the boys, I think we've been quite fortunate in that the boys have only very recently shown an interest in using the iPad or our phones and spending time on 'tech'. I say fortunate, not because I think screen time is in any way bad for children, I actually believe that if used in moderation it can often be quite educational and it can aid and encourage children to learn to use devices that will no doubt be a part of their lives and even possibly their careers when they're older. I mean fortunate in that we've not had to set restrictions or encounter battles to encourage them to use screen time in moderation.

But now that the boys are asking to use technology more often and showing such an interest in it, we've found ourselves feeling the need to set restrictions on the use of screens, as we know ourselves as adults, especially as we both spend a lot of time online for our jobs, just how easy it is to lose track of time whilst online.

Our Stay In Newquay, Cornwall At Hendra Holiday Park

A little while ago we were invited to Newquay, Cornwall to stay at Hendra Holiday Park for four nights and we absolutely jumped at the chance having heard and read amazing things about Hendra Holidays via Tripadvisor and other blogs where the reviews and photos of the park had also been amazing. 

Cornwall from where we are in Buckinghamshire is about 4 and half hours and the journey there last week was smooth as the boys are at a great age now where they will happily entertain themselves in the back until we get to where we are going. 

On arrival at Hendra the first thing I noticed was how lovely the park looked, there were beautiful colourful flowers everywhere and the park looked really clean and looked after. A member of staff was waiting outside the reception to greet the cars coming in and he ran us through what we needed to do to get our keys. Once we had our keys, we followed the map that we'd been given over to our static caravan which was a 3 bedroom Porthminster Premium and when we got inside we were all blown away by how incredibly lovely and spacious the caravan was. 

Getting Your Home Ready for a New Baby: A Guide

Bringing a new baby home is an incredibly exciting time, but it is also one which requires dedicated preparation. You not only need to feel prepared yourself, but your home also needs to be transformed ready for a newborn. From creating a nursery to keeping sharp objects and electrical items safely out of reach for when they begin crawling, the below guide will show you how to get your property ready for your new family member.

Summer Bucket List - 40 Things To Do With Your Kids During The Summer Holidays

With the school summer holidays in full swing, I thought it would be nice to sit down and share a few ideas I've had for things to do with children during the six-week break. 

I am the sort of parent who just has to have some sort of plan when it comes to having the boys home from school during the week to keep us all sane, so I've been writing down ideas in a notebook as they've popped into my head and have come up with a summer bucket list and 40 things to do with kids during the summer holidays. 

A lot of these are free to do or very inexpensive to do, so I hope you'll find a few things to add to your summer bucket list no matter your budget. 

10 Simple Steps For Protecting Your Home Whilst You're Away on Holiday

Nothing can be worse than coming home from a family holiday to find that your home has been broken into and your possessions have been stolen can it? But how do we ensure that our homes are safe and protected whilst we are away on our travel or on holiday? 

The below five simple steps below will help to keep your home safe and your mind at ease.. 

Introducing Henry Tudor - The First Week With Our New Kitten

We'd been talking for a while about getting another cat. I'm cat-mad so no amount of cats is ever too many for me, but as a cat-lover, I do understand and respect that cats are naturally quite solitary animals and they don't enjoy having their territory threatened. 

In an ideal world and thinking with my heart, I would have loved to have rescued another adult cat from a rescue centre, but my head knew that that wasn't really going to be fair on our current cats or the new cat. Plus with having two small children, I worried that a rescue cat would become nervous around them when they became noisy (which is 95% of the time!). ;) 

I knew that thinking on a practical level, a kitten was the right option for our family at the stage we are in our lives right now. A kitten wouldn't threaten our current cats' territory as much as an adult cat would. And the kitten would also grow up around the boys and learn very quickly that whilst they can be loud and our house can be crazy and chaotic at times, that that is actually nothing to fear or be afraid of. I also liked the idea that the boys would have a kitten that would grow with them and that they would learn to care for from its young age. 

And so, when I ran into my neighbour last week and she asked if I might be looking to re-home a kitten (her friends cat had accidentally got pregnant just before she was due to be spayed and she was trying to re-home the kittens for her), I guessed that maybe now was the right time to go back to having four cats again. When I went round to have a look, I knew I had to choose a confident kitten who would be brave enough to stand his ground with 3 grown cats and 2 young children and we knew that we wanted a male as we already have two females. And then I spotted (or rather he threw himself in front of me by repeatedly trying to make an escape from his crate) a little male silver tabby with a black nose and we knew he was the one.

How to Raise Your Own Little Eco-Warrior (and Why You Should)

Environmental issues were seen as a niche interest until just a few decades ago. While the environmental movement has been going for years, emerging as it did in the decades following the second world war, it has really only come into its own relatively recently. There are a multitude of factors involved here - better general education means that people today are much more aware of environmental issues than their parents or grandparents were, for example.

Other important factors in the rise of environmentalism include improved technology that not only enables us to take more accurate readings of the current state of Earth environments but also to convey these findings to the general public in a much more concise way. But perhaps the biggest and most important of all these factors is the simple fact that the effects of climate change are now becoming apparent.

Around the globe, more extreme weather events are starting to become the norm. Europe has only recently emerged from a record-breaking heatwave, while the US has experienced its own extreme temperatures in recent years. From polar vortices in the north that have sent temperatures crashing below freezing, to heatwaves and intense tropical storms that are now part and parcel of living along the US coastline.

Studies show that millennials are choosing not to have kids because of their concerns about the environment. It no longer seems unthinkable that we will witness a calamity in our lifetimes that significantly reduces the amount of life on earth, human or otherwise. For parents who do decide to have children in the current climate, it is only natural to worry about the future that they will inhabit.

Simple Happy Parenting

It's amazing how things can come into your life just as you need them, isn't it? For me recently, that thing was a book called Simple Happy Parenting, a book that has changed the way I think and now parent in more ways than one. 

On the front cover, the book promises to share the secret of less for calmer parents and happier kids and it begins with a really honest, completely relatable letter to the reader from the author - Mum of two Denaye Barahona who has a Ph.D in child development with a speciality in family wellness. She talks about how when she was pregnant she wanted to give her children the world (like most parents do) and that this to her meant more love, more protection, more toys, more opportunities - more, more, more, but how then this desire to give her children more left her feeling less.. Less energy, less joy, less calm - something I can totally relate to in my own parenting.

She goes on to write that she hopes that we, her readers find inspiration from her book and that we take away tools and bits of advice that are useful to us and leave anything that doesn't suit our families. She reassuringly says that we'll never fit any perfectly shaped box or any expert-defined parenting philosophy and it's obvious even before the first chapter has begun that this isn't going to be a book that makes you feel that you have to parent a certain way or else feel like you're not getting it right. This is a book written by a Mum, who understands that parents and children and families as a whole are all different and celebrates parents for being the best they can be, rather than striving for an unrealistic 'perfect'.