Rice Krispies were kind enough to select me to be part of their colour me in challenge.  They sent us the most enormous pack of colouring in pens, complete with magic pens that changed colour, and tubes of glitter.  Also in the box was a huge box of Rice Krispies, which provided us with the fuel for this creative challenge.

I’m a big fan of art for children and we’ve spent many a wet afternoon on our big bought-with-crafts-in-mind dining table, colouring in and painting.  My son is only two but he is getting better all the time.

This was coloured this afternoon when Malachi had his older friend over to help him.  They sat in the trampoline colouring and applying glitter together, it was such a sweet sight.  I promised to buy his friend a nice present if I won.

I’m afraid I had to cut the logo off because it got ripped. Sorry!

I’ve been set a challenge by We’re For Dogs is to see if Pedigree Joint Care + will help my dog become more playful.  Shadow is five and a half and is not as bouncy as he once was.  I have recently started cycling with him and he does struggle after a certain (short) time (so do I, at the moment!).  He has always had trouble in his rear left joint, and he ‘hops’ towards the end of a long walk, so I’m hoping that the treats will help with this. My ideal would be for him to still be bounding along at a decent speed on the return journey of a bike ride. I was sent lots of joint care + treats, a lovely rucksack, a lobber and lots of balls (my son tells me this is his lobber now!).  I have a portable video recorder on loan so that I can capture the progress that Shadow makes during his joint care trial.  I’d have take a picture of the package they sent me but my son and Shadow got stuck right on in, and soon there were little yellow balls bouncing all over the house accompanies by ruffs and squeals of excitement. You can follow the conversation on twitter, with the hashtag #playagain

Here is Shadow and his two year old trainer:

OOH! I’ve just found the 100 Word Challenge for Grown ups, and thought it looked like fun, so I’ll try and join in. It seems, each week we are given a prompt, then the opportunity to link up at Julia’s place.

The prompt this week is: ….the rain turned the road into a river…

….the rain turned the road into a river…
but that was the least of our worries. The storms had been raging though my heart relentlessly for years now, but two and a half years ago the brightest most heart-lifting sunshine arrived and turned my life from a grim cold struggle into a fantasy island awash with rainbow colour. Dancing in the rain is more fun with company, and a dazzling white innocent smile is all that was needed to warm the raindrops. He turned to me with a hopeful grin and, though the hairy one looked hesitant, we pulled our wellingtons on and headed into the deluge.

More entries can be seen by clicking below:

My last competition may have been a bit optimistic for the British summer (swimwear), however this time I’m offering you a pair of Hunter Wellies in Navy worth £79.00.  Perfect for puddles and festivals.  The kind people at Simply Hike have a fabulous website that  sells camping equipment and outdoor clothing including of course, Hunter wellies, and other Hunter branded goodies.

The Terms & conditions for the competition are…

1, Product: Hunter Original Tall Classic Wellies in Navy.

2, Size: The Winner can choose a boot size from 4 to 11.

3, Date: The winner must be selected by Tuesday 31^st of July. Winner’s address & boot size must be emailed to me by the 2^nd of Aug or we will be unable to supply the item.

4, The product cannot be returned for a different size once ordered.

5, The product cannot be exchanged for cash or an alternative product.

6, If you win the competition, the blogger will notify you and the judge’s decision will be final, and no correspondence will be entered into.

7, No purchase necessary

8, Sorry the competition is open to UK residents only. 

Please note we will order the boots once the competition has ended so there will be a two week delay in delivery.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Popchips is running a competition with Planet Organic this week to give away a pair of Camp Bestival tickets. Kids under 10 go free so this is a good one for parents.

To enter you just need to tweet “@popchipsUK @planetorganicUK I want to go to #campbestival” and they¹ll pick winners at random.

Good Luck!

I haven’t been taking my camera out much this past week, what with it not being amphibious and all that, so todays Country Kids will start by showing you some nests that Cubs Grandad found when chopping down a bush (don’t worry they had already been abandoned).  The first one was just fascinating – it was a soft and springy cocoon made from moss and fine twigs, so perfect it was totally awe-inspiring.  It was lined with feathers and fur, some of which looked as though it had come from my dog, no doubt shed as he flies around the place after his ball.

The other one looked less cosy but equally as enthralling.  it’s so circular and solid – nature is truly wonderful.

Today i did manage to get a little picture on my phone, in between the raindrops – we got soaked to the skin but had so much fun, my little boy really has revolutionised my life and activities, I just follow his lead and he opens up new and forgotten worlds.

This is my favourite though, my little boy singing the Barney ‘I love you’ song under the canal bridge as he plops stones into the canal.  he likes to sing under the bridge for the acoustics!

This Morning’s Dr Chris Steel, MBE Supports the ‘Medikidz on the Road for NP-C’ Campaign

Delivering the ‘Medikidz Explain Niemann-Pick Type C’ comic book to every young patient in the UK, during Rarer Diseases Month

http://medikidzontheroad.com/

Medikidz, a specialist children’s publisher, has teamed up with the Niemann-Pick Disease Group (NPDG) to tour the country, raising awareness for the rare genetic condition, Niemann Pick Type C. The tour will deliver the ‘Medikidz Explains NP-C’ comic book across the UK, to patients, families, schools and communities affected by this rare genetic disease.

Dr. Chris Steele, MBE, This Morning’s Resident GP, said of the campaign:

“In all my time as a GP, I had never heard of any medical information available to help my young patients understand all of the different diseases they were diagnosed with. That’s why I was so excited to come across Medikidz, and all the wonderful support they provide for sick children and their families.

He adds: “It is inspirational to see such a passionate team of young doctors working to improve the plight of young patients all around the world.  It’s fantastic that they cover rare genetic diseases such as NPC, as uncommon conditions are even more likely to be overlooked.”

Dr. Kim Chilman-Blair, Founder of Medikidz, said:

“The Niemann Pick Disease Group does amazing work, and that’s why we wanted to work with them to create the NP-C comic book.  Our combined mission is to make sure that such a complex condition can be explained clearly to those patients who may be frightened or confused.  We also aim to help families, friends and classmates know exactly what is happening to their friend or loved one.

Dr. Kim Chilman-Blair adds:

“Medikidz believes that every child has a right to medical information they can understand. Our entire ethos is about educating and empowering young people.  This tour will have a positive impact by helping communities understand what this serious genetic disorder is, while raising money for this incredible charity.”

Dave Roberts, Chair of the Niemann-Pick Disease Group UK said:

“We are proud to be part of this very exciting campaign that will have such a positive impact on the families and communities affected by Niemann-Pick Disease, Type C. Medikidz have a unique way of raising awareness and communicating information about this disease and we are extremely grateful for their support.”

The time had come to think about encouraging my son to perform his bodily functions in a place other than his nappy. Being a realist, I thought about the potential associated mess and debated about whether it was time to face up to my domestic responsibilities and compare home insurance, in case of irreparable carpet damage.

I’d been setting the scene for a while – I’d bought a Pourty before he was even one and kept it near to where I changed my son and occasionally sat him upon it, to get him vaguely used to the concept. Cub showed a strong interest interest last year, when he saw a girl use a potty. It lasted a few days, but the potty use was not consistent – I encouraged him to use a potty but he would really just go sporadically. A few months ago he seemed to want to use my toilet, so I bought one of those things thats sits on top of your loo seat to make it smaller but it slipped one day when he was sat upon it, and put him off again for a while. When spring time came around once again, and he began to show an interest in the toilet again, I stuck Thomas stickers on his pourty and let him romp around bottomless but this only really resulted in more puddles than potties, and one rather unfortunate incident involving a large brown mess and his toothbrush. He did manage to go one full day in pants, but his Dry Like Me’s that I had bought as an alternative to pullups did feel a bit wet at the end of the day.

Again he seemed to want to use my loo, and around May time I found this rather nifty contraption. It’s a 3 in one potty and although initially he enjoyed using it on the actual loo, we now use it as a low-seater. At the same time, I saw Elmos Potty Training DVD on sale in Adsa for £3, so I snapped that up, and after looking around for a potty-related book that we could read together, settled on Pirate Pete’s Potty.

Over the last few months I have let him wander round the house with nothing on his bum, particularly if we were spending lots of time in the garden. I believe that this gave him an awareness of the bodily processes and though I have had to clean up mess, he realised he had done it and came to fetch me to clean it up. After a couple of poos in the garden, he would come to me and ask for a poo bag so that he could clean it up himself. If we were upstairs, he would use his deluxe potty but downstairs he would often puddle in the garden.

Sometimes I would ask him ‘do you want a nappy today or your big boy pants?’ and he would choose nappy, until one day, out of the blue, just over two weeks ago, he opted for big boy pants, and the same the next day, and we have progressed from there to full potty training in a day. For the first week I kept Dry Like Me’s in his pants but unless we’re going on a long trip I have not bothered this week. At the beginning, he would sometimes take himself off to the potty and forget to pull his pants and trousers down – an easy error, I think. A few times I’ve asked him ‘can you come to the loo with me’ just to remind him that he might need to go. One time he pooped in his pants but managed to remove them, flush the poo and even wipe his own bum (messily) ! Pulling things up and down is another hard step to negotiate but after two weeks he is doing this himself now too.

Nights have been dry for a very long time now anyway, so we are now completely nappy-free. I am so proud of my clever little boy, so I thought that I’d share some of the things that I found helpful in our quite spectacular (at only two and a half) baby milestone.

Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post

Last week has been mostly…..RAIN! Though I had to cancel a playdate on friday, the rain brought many puddles for my little water-baby. Granny and Grandads garden got flooded so I took my sons shorts off, he kicked his shoes off and in he went:

Round and round went he, followed by me and the dog, we were all drenched but very happy.

Well, I’ve always thought it fun to dress up, I suppose it appeals to my party-girl nature, not that I get out these days!  Jokers’ Masquerade Fancy Dress is a fantastic website that sells costumes for just about any occasion that you could possibly dream of.  I must have spent about an hour or so browsing for my review costume, there really is so much to choose from.  It’s very well organised, into womens, mens, kids, different theme sections such as Mexican Fancy Dress and Austin Powers.  I am not joking, think of something you’d like to dress up as and it will probably be there, from a willy to a vicar, and they even sell costumes for your dog, and a selection of jokes too.

I chose the Tequila Shooter Girl Costume and Mexican Sombrero Hat, for no reason really except I can now throw a Mexican-themed party, at some point, and get everyone drunk on Tequila.  I haven’t got any tequila in, so I modelled it with peach schnapps.

What do you think?i think it’s a fun outfit, and it fitted me well.  The fabric is a stretchy material and not very thick, so it won’t be too hot to wear but I’d also say that it might need to be hand washed to prolong its life.  The stripy scarf belt was a bit short and I think that to keep it tied would require a stitch, if you were to wear it for an evening.  The belt is plastic and the drinks bottle holsters seem a bit big, but maybe they would be a better fit if the bottles were tequila, rather than the cider and the peach schnapps that I tried them with.  The sombrero is just super and will last many years.

Overall, i was very pleased with the outfit and would definitely recommend Jokers’ Masquerade for anyone wanting to dress up.  The delivery arrived promptly and well-packaged and all I need now is a party. Anyone?

Disclaimer: The product was sent for free. I was not obliged to write this post and the opinions expressed are all my own.