Parenting: What to do?

Sometimes parenting is the most difficult job in the world. You are desperate to get it right and then situations present themselves that you have no idea how to tackle and you just have to learn on the job. Yes there are tons of manuals; books ready to tell you the best approach and there are online forums and web articles and in fact dozens of resources but really does anything beat your own intuition?

Every child and every situation is different, I've seen that with just my three children and if I am honest I look at my oldest JJ at age 12 and think that my husband and I aren't doing such a bad job. Yes he is addicted to his computer but he is a good guy all round. He's smart, he cares, he tries hard, he is polite and he is fun to be with. So I think we are right to be trusting our gut and parenting in the way that feels natural to us.

I'm having behavioural challenges with one of my girls at the moment. They are having a tough time at school and keep pushing the boundaries and acting out. This of course leads to consequences from the teacher and the last thing I want at the end of the day is yet another email to tell me of that days mishap!

The Source of my Satisfaction

All my life I’ve been looking to the wrong place, the wrong source to fill the holes and to help in all situations. When times are tough and I feel down I turn to it, or equally when times are great and I feel elated and high, what do I do to celebrate? I eat; I appear to stuff my face in all situations and it is not at all healthy.

I could tell you I am a real foodie and I just love food but when I really think about it, that is not true. I’m not interested to try all the new tastes and to seek out the very best foods to satisfy my curiosity. In honesty I’m more interested to just eat those things I enjoy and to overdose on them. Food has become my drug of choice.

This needs to change, I’ve known this for many years but what has eluded me is how to change it. Willpower alone is certainly not working, I hate just sitting with that empty feeling when I want to eat. What I need is a different focus and the clues have been there for years but praying instead of eating has never really held a strong enough appeal for me. Luckily last weekend the penny dropped when I heard the same message from two different speakers at our Sunday Celebration.

I need to move my focus from myself to the Father and I have to do this through continued worship. It is my job as a child of God to be continually worshipping and praising Him, this focus on Him will ensure that I do not have time to just wallow in my small issues, I have to focus on the bigger picture. I’ve already being practising the principle of gratitude for many years now and I know the power of praise, I just need to up my game and when I feel that pull to eat, it must act as the trigger to sing and to lose myself in worship for a bit, because when I focus on God rather than myself, I have the natural order right and I feel certain the urge to eat needlessly will go away.

Of course, alongside this I need a god eating plan (I intended that to say good eating plan but actually decided that maybe the typo was God-inspired and I should leave it, as indeed I do need God to be in the plan!) to ensure that I’m getting all the nutrition I need and eating the right things to be able to keep my yearnings under control.

As someone who has had food issues all their life, the changes I need to make will not be easy. Many of the best things in life are not easy but they are necessary, so however hard it feels to change, I have to do it. At the moment I’m on a one way ticket to hell, a living hell on earth where I am trapped in activities that are not glorifying To God. To keep eating and stuffing my face with food to block my emotions and to feed my habit is disrespectful and neglectful but I have to get past chastising myself and I need to focus on the good. He loves me as I am and by making some simple changes, with my focus moving from self to Him, I can love me too and only then will many other elements fall into place and I can find the peace that I so dearly covet.

My dear friend Gordon who has gone through so much just recently encouraged me to grab Gods hand and walk with Him in 2016 and Nicole reminded me that we must give thanks first and then the miracles happen. I’m really looking forward to the miracle this year and seeing how the changes in me impact many other people.

Thanks for reading, Mich x

Sturdy School Shoes from Hotter Shoes

Back in September JJ started secondary school and he had a new pair of what looked to be really sturdy leather shoes. Here we are just four and a half months later and they still fit him, but he has worn the leather away at the heels and they now rub. Also the insole is really worn and quite uncomfortable to wear.

With this in mind I got in touch with my shoe store of choice and asked if they might like JJ to put a pair of their men's shoes to the test. Hotter shoes are available online and from over 70 stores in the UK and I am an avid fan. I got my first pair of Hotter boots back in 2010 and I still wear them now, I also have trainers that travelled to Ethiopia with me and a couple of pairs of shoes and they all last this heavy-footed woman really well.

Getting the New Year off to a good start

I feel like Christmas is a distant memory now and I'm happy the new year is here; there is still that feeling of expectation and new beginnings. Like anything can happen as it is a fresh canvas awaiting me to draw the picture of 2016.

To be honest I came into the new year without too much thought of what the year ahead would hold and what goals I should be thinking about. I'm really not into New Year's resolutions and I just assume they will be broken, so I stopped making them some years back but I do believe it's good to have a focus and change is the only constant.

Better Health 

Over the last couple of weeks I've spent quite a bit of time in prayer and quiet contemplation of what I should be doing this year and a few focus areas have made them self apparent to me. First off I really need to get a grip on my health. I've been on too many diets in the last thirty odd years since I started to try to lose some weight. The evidence from those last three decades tells me that diets do not work for me, I now realise what I need is small, gradual changes. So I am working on changes a couple of things each month and making them habits for life. It is going to be slow and I'm sure at times boring but it is so necessary and if I can establish all the better behaviours as my norms then the weight cannot fail to fall off and my health improve.

Know your Worth Bloggers.... Pfft

Success on Blackboard from Shutterstock

'Know your worth bloggers' is a phrase I see or hear again and again. On Facebook, in blog posts or spoken about at conferences and let me say from the start I agree you are worth a lot.

But I do resent the blog police telling you what your worth is. Who's business is it if you decide to accept a sponsored post for a payment of £25 or a review for a 75p tin of beans?

When it comes to taking on work, you have to make the decisions, how much money will you accept? What is the lowest value product you will accept? Will you work for goodwill or an owed favour? Whatever you decide is OK, is just that - OK for you.

Personally I've now been blogging for eight years, I have a large readership and a good social media reach. I therefore make the decision that I do not undertake sponsored posts for less than £125 and it is extremely rare for me to review low-value products.

However spin the clock back to 2010 and I'd of happily reviewed some toddler snacks worth about a fiver and I know for sure that all the low value reviews I undertook gave me valuable experience of crafting a good review and developing a strong relationship with PR agencies and brands. Some of my fabulous early opportunities came about because I put in the hard work to nurture a relationship and to learn my trade.

As a new blogger in this completely saturated market, you cannot expect to arrive and be offered the chance to review a holiday and £200 vacuum without having put in some serious work to develop your blog and following first. So yes, please do know your worth but do not allow others to define it for you and make you feel bad.

If you are not being offered £100 for a sponsored post as you do not yet have the reach and domain authority to warrant that then agree a price that you feel is fair and you are happy with and don't listen to any other blogger who tells you that you are letting the side down and devaluing us all. It's just not true,

For years I've been offered £25 posts and been turning them down, there are always dozens of other bloggers willing to take them and that is OK. I've made the decision to say no and know that better opportunities will come up for me, My personal decision is that I'd rather do 2 posts at £150 a piece each month than 12 at £25 to make the same money. You decision might be totally different and I respect your choice to make that decision.

I'm a live and let live kind of woman and I think life would be a lot easier if more of us were but I'm always open to (polite) debate so do share your opinion if you think I'm talking nonsense.

Mich x

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I'm talking Bladder Weakness - Because we Should!

Pop Photo Art Oops Image from Shutterstock

I've always been very honest on this blog and to be fair, my raw posts are often the ones that I've received the best responses to. The ones where comments, emails, tweets and even phone calls have poured in. It's not as if I'm shy - I've blogged about my issues around food and overeating, giving birth, having a miscarriage, bleeding all over a swimming pool floor and my foray with PND but I've never (yet) written about bladder weakness.

It's just not the done thing, is it? Do I really want to put it out there and say that I have to wear a pad each day and that I am avidly practising my pelvic floor exercises any time I remember. Yes you could be chatting to me in the playground and I look as if I'm concentrating but really I am squeezing and releasing with the hope that things just might improve down below if I'm a really good girl.

1. Stop the taboo and start talking about it
Sometimes I hear or read friends joking about sneezing or using the trampoline and having a worrying moment of 'wee leakage'. 'Ohh make sure you are wearing a Tena lady' is the standard response but bladder weakness really is still one of those subjects that we just do not talk about in a serious manner and I think we need to.

Little Steps, Big Changes

It’s that time of year again, when we all reflect on our lives and the year gone by and many of us decide to make some changes and set some goals. I’m not a big fan of making resolutions as they feel like pressure I do not need and I’m tempted to break them very quickly, so I struck resolutions off my to-do list quite some years ago now.

I am however passionate about change; things do not stay the same and that is a good thing. As a Christian, I’m learning and growing every day, just like Jesus did and even though on the outside it might look like my life is pretty much the same as this time last year it is the inner me I know that has changed for the better.

There are still plenty of changes that need to be made and the biggest one of all is losing some weight and becoming healthier. In the last year I have been diagnosed with cough variant asthma and early onset arthritis in my knees and that can’t be right for someone who is just 42 years of age. Losing weight has been a goal of mine for near on thirty years so this isn’t going to be an easy one to achieve but then the best things in life are never easy.

I’ve had a bit of a revelation in the last few weeks though and it is encouraging. I’ve been asking myself why I think I can have a different result (i.e. weight loss) when I keep doing the same things? I’m in a terrible pattern of trying to diet or ‘be good’ as I call it at least once a year and for two or three months I am motivated and I can manage to drop a few stone. Then it gets boring and my true love of food rears its head again and off I go in that same spiral of eating and dieting.

My revelation this year has been that I need to make small incremental changes and introduce new habits into my life. Habits for life in fact. The current NHS programme to help educate our nation is called ‘change for life’ and that is exactly what I need to do. Not diet, not ‘be good’, not anything for a short period of time but make long lasting changes.

It’s been fairly easy to identify that I lose all will power and determination as soon as I’m tired so the first change I’ve been making in January has been my bedtime. In bed with the light off by 11pm has been my rule, there has been the odd time later but massive improvements have been made in general. If I want to read my book I go up at 10pm so there is time before the 11pm lights off, not just tag it on the end and find myself still awake at gone midnight as had become the norm.

Hand in hand with this earlier bedtime has been an earlier wake-up time. I like the morning and thus it seems sensible to make the most of it before the house awakens, so at 6.30am I’ve been creeping into the lounge and reading my bible, writing my journal and praying. It’s been a very blessed time.

I now need to ensure that these patterns continue for the foreseeable future. Researchers seem to say that the minimum time it takes to form a habit is 21 days of continuous activity, but the more complex and difficult it is for you to personally adopt that habit the longer it will take. There is no strict formula but UCL suggest a good estimate is 66 days, that’s just over two months, yikes!

I’ve also had a health assessment in January and found out I am 47% fat and that feels like a scary figure but it is just that, a figure. A place I’m starting a journey from, it does not have to define me. There is no more ‘hello I’m Michelle and I’m fat’, it is now ‘hello, I’m Michelle, a child of God’, that is what defines me. It will be incredibly satisfying to watch this fat figure decrease, in more ways than one!

There will be more for me to update you on in coming weeks, but that’s it for now.

First two small steps, early to bed and early to rise. You know what they say about that? I’d be content with healthy, wealthy and wise!

What about you, have you got changes planned this year?

10 Family Movies to enjoy on NOW TV

During the run up to Christmas and this last week whilst the kids have still been off school we have been enjoying at least one family film every day. Sometimes all the family together, occasionally just the kids and a variety of family members at other times. It is definitely one of my favourite things to do, snuggle up with at least one of my children and watch a very good movie.

I'm  absolutely loving the variety that NOW TV is giving us. The movie package is probably the one that has been used the most (so far). We have been gifted this but it costs just £9.99 per month and I think that is great value, a trip to the cinema costs nearly that for just one adult. Also the films on NOW TV are good quality and there are over 1000 movies to choose from and up to 16 premieres each month. You won't get bored or run out of things to watch - I promise you!

Wishing you a Very Happy Christmas

All the preparations are done, the kids have finished school and we are now off visiting family and friends. 

Our Christmas will be a large and busy one but with plenty of moments of peace and calm thrown into the mix too.

I pray you can take time to feel joyful over the holidays and I wish you peace, good health and a life full of contentment in 2016.

You might have noticed I've had most of December away from blogging and I'll be honest it has been liberating, at the moment I feel no real pull to come back and blog again, so I might be away a while yet......

Be blessed, Mich xx

Image credit: Shutterstock - Christmas Cross

Fun at church last weekend.

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Doing Christmas Large!

I love Christmas, it is such a fun time and one I always look forward to. In the old days it meant time off Uni or work and plenty of dressing up, going out and having a tipple of two. For the last decade it has been about staying home and enjoying the time with my family. Building memories and traditions, some that have stayed with us and others we have had to adapt or even scrap completely.

One of the earliest traditions we adopted was wrapping all the kids presents on Christmas eve whilst watching a Christmassy film and having a Chinese take-away. My husband and I loved this and it was so easy when we only had one child and he went to bed at 6 or 7pm. Then even when we had three children all of a younger age it was still doable but over the last few years we haven't been able to start wrapping until about 10pm at night and with three kids and lots of gifts it started to get very tiring. The final straw was when we moved to East Sussex two years ago and our nearest Chinese take-away did not deliver and is a 10 mile round-trip.

Sadly that tradition had to stop but really it is no major issue as the conference centre where we live closes at midday on Christmas Eve and all the community and many of our returning friends come together to celebrate Christmas together. This year we expect there will be about 110 of us. Can you imagine how exciting my kids find this?

Every Day is a Roast Day for this Family - Toby Carvery Review #ManicMumDay

We all know that Mums generally lead a busy life and let's be honest many dads do as well. Recent research commissioned by Toby Carvery showed that most mums do not get to sit down on an evening until 8.07pm and I think on average this is probably about right, although some nights it is closer to 9pm!

It is for this reason that Toby Carvery offered my family and I to go along to our local restaurant (which in our case is Willingdon Drove, Eastbourne) on a week night and enjoy a meal that is cooked for us and involves no washing or clearing up. Result!

We booked a table using the online booking system, which is super easy and I have to confess that I have no idea you could book a table for Toby nowadays, as you never used to be able to. I was very aware from the start that the email confirmation (and reminder emailed to me the day before the reservation) stated that the table would only be held for 10 minutes from the reservation time and thus we arrived promptly.

A new Hobby for JJ

I was super pleased when our small gym was given a make-over recently. It is in the basement of the main house at the conference centre where we live and it has always been dark and dingy.

However, hard work from many of the young volunteer team has meant that a window has been unblocked and new equipment has been purchased and it has all been spruced up with paint and new safer flooring's.

This complete change has meant that my 12 year old son JJ has started to show an interest in using the gym and let's be honest, anything that gets my computer loving son out of the house and doing something physical is alright with me.

It's also fabulous that many of the international volunteers who live here are very into personal fitness and we even have one qualified personal trainer amongst them, so JJ has been given some great tuition and tips of how to exercise safely.

It was great timing that JJ received his Adidas Terrex Boast GTX trainers (with GORE-TEX® technology to ensure your feet stay dry even during the wettest of weathers and activities) some weeks back as they have been perfect for exercising in - light weight, good grip and able to keep his feet dry and sweat free. I went down to capture JJ in action at the weekend and I thought I'd share some pictures -

Encouraging Your Child's Imaginative Play

I'll make a confession to you and I'm sure I'm not the only parent who feels this way but I really dislike having to play make believe with my children.

I know, I'm terrible, right? I just find it so boring. I am a realist and I'd much rather be doing something that my logic says is worthwhile and is achieving something. You know, perhaps crafting some cards, baking cakes or going for a ramble.

But the research shows how important it is to encourage your children to take part in imaginative play. A key article in Psychology Today cites benefits such as increased creativity, enhanced empathy, your child gaining an understanding that others thoughts differ to their own, advanced language skills developing and even a reduction in aggression to name just a few of the major plus points.

Growing in Confidence along with your Child

It is all too easy to feel like you are failing at parenting. Whilst there are hundreds of manuals and books giving you instruction on the best way to do things, at the end of the day it is all down to personal preference and I think we grow and improve with time.

I've been a parent for over 12 years now and if I'm honest it feels like a lifetime (in a good way). I can hardly recall what it was like to have a weekend ahead and no-one else relying on me. Parenting certainly does help you learn to be less self-centered when you have a small person (or three) relying on you for their every need,

But it is scary at first, right? I clearly remember bringing JJ home from the hospital after a traumatic birth and having been in there for four days. We headed straight off to Mothercare to buy some dummies (or soothers as them seem to be called nowadays), have a quick McDonalds so I didn't have to worry about tea and then my husband headed out to lead Cub Scouts and left me at home with this tiny little person with baggy skin and big alien eyes.

I laugh when I think back to myself sat on the sofa with JJ at my shoulder pondering when dh would come home as what did I do if he cried too much? How could it be that the last time I sat on that sofa it was only me and my husband to be concerned about and now we had this special responsibility of parenting a child. Rather than being too worried I did what has now become a habit at times when I need reassurance. I headed to the Internet and more specially at that time to my birth club on Baby Centre.

Finding my #IGoodThing A Day for Advent

This is Ted, Alfie & Pinkie. Today I am #grateful for Miss E listening to me. After coming home from #blogfest15 I had to chat to the kids about tidying when I'm not home. This morning my 8yo made the effort to make her bed nice before school & not even tell me. During #Advent I'm sharing #1goodthing each day to remind myself how #blessed I am. It is a great way to stay #positive in these dark, cold months. I'd love it if you'd like to join me. #epig

A photo posted by @michelletwinmum on Nov 23, 2015 at 7:13am PST

I'm having the month of December away from blogging, I've done it a few times before and I always find a bloggy break is really good for the soul. My intention is to be really present in every moment and not thinking about where I'll find the time to write my next blog post or which review we have to undertake that weekend, Blogging has bought many blessings to my family but it is really important to know when to turn-off.

I won't be completely turning off social media but to help me stay focused on what is really important to me during Advent I'll be sharing a visual diary. One photo a day labelled as #1goodthing, this will act as a reminder of how blessed I am and how grateful to the Lord for all the great things he provides to me.

Black Friday Special Offer - NOW TV, Save 40%

I'm a big fan of Internet based on-demand TV, we have been using it for about 18 months now since we moved to the countryside and were not able to continue with our cable TV, But you know what? I am so glad we had to give up the cable as being tied into an expensive contract is a headache.

Much better to be able to pay month by month and to finish your subscription whenever you need to without any penalties. We only got NOW TV about three weeks ago but I have already been crowned the best mum ever by my girls. Apparently it is the most awesome on-demand TV there is and I suppose that is only to be expected when you realise it is the offering from Sky.

And now is the perfect time to buy as today is Black Friday and most of the major retailers are offering great deals but you don't have to go and fight in the shops for this one, you can order online.

Today's great saving is 40% on a Now TV Box Bundle, making the cost of any of the following deals just £14.99 -

• Now TV Box & 2 months Movies, 
• Now TV Box & 3 months Entertainment or
• Now TV Box & 2 Sports Day Passes 

But you need to act quick as the offer is only available from the 27th November – 30th November.

I'm seriously considering giving this gift to my adult brother for Christmas. This is far cheaper than the £25 I'd normally spend and I love the idea of a gift that entertains the whole year through. Even if he decided not to keep up the subscription to the entertainment, movies or sports that I have chosen for him, he can still use the NOW TV box as a really convenient way to stream things like BBC iPlayer to his TV.

10 Top Tips for Enjoying a Stress Free Advent

This is the view from one of the prayer rooms in the prayer centre just a few steps from my house.
I'll be spending lots of time in here, cosy by the radiator!

Last Christmas I had such a wonderful chilled Advent period that I wanted to make sure I copied it again for this year. Thus my November has been a time of getting ahead with my blogging commitments, adjusting my pace to slow down and saying no to most of the opportunities that have appeared in my in-box.

I had lots of comments last year about how calm and organised I was and I wanted to share the ways I achieved this. There isn't any secret formula and I can't promise what works for me will work for you but if you fancy a chilled Advent and a better chance of focusing on the real meaning of Christmas then organisation and planning are your friend.

Each year I plan to have most of the commercial Christmassy things done by the end of November and then Advent is all mine to do the activities that I enjoy and to dedicate my time to The Lord.

6 Reasons to Choose the Novotel Blackfriars for your Family London Stay

If you are anything like me you may get flighty ideas of taking the kids for a nice weekend away in London and then you start to think practical and have a look only to find that everything is prohibitively expensive or that you have to book two rooms to be able to accommodate your kids and frankly that just isn't practical.

Well, worry not.  I have the solution for you, book to stay at the Novotel Blackfriars and two children (up to the age of 16) can share your room free of charge and they can also join you for a delicious buffet breakfast without cost. In fact book to stay at any Novotel anywhere and you will be offered these two free places, as this is their regular family offer and I think that is pretty fabulous. Not perfect for my family if we are being honest, as we have three children but they do offer a 'Family Extra Room' promotion and this gives a second room for 50% of the cost. Which means your break can still be affordable and as my kids are older it is also workable.

I've been very impressed with all the family friendly offerings that Novotel have in general and I wrote a post about it recently, take a read over here. But what I want to share today is why the Novotel, Blackfriars has captured my attention and become a hotel that I'd happily recommend to friends.

We're off out for a run Mum!

This was the shout I heard most mornings about 8.30am during half-term week. My twins are just 8 years old but already they want to get out and have a run.  I'd love to tell you that they have got it from dh and I but my running efforts this year were pretty appalling and thwarted by health ailments and dh's well, who knows the last time he ran anywhere! lol

No, it is lucky we live in a close-knit Christian community with about 50 young adult volunteers as this means my children have some superb role models to follow in the footsteps of. One of the things they seem to be copy-catting right now is having a bi-daily run and I can't moan at that. Nor the fact that JJ has been using our new gym on site, that is fabulous too.

It was a complete coincidence that Miss E moaned to me on the Wednesday of half-term that she had no suitable footwear as it is muddy round the lake and wellies don't cut-it when you want to run and then we received a package of three pairs of truly stunning Adidas trainers with waterproof GORE-TEX® technology. The kids were over the moon when they unpacked them.

We Can't Let Them Win - Love is Our Response!

I'd love to credit this, but I have no idea where it is from. I shared it from a friends FB post but it is not hers

What happened in France Friday is devastating and the outcry from the public is of course understandable. As a Brit I painfully feel the tragedy as Paris is a city I have been to, I have fond memories of and I currently live with a few French people. Living in an international community makes my heart stretch and want to embrace the world and no, not just the white developed world.

I want to embrace and care for all parts of the world. Currently there are 23 nationalities represented within our community, that is people from the continents of Europe, Asia, Africa, North America and South America. Each one of those people adds something just a little different, special and unique to the lifeblood here and I do not value any one of them more or less because their skin is white or because they speak English as their first language.

Yes, we are all Christians, I live in a Christian community but I suspect every one of us has friends of other religions and none. I will not ostracise people because they are Muslim.

Netflix - It just gets Better and Better

I'm not a big one for going out at night nowadays.  Each month I like at least one night out with my husband and probably every other month I'll go out with some girlfriends but that is about it, well unless you count my Monday night Spanish class but it is not exactly a big night out!

It's therefore really important to me to have some good TV to watch for those evenings when dh is at work or when I just need to completely relax and zone out. Netflix is my answer to this and over the last 18 months it has been a Godsend, we don't have Sky and we can't get cable due to where we live and thus on demand TV is what we have.

I written quite a lot about my love affair with Netflix, I truly think it is such fantastic value at £5.99 a month, I mean really, what else can you do for 6 quid?  not even go to the cinema once.

Every so often I get an email from Netflix and rather than annoy me, I love it as it flags a film or series that it thinks I might like based on my ongoing viewing preferences and it cleverly builds up a picture of what I like and do not like based on programmes I have watched and rated. It also acts as a reminder for me to head into Netflix and to explore what is new one there and add some new watches to my list.

I received one of those emails this week and it alerted me that Big Momma's House had been added to Netflix and I don't know about you but I think that is a classic.  Such a great family film and one I'll share with the kids and a bucket of popcorn one chilly evening when we cuddle up for some family time. It is a 12 and that's older than my girls but I can't recollect anything in it that concerns me. I'll need to have a little google and see why it is rated as that.

5 Great Christmas Gift Ideas: For Him

My Christmas shopping is in full force now. I do like to be organised and get it all done early but the ones I find it hardest to buy for?  Well my husband and dad of course. They are both the kind of men who don't really have any hobbies, are not interested in boozing, are not keen followers of fashion and don't want for anything. They are very happy to spend time with those they love and to bypass presents all together.This doesn't help me though as my kids would never let me hear the end of it if we didn't get them something.

So here is my list of the top 5 gifts for the man who wants for nothing -

1.  Personalised cheese or breadboard - If you have a man who likes to cook or loves some cheese and biscuits with a glass of port in the evening (like my husband) then why not check out this new supplier of personalised wooden gifts. Burn Me On make really nice gift bread/ cheese/ meat boards - really quirky and something a bit different. At £20 for a 30cm x 20cm the price is reasonable and the quality of the board (hevea wood) and the packaging is excellent and really pleasing to the eye. The postage of £2 is also reasonable and I think you will like your board enough to use it on the table as a serving platter too.

Breakfast with Santa - The Kids Can't Wait!

I don't know about you but I've always had mixed feelings about taking the kids to meet Santa.  I know they love it when they are small but very often it costs an absolute fortune, you wait in queue for literally hours and it ends up being a massive anti-climax as your child hates the pound shop tat they are given as a gift.

It really has been a love:hate relationship in the past. The dreams I had in my head for that special white filled day where the kids smile the whole time and behave like angels often ends up with a meltdown and an early bedtime.  Well, no longer there is now a fabulous solution that both adults and children can enjoy together.

Will you be Packing a Gift filled Shoebox this Year?

Each year I share about my children packing shoebox gifts for children in other countries. We send these with Operation Christmas Child (OCC), an initiative run each year by Samaritans Purse, an evangelical Christian charity that I travelled to Belarus with, in 2012.

Every year I read the debate about whether people should join in with OCC as they are a Christian charity and each year it makes me smile when non-Christian friends point out that you can't have Christmas without Christ and is it really surprising that a Christian charity is spreading the message of God's unconditional love with a gift box and the opportunity to learn more about Christ if the recipient so wishes?

Whilst I'm totally happy with my decision to give via OCC and I feel sure they are not pushing Christianity onto unsuspecting children in other countries (I've seen a distribution with my own eyes after all), I do totally understand that some people feel dubious and would rather give through a different charity and there are loads. Have a google of your local area and I'm sure you will find an initiative often run through organisations like The Salvation Army, The Royal British Legion or The Rotary Club.

My Girls are Stylish this Winter with Vertbaudet

Winter can be an expensive time as you have to kit the kids out - new coat, boots, hats, scarves and anything else that was lost last season and all this just after you have sorted the September school uniform and before Christmas comes along to empty your pockets. So I am always glad to find somewhere selling winter coats at reasonable prices, especially if they are high quality.

This year Vertbaudet, the online and mail order retailer got in touch with me and introduced me to their range of coats and to be honest I was blown away. I am used to shopping in the high street stores or supermarkets where you have a choice of about 4 coats and if there is not one your child likes well it is tough really, as they have to have something and you don't want to trail around for too long! No such problem with Vertbaudet as they have 57 coats for girls and 33 coats for boys aged between 2 - 14 years.

Half Term Fun and Memorable Moments #GetPopped

What a great half-term week we have had. I wasn't sure whether to book a holiday but the kids all asked to stay home and just have some days out so that is what we did and it fitted in really well as just before half-term Popchips (the popped potato snack) challenged me to have six days of enjoyable experiences and to take a packet of Popchips with me for each.

They set the challenge to celebrate the launch of their new 6 pack multipacks, which are available in Sea Salt and BBQ flavours. I can genuinely tell you that I am so glad they set me this challenge as I'd not tried Popchips before and I really like them. As someone who needs to be cutting down on calories they are my new best friend at around 70 calories for a packet.

Popchips believe that every day should be filled with joyful and light-hearted moments and I set about capturing those. Not just the moments that you know are pretty special but also the ones that are easily missed and must not be taken for granted. I wrote recently about how important it is to choose joy and to make sure you live in the moment and delight in the small stuff.

Horrible Histories at The De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill

We had a fun family afternoon at the De La Warr Pavilion last Sunday. They had gifted us tickets to watch Horrible Histories, Barmy Britain part 3 and to be honest I had no idea what to expect.  The kids all watch the TV programme (well 8 year old Miss M and Miss E do as 12 year old JJ tells me he outgrew it years ago) but he still seems to have a massive collection of the books in his room but apparently reading is different, much more grown-up!

The one hour theatre show is billed as being suitable for children aged 6 years upwards and I think it was perfectly pitched. My kids have not been to many live theatre shows before and I think TV has spoilt them somewhat as they were a little disappointed there were only two actors in it, Neal Foster and Anthony Spargo. Neal and Anthony was fantastic though, so much energy and just bouncing off each other. They were the full works as far as I'm concerned.

I didn't expect to laugh so much at this stage show but it has a definite comedy edge to it. The audience were encouraged to participate in many ways with a sing along, calling out, clapping and one lucky little girl even got to go up on stage, one of mine would have loved that!

I thought the show was super clever, it was two men, one big travel case and two stacks of costumes and they dd everything in front of our eyes including changing clothes but it remained fun and the high-energy kept up the whole way through. We bounced our way though some of the major British historic events and we met King Charles II, the Puritons and Nelson. Here is a glimpse of some of the sketches -

I'm a Good Enough Blogger, Are You?

I'll just go ahead and answer that question straight away, no point in leaving you hanging.

Are you a good enough blogger? Of course you are. We all are.

Who is it up to anyway? Who gets to decide what is OK and what is not with YOUR blog? This is your space after all, only you can say. You are the judge and in this case you are the jury and YOU get the final say.

Now I know some of you reading this might be arguing with me in your head or even shouting at your screen. "No Michelle, it is not all about me. There are so many people judging me - my readers, my family, other bloggers - the top bloggers even (*Yawn*), PR's, Companies etc etc. I have to perform, I have to do well, I have to work on my blog 24 hours a day, I must never take a day off, I have to grind myself into the ground, I have to be active on every social media networks, even those ones no-one has even heard of yet. I want to be a success. So. I. Must. Work. Super. Hard!

Well I think you are wrong, you don't need to satisfy anyone else in particular to be good enough. Let me explain.

Chestnuts, Chestnuts Everywhere - Photo Blog

We've had some fabulous weather just recently and the girls and I have been getting out and making the most of it. It is not always necessary to spend lots of money to have a great time together, getting outdoors and foraging for a sweet treat can be really satisfying.

The chestnuts are dropping by the dozen right now and we wanted to get some before all the deers ate them up. We headed out with some friends to go collecting and we didn't have to go far before we found an abundance. Between Friday and Saturday we collected a great haul and the kids got to partake in some of their favourite pass times - tree climbing and mud jumping!

 The golden nectar that we set out to find, they are stunning just to look at, let alone eat!

The Happiest Boy Alive - JJ is now Officially Amazing! #GWRLive! #GWR2016

Is that title enough to give it away?  Can you guess what my little man did last week?

He only went and bagged himself an official Guinness World Record (GWR), not everyone can do that, me included! Over the last four years our family has been lucky enough to attend four GWR events and both JJ and I have missed out on records by just one or two, thus our determination to get one for the family was pretty strong. So when we headed up to the GWR office last Tuesday I commented on Twitter that we were 'limbered up and ready to break some records'.  Little did I know it would turn out to be true!

Embrace Autumn - Our Walk at Home #CountryKids

Now I realise not everyone is as lucky as us and doesn't have this kind of walk on their doorstep but literally everywhere is beautiful in the Autumn.  Even in massive cities there are public parks and green spaces where the leaves are changing colours and falling from the trees.

I swore when we moved to our unique home 27 months ago that I would never take the beauty of this place for granted and I don't think I have but our walk yesterday did make me realise I have also not been making the best of it and getting out enough.

It is probably six weeks since I have last been for a really long walk and taken my camera with me. The girls and I rediscovered the grounds at our home on this Autumnal walk and had loads of fun too. All these photos are taken around the estate that we live in.

Thank You Lord for My Boy

The girls had an inset day today and as a treat I drove JJ to school so he did not have to ride the bus which requires him to leave home 80 minutes before school starts. Today we drove the 11 minute car journey and wondered why on earth the bus journey takes such a very long time!

That's not what this post is about though. I was on the journey back home when I started to reflect on how very lucky I am that JJ sets his alarm and gets himself up in the morning. I have many friends with 12/13 year old children who have a battle each day to get their child up and dressed. I am truly lucky and very, very grateful that I don't have this fight with JJ. Of course it could all change, the hormones are arriving and it could get much more tricky but for now, I am just happy that he is generally a really good lad and great fun to spend time with too.

U2 at The O2 - Inspired to Speak Out

I've been working with the NGO (non-governmental organisation) ONE for a few years now and my passion for the work they do continues to increase day by day. As they are not a charity seeking funding but a grassroots campaigning and advocacy organisation they suit me much better as a partner. I'm more comfortable giving voice to issues and allowing my voice to speak on behalf of those who can't be heard than I am at raising money.

One of the founders of ONE is Bono, the lead singer of U2 and as such my husband and I ended up as guests of ONE at the U2 concert at The O2 this week. To say it was good is a major understatement, U2 really know how to put on a show. Due to my poorly knee I had changed our standing tickets to seated ones at the last moment and this meant we were up in the Gods on the 4th floor.

Guest Post: Jesus is my Friend

Helping Hands by Shutterstock

Another guest post for you today in my series 'Why am I a Christian?'. This time from Nicola -

I keep trying to write this piece on why I'm a Christian and I keep getting stuck, or sidetracked! It's not that I haven't ever thought about it before - I've probably thought about it too much - it's that there are just so many reasons.

Firstly, I come from a place of philosophy - it's important that what I believe makes sense to me.  And I just can't believe that there wasn't a creator of all this intricate creation.  I see it this way - I'm a mother and I'm pretty convinced that my 'creations' cannot have things in them that I don't have myself - so if I, as a thinking part of creation, can love, then my Creator, God, must be thinking and loving...

I'm going to leave that one there, otherwise I'll get sidetracked into philosophy and that seems to go on to be something in the nature of a 10,000 word essay.

What do you Love about Mummy?

Earlier this week I went to an event at a local church, it was run by a charity called Care For The family and was called Mums the Word. It was sold as a night for mums to come together, have fun and be inspired. The speakers were Diane Louise Jordon, who you may know from TV and surely from Blue Peter if you are anywhere similar in age to me and also Cathy Madavan, who you might only know if you are a Christian.

I've heard Cathy speak a number of times at Spring Harvest and always really enjoyed her natural and friendly style; she doesn't fail to make you laugh. Add Diane into the mix and you have a great combo, the two of them genuinely seemed to get on like a house on fire and had a lot of parenting wisdom and humility to share.

There was far more content in the three hours than I could ever share in one post, so you can expect some more parenting/mums type posts over the next few weeks and that is no bad thing when I am still classified as a parenting blog but in recent times I've noticed that the subject is dwindling.

5 Reasons We Do Not Celebrate Halloween

Image used with permission

I’m not a big fan of Halloween, I never have been. However as a child I was desperate to dress up and go out trick or treating with the hope of a night of fun with friends and a bag of booty at the end of it but as for the scary and ghoulish stuff no thank you.  I never did get to trick or treat as my Dad was adamant that no child of his would go begging door-to-door and I didn’t understand what his issue was when I was a child, I just thought he was a meanie. I get it now though.

I wrote a post about Halloween back in 2011 which was a bit controversial as I said if you celebrate Halloween you were worshipping all things evil including the devil himself. It was purposefully provocative to get people to think about Halloween and what they were doing. I wasn’t actually saying that I believed many of my readers were devil worshippers, because who am I to make that judgement? I‘ve always been a live and let live kind of woman so I do feel it is your choice as to whether you and your children celebrate Halloween or not. We are all answerable for our own decisions and as long as we make them rationally and with all the information available to us then it is no-one else’s business.

I do worry however, that many people just go along with Halloween as they have never really thought about what it is or what it teaches our children. This is when it becomes problematic. I have heard Halloween referred to as ‘harmless fun’ on so many occasions, just look at the 59 comments on my earlier mentioned post. Yes there were a few people that agreed with me that it was dark, best stayed away from, over-commercialised and teaching our kids the wrong things but most people thought I was a party-pooper. That's right, I'm the up-tight Christian woman who doesn't know how to have fun!

Guest Post: Why am I a Christian?

Close up Wooden cross necklace from Shutterstock

I'm sharing another guest post today, in my series to find out what inspires other people to be a Christian. over to Naomi -

I think the simple answer to the question ‘Why am I a Christian?’ is ‘Because of God.’ I did, I admit, go looking for Him, and He found me. I know that sounds confusing, and probably a bit over-spiritual, but I’ll share a bit of my story.

Having grown up in a Christian home, with Christian parents, going to church every week, I never really questioned the existence of God. What I did question was what I saw as a fairly restrictive lifestyle: a lifestyle where my teenage version of having fun was disapproved of; a lifestyle where my friends (none of whom were Christians) wouldn’t fit in; a lifestyle which looked very much about duty, and very little about joy.

I think a big factor in that way of thinking was that I didn’t have any friends my own age who were Christians. I was pretty much on my own in my parents’ church. Now, I look at groups of teenagers from my own church, and hope that they are actually friends, that they do hang out together. Anyway.

BRITA Back to School Hydration Challenge

Recently BRITA (the water filter people) approached me and asked if I knew how much water my children were drinking when they are at school during the day. Of course the answer was no and if I'm honest I knew what the answer probably was - not enough!

I was therefore very happy when they sent me some of their superb Fill&Go water bottles (with nifty integral water filtration) for the kids to take to school each day.  As well as the bottle they also sent me some great ruler stickers to attach to the side of the bottle and these give visual reminders to the kids of how much to drink and by when. This ruler is based on official guidelines and recommends they drink 300ml by morning break, 600ml by lunch, then there is a lunch time reminder to refill the bottle and to have drunk another 300ml by afternoon break and the last 300ml by home time. Thus meaning they would have consumed 1200 mls between the hours of 8.45am and 3.15pm.

Finding your Joy in Every Day

This week I'm part of a video that has been put together by Michelle Reeves, who formally blogged at Bod for Tea and now at The Joy Chaser and The Essex Barn. Michelle and I first got chatting back in 2010 when she was an expat living in China and a fairly new mummy. When I started my Reasons to be Cheerful linky in January 2011 Michelle was one of the first to join in and it was clear even then that she wanted to seek out the joy and the good in life, turning her back on old habits of negativity.

You can read about Michelle's journey to joy and how she has found her new happy over on her new blog but being involved with this project has had me reflecting on the subject of happiness and joy and how for me they are very different constructs.

I know most people use the terms interchangeably and I think perhaps my perspective is different due to my faith. I view happiness as something very surface, usually dependant on external circumstances and it is normally achieved when everything is going your way and life (or a situation) is good. Whereas joy is always achievable, even in the darkest of times because it is an internal; found in our relationship with Jesus. It is a gift that He freely gives to us, in the same way He extends His grace. All these amazing things that we don't deserve and yet He wants us to receive them freely.

Can Kobo convert me to an eReader?

I'm a bit behind the times, you can call me old fashioned but I don't mind. I have been resisting the lure of an eReader in favour of keeping my paperback books. I love the fact I can walk out of a charity shop with a bag of 5 books, all picked up for under a fiver. Second hand is my thing and it always feels like a real bargain.

What I don't love is the mountain of books that take over my house, waiting to be read. I'm very good, once a book is read it gets passed straight back to a charity shop but I do confess to have a whole big wicker hamper full of books waiting to be read. This could be a thing of the past though as I now have a Kobo Aura H20 eReader and it comes with 4gb of memory built in and the option to use a Micro SD card to boost it to 32gb, that would literally take thousands of books. 

10 Ways to Share your Faith with your Children

Lake baptism at our home and my childrne praying

It's funny how things don't work out as you imagine sometimes. When Cass at Diary of a Frugal Family asked me "how do you share your beliefs with your children and how do you encourage them to have faith too?" I had this idea that I'd write a crowd sourced post. I'd ask lots of Christian friends how they share their faith with their kids and put together a treasury of ideas.

It was all very simple in my head but what I forgot to factor in is that sharing your faith with your children is the norm when you are a Christian. It is an intrinsic thing, something you mostly do without having to think about it or orchestrate any special activities. So when I asked the question in a fabulous Christian FB group that I'm part of the kind of responses I got suggested involving your children in your everyday life and this is very true and really valid but it doesn't perhaps help a non-believer or a new believer know the mechanics of what to do.

20 Tips to get More from your Money

Money in Glass Jar by Shutterstock

Just over two years ago we moved to East Sussex from Hertfordshire and with this move came lots of change. I gave up my out-of-home job, we sold our house and dh took a massive pay-cut. Without a doubt it is the best move our family ever made but it didn't come without its fair share of challenges!

Due to the massive cut in our income we have had to look for ways to be much more creative with our money and to save spending out unnecessarily. I'm not the type to go without all my luxuries so we have had to shop smarter to get the things we need (or even just want). I thought it might be useful to share with you some of the ways that I have become thrifty and saved money along the way -

1. Pick your credit card wisely. We pay off our balance every month so interest rates hold no real attraction for us but we do like to choose a card that offers us a little extra. Our card comes with points for every pound we spend and then we can exchange these for restaurant, cinema and holiday vouchers. We gain loads of days and meals out in this way.

Our On The Glo Beanie - Fabulous but an Argument Creator!

As a blogger I get offered dozens of review opportunities every day and in the main I have to say no to about 90% of them. There is only so much time in a day and frankly I can't drum up the enthusiasm to wax lyrical about a tin of beans when I have parenting and real work to do.

Family Visit to National Trust Attingham Park, Shropshire #CountryKids

A couple of months ago when we were on holiday in Shropshire we took a visit to Attingham Park. As we are members of the National Trust we always try to visit at least one of their properties wherever we are and our membership has paid for itself dozens of times over. I do love the freedom membership gives us as it means we are happy to go to an NT site for just a few hours, rather than having to take a whole day.

We arrived at Attingham Park about 2pm after a morning in Shrewsbury and we weren't quite sure what the weather would do so we headed straight off to explore the grounds and find the playfield that we had heard was fabulous. After a meander through the glorious walled kitchen garden, past the bothy, through a conservatory and across a small orchard we came to the playfield and no, we were not disappointed.

Guinness World Records Books 2016 - Great Christmas Presents

I mentioned before that all my kids love the Guinness World Records book and there does not seem to be any sign of them growing out of it. JJ is now 12 and the girls 8 and it is as popular as ever.

When the 255 page book arrived at my house a couple of weeks ago there was a scrum to see who would read it first. JJ being the biggest won and it remained in his bedroom for over a week. Each time I popped my head in his room he was buried in the book and told us the girls could not have it yet as he was busy reading and he was no-where near finished. This week I got a bit firm with him and now the girls have it back in their grips. This means the next few weeks of school car journeys will be full of chatter with all the kids I drop off discussing this years records and interesting facts.