The last few months have been a really stressful time for us - we've been having a huge renovation project at our house, so we've moved across the county from Surrey to Berkshire, to live with my parents. I'm eternally grateful that they've put us all up, but as someone who is a huge homebird, it's been difficult not to have that space that you feel is your home. But it has encouraged me to explore new places, and one of those has been The Lexicon in Bracknell. We were invited to Bill's restaurant last week, to try out their spring menu, and I took along Ben and my friend Laura (Dear Bear and Beany). I love Bill's - it's somewhere ...
Reclaiming A Touch of Me Time {with Lyons Coffee} | AD
If I think back to my pre-children life, I always find it's the little things that I miss most. Curling up with a good book, taking a long bubble bath, or enjoying a hot cup of good coffee. I guess you'd call me a coffee snob really - I don't like instant coffee, and we grind our own beans each morning for a proper cup of coffee to start the day. When we lived in London, part of our weekend routine was to head to Monmouth Coffee at Borough Market and get a flat white and buy our beans for the week. How different life was back then! These days, once my day gets going, with two children to run around ...
What to do when your baby doesn’t sleep… Drink Coffee!
If you know me in real life, or if you're a regular reader, you'll know that our household is sorely lacking in the sleep department. For the last 11 months, the youngest member of our family has taken it upon himself to give us regular wakeups throughout the night, and it's left us feeling more than a little zombie-like. Pretty much the only thing that is getting me through the days is coffee. I'm not even functional until that first cup of dark liquid touches my throat, and I require regular top-ups throughout the day. When you go through that much coffee on a daily basis, a coffee subscription service is the way to go, so when The Roast Club ...
Guilt Free Snacking with Heavenly Tasty Organics
I don't know about you, but there's one food that my fussy eating 3 year old loves, and that's snacks. It doesn't seem to matter what it is - call it a snack, and he's won round! So when the lovely folk at Heavenly Tasty Organics got in touch to see if we'd like to try out their range, I was pretty quick to say yes. The range was developed by mum Shauna McCarney-Blair, with the aim to create healthy snack options for young children and babies. The range is entirely free from artificial colours of flavours, and has no added sugar or salt. It's also perfect for little ones who have food allergies, as they're all gluten free and ...
Our Weaning Journey, with Obstacles Along the Way
Weaning was one of my favourite baby stages with Max. I loved the exploration, watching his little face light up as he tried new flavours, and seeing his mouth wide open, like a baby bird, waiting for you to spoon in his favourite food. I had my first inkling that weaning with Ben might not be that easy when we were advised to try early weaning to help with his reflux, but he didn't even seem to remotely understand the concept of food, and either refused to open his mouth, or gagged on whatever we gave him. We had two very tentative attempts before 6 months, both of which were resounding failures, so I abandoned the idea of early weaning ...
Filling the House with the Scent of Christmas
I'm not much of a cook, but I do love cooking at Christmas - there's something about all the fragrance of all those festive spices wafting through the house and making it smell delightful. Last year Max and I made gingerbread men, and it was really lovely. I was still feeling absolutely awful from the pregnancy sickness, but I was so proud that we managed to bake them together, and it was something that both Max and I were determined to do again this year. But oh my goodness, baking with a 3 year old is a new experience altogether! Last year he was perfectly happy to be involved but was content with me doing the bits he couldn't. This year ...
A Guilt Free G&T with the Pizza Express Autumn Menu
Would you miss alcohol if you gave up drinking? When I was pregnant, I tried quite a few non-alcoholic cocktails but there was only one that I felt really worked. Most were overly sweet and just didn't have that refreshing taste that I look for in a drink. And a lemonade or an orange juice lacks the glamour of a wine glass or a cocktail glass - especially when they get served up in a pint glass! I was kindly invited to an evening with Pizza Express and Seedlip Drinks, whose Garden 108 non-alcoholic spirit is one of the new additions on the Pizza Express autumn menu. Seedlip are the world's first distilled non-alcoholic spirits and the Garden 108 is a ...
How to Host the Perfect BBQ - Part Two
Welcome to the second part of my BBQ 'series'! This post is going to focus on the food and drink itself and I'm going to leave you in the capable hands of my husband, John, to talk you through his most recent discovery for the BBQ - brick chicken - before I take the reins back to talk about side dishes and drinks (we stick to fairly traditional gender roles for our BBQs!). John is an engineer by trade, and every so often, he chooses a particular thing to try to perfect and this year it's been this recipe, which is all kinds of amazing. It's like a roast chicken, but so, so moist, and just packed full of flavour. Brick ...
How to Host the Perfect BBQ - Part One
There's nothing we like better in our house once summer rolls around than getting the BBQ out. I swear I have an in-built BBQ sense and my nostrils can pick up any BBQ within a 10 mile radius! Over the years we've hosted so many and there are a few things that I feel can really give your BBQ that extra touch. I'm splitting this into two posts - the first focusing on styling your BBQ, and the second post focusing on some of our favourite food and drinks to serve at a BBQ. Drinks & Glassware If you're anything like me, your cupboard is full of mismatched glasswear - we seem to have numerous 'lone' glasses where we've broken 5 out ...
A Birthday Celebration with Baker Days
Last weekend my little guy turned two and I can't believe where the time has gone! It seems simultaneously like he's been in our lives forever, but also like it was only yesterday when we bought him home from the hospital. And a key feature of any birthday celebration for me is cake, and lots of it, so when the lovely people at Baker Days got in touch to ask if I'd like to receive one of their Letterbox cakes* to celebrate Max's 2nd Birthday I was delighted! I love the concept of receiving unexpected things through the letterbox - letterbox flowers have taken off recently, and cakes are the latest thing to go letterbox sized. We all know the hassle of ...
