Author: Sarah

- Sarah 4 Comments

Review: Lindam Safe & Secure Metal Play Pen

Lindam Play Pen

I’ve mentioned a few times lately that Toby is well and truly on the move. He has been commando crawling for a few weeks now and is really fast when he sees something he wants! This meant that it really wasn’t safe to leave him on his own any more – which was starting to be a problem when I was on my own with him during the day. Unless he was in his highchair or upstairs in his cot I couldn’t even leave him to go to the loo! So, we needed a play pen, and we were delighted when the lovely people at Lindam said they could send us one.

The Details

Lindam make two different play pens; one metal and one fabric. We chose the Safe & Secure Metal Play Pen which has an RRP of £94.49 (It is available for less than this – at the time of writing you can get it from Tesco for £65). The play pen has six panels (one of which has a gate in it) and can be used as either a free standing play pen, which can be rectangular or hexagonal, or attached to the walls and used as a room divider or multi-panel safety gate. The play pen also comes with a padded hexagonal mat with ties into the bottom.

The Pros

  • The play pen was very easy to set up. It was simply a case of clipping the sections together and then tightening up each joint with the allen key which was in the box. It would also be easy to take the play pen down again and it folds up relatively small if you wanted to take it on holiday or store it.
  • The play pen is a great size. It measures 125cm at the widest point and there is plenty of room inside for Toby to have some toys and roll and wriggle around without it taking up the whole of our living room.
  • The included mat is a great addition. It makes it nice and comfy inside the play pen and it is machine washable which is fantastic for us as Toby is in a very dribbly phase at the moment! We’ve hung our other play mat over the side of the play pen as it’s nice and colourful (and also stops Toby playing with the plug socket switches on that wall!)
  • The gate is easy to open and close one handed.
  • The play pen is very sturdy – there’s no danger of Toby pushing it over or moving it.

The Cons

  • The bar at the bottom of the gate comes right up to the frame – we had a little accident (which was more my fault that anything to do with the play pen but I thought it worth mentioning) when I left Toby for a second in the play pen with the gate open. He grabbed the get and managed to trap his thumb between the bottom of the gate and the frame. There was no serious harm done, and I know for future not to leave Toby even for a second with the gate open!
  • This isn’t really a negative but the play pen is quite heavy so if you are putting on carpet and don’t want to leave a big dent I would recommend putting something underneath it. We had some thin foam sheet that we use when we’re camping and we’ve put that underneath.

The Verdict

Lindam Play Pen full view

We absolutely love the Lindam play pen and it has made my life so much easier. Toby seems very happy to stay in the play pen with his toys while I clear up after meals, hang the washing out or do whatever it is I need to get done. I know some babies might not take to being confined by a play pen so I’m glad Toby is happy to stay in this one. Lindam are a brand I know I can trust, the play pen is really well made and I’m confident we’ll get plenty of use out of it in the coming months.

**Disclosure: I was sent a Lindam Safe & Secure Metal Play Pen in return for this review. All opinions are my own.

We're going on an adventure
- Sarah 1 Comment

Munchkin Peek-a-Boo competition

Meal time fun

Munchkin is on the look-out for three new faces to be the 2015 ‘Munchkin Peek-a-Boos’! Munchkin’s motto is ‘It’s the little things’ and they are all about finding the fun in the day to day. We might find bath time or feeding time boring but for our little ones these are moments of fun that happen every day! I know Toby has plenty of fun at mealtimes (when sometimes I wish he would just hurry up and eat!) as you’ve probably noticed from the amount of photos of him in his highchair that end up on this blog!

The Munchkin Peek-a-Boo competition launched on Tuesday 15th April and has three age categories (0-6 months, 6 – 12 months and 12 – 24 months). To enter, all you have to do is submit a photograph of your baby/toddler having fun during bath time or feeding time, along with a five-word caption. Entry is via the Munchkin UK Facebook page and all entries will be put into a ‘Munchkin Peek-a-Boo’ gallery.

There will be one winner and one runner up in each age category and each winner will feature as a ‘Peek-a-Boo’ face within the 2015 Munchkin UK catalogue, marketing materials, packaging and across social media. Winners will also receive a framed version of their favourite photograph from the photo-shoot and a bundle of Munchkin products to take home. Three lucky runners up will also receive a bundle of marvellous Munchkin goodies.

The competition closes on 16th May so head to the Munchkin UK Facebook page to enter!

Munchkin Peek-a-Boo logo

 

**Disclaimer: I was not compensated for this post and Toby is not eligible to enter the competition due to our role on the Munchkin Lindam blogger panel.

- Sarah 4 Comments

Self-catering with a baby in the UK

Self-catering with a baby

We’re going on holiday tomorrow for five nights in a cottage in the Lake District. This will be the first time we’ve taken Toby away and not just gone to stay with one or other sets of grandparents. I am looking forward to it but I don’t think it’ll be the kind of relaxing holiday we were used to pre-baby (especially since Toby seems to be heading back into teething hell today)! Will self-catering with a baby be even more tiring than just staying at home?

Before Toby was born we went on a few cottage holidays in the Lake District. When I was searching for a property a pub within walking distance and a log fire were always top of the list of requirements. This time it was a second bedroom with enough room for a cot and a washing machine! The place we’ve found is not far from Kendal, it’s a barn conversion and it sounds perfect so I’m hoping it lives up to expectations.

We both spent a lot of time in the Lake District when we were growing up, we love it there and go back as often as we can. The reason for this trip though is that Barry’s parents have recently moved to the south Lakes, we’ve not seen their new house yet and they haven’t seen Toby since Christmas so it seemed it was time for a trip. We didn’t want to stay with them as they are still getting the house sorted out and we had some Tesco Clubcard vouchers that got us £100 off our booking so it wasn’t too expensive to stay in the cottage.

We’re looking forward to visiting a few of our favourite places while we’re in the Lakes, and also trying out a few new ones. We’ll definitely be making a visit to The Apple Pie cafe and bakery in Ambleside (which is actually owned by someone my parents know – I’ve been going there since I was tiny) for THE best apple pie ever. The original Lakeland store in Windermere is also high on my list of places we have to go (although Barry isn’t so keen on this one). We’re also hoping to go to the South Lakes Safari Zoo as long as we get some decent weather. I’ve been there once before and thought it was great and I’m hoping Toby is old enough to enjoy looking at some of the animals.

So, we’ve got plenty planned for our five nights away but I’m just hoping that I do manage to get something that at least feels like a holiday. I am a bit worried that it’s just going to be like being at home, with all the cooking, washing and general baby-looking-after that I usually have to do but just more annoying because we haven’t got all the stuff we usually have at home! Whenever we’ve been away previously Toby has slept well in the travel cot so I’m hoping that continues. We’re going to take our Gro Company Gro Anywhere blackout blind with us so we don’t have to worry about light nights and early mornings. I’m a bit worried though that if we disrupt Toby’s nap routine by going out and doing things that he’ll be super-grumpy and won’t sleep well at night. He never sleeps in the buggy any more, there’s too many interesting things to look at (even with the Snoozeshade on), but he does still sleep in the car and usually in the baby carrier so I’m hoping we can still make sure he gets some daytime sleep even if we are out and about. I’m not too worried about feeding – Toby pretty much eats what we eat so if we want to eat out I’m sure we can find something suitable.

The last thing that will make it just the same as home is that I’m planning on using our cloth nappies while we’re away. I know you might think I’m bonkers not to just give myself a break and use disposables but after eight months without a single disposable I don’t think I could do it (although I am considering eco-disposables for our summer camping holiday in France). Plus next week is Real Nappy Week which means I would feel doubly guilty if we didn’t stick with cloth! We’re only away five nights and if I get the timing right I’ll only have to do one nappy wash while we’re away so it really shouldn’t be too bad.

If nothing else it’s week when we’re both going to be around to look after Toby so I should get a bit of a break. And what is it that they say? ‘A change is as good as a rest’. Here’s hoping – and I’m sure I’ll be blogging all about it when we get back.

What do you reckon? Have you ever been on a self-catering holiday in the UK with a baby? Did it feel remotely like a holiday or just the same chores in a different place? Any top tips for making the most out of our time away?

Now I’m off to start my first challenge of the whole escapade – remember to pack everything we need and then try and fit it all in the car!

- Sarah 8 Comments

This time ten years ago…

I was tagged to do this meme by the ever lovely Donna at Redhead Babyled. It’s actually been quite hard to think what I was doing back in 2004…and it’s made me feel old! But anyway, here we go.

Ten years ago… I was a month off being 26 years old. Jeez – 26 and I still felt like a kid! I actually genuinely thought I was 26 for two years and was really confused when I turned 28.

Ten years ago… I had been living in Scotland for about five months after moving here for my job. I had been working on campsites in France for the six years previously (on and off) but had moved to Scotland to work for Canvas Holidays to do recruitment and training. I was originally planning on going back to France for another summer but had just been offered a permanent job in the office so was staying in Scotland for the foreseeable future.

Ten years ago… I was living on my own in a rented flat. My brother had been living with me over the winter but he had just gone back out to France for another summer season.

Ten years ago… I was single – and not particularly happily so. It was all very complicated and messy. I had been going out with a guy I worked with in France. We had split up about 18 months earlier and I thought I was fine about it. He then moved to Scotland to work in the office too and we had a very short rekindling of our relationship. I wanted to get back with him, he didn’t. I was sad. Quite a while after that he started going out with one of our other friends (who was also our boss – told you it was messy!). They are now happily married with two kids and it all worked out fine in the end but it wasn’t an especially happy time for me.

Ten years ago… I had not long got my new car. A lovely wee red Fiesta that I got after my old Vauxhall Nova was stolen (twice!) and written off. I loved that little car!

Ten years ago… I used to go to the pub with my friends (who were also my colleagues – there were five or six of us who had worked in France together who all moved to Scotland at the same time) every Friday night straight from work. Stay there until they kicked us out and then quite often go on to one of out local ‘nite spots’ to dance to Bryan Adams and drink Apple Sourz – all still on our office clothes! Most Saturdays were spent sleeping off a hangover. I would also feel extra rubbish because I was in the process of giving up smoking and although I wouldn’t smoke during the week I would be useless on a night out. Not something I would want to do now but it was fun at the time!

Ten years ago… I was trying to lose weight – as always! Although I seem to remember I was actually fairly happy with my weight at the time. I joined a gym for the first time in my life and enjoyed going to Body Combat and Body Pump classes. I had to do something to offset all the weekend binge drinking!

Ten years ago… I was planning on using the free holiday I got from work to go and visit my brother in the south of France and take two of his friends (who were sort of my friends too) with me.

Ten years ago… I had no real plans for the future. I was happy just to live life as it happened and see where it took me.

Ten years ago… I had absolutely no idea that in ten years time I would still be living in Scotland, that I would be a teacher or that I would be married and have a baby. Or that it would be another six years before I would meet the man who was going to become my husband!

Ten years ago… I didn’t have a digital camera and so I can’t find any photographs at all to share with you! All my printed photos are in a box in the loft so next time I’m up there I’ll have a rummage and see what I can find. The closest I can come up with for now is this one from 2005 which I think was taken for an ID badge at work or something like that! I don’t think I look much different – apart from the long hair.

me colour

And this one which was taken at a wedding in 2006.

2006

 

So that was me ten years ago – what I can remember of it anyway. It’s strange what time can do to your memory isn’t it?

So what were you up to ten years ago? I tag Chantelle at Seychelles Mama, Hannah at Make Do and Push, and Eline at Pasta & Patchwork

 

- Sarah 1 Comment

Happy Birthday Lindam

25-years

 

Before I even had a baby I’d heard of Lindam and knew that they made stair gates and other baby safety products. In fact Lindam have been around for 25 years and are the UK’s number one safety brand. They have won over 90 product awards and sell not only stair gates but also playpens, cupboard and appliance locks, plug socket covers, corner protectors, door bouncers, bed rails and travel accessories.

Now Toby is crawling we really need to make sure our house is safe for him so I was delighted when Lindam sent us a whole box of safety goodies to celebrate their 25th birthday. We’ve not used them all yet but I’m sure they’ll be coming in very useful soon!

Lindam

In the big box of goodies was a Light My Way Night Light – a battery operated night light in the shape of an owl. We are already lucky enough to own one of these lights after we were given one at the Munchkin Lindam blogger event last month so the lovely people at Lindam said it would be OK if I gave our new one away to one of you lucky people. This night light has some great features – I love that it is battery powered (and yes, batteries are included!) so there are no trailing wires to cause any safety concerns. I also like that it turns itself off after 20 minutes so your little one can have it on while they go to sleep but it doesn’t stay on all night.

Lindam Night Light

So if you would like to win this Lindam Light My Way Night Light then simply complete the Rafflecopter below.

UK residents only

Giveaway closes at 12 midnight on 20th May 2014

No alternative prize available

a Rafflecopter giveaway

**Disclaimer: I was sent some safety products from Lindam, however I was not compensated for writing this post and all opinions are my own.

- Sarah 8 Comments

Going self-hosted // A guide to WordPress plugins for the newly self-hosted

A guide to WordPress plugins for the newly self-hosted

OK. Before we start, I am not claiming to be any kind of expert on WordPress, or plugins but I thought it might be helpful to some people if I share what I have learnt since Toby Goes Bananas became self-hosted.

What are plugins?

First things first then – plugins are basically add-ons to WordPress which allow you to add all sorts of features to your blog. If you’ve recently moved from WordPress.com then you might notice a lot of the features you are used to aren’t there any more – for example stats, sharing posts, subscribing by email and some of the widgets. If you’ve come from Blogger then equally some of the features you might expect from your blog don’t come as standard. All these things are still available but you just need to install a plugin to get them on your new self-hosted blog. Installing a plugin is easy – just go to Plugins on your sidebar menu then Add New, search for the plugin you need, install and activate. Easy peasy!

Which plugins do I need?
Jetpack

The first plugin you’ll definitely need is Jetpack – in fact depending on your hosting company this might also come pre-installed. Jetpack basically gives you a lot of the features of your old WordPress.com blog – stats, comments, sharing. I would just install Jetpack to begin with. You can always disable particular parts of it later if you want to use a different plugin.

CommentLuv

Now, there are loads of different options for comments on your blog. The main thing to remember is that if you want people to comment on your blog you need to make it easy for people to comment on your blog. You can use the inbuilt comments in Jetpack which are just like you might have had on your WordPress.com blog and to be honest there isn’t really anything wrong with that. I have chosen to use CommentLuv because it is super simple – it just asks for name, email, URL (if the commenter has one) and the comment. If the commenter enters a URL it then allows them to link to one of their 10 previous posts, which is basically just nice for them! There is no stupid Captcha code to fill in and nothing to put someone off leaving a comment. If you go to Settings/Discussion in your sidebar menu you can choose how you wish to moderate comments – I have mine set up so that if someone has commented on my blog before then any future comments are published immediately. You can also choose options for if you want to receive emails when you get a comment.

Anti-spam

Unless you want to moderate all your comments you need something to catch the spam. I was just using a plugin called Akismet which did a great job of catching all the spam comments but it puts them in a list which you have to manually check if you want to make sure no genuine comments have been filtered out. I had got to a point where I was getting upwards of 50 spam comments every day and it was taking ages to check them all. I then heard about a plugin called Anti-Spam. I don’t quite understand the technicalities of it but it seems most spam comments are automated and don’t come from someone actually visiting your site. Anti-Spam automatically blocks these type of comments. There is still a chance that someone might actually visit your site and leave a spam comment but if you leave Akismet running as well then it should catch these. Since installing Anti-Spam I haven’t had a single spam comment. Speaks for itself really!

Yoast SEO

SEO, if you don’t know, stands for Search Engine Optimisation. If you want to make sure your blog reaches the biggest audience you can then SEO is something you really need to be doing. It is basically about making sure your blog posts (including titles, URLs, images and text) contain ‘focus keywords’. What it is trying to do is make your blog appear near the top of search results. So if, for example, someone searched for ‘Mamas & Papas Sola Review’ (a popular post on my blog) then my post appears at the top of the third page on Google. Which isn’t bad out of 36k results! SEO sounds like it’s complicated but it doesn’t need to be. With the Yoast plugin you simply choose your focus keyword (think about what you would Google if you wanted to find the post) then the plugin analyses your post and gives it either red, amber or green for SEO. If you don’t get green then check the Page Analysis tab and it will tell you what you need to change to improve your post’s SEO. You can also used the plugin to write a new meta description for your post – this is the short description that appears alongside search results. A better description can increase the number of people who actually visit your site after seeing it on a search engine. OK. So it does sound a bit complicated but if you get into the habit of doing it at the same time as writing each post it really does drive more traffic to your blog. And if you really aren’t bothered about that then you don’t need to bother!

Tweet Old Post

This is a really simple plugin that automatically tweets old posts for you. You can set how often it posts (mine just does one a day) and any text you want to include in each tweet. You can also exclude categories or individual posts if you don’t want the plugin to tweet them. I find that every old post that is tweeted gets at least a few views to it all helps.

Updraft Plus

Backing up your blog regularly is really important. You wouldn’t want to lose everything if there was a problem with your site. You can do this manually but it’s easy to forget. This plugin automatically saves a back up copy of everything on your blog. You can choose how often the back up is done and where it saves to. Mine is done weekly and saves to my Dropbox and the plugin only keeps the last two backups to prevent my Dropbox getting full. You can save to all sorts of different cloud storage services, or you can just choose to have the files emailed to you.

Shareaholic

I use this plugin to add sharing buttons on each post – so people can share posts they like on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Pinterest and by email (you can also use Jetpack to do this). I also use Shareaholic to put links to related posts at the bottom of each post. The plugin automatically works out the related posts and you can customise how they appear. Using this feature can encourage people to stay on your site for longer and look at more posts.

jQuery Pin It Button For Images

I use this plugin to put a ‘Pin it’ button on all my blog post images. I use this myself to Pin the images on my own Pinterest boards but it also means anyone visiting the site can easily Pin an image if they want. (I should admit here I still don’t really ‘get’ Pinterest but I know loads of people love it, so I am trying!).

Add Post Footer

If you want something to appear at the bottom of every post without having to manually add it every time you can use this plugin. I use it for my Bloglovin’ badge and I also used it temporarily when I was asking people to nominate me for the MADs.

Phew! That was quite a lot of information so well done if you got through it all! These are just a few plugins that I’ve found useful. There are literally thousands of plugins available so if you think of something that you want to do on your blog then search the plugins and you’re bound to find something!

I hope you’ve found this post useful – if you have any plugins that you use and can’t do without then please do leave me comment and let me know.

You can read my other blog posts about going self-hosted here:

Part 1 – Going self-hosted – Why should I do it?

Part 2 – Going self-hosted – How do I do it?

- Sarah 3 Comments

Living Arrows 16/52

It’s been lovely weather for the last few days up here in Scotland. Barry’s managed to make a great start at getting the garden back under control and so today we decided to put a plastic sheet out on the lawn and have ourselves a little picnic. Toby’s never had a chance to crawl around outside before so after a liberal application of suncream we let him out for a wriggle. He was a little wary at first but then immediately made a beeline for anything we didn’t want him to play with (including the bubble machine – a Christmas present which only made it out of the box today).

I’m loving this age with Toby. He’s such fun to play with – he loves being swung and bounced around and it’s lovely watching him exploring all the new things around him.

16_52

 

16_52 3

 

16_52 2

 

living arrows
- Sarah 9 Comments

Review: Plum Little Yums

Plum Little Yums packaging

After a slightly rocky start with weaning Toby now loves his food and especially likes things he can easily get his hands on and eat by himself. I’m always on the look out for new healthy snacks for him to try so when the opportunity came up to try some of Plum’s new Little Yums we were eager to give them a try.

The Details

Little Yums from Plum are wafers made from buckwheat, fruit and vegetables. They come in two flavours; spinach, apple and kale, and pumpkin and banana. Each box has six packets each containing three wafers. One box retails at around £2.50.

The Pros

  • I like how the wafers come in small packets inside each box – it makes them great for popping in your changing bag for a quick snack when out and about.
  • The wafers were easy for Toby to get hold of (although I had to snap one in half for him to be able to eat it).
  • I like that the wafers are made with all organic ingredients with no added salt or sugar.
  • The wafers made very little mess when Toby was eating them – there were very few crumbs or bits falling off. Also there aren’t any strong colours so he didn’t end up with a orange face as can happen after some snacks!

The Cons

  • The wafers were quite big so I had to snap them in half for Toby to eat them – it might be easier if they were more finger shaped.
  • The wafers don’t have a very strong flavour so if your baby is used to normal adult food (as Toby is) then they might not be that keen on them.
  • I thought the flavour combinations were a bit odd – I wouldn’t eat spinach, kale and apple so I don’t know why I would want to give that to my baby.

The Verdict

Plum Little Yums taste test

Well. Toby did eat a couple of the wafers but he really didn’t seem to like them very much. However, I know that this is just a matter of taste so in the interests of writing an honest review I also gave my friend Claire some Little Yums for her to try with her six month old twins who are just starting weaning – and by all accounts they went down very well. Claire liked the fact the wafers dissolved in the mouth and thought this made it easier for young babies to swallow. So overall I would say the Plum Little Yums are a handy snack product but perhaps more suited to younger babies, or babies who don’t like strong tasting food.

**Disclosure: I was sent two boxes of Plum Little Yums in return for this review. All opinions are my own.

We're going on an adventure