Sea Band Giveaway

This competition is now closed. Please keep checking back for more great giveaways!

Sea-Band acupressure wristbands have been providing nausea relief to millions of people for over 20 years. They work fast and effectively for all types of nausea including travel and morning sickness. 

·         Sea-Bands work using the principles of Acupressure.

·         Sea-Bands are non invasive and drug free.

·         The plastic stud on Sea-Bands applies a continuous pressure on each wrist relieving the feeling of nausea.

·         Sea-Bands can be used for Motion Sickness, Morning Sickness (Pregnancy Nausea and Vomiting), Chemotherapy related Nausea and Post-Operative Nausea.

I was sent some sea bands to try out as both Chick and I get a little travel sick and I must admit that at first I was a little sceptical, but they really do work!!!  I’ve worn them on a couple of trips as a passenger and it was so nice not to be nauseous in the car. I really wish that I would’ve known about them years ago when I was pregnant as I was sick for six months!

Mine came in a lovely shade of grey but there are different coloured choices if you should be fussy about the colour! Chick was also less impressed with her camouflage set but the kids version also come in Pink or Blue.

I have two pairs of Sea Bands to give away one for adults and one for children. Just leave me a comment here telling me which pair you’d like and why. You don’t have to follow my blog or me on Facebook but if you would like too then that would be lovely J


Closing date is Friday, 5^th November at 5pm.


Sea Bands are available to buy from Tesco, Waitrose, Sainsburys and Lloyds Pharmacy in the UK and retail at £7.99 


In the US they are available at Walmart, CVS, Walgreens and RiteAid.

Magic Fabric Creation Studio

Description: Use this great Creation Studio to make six magical puffy characters, a gift card and a picture frame.

 Create your own design on the plates, wind it through the Creation Studio and wow! Your very own puffy characters from flat to a 3D in a flash.

Decorate your characters with the eyelets and danglers to bring them to life, then hang them off your bag, pencil case and more!

Recipe

Step 1: Take one character design

Step 2: Layer and add the foam centrepiece:

Step 3: Add top layer and features to your character:

Step 4: Line up plates and insert into machine:

Step 5: Your character is now ready:

Repeat steps 1-4 to make the other characters:

For additional cuteness send them to everyone you know as presents and then drive your Mum crazy until she buys you the refill sets ;-)

Available from Toys R Us at £24.99

Reviewed as part of the Toys R Us Toyologist Programme.

Disgusting Science

This set was so cool that we had to make two videos of the various experiments:

Disclaimer - This is actually quite disgusting so probably best not to watch it whilst eating!!!!

We had so much fun with this and we all give it a huge thumbs up. The only downside (which probably won't apply to most people!!) is that you need a microwave for most of the experiments and our holiday cottage didn't have one and I'm guessing some other people may not so you may need to take that into account!

Available from Toys R Us and costs £12.99.

Blendy Pens - Review

For this review I thought I'd pinch the idea of a slideshow from the lovely Glenda over at Precious Memories as she did it so well with her amazing 'Magic Science' review!!!

As you can see from the pictures we all had a turn with the blendy pens, me included! Chick and the Punk thought they were great fun and we've already used all the pictures that were included. To make different colours you jut choose two pens, click them together, twist the pens for 5 seconds, let the mixing chamber work its magic and hey presto you are done!

The pictures that were included are great in the fact that as you colour them in, different shapes and patterns appear and add to the general awesomeness of the colouring! The downside of the pictures is that the girls didn't want to colour the train and the planes as 'they are for boys'! Instead they argued over the animal pictures!!!

The girls both give them a 10 out of 10 and 'lurve them'.

I'd give them a 9 out of 10. They kept the kids amused for a long time, with only a point deducted for the generic pictures themselves! At £9.99 I think they are good value for money and I would definitely buy them for Chick or as a present for her friends.

Follow Toys R Us on Facebook for news  of competitions and all the other Toyologist reviews

Fur Real Friends - Furry Frenzies Review

Furry Frenzies - Flurry in a Hurry

Chick gives this a 10 out of 10 and a big thumbs up!

I'd give it 9 out of 10 with bonus points for working on the carpet and managing to do wheelies!!! I feel that it's pretty good value for money. The only downside being that Chick would like the Scoot & Scurry City Playset to go with it ;-)

Available from Toys R Us for £7.99. You can follow them on Facebook for news and giveaways as well as all the other reviews.

Silver Spoon Cakecraft - Scary Halloween Cupcakes

The lovely people from Silver Spoon sent me these to review and use for decorating some scary Halloween cupcakes:

I mentioned a few weeks ago over on Adventures of an English Mum that I am trying to cook and bake with Chick so this lot came in very handy. The cupcakes were a pretty straightforward recipe that you can find here along with some fabulous ideas for decorations. The decorating was absolutely the most fun!!! We made some lovely coloured icing:

The black was my favourite and I'm very tempted to make a huge black spider cake just because I can!!! Obviously mine aren't quite as good as the beautifully prepared ones over at Silver Spoon and I won't be giving up the day job any time soon but ours worked out pretty well:

We made a devil and a monster:

Also a gravestone:

The one that I was most impressed with was this Spider web:

At this point Chick went off to eat them all and I was left with this:

Was a brilliant way to spend an afternoon with the kids though! 

The Silver Spoon range is available from the baking aisles at Morrisons, Sainsburys, Tesco and Asda. Prices start from 52p for the food colouring. Check out the Silver Spoon website for more details on the range of goodies and some yummy recipes!

Winner of Toyologist Giveaway Carnival.....

.......was comment number 16 from Monkeying Around!!

If you could e-mail me at adventuresofanenglishmum@gmail.com with your address and I'll get it sent to you as soon as possible.  Thanks to everyone who entered!

Littlest Pet Shop Vehicle - Review

As you can see from the video, Chick absolutely loved this and gave it a 10 out of 10!

What I liked about it: First and foremost it was easy to get out of the box! Surprisingly it was attached by paper ties which were super easy to undo and can also be recycled! No more ridiculous plastic/metal ties and other manufacturers should definitely take note! Massive brownie points from me!!!

It's made of sturdy plastic and having been dropped a couple of times already is still in one piece! It's also bright and colourful and just what I imagine most 7 year olds would adore! Chick has played with it most of the afternoon and it's been left out for tomorrow!!

The downside: The only thing I can come up with is that the set only comes with one pet. There is room for five more and these are replaced by cardboard cut outs in the box! Now, sensible folk may have noticed this previously but we can't all be sensible and therefore I did not notice!!

This gets a definite thumbs up from our household and retails at £19.99 although it's currently on sale on the Toys R Us website!!

Barbie Glitterizer Wardrobe

In our last fantastic Toys R Us box we got this:

This Barbie Glitterizer Wardrobe is ideal for budding fashionistas! From the new movie, Barbie A Fashion Fairytale, this fabulous playset adds glitter and sparkle to your doll’s outfits, accessories and your own personal items in 3 simple steps! Basically you put stickers onto the clothes etc, put them in the Glitterizer and hey presto they come out all sparkly!!!


In the set there is the wardrobe, a Barbie, a couple of outfits, stickers and of course lots of lovely  glitter that Chick and I will inevitably end up covered in!!!

This isn't a 'proper' review as I really want Chick's input on this one but she hasn't seen it yet! The reason I mention it now is because I think this is going to be one of the top toys for Christmas, well Chick certainly had it on her list and currently Toys R Us have £10 off so it's now £39.99!!!!  I'm not sure how long for the offer will last for but I would get it now whilst they still have them!!!

A proper review to follow I promise!!!

Toyologist Competition Carnival

This competition is now closed. Please keep checking back for more great giveaways!

Woo Hoo!!!! I t's my turn for the giveaway on the Competition Carnival today. The prize that I have for you is a Mould & Paint Glitter Fairy kit:

The set comes with 6 fairy moulds, magnets, pins, glitter, paint and enough powder plaster to make six fairies. Chick would have loved to have kept this but seeing as we only just made the Cute Cupcakes I managed to persuade her to give it up!! She did say that she liked the fact that the Fairies had their own names and that it came in a very girly box!

The Fairies can be made into fridge magnets or badges and this is definitely the kind of thing that I would buy Chick or her friends for a present and at £7.99 it's a good buy. It would also be a great activity for a small birthday party or sleepover.

To enter all you need to do if follow Toys R Us on Facebook and then leave me a comment saying that's what you've done.  It would also be fabulous if you are the winner if you could write a very short review for me!!! If you aren't on Facebook then feel free to follow me here instead!

Closing date is Friday, 15th October at 5pm and I'm happy to send these lovely Fairies anywhere in the world!

The next giveaway is tomorrow over at http://perfectlyhappymum.com/ so make sure to visit and enter her giveaway too!!! I have posted the full list of giveaway dates but click here to see it again or there is a link at the top of the blog so that you can keep checking back.

Lansinoh Winner

A huge thank you to everyone who entered the competition and to those that RT'd on Twitter. The winner is:

Comment number 8 was @pollypodders. Please e-mail me your address and I'll get them sent out to you as soon as possible.  New giveaway will run from tomorrow so be sure to stop by and have a look!!!

Lara Doll - Review

Chick has been dying to open this ever since we got our first Toyologist box in August.  It's taken her six weeks but the bedroom is finally tidy so she's been allowed to open it.  This is her thoughts:

So what do I think? Well Chick has quite a thing for scary dolls so I'm not surprised that she really liked it and the horse riding theme really added to the novelty. It comes with a story book CD which is quite cool but I don't know if she'd listen to it for more than one day!

Chick already has lots of dolls and clothes and the house is almost overrun with baby stuff for them.  We also tend to trek them to the park, supermarket etc with us! Lara is smaller than the other dolls that we have and I think a little pricey at £29.99, although I could be persuaded to buy it for a birthday or Christmas present. A good thing about Lara is that she fits into Baby Annabel's clothes so Chick can share between the two.

Something that was a bit odd however is that Lara has two left feet!!!!!  I was initially amused when Chick first pointed it out but if that had happened on Christmas morning and I'd paid the £29.99 for it, I probably wouldn't have giggled so much!!!  I know that Toys R Us would have happily given me a replacement and on the plus side we have a completely unique Lara so that's quite cool!!

Lara and her friends Emma and Kim are available to buy from Toys R Us at £29.99.  'Like' Toys R Us on Facebook to see all the other reviews as well as updates and competitions

Say it with Celebrations

I get almost daily e-mails asking me if I'd like to review a whole manner of stuff so imagine my excitement a couple of weeks ago when I opened one asking me if I'd like to review a brand new online chocolate ordering service! Well I obviously thought about it for 0.000001 seconds before replying yes as I am a complete chocoholic!

So the deal is that Mars Celebrations have launched a new service called 'Say it with Celebrations' where you can send your own personalised Celebrations giftbox. It's a very simple thing to do.  Basically you log on to http://www.sayitwithcelebrations.co.uk upload a picture and your message, decide which size giftbox you would like to order and send it!  That's it!!  What a fab idea.  

To be honest I was expecting just a box of chocolates to be delivered to me but I got my very own personalised giftbox! Which I very kindly (I thought!!!) shared with my lovely Ladies at work hence the reason there's only a few left:

My only criticism would be that there just isn't enough chocolate but that may well just be me being greedy ;-)

To launch the website Celebrations are offering all my readers a 2 for 1 promotion. Just enter the promotional code 'ADVENTURES' at the checkout before the 25th October to qualify and enjoy!!!!

Toys R Us - Competition Carnival

This month the Toys R Us Toyologists have brought you something a bit special.  We're all a little overwhelmed with the number of toys we've been sent and our children are worn out testing and reviewing them.  If you're wondering what to get your children for Christmas, keep an eye on the Toys R Us Facebook page, which carries links to all the reviews we've been doing. 

Lots of the Toyologists have been doing some fantastic giveaways on their site, so we thought we'd all get together and bring you The Great Toyologist Competition Carnival!  Throughout October we will be bringing you not one, not two, but EIGHTEEN different giveaways.  There are some really fabulous prizes on offer, so keep your eye on the schedule and enter as many as you like.  Each of the competitions will provide a link to the next one, so you can easily keep your eyes on the prize.

The Competition Carnival started today, with the first giveaway offered over at Notes from Inside my Head.  It's a fantastic prize, so I wish you the very best of luck.  I'd enter myself, but I'm not really short of toys at the moment...   

Competition Carnival Calendar

Tuesday 5th October          Notes Inside my Head

Thursday 7th October         All about the boys

Friday 8th October             Emmaand3 - reviews

Saturday 9th October         Adventures of an English Mum

Sunday 10th October         Perfectly Happy Mum

Monday 11th October        Not Supermum

Wednesday 13th October   Precious Memories

Thursday 14th October       New Mummy's Tips

Saturday 16th October       Carrots and Kids

Monday 18th October        The Five Fs Blog

Tuesday 19th October        Glowstars Reviews

Friday 22nd October          Sarah Cookson

Sunday 24th October         A Modern Military Mother

Tuesday 26th October       More Than Just a Mother

Thursday 28th October      Flower Fairies and Fairy Cakes

Saturday 30th October       The Babbling Mummy

Sunday 31st October         A Mother's Ramblings

Tuesday 2nd November     Are we nearly there yet, Mummy?

I totally stole this entire post from the gorgeous and lovely Emily over at More Than Just a Mother.  I did however have her permission!!!

Pass the Bomb Review

Chick and I love playing games together, although I must admit to not being great at playing make believe (mainly because I'm completely lazy) but I am a massive fan of board games. Once a month on a Sunday afternoon we make the effort to turn off the TV and the laptop and Chick and I have a games afternoon. We have rather a limited choice and only have about 6 cards left in our favourite 'Guess Who' game so I've been praying that Toys R Us would send us lots of games to play together and they didn't disappoint us!

We've previously borrowed Pass the Bomb which Chick loved mainly because of the ticking bomb but it was too grown up for her at the time and she couldn't put the words together quickly enough.  This version is perfect for her age because it comes with picture cards and not parts of words. The aim of the game is to look at the picture and say a word relating to it so that your opponent can guess what's on the card before the bomb goes off. For instance if the picture is the beach then you could say sand. I guess it's a bit like charades but with words not actions!

I would love to say that we play the game oh so nicely between the two of us but erm......someone inherited my competitive streak and so there is lots of discussion about what constitutes cheating and whether or not the word actually relates to the cards!!!  You have to be quick though because if you are holding a card when the bomb goes off you get to keep it. The player with the most cards at the end of the game is the loser!!!

I have to say that I love the time we spend together like this, arguing and all! It reminds me of some lovely nights spent with my American family....can't wait to get out there again next summer.....we may even take this with us! (Not that my lovely Americans cheat!!!)

It's probably apparent from what I've written so far but we both love this!  I like the colourful cards and the ease of playing together with it.  Not so keen on the noise of the ticking bomb but that's a hazard of kids toys unfortunately! This was already on the birthday list and I'd be more than happy to part with £12.99 for it! We were also lucky enough to get a huge battery supply from Phillips....very handing for all the ticking!!!!

Chick says: This is a very fun game.  The best part is beating Mummy! (Mummy says hmmmmmm ;-)

Available from Toys R Us.  You can also 'like' Toys R Us on Facebook for more reviews and some fabulous giveaways! During October and November we are holding a giveaway carnival.  Click here  for more details.

Lansinoh Giveaway

This giveaway is now closed. Look out for another one coming this way very soon!!!

Sometimes when PR folk contact you they obviously haven't read your blog ever so well and offer you products that blatantly aren't any good for you! It was with some relief that the people from Lansinoh obviously had read my blog and recognised that breastfeeding products are no longer any use to me but they offered to send me some of their products for anyone that I knew that could use them or for you my lovely readers. I know that some of you are pregnant or are still feeding babies so this one is for you. 

Lansinoh have given me three products to giveaway. The first one is the breast milk storage bags. Easy to use, Lansinoh Breastmilk Storage Bags are made of food safe polyethylene and have a double seal to make storing milk simple.  They are also freezer safe and come with a useful tab for writing on, which lets you make a note of the date and volume of milk in each bag.

Also the Lansinoh nipple cream, which I'm sure most of us needed during the time we were nursing due to sore and cracked nipples!!  This cream has been specially developed to help with the healing process, is completely hypoallergenic and is great for those that suffer from sensitive skin. It is also the only lanolin to be approved by the British Allergy Foundation.

Last but not least are the disposable breast pads.  The Company say:

Let’s face it - every woman wants to feel their best and after you’ve had your baby it’s important to make sure you’re as confident as possible. If you are worried about leaking breastmilk, Lansinoh Disposable Nursing Pads take any moisture away from your breasts and prevent it from showing through onto your clothing.   

The ultra thin, super absorbent contour of the pads allows for a natural fit that doesn’t show under tops and dresses. The pads have two non slip adhesive strips to secure them in place, giving you peace of mind that you will remain dry throughout the day or night. 

The breast milk storage bags cost around £4.95 for 25 or £8.99 for 50. 

The Lanolin cream is £9.95

The breast pads are £2.49 for 24 or £5.49 for 60

Visit the website at http://www.lansinoh.co.uk for local stockists which include Sainsburys, Boots, John Lewis and selected pharmacists.  Also available in the USA.

So if you or anyone you know would like to win all three then you just need to leave a comment below.  Would be great if you would like to follow me here, over at my main blog or on Facebook but I won’t make it compulsory this week!! The winner will also need to be happy for the PR company to contact them to see how they are getting on with the products.

Closing date is Friday, 8^th October at 5pm.  Good Luck!!!

*Competition only open to UK residents....sorry!