Visiting @Bristol, At Bristol!

'At Bristol' is a great city centre science museum perfect for a family day out. We spent the later part of an afternoon here recently and thought we'd share with you what we thought!

The museum is over 2 floors and is well spaced to allow easy access for prams and wheelchairs. The exhibits are all hands-on; so much in that it was difficult to decide where to start! When you buy your tickets, you receive a wristband which you can scan on various exhibits as you go along and then by visiting the 'At Bristol' website from home, you can download your results and 'experimental findings'!

Our favourite part of the museum that we saw was the human body area. There's lots of different experiments to take part in - everything from hearing and smell to bones, muscles and energy!

There's also motion and physics displays showing how pulleys work and problem-solving, for example transferring kinetic energy to light energy. I've always loved science and my children seem to be taking after me in that way! They were really interested in everything that we saw and we will definitely return to see the remaining exhibits that we didn't have time to explore.

My daughter especially liked reading the weather forecast using the auto cue and 'blue screen'. There are also different activities at various times throughout the year - live Science shows and 'Spring Alive' are running at the moment so keep an eye on their website for up to date information.

Just one tip - we arrived late on in the afternoon and purchased a late entry ticket (available 1 hour and a half before closing) - this didn't give us enough time to see EVERYTHING but saved us about £8 per adult and £5 per child (approx. £34 for our family!) so I'd recommend either arriving as early as you can to see everything in one go or if you only have a short amount of time to spare, arrive 1 1/2 hours before they close. There's no mention of this discount anywhere that we could see in the reception/booking area so make sure you ask!

Also, if you Gift Aid your tickets, you receive vouchers to spend in the gift shop - a win/win situation! There are lots of different things to choose from, ranging from pencils and rulers up to larger items and toys/science kits. 

Overall, this was a great afternoon out in a great part of Bristol - why not visit if you're in the area? You'll be amazed at what you will learn!

You can keep in touch with them via Facebook here or Twitter here for regular updates and fun!

Our visit to the National Trust Property Tyntesfield, Bristol

To start our half term fun, we took a trip down to Bristol to stay with my family for a couple of nights. After a long drive we finally arrived ready to have some fun!

We took the opportunity to visit Tyntesfield, the National Trust property near Bristol. Tyntesfield is a spectacular Victorian gothic revival house with large gardens and parkland. There's plenty of room to explore outdoors; we especially liked the kitchen gardens where we could show the children the veg plots and herb gardens which are still in use today.

During the school holidays, they have activities on for the children - we took part in the Fab Feb Finding Challenge which was simple enough to complete but not too easy that it was boring!

Whilst at Tyntesfield, you can also explore the house and chapel. Although there are plenty of things to look at but not touch(!), there are children's boxes strategically placed around the house. Children are openly invited to explore these activity boxes - some contain dressing up costumes, games and traditional Victorian toys amongst other exciting child-friendly things! This kept our children occupied for the most part... although my youngest (6yo) did exclaim rather loudly, "Does this house EVER end?!?!"

The volunteer staff were very knowledgeable and enthusiastic, even talking to the children as well as the adults in our group which gave them smiles all round! They were ready to answer any questions - silly or not!

My favourite part of the house was the kitchen (of course!). It's still used today in mostly an original state, with the addition of a new electric cooker and dishwasher!

Here are some photos from our day:

One point just be to aware of, the house wasn't fully open when we went and so didn't get to see as much as we could have done. The reason was that it was early in the year and everything would be fully open from Easter time. My only gripe was that this isn't noted anywhere until you have already paid (full price) and have made your way down to the house. With the children, just the downstairs of the house was probably enough, but I still would have liked to have seen the upstairs!

We have fondly renamed Tyntesfield as 'Tinsle-field' as my children much preferred this name! We have planned to return at Christmas time, just to check out the presence of tinsel!

Have a look at the webpage here to check out the prices and events throughout the year. It's well worth a visit but just make a quick phone call first to make sure everything's open!

Twinkl Half Term Activities - How did we do?!?

Well, we had great fun this week - a couple of days out in Bristol (Tyntesfield & At Bristol) and one a bit closer to home (Danger Point) along with plenty of activities indoors too!

We used the 'Weekend Activities' decision mat to help us to decide what to do through the week... my children closed their eyes and pointed randomly on the decision mat. We covered going to the countryside, sleepover, visiting a museum, writing, drawing and cooking!

The mat was really useful to stop any arguments about what to do - you can find the 'Weekend Activities' mat here. There are other words mats available to print too; why not have a browse and use them yourself?

 

My youngest really enjoyed making the Astronaut from the Twinkl website (link to instructions here) - he managed to complete it himself with just a little bit of help piercing the holes for the split pins. Actually, he wanted to (and was pretty sure that he could!) do this himself but it was me who decided the 'piercing job' was mine to do!

To get a bit of reading/writing/drawing into our half terms days, we used the 'At Home I See...' writing frames. These are ideal to use for any theme and for any age. We used each room as a theme but you could ask your children to find things that are blue, or begin with a certain letter - the scope for this activity is endless!

Lastly, we had great fun with the Science Sparks experiment sheets. I have to admit, I love the science of how things work and why but it's often difficult to explain to a child. With these experiments, you can actually SEE the science and so my children were fascinated by the experiments, so we felt that these worksheets were really engaging.Pictures to follow as we had a bit of a glitch with the camera!

There are plenty of other great ideas on the Twinkl website - make sure you explore the site and start planning your Easter break!

Nestle Cheerios "Grab 2 Go" Packs Review

We were sent a new concept in Cheerios products - "Grab 2 Go" packs are portion sized bags of delicious Cheerios perfect for packed lunches (school and work!), picnics and also for a quick snack on the go at any time of the day!  Living "out in the sticks" any journey is quite often a long one... our nearest "big" shops are an hour and a half away so these are great as a snack in the car for the kids (and me!).  They would also be good to pop into an overnight case for a quick trip away; better than carrying a normal-sized cereal box around with you!

They come in a multipack of 5 - the magic number for packed lunches... 5 school/work days = 5 packets in a multipack, perfect!  As more and more schools (quite rightly!) are promoting healthy lunchboxes, these are an ideal snack to replace sweeties and savoury snacks much higher in fat than Cheerios.  And, of course, they carry the usual wholegrain guarantee that Cheerios are proud of!  The 25g packs are just the right size for a snack.

The new packaging certainly does solve the problem of a trail of Cheerios where my son has sneaked a handful from the packet and is wandering around munching them one by one!  It's like a scene from "Hansel and Gretel"... at least I can always find him!

To keep up to date with new Cheerios products and news about existing products, pop over to the Cheerios UK Facebook page and say "Hello!".