Learning ~ Richard Bach #wednesdaywords

Learning is finding out what you already know.

 

Doing is demonstrating that you know it.

 

Teaching is reminding others that they know it just as well as you.

 

You are all learners, doers and teachers.

Richard Bach

 

 



Perfecting a Roast Dinner with Scrumptious Side Dishes!

We love a roast dinner on a Sunday but often cook the same vegetable dishes time after time. So I've been on a mission to find tasty but simple alternatives... here's the first one!

Roasted Root Veg with Parmesan - serves 4
Preheat the oven to 200C/Gas 6. In a roasting dish put 1 swede and 2 potatoes, all peeled and cubed, and 2 carrots, peeled and roughly chopped. Sprinkle over 50g Parmesan (or Cheddar if you prefer), grated, 2 tbsp. fresh thyme or 1 tsp dried thyme and 2 tbsp. olive oil. Roast for 45-50 mins, stirring occasionally, until crisp and golden.

Source: The Co-Operative instore magazine.

The Smile ~ Mother Teresa #wednesdaywords

"Smile at each other, smile at your wife, smile at your husband, smile at your children, smile at each other - it doesn't matter who it is - and that will help you to grow up in greater love for each other."

 

Mother Teresa

 

 

Win a family ticket to The Sooty Show at Rhyl Pavillion!

'The Sooty Show' is a long standing family entertainment show - I do remember it from my childhood and if I remember correctly, I had the set of puppets and a Sooty Magic Set! I also thought that Sooty had melted away into the middle distance along with Thundercats and Button Moon but I was wrong!

Thanks to 'Ask The Usher', here's an opportunity for you and your family to win tickets to see The Sooty Show at Rhyl Pavillion on April 13th. It will be afternoon of fun for both adults and children - those of a certain age will enjoy the nostalgia whereas the younger ones will giggle away to the antics the trio get up to!

Enter via the Rafflcopter below... and good luck!

  a Rafflecopter giveaway

A box full of fun! Weekend Box Club Review

The Weekend Box Club is a company who provides letter-box sized activity boxes delivered fortnightly to your door packed full of activities to last you over the weekend. Now, we always hope for lovely, dry weekends filled with sunshine and long walks on the beach... but that isn't a guarantee in the UK! These activities are ideal to give you new ideas and how to be a good 'finder-outer' when it comes to child-friendly science tasks. The boxes are aimed at ages 4-6 years and contain 4 different activities; something to cook, something to make, something to explore and something green.

 

 

 

We were lucky enough to receive a Weekend Box to review - so here's what we thought!

 

 

 

The content looks great, with clearly colour coded activity packs and instruction sheets along with almost everything that you need for each activity. The handy sticker sheet helps you to see which activities you have completed - all kids love stickers, right? The larger poster also helps you to track how many boxes you have received and completed, with a free gift in store when you have completed 6 packs.

 

Pot O' Gold

My son loved making this little game and enjoyed playing it with his older sister. After getting the hang of the force required to flick the coins and a few coin-chasing and coin-ducking moments, he soon became an expert!

Rocking Spring Bird

Craft activities are always a winner in many homes and this one was no exception. Everything you need is contained within the pack (except for scissors and a plate to draw around!) - even the glue stick was included! The kept my son happy and he was able to complete the full activity alone, with just a bit of supervision with the scissors! He's decided to make more of these birds to place on the table over Easter as place-markers for our family Easter dinner.

 

 

 

Green Pancakes

My son loves to cook - not just cakes and biscuits, but savoury foods as well. He was really looking forward to making these pancakes. The spice mixes are included in the pack and the rest of the ingredients are basic store cupboard items so most households would have them in anyway.

He wanted to make the recipe himself, so with just me to overlook what he was doing, off he went. He collected the ingredients and read (with a little help) what to do. Now, I can cook and can definitely follow any recipe I am given, but this recipe for green pancakes just did not work for us. There was no mention of chopping the spinach (which we ended up doing as there was no way that it was going to work otherwise!) and the finished mixture was definitely not something that you could ladle into a pan and fry like a pancake. We did persevere and cooked a little in the pan; the taste was nice but was more like fried spinach leaves than a pancake!

 

 

We then tried to analyse what we *thought* was wrong, so we added some milk as non-green/normal pancakes use milk... this resulted in a slightly better pancake but I'm sure something was still wrong! So overall, we were disappointed with the recipe but enjoyed the kitchen experiments we ended up doing instead!

 

Sound Explorers

This activity sheet taught us how sounds travel and helped us to use our other senses (touch and sight) to hear sounds. The link to the YouTube video for the alien-voice maker was definitely a hit and we had an afternoon of funny voices all round! Everything was included in the kit and the fun lasted longer than I'd have expected from straws and a balloon!

 

Overall, the Weekend Box Club is a great idea and great fun - just on this occasion we didn't seem to make a good go of the recipe activity. I'd still recommend the box to other families, so why not give it a try? Using this unique promo code (KATIE94) you can try your first box free - redeem here.

 

You can see what other families have been getting up to on their Facebook page here or via Twitter here. Pop over and give them a 'like' - they really are lovely people!

 

 

 

 



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!

Magic Memories - Canvasdesign Review & Competition!

They say a picture tells a thousand words and so does a canvas print! Canvas prints have grown in popularity over the past few years, with almost every household owning at least one showing off beautiful scenery or a lovely family member.

Canvasdesign are a company who specialize in canvas printing with prints available from just 6 inches square up to 40 inches square - the choice is yours! We had the opportunity to receive a canvas print from Canvasdesign to share our opinions with you and pass on a great discount code.... as well as giving one of you the opportunity to win a canvas print of your choice absolutely free!

It was a really difficult decision as to which image to choose for our canvas - eventually we settled on a landscape taken this winter from the beach opposite our house.

We were really pleased when the canvas arrived. Quite often you see a perfect picture with your eyes, take the photo with your super-duper camera but then when you see it in print, the colours just aren't 'there'! With the canvas from Canvasdesign, the colours are really vibrant and the sky-blue really shows the quality of the print. The photo is not at all grainy and we were definitely impressed!

Now for the boring, but essential, bits - the ordering was really easy and simple to do, delivery was quick and the communication from both the courier and Canvasdesign was very good. Overall, I would recommend this company and definitely use them again.

So, here's your opportunity to do just that! Canvasdesign have given me an online discount code to share with you all - just use BLOG15 at the checkout to receive 15% off your total order and delivery is free too! Click here to shop now!

But first, you may want to enter my competition to win a canvas print of your choice. Just complete the Rafflecopter entry below and good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclaimer: We received a canvas print free of charge from Canvasdesign for the purpose of review.