Summers here!

Today it finally feels like summer is here! We have had such rubbish weather so far this year, rain followed by cold followed by more rain!

We have been enjoying spending the morning in the garden today. Mia has been playing in her baby nest with some toys. U got her to sit feeling the grass earlier too. She just scrunched up her toes and gave me the strangest face! Haha!

Here are some sunny pictures of my garden. 

Mia's 7 month update!

I can't believe my little baby is 7 months old! This just seems crazy to me! One minute she is this helpless little newborn baby who just sleeps, eats and poops and now she is becoming more independent, mobile and talkative! I think she will crawl soon, you never know next months update may well be the one she starts crawling in! 

She is now on 2 full meals a day and has cut out her lunchtime bottle. She loves broccoli, carrot, cauliflower, mash potato & rice cakes. 

She can roll from front to back and back to front very easily. And prop herself up on one arm. She is enjoying tummy time a lot more as well. 

She is using her index finger a lot now when playing too, like to touch the small delicate parts of her toys such as the hair and eyes of dolls. 

She talks for England too, just sits and natters on! It's so loud sometimes it gives me a headache. 

The long week

Apologies for the lack of posting this week. It's been a very long week! If you follow my blog you will know that I have been selling bits and bobs on eBay recently. This is all great apart from then having to package and post it, which takes ages! We are also in he process of moving and trying to organise all the paperwork is just insane! 

I also went to visit my friend earlier in the week as she was looking after her cousins and Mia loved playing with then! We had a great morning playing with instruments! 

The weekend is pretty busy for us too! We have a baby shower and a friends birthday. I have a great post coming up on how to make nappy/diaper cakes. I have had to wait until now to upload it as the cake I'm using as my demonstration in the photographs is the one I'm giving away this weekend and I didn't want her seeing it before the shower! 

I hope you all have a great weekend and I promise to start updating everyday again! 

My Moisturiser & Primer

I love the Olay complete care moisturiser. It has spf 15 which is great as I have very fair skin. It also makes my face feel so soft and has never irritated my skin. 

I love the Nivea primer. It's affordable and applies onto the skin easily. It's not too thick or sticky either. 

Clothes haul Summer 2013

Dorothy Perkins....one of those shops I never go in but the other day I randomly decided to have a quick peek. I had been shopping all day and was getting fed up with not finding anything I liked. I spotted two gorgeous maxi dresses in Dorothy Perkins. I'm a real maxi dress girl and I bought both dresses which were £30 each (the next day they decided to have a sale on everything inshore and so I returned them and repurchased them saving myself £12 altogether!) it's so annoying when that happens with things going on sale straight after you buy them!

Hefty eBay Fees!

I have been getting into the world of selling online this month. We have been selling furniture no longer needed and various other items. How happy was I this morning to discover one of our items had sold for £300! How amazing, thats enough to buy a new dining table and possibly a coffee table too! How wrong was I? After eBay took their initial hefty fees of £9.10 to list the item, I then had to also pay £29.95 in final value fees followed by another £11 to paypal! So basically altogether I paid out £50.05 so really I only made £249.95. That will just about buy my new dining table and I can forget the coffee table! I was actually really enjoying selling on eBay, it seemed simple and with the app on the iPhone you can check up on it and answer questions quickly and easily but now I just feel ripped off!

Does anyone else thinking eBays fees are hefty?

Mango

Mia loves puréed mango! 

Since starting her on solids she has had a few clear favourites. One being mango and others including strawberries, apples, pears and porridge. She's even started grabbing the spoon and trying to feed herself. 

I can't believe how quickly she is growing up!

London to Brighton bike ride

We went down to Brighton at the weekend and watched the London to Brighton bike riders come to the finish line. 

My dad does the bike ride every year. It's for the British heart foundation.

When I was younger, maybe 16 I did a 26 mile bike ride for the portage charity and it took me 4-5 hours! I had to keep stopping to reapply sun cream because it was such a hot day! I know, I know us Brits would be the first to complain if its a rainy, cold day and the first to complain when it's too hot! Haha the poor weather can't win! 

I think it must feel like a great accomplishment to complete the London

to Brighton bike ride. I'm trying to encourage Adam to do it next year. We will see if I can convince him! 

We have found a house!

Finally we found a house and our offer was accepted! It's been a really long week of looking around loads of houses but we have found one we love! 

It's a big Victorian house in a lovely location surrounded by countryside but a few minutes walk to the small high street with coffee shops and little independent shops. 

I love independent shops, especially furniture shops that sell all the little nicknacks for your home. We have decided to go for a shabby chic look in the dining room. I'm currently hunting eBay for a shabby chic dining set. 

Beauty Haul June/summer 2013

So I have been very naughty this month and spent far too much money on beauty products. It's not all my fault though because Adam also bought me some beauty products but since we share our money I'm going to include the gifts he bought me in this haul.

First thing I got was the urban decay naked palette 2. This was a spur of the moment buy. I had wanted it for ages but the price really put me off. £36 for an eyeshadow palette is crazy in my opinion. But I wet into house of friaser and they had a sale. OK so it was only £3.60 off but still that's better than nothing right? 

It's so beautiful, I am so excited to try it! If any of you have any tutorials on youtube or your blogs using this palette please pop the link down below I would love I see them! 

It also comes with a plumping lipgloss in a pink colour.

The next purchase was the real technique brushes. These were actually a gift from Adam and I had wanted them for ages so I was so excited when I opened he box and saw them inside! 

Then we go on a bit of a benefit theme and I got the benefit 'how to look....' This kit contains: concealer, foundation, primer, blush. I haven't tried it yet but I will let you all know how I get on with it. 

The final thing is the benefit bad gal mascara. I have tried this before and want a fan but I do love the wand size as its quite small and delicate and I do like to colour as well. I just found the last time I used it it dried up very quickly and after a month or so I had to bin it but I'm optimistic that maybe It was my fault and I had left it near heat or something an ruined it.

Monsoon and Ted Baker Baby Haul

 These are a selection of beautiful dresses which have been bought for Mia this month. Most are in 12-18 months and are cord or knitted material so will be lovely in winter with cardigans and thick tights.

These are all sale items and cost between £10-£20.

When to put your baby in their own room?

This is a question I have been asking myself for a while now. When is the right time to move baby into their own room? 

Mia co-slept with us for the first 4 months. She then moved into a cot, which I thought would be a nightmare but she handled it well. Adam suggested yesterday that we move Mia into her own room as she's 6 months now and does tend to wake up with small sounds like if we wanted to have the tv on in bed. So we moved her cot yesterday afternoon into the small bedroom next to ours and put all her toys and clothes in there. I was so sad, it was like my little baby was growing up and once she's in her own room she will never be in mine again. I struggled to not get upset when we put her to bed but I know it will be better for her and we will sleep better as well. 

    
    
   

When did you put your baby in their own room?

We have put in an offer on a house!

We have put in our first offer on a house today! We found a beautiful cottage with all the original features and in a beautiful countryside setting. It has three bedrooms and an outbuilding with underfloor heating that could be used as a playroom or office. It's not perfect, the garden is sloping and dangerous for Mia to play alone as it is at the back of house above the house (if that makes any sense at all?) It has a drop with no fencing straight onto the back door patio so Mia couldn't play up there alone without a strong fence being put up. It also doesn't have off road parking or parking right outside the house. The parking is a 2-3 minute walk from the house, which doesn't seem like much but when you are walking carrying a baby (who only gets heavier) you just want to be pulling up to your front door!

But it was so lovely and the area was something we never thought we would find in our budget so we have decided to put in an offer, lower than the asking price but an offer nevertheless.

Fingers crossed.

Hot day

It's the first time we have had hot weather this year this week. It's been lovely dressing Mia in all her lovely summer dresses and not having to try and match them with tights! 

The funny thing is that in England people moan when it's cold and complain that's its too hot when we get nice weather, haha!

Next week I really want to try and get out more with Mia. Maybe take her to the park or in the garden more. She likes sitting on the grass feeling the new textures. 

I can't believe she's 6 months already and she's going to turn one in less than 6 months now! It seems crazy to me! 

Primark online

It has been long awaited for Primark to start selling online. Thy have teamed up with Asos to start selling their stock online. This is a great thing for those of us who can't get out shopping often however, would I personally buy anything from Primark without trying it on first? Unlikely, but it will be useful to have a browse online in future before going into store. 

What do you all think?

Mia's 6 month update

I didn't know whether I was going to make monthly updates of Mia or not as I wasn't sure how involved she was going to be in my blog. I decided that I will start updates as its a nice way for me to log how she is doing and just because I am doing monthly updates doesn't mean I have to post pictures. I will however post a foot or other picture each month then at least its a snap shot of Mia but you just won't see her face. I know its nice to see proper monthly pictures and see how baby has changed  but I made a decision before Mia was born that I wasn't putting her on YouTube or my blog. I'm not judging anyone who does, its completely individual parents choices, it's just not for us personally.

So lets get started....

Mia turned 6 months on the 23rd May - this is late I know! Sorry! She has changed lots this last month and I'm beginning to see my little baby becoming more independent and mobile everyday!

She can now....

• Sit up unaided! OK so the unaided part isn't completely true, she can sit up on her own and sometimes for a really long time but occasionally she will still flop over onto her side mostly. We are using a baby nest with her which is like a giant rubber ring so that she can play happily while I wash her bottles or prepare the changing bag for the day etc.
• Roll over from front to back! This is a big change this last month. Mia can roll from her front onto her back. I will say she hates tummy time and doesn't enjoy being laid on her tummy so I think that actually helped her learn to roll quickly because she wanted to be laying on her back rather than her front. She can't roll from back to front yet but maybe that's just because she wouldn't want to? 
• Use a sippy cup! Well sort of.....we actually bought her just a cheap basic sippy cup which she was quite good at but she did tend to get water everywhere! So what we have done is buy her one which has a teat on the end to help her learn how to tilt it up to get the water without it going all over the place!
• Talk for England! OK so its not actually speech yet but it's a start. Mia gaggles and babbles for hours and hours. Adam even thinks she said 'dada' the other day. It still counts even if they don't understand that the sound 'dada' is her daddy doesn't it?
• Eat solids! We started Mia on solids when she turned 6 months old. I know lots of people start weaning before this age but Mia just wasn't ready. She eats banana and apple puree, mango puree and strawberry puree. So far she has liked everything apart from melon.

Baby nest review

We bought this the other day because Mia has started to sit up but not confidently. 

It cost us around £20 but was in a 3 for 2 offer at tesco. I actually think this is really good. Mia is quite happy playing in here for ages and I feel like she's safe in there and even though she sometimes flops into the sides she's not going to hurt herself. It has really good textures around the outside like string for the horses tail, the crinkle feeling and noises baby loves and felt material. Mia loves feeling all the textures and I usually put some small toys inside such as a rattle and a material cube. 

Crest 3D whitestrips

A quick review of the Crest 3D whitestrips. 

I actually like these, I don't normally use whitening products but I tried these after my sister suggested them. They are really easy to use, you simply stick one strip to your top teeth as one to the bottom. You have to keep them on for half an hour at a time which can get a little annoying. You are supposed to do this process for 14 days I believe but I only did one treatment an could already see a big difference. My sister had tried it previously and attempted the 14 days but had to give up as after a few days it started to hurt her teeth - this put me off even trying haha! But if I could see a difference after one application I was quite pleased with that. I think if you used them once a month it would make a difference as mine has lasted quite a long time. 

We buy them from eBay as they are from the US. 

They are not that expensive either, around £10 for 14 strips which if like me you are not going to use them all at one will last me a year. 

Let me know what your favourite whitening products are...

Chicco Polly Highchair Review

This was a requested post and I also had decided to start doing lots of reviews because when I am looking to buy new things for Mia I often find myself hunting for independent reviews. 

We bought this highchair after seeing it at The Baby Show. The thing that first attracted me was the seat because it looked so comfortable and I liked the patterns available in the range.

This highchair retails at around £100 but if you wait for deals like we did you can pick it up for less. We paid £70 for ours and I had always expected to spend around £100 so we were happy with the price.

The highchair itself comes with removable seat covers which are plastic material and really easy to just wipe clean. You can remove the top cover as baby grows to make more room within the chair. It also has 7 seat height adjusters so you can use it as a low chair or attach it to your table. The tray has a top plastic cover which you can also easily remove to clean in the sink. The tray itself can be moved towards and away from baby and can be removed completely. The foot rest has different height settings which was perfect for us as Mia is quite small she needs to have it on the highest setting and lots of highchairs don't come with that function. You can also lean the seat back if you like to 3 different positions. It also has a very secure harness which goes over the babies shoulders, around the waist and between the legs. I feel Mia is very safe in the highchair leaving me free to do what I need to do in the kitchen.

It has a small basket at the back which you can keep bibs and sippy cups inside. At the moment we keep the tray that hooks onto the side of the chair legs as it keeps getting knocked off with it being in a small kitchen. The tray that attaches to the side is really good as you can put your drink or babies sippy cup on there safely while you're feeding baby. It also has wheels so you can easily move it around.

The imagine below shows the chair set up with the tray attached and seat upright.

This picture shows the highchair folded down. You can see we have the legs in two halves - one attached to the seat and the second part of the legs has been removed from the main frame and is standing up against the chair. This makes the chair really good for storage.

For our use this highchair is perfect. It folds away small enough and when it's fully assembled it doesn't take up masses of room. What I would comment on though is even though it is not big for a highchair when its assembled it can be a little bulky if you are using it in a small kitchen area. 

So far I have found it easy to clean, easy to feed Mia and she seems to love being in there.

Snaps with the new camera...

I'm learning how to use it slowly but surely....