My John Greed Valentines wish list

When I came across the john Greed competition for bloggers I had to enter. I love jewellery- browsing and wearing. John Greed is an amazing website and its actually took me days to decide on these items I would love to receive for Valentines.  This Valentine is going to be a special  one for us as its our first as husband and wife although we have been together for 8 years! 

I have two full charm bracelets that I first received for my 21st birthday and since then I have collected charms for all different occasions. I don't think I have ever received one for Valentines day though. Charms are so special and personal, I remember who bought everyone of mine. I have about 50 different charms. This NEW pandora silver charm would be perfect to start a new charm bracelet. At £50 its quite pricey for one charm but i would keep it forever so if you think of cost per year it would be well worth it!

These beautiful pilgrim classic silver plated crystal heart stud earrings remind me of the ones I wore to my wedding, they would be perfect for everyday wear and would constantly remind me of my special day. And at only £8.99 they are an absolute steal!

(Sorry this is the closest close up of them!)

This  hot diamonds silver necklace would be next on my wish list, I don't really wear necklaces, I got out of the habit when I had my children as they used to pull on them. But now the youngest is two this would be great. Its plain, simple and pretty. Its £49.95 which I think is a great price for such a pretty thing and of course something you would keep forever.

I would chose this DKNY watch,I love watches but I am a rubbish time keeper which my husband always complains about, so if he bought me this I would have  no excuse. I would love to receive this watch its classy and would go with anything.  I love a bit of bling  and the embellished clear crystal stones are just enough. Its in the sale at the moment for £80.

I would also chose these Pandora Silver & Rhodolite heart stud earrings priced at £45.00. As this would be our first Valentines as husband and wife I think these would be quite fitting. I just think they are so pretty and I like the detail around the stone. The stone is also my favourite colour and matches the stone in my engagement ring.

So there you have it my Valentines wish list all priced under £250. If you want to enter the competition to win your wish list head over to John Greed jewellery to find out how.

Miss guided Valentines date wishlist

I am completely in love with Missguided at the moment, I've been browsing the website for far too long this week and seem as I'm not buying clothes at the moment I didn't think it would do any harm in creating a valentines date wish list! 

So if my husband was to take me out on Valentines Day this is what I would be wearing:

I think most people would chose red but I really don't suit or feel comfortable in red so I would go for this plum dress. I like that its got long sleeves, I feel the cold so they will do nicely. And to cover up my legs I would wear these tights, definately got a love theme going on:

As for shoes I freakin' love these, geez they are beautiful. I want them! Would they even match? I don't care I'm sure they would.

I never really take much out with me on a night out so this clutch would be perfect.

Paired with a few bangles my look would be complete!

So what do you think? I really feel like its got a rock chic theme going on and I love it and for just over £100 I think I would look pretty cool!

weigh in 3rd Feb

After doing the get fit feel epic competition post I've really tired to lose weight, I'm not doing as well as I had hoped, and this week I thought I had better put a real effort in to get me going again. I thought I would start with a blog post so you all know where I'm up to!! That way I won't be able to slack!

Since January 1st I have lost 4lb, although I am now at my lightest I have been all year. So what am I going to do?? Well first of all exercise, I have a wii fit and its great for keeping on track, so I'm going to try and go on it at least 5 days out of 7.

Also I have given myself another challenge, I've had my eye on a coat for a while from Missguided I have £50 Christmas money left and my husband has agreed to 'save' it until I have lost a stone, yes A STONE!! So with 10lb left to go how long do you think before I will be wearing this?

I'm sohoping I will have lost the weight before its out of stock!!

I weigh 12.4st now ( I can't believe I just told you that!) and I would really like to weight about 10.2st. Roll on 11.8st and I can purchase this beautiful coat.

What would revolutionise my 2013?

I've just spotted the Confused.com blogger competition to help you revolutionise and de-stress your life in 2013, and you can win the gadget of your choice! Now, this is so simple for me, there has been a gadget I have wanted for ages and never had the funds to buy it.

I love to bake as most of my blog followers will already know from my recent cakes blog post. Baking with 3 children is pleasurable, exciting, satisfying but so... STRESSFUL. I try to plan, organise and delegate but things don't always go to plan!!! They LOVE baking but the usual conversation goes along the lines of:

 "I want to stand on that chair" "No! I was there first" "He's pushing me" "No he's pushing me" " Can I crack the eggs" "No he did it last time, I want to do it this time" "He's pushing me again" "I'm not" "Can I do the flour" "No I want to do the flour, you do you sugar" "Can I stir" "Can I use the hand blender" "It's my turn let me have a go" "I've only had it 2 minutes" OH I could go on but it's actually stressing me!

Most of you are probably thinking well why on earth do you do it. Well, past all the arguing and bickering they do enjoy it, and obviously its a great way of learning all different skills. And at the end the cakes taste delicious.

So what gadget would make my life less stressful? One of these beauties....

It will set you back a whooping £429 at Lakeland. But you will have stress free baking! An Artisan Kitchen aid mixer... ahhhh heaven.

Like I said my children love baking but sometimes get bored...

So sometimes I have to stop mixing and the meringue goes wrong and we end up with plain icing and a very messy kitchen!!

I started these cakes when my helpful children went to bed! Meaning starting at 7.30pm, they both had 16 eggs! Imagine the arm ache, not only that it takes forever, I tend to make them one night and ice them the next, if I had  a mixer I could get to work on the icing while the sponge is mixing, then I wouldn't have the stressful 'icing period' the next day rushing to get it finished before midnight.

I didn't actually finish the sewing machine cake until the afternoon of my dad's birthday... STRESSFUL!

If I had one of these I can imagine stress free baking with children, excitedly waiting to drop there chosen ingredients in to the bowl, willing to take turns and wait nicely. Sharing and laughing and enjoying. Who I am kidding, they will find something to bicker about!

But I can imagine, tucking them up in bed, hurrying down the stairs, and get to work on cakes quickly and efficiently, enjoying, tasting, smelling and listening just to the whir of the cake gadget at work. Bliss!

Lego, castles and sewing machine cakes

I love making cakes for all different occasions and people, i have never had any training I've just learnt tricks as I've gone along, I had some tweets and messages from people saying they liked my Wallace and Gromit cupcakes so I thought I would share some more with you.

This is the first cake I made and really got me going.I made it for my sister when she graduated.

This is the most recent one I made for Millie's 2nd birthday

 

I made this for my sister's engagement party, her fiancee proposed in New Zealand and the kiwi's are the New Zealand bird! Funny looking things aren't they!

I made these coffee cupcakes to go with them!

My eldest loved Lego around his 6th birthday and still does actually.

Sewing Machine cake!

This is definitely my most ambitious cake to date, it was so hard to balance the cake and the left hand side is held up by 1 skewer! Dad loved it (he is a sewing machine mechanic)

These were for my bug obsessed 3 year old's party.

 The very hungry Caterpillar

And this was his cake to go with it!

Although they take me hours (sewing machine being about 12 hours) I definately think homemade cakes are so much more personal to the person receiving them. I must have more pictures somewhere but can't seem to find them. It's my sister's birthday in March and I'm thinking of attempting a handbag cake.

Do you like making cakes?

A day Trip to London

Part of my boys Christmas present was a day trip to London so yesterday was the day, we got up nice and early, dropped Millie off at my mum's and headed to that station and jumped on the 7.56am train.

We got into London at 10am there were some delays on the lines so it took us abit longer, the boys came up with what they wanted to see! Firstly we headed over to Buckingham palace, as we got there we realised that people were waiting around the the changing of the guard, we waited too, although it was so busy we didn't see much, the boys did as we had them on our shoulders, they loved every minute of it and took some great pictures.

Leon with my sister

Toby on his Dad's shoulders and Leon in front on mine.

Next was Big Ben, they have wanted to see Big Bin since they first watched Cars 2, along with the Eiffel Tower (which they have been to) and Tokyo Tower (which they probably won't see). Leon was so pleased he saw it and took quite alot of pictures on his camera. All they wanted to do was go inside it!

Leon the keen photographer

 We do have one in our town centre but they insisted!

We had a pre-booked flight on the London eye so after dinner in the good old McDonalds we boarded on! None of us had been on the eye before and it was such a clear day we could see for miles. It was much better than I expected it to be. The boys were fascinated with the whole thing. The Asians who we were on the flight with were more fascinated with Toby than what they could see out of the window, asking him for photos, he was in his element!

Next we jumped on the tube again and made our way to Piccadilly Circus they didn't really know what else they wanted to do so we suggested Ripley's Believe it or Not! Dave and I have been before and we new they would love it, we spent the rest of the time in here looking at the weird and wonderful things from around the World.

My sister with the World's tallest man!

We caught the 5pm train home, made it back for 6.40pm, picked up Millie got changed and we all headed out for a 30th birthday party! Today we are having a lazy Sunday!

My favourite shoes from Next

I LOVE shoes... i always have since i was small, I remember trying my Mum's on and squeezing my younger sisters on. I have never really grown out of loving shoes. When I saw the blog competition at A daisy chain dream I new I had to share my love of shoes with you.

I'm a sucker for shoes in the sale, in fact a have two pairs of shoes in my wardrobe I haven't worn yet but I love them!! I don't only like buying shoes for myself I have 2 boys and a girl so I get to dabble in all kinds of shoes! Even cake shoes:

 I made these last year

So whats my favourite pair of shoes? Hmmmm this is such I hard question! I have a favourite everyday pair, flats, boots, heels, wedge and flipflop!

So I will share these, these are my wedding shoes, I love them I will keep them forever, I might never wear them again I don't know, but when I look at them, I remember the happy day I wore them strolling along the Italian Lake Garda hand in hand with my new husband, with our children and family laughing along side us, the heat, the colours, the sun, the food and pure happiness.

After browsing the Next website for far too long (see the time this was posted!!) I've picked out some of my favourites. These are my favourite flats:

Being a beautician I wear flats all day for work, so I need the comfort and the style and these Davina Bow Ballerinas definitely seem to have both. I also have quite a wide foot so these would be perfect.

These black biker mid heel boots would but perfect for walks with the kids and keeping my feet warm, not to mention they are super stylish!

These just because anyone needs a bit of rock chic glamour in their life, no? YES! And they kind of look sensible enough for the school run, don't they?? Any way Lipsy stud wedge shoe boots are definitely on my wishlist. I love the fact that next do other brands.

Finally because its getting far to late and I need to be up with 3 children at 7am...

These... sensible, practical and darn right cool! Tan casual wedge boots I have to say I'm a fan, I have a pair like these in black and they are my favourite everyday shoe!

So these would be my replacements for my old shoes, what do you think? Do you have a shoe passion?