ASDA has a bunch of cool snack pots on sale for £1. These are brilliant for storing snacks and treats, they keep food fresh and this sale means you can buy a ton of them for whenever you go away on long car journeys, picnics, days out and more.

• Click here to get snacking with ASDA *

The snackpots that ASDA has on offer for £1 include Spiderman, SpongeBob SquarePants, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Hello Kitty and Disney Princess. You can use these snack pots to take snacks to school and use them to fill with nuts or fruit or even carrot sticks to keep them healthy and getting their five a day.

The snack pots will fit neatly into most lunch boxes I think, and you will have to pay for delivery which is almost three snackpots in price - £2.95. Your best bet is to click and collect instore so you save on the heavy delivery charges and score on the ace price point.

Thanks to Poppyj1 at HUKD!

WH Smith have slashed the prices of selected arts and crafts stuff by almost 50%. These 100 washable coloured pens which normally retail for £6.99 are now £3.50. That’s a full 50% off! So order online and get it delivered to your local WH Smith store for free or if your order's over £15, WH Smith will deliver it to your door within five days. If you need your stuff sooner, you can opt for one of their first class and courier delivery options.

• Click here to add colour to your child’s life with WH Smith*

I love it when my kids draw and colour. Not only does it give me some time to do what I want to do (for a change) but they get to communicate what’s going on in their sub-conscious. This plastic barrel full of 100 fibre-nibbed colouring pens will delight any aged child and keep them busy for hours! They’re not recommended for kids under 3 years of age but since the ink is washable I don’t see a problem with little sister getting in on the colouring act! The pens and not refillable but at this price its not a deal breaker

KTwo is one of those brilliant companies that come up with super useful things that just make the administrative parts of life so much simpler. They're often the kind of things that make you look at them and go '"why didn't I think of that?!"

Two of the products that I currently own are the School Year Calendar (£12.99) and the Mid Year Diary (£9.99).

The School Year Calendar runs from August 2013 to August 2014. Each month has the list of dates and their corresponding days running down the left side, with five columns - one for each member of a five member family. There is  sixth column that could also be used, but it is titled 'Birthdays', so obviously meant to be for that, and other important to remember days. It comes pre-printed with important calendar dates, like 'British Summer Time begins' or 'Christmas Day' or 'Burns Night (Scot)', which is useful.

My favourite online shoe shop, Cloggs is offering this two-strap patent black shoe for just £9.99. A school shoe for under a Tenner? Now that’s a bargain! Plus they offer free delivery if you can wait 2-4 working days or if you need your parcel delivered the next working day you will be charged £3.95 if you order before 4pm.

• Click here for stylish footwear at Cloggs*

This cute girls’ Mary Jane black shoe features Patent uppers with floral front detail and a fastening strap to keep little feet safely in the shoes while they run, climb and ride bikes. The clean man-made sole finishes the shoe off beautifully.

Half term is coming. It almost has the same soundtrack as Darth Vader in Star Wars, only with more screaming and hiding gin in a water bottle. And that’s just the parents. As the days of children roaming free approach, here are some ideas, tips and suggestions to surviving half term with your kids.

I think this is a great deal. The Disney Princess Backpack was £12.00 but is now half price at The Toy Shop so you’ll get it for £6.00 and be saving £6.00, smashing. We may still be months away from the new school year but at this price you might as well get this now and hang on to it until you need it.

• Click here for the Disney Princess Backpack from The Toy Shop*

Kids seem to go through school bags at the most ridiculous rate; I don’t know what they do to them! Oh my goodness as I said that I realised I have become my mother, not sure whether to laugh or cry. But anyway, my point is that school bags seem to need replacing on a fairly regular basis so if you’re in need of one the Disney Princess Backpack is just so cute! It’s a schoolbag fit for a princess.

The backpack is a pretty pink colour and features Snow White, Rapunzel and Arial, Disney’s finest in their fabulous dresses. The 41cm backpack has plenty of room for all the kid’s school books, and an extra front pocket for your princess’s goodies and snacks.

Send your princess off to school with a fitting schoolbag that she’ll love.

Use this Great Little Trading Company promotional code to get 15% off when you spend £50 or more. The company often has a 15% code out there, and this is the latest offering.

Click here to use your Great Little Trading Company promotional code*

• Discount: 15%
• Minimum spend: £50
• Promotional code: HARP
• Expires: 18th March 2013

The site sells items for children's bedrooms, as well as furniture and other accessories, plus toys for indoor and outdoor use, and lots of other useful items. The code worked when my basket contained sale or special offer items, but it only took 15% off the full price items.

To use this code, go to the Shopping Basket page and enter it in the Promotional Code box. I have bought a few items from here over the years. They do really lovely, nicely designed and built furnishings for children's rooms as well as accessories. The site also sells toys and games.

There are lots of stylish storage solutions on the site, and I had better warn you, it is easy to spend hours browsing!

Thanks to rob3t at HUKD!

Get a collection of 20 classic children’s stories in paperback for just £19.99 at Red House. The recommended retail price on all these kid’s books together is £99.80 so you’ll be saving a whopping £79.81, awesome!

• Click here for this great book deal from Red House*

The Usborne Picture Book Gift Set is the perfect gift for any child who is hooked on reading and loves stories. The fabulous set contains contemporary and humorous takes on 20 famous children’s stories; the books are perfect for bedtimes or rainy days. Among the classic retold stories are Alice in Wonderland, Little Red Riding Hood, The Wizard of Oz and The Little Mermaid.

The books are presented in a slipcase to keep them all neatly together. All the books feature fantastic bright imagery from extremely talented illustrators and the simple text makes them a joy to read for both children and parents. Some of the other books in the collection include The Snow Queen, The Wind in the Willows, The Story of Black Beauty and The Three Little Pigs.

Having kids is awesome, but sometimes the admin around it can be quite daunting. This is especially true of school and the millions of things that they manage to add to your To Do list every week. The thing is, we are all really busy and being a time-strapped parent is extremely common nowadays. So how can we give our kids the support they need at school? Here are some top tips from the experts.

MiniMonos is the virtual world for children who love to play and love the planet and they’ve teamed up with the wonderful people at World Book Day to offer kids a one month gold membership card, as well as the whole collection of World Book Day £1 Books.

• Click here to see how you can help save the planet with MiniMonos

Kids visiting MiniMonos can create monkey avatars, make friends and play lots of fun and exciting games and all while learning about the environment and the world around them. By purchasing virtual goods inside the game, members contribute to a clean water supply for kids in India, as well as adopting orangutans, supporting wild tigers, and other rewards.

World Book Day is a worldwide celebration of books and reading. A main aim of World Book Day in the UK and Ireland is to encourage children to explore the wonders of books and reading by providing them with the opportunity to have a book of their own.

To mark the day, school children are entitled to receive a World Book Day £1 Book Token. The Book Token can be exchanged for one of eight specially published World Book Day £1 Books. The World Book Day £1 Book Token will be valid from 25^th February to 24^th March 2013.

The 2013 list of £1 books is:

• Alfie’s Shop, Shirley Hughes (Random House)
• Giraffes Can’t Dance: Colouring and Puzzle Fun, Giles Andreae and Guy Parker-Rees (Orchard Books)
• Horrid Henry’s Guide to Perfect Parents, Francesca Simon, illustrated by Tony Ross (Orion)
• Tony Robinson’s Weird World of Wonders: Funny Inventions, Tony Robinson (Macmillan)
• The Diamond Brothers in… Two of Diamonds, Anthony Horowitz (Walker Books)
• Ruby Redfort, Lauren Child (HarperCollins)
• Tom Gates: Best Book Day Ever! (so far), Liz Pichon (Scholastic)
• The Chocolate Box Girls: Bittersweet, Cathy Cassidy (Puffin Books)

My daughter has long, fine and very curly blonde hair which is, as you can imagine, really hard to keep knot and tangle free. She only need wear it loose for ten minutes and already there will be some scary knots and lumps forming. So, when a friend of mine bought me the Denman Tangle Tamer hairbrush, I was really pleased.

The tangle tamer is on sale on Amazon* for £5.95 at the moment (you’re saving 5p, which I find quite funny) and comes with the free Super Saver delivery. You can get it in Pink or Black. Now we’ve had our Tangle Tamer for a really long time now and I’ve held off on writing this review so I can compare using it to a bog-standard hairbrush.

The brush has super-soft nylon bristles that sort of stick out at different angles. I imagine that the principle behind this is that they don’t grab the hair in one jerk so there is less pain as you brush. I have to admit that brushing her hair with this brush is easier. A lot easier than a standard hairbrush. With this brush there are far less tears and drama with knots and tangles.

You will still have to wrestle with the big knots – this Tangle Tamer is not a miracle worker – and you will have to painstakingly work through the tough tangles, but overall the brush pulls less and hurts less than a normal hairbrush. When we forgot our Denman Tangle Tamer on one of our holidays I tried to use my hairbrush, it caused so much drama that I ended up brushing her hair out once and keeping it tied up for three days!

I’ve ended up sharing her brush and have just ordered a new one thanks to its comfortable brushing and the fact that it’s dead easy to clean. An easy 9/10.

Use this Kids Learn Languages promotional code to get 50% off the My First Learning Pad. The tablet is normally £29.99 so it becomes £14.99 with the promotional code. According to the reviews this is a really good tablet that has great educational value and loads of fun activities for kids.

• Click here to use your Kids Learn Languages promotional code 

•     Discount: 50% off
•     Promotional code: learningpad50
•     Expires: 15 February 2013

To use this code, use the link above to visit the Kids Learn Languages website. Once you have added the My First Learning Pad to your basket you’ll immediately get a box in which you fill in your post code and the promotional code. Put in the promotional code learningpad50 and you’ll see the price drop from £29.99 to £14.99, lovely.

The fun hand-held Learning Pad has 40 activities across six learning categories. The categories are Language, Maths, Logic, Tools, Games and Music. The pad teaches your kids letters, words, counting and numbers, logic, games and so much more. It’s easy to use, has cool sounds and is ideal for toddlers and young children to start learning all the things they need to know as well as how to figure things out on their own.

Ever since my daughter started school I’ve been on the hunt for the perfect lunchbox. It can’t be too big, or she won’t be able to carry it, it can’t be too small, or you won’t be able to fit anything healthy inside it. So I thought I was onto a Good Thing when I saw the Sistema Slimline Quaddie lunchbox on sale on Amazon* the other day.

This Sistema lunchbox isn’t too big and it offers you four compartments of varying sizes to slot things into. On the top of the box (which comes in pink or blue with the latter on sale at the moment) you will find three compartments. Two quarter sizes which can fit a snack bar, or raisins or other easy little snacks for a quick energy boost, and one half size that fits a sandwich.

The main body of the Sistema lunchbox is roomy enough to put in a sandwich Tupperware container along with juice and other lunchy bits and pieces. What it cannot do is house a yoghurt pot or an apple. This drops the points on this lunchbox down considerably. How can you have a lunchbox with no compartment big enough for a small yoghurt or an apple?

Obviously you can resort to slicing your apple up and slotting it into one of the top compartments, but there is no way of fitting in that yoghurt. It is also worth mentioning that the Sistema lunchbox has a juice flask that comes with it – this fits perfectly into the half compartment on the top. It’s very handy as extra liquid for thirsty kids.

You can wash it in the dishwasher, it can be microwaved and it is compact enough to be easy for kids to carry. I give this product a hefty 9/10 – it only costs £5!

The alarm is howling, your head is fluffy, the kids are arguing and your partner has decided to move into the bathroom just when you need it the most. Weekday mornings are always the hardest. Everything seems to be a mad rush with people shouting, falling, forgetting and moaning. So here are eight brilliant breakfast ideas to boost your mood, give you energy and make sure that your kids have the right nutrients to help them get the most out of their day and their learning.

Let’s face it; we all need a little help with maths. Help you kids and make it easy with Maths Made Easy Times Tables at half price from Amazon. The book by Carol Vorderman was £2.99 but has now been reduced to £1.49, lovely.

• Click here for easy times tables with Amazon*

Let Carol Vorderman help your child to succeed in Maths and master Times Tables. Times tables are one of the fundamentals of mathematics and your kids need to know them as well as they possibly can if they’re going to come to grips with maths and understand it properly. Maths Made Easy is packed with notes and tips to make learning about Maths easy and fun! Follow the exercises with your child and then reward them with gold stars for their efforts. Each title contains a progress chart so your child can keep track of all the exercises they have completed.

This maths book is ideal for kids aged five to seven to give them a helping hand as they start to learn all about multiplication and times tables. Give it a go!

Thanks to Headingley_Lad @ HUKD!

In my last lunchbox feature I found some great ideas that you can use to create healthy and entertaining lunchboxes for your kids. It can be close to impossible to get your kids to eat the right foods and even touch what’s in their lunchboxes, but that doesn’t mean we should stop trying to create the kind of food that will help them become better, stronger and faster.

So what kinds of food do what for our bodies? These tasty snacks and ideas are brilliant for both you and your kids, and there is so much  variety that there are sure to be options for the fussier eater.

Send the kids off to school with a healthy lunch in this really cool lunchbox from Asda Direct. The lunchbox is shaped like a Chelsea Football Club shirt and is guaranteed to be the envy of all the kids! The Chelsea FC Shirt shaped lunchbox was £9.00 but has been reduced by 50% to £4.50 so you’ll be saving £4.50.

• Click here for the Chelsea FC shaped lunchbox from Asda Direct*

It’s really hard to get some kids to eat their lunches, or even remember to take them with to school, but the really cool football lunchbox should help. This Chelsea FC shirt shaped lunch box is perfect for little Chelsea football fans.

The blue shirt lunch box is made from hard plastic and has a clasp fastening and the Chelsea crest and sponsors logo on the front. The lunch box has a single hard plastic blue handle and it measures approximately 23 x 18 x 10cm, great for lunches, snacks or even storing bit and pieces in.

Thanks to koli_8485 at HUKD!

That certainly is a mouthful isn’t it? Well, the Vosene Kids anti-lice conditioning spray may have the longest product name in anti-nit defence circles, but it is the best. I am writing this review after using Vosene for three years. Three years of testing on long, fine hair that catches lice from passing children like a web catches passing flies.

I have had three lice outbreaks since using Vosene. Each time it was because I had run out of the stuff and my daughter had not had her hair smothered in Vosene before she left for school. Then I spent an entire year of using the spray and the shampoo without fail, and we have not had a single outbreak since.

Not only does the Vosene Kids Conditioning Defence Spray actually seem to repel the ghastly lice effectively, but it does a halfway decent job of conditioning the hair too. My daughter has very fine and curly hair that’s now down to her waist. It is tough to brush every day and really tough to keep in decent condition because she is at swimming or running in the rain or jumping between toasty warm heating and freezing cold outdoors. Hair suffers.

Now I cannot say that the Vosene Kids Conditioning Defence Spray is better than other conditioning sprays. It isn’t. I have compared it to other types and it doesn’t condition the hair as well, leaving it a bit dry with a faintly sticky texture. In my world this is a fair price to pay for the fact that it detangles and keeps lice at bay.

It gets an easy 9 out of 10 for price (less than £2 on Amazon* at the moment), defending your child against the lice horde and adding some conditioning shine and detangling action. It loses points for the sticky texture and the smell.

Most of us have phones or devices that can enjoy downloading and using apps, and most of us have seen our kids pick these gadgets up and do far more with them than we ever thought possible. Certainly my iPad is more used by my daughter than by me, and the apps we have installed on it are superb for boosting her education. So, without further fanfare or ado, here are 20 apps that will help your kids learn and give them a kickstart into their futures.

Just in time for a new start in the new year, the pale blue Octonauts Rucksack for boys from Debenhams is just £3.60. Debenhams have reduced the rucksack from £9.00 so you’ll save £5.40 and they offer FREE standard delivery so the £3.60 is all you pay, smashing!

• Click here for the blue Octonauts Rucksack from Debenhams*

The new year has arrived and it’s time for a fresh start. If you’ve been looking for a new school bag for your child as the old one is falling apart and has holes in the bottom then look no further than the Octonauts Rucksack at this great price from Debenhams.

This pale blue boy’s rucksack has an underwater Octonauts design with a front pocket and two adjustable back straps, ideal for keeping school lunches, jumpers and anything else your child needs during the day. I love that the rucksack is machine washable and tumble dry safe so getting rid of juice spills and mud is really easy. And the kids love having rucksacks with characters on, it’s so much cooler than a boring plain one.

Thanks to tanked @ HUKD!