Right, so your summer holiday is on its way and if you’ve not sorted it out yet, then it is time to do so now. Here are some tips and tricks to saving money on your holidays so you don’t end up feeling stressed about your finances when you get home.
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Scared of the gym? Then get this FREE one day pass to your local Fitness First gym and see what its all about. It’s a lifestyle choice that could transform you from pregnant Kim Kardashian to pregnant Heidi Klum!
If you’re wanting to stay in shape while preggers or trying to shed the baby weight, exercise is the best way to do it. Fitness First have over 80 clubs nation-wide and with classes ranging from Spinning to Yoga to Zumba there’s definitely something you’ll like! They also have a range of packages to choose from, each of which includes a voucher for a 40 minute personal training session which you can redeem at any point during your membership. I’ve learnt from experience that it really is better to have a qualified personal trainer tailor make a programme for you so you don’t waste hours doing the wrong thing on the equipment with absolutely no result. Plus they have a membership option where you can access other gyms in addition to you ’home club’ so if you’re away your training schedule doesn’t fall by the wayside. Fitness First offers monthly, 4-monthly and 12-monthly memberships depending on what type of commitment you’re prepared to make.
So don’t be intimidated by the gym – pop into your local Fitness First and take advantage of their one day trial – you never know you may have fun and make a like-minded friend!
John Lewis is selling the 7 inch Kurio tablet for under £100 which is, I think, rather brilliant. This tablet has been designed specifically for kids and boasts a wide range of apps and features to boost their education and plenty more. For a bigger screen you’ll pay £150, so for the sake of three inches, this is a brilliant saving.
The Kurio on sale at John Lewis will get delivered for free and is loved by kids and trusted by parents. This is the ultimate Android tablet for families. Well, that’s what it says on the packaging anyway. The tablet is pre-loaded with games, videos, educational content, ebooks, and cool things for everyone to enjoy.
You will get Angry Birds, World of Goo, Doodle Jump, Where’s My Water, Cut the Rope, and Fruit Ninja included. There is Wi-Fi, support for Flash, front and rear cameras make it easy to snap shots, you can even shoot videos and watch them. Nice.
Thanks to saibahn at HUKD!
Fly away to somewhere exotic and save up to £1 050 per family with the Club Med Summer Sale. With deals from only £79 per night per person you and your family can enjoy the May Half Term break at Off Peak prices.
Imagine a summer holiday that exceeds all expectations! After a long, cold winter why not treat your family to a family-friendly resort that offers a Children’s Club that lets your kids play, have fun and learn while you enjoy adrenalin pumping activities or kick back and enjoy a cocktail next to the pool. Club Med offers packages to pretty much everywhere in the world – from the Mediterranean and Atlantic Coast to Asia and the Indian ocean so you’re sure to find somewhere fabulous that fits your lifestyle and your pocket.
With deals from just £79 per night per person you can afford an overseas summer holiday but book now some offers end 15 May so book now and be the envy of all your colleagues when you return to work relaxed and tanned.
This body butter from Soap & Glory called The Righeous Butter has to be my favourite all time body butter in the history of forever. And I happened upon it entirely by accident. It was on sale in Boots, along with a couple of other products including a wash poof (that fell apart within a month) and the body wash (which was nice).
This product sells for £10 on their site, but can often be less at Boots* so take a peek there first if you happen to want to try it out after my review.
Wow. What a smell. I cannot tell you why the smell of this Soap & Glory Righteous Butter is so utterly intoxicating to me, but it is. It reminds me of fields, and skin that’s warmed by the sun, and freckles, and happiness, and giggling next to a campfire on the beach.
It has also won the Woman & Home best in beauty award. I am clearly not alone in this love affair. It also does what it should, it moisturises. My skin suffers in the winter with the constant changes from hot to cold and back again, and this does the job. It doesn’t rub on thick and oily only to feel all thin and useless and papery ten minutes later. No, you get proper moisturiser with this Soap & Glory product.
The only negative I would give the Soap & Glory The Righteous Butter is that the smell could be, for some, a little too overpowering, especially if they are heavy handed with their moisturiser. This is a sentiment shared by others on their site but I must say that it isn’t something that would stop be from buying this. Ever. I may just stock up for life, just in case.
This is a sweet little deal for those of you hunting for really neat and cute storage solutions for your kids. This 3-box library kit is down to £36.99 including delivery charges from Vertbaudet using the voucher code below. Tasty.
To get this low price on the Vertbaudet 3-box library storage solution you can use the code 5808, and if you spend over £60, then the delivery charges will be free. Otherwise you are spending £3.99 on delivery.
This is a practical storage space with three staggered boxes and two side compartments. It comes with silk screen printed motifs and non-toxic lacquered MDF. You will need to build it yourself and it only comes in pink at this price.
The cost on the website is £44, down from £55, and the voucher code above, entered at the checkout, will drop you down enough to make it a total of £36.99 including the delivery charges.
Thanks to BargainHunter at HUKD!
Right. So as human beings become increasingly focused on oral hygiene and on the various things that can affect it, weirder and weirder devices are appearing on the market to help us out. I got the TePe TongueDetox device in to review because a) I am a sucker for cool oral hygiene stuff and b) this is just too weird.
Just look at the instructions:
Rinse the TongueDetox thoroughly under cold water. Extend the tongue. Place the TongueDetox at the back on the tongue with the thumb grips facing down. Gently press down and pull forward along the surface all the way to the tip. Rinse the TongueDetox under warm water and repeat as necessary.
So, cold water to start, warm water to end, and some pretty serious instructions considering this is a glorified tongue scraper. To review this I started out with an 11am tongue. I had drunk coffee, eaten breakfast, had more coffee, an orange, lots of water and one lovely truffle. My tongue was bound to be a cesspool of germs and bacteria – the cause of bad breath and the formation of plaque on the teeth.
I went to the bathroom and followed the instructions on the card. Right, so before you worry that I am about to go into horrific detail about weird stuff dripping off my tongue scraper I can reassure you. Nothing happened. My tongue just feels, well, rather scraped. I don’t think I feel any different at all.
So what is my verdict? It says it has a mint aroma, I didn’t notice it at all. The two handles make it very easy to use. One scrape does it all and you don’t activate the gag reflex. There is no way to prove that it has improved my breath or sense of taste so I cannot tell you if this genuinely works.
I like it. I like the fact that it makes my tongue feel all tingly, but I probably won’t use it as religiously as I do other oral hygiene products. I like the range of colours and that it takes away germs. I also like the fact that it is made from environmentally friendly materials and costs only £3.35. It gets 7.10, losing points for the fact that the mint is barely detectable and there is no way to prove it works.
You’ll save £8.25 (which is 68%) if you buy this pack of three Little Me Organics Mmm Moisture Babies Bath Soak on sale at Amazon. Each bottle is 300ml and they are normally sold individually. It would normally cost you £12.21 for three of them so I think £3.96 is a pretty good deal.
Make bath time fun and soothing with the Little Me Organics Mmm Moisture Babies Bath Soak. The bath soak contains Chamomile and Organic Lavender so it helps to comfort, soothe and moisturise your baby's skin. The bath soak is milky and does not create bubbles so your baby can just soak and enjoy.
The bath soak comes in a 300ml bottle and contains organic ingredients that are gentle on your baby’s skin. It’s soothing and moisturising at the same time to make bath time more fun and enjoyable. Extra ingredients in the bath soak include Sunflower Oil and Aloe Vera which leave skin soft to the touch.
Sounds lovely, think I might give it a try too.
Thanks to mamboboy at HUKD!
Get a whopping £11.00 off these super cosy and comfy looking slipper boots from Boots. The boots started out life priced at £16.00but are now on sale for just £5.00, fabulous.
Trust me, slipper boots are an absolute essential for winter. I bought mine three years ago and I wear them all the way through winter. After a long day at work, leaving in the dark and getting home in the dark and just generally being cold and miserable, the best part of my day is getting home and changing into a pair of tracksuit pants and my slipper boots. It just makes me happy to be warm and comfy.
The luxuriously soft Cosy Oatmeal Cable Knit Slipper Boots are a great winter warmer. They have a fur lining to keep you warm and two little pom-poms each for decoration and a bit of fun. They're perfect for lounging around the house. Winter might be nearly over but you can always use them next year (and the year after that and the year after that…).
The technology revolution and the rise of the app have made me very happy. Not only does it mean that we get to play around with amazing new toys, but we also gain access to a world of recipes and ideas that people never had access to before. In this feature I am going to take you through some of the coolest recipe apps from the free to the costly…
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Stock up on prezzies or just restock your hand bag with this cool special from The Body Shop. If you go to The Body Shop site now you’ll get up to 30% off some of their gorgeous hand creams.
The Body Shop makes all their decadent products with love and care. They source some of the finest raw ingredients from the four corners of the globe, harness the skills of artisan farmers and add their expertise to create effective, environmentally friendly products that are wonderful to use.
The Body Shop trades fairly so communities benefit as well as you. They never test on animals, and all their products are 100% vegetarian. The Body Shop is a wonderful company that always keeps people, animals and the planet in mind.
Some of the hand creams on offer are Absinthe Purifying Hand Cream reduced from £10.00 to £7.50, Almond Hand & Nail Cream reduced from £10.00 to £7.00 and Wild Rose Hand Cream SPF 15 reduced from £5.00 to £3.50, goody!
Apparently I am on something of a mission when it comes to the For Dummies books lately. A few weeks ago I reviewed the Children's Health for Dummies book and it was something of a hit in our family, this week I'm all about the Blogging for Dummies book. Now, as you probably are aware, blogging can be quite a lucrative and exciting thing to get into, but for those of us who are short on time, the learning curve can be quite intimidating. That's where this book comes into its own.
Blogging for Dummies is laid out in a very intuitive style with each chapter moving into the next seamlessly. You don't have to flip back and forth through pages to find information or sit back and feel a bit baffled by it all. The first chapter outlines what blogging is, how to fine tune your blogging angle and plan and other essentials. This section I found quite informative and very well written. If you have ever sat staring at an empty blog page, wondering what on Earth you are supposed to blog about, then this is where they will help.
The book then moves swiftly onto topics like: entering the blogosphere, choosing and hosting blog software, setting up your blog (this includes detailed instructions on choosing a platform like Wordpress or Blogger or Tumblr), finding your niche, creating great content and so on and so forth. I was disturbed to find that Mommyblogging was not only spelled as one word (aargh) but that it is classified as an actual topic. That could just be me hating that entire label and what it does to women bloggers who happen to write about parenthood.
It doesn't stop there. Blogging for Dummies goes into using social networking effectively - and this is a great section - as well as how to make money, how to blog for other businesses, and then an entire section dedicated to the power of tens. The latter is really an entire section with top ten lists in it. Very useful actually and very much worth reading.
I found this book to be informative, well laid out, clearly explained and packed with facts that really, every blogger should know. Ideal for the newbie and the intermediate blogger, Blogging for Dummies will take your site to the next level and make sure that you get to grips with this online phenomenon. And what's even cooler is that it is on sale on Amazon* at the moment. Brilliant.
This Spring, Magnum has joined forces with the UK’s fastest growing smartphone-based savings club, SHOP SCAN SAVE®. Together, they are offering the nation awell-deserved, springtime indulgence in the form of any free Magnum ice cream, yum!
The offer is available to the first 15,000 new consumers who download the free SHOP SCAN SAVE® app between 9 am on 16/04/2013 and 5pm on the 19/04/2013 so hurry and go now! The promotional code required upon registration for new members changes each day and can be found at the above link.
To claim your free Magnum, new users simply download the SHOP SCAN SAVE® app from the Google Play or Apple iTunes App store, register their details including the promotional code and head to their local Co-operative, Costcutter, Nisa, One Stop, Premier or Spar to collect their treat. The offer is redeemed via a single scan of the member’s barcode ID in the app and validated against the offer product, technology is amazing!
SHOP SCAN SAVE® is a free money saving app which enables consumers to save on a range of popular branded goods such as Activia, Actimel, Lurpak, Cravendale, Bacardi rum, Southern Comfort, Fairy and Lenor, across over 25,000 participating stores nationwide. SHOP SCAN SAVE® already has over 70,000 members, and can save members up to £300 on their shopping each year.
Have you ever looked at something that someone has given you with deep suspicion? This was me when I first received the TePe Angle kit for review. This extremely strange and alien looking product is a box with six, coloured, plastic sticks inside, at the end of each stick is a furry thingamajig that sticks out like an angry caterpillar. These, dear reader, are intended for your teeth…
You are, like me, probably wondering why caterpillars are needed for your teeth. Well, let me tell you. These are interdental brushes that have been designed for easy access and efficient cleaning between the teeth. These are the solution for those of you who just cannot get their heads around dental floss.
The pack contains different colours because each one is a different size. You start with the smallest one and work your way up the sizes to find the one that fits your teeth. You insert the brush between the teeth at the gum level and move it back and forth a few times. Don’t force the brush into anywhere or you can really damage yourself.
I really like the packaging. It is easy to open and you can reseal it so that your brushes stay safely stored. And that’s where the awesome ends. I managed to get my TePe brush in between maybe three teeth. The wire constantly bends and I had to keep straightening it with my fingers – not hygienic! That was the small sizes. The bigger sizes worked and didn’t bend as easily so they are the best of the bunch, but they were not a great fit and hurt a bit.
Then you rinse your TePe Angle under cold water and re-use it. None of them fit snugly between my teeth I’m afraid, but when I did get them to work, they were great. I’d give it a 7/10 for being effective with points coming off for difficulty initially but points regained for ease of use and the angled handle.
Use this Sportbaby promotional code to get cool sporty clothes for active kids. Sportbaby sells kids and baby swimwear, swim accessories, sun protection, outdoor and ski gear too. The offer is valid for all full priced items on the site.
Click here to use your Sportbaby promotional code
To use this promotional code on full price items from Sportbaby go to their website and select your items. After that go to the checkout to use your promotional code F&F10 and get your 10% off. I went to the Sportbaby site and select a Zoggs Neoprene Swim Jacket, a really cute little life jacket for the upcoming summer months. The swim jacket is £19.99 so when I put the code in and got my 10% off it became £18, lovely.
Sportbaby has specially selected high quality, competitively priced items from the most popular ranges of reputable brands. They have kid’s swimsuits, baby swimwear, buoyancy aids, goggles and swimcaps, sun hats and sunglasses from Zoggs, Splash About, Jakabel and Baby Banz. There are waterproof jackets, rain suits and fleeces, snowsuits, salopettes and ski jackets from Kozi Kidz, Hippychick, Trespass and Dare 2b.
For the budding young team supporters they also offer high quality, official England RFU and Premier League Football baby clothes for Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur fans.
Most parents really enjoy baking and cooking with their kids. There’s something very sweet about little hands covered in flour and a huge chocolately grin as they lick the spoon when everything is done. So when My 1st Years offered to send me a personalised apron for my daughter to review, I leapt at the chance.
You can choose from a range of different styles on the site, and these include parents so you can get a scrummy one as a gift for someone special in your family. The children’s aprons are available in blue or pink and have a different pattern on each. The pink has a candy stripe and the blue has yellow stars.
What’s really lovely about these aprons from My 1st Years is the price. You pay £14 for a personalised apron that comes with front and top ties, personalised name area and a front pocket. I think that’s good value for money.
So, what was the quality of the apron like? It arrived very quickly after ordering and came in a lovely presentation box and wrapped in tissue paper. My daughter unwrapped it with reverence and absolutely loved it on sight. The apron is well made with sturdy stitching for the seams and the ties – I have an apron that lost one of its ties in the wash! This will last you some time.
The fabric is surprisingly thin, though, and this did take me by surprise. I think it is because I am used to aprons made with very sturdy fabrics whereas this is light and thin. I don’t think this is a bad thing and it still keeps her nice and clean while whipping up a batch of fudge and it is 100% cotton, lovely.
You can choose the colour of the text for their name when you personalise it and it is completely free. I give this 9/10 and a Worth Every Penny award too.
Use these Ellos promotional codes to get awesome savings from Ellos this week. Ellos are having one day only sales so have a look at the list below to see when’s the best day for you to go get your bargain buy from Ellos. They’re offering 10-30% discounts and FREE gifts.
Click here to use your Ellos promotional codes*
To use these promotional codes on full price items from the Ellos ranges select your items and then go to the shopping basket page. There’s a box on the right that asks for your promotional code. Put in the relevant code and you’ll get your discount or free gift. Offers end at 12pm on the day they are valid so put them in your diary for the week and make sure you don’t miss out!
I recently got very lucky and managed to get a Skylanders toothbrush set for a measly £1.75. The set has a toothbrush with Gil Grunt on one and Spyro on the other and is an absolute win for parents who have kids that are Skylanders fans. This is one game that has gone absolutely stratospheric.
So, how do you review these, I hear you ask me? Well, we have used one of these toothbrushes for over a month now and so far it has proven to be very robust. It has withstood my daughter’s tendency to chew on the bristles while brushing her teeth without getting too damaged, and it hasn’t developed a serious case of sticky-outy-mad-bristle-syndrome either.
These Skylanders toothbrushes also feature a grip in the middle of the brush with easy hold rubber for little hands. The one has a bright orange easy hold area and the other has a black one. Both toothbrushes also feature coloured bristles for extra colour fun. They don’t do fancy colour changing features to let you know your toothbrush is about to die, they are way too cheap for that.
I bought my set at Game where they are currently having quite a big sale on cool Skylanders merchandise, but this is not showing online. You can also find them for £1 at some Poundland* stores or you can get them at Amazon* for just over £3.
The only thing that I find wrong with these Skylanders toothbrushes is that they are assuming all Skylanders fans are boys. Both the characters are male and there are absolutely no toothbrushes with female Skylander characters on them. This, I think, is a huge shame and drops the product points down substantially. It is time that manufacturers stopped marketing to boys exclusively when it comes to games. The score was 8/10 but now it is only 5.
Owning a video camera doesn’t mean you suddenly become brilliant at shooting home movies. Often the opposite is entirely true. There is camera shake, funny noises, blurred shots, a bit of a Blair Witch thing with random feet and noses, and the weather doesn’t help either. So, we went and asked around for some ideas on how to capture fantastic videos while out with your family and both Panasonic and the National Trust replied…
The weather has been, let’s face it, more than a little unpredictable lately. I would even go so far as to say that the weather, if likened to a mental state, has moved from strange to downright insane. So where can you go on a gloomy day?
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The Castle Bouncer with Slide from Smyths Toys was £274.99 but they’ve decided to take £100 off that price and it’s now £174.99. Just think, you can own your very own jumping castle for just £174.99!
Now I know £174.99 is still a lot of money but I do think this could save you quite a bit in the long run. I don’t know what it costs to hire a jumping castle but if you’re likely to use one on a regular basis then it has to be worth getting your own. They’re great to keep the kids entertained at any outdoor (or even indoor if you have enough space) event from Birthday parties to Sunday afternoon lunches.
The jumping castle sets up and packs away in minutes for hours of fun outdoors. It’s made from durable PVC and double laminated nylon which is double stitched for further protection if pinholes appear. Electric blower and ground pegs are included for outdoor use.
I would have died with excitement if my parents had told me I could have my very own jumping castle as a kid.
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