Guest post by Kizzy

If you are like me, just simply seeing a Gingerbread house signifies that Christmas is here! So if you fancy making your very  own Gingerbread house and even get your little ones involved too then why not watch the video below and make your own!

I always thought that it would be a really hard project to undertake with my children let alone on my own but after watching the full video, it seems to be a lot easier than I thought.

You can make the house as big as you want and decorate it in whatever sweets and icing you like. They make a great table centrepiece and  this could be something you take into consideration when decorating it to tie it in with the rest of your tableware.

The great thing about making a gingerbread house is it can be a great activity you do with your children. Other than the size of the panels of the house you don’t need to be that accurate and you can use whatever extra’s you want to add to your house. I love the welcome mat and the snowman that is used on the video!

So if you want to occupy your children for a few hours then why not have a go at making one of these super wintry gingerbread houses and let your imaginations run wild!

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Guest post by Kizzy

Photo by Stuart Miles

Christmas is such a hectic time that it can be hard to find time to look after you. What with all the present buying, wrapping and food preparation, our needs as a mum are always last on the list. So here is a guide to help you look amazing on Christmas day and still have time for everything else.

Before the big day arrives there are some tips you can do to ensure you and your skin are in tip top condition. During the winter months the central heating and cold winds will dry you skin out which can leave it sore and flaky. To compensate for this you will need to increase your water intake so your skin becomes less dehydrate and looks more radiant.

If you do find yourself with a bit of time before Christmas day, make the most of it by having a long soak in the bath, exfoliate your skin, give yourself a mini facial and thoroughly moisturise your body from top to toe! This way you will have less to worry about when time is getting short.

Shall I let you in on a little secret, dry shampoo? This should be in every mum’s bathroom cabinet. It is a fantastic product that will leave your hair looking just washed by simply spraying, massaging in and brushing through. Great for Christmas morning when you have been up since 5 with the children opening presents, need to get the turkey in the oven and still look a million dollars for all your family turning up in ten minutes!

Image by Ambro

Make up for the big day may also be important but if you only have 10 minutes you can still look fantastic. Firstly you need to prepare your skin to ensure your make up lasts all day. If you do have time to cleanse properly then do this but if not then wipe your face with a baby wipe and moisturise. The next step if you have it is to apply a primer. This will ensure that your foundation lasts all day and night leaving you with a perfect appearance you won’t need to worry about.

Next apply your foundation. A mineral foundation is ideal as it is quick to apply and will last if used with a primer. It gives an even coverage without clogging your skin and won’t rub off onto your outfit. Mascara is the next essential item. It helps to frame your eyes and make them appear wide open even if you’ve only had 3 hours sleep! Finally apply some lip gloss to give your face an instant lift and finish the look. Now you’re ready to face the day.

Image by Idea go

So the dinners cooked and everyone’s snoozing in the lounge and you are left to do the dishes, this doesn’t mean that you can’t still be treating your skin whilst being a domestic goddess. Apply your hand cream before putting on your marigolds and with the heat of the water, the moisturiser will penetrate deeper leaving your hands silky smooth and looking well looked after.

So I hope you enjoy your busiest day of the year and do get chance to have some time to yourself but if not you know no how to look your best in 10 minutes!

Photo by Stuart Miles

Christmas is an expensive time of year and especially so for many this Christmas. Therefore I thought I would share with you some of my frugal ideas to still make the festive period as magical as it should be without breaking the bank!

There are lots of ways of saving money and making things for Christmas and along with being frugal, it will give you some fun activities you can do with your children which will create great memories for them to look back on in years to come.

Cards and Wrapping Paper

I have decided this year that for family’s presents we are going to make our own wrapping paper! I know there are lots of stores selling cheap paper but I wanted to make our own as I thought not only is it cost effective, it will a nice activity to do with my little ones. So I have brought some parcel paper and will cut stars, angels and Christmas tree’s out of potatoes and stamped them in festive colours and maybe add some glitter too!

For the cards why not make some salt dough decorations which will hang on the front of folded piece of card. Salt dough is really easy to make and great to paint or simply glaze with PVA. You need 1 cup plain flour, ½ cup of salt, ½ cup of water. Mix it all together and roll out. Once you have cut them out bake them in the oven at 120C/240F for 2hrs. These are great for frugal decorations for your tree too!

There really aren’t that many ways to be frugal on what you spend on your children other than look out for offers on the items they want or use price comparison websites to check prices. But for family you can always make your own presents or recycle old items into new things. Old knitted jumpers can be turned into hot water bottle covers and mismatched tea sets can be made into a beautiful cake stands! Homemade biscuits and sweets are a lovely thoughtful gift and another activity your children can join in with. Another great gift idea is to fill a large jar with all the ingredients to make cookies, decorate the jar. Looks great and saves on time for you!

Decorations

Paper chains are easy to make and fun for your little ones to do. You can use coloured strips of paper or left over wrapping paper and glue to make the links. Pine cones edged in glue and glitter can make a great wintery table decoration when added to a candle and holly on a pretty plate.

Why not make your own stockings to hang on the fireplace? You can recycle worn out t shirts or old bed sheets by simply cutting out 2 stocking shape’s, sew or hot glue the two pieces together and decorate with glitter, glue and other crafty items you may have.

Food

If you are having family over for Christmas dinner, why not suggest everyone bringing a dish with them. It could be vegetables or a dessert, every little helps!  Buying own brand nibbles such as nuts and crisps will also save some money and if you have time, try popping into your local supermarket just before closing on Christmas Eve as they usually have some great reductions with the stores being shut for a few days.

So I hope these ideas and tips will help you save money and still enjoy the most wonderful time of the year!

A couple of weeks back we were sent an iHelicopter to review. The iHelicopter is an iPhone controlled helicopter, perfect for teenage stockings and dads. The guy in the video makes it look easy but actually the little blighter is really sensitive and it takes a while to master.

I have one iHelicopter to giveaway so if you know someone who’d love this then enter now!

How to Enter

1. Answer the following question in the comments. ‘The best christmas present I’ve ever had was …………..’
2. For a bonus entry retweet this competition

That’s it. A winner will be drawn at random on Wed 14th Dec 2011.

For more christmas gifts like this check out Paramaount Zone.

For worldwide buyers, you can purchase the “ihelicopter” for $60 at i-helicopters.net

We’ve been sent some fantastic things to try over the last couple of months that would make great christmas gifts, these have been two of my favourites!

For the kids

The playmobil zoo would make the perfect main present from Santa. Like all playmobil stuff it takes a while to set up but it really is worth the effort. What’s cool is that now we have quite a few sets all the stuff is interchangeable as it’s all set to the same scale. It’s like playmobil heaven here Oh, and you should totally add the meerkat rookery because it’s beyond cute and a bargain at just over a tenner!

For the stationery lover

I love stationery and when I was offered a Journal 10 I couldn’t resist. Each page is basically split into ten years. For each day you write a few lines, what you end up with is ten years of memories on each page, cool eh. Imagine reading that back. My plan is to starting writing our on the 1st January which means we’ll be done by the time Erin’s 16!

AN EARLY CHRISTMAS TREAT FOR MUMS AND DADS! WIN Christmas Gifts for your family, your friends and YOU!

www.SupportiveBusinessMums.co.uk has put together a fabulous online Christmas Gift Guide complete with ideal Christmas Gift Ideas for all the family, reviews and recommendations, great small gift business features and best of all… Christmas Gift Give Aways with gifts up to £100 each plus exclusive offers and discount codes! We are featured on here too!

Supportive Business Mums was founded by Ces Loftus, a designer, brand buzz creator and work from home mum. Ces says : “Christmas Shopping can be stressful as well as time consuming and costly. I have put together a great selection of ideal gift ideas, all from small businesses as opposed to the high street and offering some great discounts and special offers too. We have some awesome prizes up for grabs and all you have to do is visit the online features, click through to the sites you are interested in, then comment on the Christmas Guide Blog to say which products are on your Christmas Wish List! You double your chances of winning by sharing the Gift Guide page on twitter and facebook. An early Christmas treat ready to make your life easier and save you some money!”

Do you want to win a gorgeous gift for yourself and have gifts for family and friends sorted too?

Quick, get over to http://www.supportivebusinessmums.co.uk/christmas-gift-guide/ there are so many fabulous gifts including, clothes, shoes, bags, jewellery, bath and beauty products, pamper products, candles and homewares, art, personalised gifts, cards and paper, books, novelties, stocking fillers and toys to be won!

If you have a small business selling products suitable for Christmas Gifts and would like a free feature on our guide then contact Ces Loftus by email at ces@creativelyminded.co.uk

NOW GO and WIN yourself something fabulous! Good Luck Everyone!

http://www.supportivebusinessmums.co.uk/christmas-gift-guide/

So after a trip to A & E the snow came.. We reckon we had a couple of foot or so fall over the week, school was off last day of term so what else to do but make snowmen. This is a picture of Erin in our front garden at about 3pm, I had to lighten the picture it was so dark!

Christmas Eve

We had a quiet morning then we baked heart shaped cakes for Santa using the cooking set sent to us by the kids cooking company, silicon baking trays are the way forward! Erin loved her new bowl and spoon sent by the elves

Before bed I warned my Mum who has a habit of tearing around the house in the wee hours shouting “Santa’s been” (only at Christmas you understand) that she wasn’t to wake us before seven, I didn’t mind anything after six but I wanted to make sure there would be no 4am wake up ‘calls’.

Christmas Morning

I heard mum sticking the kettle on, I glanced up bleary eyed to see the alarm clock reading 4.40am, I hid under the covers and feared the worst. As it happened I’d barely slept anyway, the excitement had triggered my crohns and I’d spent all night in pain. I gave into the cramps at 6.30am and mum woke Erin, who in turn woke us. We crept downstairs to find a a few crumbs and an empty cup where the milk and heart shaped bun had been. Santa left us lots of goodies including a bike and all the toy story characters.

We cleared the carnage and had a lovely dinner of asparagus and parma ham, traditional dinner but with chicken instead of turkey and ‘welsh’ gravy followed by chocolate souffle and ice cream.

Erin hasn’t stopped wearing her bike helmet and Jesse (from Toy Story 2) was promoted to her bed

A second christmas with Alex’ family awaits us on the 27th.

Merry Christmas all!

6. Griffin MyPhones

We were sent a pair of these to trial. MyPhones are designed for kids 3-8 yrs old, special care has been taken on the comfort and safety of MyPhones – they cap the volume at 85 decibels which is the safe level for children. I was really impressed with the packaging and design, you can change the colour of the ear casing and they arrive in a little carry case. Erin loves them, she mostly uses them for the laptop games but I think Santa might be bringing a cheap cd player for christmas

7. Jamie Magazine Subscription

Love the Jamie magazine (I’ve asked for it myself!). It’s bi-monthly which seems to ensure the quality, the recipes aren’t regurgitated and there are feature length articles on various food related topics. I particularly like the non glossy feel of the pages, it’s almost like a paperback book. I never keep food magazines but these have pride of place on my shelf

8. Samsung MP3

I want one! That is all

9. Joe Browns

So many cool clothes, not sure if they have bricks and mortar stores, but I have the catalogue

10. Snow White on DVD

I woke up to the tuneful singing of Snow White the other morning and remembered just how good it was. They’ve done some of their techy magic with this and released it on blu-ray ready for christmas. Worth a look if you fancy going retro (ps we were sent a copy for free, not bragging, just letting you know for disclosure an’ aw that)

I’ve been sent the Wiki Digital Camera to trial. I’m a big fan of my flip video camera which I received for my birthday and this is a very similar product. The Wiki is a lightweight portable digital camera that has the software required to download videos built-in. The main advantages to owning one of these is their ease of use, a monkey could learn how to use it, and also its portability.

At ?59.99 the Wiki is around ?20 cheaper than a standard Flip and that difference is reflected in the quality. The sharpness of picture that you get with a Flip is not there with the Wiki. Having said that I think a Wiki is a perfectly good gift for a teenager or a blogger who’s just starting out doing videos. I plan to give this wiki away to a lucky reader soon so stay tuned for that.

Here are a few other things I’d like from ‘I Want One of Those‘

1. A Tuckshop Sweet Box

2. An Undercover Laptop Bag “I’m mummy. Little Mummy”

3. A Giant Cupcake Tin – but I’d give it to the blogging baker Englishmum

1. Whisky Beer

Whisky Beer or Ale is something we stumbled across when we were shopping at Ocean Terminal, that’s where the Royal Yacht Britannia is moored by the way. There’s a specialist whisky shop with a very passionate employee who was more than happy to show us everything in the shop which is when we found out about whisky beer, it’s essentially beer that is conditioned in oak casks so the beer takes on the unique flavour of that particular whisky.

Here’s more from the website where you can buy it;

How appropriate that Tullibardine should produce a Whisky Ale. The Distillery sits on the site of Scotland’s first ever brewery, a purveyor of fine ales enjoying the royal patronage of King James IV after his coronation in 1488.

This remarkable Blackford 1488 Whisky Ale is brewed with the pure crystal spring water and malted barley used in the distillation process. It is conditioned in individually numbered oak casks which have been used in the maturation of the majestic Tullibardine single malt Scotch whisky, its distinctive character beautifully balanced by the lightness of touch so familiar to Tullibardine connoisseurs the world over.

2. Toy Story Mania for the Wii

We were given a complementary copy of this and really enjoyed it, be warned it’s highly addictive. It’s one of the best kids computer games I’ve played, based on the ride in Disneyworld you face a number of challenges including bursting balloons and saving aliens. The whole family can enjoy this one and it’s only ?17 or so on Amazon.

3. Beatles Rock Band

I think we’re going to buy this between us. I saw it all set up in HMV and it looked like a lot of fun, we may buy the standard version though which is cheaper than the Beatles version.

4. Oban Tweed Ness

Finally, a fashionable way for women to wear tartan. The range includes outfits, hats, scarves and purses. The vibrant colours and excellent design will make this a successful Scottish brand.

5. Keep Calm and Carry On
During 1939 when the war with Germany was impending the Ministry of Information printed a number of posters urging people to “Keep Calm and Carry On”. The posters were never officially issued and thus widely unseen by the British public, until now.

I love the slogan’s simplicity, it’s become a bit of a family motto and the poster is now framed and hangs proudly at the front entrance of our house. If I get stressed or worried (which is really bad for kicking off my crohns) I sometimes go to the poster and remind myself to “Keep Calm and Carry On”

I’m hooked now and want the hoody, the mug, the….. I’ll need to get started on my christmas list.