When Carcraft said they wanted Bloggers to go to the Legoland Discovery Centre and build cars it was almost too good to be true. It meant I had a genuine excuse for going and playing with Lego with the little boys while my partner took his daughter clothes and Christmas present shopping. Unbelievably on this occasion we all thought we had the better end of the bargain!

They've revamped a lot since we last went, when it was looking a bit well-used. One of the first things was a green screen photo as you go in, which places you in a hot air balloon. You'll have to excuse the lack of photo's as I'm still on crutches, and wrangling 2 small boys was all I could manage at this point!


The lovely trees and decorations continued throughout, even a small tree and garlands in the film room while we waited for the Factory Tour. Now, I've seen the Factory Tour a few times and it's not so exciting for me, but the boys still love it, however I was in for a treat. Clearly whoever was meant to be doing the tour wasn't available and the poor man who had been sent to replace them wasn't really sure of his lines. He referred to most things as "erm, erm, a blue box" or "ahhhhhh, a red box". How he stayed in character throughout and managed to stop himself from actually laughing was a miracle. He gave it his best effort and was brilliant with the children.



 










Legoland Discovery Centre currently (10/12/13) costs £16.50 per person if you pay on the door, which is the expensive way to do it, but it's only £12 if you buy online in advance. An annual pass is only £25 and includes a free ticket to Legoland Windsor, so if you plan to return it's well worth getting. You can also visit with Clubcard Vouchers and Merlin Passes and other special deals are available.

 









Ingredients

• 350g/12oz plain flour, plus extra for rolling out
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 2 tsp ground ginger
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 125g/4½oz butter
• 175g/6oz light soft brown sugar
• 1 free-range egg
• 4 tbsp golden syrup

Method

Sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda, ginger and cinnamon.
Add the butter and rub together or blend in a food processor until the mix looks like breadcrumbs.
Stir in the sugar.
Lightly beat the egg and golden syrup together, add to the flour/sugar mix and beat with a wooden spoon or food processor until the mixture clumps together.
Tip the dough out, knead briefly until smooth, wrap in clingfim and leave to chill in the fridge for 15 minutes.


It's important to allow the dough time to rest and you will find it much less sticky and far easier to work with.

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Line two baking trays with greaseproof paper

Roll the dough out to a 0.5cm/¼in thickness on a lightly floured surface.
Cut out the shapes and place on the baking tray, leaving a gap between them.


Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until lightly golden-brown. Leave on the tray for 10 minutes and then move to a wire rack to finish cooling. Be really careful because it will be very soft and bendy and easily broken when it's still warm.

Only once completely cool can you decorate and make your chosen creation. My 3 year old was VERY helpful with the faces...














Just for fun Sykes Holiday Cottages decided to try and find out how much it would cost and what you would need to build a lifesize Gingerbread House - the infographic below shows the results -a fairly reasonable £66, 037.05....I'll take 2....

Everyone knows that Christmas is the time of festive good cheer, but what if you don't want to drink alcohol? It doesn't mean that you can't enjoy a drink with everyone else and have something special. So here a few ideas for non-alcoholic drinks that mean you can join in the fun.

For our Bloggers Night In we were sent some lovely bottles of Eisberg Alcohol-Free wine, which is ideal for anyone who isn't having alcoholic beverages. We used it first to toast, and it had a lovely fresh fruity taste which was really indistiguishable from regular wine.


Later in the evening we all moved on to cocktails, and the people at Funkin had sent us some Bellini and Mojito cocktail mix pouches and boxes. Because they contain no alcohol it was perfect to mix with the Eisberg White Wine and no-one was left drinking boring old cola or lemonade all night.




Full of some amazing juices that are perfect for revitalising your body when you've overdone it over Christmas, these can also be let down with lemonade or mixed with Eisberg wine to make a drink that's perfect for a party. It's worth pointing out that I don't have a juicer - a hand blender will do the job, it'll just be a little thicker.

My household are all suffering with seasonal coughs and colds, so it's a perfect time to grab some vitamins.



Ingredients
1/2 pomegranate, seeds only
1 mango, pitted, peeled and roughly chopped
1 orange, zest and a little pith removed, deseeded and roughly chopped

Method
Reserve 1 tablespoon of the pomegranate seeds, whizz the rest in a blender until combined and pour into a glass.
Put the mango and orange in the blender and whizz until smooth.
Pour on top of the pomegranate juice, sprinkle with the reserved pomegranate seeds and serve.



Ingredients
2 clementines, zest and a little pith removed
1 mango, pitted and peeled
2 apples, halved
small handful of crushed ice to serve
chilled water to taste
1 tsp clear honey

Method
Feed the clementines, mango and apples through a juicer.
Half fill a glass with ice (if you wish).
Pour in the juice and top up with water to taste, stir in the honey and serve immediately.


This year, for the 3rd year running, Eisberg Alcohol free wine will be taking a tour of Morrisons stores near you with British Liver Trust's upcoming Love Your Liver campaign. They are encouraging people to take the three step challenge:

If you want to test your own liver health, you can try their first ever online liver health checker here.

The Juice Bar is published by Parragon Books with an RRP of £10 and is currently available for £3.99 plus postage from Amazon
Funkin Cocktails are available online, prices start at £2.99 for a 7 serving box
Eisberg Wine retails at around £3.49 per bottle and is available from Morrisons, Waitrose, Asda, Nisa Local, Londis, Budgens, Spar, Ocado, Bargain Booze, Slurp.co.uk
I was sent the above items to review.

I've used phone cases and screen protectors with all of my phones. I even bought a waterproof rubber bag for my previous phone and that saved it from a couple of drenchings, but they don't last very long and they look ugly, they're not very good for keeping your phone in your pocket either because they're so huge.

I was sent a frē Lifeproof case for my Samsung Galaxy S3 - and I was really intrigued to see how well it performed as it claims to be able to withstand a 2 metre drop and be fully waterproof. The spec is amazing, it meets military standards and should be okay underwater to 2m for an hour. The phones are "waterproof, dirtproof, snowproof, shockproof".

Without any case/with the Lifeproof case

The case makes some bold claims. I'm not willing to try dropping it 2m on purpose, but I have dropped it 1 metre by accident twice now and there's not a mark on the phone or the case. I was however willing to take it into the water.

The information leaflet describes a test before planned submersion and while I wasn't actually going to take any underwater shots, I was going to take photo's while in a pool, so we tested it.

Before submersion

30 minutes underwater

Completely dry!

The clarity is perfect. The water was very warm and the day very cold, so there was a lot of steam, but none whatsoever in my phone case and no condensation anywhere. I took this photo after being in the water for easily 20 minutes.

Having 7 children I'm well aware of the speed and precision with which they can break things. We're currently awaiting the arrival of 3 new phones to replace broken ones for the teenagers. My youngest son is fascinated by phones and it's a special treat for him to be able to play with mine. At 3 he tries to be careful, but then he sees something shiny or puts it down on the table with enough force to throw it across the room. I think a case is really essential with small children.

Lifeproof commissioned a study of 2000 parents and found that more than half allowed children aged 3 or younger to use their phone or tablet, with one third remarking that their child is increasingly interested in using technology so they can 'be like Mum and Dad'. 6 in 10 parents say they let their children use their tablets and phones as a reward for good behaviour like I do and the price we pay is an average £110 fixing broken gadgets. The most common cause of damage is dropping, and spillages are seen as an everyday occurrence. 

Lifeproof have attempted to help parents with this - the MD said:

 “Let’s face it broken gadgets are a sure fire way to put an end to family harmony! We know that things don’t always run smoothly, and that’s why we’ve developed a range of everyday cases for smartphones and tablets that are water proof, dirt proof, snow proof and shock proof, allowing even the very youngest users to take devices anywhere and everywhere – while adding a little peace of mind to parents.

I do have one gripe with the phone case, and that is that it gets in the way when I charge my phone. It's impossible to use a cranked charger, and a standard UK phone charger only just goes into the phone enough to charge it, so a couple of mornings I've woken up to find my phone battery almost flat, but it's only a minor gripe and possibly the original Samsung charger has a different shaped plug at the end which is a better fit - but I can't find mine!

Overall I'm incredibly impressed. The cases are not cheap, but they're a lot cheaper than a new phone and less than a lot of insurance excess payments. Mine has performed briliantly, there's no loss of control and it seems to do everything it claims to do. I would heartily recommend Lifeproof cases to protect your valuables.

They have a really soft fleecy lining inside, so they're lovely to wear and very comfortable. They perform very well and are much warmer than tights of a similar thickness, and less bulky than woolly tights. They're also more user-friendly. We've washed them twice now and they dry much more quickly and can be machine washed without any danger of them shrinking or stretching. They're unlikely to snag and won't ladder like tights do. I'm impressed with how well they've kept their shape - even after a day at school and a few miles walking the knees aren't saggy at all.

We're impressed with Heat Holders and there are going to be some matching socks in her Christmas parcel this year...

Heat Holders Leggings are available in Small, Medium, Large and Extra Large, and in 3 colours - black, blue and plum. They have an RRP of £8 and a Tog Rating of 0.63

 

Win a Christmas supply of toilet tissue for your family courtesy of longer lasting(i) Andrex®

Looking after the family can often mean mums and dads are left doing all the little things that go unnoticed in the home, such as changing the empty toilet roll tube, especially when guests are around over Christmas.
These tasks can sometimes seem thankless but to help ease the burden of changing an empty roll, the nation’s favourite toilet tissue, Andrex®, has reinvigorated its Classic White product and made each sheet of toilet tissue significantly stronger. This means each roll lasts even longer than before, so mums and dads can spend less time changing the toilet roll and spend more quality time with their loved ones over the Christmas break.



a Rafflecopter giveaway
(i) Vs. previous Andrex® Classic White

Additional Terms and Conditions to those shown in the Rafflecopter:-
1.       One winner will be selected at random from all correct entries after the closing date 16/12/2013.
2.       The prize will be delivered by courier before Christmas (25/12/13).
3.       The prize is 5 x 16-roll packs of Andrex® Classic White toilet tissue
4.       There will be no cash alternative and prizes are not transferable.
5.       UK entrants Only.