Valentine's Day is a perfect occasion for cooks and food producers to really go to town and create some lovely products. The heart is a very easy shape to make and can be used to make a whole range of foods romantic and special. You don't have to spend a fortune, a few simple tricks and treats and you can have special Valentine's goodies for pennies.


It's easy to make a heart if you don't have one. Take some strong card - thicker than a cereal box is best - and cut a strip about 3cm tall. The length will decide how big your heart is, so experiment until you're happy with it. Fold your card in half and then fasten the open end together with tape.
 

If you want it bigger then fasten 2 pieces of card together and tape both ends. Then push one end inwards to make a heart that you can draw around or cut around. If you use food safe card (from inside a bread roll bag for example) you can even press out heart shapes from bread, pastry, fresh lasagne sheets or a multitude of other things.



Duerr's have released a special Aphrodisiac Jam for Valentine's Day this year - Strawberries and Champagne with a hint of Horny Goatweed, it's gorgeous, and lovely on a shaped sandwich or toast....
 

.....or pancakes with whipped cream for a very sweet and special Valentine's breakfast, lunch or evening supper. I'm not going to comment on the potency, but I'll tell you that the taste is great....


Heart-shaped moulds can be picked up really cheaply, we got ours free with a magazine that was £2 and chocolate is a definite win for Valentine's Day. We made it extra soppy by adding heart-shaped cake decorations. I bought a bag of thousands from ebay for less than £2.


The effect is one my assistant and I are very pleased with....


You can't mention Love Hearts without thinking of Swizzels Matlow sweets and this year there are a range of special releases for Valentine's Day. The embossed tin full of mini Love Hearts is my favourite, and they also have a selection of gifts that can be personalised on their website if you're quick! It's a great way to say "I love you" without breaking the bank.



If your loved one is unable to eat foods containing wheat or dairy, then another treat for them are these gluten and dairy free Shortbread Hearts from Orgran. We tried them at our bloggers night in last year. They're also vegetarian and despite being made without butter, the taste is gorgeous. They're a little hard for me, so perfect for dunking in a nice cup of coffee while you relax and let someone else tidy up after dinner....


 I hope you have a Happy Valentine's....

I've been tagged by Eileen from ET Speaks From Home to give you my Desert Island Disc selection. It's a fantastic meme and I'm delighted to take part. Anything that has me looking up my favourite songs is a win. Eileen is a not-so-secret party animal - you can check out her selection here....

I have to choose 10 songs (very hard), one book and one luxury.

The Verve - Bitter Sweet Symphony. It'd be perfect. You wouldn't need money, and you'd have all the time in the world to relax and sit around enjoying the sun and the sand and the sea, and you'd just want to leave. Definitely bitter-sweet.

Bjork - Hyperballad. Because it's beautiful. It's about those things we do that no-one knows about, that keep us going, keep us sane. And it'd remind me to tidy up a bit.


The Smiths - How Soon Is Now? Because it is, in my opinion, THE best song ever, with that amazing riff and the lyrics. When I was an angst-ridden teen I'd sing/sob my heart out to this song.

"There's a club if you'd like to go, you could meet somebody who really loves you.
So you go and you stand on your own, and you leave on your own,
And you go home, and you cry and you want to die".

And then, when I was 33, I was in a VW Campervan club, and I met someone who really loves me. So ha!

The Beach Boys - Good Vibrations. Because it's entirely The Beach Boys and it'd be a perfect soundtrack to an evening sat alone watching the waves. And for when he sings that first note - it sends a shiver down my spine.
Placebo - Pure Morning. I love this song so much. It'd be my waking up and getting going music. And probably because of the sex - or serious lack of it on your own on an island.


Cud - I've Had It With Blondes. A record I love and which takes me back to my student days. It has the fantastic couplet:

I was a teenage stamp collector,
I'd lay on my back and you'd stamp on my face

The use of the word 'expectorate' and the immortal line "Things get worse when you get older". And it's great.

The Pixies - Where Is My Mind. You'd go crazy on your own on that island. At least this way you would be okay about it....


James - Laid. It was really hard to choose a track from James, because I have so many favourites. I went with this one because I'd be singing the last 2 lines in my head all the time...

"You're driving me crazy,
When are you coming home?"

Echo And The Bunnymen - Ocean Rain. I was besotted by The Bunnymen when I was a teenager. At 15 I saved up all my money for 6 months to go and see them and buy every t-shirt. Ocean Rain is a gorgeous song, it would be so apt, and so soothing.


Snow Patrol featuring Martha wainwright - Set The Fire To The Third Bar. I am after all, a girl. And before I moved to Manchester I spent 18 months living 80 miles away from my partner. The lyrics say everything.


There's a theory that you set your musical taste quite young, and when all those psychological and physiological changes are going on in your head and body, something about music generally gets stuck. Although I love a good modern tune, as soon as I started doing this I became transfixed with a ten year period and had to force myself to move, so I guess in my case at least, it's true.

My book would be something to write in. I have a good memory and I've read a lot of books, I'd be able to entertain myself better with a notebook. I'd be able to keep track of time and I think I really would go insane if I couldn't take note of everything that happened.

My luxury would be a satellite phone - I'm not staying!


Thank you to Eileen for tagging me, it was fantastic fun listening to hundreds of songs and trying to choose only 10!

The set is amazing, opening the box is like opening a treasure chest of yuck. There are goo and snot and squished insects, cockroaches and eyeballs, and a really good booklet detailing how to perform around 50 tricks.


My no.3 son is only 5 and the recommended age range is 8+, but he was absolutely enthralled with this set, so we let him and his 16 year old brother review it. They really couldn't wait to get started, and within 20 minutes had mastered their first couple of tricks.


The tricks range from very easy through to those that really will take a bit of practice and dedication, but there is masses for a complete novice to have a go at straight out of the box.

After a bit of practice my 5 year old wanted to show off his new skills - so here's just a small sample of the set in action!

We're really impressed with this set because there is so much there! The props and tricks are great and it is lovely that you can get started straightaway as well as build your skills and try some of the far more difficult tricks.

Reading Eggs is an online programme that helps teach your children to read. It starts with letter recognition, and moves on through progressively harder levels covering techniques for reading and writing - understanding different letter sounds, how letters change when grouped together, tricky words etc. It is aimed at children from 3-13, so has a huge range and suits any ability.

We've been using Reading Eggs for a little while now, and the boys love it, so when they asked me if I wanted to publish a review, I was more than happy.


In total there are 120 Learn-to-read lessons and 96 spelling lessons in Reading Eggs, but there's plenty more besides. There is also a Mathseeds programme for younger children  and once your child has completed the Reading Eggs lessons they can move on to Reading Eggspress, designed for children 7-13. The 4th part is the Library, with thousands of books to suit any age group from 5+. Golden Eggs and trading cards are collected for completing games and challenges and reading books.



My younger boys are 5yrs4mths and 3yrs10mths, so they're both beginning to learn to read. Our 5 year old is beginning to put together tricky words, and our 3 year old is still learning letters.


Children start off with a Playroom with interactive objects leading to games and activities, and a Music Cafe where they can watch and learn short animated songs and rhymes which teach different rules and oddities of reading.






I'm delighted to be able to offer my readers an extended 4 weeks free trial of Reading Eggs by following the instructions below. You don't need to add any payment details, and you won't be charged if you decide not to continue.

• Visit www.readingeggs.co.uk and click on the ‘Parents Click here’ button

• Register your email address and create a password
• Activate your account and add your child
• Once set up is complete add your promotional code UKB26RET in the ‘Have a promo code?’ box located on your parent dashboard and click ‘redeem’

Click on ‘Start Reading’ to begin your learning journey with your 4 week free trial. 

Hopefully you'll enjoy it as much as we do and your children can benefit from learning while they have fun too!

The people at Carcraft have challenged bloggers to come up with an action scene using Lego and Carcraft will choose a winner from the entrants to win a £100 Lego set! We were sent the Lego City High Speed Police Chase 60042 to create our story...


Okay, I admit it, my other half took over and made this with a little help (hindrance) from the children! He's a bit more graphically talented than I am - plus he really wanted to do it, so I let him! The entire comic strip was made using just the 110 pieces in the High Speed Police Chase set, which has a suggested age range of 5+ and was absolutely no challenge for our 5 year old. We even let him put the stickers on himself...

I've missed the previous events at the Imperial War Museum North in Manchester because I've had other commitments, so it was lovely to be able to attend today for what must be the best ever - their programme for the February 2014 half term - Spies, Disguise and Ways to Hide.

As soon as I started reading the list of  activities my 5 year old was enthralled. He got a Spy Pen for Christmas and he's been really interested in what spies do. Animals On A Mission, Spy Binocular Crafting and Gadgets And Disguise are right up his street.

So today we went out! Yeeeay!! It's been ages. It's over 2 weeks since I had my leg operation and so far I've only managed the school run 3 times, my outside world experience has been limited to that and the gorgeous Sim's birthday party.

The Imperial War Museum North is located between Manchester and Salford, near the Trafford Centre. It's right by both the BBC Media City and the studios where they film Coronation Street. It was a gloriously cold and fresh morning and a rare blue Manchester skyline.

ITV's Coronation Street in front and over the water on the right the BBC

We were taken into the Learning Studio where we started our day with Animals On a Mission. Using puppets and pictures we were shown some of the animals who were employed to carry secret messages during the war. My boys were fascinated! It was lovely to see that it was fully interactive and all of the children got to answer questions and lots got to 'look after' the animal puppets. The storyteller was brilliant, kept it short and sweet, and held the attention of most of the children, even the little ones.


Spy Binocular Crafting was next. Fantastic Baker Ross cardboard binoculars with real magnifying lenses! The children drew their own designs and then we formed the binoculars in seconds. They're brilliant, the boys carried them about and inspected everything all day...


Gadgets and Disguise! My 5 year old loved it! The 3 year old went off to play with the huge stack of toys and the den that had been built for the children.


This is my favourite photo of the day. One of the Thompson Twins spying on someone disguised as Ricky Tomlinson....


One of my children didn't want to dress up....the one on the left in case you weren't certain....


Next we were allowed to get 'hands on' with some of the objects in the museum. The rangefinder was fascinating for my 5 year old.


The periscope was his favourite though. He has a plastic periscope of his own, so to see how heavy a real metal one was, and how tiny the sight was a real revelation to him.


Then we were let loose to explore the museum. There are some amazing exhibits, notably for us at least, the actual war-battered tank and Harrier Jump Jet...and the cannon, which my 5 year old remembered from the storytelling was drawn by 6 horses.


The large exhibition space is  also where the Big Picture Show takes place. The lights go dim and a soundtrack fills the room. Several different films that work together are projected all around on the walls, so wherever you are, you are able to watch. We watched the Horrible Histories®: Rotten Rationing Big Picture Show and it was brilliant. The boys were stunned, but not at all scared.


The Rotten Rationing Big Picture Show lasts around 7 minutes and we were told all about rationing in simple language and with fantastic animation and pictures. They couldn't make 'Imitation Banana' sound good though....



The Imperial War Museum North houses plenty of reminders that Britain has been at war constantly with someone since 1962 - and if you include the Cold War, far longer than that..

A huge section of steel recovered from the World Trade Centre

Before we left we had to visit the Air Shard - passing the Learning Studio which I was delighted to see had been opened up by opening several double doors and was now full of families and children playing. Rise 100ft in the air by lift or steps (who'd be that mad!?) and look out over Salford and Manchester. It's a great view and not to be missed, designed with no solid walls or floors, almost entirely from mesh, so it can be a bit disturbing - especially on a windy day like today.


You can see for miles.....really....


Up and down!


The Imperial War Museum is free to visit although some extra activities can carry a small charge. The large car park is pay and display. It is open daily from 10-5 except 24, 25 and 26 December. Going to the top of The Air Shard costs £1.20 for adults and 60p for children.

A while ago, as part of our role as Toadstool Toy Testers, we reviewed the fabulous Wonderworld Recycling Game. Suitable for children from around 2+, it's a really simple game where you travel around the board collecting all the different types of recycling from the houses.


It's brilliant for early numeracy skills, learning to play games, learning how to use dice, and learning about the world around us and what different materials things are made from.

What makes this game so special is the quality, it has real little houses and cars that drive and my youngest son plays with it as a 'street and vehicles' as much as he plays the game itself. It's a really beautiful game and makes an excellent gift. You can see our full review here...


The Toadstool Toy Shop is an online independent toy shop and sell all kinds of fabulous toys which can be tricky to find in the big chains. They kindly offered a copy of the Wonderworld Recycling Game for one of my readers - that giveaway is now over.

Terms and conditions - UK entry only. This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with Blogger. We hereby release Blogger of any liability. Winner(s) will be contacted by email within 48 hours after the giveaway ends, if the winner does not respond within 7 days The Toadstool reserves the right to choose another. The prize is one copy of the Wonderworld Recycling Game to be supplied by The Toadstool. In the unlikely instance that the prize becomes unavailable, The Toadstool reserves the right to substitute for something of equal or greater value. If you have any additional questions - feel free to send an email to thebrickcastle@gmail.com or onfo@thetoadstool.co.uk. Additional terms and conditions are shown on the rafflecopter. The competition ended at midnight 26th February 2014.