Cleo is  released on DVD and Digital Download this weekend. Based on 'The Dog Who Stopped The War', the story focusses on a group of children living in a village in Canada. Snowy mountain ranges and beautiful scenery surround them as they play.

If you were expecting a cute tale about a fluffy dog named Cleo then think again. Okay, the eponymous dog might well be huge, fluffy and cute, and the movie might be full of laughs and jokes, but this is also a genuine 'coming of age' tale which covers some serious ground.


Over the school holidays the children's play gets a little competitive, they split into two groups and they take a snowball fight to it's limits, one side building the most amazing snow fortress you could imagine. As they progress through the holidays they continue the battle, led by their two leaders General Luc and Marc. Cleo is Marc's dog.

It's Pancake Day! Hurrah! And every year I stand in front of my oven for far too long cooking a mountain of pancakes for my large family, and at the end when everyone is full and the last orange has been squeezed and the chocolate sauce wiped away, we say "we should do that more often".

The UK is rare in that we eat pancakes, or crepes, but the majority of us only on one day a year. Pancakes can be part of a healthy varied diet, they're an excellent carbohydrate base and you can top them with pretty much anything you want.

The Bratz Dolls are back this Spring with 'Super Styles And Sounds', 3 different ranges with a very 'pop' feel to them! Bratz Remix, Selfie Snaps and Festival Vibes feature the regular Bratz characters (Cloe, Jade, Yasmin, Sasha and Raya) in their usual over-the-top bright and colourful style.

Over the weekend we spent a lot of time on the sofa watching movies, and one of them was Girlz 4 Life, the new DVD from LEGO Friends. We've watched quite a lot of LEGO movies over the years, and they're always pretty watchable for the whole family, with the occasional joke for the adults thrown in.


In Girlz 4 Life the LEGO Friends (featuring the regular characters - Olivia, Stephanie, Emma, Mia and Andrea) are doing well and have a great new song 'Girlz' ready to earn them fame and fortune.

A famous pop star called Livi comes to stay in Heartlake City and her manager hears Girlz. she knows that Livi will do very well with it and steals it, saying she wrote it herself. Livi's version of Girlz soars into the charts and she becomes even more famous, leaving the LEGO Friends cheated. They need to let everyone know that it's their song, they want to get it back, and they turn to Livi herself for help.

My partner and I have always marked Valentine's Day. With our large family and a lack of local relatives I actually don't think we've been out together for Valentine's Day since 2008, but we have had some lovely candlelit meals alone in the kitchen. We swap cards and small gifts and that's been our limit until now...

This year I've been asked by several companies if I wanted to have a look at their products for Valentine's Day. I felt like spoiling myself and my partner, so I picked the ones I liked and said yes. I just hope he doesn't actually read this...

Snapfish asked if I wanted to look at their personalised gifts, so I made a card for my partner and a photo mug with a nice picture of me on it. My partner saw I was making him one and he made one for me too, proving he really is just as romantic as I suspected...

When I was offered the chance to review a brand new collectible children's toy that is sticky, horrible, and called Fungus Amungus, I just knew my 2 little boys would love it. We were sent our parcel covered in yellow and black striped 'CAUTION' tape, and inside was all the protective equipment necessary to open the parcel and examine the contents.

I'm pleased to say that this year we've been chosen by Wilko to be Wild Bird Bloggers. We're really lucky in that we have a quite large garden, and although we're in a town, we have countryside very nearby. We have a lot of birds who visit and live in our garden.


Wilko sent me a multi-purpose nesting box, a wooden bird table, a cage seed feeder and a bag of wild bird seed mix. When the boys came home from school they were genuinely excited and had a lot of questions about where we were going to put everything.

Cleaning isn't the most glamorous of jobs, and it gets in the way of the fun stuff, so anything that makes household jobs easier is brilliant in my book. Dr Beckmann have a long history of making cleaning easier and giving us back some of our precious time.


I've been sent a bundle of Dr Beckmann products to try out, including Stain Devils and Glowhite Ultra for my laundry - both of which have been in my cupboard now for the last 25 years and have been essential since I had children. I haven't tried the Colour & Dirt Collector yet, but as my eldest has recently started manual work and comes home looking like he's been down a pit all day it'll come in very useful for his overalls!

Cardooo make greeting cards that are far more than just a card. The cards include puzzles, colouring, stickers and stories and even games, and are a gift all by themselves - and yet they still only cost £3 each. 


I've been sent a few cards that I can use for birthdays this Spring and I'm really impressed. Considering you can easily pay £2 for any old birthday card, the added value is massive.

For over 25 years Goodlife Foods have been providing the UK with good wholesome dishes that make mealtime easy and are full of tasty flavours. They don't resort to massively processed ingredients and the protein comes mainly from beans and cheeses.This is not 'meat substitute', this is good food that happens to be vegetarian.