This Father’s Day Egmont Books have treated the Dad of our house to some of their great new Star Wars mini-build books. They are exactly the type of the kind of gift he would buy for the boys – partly because he wanted to have a play and a look at them himself…


We've been sent Star Wars: Battle Stations: Activity Book and AT-AT Model and Smuggler's Starship: Activity Book and Millennium Falcon Model. We chose to give my partner the Battle Stations AT-AT model book for his birthday a couple of weeks ago, and we will be giving him the Smuggler's Starship Millennium Falcon book on Father's Day this Sunday.

Heck are well known mainly for their incredibly special meat sausages, so it was a real surprise to me to discover they have launched a vegetarian range. Knowing how much care and effort Heck take over their meat products, and their reputation for real food with excellent quality ingredients, it was something I was very excited to try, as were my family - veggie and non-veggie.


There are 3 products in the Heck Meat-Free Vegetarian range:

Super Greens - Veggie meatballs made from made from quinoa, spinach, kale and ginger.

Nuts About Cheese - Veggie sausages made from cashews, two cheeses, flax and chia seeds, and a dash of chilli.

Gourmet Goat's Cheese - Veggie burgers made from quinoa, goat's cheese and caramelised onions.

Regular readers may remember I don't really enjoy cooked cheese, so for reasons of fairness the rest of my family insisted they also sampled the products.


Heck Super Greens are the only one of the 3 products that are vegan. 9 balls in a pack with an rrp of £3. They have a quite solid consistency and are quite dense, and drier when raw than I anticipated.

Very similar in texture, shape and size to Falafel, they are mainly chick pea and quinoa, but the taste is very different indeed. These are more herby, not spicy at all, but very strong tasting. It was also evident straightaway that they are a little heavy on the Coriander (always a risky move).

Considering the density they cook very nicely, with a crispy shell and are soft, but not mushy inside.


We nibbled on them the first time to test them, but I think because they are so strongly flavoured, you don't need any more than 1 or 2, and a couple of my family really don't care for Coriander, so they struggled with them.

I've since used the Super Greens Balls in a burger bun and in a wrap with salad, which works much better and makes a nice alternative to a sandwich or burger. Good, but don't overdo them by attempting too many at once or you'll spoil it, and if you aren't a fan of Coriander then approach with caution.


Heck Nuts About Cheese Sausages are a nut and cheese sausage that otherwise has more subtle flavours. Sold in packs of 4 with an rrp of £3. These are the most 'realistic' looking vegetarian sausages I've ever used, and have a thin skin which means frying them results in a lovely glossy golden sausage.

The ends do escape a little during cooking as the cheese melts and the sausage contents heat and expand, but there is no excess fat to escape and they keep their shape nicely. They're great for adding to recipes because they do keep shape better than a lot of other 'real food' veggie sausages, even when chopped.


The Nuts About Cheese Sausages were deemed 'very cheesy', so I avoided. The general consensus is that the cheese taste is rich and delicious, and these sausages were very different to any usual sausage whether vegetarian or not, but different in a good way. When I cooked them again I had no trouble emptying the plate, although my little boys didn't like them for being 'too weird'. Definitely worth a try, especially if you like cheese.


Heck Gourmet Goat's Cheese Burgers were the stunner of the show. Two burgers per pack with an rrp of £3. Not as cheesy as you'd think, I even had half and was very impressed. Mainly quinoa, but with a large proportion of nuts, they have a fresh, nutty taste above any other flavour.

They may fall apart a little during cooking, but give you a crispy, delicious burger with a lovely texture. Fabulous in a bun, but maybe a bit risky on a barbeque, cook them in a pan or on a tray. I cannot imagine any vegetarian being disappointed by these.


These burgers are now my partner's favourite burger ever. He adores them. He isn't vegetarian, but says he'd rather have these than any other burger he's ever tasted. I honestly could have served them up 3 times over and they'd have been eaten. DEFINITELY worth trying.

In all it's a very impressive range of products that doesn't disappoint. You can taste the quality, the ingredients all have a clear role and add to the overall effect, in the case of the balls maybe overdoing the Coriander, but in the burgers hitting perfect spot on. Full of flavour and each unique in it's market, they are a tastier and more decadent product than your everyday burger, banger or ball. 

We've reviewed Num Noms before, children's scented collectible toys that are designed to look like Cupcakes and Ice Creams, and we thought it would be a fun idea to try and recreate them for real. I think we may have cracked it...


Num Noms all have a particular smell, and there are tons of different flavours (my review of the Num Noms Cupcake Party Pack). We actually bought several flavours of ice cream to try and recreate them, some were more successful than others!

We've been sent the Kinetic Sand Build Crash'em Cars for review. Initially I couldn't believe they'd stay together at all, but the kinetic sand holds so well that the cars have to really crash to break, and you don't have sand flying everywhere, it mainly stays on the enclosed playsurface.


Inside the box we have a selection of printed cut cards to make a scoreboard and ramps to add to the scenery, 2 sets of car moulds, an instruction leaflet and 2 colours of Kinetic Sand.

During half term 3 of my boys and I were treated to a trip to London and an awesome event to preview Skylanders Imaginators, which will be released this October. Gaming is a big thing in my house, and Skylanders has been a favourite for several years, so this really was a treat and a half.


We even got some smiles at 6.30am in an almost empty Piccadilly Station, Manchester. Our own personal Turbo-boy was naturally already raring to go...

It's been a while since their last outing, but Blythe and her gang of pet pals are back when Littlest Pet Shop: Lights, Camera, Fashion struts onto DVD and Digital Download on 13th June. Fashion is now the order of the day, and all of the cattiness that competition brings out in some people...and animals...


We reviewed the last Littlest Pet Shop DVD release, Lights, Camera, Mongoose!, and since then Blythe really has proven herself as the trendy teen and talented fashion designer. She has managed to keep her ability to talk to the pets a secret, and enters them into a ‘Terriers and Tiaras’ talent show.

I love children's artwork, I've examples from the past 10 years all over the walls, noticeboards and fridge in my house. The way children draw people is fascinating to me, and I spent a lot of time looking at that rather than actually studying when I was at college doing Child Language Acquisition.


I've even gone so far as to have one of my children's drawings embroidered onto a bag, and I've posted my children's pictures on my blog regularly with a huge degree of pride and a big smile.

I'd heard great things about Bill's, so when we were given the opportunity to review I was really pleased. The Trafford Centre want the children's opinions about the food there, so on this occasion it was my 6 year old who was giving his view. He was really on form...thankfully when we arrived they offered to seat us in a booth...



The Children's Menu was easy for my Year 1 boy to read himself. Full of recogniseable food that children will know and understand - children aren't often as keen on surprises when they eat as adults are, so this was great. He was especially impressed that dessert was Chocolate Brownie AND Ice Cream.

Father's Day this year falls on Sunday June 19th - so you still have more than 10 days to choose that perfect gift. Here are a selection of my favourites from what's on offer this year...


Memories are precious to Dads, and they can be emotional, hilarious or just make him proud. Cheerz have an awesome range of gifts including their letterbox sized Cheerz Box which starts at £16 for 30 beautifully packaged prints delivered. We also reviewed their Retro Magnets at £17.50 for 12 awesome magnetic prints delivered to your door. Our Cheerz photogifts review is here...

We've been playing Loony Quest for a couple of months now, and this very different 'board game' has proven a massive hit in our house. Just as much fun for my 7 year old as it is for the teenagers and adults, it plays through levels like a platform video game, beating the bad guys and collecting bonus points as you try and survive to the end. All the best video games have expansions to give you a little bit more, and so does Loony Quest.


We've been sent the Loony Quest: The Lost City Expansion. This is an add-on pack, so you need the original game (here's our Loony Quest Game Review) in order to play the Lost City levels.