When times are tough you need to save those pennies, and let’s face it who doesn’t these days? It’s sometimes hard to find inspiration to create cheap, nutritious, delicious and appealing meals that the whole family will eat and on top of that trying not to waste anything and throw away food unnecessarily. As a mother of two under-fives who has recently become a full time SAHM I find myself in this predicament.
This is where the lovely people at Changeworks come in, they are an Edinburgh based environmental charity and the brains behind the helpful Kitchen Canny kit. Did you know that “wasting food costs the average UK family with children £550 a year, or £45 a month*” (*Waste & Resources Action Programme 2009) . Now that is a serious amount of money to spend on something useful!

Bearing this in mind I had a kit delivered to me and decided to take up the challenge. This handy kit contains: some step-by-step cards to guide you through the process, a shopping and meal planner to stick on your fridge, some canny bags to compare your waste before and after the challenge, a canny sticker so you can celebrate your achievement in reducing waste, and a kit registration number so you can stay in touch with Kitchen Canny and fellow members on Facebook and Twitter.

I did think that I was fairly canny in the kitchen already, but after a few days of putting unused food into one of the special strong canny bags it proved I was indeed still wasting food. I know my weakness lies in preparing too much food so that we have leftovers and often can’t face eating the same thing again and again. So Kitchen Canny is great for actually making you think twice about what you do and how to make a change for the better and as the mantra goes all you need to do is:

• Buy what you need
• Cook what you need
• Buy and cook seasonal foods
• Use leftovers

Simple really!

So to turn over a new leaf, I will use the shopping and meal planner to help me buy and cook fewer portions, make a point of writing a shopping list and sticking to it! The step-by-step cards are full of common sense hints and tips that make you wonder why you haven’t done things before, like:

Reviving limp salad leaves by soaking them in cold water, biscuits/crackers that have gone soft can be crisped up by putting them in a warm oven for a few minutes- clever eh?!

Shouldn’t we all try to be more savvy shoppers and then canny in the kitchen, just think of the money you’ll save and how much kinder to the environment it would be?
For more information and to buy a kit for £10 plus £2.59 P&P go to http//:www.kitchencanny.co.uk

The Colour of London, written by debut novelist Piers Treacher, is an enjoyable and easy read. Easy, I hasten to add, does not mean lacking in plot or thought provoking ideas; just that the story moves forward at a good pace and is well written. The characters are well drawn and easily visualised, which made me care about their futures.

The central character, Jack Eastwood, is a grad student working on a physics experiment which is currently occupying all his time. Lacking in sleep and finding little time to focus on his relationship with girlfriend, Mandy, Jack is introduced to us an overtired but hard working fellow. His normal, dull and routine-filled life however, is smacked into a new reality where enlightenment, discovery and hidden peril take over. Jack has been 'awakened' and, along with some other highly likeable characters with similar 'gifts', he must save London from the evil waiting to be released by the dark and intimidating Avaro, who moves through the pages with an acid force.

There is something engaging about the way Treacher uses a recognisable format and the basic premise of good versus evil to pull the reader comfortably into the science fiction. And by embedding the story in modern day London the plot is accessible to readers who might ordinarily avoid books that lean in that direction. In fact, the book takes an interesting look at modern society, with its reliance on social media and celebrity. Treacher also looks at how human behaviour can be influenced by fear and mass fervor. Yet, despite these less than cheerful themes and some moments of sadness, Treacher manages to write with a light and welcome humour which keeps the story moving.

I would have liked to see the central characters face a little more danger earlier in the book but given that that this is a first novel there is really very little else to criticise and Treacher writes with a confidence that makes his story believable and real. The Colour of London is an enjoyable, relevant and thought provoking book which I think would be an excellent choice for a book group, as it is the kind of book you want to talk about after you have finished reading it. Alternatively, enjoy it with a cuppa one weekend, then recommend it to a few friends so you can chat with them about it later.

The Colour of London is available to buy on Amazon here.

These dance games tend to fall on one of two points,either the selection of music or the dance mechanic. If you’re an ABBA fan, you don’t need to read much further, the dance mechanic is brilliant and you should buy it for parties, and the odd quiet Tuesday night in.

Since we received ABBA You Can Dance from Ubisoft, wifey has either been enormously pregnant or in possession of a newborn, so it fell to me to try the game out. As a couple we’re veterans of this sort of game, but veteran doesn’t necessarily mean any good. Fortunately ABBA You can Dance is pretty forgiving to beginners.

It shares much in common with the excellent Grease Dance we reviewed recently, right down to the karaoke mode. We found Grease slightly more polished and enjoyed it’s cartoony characters that we had to copy on screen. With ABBA, you get cleverly anonymous motion captured dancers.The girls on SOS have nice thighs, randomly passed through my head as I was attempting some wiggly arm move to represent SOS.

Games like this aren’t brilliant to play on your own, especially on the Wii as you don’t have the online functionality of the Xbox 360 BUT as soon as you get a bunch of mates round, you will definitely have a great time as that is the exact sort of situation this game is made for. And yes, I did look stupid playing it, as wifey helpfully pointed out to me incessantly.

ABBA You Can Dance is out now on a number of formats, including Wii 360 and PS3. The Wii version costs £17.99 from Amazon at the moment.

We nearly jumped for joy when as a family we were asked to join the Playmobil brand ambassador scheme. I love Playmobil mainly because they actually do realistic Roman Soldiers and gladiators ( I can’t help myself from buying them). The boy likes to play with his knights battlement set and Fifi has a rather wonderful boat, killer whale and fisherman from the 123 range. We’ve also been collecting the odd bit we see on special offer, thus we have a mermaid, a princess complete with her own dressing table and a police car. But my Roman Gladiators are the best.

Anyway, the boy was asked what he would like most from the range to try and he opted for the Falcon Knights Castle. I can’t tell you how thrilled he is with it, delight is a wonderful emotion to see in a child and he is brimming with it. As I type this he has been playing solidly with his knights and their castle for four hours, yes, FOUR hours. There have been a range of different scenarios and adventures, some involving the horse, some the weapons but all of them involve lowering the working drawbridge.

The Falcon Knights Castle is just a brilliant toy, it’s really well made, something you would expect from Playmobil and you know that it will last. In terms of value for money, I am surprised how cheaply you can pick this up for considering that its something that your child would play with from the age of four to about ten (I imagine) it represents a good investment.

The castle came in various pieces which all needed construction. I have to admit this took a bit of time and was a bit of a challenge, at one point we realised we had done a bit wrong and had to start all over again. However, now its all built, the castle is proving very robust and quite literally a brilliant toy. I’m very jealous of the boy, I wish it was mine. I suppose there’s always a chance for me after bedtime….

You can buy the Falcon Knights Castle directly from Playmobil or from loads of other retailers.

I’m part of the Vax Voice team which means I get the chance to test out Vax products and provide a fair report back to you on them. A few months ago we tried their carpet cleaner and I have to say this has proved absolutely invaluable especially after a little boy sickness episode *ahem*.

Anyway, the latest thing we tried was the Air Total Home C89-MA-T Cylinder Vacuum Cleaner. This is a little compact cylinder vacuum cleaner which can be used all around the home. One of its strengths is that the filters don’t get blocked which means it keeps its suction and all the dirt goes into a container which is easy to empty and saves you from buying more vacuum cleaner bags.

I have to admit this is rapidly becoming one of the best vacuum cleaners I have owned, not least because it is nice and small which means that it is easy to store. I liked the length of the hose and all the extra accessories and have been really pleased with the results. We have a lot of food dropped on the floor with two toddlers and it seems to tackle this really well.

One of the best features of this cleaner is that fact that the hose is so long you can leave the cleaner at the bottom of the stairs whilst you hoover. I think this is a brilliant feature and makes it very safe. I have to admit it isn’t brilliant to move around in a position other than straight, but then for me that isn’t too much of an issue as I have to be careful about vacuuming up the kids when I get too carried away!

Although the cleaner feels a little bit plastic compared to other ones I have used it does come with a SIX year guarantee which is one of the best I have come across and means that you don’t need to worry too much. Regardless,  it does seem quite sturdy as I’m quite heavy handed and have been using it for a few weeks without any problems at all.

Now, I would show you some before and after pictures, but in a way these are quite meaningless apart from showing how filthy my house can get. I could offer you a picture of me as a domestic goddess with my cleaner but at nearly 38 weeks pregnant it would be more like a beached whale pushing a vacuum cleaner so on this occasion you’ll have to take my word for it. I think this cylinder Vacuum Cleaner deserves 4/ 5, if you are looking for something small, powerful and practical its a really good buy.

We were asked if we would like to do a review for Pillow Pets a few weeks ago. Before then I had never heard of them, not surprising really since they are only just being launched in the UK this spring. Originally developed by an American mum in 2003 (which sounds like last week but is in fact nearly ten years ago, eeek!) they are, as the name suggests, both a pillow and a pet.

The idea is actually remarkably simple: imagine a pillow which can fold in half and hold in place with a velcro strap. When it is folded, it becomes a soft cuddly toy, when unfolded it is a full sized pillow. Our particular new little friend is a puppy dog, though this is only one of eight designs you can buy. Since Daddy is a very keen dog lover and is trying his best to instill this in ourbaby boy, he was thrilled that we were sent this cute little dog.

When it arrived I was immediately struck by how soft the fabric it is made from is - I think it must be one of those super-soft micro fibre fabrics that they make things for babies out of, which just invite you to snuggle up with them. Its face is very cute and appealing, and my son seems to enjoy playing with it. In terms of function, the Velcro strap that converts it from pet to pillow is as simple to use as... well, as Velcro is, and there is a little flap to cover up the scratchy side of the Velcro when it is being used as a pillow, which I thought was a clever touch.

This idea really is a good one, since they are cute enough to work as a cuddly toy and large and firm enough to be a proper pillow for a child or an adult - Mr W has taken to snuggling up with his puppy pal under his head when watching TV in the evenings, not that he’ll thank me for sharing that! From a mum’s perspective, if I am going to have toys littering every room of my house - and it seems that I am - then it is great if they can also serve a useful purpose for the whole family as well. I would say that the Pillow Pet is larger than most of our other soft toys, but this does mean that it unfolds to be a proper sized pillow, which means it can be used for adults as well ad kids.

The website recommends that Pillow Pets are ideal for little ones to snuggle up with on long car and plane journeys. We haven’t had much chance to test our Pillow Pet on any long journeys since we got it but I can imagine that it would be especially comforting for children who get travel sick or are nervous about a big trip to have a familiar snugly toy that they can comfortably sleep with in strange surroundings.

Although my son was perhaps a little younger than their target market (the website recommends Pillow Pets), we have already found our Pillow Pet to be useful, cute and well made, and the price tag of around £20 seems reasonable, so I would be happy to recommend this product to other mums.

Website: http://www.pillowpets.co.uk
Facebook: www.facebook.com/MyPillowPets
Available from: Directly from the website, on Amazon, or from Toys R Us
RRP: £19.99

I am always looking for ways to try and get more vegetables into my carb-crazed baby’s diet, so I was excited to be asked to review Barfoots’ new Sweetcorn Bites. It is a pretty simple idea really, they are literally just small-hand-sized pieces of corn on the cob, prepared, cut up and ready to cook. The packet gives you several options for how to cook the sweetcorn, but frankly I saw the “microwave in the bag with a bit of water for 4 minutes” option and went for it. If you were inclined you could also boil or steam them.Before becoming a mummy I tended not to buy pre-prepared vegetables much, scornfully thinking “come on, how hard can it be to lice/dice/peel that?”. Since have a baby I know how it is to get to 5 o’clock and realise you don’t have any veg in the fridge and if your little darling is to eat vegetables its going to be frozen peas again. We all try to make sure our babies have a healthy diet as much as possible, and frankly if buying some pre-prepared fruit and veg every so often means my baby doesn’t live on breadsticks and fromage frais then its not to be sniffed at. According to the website, Sweetcorn Bites are “completely natural and with nothing artificial added, they’re a brilliant source of nutrition, containing carotenoids, vitamins A, B3 and C, plus Folic Acid, fibre, carbohydrates, sugars and protein for energy.” Sounds like something we should all be eating more of, eh?

Since we already knew we liked corn on the cob, it wasn’t much of surprise that my husband and I thought they were delicious, and made a nice change to our usual broccoli or greens. But I was really impressed at how much my 11 month old (pictured) went for the sweetcorn bites: Like all babies, almost any food can be hit or miss depending on their whim of the day, and I had given him tinned sweetcorn before but never corn on the cob so it was a leap into the unknown. However, he really seemed to love them on the several occasions I gave him them. I think the reasons for their appeal were that the naturally sweet taste of sweetcorn (like peas, butternut squash etc) is very palatable for little ones, the bright yellow colour is attractive and they are a really good size for a little hand to hold so that even a young child can eat it themself without needing help. It seemed like he enjoyed gnawing on the little cobs and ate loads, which I was really pleased with. One day he even insisted on taking a half eaten piece of sweetcorn up with him at bath time, and then throwing it into the bath...

As I say, in an ideal world we would be eating home grown organic veg all the time, but on the days when that isn’t possible (and I have quite a few of those...), I would definitely recommend Sweetcorn Bites. They were very quick and easy to cook, convenient and reassuringly natural and wholesome - just fresh vegetables. At £2.49 a pack I would think twice about buying them all the time but for a quick and easy way to get more veg into your family’s diet they are great and I can vouch for their baby appeal!

Website: http://sweetcornbites.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/sweetcornbites
Available from: Ocado and selected stores at Tesco, Waitrose and Co-op.
Retail price: £2.49 for a 300g bag (average 8 bites per bag), but Ocado currently have them on special offer, £3 for 2 bags until 10/4/2012, or whilst stocks last.

I must say, when I was asked if I’d like to review the new Lindor Collection Gift Box in time for Mothers Day (the 18th March, write it down now!), I pretty much bit their hand off. Really and truly, Lindor are my go-to chocolates to give anyone, including myself. I just LOVE them, every colour, every variety, any time, any place. Basically, if you like chocolate, you can’t fail to like Lindor, which is why, if in doubt about a present, I always go for them, knowing they are a universal crowd-pleaser. Perhaps I am not the most objective person to review this box of chocolates, but hey, at least I’m already an expert on the subject in question...Previously I have only bought the red boxes of Lindor (milk chocolate, the original variety) and the mixed boxes you can get, which contain milk (red), plain (black), white (gold) and hazelnut (brown) varieties. So imagine my surprise to learn that there are another two varieties, hitherto unknown to me, in this collection, Yes, you read that right, there are MORE flavours!

As well as the familiar mix, this box also contains... wait for it... Stracciatella and Irish Cream flavours! Yu-u-m! The Irish cream variety (bronze wrapper) improves on the original by adding a cheeky hint of booze, in that mum’s favourite tipple flavour ideal for pairing with creamy milk chocolate. Stracciatella (light blue wrapper) may be unfamiliar to many, but it is a classic Italian ice cream flavour that pretty much equates to chocolate chip. Here, it reminded me of other cookies and cream flavour chocolates I’ve had before, creamy white chocolate with little dark chocolate chips swirled through. In addition to the regular round Lindor truffles in all these flavours, the box also contains three sweet little heart-shaped milk chocolate Lindor, which would make the box an ideal Valentine’s gift to bear in mind for next year as well.

So, apart from the fact that the chocolates are delicious, as you might expect, what makes this box of chocolates worth buying compared to regular Lindor? As you can see from the main image, these are presented much more as a traditional box of chocolates, laid out in a gold tray within a lidded box decorated with ribbon. To me, they do look like more of a special gift than an ordinary box of Lindor (not that there’s anything wrong with them!) and more suited to a special occasion. Where you would perhaps take a normal box of Lindor as a gift when you go for dinner at someone’s house, this looks more expensive and impressive, ideal as a birthday gift or, as Lindt suggest, the perfect gift for Mother’s Day. Since I would often give my mum Lindor for Mother’s Day, this box is definitely something I would consider purchasing in future.

I would say that this box definitely has more wow factor, and the RRP of £9.99 is pretty much on a par with what I would expect to pay for this sort of thing. And I would DEFINITELY recommend that you try the two new flavours, they are so delicious. What a shame I had to sacrifice my diet for the good of this feature, but that’s how dedicated I am...

Website: http://www.lindt-shop.co.uk/lindor-gift-box-285g.html
Price: Retails at £9.99 for a 285g box, though they are currently reduced to £7.99 on the Lindt website.

Hot on the heels of reviewing mother’s day chocolates, I was asked if I would also like to write a review for Byron Bay Cookies. So much for the new year diet... I was amazed when the box arrived from Byron Bay (not Australia) filled with every flavour of cookie you could imagine. This was going to be a serious job!Byron Bay Cookies is originally an Australian company but since 2007 they have been working with a UK bakery to produce their cookies in the UK, meaning they could use as many locally sourced ingredients as possible. Their cookies are available from independent cafes and coffee shops and selected health food shops.

Byron Bay Cookies are certified by the Vegetarian Society, use only free range eggs, and are free from artificial colours, flavours and preservatives. Importantly for mums whose children have food intolerances (or mums with food intolerances themselves), Byron Bay also produce a range of gluten free cookies which have been approved by Coeliac UK and display the Cross Grain Symbol. The gluten-free range is also available as packs of mini cookie bites in the Free From section in larger Sainsbury’s stores.

I was interested to read about their environmental pledge as well. Here’s some more information about what Byron Bay Cookies are doing to be socially and environmentally responsible, taken from their website:

• “We are leading the way with the following initiatives:
• reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 86% ie 13, 000 tonnes
• installing a recycling plant for cardboard & plastic
• international orders now shipped by sea rather than air
• all palm fat used in our cookies is sourced sustainably
• we use as many locally sourced ingredients as possible
• all outer packaging is now bleach free and 100% recyclable
• employees are offered cash incentives to use pedal power to work”

So, with the science but out of the way, let’s get down to business: what do they taste like? In short, delicious. These are mostly crumbly cookies rather than the soft-baked type, and they taste buttery and crisp. The exception would be the sticky date, ginger and walnut cookie which was softer, maybe because of the dried fruit.

My favourite flavour, which turns out to be their original recipe, was the white chocolate and macadamia. I was really curious to try the gluten free cookies: since I am not gluten intolerant, I haven’t really tried any gluten free biscuits before and wondered whether the would be as nice as the ordinary ones. I have to say, if I’d been tasting these blind, I don’t think I would have guessed these were ‘free from’ cookies and I especially loved the strawberry, clotted cream and white chocolate chip gluten free cookie (as gorgeous as it sounds). My husband, who I got involved in the cookie tasting session to canvas a range of opinions, thought that the gluten free chocolate cookie he tried was drier than the regular one, but perhaps this is more to do with personal taste as I thought the buttery, crumbly texture was great. I certainly think if I was gluten intolerant and couldn’t eat normal cookies I would be thrilled to have these as an option in my local coffee shop.

Apparently Byron Bay’s best selling cookie is the Dotty cookie, available in regular and gluten free varieties, which is a chocolate chip cookie studded with coloured chocolate drops (think the popular multi coloured chocolate sweets that come in tubes and rhyme with “arty”). I can imagine this would be the first one that kids would go for, though it was also the first one my husband picked out as well...

In conclusion, I really liked these cookies. They tasted great, their ethical and environmental credentials seem solid, they fill a big gap in the market for people who are vegetarian and gluten intolerant and they offer a range of flavours which is a bit more unusual than your average cookie (lemon and macadamia nut shortbread, fig and pecan). I’m just hoping the next review I do is for mineral water or dumb bells, otherwise this mummy tummy is going nowhere...

Website: http://www.byronbaycookies.co.uk/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/byronbaycookies
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ByronBayCookie

Raa Raa is one of the sparky new shows on CBeebies so we were really chuffed to get the Raa Raa The Noisy Lion Interactive Playset as part of the BBC Ambassadors scheme. With the playset you get a Raa Raa interactive figure and TreeHouse with Smartspot system, as well as Raa Raa's car.

We weren't able to test the interaction as you need other figures in the range for this to happen but we understand that the figures talk to each other in, unsurprisingly, an interactive manner.

The TreeHouse is really great. Our 3 year old loved pushing Raa Raa on the swing but really really loved pushing him around in his little buggy. Unlike a lot of character tie in figures, the Raa Raa toys are really well made- a few weeks of razzing the car and Raa Raa around have made no discernible difference to them. Nothing has fallen to bits, which is a near miracle with Fifi involved.