How to survive the school holidays

To many parents, the prospect of 7 weeks of school holidays causes mixed and conflicting emotions. For working parents, on one hand there is an opportunity to spend more time with the children than the two day weekends usually allow, assuming, that is, you can book some leave. On the other hand, most working parents get less than 30 days annual leave a year, so the school holidays present a logistical childcare challenge.
You are torn between wanting to be delighted that the children are not at school, but actually feeling fairly gutted that the children are not at school.
This is also because the working parents amongst us don't get nearly as much childcare practise. We are just not used to entertaining the children, or indeed pointing them in the right direction of the garden/playroom/bedroom (delete as appropriate) so that they can entertain themselves. We spend our time getting very good at filling school bags with the right letters, prepping lunchboxes, prepping and distributing breakfasts and evening meals, bathing, stories and bed time. That bulk of time in the middle of the day that needs filling with other stuff? Well that's something of an enigma to us.

10 reassuring and helpful tips for getting organised: for mums whose children are starting school

Little Miss George started in Reception just over a week ago. Already she has brought home two reading books without any words in them; a sponsor form to raise money for the school; 3 separate newsletters with dates for parent evenings, school photo sessions, coffee mornings and encouraging suggestions that I attend the annual general meeting of the "mums and dads" committee; and lots of tales of playing with lots of Lego. If she was my elder daughter I would be wondering what on earth the school was playing at and would be feeling completely overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information.

If she was our first, I would have diligently attending the welcome meeting for new parents last week in order to be told exactly how important it was to read the reading books "the same night" and return the next day to ensure that the book was available for the next child.

I would be feeling under pressure to attend every meeting, and already panicking about the potential risk of forgetting to dress my daughter in appropriate "dress-up" gear on various fancy dress days to come.

I would be scanning every letter and marking in my diary every single event, without having a clue which pieces of information were more important than others.

As it is, I know better.

This year I am much more relaxed. Here's my list of top tips that will help you work out what information is important, what to prioritise and what to just ignore. I hope it helps.

Woolacombe Bay Hotel: A review

If you are looking for a traditional English seaside holiday, with all the good stuff; ice cream, miles of golden sand, rock pools, fish and chips, wind breaks, sandcastles, bat and ball on the beach, crazy golf, and of course a great surfing scene: and if you want it in a stylish location overlooking the beach, in an immaculate hotel, with Spa and indoor pool, Approach Golf course, children's activities and film club* and waitress service to your sun lounger besides the heated Lido, then it's Woolacombe Bay Hotel for you.

5 useful things to take on holiday

Here's my top 5 unusual, but incredibly useful things to take on holiday this summer.  Packing your case?  Try adding these before you sit on it. (Oh, sorry... is that just me?)

A Pillow.  A travel one. Not just brilliant for snoozing on long car, train, bus or plane journeys, but also brilliant for lounging by the pool. Much more comfortable to rest your chin on whilst reading than a rolled up towel.

Hangers... Fold up travel ones. There is never enough in the hotel wardrobes.  This is a stress-reducing move for hotels with little storage.

Torch. For walking home along ill lit streets, or the beach. and very useful for children in the night to save blinding the whole family when your 6 year old needs the toilet. And of course for power cuts!

Gullivers World Hotel and Gullivers Splash Zone, Warrington: A review

Tree house beds: kid heaven!

Should I share?

I was torn as to whether to share this brilliant find with you.  But I just had to.

Oh my! What a fabulous hotel!

Despite Gulliver's World theme park being technically closed at this time of year, the hotel, and neighbouring Splash Zone is still open.

So we decided to book an overnight stay at the hotel, in a family room, for one night.  Some friends of ours and their children booked too.

We set off around lunchtime on Saturday, and arrived at 3pm, in plenty of time to quickly ooooo and aaahhh at our room, more on that later, grab the children's swimsuits and wander across the car park to the Splash Zone.

Gulliver's Splash Zone

The Splash Zone is great for 6 year olds and over. It is essentially the sort of mini splash park you get at family hotels in Spain, but instead of being outside, it is inside, in the same set up as the popular soft play zones that have sprung up in every town in the UK in the last 10 years.

Day 5 - Legoland Windsor: A review

This is the fifth and final of a series of posts based on our crazily busy holiday down in Bournemouth and Slough in August.  Yes, you heard that correctly; Slough.  We had an intense week of family days out; it cost us far too much, but we had an absolutely ball. 

I publishing the posts that were drafted during the trip between other yummy musings throughout September.  The first one: Sandy Balls is here and the second; Wet Bottoms: A review of Peppa Pig World is here. The third: Painful Groynes - a day at Bournemouth beach is here.  And the fourth, Piddle Valley and Sea Life Adventure Park, Weymouth, is here.  Enjoy the series.

We also managed to visit Beaulieu National Motor Museum to check out the James Bond Car collection (DB9 - yum) along with Noddy and Mr Bean's cars, go ten-pin bowling and catch this year's new Disney Film Brave.  It was a VERY busy week!

If you don't want to miss future reviews, parenting and beauty advice you can subscribe by email over on the right hand panel, or follow on Facebook or Twitter.

LEGOLAND Windsor - A review

 

I was delighted when the lovely people at Legoland Windsor agreed to provide me with a family ticket for the day in return for an honest review of the park.  It's somewhere I've always wanted to go (I'm such a lego geek) and my hubby was excited about the prospect of seeing the Star Wars Lego sets.  My children obviously thought I was the best mum EVER to get them free tickets, so it was all looking good.  My  camera took a hefty toll on the day of our visit.   

My pictures first... then the review.. then some more pictures... work for you?

My picture of the Legoland Hotel entrance

Brrrrruummmmm

At this point hubby was drooling.....

Run!!

Younger was shouting and pointing at this point.

Not a bad effort capturing the action!?

Remember when TV's were that deep?

Yellow piggies?

Dear Father Christmas......

What I'd really like for Christmas....

is a whole village made from Lego!

I wonder how much, at RRP....

Miniland cost to build?

I wonder how much this set would be on ebay?

The giant people have invaded!

London Calling...

How cute?!

Amazing eh?

Unfortunately we managed to pick the hottest day of the year to go.  Ordinarily we would have adapted our plans and gone to the beach for the day, but the tickets were for a specific day so we were limited.  With suncream plastered on, sun hats on our heads and spare clothes in the day bag we set off from our base for this part of the trip, Premier Inn Slough and arrived at the park 10 minutes later.

Parking and collecting our tickets was easy as we'd arrived at 9.15am.  The park wasn't due to open until 10am but I kind of hoped maybe we'd be able to get in either early or as one of the first.  The turnstiles for entry were empty, so no queues to pay at this time.
 
We paid for our car parking (£2).  Yes, I was surprised.  You'd think that the entry fee to the place would include your car, but apparently not.  Either this is Legoland's attempt to be ecofriendly by trying to discourage car users and encourage the use of public transport (tricky since it's not exactly next to a train station) or someone somewhere is being a bit greedy.  Tickets for 2 adults and 2 children bought online in advance (and therefore at a saving of £25) cost £33.30 per adult and £26.55 per child.  That's £119.70   .  What do you think about charging extra for parking?

Onwards then, into the 'Beginnings' section of the part.  Here we hired a buggy for the day for £8.  In hindsight we should have made it a double buggy.  Although our Elder has recently turned 6 years old, the busy week we'd had, combined with the heat and a large park to cover took it's toll. 

 The Star Wars experience is over to the right as you go in.  We wandered straight into there (hubby was delighted) and were impressed by the models.  The kids were slightly uninspired, but then they aren't old enough to have seen the films yet so it was a bit bewildering for them.  Hubby was, of course, completely bewitched! We ended up in the Star Wars shop (of course).  At this stage in the day we weren't about to start shopping so we emerged from there into the sunshine only to find a crowd of people gathering just outside the store.

A queue? Or not? A quick look at the map revealed that they were blocking where we needed to go.  I thought we'd been let in early, after all we'd just been in one of the attractions, but apparently not.  In much the same way that you can get into the entrance to Disneyland Paris, but have to wait at the Castle until that section of the park opens, in Legoland you have to wait outside this store.  Only there were no employees letting the customers know this or directing traffic.

I am a traditional fair queuer.  I get in the queue at the end and wait my turn.  But this wasn't a traditional queue.  There were people surreptitiously going into the Star Wars store, then emerging and hovering near its entrance alongside the queue  instead of walking back up to the back of the queue.  Even worse, when the queue started moving, people emerged deliberately from the store and just joined it.  Major queue jumping!  I hate this.  I think you should wait your turn.  It wound me up no end, and since we were stood in the heat (about 22 degrees already) with two over excited children, the queue jumping made me angry.  I turned to my husband and said "At least I'll have something to review.  They've failed at the first hurdle."  So Legoland, please sort out this queueing.  Have an employee (there were plenty wandering around with those refillable bottles (more later) stood directing people into the queue and not letting them jump in from the shop. Please!

Anyhow:  enough of the moaning, because this is a HUGE attraction.  There was far far far far too much to see and do in one day, so what did we do?

We hotfooted it straight over to the Atlantis ride - an amazing journey underwater with the sharks and a fair bit of Lego (obviously).  The sharks are real though.  Really.

Tried Dino Safari which the girls enjoyed (mostly the younger) and there wasn't a queue.  The dinosaur models are brilliant.
  
Checked out the exterior of the Legoland Hotel, and worked out that, since it is physically INSIDE the park, they probably get in before the rest of us (mental note for next time).  The pictures on the website (see the pirates bedroom I've shared over on the left) show some interior decoration that is going to forever make the kids own rooms seem dull.  I'm not sure Santa Claus could cope with the length of my daughters' letters if they went to this hotel before Christmas!


Had a go on the Squid Surfer - great fun. Our elder thoroughly enjoyed forcing us out to the edges so that I'd get absolutely drenched stood behind her.  I was dripping, but pretty thankful - it cooled me down.

Bought 4 refillable drinks bottles.  These large plastic bottles on lanyards are brilliant.  You pay £6 each for them, but since a large drink is approx £4 anyway, you only have to refill it once (at any drinks venue in the park) and you've saved money.  On a day like today, with the heat, with small children, they saved us from sunstroke or dehydration.

Tried Digger Challenge - good and novel idea, but the queue was long and they hardly give you any time when it's your turn to have a go in the digger.  Younger loved this, but wanted LOTS longer.  Any chance of more diggers please Legoland?

Watched The Pirates of Skeleton Bay stunt show.  Absolutely fab.  See one of my pictures further up this post.  But it is out in the open, so if it's hot, it's really hot sat watching it.  Maybe a few seating areas under cover would be good (are you taking notes Legoland?  Hehe!)

Ate lunch in City Walk Pizza and Pasta.  This restaurant is enormous but at noon there was a huge queue going out of the door and an empty restaurant.  The system in place is unusual and has advantages and disadvantages.  You queue up at the door where one member of staff is stood.  His entire job is to stop you going further.  You are then collected by another member of staff who takes you to a table.  Then she asks you how many are eating and tells you how much it is.  If memory serves she disappears to bring back one of those card machines.  Then she goes to get plates for you and brings them back (If they'd have been stored by the door she could have picked them up with us, so there's another idea for the notebook Legoland).

Finally she disappears so you can go away from your table to the self service buffet to load up your fairly small plate and grab a drink.  The food was nice.  Hearty, filling, plenty of choice and salad too.  But the logistics of this didn't work.

I suggest that the chap stood on the door would have been better off joined by one of the numerous 'take-you-to-a-table' folk.  Two people, with payments machines, could have taken your payment on entrance and then let you in.  You could then help yourself to plates, a table, the food etc.  A few members of staff to keep the place clean, clearing tables etc and you are sorted.

After lunch we walked across to try the Fire Academy.  Another great idea but unfortunately again there weren't enough of them, and by them I mean life size Lego style fire engines, so the queue took nearly an hour (in the heat).  The actual ride is also over in less than 30 seconds by my reckoning.  That's a lot of time invested for 30 seconds.  Making it a race between the four families that get a turn together was also not ideal for smaller children who, lets face it, just want to have a go and not be rushed.   

The plan was now to walk up near Duplo Play Town where all the smaller children's rides are.  However, as we approached it was clear that this was one part of the park that was absolutely packed!  There is a splash park called Waterworks.  I couldn't tell you what it looked like because of the sheer volume of people in and around it.  I, as a very risk averse mother, was scared at the thought of children running around that splash park, because a) there was no chance as a parent you could keep eyes on them with that many people around, b) there isn't just one entrance into it that you can stand by, there are multiple and c) the children running around ranged from tinies (3 and 4 year olds) to teens making it, again just by sheer volume, a recipe for broken bones.  The only way I can explain how busy it is is by saying that there wouldn't have been one child inside there that could have stood with arms outstretched without hitting someone else.  I don't have an answer to this though.  Limiting access on that hot day could have sparked a riot, so not really an option.  We chose to walk through this section of the park as fast as we could, stopping off at the toilets on route.

Quick Tip on Baby Changing: there are separate doors for specific toilets with changing tables so parents with babies were queueing outside those, BUT, the normal toilets (with no queue) also have changing tables in them, so before you queue, take a peek.

We spotted Fairy Tale Brook, as we tried to walk through this part of the park, with hardly any queue.  20 minutes later we were sat in a little boat spotting the different fairy tale characters, all made of Lego of course.  Quick Tip on this - Don't sit two adults in the back of the boat and two tiny children in the front... it makes for an unsteady boat!  We had to lean forward to ensure we didn't flood the boat.  This was a lovely little ride though, and the girls were tiring by this time.

Next for a walk through Miniland.  My favourite bit.  The camera took some hammering and my favourites are at the top of this post.  The lovely train close up here is, of course, a Legoland official picture and far superior to my efforts.

And that was it for us other than the inevitable trip to the Lego shop at the exit.  I started to comment on this, and got sidetracked thinking about the gender stereotyping that we were faced with in this store.  I decided to move that discussion to another post which you can find, and add your Lego set pick to, here.

And that was us done.  The girls were exhausted and there was So much more to see.  I think, looking at the map (HERE) we probably covered only about 20% of the park rides, if that.  I guess it means there's plenty to look forward to next time!

Would we go again?  Absolutely yes.  I'd be prepared for the queues and would research the QBot scheme next time.  I'd try eating in another of the eateries and I'd not go on the hottest day of the year!

All in all Legoland Windsor has some great original ideas which is rare in a theme park.  Often the rides are all the same basic structure with different themes painted on (think Dumbo and Aladdin rides at Disneyland Paris)  But here, there were ideas I'd never seen before.  Great work on the originality.  But room for improvement on the restaurants and queueing.  


PS  If you are going out for the day with young children always take spare clothes! These parks all seem to include either rides with water involved, or actual splash parks for the kids)

Piddle Valley: SeaLife Adventure Park - a review

This is the fourth of a series of posts based on our crazily busy holiday down in Bournemouth and Slough.  Yes, you heard that correctly; Slough.  We've had an intense week of family days out; it's cost us far too much, but we've had an absolutely ball.  Sleep is high on the agenda this week.

I am publishing the posts that were drafted during the trip over the next few weeks between other yummy musings.  The first one: Sandy Balls is here and the second; Wet Bottoms: A review of Peppa Pig World is here.

The third: Painful Groynes - a day at Bournemouth beach is here. 

The fifth and final in the series - A review of Legoland Windsor is here.

Enjoy the series.  If you don't want to miss a thing you can subscribe by email over on the right hand panel, or follow on Facebook or Twitter.

Day four: Piddle Valley and Sea Life Adventure Park, Weymouth - a review

 It was absolutely throwing down with rain when we pulled into the car park by Sea Life Adventure Park.  The puddle outside my car door was so big I had to leap from a sitting position in the car to a standing position about a metre from the car, all in one go!

The irony of the name of the place we'd driven past en route to Sea Life Adventure Park wasn't lost on me; Piddle Valley.  I do love the place names around here!

But with ponchos and umbrellas, and a day bag with spare clothes, snacks, plasters, germoline etc (with 2 adults and 2 children under 6 years old.  We ALWAYS need a first aid kit of sorts!) we braved the weather to enter the park.

I have to be honest; if we were at home and I was on my own, there's absolutely NO WAY I would have braved the weather to go on a trip out with the two girls.  My excuse would be fairly persuasive and would focus on the logistical difficulty of keeping hold of two child in a potentially busy, unknown environment whilst also carried the day bag (rucksack in this case) and the umbrella.  I have to also admit to being really pleased that we DID brave the weather, because we had a lovely day.

Special Events

 

Within 2 minutes of entering the reception area pretty much at opening time, we bumped into Timmy.

For those who have older children, or indeed no children, let me explain quickly who Timmy is.  Remember Wallace and Gromit?  Shaun the Sheep?  The brilliance of the Aardman team?  Their venture into cartoons for pre-schoolers took the form of Timmy.  He is the cutest lamb ever, who gets up to all sorts of fun at his nursery school with his other animal friends (their are ducks, owls etc.  They probably have names, but since it doesn't have 'speech' in the cartoon I'm afraid I've never worked out what they are.)  There's even a website with lots of resources, games and activities where you can watch clips called Timmy Time.

Timmy was stood in reception.

Just to clarify this further; a 6 foot Timmy was stood in reception.

As part of a promotional tour of various theme parks, (Timmy has a feature length DVD out called Timmy's Seaside Rescue) he was today at the Sea Life Adventure Park.  My girls were, luckily not traumatised.  After all, they'd been cuddling 6 foot tall Peppa and George only two days ago.  So they launched themselves on Timmy; who may well now be traumatised, and wouldn't let go for quite some time!

It's funny how it's the deviations from the days plan that are often the most memorable moments!  Future events in October 2012 include Shark Week, so it's worth checking out the Sea Life website here before you go to see what special events may be on.

Things to see and do

 

So what was the park like?

The exhibits are amazing.  I didn't want to take any photos inside the habitats, as obviously it is kept fairly dark for the comfort of the creatures used to living miles under the sea.  These pictures are courtesy of the Sea Life Adventure Official web page.  Head on over there to see more.


There are sharks swimming over your head....

..turtles (some the size of small cars).....

...sea horses....

.. enormous crabs (really enormous - I felt ill watching the trainer handle him - I did risk a picture of that....

 ...penguins (I took this photo too.. not bad?)...

...and tank after tank of amazing sea life exhibits.

And on top of the amazing habitats; there's so much more to do.

• a penguin footprint trail, so that you can ensure to see everything; 
• a trail of questions to keep the children engaged.  Whilst we were there, they had an additional trail of Timmy's sea life questions, which they also had a go at.  
• Face painting.  I don't know if they just do this in the holidays or not.  The guy that did the beautiful fish and starfish on my girls cheeks was good at it though!

• Model making.  Again, this may have been a holiday extra.  They had large laminated posters of various different clay modelled sea creatures.  The girls got a big lump of, well, dough, or clay, and shaped their won starfish and puffer fish respectively.  
• A splash park.  Within the main park there is a small section of fountains.  The sort that the children run about underneath on a spongy surface.  By the time we reached this part of the park it was after lunch and the sun had made an appearance, so the swimsuits came out and our girls ran around for half an hour!  This was in August, so it wasn't cold (just wet!)

• A mini arcade area and slides by the cafe area midway around.  I suspect this area is a lot nicer when it's not still throwing it down with rain.  It was a fine place to sit and eat lunch though, as it took us until then to get to this part of the park!  There's a larger facility by the main entrance which we didn't use but looked fine.
• A smallish log flume.

As if we weren't wet enough!?

• The Sea Life Tower is not at the same location as the Sea Life Adventure Park.  You can buy joint tickets, but you'll need to travel from one to the other and treat them as separate trips.  We didn't bother with the tower this time.  Check it out here.
• There's another theme park next door.  Don't be fooled though; you can't access it from Sea Life.  It's entirely separate.

All in all there's a great layout and a good portion of the actual exhibits are inside.  Check out your visitor map here to plan your visit.

The down side

 

Bear in mind that many of the exhibits are inside because the creatures are used to living miles under the sea where it's fairly dark.  Therefore the lighting within each building is very low.  Even though it was overcast outside, I still found it difficult transitioning to the new light levels as we entered each area.  Because of this; the fact that adults start by checking out what's at eye level, not necessarily what's around their knees; and because some of the flooring in some areas is a little uneven; I'd keep a very tight hold of young children.

Other tips

 

Always pack a swimsuit and a small towel.  We pack one poncho style towel between the two children.  Enough for the types of splash parks that this, and many other theme parks now have.  And even if they don't, the towel came in handy after a ride on the log flume.  We also packed (through necessity) rain macs, umbrellas, sun cream (I know it sounds crazy, but did you see the crazy mixture of weather we had in the UK in August?), snacks and bottles of water.

Opening and Prices

 

Sea Life Adventure Park, Weymouth, is part of the Merlin Group. It is open from 10am til 5pm daily.  You can buy tickets in advance online here from £13 each.  Or treat yourself to either a Sea Life Adventure Park Annual Pass, or a Merlin Annual Pass (incorporating access to other Merlin attractions such as Legoland and Alton Towers) here. 


This is NOT a sponsored post.  We paid full price.

Painful groynes: a day at Bournemouth beach

This is the third of a series of posts based on our crazily busy holiday down in Bournemouth and Slough.  Yes, you heard that correctly; Slough.  We've had an intense week of family days out; it's cost us far too much, but we've had an absolutely ball.  Sleep is high on the agenda this week.

I am publishing the posts that were drafted during the trip over the next few weeks between other yummy musings.  The first one: Sandy Balls is here and the second; Wet Bottoms: A review of Peppa Pig World is here.  Enjoy the series.  If you don't want to miss a thing you can subscribe by email over on the right hand panel, or follow on Facebook or Twitter.

Day three: Painful groynes - a day at Bournemouth beach

The theme for our holiday so far appears to be unusual and slightly sniggersome (if it's not a word, then it should be) place names.  The fact that there are also signs warning people not to bump their feet on the groynes on Bournemouth beach was suitably in keeping with the holiday so far!

We wandered down the pier (you have to pay to do that!  I was shocked!  Only 60p, but still!)

 

 

 

We made sandcastles and collected shells.

 

 

 

We had Harry Ramsden's for lunch, sat in a window seat with the beach and sea providing a beautiful view.  Our younger daughter was particularly impressed that her request for a bucket of chips (she was joking) was honoured, and a bucket duly arrived!
A ride on the mini train along the sea front... lovely opportunity to nosey at the design of the beach huts.
.

 

A quick go on the park at the other end, a return journey back past the beach huts and a quick go on the bouncy castle, before a lovely wander through the park and past the balloon and bandstand....

 

 

A perfect English seaside day.

We parked at the car park next to the pier.  The train ride is £2 per adult (over 5s) single. It was £3 per child for 5 minutes on the bouncy castle. If you fancy a day at the beach, you can't get much better than this.