GFC will be no more...

Obviously for most of you reading this the fact that from tomorrow Google Friends Connect (where some of you follow me by) will be no longer is no big surprise!

So here is my one and only beg for my followers....

Please follow my by using Bloglovin'... please...

Ok there we go, I have done the awkward bit!

Mummy B xoxox

Mine and Jamie's little adventure on the Bike - Southwold

Last night me and Jamie had a little date night on the back of his bike, where we drove to Southwold and had a yummy dinner.

It was the first time I had been on the back of a bike in about 8 years, and the only times I have ever gone on one was with my Dad, who I obviously trust a lot! 

Was I nervous?

YES!

All I could think, was what if something happened to us and Darcie was left with no parents?! It was a scary thought, but after lots of persuasion from Jamie, and quite a lot of money spent of good gear, in order to make me feel safe, I finally agreed.

 On the journey to Southwold I was very tense and when we reached The Habour Inn, I could barely walk because I was very tense on the bike. I did however enjoy it, sat on a bike I saw alot more than you would in a car, and something about being on a bike and putting all my trust in Jamie made me respect him more, he was keeping me safe!

The journey back I was a lot more relaxed, I knew how to sit and go with the bike. I have to say I'm quite looking forward to our next ride.

It was quite nice too to have some us time, something which we do not get a lot of!

Mummy B xoxox

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Having a rubbish Monday? Cheer your self up with some of these amazing cookies...

On Saturday I made these tasty cookies, I'm slightly obsessed with peanut butter and chocolate so god knows why I have never made them before! The recipe I used made around 12 large cookies.

Here's what to do....

Ingredients

1/2 cup of butter, softened

1/2 cup of peanut butter

1/2 cup of granulated sugar

1/2 cup of brown sugar, firmly packed

1 egg

1 1/4 cups of all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon of baking powder

1/2 teaspoon of baking soda

1/4 teaspoon of salt

1 cup of chocolate chips

Method

• Cream the butter and sugars until light, add the egg and mix until fluffy.
• Blend the flour, baking powder, soda and salt together well. Add these dry ingredients to the butter mixture. Add the chocolate chips.
• Drop the cookie dough by teaspoons onto lightly greased baking sheets. bake for 10-12 mins at 175 degrees.

These are honestly the BEST cookies EVER! I need to stop myself baking these every day!

Mummy B xoxox

I do love a bargain!

Just before Darcie's birthday I was eyeing up a little coat for her from Debenhams. I so very nearly bought it, but it cost £24!

Yesterday I popped into Norwich and happened to wonder into Debenhams and saw this coat but for........

£11.52!!!!

Needless to say this was promptly bought!

Little things like this make me happy. Yes, I'm that sad!

Mummy B xoxox

Your a cheeky one...

Your such a cheeky one Darcie b! I love seeing you explore and test your boundaries learning the do's and don'ts. I'm trying avoid to keep saying "no", because I know this you learning and exploring. Instead  I want to join in on your explorations and see the world from your point of view. Obviously sometimes I can't quite get your distractions and "no" is used, but sometimes its ok to play with the pots and pans.

Keep being my gorgeous inquisitive, loving, little girly.

Love you

Mummy xoxox

Darcie's New Bedroom

As you may remember we are changing Darcie's room over to the bigger spare room. The look I have decided to go for is a bright and colourful look with birds and owls as a theme.

I have seen so many wonderful things that are mounting up on my shopping list...

1, 2, 5 are all available at NEXT, when I saw this in their latest catalogue I knew I HAD to have it! So pretty and girly and perfect for Darcie.

3 & 4 are available from ARGOS for a very reasonable price! The wardrobe is £109 and the shelves are £19.99 each!

6 I already have from Darcie's birthday and they were from EBAY and priced at around £5.

7 is just a general colour of paint I would like to get...

8 is something I saw on ETSY, I love the song and I think it would look beautiful in an alternative colour in her room.

Here are some more recent inspiration pictures that have helped me with my planning...

Want to check out more of my ideas? Then head over to my Pinterest page HERE.

I do love dreaming up ideas for decorating and creating things. I so should of gone into something more creative!

Can not wait to get started! This will be my summer holiday project I think!

Mummy B xoxox

Right grab a brew and lets catch up...

As you may have gathered from my last post this week has been pants. When I said "why do bad things come in threes?" what I should of said "why does twenty bad things come at once?!!".

Yes quite frankly (yup I'm going to swear) this week has been shite.

As I said, its just been one thing after another, but as my Dad says, that's life. We wouldn't appreciate the good things in life if there wasn't challenges. Well my bank balance certainly doesn't appreciate the bashing its taken this month... thank you car oh and not forgetting washing machine. 

Positives from this week?

My girly, she continues to grow and amaze me. Walking behind me and Jamie like out little shadow brings a lovely warm feeling that makes you feel that life isn't really that bad in the grand scheme of things!

What to look forward to?

Blogging wise I have lots of posts coming up, including more (set in stone) ideas for Darcie's new room which we are planning of doing in the next month or two. More reviews on things she got for her birthday, a couple of clothing posts, one recipe post, and a couple of random days out posts for good measure!

How have all my lovely readers been?

Mummy B xoxox

Why is it bad things comes in three's?

To be honest things have been pretty crap of late, lots of little things of happened were I can't do a lot about them and I just want to GRRRRRRR at someone!

These things are only trivial but you know when sometimes things happen and your like"really?", well that's happened a lot recently!

BUT I have wonderful family and friends around me that make me smile on a daily basis! 

Sooo...

Lots of happy thoughts keep running through my head, lots of exciting things coming up. So I'm staying positive!

Mummy B xoxox

The Broads June 2013

 Today was spent with my side of the family on The Norfolk Broads.  It was the first time Darcie had been on a boat so of course being the snap happy person that I am, I couldn't resist capturing the day through photos.

The reason for our trip was to say our final goodbyes to my Grandparents (Brian & Irene - This is where Darcie got her middle name, Irene), who died over two years ago. We have waited for the perfect opportunity give them a send off that they would of wanted. To be by The Broads where they have spent many happy times together.

It has been a lovely day and it was nice to have us all together, completely relaxed and enjoying time with the whole family.

Darcie was  quite intrigued by the boat, she loved seeing her favourite things, ducks and loved helping Grandad steer the boat.

As expected Darcie, did not want to sit still, with her new found walking skills she wanted to be on the move! Luckily we stopped for some yummy dinner at a Pub where she was able to stretch her legs, have a swing and refuel!

Whilst we stopped at the Pub, we were treated to this beauty!

We had such a wonderful day, its been a while since I have been on the broads, probably not since my grandparents died. Will be going back more often as it is such a beautiful place, this will be a destination for the summer hols!

Mummy B xoxox

Skip Hop Zoolet Toddler Backpack with Reins Owl - Review

The Skip Hop Zoolet Toddler Backpack with reins the Owl edition was one of the Birthday presents that me and Jamie got for little d. She has become so mobile and this week she has leant to walk all by herself, one week after her first birthday!! So I am ever so pleased we thought to buy her this, as I think its going to be a big hit!

When looking for some reins for Darcie I knew I didn't want your usual looking reins but at the same time I wanted something that was going to be safe! We went to JoJo Maman bebe in Norwich and was instantly drawn to The Skip Hop Zoolet range. Their fun design and and secure straps looked exactly what I had in mind. The staff were very helpful in helping us choose a suitable rein, and I was very happy to part with £19.00 for this particular rucksack. 

Darcie's verdict... She loves it! She thought she looked rather cool! When its off we leave it hanging on the living room door and she constantly goes over to it wanting to try and put it on! 

I love the size of it too, for days where perhaps you won't need to use the rein, and you don't want to lug around a changing bag, its a handy bag to carry some nappies, wipes, creams and a drink - which is what we did today!

This rucksack is available from a variety of places including Amazon.

Mummy B xoxox

Happy Birthday Daddy

I don't know what I would do without my Dad, Love you lots! Happy Birthday 

xxxxx

The Birthday Series.... CAKE

Darcie's birthday cake was made by my lovely friends Mum, Rachel, who makes amazing cakes for all sorts of occasions. When I contacted her I wasn't really sure what I wanted, I had seen lots of designs that I loved (remember my post HERE) and one in particular stood out to me...

(Source)

So I gave Rachel the picture and said I wanted something like this. I think Rachel did an amazing job and thought it looked so beautiful. We opted for a chocolate cake as I knew mainly adults would be eating this and me and Jamie (The diabetic I may add) are chocoholics! The cake not only looked superb, it tasted divine! 

If you liked the look of Darcie's cake and want to find out more, head over to Rachel's Facebook page and give her a like HERE.

For people to be able to take some cake home, I had some paper bags made on Ebay by a shop called Label Amour which came out beautifully! They were very cheap priced at £2.50 for 10! You can find them HERE.

Mummy B xoxox

Darcie's First Birthday

Yesterday was Darcie's special day and it was perfect in every single way! We had a garden party with our close family and friends, we wished we could have invited all our loved ones who are special to Darcie but our garden would just not fit everyone!

I'm going to share our day with you through photo's (the best way!) and then, in the next few blog posts, I will go into more details on cake, dress, decorations etc to share our ideas with you. But for now enjoy these photos from our special day, thanks to Lou & Lu for snapping our day whilst I was busy hosting!

Happy Birthday Darcie B, Mummy and Daddy love you so much!

Mummy B xoxox

Dear Darcie - One Years Old

In the morning you are going to be a whole year old and I simply can not believe it. 

This time, last year, was a very scary time. We had been at the hospital all day because the Midwife came to see me that morning and my blood pressure had gone sky high (even higher than it already was!). She sent me and Daddy straight up to the hospital so they could investigate. They did lots of tests and monitored you very closely, we got to listen to you all day long. I don't think I will ever forget the sound of your heart beat. After a very long day of tests they still couldn't understand the reason for my high blood pressure or why you were measuring 33 weeks instead of 38+5. So they sent me down for a scan to see what was happening. The highlight of the day was getting to see you again, even though it was very hard to make out as you had gotten so big since the last time we saw you. The lady scanning confirmed the reason my bump was so small... I had dangerously low waters! She estimated your weight as being 6lb too. So off we trotted back to the ward. 

When we got back the doctor looked over the results and wanted to to another internal examination to see if my waters had started leaking. But they hadn't! Which again caused more alarm bells. The doctor then told me it could be very likely that my placenta had started to fail and whilst you wasn't in immediate danger you couldn't be left longer than another day. So in the morning they planned to induce you. 

That night me and Daddy prepared for you arrival, getting the house ready and Lady settled. We went over my hospital bag about thirty times to make sure we had everything! Then we decided on an early night. We couldn't sleep. I was very nervous about being induced, especially with the added complications but more than anything we were very excited to meet you.

One year on you have grown into such a beautiful little girl who really has filled our lives with so much happiness. Tomorrow we are going to celebrate with all your friends and close family, I can't wait to see your face when you see all your guests!

I love you Darcie Irene Burgess, with all my heart.

Lots of Love Mummy xoxox