Review // The Lego Movie

The Lego Movie, Review in Partnership with Suppose.

The nights are drawing in, its getting slightly chillier outside and evening's snuggled up with your family are just beckoning to be had an evening with a good film sounds pretty perfect. So when I had the opportunity to do just that - I jumped at it! I was kindly sent by the lovely people at Suppose, The Lego Movie. It's a film we hadn't seen, but was on our list of ones to watch. I was slightly dubious when it started, and wondered if it was going to be one our whole family would enjoy. But to quote the Sunday Mirror as labelled on the front of the DVD - its AWESOME! The humour in it is something that can keep the adults entertained, and then fun loving characters keep children amused - even Darcie giggled in a few places. 

So, what's it about? An ordinary guy called Emmet (Chris Pratt) is mistaken as being the Master Builder, the one who can save the universe. With the aid of an of mystic Vitruvius (Morgan Freeman), as tough young lady calld Lucy (Elizabeth Banks), and Batman (Will Arnett), Emmet will fight to defeat the evil tyrant Lord Business (Will Farrell) who is determined to ruin their universe by gluing it together. This film is defiantly aimed more at older children, with the story line and pot twisters I know Darcie probably almost definitely didn't take it in - though she seemingly enjoyed it all the same!

If you're thinking of films to add to your collection and you don't already own this one, make sure you add to your list! Especially with Christmas just around the corner! You can track the very best prices for The Lego Movie and everything else you are lusting over at Suppose.

Mummy B xoxox

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This item was sent for the purpose of the review, all thoughts and opinions are my own.

Birthday Shenanigans

My 26th Birthday

Mammoth cake eating, wine, strolls along the beach and fish and chips equals a pretty amazing birthday! 

As I spent most of the day at work, we tried to make the most of the day by doing presents in the morning followed by a trip to Southwold in the afternoon/evening. We arrived at around 4.20pm so allowed us plenty of time to play on the beach, it is unseasonably warm at the moment - even if I was determined to dress for Autumn (I'm desperate to wear my lovely chunky knits - who it with me?!).

I was incredibly lucky gift wise, Jamie got me quite a few things off my wish list including the gorgeous dress pictured. He also got my many, many, many hints for a new lens and got me the 50mm f/1.8 that I had been pining after amongst a couple of other things, so going to Southwold offered me the perfect opportunity to put it to the test!

Darcie treated me too with some pretty lovely earrings daddy she did really well! My parents also spoilt me, I'm now the proud owner of a Jack Wills coat, and a very lovely chunky knit. Come On autumn I need to put these to good use! Despite moaning about the warmer than average weather it did mean that we could eat outside my favourite pub. The Harbour Inn is such a favourite of mine, tucked away down the harbour away from the hustle and bustle of the seaside town. 

The food there is truly delicious and I thoroughly recommend the vegetarian fish & chips - haloumi in a beautiful batter. Whats more is you can eat and soak up the beautiful views too.

Such a perfect end to a such a perfect day (though I won't go into our car journey where Jamie developed tourettes - silly car!).

Mummy B xoxox

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I turn 26 tomorrow...

Tomorrow I turn 26.

I haven't really welcomed this birthday. It marks the end of my early twenties and I often find myself thinking, how did this happen so blinking quick? The last 6 years have been a bit of a blur, from graduating from University, entering a career in education, completing another degree, buying a house, getting our doggy Lady, becoming a mum to the most amazing and beautiful little girl (inside and out) and then finally becoming a wife to my partner Jamie. Even though I have achieved so much, it does scare me that all these huge life moments have come and gone. A little part of me thinks well what’s next?

Whatever the future brings, I know we will embrace all the ups and downs that we will inevitably encounter. We would love to be able to give Darcie a baby brother or sister, we would like to organise the house or even perhaps move to a slighter bigger house - who knows what the future may bring. What I do know is, that we will continue to work together as a family working towards our goals and creating our own little adventures. Turning 26, in fact just generally getting older, doesn’t change anything. Age is just a number and shouldn't define us or stop us from achieving any dream or goal. 

I’m excited to see what tomorrow brings, with Darcie being slightly more switched on and she clearly knows what tomorrow is. She has already told me that she and Daddy have got me a card, dinosaur wrapping paper and a birthday cake. Oh lets not forget to mention, she is now pretty awesome at the Happy Birthday song! Surprisingly she has kept my present under wraps! 

So here I say goodbye to 25 and I will welcome 26 with, umm, embracing arms!

Mummy B xoxox

Things That Make Me Happy

The little milestones 

Now Darcie is two the milestones seem to have slowed down, however there are two more recently that I'm ever so proud of. Firstly she is now able to go to bed all by herself. You maybe thinking why is this such a happy "thing"? Darcie has spent her entire life reliant upon us helping her to soothe herself to sleep. It's something I hadn't hoped to do, but it just became one of those things. This last month we have seemingly turned a corner and now experience relatively stress free bedtimes (hurrah!). The second little milestone is that Darcie is making more of an attempt with potty training. She regularly asks to go to the toilet (she hates her potty) and most of the time actually does go! I don't feel we are at the stage to try knickers, but we are definitely getting there now!

The colder evenings

You may think I'm mad, but I adore autumn and winter. I love everything about it, including the cold! I love to snuggle up, drinking hot drinks, watching a tv series (usually in one go!), wrapping up and going for walks. I literally can't think of many things I dislike - even the rain I love!

Home

Our home is getting more and more homely. It feels like we have grown into the home now! I remember when we first bought the house back in 2011, for the first year it was so bare. We were fresh out of university, in actual grown up jobs, using deck chairs as a sofa until they were delivered! But now, I look around and it is filled with happy memories. In fact sometimes I think it won't be long before we have outgrown the house.

Family

Of course my family make me happy, but sometimes I just forget how flipping amazing they all are. We are so fortunate that if ever we need advise or someone to turn to, they are always there, it what ever capacity they can be. Of course my Husband (just being able to say Husband makes me extremely happy!) makes me happy on a daily basis. One evening last week, I had a particularly long and tiering day at work, he did the food shop, made dinner, ran me a bath (and left towels, pj's all ready for me). To be honest he does these things on a regular basis, but as they say, its the little things that make you smile. Not forgetting Darcie, with her rapid broadening vocabulary, it has been wonderful to be able to have conversations and share secret jokes with each other.

What makes you happy at the moment?

Mummy B xoxox

Our Wedding Day // In Video

I have put together a little video of all our favourite snaps of the day. The song is Tenerief Sea by Ed Sheeran - the song I walked down the aisle too (also has great meaning to us). Hope you enjoy!

Mummy B xoxox

Our Wedding Day // Hair & Make-up

Here is a post for all you beauty junkies out there! Finding a makeup artist was something I really did take some time over, I wanted to make sure I got the right look for the day. I did think about doing my own, but I wanted to make sure the morning was as stress free as possible. So when I was doing my usual morning routine whilst getting ready for work, doing my make-up whilst catching up with my favourite YouTube channels, Jessica popped up. I have been following Jessica for such a long time, I knew her cousin very well at college and then discovered she had a blog and channel. Jessica is such a pro when it comes to make up, especially for a natural look that I was so desperately after.

Normally, I wear quite a lot of makeup. I like wearing a full coverage foundation along with bronzer, contouring and blush and everything else to cover up evidence of being up all night with a two year old! But for my wedding day I wanted something different, something especially for Jamie. Jamie always says how he prefers me with less or no makeup, he loves my freckles (which I'm not keen on) so I thought I would go for a very natural look.

Jessica used Bare Minerals as my base and whilst it looked like I wasn't wearing makeup my skin looked incredible! I was thoroughly impressed and wouldn't mind exploring the Bare Minerals brand further. She also used a few Mac eyeshadows, I was very envious of her impressive pallets! 

So thank you Jessica for getting the perfect look for the day!

Now for my hair, which is something that everyone has commented on! My lovely, very amazing and patient hairdresser Donna, created something truly special for my day and I was so, so, so pleased with the final look. We had a trial of a style that I thought I wanted, you know, the usual curly updo. But the more and more I thought about it, I knew it wasn't really me. So on the day we decided to do this...

To achieve this look, Donna firstly curled the entirety of my hair. She then carefully pinned sections before the creating the fish tail braid. It's definitely not something I have seen many brides go for, but its certainly my kind of style!

Each of my bridesmaids went for something different and each of them looked gorgeous.

Donna has always been so patient with me, she has her own little salon at her home. For my trials and previous hair appointments, I have always had Darcie with me. Having a two year old running around like a loon could be disastrous when having your hair done, but Donna has always made me and Darcie feel very comfortable - best hairdresser ever!

For my last wedding post, tomorrow,  I will share with you our favourite snaps!

Happy Friday all.

Mummy B xoxox

Our Wedding Day // Venue, Flowers, Decor

Hey guys! This evening we will be talking all about our venue, flowers and general decor! I kept our venue pretty much under wraps as I wanted to keep somethings to myself for the day. Batemans Barn was the only venue we looked at, after a friend recommended it to us (thanks Sarah!). The barn was simply stunning, we loved the layout. It felt so cosy and intimate and yet it offered lots of space for people to take themselves off and mingle with old friends and family. The owners Nicole and John were brilliant, always there to answer questions and offer advise, they took so much stress away and just made the day run incredibly smoothly!

Inside the barn we kept it pretty minimalistic. Across the beams laid rose garlands and fairy lights, these really did add to the rustic charm. We then also had some flowers tied to the ends of the chairs. We left the chairs uncovered - I'm not a fan of them, why cover up already beautiful chairs?!

We kept the flowers very simple, roses and gypsophila were key. Talking of flowers lets just talk about our bouquets. All of the flowers were done by New Beginnings, recommended to use by Nicole (at Batemans).

When I met with Suzanne at New Beggings, I simply showed her a few images from Pinterest and she drew inspiration from that. I'm very pleased with the way it all turned out, in particular the centre pieces, they looked incredible.

When I walked into the marquee which is attached to the barn, I felt liked I had walked into my wedding Pinterest board! All my inspiration and work just came together beautifully, I was so proud (haha)!

My step mum's mum, Sue, is a very talented lady. She made 100m of hessian and lace bunting (!) and this beautiful lavender filled heart keepsake.

One of my favourite areas was the gift table, it looked so rustic -This is why I loved Batemans, it had so many pretty areas!

 Next to the gift table we had a relaxing area with sofas, we lays out our giant wooden 'B' to be signed and engagement photo album for people to leave us well wishes.

Another cute element to the venue was the bar. It was small, but perfectly formed! Our guests were treated to a free bar and the little ones had a basket of goodies they could help themselves too (another fab idea by Nicole!).

Whilst people mingled we sneaked off to have some Mr & Mrs Shots. At Batemans there are some beautiful ruins in which you can take some amazing photos...

As you can see the venue had ALOT to offer!

Ok, so lets talk CAKE! I had my hear set on a 'naked' style cake and I spoke to my friends mum who made Darcie's first birthday cake. She had never made one before but was up for the challenge!

Everyone commented on how gorgeous it both looked and tasted. We even managed to freeze some, so have still been enjoying it a month on!

In the evening the barn had been transformed into a disco, we shared our first dance, danced to a song my brother made especially for me and sang and danced till our feet were sore! 

I must not forget, that as well as dancing, our guests were treated to a fire pit completed with marshmallows (unfortunately I don't have any photos to offer here).

I hope you're enjoying our wedding series, it has been lovely to put them together and spending sometime reminiscing.

Tomorrow make sure you pop back for wedding make-up and hair!

Mummy B xoxox

Our Wedding Day // Wedding Party

Today I will be sharing all things Wedding Party! Look at my lovely lot! I had four bridesmaids (including Darcie), all my bestest friends in the whole wide world! Jamie had his best friend Adam as Best Man and we had our brothers as Ushers - what a handsome lot!

So lets start with the guys...

We had seen an amazing suit in a magazine that we fell in love with. The suit itself was a very deep brown- we felt black wouldn't be in keeping with our theme. We couldn't locate the actual suits we saw, but I sent Jamie to Moss Bros to see if they had something similar. Now, unfortunately, I don't have anything positive to say about our experience with Moss Bros. The customer service from start to finish was actually shocking. They managed to find Jamie a similar suit (apparently - I wasn't with them at the time), and so they went ahead and started the process. The payment and process took well over an hour. My dad almost walked, but persevered. The next meeting with them was when they had fittings. The guys at the Norwich store were so rude, favouring other customers and kept us waiting. We had Darcie (our two year old incase you're reading Moss Bros) with us too, so this extra wait wasn't exactly ideal. The guy who appeared to be in charge kept swearing about his staff, so unprofessional and so offensive - all within earshot of our two year old.  Feeling frustrated and knowing that it was now too late to find an alternative supplier, we left feeling really uneasy. The day before the wedding my dad and Jamie went to collect the suits. When they arrived back, I asked if they doubled checked if they were ok - they hadn't. So we checked and low and behold they had messed up. My dad had a purple waist coat and Jamie an ivory tie. So very bizarre. I just burst into tears because all these horrible feelings about this company came true. To be fair to them, they did rectify the mistake. BUT, on the wedding day we discovered that Adam's (the best man) waist coat HAD NO BACK!!!! It was just a piece of material!!! Luckily the grooms men managed to bodge job it on. 

Ok, that's my rant over with.

Luckily these things didn't put a dampener on the day (even if every guest asked what was up with Adam's suit!) and now I just look back and laugh!

On to my beautiful bridesmaids. We were very lucky that an old colleague of mine recently left to open a bridal store, The Frock Spot, with her daughter and so she helped us with the bridesmaids dresses.

These beautiful chiffon dresses were the perfect splash of colour that we needed to bring everything together and also worked perfectly well with Darcie's dress.

I can't  get over how beautiful Darcie looked, she made me and Jamie so proud as she was good as gold from start to finish (even walked me down the aisle with my dad). Her dress was from Mamas & Papas (£22 in the sale!), shoes Next and her flower crown was from THIS Etsy store.

I'm soo thankful for all our wedding party, they were all amazing on the day, whether it was running round after Darcie, settling nerves or directing guests. They helped made it a very special and run smoothly. 

Come back tomorrow for venue, decor, flowers and cake!!

Mummy B xoxox