Tag: summer

Fashion and Style

Updating Your Summer Wardrobe

JayneLeave a comment

summerNow that the hot weather is in full swing, it’s made me realise how very little I have in the way of summer clothes. Husband noticed that I had a zip-tie holding my favourite shirts up the other day, because the button had come off, and that’s a pretty fair description of most of my clothes, so it’s safe to say that I’m desperate for an update to my wardrobe to see me through the rest of the summer.

The first think I need is some summer dresses, like the dresses from esprit; they’re casual yet pretty and perfect for everything from a summer barbecue to doing the school run on a hot day. I love dresses that can be worn casually with flip flops every day, or dressed up with a pair of wedges and a statement necklace for slight more formal occasions.

Obviously, I also need to invest in some new shorts, because the ones being held together by a zip tie just won’t do. I do like to have my legs bare in the summer, because I tend to feel claustrophobic and overheated if I wear trousers, even ones made from light material, so shorts and skirts are the way forward.

I’ve also realised how few summer friendly tops I have. In the winter, I tend to layer up with a t-shirt or vest, followed by a jumper or hoodie and then my coat, but all of my vests are either too clingy for summer or just not really tops that you wear by themselves. I recently invested in a strapless bra, for the first time since I got married 12 years ago, so I’m thinking of looking at some of the funky off-the-shoulder tops that seem to be everywhere at the moment.

Finally, footwear. My lovely sister-in-law bought me a new pair of Havaianas for my birthday back in June and I have about 8 pairs of Birkenstocks, but I think I need to invest in something a bit for formal, like a nice cork wedge so that I’ve got all my bases covered. I’m not a big wearer of heels as I find them uncomfortable, but I could wear wedges all day every day and still feel happy in them!

What are your summer basics? Do you have a summer wardrobe that you bring out every year or do you wear things until they need to held together with zip ties, like me?! Do leave me a comment below!

Kids

Keeping the Kids Entertained This Summer

JayneLeave a comment

keep the kids entertained this summerEven if you’re going away this summer, there’s a good chance that you’ll have at least a month at home, which you’ll be wanting to fill with activities for the kids, keeping the dreaded cries of “MUUUM, we’re BORED!” at bay for as long as possible! There are loads of things that you can do across a variety of budgets, which will fill their summer nicely, and this is just a few of them:

Pony Camp

If you live near a riding stable and have kids who love animals, find out if they’re doing any sort of pony camp during the summer. Last year, Sausage went to a pony camp one day a week for the entire holidays, and although it wasn’t cheap (we paid about £25 per session), it meant that even during quiet weeks, there are at least one day with guaranteed fun! Our stables bought all of their Horse Nutrition Products from Spillers, so we knew they were well cared for.

Shopping Centres

Take a look at the shopping centres near you; many of them have fun days for kids all the way through the holidays, with various characters like Chase from paw Patrol or Anna and Elsa from Frozen turning up. They’re generally free or very cheap, and give you a chance to pop into town for an afternoon of low-cost fun.

Pick Your Own

The nice weather means that you’ll be wanting to get outside as much as possible, and a PYO farm is a lovely bit of wholesome fun for the whole family. You generally only have to pay for the fruit you actually want to take home with you and the kids get to spend a few hours doing something which is about a million miles away from screen-time.

Fun Classes

Okay, so I’m not suggesting you get them doing school work in the holidays, but there are a few different places you can take them where they’ll get to learn something fun. YO! Sushi do awesome sushi making classes for kids, which we tried last year and the girls ADORED, but you’ll also find stuff at your local library, like coding classes, which your kids might enjoy, and again, they’re usually pretty cheap.

Litter Picking

This summer, Husband, the girls and I have decided that we’re making it our mission to go litter picking at least once a week. We live in a beautiful rural spot which is popular with dog walkers and cyclists, but we see an alarming amount of trash and mylar balloons when we’re out on walks. We figured, if we pick up as much as we can, we might offset some of the damage, doing a good deed and spending time together in nature at the same time. It might not be hugely glamorous, but it’s free and we’ll get a nice warm glow for having dome something for the environment.

Family · Humour

8 Ways We Know it’s Almost The Holidays

Jayne16 Comments

school holidaysI don’t know about you, but we are SO ready for it to be the summer holidays. Sausage has really enjoyed Year 3 and loves her current teacher but she’s definitely in need of a long break from the 32-mile-a-day school runs and if I’m honest, so am I! We, like most families, start September with very high standards of polished shoes, new stationery and a strict timetable but by this time of the school year things have well and truly slipped so I thought I’d give you an amusing insight into how we know it’s almost the end of the year:

  1. Your super-strict “we MUST be out of the door at 8am SHARP!” becomes “meh, it’s 8.10…we’ve got a few minutes before we absolutely HAVE to leave…”.
  2. At the beginning of the year, snazzy new school shoes have lights in them…only one of those lights now works and you have absolutely ZERO intention of working out how to fix the broken one.
  3. Socks which were once white (and kept that way through weekly soaking in a whitening solution) are now distinctly grey…or pink…and will be staying that way until they get binned in two weeks.
  4. Pristine book bags are now replaced with random rucksacks…or on a very bad day, a Bag for Life because the other bags have been shoved somewhere during a tidying frenzy and can no longer be located.
  5. Healthy packed lunches and bottles of filtered water are now hastily bought dinner tickets and a bottle of pre-made Vimto from the corner shop.
  6. Creative homework, which was lovingly crafted at the beginning of term is now largely forgotten, or done in a five minute panic on a Sunday evening.
  7. Uniform, which was once immaculate, is now looking a little worse for wear with inkspots on shirts and summer dresses which are a little on the small side…but you’re definitely not going to replace it before September!
  8. There’s a massive chart on your wall where you tick off the days until the summer holidays and it’s literally the most exciting thing you do all day.

I’m sure there are other surefire signs of how much we’re DONE with this school year. What are yours? Leave me a comment below, I’d love to hear them!

Slow Cooker

Busy Summer Vacation? Get Help With Slow Cooker Summer Recipes

Jayne4 Comments
Kids are out of school, and that surely means it’s a time for you to take a break of nine months of being a taxi driver for extracurricular activities or a school volunteer, right? Of course not. When summer break hits, you’re marching to a different rhythm—driving kids to and from summer camps, going on more daylong trips, or just scrambling to organize summer activity ideas to hold off kids from saying, “I’m bored!”
Basically, your kids may be getting a break from the summer, but your job has shifted to activities director—you are most likely just as busy as during the school year.
Good thing your slow cooker also doesn’t take a break either. This trusty appliance was most likely was your saving grace during the school year, cooking your family meal while you are gone all day and having it ready when you arrived home after work and picking up children. In the fall and winter months, a warm and hearty meal from the crock pot sure hit the spot after enduring brisk weather. Crockpots are great for cooking and keeping food warm on those winter days, but what about summer when a hot day calls for a cool drink or a crisp salad? Your slow cooker can cook up meals that are sure to hit the spot on summer months without you being stuck in the kitchen. Check out these crockpot tips to make summer cooking a little easier:
Barbeque
Summertime is all about cooking on the grill, but if you’re gone most of the day, firing up the grill for a quick meal may not always fit in your evening schedule. Luckily, there are many crockpot recipes that offer that summer barbeque taste without needing a grill. Many of these barbeque-like recipes simply involve marinating the meat in a sauce like mayonnaise, barbeque, or salad dressings.
For example, consider a recipe like Crock Pot Caesar Chicken: simply place four boneless, skinless chicken breasts in the crockpot, and set the crockpot on either high for three hours or low for six hours. After cooking the chicken for either three or six hours in the crockpot, drain the juices from the crockpot, keeping the chicken inside. Pour a bottle of Caesar salad dressing like Just Caesar from hampton creek on top of the chicken. Cover the crockpot and set it on high for 30 minutes. Top off with parmesan cheese and cut it up to serve with a salad or as a chicken salad.
The difference in Hampton Creek salad dressings and sauces is that they are made with minimal artificial additives and free of gluten, dairy, and soy. The company has other sauces like Just Mayo, an eggless mayonnaise, that you can use in other crockpot recipes that call for mayonnaise. Try replacing any crockpot recipe with a sauce or salad dressing from Hampton Creek.
Vegetables
Summer BBQ isn’t complete without a side of vegetables, especially corn on the cob. Corn is often boiled in a pot or cooked on the grill, but you can prepare corn on the cob ahead of time in a slow cooker so you have it ready when you get home.  One version of crockpot corn requires that you prep each ear of corn with garlic butter, pepper, salt, and wrap each ear with a slice of bacon. Place the ears of corn in a crockpot with chicken broth and minced jalapeno pepper. Cook on low for up to four hours.
Soup
Just because it’s summer doesn’t mean that you can’t eat soup. Soups are often thought of as hearty meals meant to warm you up after a cold day, but there are just as many soups that are light and flavorful, making it a perfect dish to enjoy on a hot summer day. It’s also a fun way to incorporate fresh vegetables from farmer’s markets, which most of the time are held during the warm months. A summer vegetable soup like a summer vegetable pesto soup makes use of summer vegetables like sweet corn, green beans, tomatoes, and more, and tops it off with pesto. You can also add other vegetables like white beans for a different flavor.
Summer break from school doesn’t mean that parents also get a break, but summer crockpot recipes give you a break from the kitchen so you can spend your summer days doing what you want—going to the pool, attending the county fair, relaxing at the beach—without the worry of what you’re going to eat for dinner.
Family · Fashion and Style

Dressing Girls for a Rubbish Summer

JayneLeave a comment

One thing that I’ve found quite tricky these last few weeks is getting the balance right when dressing the girls. The appallingly bad “summer” weather means that the usual dresses and sandals have been completely out of the question, but it’s also not quite cold enough for coats and jumpers, so it’s been a case of finding some middle ground.

Husband is a big fan of layering because it means that you can adjust what you’re wearing if your environment changes and we’ve been trying to adopt this for the girls, too. Instead of thick coats, we’ll give them a fleece and a shower-proof layer, and they can still wear dresses, but often wear a t-shirt and leggings underneath.

Recently, House of Fraser asked us to take a look at their Kids Clothing range and pick a few things for each girl that would make it onto a summer outfit wishlist, so we thoguht we’d put together a little board for each of them to show how we cope with dressing for any weather:

 

Layering for Summer

 


The items on the left are what we chose for BB and the stuff on the right are for Sausage…what do you think of your choices? I think they’d be perfect for a day out while the weather is so unpredictable. What would you choose? Do you have boys or girls? Do you find it easier to shop for one gender than another at this time of year? Leave me a comment below, I’d love to hear from you.