NONABOX - IDEAL FOR ALL THOSE NEW BABIES

I haven't had much time to write any posts recently as I have been so busy at work, but this competition prize that has just arrived really captured my imagination.

My children are teenagers now, but some of my friends' children are now having children of their own and so I do enter competitions for baby items.

Nonabox is an established Spanish company that specialises in putting together a box of items that any new mother would love. They have now set up a UK company and I think you can order just one box or set up a subscription.

The box arrived beautifully packaged with a grey ribbon (that my daughter took for her hair!) and as you can see from the photos looks amazing. Lots of detail even in the lid.

The contents of the box are lovely - a really fabulous selection.

• Muslins - rolled and tied with a ribbon
• Lamaze Bend and Squeak Penguin
• Dr Brown's dummy
• First Choice bottle
• Pasito a pasito bib
• Bag of 20 quick clean microwave bags - sterilising bags for use in the microwave
• Baby lotion
• Baby cream

As you can see the items in my box are pink as chosen for a girl, but you can choose blue or unisex.

I think this is a great idea and is just a little bit different to a teddy or a sleepsuit for a newborn.

CAMERA CASES

As some of you might have realised recently, we have been having a bit of a tidy up with our gadgets. Getting covers for the Kindle and looking at accessories for tablets.

Now it is the turn of the cameras. It was high time that instead of using carrier bags or a sock (a compact camera fits well into a sock, but you do get some strange looks.....) we bought camera cases.

My son has a very nice Canon camera that he has been using for work towards his GCSE photography exam. Quite a "large" camera - well compared to my compact one - and then there are the lenses, the remote control switch, the lens filters, cleaning kit, charger....

He had been carrying it all around in the box that the camera came in, but we had to look for something that would hold all the kit and at the same time look "trendy" enough for a teenage boy to want to carry around.

As you can see from the pictures this is a stylish bag that has plenty of separate compartments for the various bits and pieces that he needs to carry around. There is also the zipped meshed pocket at the top - handy for the SD cards and filters and you can easily see what you are carrying. There is a zipped pocket at the front into which the charger will fit.

The colours are great for a teenage boy. The bag can either be carried by hand, or there is a shoulder strap that can be attached. There are also two straps for attaching a tripod.

All in all a sturdy, waterproof, nice looking case of good quality and at a reasonable price.

So, my son is all sorted out!! Now my compact camera. I have a Nikon Coolpix and all I really wanted was a case that would protect my camera and fit into my handbag. Being a girl I obviously wanted a nice bright colour, rather than the masculine greys and blacks that proliferate the camera accessories industry.

I looked at many, but finally settled on a Case Logic case in turquoise. The case is also available in black (of course!), red, blue and purple. The case has a compact design and fits the camera exactly. There is a stiffened front panel to protect the lens and a handy carrying strap. For a price of around £10.00 this is a real bargain and I don't lose it in my bag due to the lovely colour.

WIN A NEXUS 4

GOOGLE NEXUS 4

2013  is the year that Google has teamed up with LG to release a new Nexus phone that will include all the most up to date software. This phone has an Android 4.2 operating system,, a 4.7-inch HD screen and 1.5GHz quad-core processor. Best of all it’s reasonably priced at £239.00.

Android 4.2 has a number of  improvements over 4.1 -  notifications you can open in the pull down tray and read and  there’s a new settings menu in the notification drawer you can use to toggle everything.

There’s a new camera experience – Photo Sphere Camera – you can take photos in every direction and then bring them together in a photo sphere that puts you right into the scene. I can envisage lots of fun on holidays with this. You can view the sphere on your phone, share them on Google+ or even add them to Google Maps …if you wanted the whole world to see your amazing pictures!!

Android 4.2 allows devices to enable wireless display. You can share movies, YouTube videos, and anything that’s on your screen on an HDTV. All you need to do is connect a wireless display adapter to any HDMI-enabled TV and it will display what’s on your screen on the television screen. How to bore people with your holiday photos on the large screen!!!

With Android Beam on Jelly Bean you can now easily share your photos and videos with just a simple tap,  A really fun feature is the ability to  touch two NFC-enabled Android devices back-to-back, then tap to beam whatever's on the screen to your friend.

A new fabulous way of typing that's brilliant for those with few typing skills. Instead of having to type each letter individually you can simply slide your fingers from letter to letter and then lift at the end of the word. This is so much quicker on a phone than by using the traditional keyboard it will speed up your messaging hugely. The keyboard anticipates and suggests the next word, speeding things up even more.

Android's dictionaries are now more accurate as well so the predictive text is more useful than it was. There is also an improved speech-to-text capability so voice typing on Android is even better. It works even when you don't have a data connection, so you can type with your voice everywhere you go. You may get some strange looks on the train when other passengers think you are talking to your phone, but if that’s the price you have to pay for rapid messaging….

Well, I’d love one of these, but I can’t really justify buying another new phone at the moment, so what better than a competition to win one.

Our friends over at Mobilefun.co.uk have one of these great phones available to win in a draw that ends on May 1^st 2013. So why not hop over to their giveaway page and enter this competition today. You can enter with your Facebook account or by email.

Don’t wait. Enter now!!

TABLET PURCHASE AND ACCESSORIES

I have been considering a tablet purchase for a long time - smaller than a laptop, so easier to carry around (and I can probably fit it in one of my day bags), yet bigger than a phone if I want to watch films or TV programmes or read a book or magazine. As I am getting older I find that the larger size screen is better anyway!!

But which one to choose? The main competitor to Samsung is obviously the Apple IPad, but I am not necessarily seduced by advertising and peer pressure so looked at the new Galaxy Note 8.

Samsung's Galaxy Note 8 tablet is now available to buy in the UK.

 

But what good is a tablet without accessories?!!

I personally need at least a good cover to protect the tablet from the usual day to day knocks and a means of resting my tablet if I want to read books (which I do frequently whilst waiting for my children to finish whatever activity they are participating in which means I have to wait in the car!).

My first choice for phone and tablet accessories is always GearZap. They offer a wide selection of accessories and have just launched a range of accessories for the Galaxy Note 8.

The covers come in five colours – dark grey, white, berry pink, lime green and garnet red. As fashion trends at the moment are for neon brights, the lime green one would be ideal.

The desk dock is a great idea as it puts the tablet at a good reading angle which is comfortable for reducing eye strain if using the tablet as an e-reader. There is also a vehicle dock if you are thinking of using the tablet as your sat nav.

As you expect with Gearzap the prices are extremely competitive and their delivery service is fast and efficient.

My ChiChi wish list (or more accurately the clothes my teenage daughter would like!!)

These dresses are all beautiful and ideal to wear for both young and the not so young!! Elegant and tasteful without being revealing.

We love them!! Chichi really do sell good quality reasonably priced dresses…so we can buy more than one!

This post is part of a competition run by eTailPR.

MANAGING TWITTER FOLLOWING FOR COMPETITIONS

As you all know I am an avid comper and try and enter as many as I can through social media such as Facebook and Twitter.

As you can only follow 2000 people at any one time, it can be easy to reach this limit on Twitter and unless you have some magical spreadsheet method for remembering which competitions end on certain dates, it can be a bit of a nightmare deciding who to "unfollow". 

Well, I have a solution that may take a little bit of time at the beginning of each month, but I promise no more than 10 minutes.

OK. The first step is to be brave and go through all the people you are following and unfollow those who you are pretty sure you haven't seen listing competitions recently.

Then you need to go into your profile and set up three lists - labelled Competitions April, Competitions May and Competitions June (clearly it needs to be the current month and the next two months, so depending on when you read this post, make sure you use the correct ones). I always have them as private lists as they are purely for your own competition tracking purposes.

Then it becomes very simple...when you follow a company to enter a competition, click on the icon next to the FOLLOW button and then ADD OR REMOVE FROM LISTS. Simply check the box next to the month that the competition ends in. If the competition depends on a number of followers being reached, then you have to take a view as to whether you place the company in one, two or even three lists.

Note that you can only have 500 people in any one list so some months you may need to set up another list called (for example) Competitions April 2.

At the beginning of the second month (May in my example) - I usually wait until around the 5th or 6th of the month - go into the list for the first month (April in my example) and unfollow everybody!! I know this sounds drastic, but trust me!! Once everyone has been unfollowed, delete the list. YES DELETE THE LIST. You won't need it for another year and too many lists becomes unmanageable. Even if you were following 500 people, this means 500 clicks and at one click a second, this takes less than 10 minutes.

Then, go into the lists for months 2 and 3 and follow anyone who is now showing as not followed. There are always going to be some. This means that your competition entry that depends on a retweet and follow remains valid.

Finally, set up another list for the new month 3 (in my example Competitions July) and start the process all over again.

If you do this on a regular basis you will find that you may get close to the 2000 limit at the end of a month, but you will rarely exceed it.

Happy comping everyone!!

BEDROOM MAKEOVER

Oh what I would give to have a bedroom makeover!!

I bought the house I currently live in from a couple who had lived in the property for over 35 years. The main bedroom was dark and gloomy and wallpapered in an interesting range of different patterns - all floral. Stripping the wall paper took a very long weekend as the previous owners had simply papered over paper every time they decorated. There were 8 layers on the chimney breast.

Next the carpet had to be looked at. Brown floral - very nice! Actually I think it should have been a sort of creamy pink colour, but age and the fact that the couple smoked in the house hadn't helped it. When I took the carpet up, there was another carpet underneath that had been used as the underlay! Cream and worn in many places, but better than the floral one and so this has stayed in place. 

Wardrobes....what can I say. They were freestanding wardrobes that had been nailed and screwed to the walls either side of the chimney breast. Sadly, they thought it was a good idea to knock out the chimney. The wardrobes have been removed and this entailed having to plaster and reline the walls. My clothes now hang on temporary rails pending new ones being sourced.

I have at least painted the walls and put up Roman blinds, but as these are now a couple of years old, they could do with replacing or sprucing up a bit.

So what would my ideal bedroom makeover entail....

• Built in wardrobes with sliding mirror doors, plenty of hanging space, shoe racks
• Nice dressing table with lights to do my make up and hair by (very important!!)
• New carpet and curtains or blinds
• Nice new bedding to coordinate with the walls - nice pale purple that I love

This blog post is part of the Silentnight Spring Bedroom Makeover Challenge.

THE COLOUR STUDIO - HAND DYED SHOES

I was lucky enough to be picked as the winner of three pairs of shoes of my choice to be hand-dyed in a Facebook competition. This was a fabulous prize for me as I absolutely love shoes and am always on the lookout for well made, unique coloured shoes to coordinate with my clothes.

Like most people, I'm sure, I have shoes in nude, black and navy, but here was an opportunity to really personalise some shoes.

The system of buying shoes is very simple - there are (currently) 49 styles of shoes on their Occasion Shoes part of the website (http://www.mycolourstudio.co.uk/occasion-shoes). You can literally spend hours deciding which style of shoe, because of the websites ability to let you see the shoes in any of the standard colours that they offer (currently 40). You can do the mathematics...but if you looked at every shoe in every colour that would be 1960 combinations....I think that my teenage daughter and I must have looked at every shoe in every colour and then tried to imagine them with different outfits. It was the most fun we have had together "fashion" shopping in ages.

Finally, I made my decision on the style of the shoes. All to be worn on evenings out, though I am very tempted to wear them to work, just to cause a stir.

I ordered the shoes and they arrived, beautifully boxed with a Colour Pack in each box. The process is very simple - you complete the form with the colour you want, send the shoes back in a helpfully prepaid packet and then wait for the shoes to arrive. (Please note that I think you now have to go to a local stockist to buy the shoes).

Once I had sent the shoes back to be dyed, turn round time was around 6 working days for my shoes, though I imagine if you were asking them to hand-dye to match specific swatch of fabric it may take longer.

I have to say that I was absolutely delighted with the shoes that I received. All were boxed, with tissue paper and shoe shapers. The shoes are fantastic quality - top notch satin material. The shoes with open toes have a hand dyed section at the front of the shoe (as you can see in the photograph), so no inner of the shoe is showing when you wear them. The shoes with toes have a suede insert in the heel area for comfort. The detail is amazing.

True to form I chose some taupe coloured shoes as these will go with practically all my outfits.

Next. some dusky pink ones. I have a couple of cocktail dresses with pinky/peachy tones and these shoes would match brilliantly. I love the diamante detail!

Finally, the shoestopper....bright blue for a real statement shoe.

 

 

They can also dye handbags and shoe clips and can match to your own colour swatch.

 

Whenever I want a special pair of shoes I will definitely be turning to Rainbow Couture (http://www.rainbowclub.co.uk/). They should be every girl's first stop for weddings and special occasions.

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REVIEW OF KINDLE COVER AND READING LIGHT

I have had my Kindle for a while now and have to say that I think it is one of the best gadgets around. It is great to take on holidays where you can have access to hundreds of books for less than the weight of one large paperback and I find it especially handy to have with me in the car for those many occasions when I am waiting for my children to finish clubs or activities. There are often evenings when there isn't enough time to warrant going home and I don't need to go to the corner shop again to buy things I don't really need!!

I use my Kindle both for books I read in text form and for listening to audio books - that way I can knit socks at the same time, which is another of my hobbies.

However, I have found recently that although I take care not to scratch the screen or back of the Kindle, that it has been looking a bit forlorn. What I really needed was a cover. I looked at many websites for covers and found them all extremely expensive. What I wanted was something that looked classy, but that didn't come at a price that was equal to the cost of the Kindle.

 I found the perfect Kindle cover at Gearzap.com. ( http://www.gearzap.com/amazon-kindle-accessories/amazon-kindle-cases.html)

They offer a range of covers to suit all the various Kindle editions so you will be sure to find the one for you. I chose a deep purple one (it matches my handbag!) and was very impressed. The quality of the material is excellent and you could believe it was leather as it has that feel about it. The Kindle is held securely within the case by four corner straps and on the inside cover there is a handy pocket that could hold a rail or bus ticket for those travelling on public transport. No fiddling in pockets and bags for that elusive ticket.

My other desire with my Kindle was a reading light. I am often sitting in the car during the Winter months (sometimes for up to half an hour or forty minutes) and trying to read by means of the interior lights not only drains the car battery, but is also a great strain on your eyes as the light does not shine onto the Kindle well and so you are reading in half gloom.

So when I ordered my cover I opted for the pack with the LED booklight. Fabulous! It clips onto the top of the Kindle cover and provides just the right amount of light without too much glare.

Best of all was the price. at only £18.95 this was an absolute bargain for both items and I would highly recommend to other Kindle owners.

COMPETITION WINS JAN & FEB 2013

Well this year has started off really well (though not quite as good as November and December when I managed to pretty much win all my Christmas presents!), but some nice wins nevertheless.

I have continued to enter competitions on Facebook and Twitter as these are easy to do and require nothing more than a click of the mouse. Beware however, that you don't get too carried away as time can pass by very quickly.

There are problems with both of these methods though;

1. Beware you don't enter too many at once or you could find yourself banned from using either site for an hour or so or even longer. Facebook especially blocks you for up to 30 days if it thinks you are "spamming" and as many competitions require you to simply "like and share" the posts do all look similar.
2. With Rafflecopter entries on Twitter you often have to post the URL of the tweet. Don't simply copy the tweet as this will not be recognised. To find the URL, find the tweet, hover over the time elapsed since sent record (top right hand side of the tweet) and copy and paste this into the Rafflecopter entry form.
3. Winning posts - Twitter is much better at this and you either get a mention (which is easy to check on your profile page) or a DM. Facebook not so good and many sites just post a message on their wall. If you follow lots of pages for competitions, it can be difficult to check them all, so join The Winners' Circle group and you may find others post your name as a winner!

So what have I won.....Quite a lot of makeup and facial products which all come in handy with a teenage daughter in the house, the nicest being a three month subscription to BirchBox, which has given me the opportunity to try out products I might not think of purchasing; a few DVDs and books; bracelets (these seem to be popular prizes, but a girl can never have too many).

The best prizes so far this year - 10 balls of Louisa Harding wool that I intend to make into a cosy jumper (great prize for a knitter), three pairs of shoes that were hand-dyed to the colour I wanted (I'll post something separately about these when I get a chance to take photos) and £200.00 of loungewear from Skiny that has yet to arrive.

All I can say to other compers is don't give up if the prizes don't seem to be coming as they will. After all you have to be in it to win it!!