The perfect bottle in less than 2 minutes - Tommee Tippee Perfect Prep

I was invited to the launch of an amazing new product from Tommee Tippee. It was held at the ExCel baby show in London. I travelled up there with my Mum and the two boys by train.

We got there early enough to have a look round the baby show at some of the stands, then we dropped BoyG off at the Fisher Price creche and made our way to the product launch.

It had all been kept very secret so the first we knew about it was at the show. Wow! What an amazing machine!!

The new product is called the Perfect Prep and it is for formula fed babies. It helps make the bottles up and makes them body temperature so that the milk is even more natural like breast milk. It does this in less than 3 minutes!

You put tap water straight into the machine which has a built in filter. You can set the correct bottle size in ounces and put your empty bottle on the stand. The stand can be moved higher or lower depending on how tall the bottle is. So you can use most makes of bottle with it.

Once the bottle is on the stand, you press a button and an initial hot shot will come out at 72*. This is hot enough to kill any bacteria which might be found in the formula powder. The machine will then beep to let you know it is time for the next step.

You then remove the bottle and add the correct amount of formula to the bottle, cover with the bottle cover and shake until the powder has dissolved. Then after removing the bottle cover, place the bottle back on the stand and touch the same button again which will fill up the rest of the water at body temperature. The bottle is ready for baby.

What an amazing concept!! No more waiting for the kettle to boil in the night when baby is crying for their milk! It is a lot faster than boiling the kettle then waiting for the water to cool down. Also, safer than pouring boiling water out at eye level.

The Perfect Prep has several warning alerts built into it, so for example it lets you know when the filter needs changing, or if the machine needs de scaleing.

One of the things I like the most about this product is the lime scale alert. When you use kettle water for making bottles it is so hard to do it without getting at least a tiny bit of lime scale in the water. This product just gives your baby perfect water in the bottle without any lime scale. And when it needs descaleing, the Perfect Prep will tell you!

The Perfect Prep machine is part of the closer to nature range from tommee tippee. As I mentioned before, it has been designed to fit most bottle shapes and sizes. It is available from the first week of May from Amazon and Babies r Us, and costs £99.99. You can also pre order his now from Amazon.

There is a special price this weekend of £66.66 to pre order the Perfect Prep at the baby show.

Below is a discount code so you can also pre order at the baby show price from Amazon.

9DIC8VIU discount code valid until 3/3/13

A Lush Day In Covent Garden - Product Review

While on a recent trip to Covent Garden, I popped into Lush which is one of my favourite shops. Definitely my favourite cosmetics shop. I had a lovely chat with one of the sales assistants about the products and she kindly gave me some samples to try out.

Lush is a cosmetics company specialising in handmade, natural products. They are against animal testing, you can recycle the packaging and the products smell fab! Whats not to like??

The first sample we tried was the shower jelly. This comes in two fragrances; Whoosh and Sweetie Pie. Its a soap that literally looks and feels like jelly. You can use it at room temperature, chill it in the fridge, or even use it frozen! We went for Whoosh in the boy's bath. Its a nice clean and fresh fragrance with lemon, lime and grapefruit. BabyG is a teeny bit small to really know that we were using jelly. BoyG on the other hand thought it was very funny having jelly in the bath and even better that he could wash with it!! They both smelled lovely after their bath!

Next, we tried the Sweetie Pie shower jelly. Again it smelled lovely but I did prefer the smell of Whoosh. I asked BoyG for his opinion and he thought they both smelled good. We crushed some of the Sweetie Pie jelly into a sponge and rubbed a bit of water on it to lather it up a bit. We only used a small piece but it made enough soapy foam to wash both boys.

I really loved the next four products. They really worked well together.

Dreamwash, Dream Cream, Angels On Bare Skin and Skin Drink.

I found that a little bit went a long way with these, making my samples last longer. I have problem skin as I suffer from psoriasis. I don't use any medicated creams as I don't find them any use so I'm always on the look out for something new to try. The Dreamwash and Dream Cream are made for me! Well, actually they are made for anyone with eczema, dry or irritated skin. I thought the Dreamwash felt lovely and smelled great, and the Dream Cream again felt great. And after using them just once I could tell a difference in my skin. These have got chamomile, tea tree, rose and lavender, and as well as being great for the skin, the lavender is very relaxing as well. Both of these are gentle enough to be suitable for children. My two boys both have dry/sensitive skin so these are good for them as well as me, making them soft as silk and smelling great! I used them on BoyG and that helped his skin where it has a teeny bit of eczema, and on BabyG where he has a little dry skin under his arms. Both boys skin looked better afterwards.

Angels On Bare Skin.... The name kind of says it all!! Along with the rest of me, the skin on my face can get sore and look blotchy. I used this cleanser just once followed by the Skin Drink moisturiser and my face felt so soft and smooth! The cleanser has quite a strong lavender scent, but the Skin Drink has a very subtle scent so it wasn't too over powering like some moisturisers can be. Again as with most Lush products, you don't need much. Just a tiny bit of the Angels On Bare Skin, mixed with water to make a paste was enough for my face. Massage on then rinse with warm water. Follow with Skin Drink and you will love it as much as I do! Hello soft pampered skin!!

 Putty For The Hands - I'm not really sure what I was expecting from this one but it was good all the same. Its a soap but as it doesn't contain a soap base it doesn't foam up like a normal soap would do. I was surprised though to find that my hands still felt clean, and they felt like they had a protective coating on them. This smells the same as the Dream Wash and Dream Cream with lots of lavender.

I followed the putty for the hands with Sympathy For The Skin. It has got a lovely delicate scent. You can use it all over but I just used it on my hands for now. It goes on really lightly and left my hands feeling lovely and smooth. I was expecting these two products to cure any dryness on my hands but I did feel that the really dry bits still needed something more. This is good if you don't have major dry bits.

I used my Sister In Law as a guinea pig with the Putty For The Hands and the Sympathy For The Skin as well as her hands were feeling dry but not in the same way as mine. She liked how it felt and she liked the smell. Her hands felt lovely and soft afterwards.

Vanilla Dee Light - I used this as a quick fix before bed as I had not used any of the Lush soaps before hand. It smells so good! One of my favourite smells so far. My skin felt nice afterwards but for me personally, I think I need the Dream Cream just because my skin is so bad with the psoriasis.

 Ro's Argan Body Conditioner - This is a very different product to anything I have used before. It is literally a conditioner for your skin. You condition your body just as you would your hair with your normal conditioner. Wash with your soap then rinse off, smooth the body conditioner onto your skin then rinse it off and towel dry your skin. Great for when you don't have much time to moisturise! This has some lovely ingredients including argan oil, cupuaçu butter and brazil nut oil. Its got a rose scent to the lotion and it made my skin feel very soft. I used this on BoyG and he was very soft afterwards. He smelled lovely all day as well!

 I have really enjoyed reviewing these products but my favourites for my skin have got to be the Dream Wash, Dream Cream, Angels On Bare Skin and the Skin Drink. Favourites for the boys would be the Whoosh Shower Jelly and any of the moisturisers as they all made their skin nice and soft.

I just want to add a note about these products. I have been using these samples exclusively over about a week and have noticed my skin getting softer although I can still see the psoriasis. When I used a different brand of cream on my hands it stung so much! This is what was happening to me before and I assumed it was because my skin was so dry but after reviewing the Lush samples I think its more to do with the products themselves and the ingredients being natural. I will be using more Lush products and less of the ones I had used before!

These samples were given to me by Lush in Covent Garden. You can buy their products on line, by phoning 01202 668545 or in stores.

British Heart Foundation - Display in Covent Garden

I went into London last weekend as my cousin was over from America for the first time and we wanted to show her the sights. We took her to Covent Garden so we could show her all the quaint little shops and the street performers. As we came out of the shops we came across a display by the British Heart Foundation trying to raise money and awareness.





There were five wire cages, one heart shaped and four spelling out the word LOVE. It caught my attention straight away so I went over for a closer look if you have read my earlier blog posts you will know about BabyG being poorly when he was still very small. He had problems with his heart and had an 8 day stay in hospital in London during which time he had to have open heart surgery. So I'm sure you can appreciate that this charity is one I support and am happy to promote.





So I went over to see what it was all about. The metal cages were covered with metal tags in heart shapes, held on with padlocks. Messages had been hand written on the tags. They were asking people for a donation of £3 and for this donation you got a packet with a heart tag, and a padlock. I decided straight away that I needed to take part in this as a celebration of my BabyG.



This was a wonderful idea. It was so effective, and eye catching, making people want to come over and see what was happening.



BabyG fit and healthy

You can find more information about the British Heart Foundation and you can make a donation if you like on their website.

Homemade pizza - simple, easy and lots of fun!

BoyG told me he wanted his favourite for tea. When asked what that was he replied 'Pizzzzzaaaaa'. Well I first thought about Pizza Hut but I'm on a diet and didn't really want to eat pizza, and I didn't really want to pay for Pizza Hut for just BoyG when DaddyG was at work and I wasn't eating. But just before I told him we couldn't go, I had a brainwave.... Homemade pizza!! So we got some ingredients, BoyG's apron on and tied, hands washed, and we made pizza!

First of all, it doesn't need to cost a fortune. We used very basic ingredients on ours. Value pizza base, value ham slices, Tesco pepperoni slices, Tesco pre grated cheddar cheese and value tomato puree. We used a pizza stone. I'm sure you could use a baking tray but I have a Pampered Chef pizza stone that I use for anything like this, or even just for baking cookies on and it works brilliantly.



BoyG's step by step pizza guide;

He squeezed the tomato puree onto the pizza base then spread it around evenly with a tablespoon.

Next, he sprinkled the cheese on top of the puree so that it covered the pizza

BoyG does all his own quality control checks so the next step was to check the pepperoni was good enough.

Once he knew the pepperoni was good, he carefully put pieces on top of the cheese.

BoyG put a piece of ham on top of each piece of pepperoni then a little bit more cheese and then it was time to put the pizza in the oven.

We followed the directions on the packaging of the pizza base for temperature and timing.

 BoyG had pizza for his dinner and saved some for DaddyG while I had a healthier alternative. BoyG loved making pizza with me. We will definitly do this again.