These City Days

Happy December everybody, how have we got here this fast? My city centre has their Christmas tree lights on, my xmas shopping is in full swing, and I’ve watched a few cheesy Christmas movies already. There’s still plenty of time to make some decorations though, and I have a great guest post here all about pom poms, which I hope will inspire you. Over to the lovely Hannah at Jolly Festive to chat about her beautiful Pom Pom Christmas Tree Project. You can find my post all about kid’s Christmas books here . Pom-pom craft projects are brilliant.  To be honest, that’s not a sentence I ever expected to find myself writing. Years of making pom poms with those cardboard circles, alongside our Guiding volunteer Mum, traumatised me.  Not because they were hard to make. But because they seemed to take an eternity and the constant feeding of yarn through that central hole made my eyes go squiggly!  Fast forward a decade (or maybe three) and I decided to brave the world of pom-poms once more. 

It's that time of year again when the shop shelves are tempting me with all the Christmas reads, how does anyone resist, it's so hard! I recently had to pause mid-read when I was given the chance to read and review The Christmas Escape by Sarah Morgan for the blog tour. This is the third of Sarah's Christmas novels I've read and I'm sure it won't be the last! The Christmas Escape follows best friends Christie and Alix as they prepare for a trip of a lifetime to Lapland and the Northern Lights to meet Christie's long lost aunt for the first time. But the path of true love and true friendship doesn't always run smooth, and there is some emotional drama along the way that threatens to de-rail the trip before anyone has even set foot on the plane. The plot follows Christie, husband Seb, and daughter Holly, along with Alix, and family friend Zac before and during their trip to Lapland. There are secrets and burdens to be revealed, long-held fears, and a lack

Clearly Besotted are fast becoming my new stamp company of choice, month after month they release teasers of their stamp sets to tempt me, and they are all so inventive, and so cute, it's been hard not to buy each time. But while I can't purchase each month I do have a few sets now and have been impressed on every score. The designs are really cute and usable in several different ways, the quality is there, and I love their little customer service touches. Each stamp set has arrived in a colourful pink bag, with an invoice and a little handwritten thank you on it. It's those touches that really go a long way to making you trust a brand, and feeling like you are getting value for money because although they are reused over and over, some stamp sets are not cheap. At the time of writing this Dolphin-themed 'Make A Splash' stamp set is still available on the website for £2.48. I chose this one because Dolphins are one of my favourite animals, but I also liked how they

May, what are you doing to us in the UK? It feels like we are getting all the April showers (and more) a month late. What better way to inject some cheer into the blog than my stop on the blog tour for Sarah Morgan's latest novel The Summer Seekers. It's published by HQ who kindly gifted me access to read the book on Net Galley, and it's turned out to be the perfect way to add some sunshine into these gloomy days.  As I'm writing this I've yet to see 'The Summer Seekers' on the shop shelves, but it will definitely stand out for shoppers, I don't think I've ever seen a front cover so bright and bold, and yellow! 'The Summer Seekers' follows the story of Kathleen, her daughter Liza, and Martha, three women seeking adventure and change in their lives, and I think it's safe to say they got it. Kathleen is a former travel TV presenter seeking a new adventure after the passing of her husband, Liza is fed up with being the dutiful wife and mothe

 One thing I have really enjoyed about lockdown is those moments, that turn into many minutes and hours when you can just sit and lose yourself in something, especially jigsaw puzzles. Late last year I was lucky enough to be #gifted a new puzzle from Ginger Fox and I can honestly say I've never done a puzzle like it. Design duo Carnovsky has produced a series of 3 animal-themed 500 piece jigsaws all, each on a different animal theme, with a very clever twist. The bo contains 500 pieces and 3 pairs of glasses, just like the 3D glasses you might get in the cinema, but each has different colour lenses. You can tell from looking at the box and enclosed print of the finished puzzle that there is more to see, but I definitely didn't expect quite such a wow from the end result, and I strongly suggest not cheating and only using the glasses when you've finished the puzzle.  The product details: Retailed by Ginger Fox these puzzles cost £14.99 each and are available from Amazon. The

I've been walking around the house recently singing the words 'I'm a jack of all trades, I'm the master of none." to myself... just over six months since I first heard them. That's always a good sign right? So I thought it was about time I introduced you all to the author of Jack Of All Trades, and his You're Not Alone E.P which was released in July last year.  I had planned to upload this blog a lot sooner but Covid stress got in the way, perhaps in a good way, as it feels like an even better time to enjoy an uplift and some feel-good tunes. Josef Pitura-Riley is a singer-songwriter based in London, and like many in the pandemic wanted a new goal and something to do. The end result is an E.P of self-recorded songs, where he plays all the instruments, sings, and produced each and every song.  The instrumentation is something you can't fail to notice through all 5 songs, and it's just pure happy. Lively, catchy, soft, and loud in all the right places

A while ago author Miranda Dickinson put up a book love challenge on Instagram, where she would put up prompts and answer with her favourite book or books in each category. I thought it would be fun to do my own, but over on my blog (I couldn't keep up on Instagram), and have (after a bit of thought) answered all her prompts below. What would your choices be? do join in, in the comments and let us all know, it's always great to hear about the books everyone else loves.  1 - A Book You Loved Paperback of Jane Eyre Jane Eyre, one of the classics I read quite a long time ago, and have read many times since. It's one of the books I keep in my bookcase and even bought a new copy of when the original got too scrappy. I'm not really sure what struck me about it, especially as it's quite a haunting story, but it was incredibly well written, with quite a few twists in the story, which none of the TV versions have really managed to capture. 2 - A Book You Want A Sequel For