Siblings Round up 2019 January to May!

And so it is December and the final Siblings Project of 2019 has just been posted. So here is a round up of all our Sibling Project images from January to December 2019!

January 
This was taken before James went to Beavers, he was looking so smart in his uniform and Freddie wanted in on the photograph action!

February
This was after school one night when Freddie had stolen James Spiderman glove!

March

This was again after school. James wanted to give Freddie a cuddle, but Freddie was having none of it!

April

This was taken when we were waiting to go into Baltic Contemporary Arts Centre, as we had been invited to the preview of a new exhibition!

May

This was taken when mummy and Freddie went to collect James from his JOTT (Jamboree on the trail!) hike with Beavers. I expect that next year mummy will be doing JOTT too!

(AD) Christmas Gift Guide for 4 Year Olds

So its Christmas, well it will be in around four weeks and its time for us here at victoriahockley.co.uk to publish our Christmas gift guides for 2019!

Today I am featuring gifts that are suitable for four year old boys and girls. Freddie isn’t actually four yet and wont be for another couple of weeks, so some of these gifts could also be used as fourth birthday presents as well!

The first item is the Pink Fong Baby Shark Song Puppet. Freddie is totally obsessed with Baby Shark and will constantly dance around doing the dance routine when it is played in the house. 

If we are early for picking up James from school he will often sit on the chairs by the back gate and ask me to put Baby Shark on YouTube for him. To use the puppet you move the mouth to start up the music of the entire song. 

Basically the faster you move the shark’s mouth, the faster the song will play or the slower you move its mouth the slower the song will play! I think this will be a huge hit with Freddie and probably also James who is seven!

Next we have the Mr Tumble learning pad. This comes with six activities to choose from including learning numbers, colours, shapes, letters and much more! 

Freddie has just started at our school nursery so something like this I think will help him so much, especially has the foundation curriculum has changed so much since James was in nursery, now children are expected to know how to write their own names before they move into reception class, which I think is crazy as James couldn't really write his own name till half way though reception. But he was the youngest in his class and was virtually a year younger than some of his classmates!

Next we have The Amazing Mystery Box. This product was originally launched in 2015 at Comic Con in London. 

Boxes can be bought on a subscription or as a one off. The box we received was the 24.99 one off box, with the value of the items being around £40. The items we received are fantastic. There are two model engines, a drink cup, a wallet, a backpack and a colour in table cloth which can be washed and recoloured! 

I have also been looking on their website and there are a few boxes that would be fantastic for James. As a special treat The Amazing Mystery Box have given us the code MYSTERYBLINDBAG and they will add in an extra treat with any box ordered!

**We were sent these items free of charge in exchange for featuring in this Christmas 2019 Gift Guide for Four Years Plus**

Siblings August

And so it is August and time for our Siblings post! The school summer holidays are now over half way done and we are on the count down to returning to school and Freddie starting the school foundation unit!

This month our photos were again taken on a visit to Dippy the diplodocus at Great North Museum in Newcastle. 

Siblings Project 2019 - June

Welcome back to the 2019 Siblings Project!

We are now into June and the boys have been so loving towards each other lately!

This month James has been loving

* Swimming

* Dippy the Diplodocus

* Being at Nana and Gaga's house

Freddie has been loving

* Swimming

* Borris the Fingerling Hug

* Dippy the Diplodocus

The boys had a fantastic time going to see Dippy at Great North Museum at the start of the half term holidays! They then spent a brilliant week at Nana and Gaga's house!

In this months photographs the boys were pretending to be Dinosaurs while we were visiting Dippy! 

Siblings Project 2019 - May

Welcome to the May 2019 edition of The Siblings Project!

How can it be May already! It really does not seem five minutes since we were celebrating New Year and now its the fifth month of the year!

This month James has been loving:

* Beavers. He went on a trip to a local Sikh Temple for part of their Faith Badge and also took part in JOTT 2019. He walked from Newburn Leisure Centre to Baltic Square in Gateshead along the river Tyne. 

* Dreamworks Dragon. James found this show on Netflix and has been watching it on repeat! 

*Pipe art. James was playing this game on my phone when we were sat in a&e waiting to get his hand looked at the other week.

Freddie has been loving:

*Playgroup. He has been really enjoying his 15 hours a week and he has a lovely little group of friends.

*Moo. He is still totally obsessed with his cuddly cow and will not go to bed without him!

*Megabloks. Freddie is still crazy about his block and building lots of towers!

This months photos were taken in the Rugby fan zone on Newcastle Quayside after James finished JOTT 2019

Mother's Day Gift Guide

Mothers day is fast approaching and what better way to start the countdown than a gift guide as to what you could get for your mum or what your partner could get for you!

Last year James dictated what mummy got and he told daddy something pretty and some chocolate so I got a lovely box of posh truffles and a Swarovski rose. 

This year I have no idea what James is going to suggest! Hopefully this post will give people a few ideas!!

First up we have the awesome "Motherhoodie" from Ada & Alfred. This sweatshirt is available in three colours of dusky pink, slate grey and nude. 

For me I would chose the slate grey as I'm not much of a pink wearer! 

It also has some brilliant features such as a Hidden earphone cord feed, a Kangaroo pouch pocket, Ribbed cuffs and hem and made from 80% cotton. This is priced at £35.00. You could always twin with your child and buy them the "Childhoodie"



Also from Ada & Alfred we have this brilliant "Lioness" sweatshirt. 

I think this will be a popular slogan this year with the women's world cup and the England ladies team aka the lionesses there! What better way to support our national ladies team than to wear a top with their name on!

This is priced at £30

A personalised phone case is always a good choice for a mum. Sadly since I am using Andy's old phone, nowhere actually makes cases for it! In fact even when it was a brand new phone you still could not get personalised phone cases for it!

Another good present for a mum is the Tesalate towel. I've been using mine for a few weeks now and I adore it. We also have a fantastic discount code for you: vickih15 to get you 15% off the towel.

These are so lightweight and dry so fast! Plus it folds up so small and has its own travel bag, so if you are taking it away with you it won't take up too much room in your bag!

Wireless headphones are another good gift for a mum! Andy actually bought me some as a wedding anniversary present as my big headphones that fold are a bit bulky for taking out and about with me, the ones he got me are perfect so I can also use them in bed if I want to watch Netflix or something on my tablet!

I hope these have given you a few ideas on what you can buy the mum in your life for Mothers Day!

Living Arrows 2019 11/52

Welcome to Living Arrows post 2019! If you haven't heard of the linky before, This was set up by Donna at What the Redhead Said and the name comes from the poem by Kahlil Gibran "You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth" Each week I post one photo of James and one photo of Freddie and share what they have been up to that week!

It was a pretty busy week last week at school for James. On Wednesday afternoon parents were invited in to join in with the last session of forest school! James had a brilliant time making a parachute and playing with his friends! He had also paid £1 to take part in splat the teacher for Comic Relief and he had a brilliant time lobbing wet sponges at some of the staff including the deputy head! All while the parents were watching from the forest school area having a right laugh!!

Then on Thursday afternoon again parents were invited in to join the class in the school library to read some books together. This time we had Freddie with us and we had a lovely time. James has started to get into the Harry Potter books and we had a lovely time reading some of the first book together!

Freddie had a lovely week at playgroup with his little friends. The big news this week is Freddie has started to use the toilet! He is actually asking to go which is a big step! He has been wearing big boy pants when we are in the house and a pull up when we had had to go out, but nine times out of ten when we have got back into the house the pull up has only been damp and Freddie has asked to go to the toilet where he has done a wee! I'm really looking forward to the day I don't need to buy any more nappies!!

Siblings Project 2019 - February

Welcome to  the 2019 Siblings Project! How is it already February! This year is going to go by so fast I think!

This month James has been loving:

* His Lego

* Going to Beavers

*  YouTube Kids

Freddie has been loving:

*  Playgroup

*  Blaze and the Monster Machines

* His wooden train set

This months photograph was taken one night after school while the boys were relaxing and watching Cbeebies! It is hard trying to get a picture of them both looking! 

Siblings Project 2019 - January

Welcome to the first post in the 2019 Siblings Project! How is it already January and Time to start the project all over again! 

As a new format for 2019 when I share my monthly siblings photos I will also be sharing three things that the boys have been loving that month!

This months photos were taken on the first night back at Beavers! James was wearing his full uniform including his new polo top and cap for the first meeting back! Freddie had to get involved in the uniform photo taking even though he was minus his trousers as he had just had his bum changed and he was refusing to put his trousers or even his pj bottoms on!

James is loving:

His action camera

His kinetic sand kits

and

His Beavers polo top and cap

Freddie is loving:

His Ninky Nonk

His Pinky Ponk

and

His Blaze truck!