Meal Planning Monday

I hope you're all back in a routine now that everyone seems to have gone back to school, preschool or work. I'm loving it - and having a meal plan is so useful. Not having had one for a couple of weeks really showed me the benefits - I was constantly trying to work out what we were going to eat and if we needed to buy anything. A little effort with the meal plan and I know what we are eating when, I can base my shopping list on it and there are fewer trips to the supermarket. I am a total convert! 

Finlake Holiday Park

We've been back from our holiday a week now and I still haven't told you about where we actually stayed!

Finlake Holiday Park is in Devon, very close to the A38 so very accessible for most people. Its location made it very easy to travel around; we were close to Dartmoor, Torbay (although that has its own issues with traffic), and also to the Eden Project in Cornwall, which I blogged about last week.

We discovered Finlake purely by chance. My sister got married last year and was meant to have her wedding reception at their sister holiday park on the edge of Paignton. However, three weeks before her wedding, the roof fell in during refurbishment there meaning the venue was not going to be ready in time so the company moved everything to Finlake. I really had no idea what it would be like, but having stayed in holiday parks as a child, I didn't really expect much.

Back to school

This is the week that most parents across the country (barring Scotland, who went back two weeks ago) have been praying for. The kids have finally gone back to school. At the start of the holiday, I was counting down the hours, but do you know what? It wasn't so bad after all.  Having lots of trips away really helped break up the long period that stretched ahead of us. When they went back on Tuesday, I actually quite missed them. I never thought I'd say that.

125 years of Anchor

We always have butter in this house. Yes, we really do. I may do healthy eating but I don't really like low fat spread - it tastes all wrong, you can't use it for baking and if you use butter sparingly, it's not that injurious to a healthy lifestyle. Butter is a great choice and I only ever buy margarine to make one particular cake that calls for it as the recipe is designed around having a softer fat.

Anchor sent me some memorabilia to commemorate their 125th birthday. They sent a rather fancy cake stand (surely too posh and fancy for this house!), some oven gloves, a mug, a hessian bag, and two eggcups. Unfortunately, Monkey was so excited about receiving "presents" in the post, he dropped one of the eggcups on the floor and broke it, even though it was wrapped in bubble wrap. Hey ho. Here they are anyway:

I love the cow! I believe that's Doreen the Anchor cow looking very regal there. You can win these and other items of birthday memorabilia - I've got my eye on the cake tin and the butter dish to complete the set - over at Anchor's facebook page where there are 125 prizes on offer over 125 days - which is a lot of prizes! You need to enter codes from packs of Anchor butter, Anchor Spreadable or Lighter Spreadable to take part in that day's draw. They're currently about halfway through so you have a couple of months left to have a go if you want. There is also a huge prize of £50,000 and 75 prizes of £1,000 to be won so it's worth having a go.

If you don't fancy trying your luck, you can also buy your favourite items of memorabilia from the same place. So, I might just be forking out for the cake tin.

Thanks to Anchor for sending me all this lovely stuff - and happy 125th birthday!

(I was sent the items above to try out for free. I have not been paid to write this post and all opinions are my own.)

The Gallery: Shoes

I don't have pretty feet. I know some people think that all feet are ugly but mine are small (for my height) and stubby, as they are wide. Wide feet are a curse as new shoes are nearly always painful for a while.

And then, at age 11, I had an operation to straighten a bent toe. This appears to have been an inherited trait as both my dad and my granddad had the same thing. In straightening my little toe on my left foot, they broke the bone and sewed it to the toe next to it. My toe doesn't look "normal" at all and I don't like the nail. So, wearing flipflops and open sandals can be a trial as said toe doesn't look very pretty. As a result, I'm not really much of a shoe person. Even winter shoes are problematic because my little toe makes my foot even wider and it can make wearing new shoes even more uncomfortable.

Meal Planning Monday

I'm back! Returned from our holiday this evening and the unpacking is done. Time to plan a week of meals for getting back into the routine. My BBC Good Food arrived and I managed to get a read of it whilst I was away on holiday and there were lots of things I wanted to try so there are a few recipes from there that I'd like to try.

Monday - Baked eggs with spinach tomato and chorizo
Tuesday - Wild mushroom and chestnut cottage pie
Wednesday - Honey mustard pork, mash and broccoli
Thursday - Pea pesto and prawn spaghetti
Friday - Sausage and bean casserole
Saturday - Onion pie
Sunday - keeping free

Seems like a reasonable mix. Two complete veggie dishes in a week and some seafood back on the menu. Sorry there are no links - either Good Food haven't added them to their database yet or they are likely to be copyrighted and not placed there, which is a shame.

Have you planned your week's meals? What are you eating next week? Why not pop to Mrs M's blog to see what other people are eating?

House of Marbles

We decided today to go on a short trip out to fill a couple of hours as Monkey has discovered the golf course here and has been round it twice today. Various options presented themselves but in the end, we settled on House of Marbles on the edge of Bovey Tracey. One of the reasons was that it was free, another that it would probably interest the children and thirdly, because in the folder of information we have in our lodge, they mention they did a cracking cream tea that they defied you to finish. Monkey, being Monkey, can't resist such a challenge!

We found the place quite easily and there was plenty of parking. The buildings are listed as they include kilns of the old pottery We went into the shop first and the children were, as expected, fascinated by the marbles. Some of the things were a little expensive but there were some nice things on offer. On the staircase was a massive marble run, apparently called Snooki. My photography doesn't do it real justice (partly because it was on my phone) but here it is.

We had a quick look at the pottery museum but the children weren't all that interested beyond the ceramic model of the Old Pottery buildings from way back and the fire pump machine that protected the factory for years. We wandered into the marble museum area where there were more marble runs and these.

Next were the glass workshops, which have always fascinated me but Monkey didn't seem all that bothered. This may have been because by this point, he had spotted the cafe where aforementioned cream tea could be served so we headed there next. This is what we got.

Monkey and I shared this one. And no, we didn't finish it. He didn't even finish his scone. This may have been something to do with the size of the chocolate milks the children had.

(That's a pint glass, by the way - not quite filled to the level, but not far off!)

The children then discovered the outdoor games area, which contained Britain's largest marble floating on water.

The children were captivated by the marble run - where you run marbles around a large copper funnel. We had a great time playing with it until some unruly children marched up and started spoiling our game so we walked away and returned to the shop, where we purchased some marbles for the children to take home. Funnily enough, they are now utterly fascinated by marbles and can't get enough of them.

It was a lovely afternoon out - free entry but cost us for afternoon tea (£15) and a purchase in the shop (£7.50). It just goes to show that the simple toys are often the best as they can be used in so many different ways. However, developing a serious marble habit could prove expensive as they had so many different types, colours and sizes.