John Cotton Gives the Gift of A good night's sleep this Christmas #Review

We all are familiar with the song ‘Santa Claus is Coming to Town’ and the line, he sees you when you’re sleeping. To ensure everyone, young and old, gets a good night’s sleep this Christmas, leading pillow and duvet manufacturer, John Cotton, has created the Christmas Bed Bundle."


I don't know about you, but over the Christmas period the likely hood that family will be staying over is almost positive and If they want to sleep here (usually on the sofa/floor), they have to bring there own bedding and pillows I just don't have much space to put extra bedding.

I was asked if I would like to review this bedding bundle from Europe’s leading bedding specialist John Cotton,

The bedding bundle that I was sent to review contains two pillows, double duvet, and mattress protector, I have to say what actually comes in the pack is Perfect for accommodating extra guests at Christmas.

I started to unpack this to have a look at what was inside the red bag and I have to say honestly I had a real job getting it out of the bag it was really packed in there tightly it took some good pulling and shaking to get it out. Once the bedding was out the bag at a first glance at the pillows I thought they didn't look very comfortable they were flat, but a bit of pillow plumping soon sorted that out. The duvet is 13.5 Tog so it is really warm. A few nights ago when I got it all out of the bag to have a look at it, I did test it out kind of accidentally it was just so snugly and warm I got comfortable on the settee, before I knew it I was asleep so the verdict a big thumbs up from me!

The only downside to this product is there is no way all of the bedding was going to fit back into the bag the way it came out. I managed to get the duvet in the bag, but didnt manage to get the pillows or the protector back into the bag, However I don't see this is a big issue.

Over all the product is fantastic and practical for the festive season or anytime of the year you're having relatives/friends to stay!

This bundle is exclusively available at Argos, the John Cotton Christmas Bed Bundle is available as a single, double or king size 13.5 tog duvet. The single pack comes complete with one pillow, mattress protector and pillow protector, whilst the double and king size pack includes two pillows, mattress protector, pillow protectors.


The Bed Bundle is available half price at Argos from now until 24 December. £14.99 for a single, £19.99 for a double and £24.99 for a king size.

I think the price is a fantastic bargain and something that can be used all year round definitely worth having a look at if you have guests stopping over this Christmas.

This product was sent to me for the purpose of this review all opinions expressed remain honest and my own

An awesome Autumn party night in!

Once upon a time my perfect night, would involve wine at home with friends a taxi to a pub, then to a club, dancing the night away and then staggering home in the early hours of the morning feet pounding.Things change and now I think you can have just as much fun at home.
I love the season of autumn reds, golds and browns, leaves crunching under your feet and crisp sunny mornings.
This is going to be my theme for the perfect night in now don't get me wrong I love my boys but its going to be an all adult party so I am calling in the favours, (Mum and Auntie if your reading this your in!).


Now for decoration I want to bring some of the outdoors in, so I would decorate the the hallways and garden with confetti leaves. 






 party lights in the front garden leading up the path, I would also have them all the way around the back garden.                    

 lighting for the back fence and windows.                                                        

I would collect leaves and hang them in the doorways on strings, there would be gold balloons and free standing artificial trees decorated with fairy lights. there would also be some big carved out pumpkins in the garden after all it wouldn't be Autumn without a pumpkin or two!

Now for the food, I would lay on a beautiful tantalising buffet, with cheesy Autumn mushrooms, chestnut salad, home made pumpkin bread, a roast turkey and some classic buffet favourites like cheese and pineapple on sticks, sausage rolls, bread rolls and lots more. Too the best bit pudding blackberry and apple crumble,  Cinnamon leaf shaped biscuits & toffee apples. The centre piece of the table would be a huge gleaming gold stack of Ferrero Rocher.

                                                                                               

Drinks Would be crisp white wine and cider, not to mention a classy hot chocolate maker with marshmallows cream and chocolate sprinkles for the non-drinkers.

I would invite all of my best friends of course, insisting they all were wearing there best outfits with something gold to fit the autumn theme, we don't ever all get together much so I think party games would be useless, far to much catching up, gossipping and laughing to do, however I do think old habits die hard we would need music, need to dance, shaking my now bigger sized mummy bum is so much fun!

 So i would have a make shift dance floor and disco lights in the corner something like this with some very cool music, probably what most would call "cheesy" lets face it a good night isn't a good night without a bit of Wham or Chesney Hawks. 

I don't think the budget would go quite as far as I have tried to make it go, but I am sure I could come up with some cheaper versions to re-in act my awesome autumn dream.

 

A girl can dream right, I have written this post after I spotted a fantastic idea for a blog post on Little Stuff last week not only has it had me dreaming about lots of different party ideas, it is a competition to win an awesome prize. It is in partnership with brand new bingo review portal Two Little Fleas, and asks us to share how we would spend £750 on a Big Night.

               

Dare to dream? how would you #Spend20K Britmums challenge

Everyone has dreams of what they would do if they won a large amount of money, So Britmums have set a challenge to share with people what we would spend £20,000 on, If of course you were lucky enough to win that sort of money. Now can you imagine going to the bank and seeing twenty thousand pounds sitting there? I cant imagine myself ever being that lucky, but if I were lucky enough to win,

"You have got to be in it to win it" 

I have been thinking long and hard about what I would spend it on.....

I do have a few small debts and boring as it seems I would definitely pay them off first it would be a big weight off my mind and a clear conscious before i started to get to the exciting things.



My first spend would be to learn to drive now I have heard a lot of people say the amount of lessons you need is down to your age (how true this is I don't know!) plus a few extra, so my age is thirty I am thinking I would need around 35 lessons, having viewed a few driving schools in the local area lessons can vary from twenty one pounds to twenty seven pounds, using that as a rough guideline and adding in the cost of the theory test and practical test (providing i passed first time) it would all in all total around £1000 pounds.
Once I had done this of course I would want to buy a car. Around ten thousand pounds of that would get me a lovely car, the car I would choose would be this fiesta.

Its just beautiful isn't it! Now I am not super savvy with cars but I have seen this when I have been out and about, I simply love it. Having the freedom of having a car would change our lives for the better, first and foremost just to be able to just go shopping with out doing it all online or nipping over to friends houses that are currently two bus journeys away.
Career wise for me it would also open a whole lot of new doors for me as i would love to work in the community with palliative care patients but without a car this is simply not an option.


I would also give to my local hospice which is LOROS (the Leicestershire and Rutland Organisation for the Relief of Suffering) five hundred pounds and although five hundred pounds doesn't seem an awful lot of money the hospice is a charity and rely on local donations and fund raising events to keep it open, so every donation is a valued one.
This is a a cause that lies very close to my heart as before I qualified as a nurse i worked in an oncology unit as a health care assistant and a lot of the patients that were looked after on the unit were refereed to LOROS for different reasons, some to live there end of life days, for pain management or purely for respite. It is a simply wonderful place and like in any health care environment everyone works really hard and does a fantastic job.

The last of my money would go on my living room at the moment my living room is a mass of emptiness and if you were to look at the room on its own with out the rest of the house you wouldn't be able to differentiate between it being a living room or a play room so let me show you  why....

The curtains and the settees are tired and worn

There is definitely to much empty space 

There is no storage for the boys toys and books 

 Some of the walls have there own drawn on art courtesy of Liam

and i have grown tired of the burgundy colour, tired of looking at blank walls and tired of it just being boring. So here is what I would do first, I would take the carpet up, having young children and carpets don't seem to be practical, As i don't have a dining room it doesn't seem to matter how much mat you put under the high chair they still get there dinner all over the floor! so id pick a nice dark wood flooring some thing like this.

After this i would need a colour scheme id without doubt pick teal probably something like this

 

I'd also absolutely love a grand fireplace 

                                            

Then there is toy storage I'd get both the boys one each of these toy boxes there so cute as well as being practical, keeping all there toys tidy and in one place.

The list for what I would like my living room is quite a long one, also I would like a beautiful rug, some shelves and some lovely big canvases on the walls.
One day hopefully my dream will come true but until then its save save save! But isn't it nice to have dreams.

What would you buy if you had twenty thousand pounds to spend?

This post is an entry for BritMums #Spend20K Challenge sponsored by The National Lottery, with more ways to win more money on the new Lotto game. Find out more about new Lotto, which starts in October, here – www.national-lottery.co.uk

http://www.britmums.com/2013/08/join-the-spend20k-challenge-win-shopping-voucher/