We're Going Camping in a Camper Van...

Disclosure: We were give a discount on Hartland's hire fees in exchange for Social Media coverage and honest feedback to the Cheltsea team.

Our Cheltsea story started in July 2020, when we booked our first ever camper van experience! We are seasoned campers, but fancied something a little bit different this year. A VW camper is something we have often talked about and lusted after, but we are not in a position to buy one (nor do we have space to park one), so we were really excited to get going! 

As our holiday approached, we exchanged emails with the Cheltsea team, arranging details like which awning we wanted to hire and booking me in as an extra driver. We didn’t tell the children about the holiday until the van was parked on our driveway and we had packed it up. It was so much fun planning everything and imagining their reaction and Cheltsea did everything they could to ensure that our surprise had maximum impact!

Hartland and the Drive Away Awning.

Once we had shown the children the van and established that we were free to roam in it for the next four days, we headed straight for our favourite place, Woolacombe. It’s been a special place for my husband for many years and I have shared his passion for the place over the last 10 years, we even got engaged there in 2011! 

 

Van life is a little different to camping, some differences we loved and others not so much, but it’s all down to personal preference! Here’s our top three perks of van life:

 

1.   You get your very own mobile changing room and kitchen! We made packed lunches in car parks, ate takeaways overlooking the sea and used the van to change in and out of wetsuits.

  2. The cool. Hartland is very cool. There’s no way you can lose this van, even in a car park full of campers! Its distinctive colourway appeals to my love of bright colours and is a great change from the usual block colours.

3.  Setting up is fast, even faster if you’re travelling light and don’t need an awning! If you’ve  

     been organised and kept your bags etc tidy, you can pack away quickly too.

 

When we go to Woolacombe, we usually stay at Easewell Farm in Mortehoe. It’s part of the Woolacombe Bay group and we love it there because it’s nice and quiet, but you also have access to their bigger, busier sites (should you wish to visit them), which have more facilities and evening entertainment. We don’t normally go down there in the summer holidays and unsurprisingly, Easewell was full this summer, so we booked Woolacombe Sands as we have friends who have stayed there and recommended it.

 

The main difference between the two sites, was proximity to town and therefore, the beach. Woolacombe Sands is the closest camp site to the beach and there’s a lovely foot path which leads you there in around 15 minutes.

 

Our few days away were a blur of exploring beaches (we loved Grunta and Combesgate this time), walking, bodyboarding and enjoying delicious food. Shout out to Fudgies for their incredible pasties and sausage rolls, Big Chief for their wonderous waffles and ice cream and Woolacombe Bay Pizza Co for the obvious!

We loved being back in Woolacombe and loved our first foray into van life. We look forward to making more camper van memories in the future! 

P.S. If you sang the title, you are my people! ;-)

Honey and Ace wear... T- Shirts tie dyed and printed by AMG Cre8tes

Playmobil EverDreamerz...

Disclosure: We were sent the products featured in this blog post to review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I have a bit of an issue with dolls. Honey has some great ones, some terrible ones and some average ones in-between. The terrible ones lose limbs, have torn clothing and sometimes their paint even chips off. The average ones sit in a drawer for a year or two and then get passed on to a younger friend or relative or sent to the charity shop. But the great ones? They encourage role play, story telling, imagination and even problem solving. The great ones, like the new Playmobil EverDreamerz, are played with often and by everyone and will be kept and passed down to cousins and grandchildren in the future. 

As children, my brother and I were lucky enough to own some Playmobil sets and I remember them keeping us occupied for absolutely ages. They were such good quality, robust enough to pass on to our younger sister a few years later and then I took it all into work with me years after that, for classes full of excitable 6 and 7 year olds to enjoy. I am pleased to report that modern Playmobil seems to maintain the high quality standards I remember.

       

Playmobil's new EverDreamerz collection couldn't be more up Honey's street if it had been designed by her! The dolls are brightly coloured, come with a whole host of accessories to inspire exciting, creative play. There are two worlds, Candy World and Comic World and there's an introduction to the characters and collection on the Playmobil website. Honey loved watching the cartoons, singing along to the positive, empowering song and playing the simple online game, this content is all free for anyone to access.

The packaging is great. Aside from a few small, thin plastic bags (which can be recycled alongside your supermarket carrier bags), everything else is cardboard and is designed to be reused and then placed in your kerbside recycling bin, once it reaches the end of its life.                      

Inside each box, there's a doll and a range of themed accessories, including a bracelet which your child can add charms to. Everything comes in small parts, ready to be assembled at home, hence the recommended age of 7+ for these dolls.

Each set also includes a water pen, which can be used on the stickers provided, to reveal words, patterns and designs, there's also a collector's card and sticker set to go with each doll.

 

So, if you're looking for cool toys that will stand the test of time, you can find the full range of EverDreamerz here.

Honey wears... Butterfly dress by H&M

It's all about you...

I was kindly gifted these books in exchange for an honest review.

When Wonderbly got in touch to see if I would be interested in choosing some of their books to review, I was so excited. I'd seen their adverts online and had put them on my list of sites to visit when I was looking to give an extra special gift. You can search the site by age, bestsellers or occasion and easily add personalisation to make your book one of a kind.

With Father's Day coming up, we chose a present for Daddy, from Ace, entitled 'Ace loves Daddy this much'. You enter your child's name and choose the illustration that most closely resembles them, in the first instance. After that, you can choose between a hardback or soft cover (pricing varies depending on which option you choose), then you choose a colour for your front cover and you can even add your own dedication at no extra cost.

Ace Loves Daddy This Much

The website is very user friendly, with clear menus and easy to navigate pages. You can even preview your whole book before you commit to buying it, which is great for checking you've spelt all the names and entered other details correctly. I was kept up to date with shipping progress via email and our books arrived really quickly.

Opening up the new books

Once you have finalised your book, you can choose whether or not to have it gift wrapped (extra charge applies). The wrapping is in the form of a pretty, cardboard envelope, which can be recycled, used again to gift a different book (or book shaped object) or it could be used as part of a craft project, which is what we decided to do with it. 

The other book I chose, is called 'That's MY Cake!' and it's all about how we sometimes don't want to share things, but it often turns out better if we do. It's perfect for siblings who have been spending more time than usual together and have been navigating the world of taking turns and sharing things they may not normally have to. As you can tell from the photograph above, Honey was so excited to see that the book was all about Ace and herself, she especially loved the personalised dedication!

Honey is a proficient and avid reader and found the book easy to read, she just needed help reading some of the larger numbers. She was amazed that the facts surrounding their ages were accurate (another thing to double check when you preview your book, as the numbers are calculated from your children's dates of birth) and loved that they were the stars of the story.

Sharing the new books

Beautiful pictures and such a fun story

I chose the hardback versions and I was not disappointed, the quality is brilliant. The colours are vibrant, the pages are thick (Ace proof) and the illustrations are so lovely. Honey and Ace absolutely love reading these books, they don't sit on the shelf for long at all, which in my opinion is the true sign of how good a book is!

These books stand out in a crowd(ed bookself)

If you'd like to order your own Wonderbly personalised book for Father's Day (or just because), visit their site by clicking here and enter your email address to receive a voucher for £10 off your first order, or enter my name (Steph Gore) at the checkout (where is says 'Been referred by a friend?). In the interest of full disclosure, I will receive money off my next order if you use my link or name when you order.

Thanks for reading my review and I hope you have fun designing your own books!

Honey wears... Flower hairband from a festival last year

Ace wears... Yellow shorts from Cotswold Baby Co

Secret learning...

There are so many brilliant activities out there for keeping little ones entertained at home. My main sources of inspiration are Pinterest and Instagram, I'm forever taking screen shots of activities I like the look of or think I can adapt for my own children. Often, the activities are just for fun, but there are nearly always learning opportunities to be found if (like right now) you want to draw them out.

A few weeks ago, we criss crossed the patio with masking tape and used pavement chalk to fill in all the shapes we created. While we worked and after we had finished, we chatted a lot about shape. This is just one example of how you can create learning opportunities during a game or activity.

Set Challenges

Find a rectangle and colour it yellow.

Colour the smallest shape blue.

Jump on a triangle.

Throw a stone onto a rectangle.

Ask Questions

How many triangles can you see?

What is this shape called?

Can you see anything else in our garden that is square shaped?

Can you see any more rectangles?

How many sides does this shape have?

How many corners does this shape have?

Can you see any letters in our pattern?

Can you see any numbers in our pattern?

Which shape is the biggest?

Which shape is the smallest?

How many different shapes can you see?

How many shapes are there altogether?

Which shape has the most sides?

Ask Trickier Questions (depending on age or stage)

Can you see any symmetrical shapes?

Are any of these shapes squares? Why/why not?

How many right angles can you see?

What is the length of the sides of this triangle?

Which shapes are regular?

Which shapes are irregular?

Which angles are acute?

Which angles are obtuse?

Can you name some 3D shapes that have rectangular sides?

So you see, home school doesn't have to be worksheets every day, there are loads of activities you're probably doing already that you can find learning opportunities within. Let me know if you have a favourite activity with added 'secret learning'!

P.S. Aside from all the learning that took place, these photos also lead to me cleaning our patio due to how grim it looked here! I spent a happy hour scrubbing the slabs using a cream cleaner, water and a stiff bristled broom (another hack seen on Instagram) and we were all amazed by the results. It feels like we have a new patio!

Honey wears... Tutu by Candy Bows