It's December and we all know what that means

So December has come around again, may I add rather too fast, so the time came to get up in the loft and drag down, hubby did it not me, boxes upon boxes of decorations, Christmas cutlery and china and of course the Christmas tree.

Usually we have our tree and decorations up November the 1st but last year was delayed due to Kellan's arrival and this year I've been dreading it as Kellan will be all over the tree and one of our cats loves to dismantle and pull the tree over.

The kids were dying for every thing to put up so we had a mass clear up, shifted furniture around until every thing fit and put the tree up and the wall and ceiling decorations.

Here's our tree which is silver and purple

I'm on the look out for decorations to personalize for Jorja and Kellan as we haven't gotten around to buying/making them a first Christmas ornament.

Bambino Mio - Mio Solo Review

So here's my first review for the reuseable nappies I tested for the Mother & Baby Awards 2012.

Back in 2008 when Jorja was a toddler we tried out Bambino Mio prefolds. We didn't have such a great time with them sadly. The wrap would fold in on itself at the belly and cause wicking which defeated the point of wearing them so we gave up on them.

The Mio Solo is a relatively new nappy on the market. There are no prefolds and wraps involved this time it's a simple pocket nappy with a fold out insert. It's a one size pocket and claims to be from birth upwards. The colours are based on retro sweets from parma violets, flying saucers to cola cubes. Bambino Mio have very recently released prints too.

The Mio Solo

When we tested the Mio Solo Kellan was 8 months old and he's not big for his age, his waist is quite wide but his thighs aren't that chunky which has caused problems for us with nappies before. I had to set the Mio Solo on the medium setting for Kellan as they are quite generous in sizing. Kellan had just started moving on to the large setting on one size nappies around then and he still had plenty of room for growth at that medium setting.

So Kellan had an ok fit with the Mio Solo. The waist was great for him especially the velcro which allowed for more range of fit but there was one very big draw back with having velcro as a fastener for us........ yes Kellan loves undoing velcro and laughing as I run to go do it up before we have a puddle on the floor, don't you just love babies lol. Now this wouldn't really be much of a problem if your baby wears clothes a lot but Kellan doesn't really wear much except a t shirt or if we go out then I dress him. So yes it was annoying for us. The fit around the legs was another problem. As I said before his thighs aren't that big and we had gape at the legs, aka I could easily put my finger between the nappy edge and the inside without having to stretch the elastic. This posed a big problem 1. he's a heavy wetter and he'd leak quickly from the leg and 2. he is breastfed and his poo's, sorry you can't escape the poo talk when it comes to nappies can you, were runny and so we had escaping poo, booo!

But............ I also used the Mio Solo on Gwen who at the time had just turned 3. She seems to have had a sudden growth in the hip area which has meant a lot of her stash, collection of nappies for those who aren't there with the lingo yet, has become useless until Kellan grows in to them. The Mio Solo fit Gwen with room, not a lot of nappies are like that with Gwen so I was impressed. Gwen can undo velcro but with her being older she knows to leave it alone so she gets on well with them. Gwen used to be a heavy wetter but seems to be less so as she's gotten older and she can go overnight in a Mio Solo which Kellan stood no chance of unless we wanted him soaked with wee in the night. She is in the large setting and the rise, measurement from the top of the front of the nappy down between the legs and up to the top of the back of the nappy, still had plenty of room.

Now when it came to washing the Mio Solo it was simple. Fold the velcro tabs on to the washing tab and put in the machine along with the other dirty nappies. The fold out insert makes it easier and quicker to dry. We don't have a tumble drier so it takes a while for our clean nappies to dry and when compared to other brands the Mio Solo is one of the fastest to dry. It's also easy to get the insert back in the pocket. You just put your hand in the little pocket at the end of the insert and push the insert in to the bottom and then tuck the flap over at the back of the nappy. Then just velcro the Mio Solo up and put it with the rest of your stash until it's next use.

So in conclusion the Mio Solo worked better on our older child mostly due to it's sizing. If there were a popper version of the Mio Solo then I'd be willing to try them again with Kellan now that he's grown a little.

It's definately worth giving them a shot especially if you see them on offer or on pre-loved nappy groups. Don't invest all out as you may not get on with them but that can be said for every nappy as each baby gets on with each brand differently.

Kellan in the Mio Solo

Testing posts to come......

I firstly apologise for the huge absence from the blog, who'd have thought 6 kiddies could keep me so busy. I will have quite a few review entries coming in the next week or two as I was lucky enough to be picked to test reuseable nappies for the Mother & Baby Awards 2012. Now the winners have been announced we can now make our opinions known on the products we tested.

I tested;

Tots Bots - Bamboozle Stretchy
Bumgenius - Freetime
Bambino Mio - Mio Solo
Smartipants - Onesize Pocket
FuzziBunz - Elite

Testing for the awards was such fun and one of nappies I tested won gold!

I also tested swim nappies, they were;

Charlie Banana - swim/potty training pants
Splash About - Baby Snug
Splash About - Happy Nappy

Wow where do I begin?

So much has happened since I last blogged here. So here's a quick run through of what I've not blogged about.

Christmas was quiet but fab. We cut down on the amount each of the children got but they loved what they got so they didn't care. 

New Years we went to hubby's parents for a party and left around 1am. The kids had fun playing with their cousin and nibbling on the food laid out for everyone.

Harvey turned 9! It really doesn't seem like it was that long ago that he was this little toddler running around after Cerys. He had tons of Lego as his presents which he loved and I made him a Lego themed birthday cake too. The amount of time it took to make Lego blocks out of icing was ridiculous but they looked great.

I turned 30 and well I don't really see the big deal about it, it's just another year.

We had parent teacher consultations in early March. Cerys is doing ok, Harvey needs to put his hand up more often and is on target, Archie is above average for everything and Jorja is getting there slowly but surely :) All are well behaved, polite, helpful, popular with others and get on with their work

Cerys is going on a class trip for 5 days to a place called Swattenden at the end of May. She's dying to go bless her but it'll be so strange not having her here for so long.

Easter is this weekend and this year our usual egg hunt isn't taking place. The weather isn't the best and it seems everyone has gone nuts buying out anything to do with easter chocolate so we haven't gotten any small eggs to hide. Cerys went to easter egg bingo at the school last week and won one of the top prizes and came home with two carrier bags full of easter eggs!

The kids school held an enterprise week sale on the last day of term. We went around each of the kids class rooms and bought something from each to help their class win. We came home with quite a stash of goodies.

Kellan is now 5 months old. He's dribbling like mad but no sign of teeth yet, is practically there with sitting up and he's done that so fast, literally in a week or 2, he loves being up on his feet and is such a smiley happy little guy.

Cerys got into her second choice of school, Spires Academy. It's currently being rebuilt so when she goes there she'll be using the new building. We think she'll love it there although she's not so keen on wearing a tie and blazer. She has to get a coach from our village to the school and we no longer have to worry about her wandering off in to town as it's too far from town for her to do that which was a downside to her first choice school.

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We've also been doing a lot of baking recently. It's really not good as we seem to be ballooning in size but oh it's just yummy.

Double Chocolate Cupcakes

Chocolate Brownies

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Valentines Day Cake

Whoopie Pies

Chocolate Cake for the Kids

Ginger Cake

Fudge Cake

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I also won a few cloth nappies. We won a prize from Itti Bitti in a photo contest on Facebook. The prize was;

 a set of cloth wipes, 

1 all in one nappy, 

1 snap in one nappy, 

1 wet bag, 

2 tuttos,

1 change mat

Gwen won a nappy from The Nappy Lady on Facebook as her photo was chosen for their timeline cover photo. I chose a Tots Bots Bamboozle size 2 in Pumpkin.

I got an Ella's house Bum Slender to test from Nappy Go Lucky on Facebook. It's a hemp fitted nappy.

I won a nappy from The Clean Green Nappy Machine on Facebook. I chose a Tots Bots Easyfit V2 in Gingerbread.

I won a Ones & Two's nappy from their Facebook page. (pictured on the right)

I won a new Little Lamb one size fits most nappy from their Facebook page.

I won a Bumgenius Freetime from Babe Me's Facebook page after a image hunt on their website.

I won a custom wool soaker in a Facebook cloth nappy group party.

I also won a Gumigem teething necklace from one of the new ranges they've just released after they chose the name suggestion I put forward for one of the designs. The design is now called Zebula.

The Sloomb nappy, Jack, arrived.

I also won a Jane Shilton gift card on Twitter and have ordered myself some lovely boots.

 

 

We also have quite a few new nappies. Fuzzibunz Elite Diaper Talk, Wee Notions Frilly Bum, Blueberry Coverall, Upsy Daisy Camo and a Holden's Landing Medium AI2. I'll do seperate posts for these nappies as reviews.

I think thats about all that I needed to post about so I'm off for a cup of tea while my little man is fast asleep.