The Gallery - Relax

So the theme this week is "Relax" . Something which a lot have us have been able to do as it's the summer holidays. I find I can have a more relaxed morning without early alarm calls and rushing out of the door with toast hanging out my mouth praying I make it on time.

For the past few days Aalliyah has been nose deep into her book (My Sister Jodie - Jacqueline Wilson) and she has been randomly bursting into fits of giggles at the clearly comical writing. However during the last chapter she went rather quiet and in fact her giggles turned to tears as she was met with the all too common "sad" ending.

I think she certainly has the right idea on how to relax though? Maybe all that blood rushing to her head helps soak up all that literature ;-)

Head over to Sticky Fingers and check out all the other Gallery entries this week.

Saturday Is Caption Day #SatCap

As terrified as Aalliyah looks on the drop down tower, she did actually go on it about 20 times after this! We had lots of scary fun last weekend at Gullivers Land.

Do you have a funny caption to go with this shot? I'd love to hear it. Then why not head over to Mammasaurus where you can have fun captioning lots more pics and even upload your own!

Instantgram Review

I am ever so slightly addicted to one app in particular on my iPhone.. Instagram! I use it daily and must confess that I am one of these people who capture snaps of various meals. I don't just randomly take pictures of my food for no reason, I do have a lot of followers who like me are losing weight with Weight Watchers and find such posts both inspirational and supportive. Foodie pics aside, I love sharing snapshots of my life through Instagram. Whether it's pictures from a day at the seaside or catching Aalliyah in the middle of some random funky chicken dance, there is always a magic memory to capture.

I was delighted when I had the opportunity to review the printing services offered by Instantgram. They can make high quality prints and magnets from your instagram photos. Most pictures we share with instagram, we give a bit of tweaking using the different filters available, so when you choose your prints for instantgram, they are already edited and looking great! There are two options to choose from, you can either order a set of 9 magnets each measuring 5cm x 5cm or you can choose to have a set of high quality square prints. These come in 2 different sizes. Either a set of 24 squares measuring 4 x 4 inches or a set of 48 mini squares each measuring 2.5 x 2.5 inches.

The price is fantastic as its a flat rate cost of $17.00 for either the magnets or the squares, which is very competitive when you look at local printing costs from similar items. They provide a free shipping service and although these come from outside the UK they arrive quite quickly. I received mine in a little under a week.

Its very simple to order and you can link to your instagram photos when ordering to make it really easy to choose which photos you want printing.

Here are just a few of the great magnets

...and here are some of the great printed squares. They are durable photo card and really good quality.

The prints and magnets are both great quality and I recommend them to anyone looking for a new way to keep treasured photos. They also make fantastic gifts.

Silent Sunday

Saturday Is Caption Day - #SatCap

No I haven't just melted a mars bar and smeared it all over my face.. It was in fact a mud mask. Nothing like a bit of self pampering.

Have a funny caption to go with this photo? I'd love to hear it. Then why not head over to mammasaurus where you can caption loads more photos and even add your own!

Have a great bank holiday weekend, what ever you are doing! Lets hope the sun keeps his hat on.

My Easter Break - In An Egg Shell

Ok, So we are done with the snow, ice and freezing cold temperatures of winter and Easter came to mark the beginning of spring, sunshine and an indication that summer was on its way! The only problem was that when I woke up on Easter Sunday morning ready to forget the diet for one whole day and devour everything anything in sight, I was greeted with the not so pleasant site of lingering snow which had been laying around taunting me and my thoughts of summer for days! Looking out of my window I could see the wooden bench in the garden topped with snow and my flower pots each with a frozen layer of ice. I turned around expecting to see gifts under the tree, not chocolate eggs and daffodils. Needless to say I was not dreaming of a white Easter and I'm pretty sure no one else had banked on it either given the sizzling temperatures this time last year.

Yes I realise I have moaned for a whole paragraph about the weather, but hey.. I'm british and thats what we do best!

Anyway, In spite of the weather, both myself and Aalliyah still managed to have a wonderful Easter as I hope you all did too. There was the typical roast dinner. I opted for a nice joint of pork for the ever so selfish reason that I hadn't had roast pork since starting weight watchers in October, so we were having it.. End of story!

Me and Aalliyah had lots of fun making some Easter inspired treats for her class, which she gave out on the last day of term, when she also came home with some goodies for winning first place in the egg decorating competition.

No Easter is complete without a bit of bonnet making.. Aalliyah also made her very own town called "Chick-ville"

Plus we had a beautiful Easter stroll in the Spring sunshine snow. There is just something so "British" about seeing a beautiful blooming daffodil..poking out of 4 inches of snow! 

Surely we have had the worst of it now? We have put up with an Arctic Winter and now Sprong (Spring gone wrong) Can we please just have a sizzling summer full of sunshine, sunshine and that other thing that went missing last year... Oh yes.. SUNSHINE! 

Good luck to the first person that moans when it's too hot!! You know there will be someone!

How did you spend your Easter? I hope what ever you did you had a wonderful time celebrating.

Snapfish Photo Gifts

Anyone that knows me will know that I am forever taking photographs. Weather it's with my camera on a day out or a quick snap with my phone, I have hundreds, so besides putting them in frames and ending up with no free wall space, I was looking for ways to create unique items using my photographs. So when Snapfish offered me the chance to make a unique photo gift on their site, I jumped at the chance. I have used a few websites before to order prints but this was by far the easiest site to use. Some of the others are so difficult and confusing to navigate around the site and upload your files, but Snapfish have simple to use upload tools and give clear instructions all the way through. It only takes a few minutes to register on the site and once you have signed up you are ready to go. You are immediately taken to your control panel where you can upload multiple image files, save them to specific albums, use the very handy auto correcting tools, which make sure your photo is at its best by correcting exposure or red eye. There are even easy buttons which allow you to upload files directly from sites like Facebook, which made it a lot easier.

Once you have uploaded your files, you can search through the products and decide what you want to create. There are so many things to choose from you are bound to find something you will love. You can create photo books, key-rings  mugs, wall art and so much more. Once you have decided on what you want to create its very simple to personalise it. You simply click a button to choose which photo you would like to use and its done. You will always see a preview of the item with your photograph on, so you can judge if its okay or not, plus you are given a warning if the resolution is too low as this may cause your printed image to be blurry or pixelated when finished.

I ordered a keyring, mug and a wooden photo panel, which is a panel or wooden with your image printed onto it and then it's given a high gloss finish. I love the photo panels as they save the need to buy or hunt round for frames that match your décor.

Even though I was given a low resolution warning on my photo, the finished product was absolutely stunning. The finish was immaculate and the picture was so sharp. Snapfish offer a high quality product at such an affordable price. They are without a doubt the best company I have used for my photograph printing and they have delivered the highest level of quality work. With this is mind, I would recommend anyone looking to create something great with their photos to join up to snap fish. They have great offers on at the moment and have some great ideas for special Christmas presents. Head over to Snapfish now and create some beautiful gifts to treasure your memories forever..

www.snapfish.co.uk