This week has been a stinker, four visits to the hospital and one to the doctors – all for the kids. Joints and bones plus a rogue chest infection for Dylan have taken their toll this week. Its been hard going with Erin having a total emotional breakdown during her assessment with physio.  Finally though we are starting to use the terminology hyper-mobility syndrome, this is important to me as I want everything ready for when Erin starts school in 2014.  This week was coupled with Chloe’s emergency dash to A&E and more heartbreak when she was told by the consultant on Friday that she has stress fractures and is not allowed to run atall for a further two months. 

One thing we have learnt regards the hypermobility is how important it is to get and keep Erin strong.  This is not easy for a child who sleeps and rests as much as she does.  Erin is quite inactive and complains of aches and pains regularly especially in her right leg which has been affected by the DDH.  Thankfully the ear consultant gave Erin the all clear to get back to swimming this weekend which was a pleasure to see.  My water baby was so excited and happy to back in the water.  Another way of building strength is encouraging Erin to use a scooter.  The motion of pushing, gliding and scooting is great for developing her gross motor skills  and building that strength she needs.  We have also been told that this movement will help deepen her hip socket.  Erin was really lucky to be sent a brand spanking new micro-scooter, I chose the mini which is for age 3-5 yr olds. Erin’s love of purple continues and she opted for the new limited edition in candy lilac.

The wonderful people behind micro scooters really impressed me when I found out that they give hospitals scooters to use with children that are inpatients or that can benefit from using the scooters as part of their physio, this is really good for children like Erin but also those really poorly children who have conditions like cystic fibrous and need physio to keep their lungs clear.

The scooters are really well made with a brake feature  that I am sure Erin will get to use one day!  The steering is straightforward and the frame is really sturdy.  I am looking forward to Erin getting to grips with it and the photos show how much she is already enjoying her new skills already!  This micro-scooter sells for £59.95 and there are a number of other models for younger and older children plus some really cool accessories we already have our eye on, so do check out the website.

Disclosure:  Erin was gifted the scooter for the purpose of the review.

What do you buy someone that has virtually everything?  It is really hard isn’t it.  However a personalised iPhone case may just do the trick. I have recently been given the opportunity to try out the service from Caseapp and I am really impressed.

It was really simple to customise a case for my new iPhone which is the 4s. The biggest decision was which picture to use! Having three children I couldn’t just choose one child so I got them all to do a quick pose together! You can also add text to the case.

Once I had uploaded my image and approved the template all I had to do was submit it and sit back and wait for it to arrive in the post. Postage is free which is another bonus!

The case arrived quickly and is well made. The image of the children has worked really well and I have already had some lovely comments on it. The teen really likes it and wants one for her phone now! She wants to use a picture she had taken of her a while ago.

In addition to personalising and making the iPhone look good, it does protect the phone from damage caused by knocks. I think this is a great product and the service was excellent.

Disclosure: I was gifted the case for the purpose of the review.

I have a confession, I do all I can to encourage the children to eat their five portions a day, but fail miserably myself. Chloe surpasses this easily as she is a real fruit fiend. Erin gets there most of the time I find it quite easy when they are little (plus nursery helps out on nursery days ). Dylan though is another matter.  Yet compared to me he does ok.

Do I get my five portions a day?   Not often if the truth be told.  It is not that I don’t like fruit – I do.  Tempting fresh fruit that is available ready for me would be eaten.  I also like variety and get bored of the same things. We have veg with our evening meal but I don’t tend to snack on fruit.

Working as a teacher our breaks are pretty non existent.  Break-time is a flash in the pan and if we are not on duty we are generally getting the room ready for the next class or doing a bit of photo copying.  Lunchtime is a little better but the door is constantly open to students who need us for whatever.  Can they give us something or sign something or some random excuse about homework, coursework or why they can’t come to after school revision etc.  It is never ending. Lunch is often eaten on the go, most of us eat a packed lunch as getting to the canteen just wastes our precious minutes. 

Therefore when fruitdrop asked if they could send my colleagues and myself one of their office fruit boxes I thought it would be a lovely end of term treat for us all.  The fruit arrived to our main reception on our chosen day and I sent one of my sixth form students over to pick it up for me.  He did so for the price of an apple!  The fruit was all really fresh and great quality.  The staff were all impressed and dipped in straight away.  We thought it was a really good idea.  We do have a milk and biscuit rota and every Wednesday we have what we call snacks.  The snacks are usually crisps, cakes and chocolate as a mid week treat to keep us going to Friday!  Therefore this is a scheme I can see us using, I mean we all know the benefits of eating fruit.  One of the reasons I don’t take fruit to school myself is that it ends up getting bruised and battered in my bag and then it never appeals to me.  This scheme means that there is plenty of fresh fruit to hand.

In our box we had grapes (which disappeared first), bananas, satsumas, plums (my favourite), apples and pears.  This definately got me eating towards my five a day, plus it stopped me reaching for the biscuits.   I really rate the scheme.

Disclosure:  I was gifted the fruit box for the purpose of the review.

Three children often means cluttered, messy bedrooms.  I would like to have a perfectly presented home.  I visit my best friend and wonder how everything is always so neat, so ordered and so tidy.  I wish she had a cleaner and a fairy godmother because then I could justify the show home look that way, except I know she doesn’t.  She works and she manages it all.

Vertbaudet have their new spring summer range out and asked if we wanted to review anything.  I took this as an opportunity to organise Erin’s room.  These pictures show just why it needed to be done!

It is disorganised, chaos! Books and reading is something that Erin loves, I decided to get something to organise her books and make them more accessible. Vertbaudet do a fab range of funky mobile libraries and bookshelves. I decided this would be ideal for her room. I also choose a coat stand. Erin has a bag for nursery, plus her swimming bag that are usually dumped in the corner of her room on days she doesn’t need them.

Both were so easy to put together, all I needed was a screwdriver. I love that each piece comes numbered and goes together so easily. It makes it so easy to assemble, you really cannot go wrong. The coat-stand took all of five minutes. The bookshelf about 30 mins – but I was impressed that all the holes lined up and went together easily. The bookshelf also had screws to attach it to the wall which we did as Erin can be heavy handed and as her mobility isn’t always great it means that she does use furniture to pull on when she stands or she grabs as she falls!
I took the opportunity to tidy her room and have a sort out at the same time! I ended up moving her whole room around. She is currently in a cot bed and I moved it to the other side of the room. Putting her to bed last night though was a challenge as she suddenly announced she didn’t like her tidy room! What she meant was she didn’t like going to sleep in a different position with a different perspective! I just ignored her, she quickly settled and didn’t mention it this morning so I guess all is well!

Here is the ‘tidy room’

Doesn’t it look better!

Erin is loving it now.

Finally, I am really honoured that the blog has been nominated for a MADS award – this is like the Oscars for parenting blogs! However I need to be in the top four to get nominated through to the finals. I would really appreciate everyone (that includes you mum) to follow this link and vote for Emmaand3 here. Please vote for www.emmaand3.com in the BEST FAMILY LIFE and/ or School Days category if you think I am deserving!