Maternity tights review

                                                                                                     Source

With spring weather right around the corner I think it is time to try out maternity tights with dresses and tunic I have. If some of you wonder why I didn't wear tights before- I just felt warmer and more comfortable in maternity jeans.

  

SimplyHosiery Online were kind enough to send me Fiore Maternity Tights Mama 20 Denier (£3.14 which is cheaper than other maternity tights).

They come in different colours (so you can mix and match them with different outfits) and sizes, I played it safe and opted for Natural colour.

                                                                                Source                                                                          

At first I thought that due to me being pregnant it will be a little awkward to put them on. 

Thank god for not so big bump! Very easy to put on and take off, maternity tights covered my bump giving it an extra support, which is what I wanted!

If you worried that tights might be too tight for you I would suggest to order size up. Please also note that these are NOT medical grade.

Thanks to Simply Hosiery Online for providing these tights for the purpose of this review.


DISCLAIMER: I was sent the above tights for the purposes of this review. All thoughts and opinion are my own. 

Binky Linky

This linky is for bloggers who have been blogging for a year or less. It's your chance to link up your favourite post of the week. It's a great way to find new blogs to read and to raise your blogs profile.

Binky is the American term for a dummy which babies obviously use. Emily (the host) thought the name Binky Linky would suit seeing as this linky is aimed at newbie bloggers! 

This is Emily from Twin Mummy and Daddy your host! 

And your co-hosts are...

Alyssa from Mum to a Monster

And...

Victoria from My Little L

The rules are simple...

1. Link up your best post of the week below

2. Visit other peoples posts and leave a blog comment on at least 3 other blogs

3. Share this linky via Twitter/Facebook/Pinterest etc using the hashtag #binkylinky

4. Follow other bloggers via their social networks

5. Every Friday at 12.01am until 11.59pm on Sunday, this linky will be open to share your posts

6. Please include the linky badge or a textlink onto the linked blog post or sidebar so people can find the link easily and to see other peoples entries

<div align="center">
<a href="http://www.twinmummyanddaddy.com/p/binky-linky.html" title="Binky Linky"><img src="http://i128.photobucket.com/albums/p184/emily_higgins1/BinkyLinkyBadge_zps6c7e0adf.jpg" alt="Binky Linky" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

Pregnancy update 23 weeks

Visible changes in my body: it seems that my bump feels harder and maybe sticking out a little bit more

Other changes: for the last couple of nights I fall asleep quicker than before, as you may recall from previous update I had problems with that; I have weird back/bum pains when I sitting down or trying to move on a sofa or even walk (sometimes it's unbearable I will mention this to my midwife next time I see her). Yesterday we used doppler to listen to Little L and is seems she was exactly where the doppler was, one of her kicks was so strong like never before. I think I might have swollen knees I'm not sure but sometimes in the mornings when I wake up I feel that they are heavy and it feels weird.

How do I feel: all the headaches and sickness are gone (touch wood); feeling tired quicker 

Cravings: still none

Fitness: Walking almost every day for max. 25 minutes and swimming once a week

Baby: At 23weeks baby is about 29cm from crown to heel and weighs a little more than 500g. Her swallowing reflex is maturing, so she will be swallowing and digesting some amniotic fluid which is perfectly normal and not harmful. She may even hiccup! Her lungs are also maturing but they are not fully functioning. They cannot process oxygen and C02 sufficiently on their own quite yet.

What's your weird pregnancy craving?

Since being pregnant I never get food cravings, it seems that I actually want to eat less than I did before I got pregnant! Some of my “weird not eating habits" are- I can't stand onions or garlic and won't eat a meal which has both of these ingredients. If I'm trying to be a polite guest and eat oniony/garlicy meal I will suffer the rest of the day with weird after-taste and I will be forced to drink loads of water. I also can't have Indian or Thai curry (used to be one of our Friday night favourites).

It seems that my taste in food has changed, I can't eat most of the meals/products I used to like (but still no cravings), as I always have after- taste I need to be very careful with my meal and I feel thirsty all the time.

What's your pregnancy (non) cravings?

As a Cow & Gate ambassador I would like to present you a new survey , which reveals the weirdest and wackiest hankerings experienced by mums-to-be: 

A poll from C&G Baby Club Community reveals a third of pregnant women (31%) are just as likely to find the object of their craving in a chemist or hardware store, as they are in a supermarket, as they admit to unusual hankerings for non-food items, such as soap (11%), chalk (6%) and toothpaste (5%), as well as creative combos such as sausages and jam.

The survey found the most popular cravings to be 

...

With some of the more unconventional individual responses including rubber, paint and rocks, while one person even said tree bark and another the smell of tennis balls.

Nutritionist, Jo Travers, comments:

"Mums needn't be fazed by their pregnancy cravings. After all, they are just one of the weird and wonderful experiences of pregnancy that every mum-to-be has”.

"The survey reveals almost half of mums are embarrassed about their hankerings, however, this doesn't need to be the case. If they need reassurance they can speak to a nutritionist or if they're just looking to share and chat about their own experiences, even the wackiest moments, they can visit the C&G Baby Club Community, a safe and reassuring place where like-minded mums can connect."

More than one in ten (12%) are desperate to fulfill cravings before breakfast while over a third (36%) of pregnant mums confess to sending their other half out in the middle of the night on a special trip to pick up a cravings meal. Family members and friends are also kept busy with one in three (32%) pregnant mums calling in foodie favours from their nearest and dearest.

With chocolate being a popular choice, it's unsurprising a quarter of mums-to-be most commonly have an urge for....

 A quarter (27%) of respondents confessed to a liking for bizarre mixtures of sweet and savory foods. Intriguing combinations listed include sausages and jam, Mars bars and bacon, and Yorkshire pudding with chocolate spread.

Other weird and wonderful cravings listed by pregnant women surveyed include:

·Banana with marmite

·Ice cream and chips

·Prawn cocktail crisps and strawberry yoghurt

·Cheese and onion crisps with nutella

·Chicken and ice cream

·Sweet and sour curry with salad cream

·Wood chips

·The smell of shoe polish

To learn more about the C&G Baby Club Community or to share your pregnancy trials, tribulations and celebrations, from pregnancy cravings to best buys, visit

www.cgbabyclub.co.uk/

Thanks to Cow& Gate for providing me with results of the survey

Tiffany Rose maternity dress review

Few months ago I started my search for a perfect dress for a spring wedding of our friends, which will go with their wedding colour scheme. Needless to say that the search was driving me mad, as I didn't like most of the dresses on me due to being never satisfied with my figure plus I was very particular about the colour and how it should look on me.

With Tiffany Rose maternity dress you can put all your worries aside, except from choosing the one and only dress from a big variety!

If you never heard of Tiffany Rose here is a little bit about them:

"Tiffany Rose began in 2003 with a simple aim: to offer pregnant women the chance to wear exciting, elegant, beautiful and well-made designs for special occasions...Our collection ranges from beautifully tailored jersey and lace maternity dresses, silk evening gowns and our fabulous selection of maternity bridal wear. 

Every single garment in our collection is designed and Made in Britain".

I have opted for Jewel Block Dress coffee bean (£89), it arrived in a beautifully presented box, the dress itself was wrapped in tissue paper, this whole experience made me feel like a VIP.

I have tried the dress straight away, but I needed my husband to offer a second opinion.

I made a right decision by choosing this dress as :

• it flatters my figure (shows off my bust and hides any imperfections I might have) 
• material is stretchy enough for me to fit in the dress (hopefully) during and post pregnancy 
• the length is perfect for my height 
• I was the most worried about the top half of the dress firstly because of the cleavage and secondly because it's a sleeveless dress, how surprised I was to see that it looks perfect, bra is nicely covered and no need to worry that someone may see too much. 

Take a look:

Look out for the online launch of Spring/Summer 2014 collection commencing today 21st February.

Here are a few of my favourites from S/S14:

DISCLAIMER: I was sent the above dress for the purposes of this review. All thoughts and opinion are my own. 

The Versatile Blogger Award..my turn

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog!

Thank you, Becky aka Laughing Owls for nominating me! The Versatile Blogger award allows us to introduce ourselves in a light-hearted form, or at least that's what I think :-)

The rules to the Versatile Blogger award are as follows…
1) in your post, be sure to thank the blogger that nominated you

2) write seven facts about yourself and nominate seven other bloggers

3) you must use the versatile blogger award image on your post

7 facts about myself:

• I think I can confuse others, I've noticed this several times I know what I'm trying to say but others don't have a clue (or maybe it's not just me :-) )
• I hate shopping, every time I walk in to the shop and see clothes on the floor or can't see something straight away I lose my interest. I can't go through every bit of clothing on a shelf or clothes rails, well I can, but it just bores me and I do it only if I have to while waiting for my friends. Don't take me wrong, if someone asks me to go shopping I wont say “no”, but I will go for a company rather than clothes.
• I had few driving lessons (7 to be exact) to find out that I still can't drive the car
• I've noticed when sun is shining I feel more energised throughout a day
• I can't stand rats, every time I see a long tail it makes me jump
• I can't ride a bike, since I remember myself whenever I've tried my cousin always managed to brake my bike
• I think I might have OCD- by books should be in a height, width order and all cans in the kitchen should stand in a width order with front labels facing us.

Now it's my turn to nominate, here is the list of bloggers:

- Mum of premature baby

- The life and time of the working mum

- Bump Moirs

- Liparazzi

- We're going on adventure

- Coming from Carsonsmummy

- The tailored mama

Over to you, ladies!

Valentine's Day in our household

I don't think that in our relationship Valentine's day is the only day when my husband buys me flowers or presents, but it's always nice to get something additional on a special day. Even though my husband thinks that Valentine's day someone's wonderful marketing trick where we all forced to buy cards, presents, flowers and deep down I agree with it, I think some men may need some kind of a reminder such as 14^th February that their women should be treated if they don't do that often.

As this year Valentine's day was on Friday and normally we go swimming on Fridays we decided not to change our routine, so we had a lovely “romantic” swim, followed my a lovely meal in a pub ( I forgot to take a picture of our meal, as always), exchange of Valentines cards, ballet tickets, tulips and slightly overdone fudge, but overall I can't wish for me!

What did you do on Valentine's Day?

C&G Baby Club Community Ambassador and community review

Few weeks ago I have been offered to join new C&G Baby Club Community ambassador programme. 

 I obviously knew about Cow & Gate products but never heard of the community before, for me as a mum-to-be at this stage it is very important to find answers to questions I have, share worries and positive moments and discuss stages of pregnancy with ladies due the same month and even to find online "friends".

Community offers:

• Community Forum, a welcoming and reassuring place to share
• Friend Finder, allowing you to connect with expectant mums local to you
• Birth Month Groups, helping you chat and share tips with mums-to-be at the same stage as you
• Amazing Moments, helping you celebrate and share all your amazing moments with other mums

- Community Forums offers different topic relevant to either parent or parent-to-be plus Careline specialists can offer you their advice:

- Friend Finder offers to search for a friend by distance, bump or baby in the same stage as yours and you can also search first-time parents only:

- Birth Month Groups means that you can pick month and year (starting from 2011) when your little one was/will be born; post quick milestone/special moment status updates (as shown in the picture):

- You can share your Amazing Moments with public by posting messages or uploading pictures in relevant topic (e.g. I'm pregnant, going public, first kicks, 20 weeks scan, I'm ready to meet my baby, we're family, first smile, first giggle, first spoonful, on the move, first tooth, first word, first birthday, first step):

As you can see it is very easy to find your way around it, it is definitely a new and exciting experience for me and I hope for you as well!

 Please join in if you are planning to have a baby, pregnant/supportive partner or already parents and spread the word!

All images were used from C&G website

Five Among Friends

Hello everyone, hope you don't mind me joining in!

I came across this new blog feature “Five among friends” and thought that it is a nice idea to introduce myself to the world and to know a bit more about fellow bloggers.

1) Describe yourself in 5 words
Friendly, Funny, Shy, Organised, Talkative (please mind that sometimes it takes time to see these characteristics).

2) Why did you decide to start blogging?
I decided to start blogging as a way of sharing with others and most importantly to remind myself about our journey.

3) How did you choose the name of your blog and why?

Oh, that's easy- I liked Jamiroquai song “Little L”, “L” stands for love, so I thought that I will merge his love with our to-be-born L, “L” stands for the name of our baby.

4) Tell us something about yourself that you think might surprise us! 

I'm Russian (and no we don't actually say "Na Zdorovie", the correct way is "Za Zdorovie"), not many people know this, but apart form that I have a lot of other things, which might surprise you. Intrigued?! Add me or follow me and if we become friends I will tell you more.

5) What is your favourite and least favourite thing about blogging?

Favourite- I like reading comments to my posts, always nice to know that I'm not alone in the big World Wide Web.

Least favourite- its not necessarily about blogging as such, but more about the fact that I find it hard to juggle offline life sometimes and keep up with other bloggers life on twitter for instance. I would love too, but I think its not enough hours in the day for me.

Don't forget to check out the other girls answers too....

Alex -Bump To Baby

Emily -London Mummy Of Two

Hayley -Sparkles & Stretchmarks

Jessica -Our Baby Blog

Kerry -Lived With Love

Lauren -Mrs Hippo & Me

Louise -Confessions Of A Secret Shopper

Rachel -BeautyQueen UK

Pregnancy update 20 weeks

Visible changes in my body: I think I have more obvious bump; one day I think I can see bump, the other day I can't see it)

Other changes: I can't fall asleep straight away like I did before, it feels like it takes me ages; more uncomfortable to lie on my side; have more ligament pains and back pains (by more I mean when I stand up or when walk on a treadmill, or sit awkwardly); and the most important I feel my baby, for the past few weeks I didn't know if it's a baby or gas, but now I know it's my little L)

How do I feel: headaches are gone (touch wood); feeling less sick in the evenings; also still have increased sense of smell, but its not so bad any more comparing to what it was before; feel tired quicker.

Cravings: still none

Fitness: before I was pregnant I tried to do a bit of running on a treadmill at home, at the beginning of pregnancy I started walking instead of running and still try to do walking everyday for 20-25 minutes, plus we started going to a swimming pool once a week.

Baby: At 20 weeks baby is about 25cm long, and weighs about 340g. Baby is becoming very active inside a womb, s\he can step, hold him\herself erect and even grab and squeeze the umbilical cord. From around now there will be slight differences in baby’s activity between morning and night with the busiest being around midnight.

Gender: We had our 20 weeks scan on Monday, baby is perfectly fine! And we are having a girl!!

It was a huge shock for us, if you read my blog from the very beginning you know that we wanted and tried to follow old wives tales and Shettles method to conceive a boy, after doing everything the right way we were 99% sure it's a boy. How naïve we were and how shocking it was to know it's a girl, I don't even know what to do with a girl!) I know that we should of considered both options, but we were totally obsessed with an idea of having a boy! I had a good cry, spoke with my mum and it helped, I am ready to welcome and to enjoy having our little girl! Yesterday I felt so sorry for her that we were upset, I love this baby already and don't want her to feel that mummy and daddy are not happy or didn't want her, it's not true, we wanted this baby, we planned it, and I know we will adjust to an idea of us being team pink!