Travelling Twinkles
Days out

A day with friends at Willows Activity …

At the weekend we headed down south to stay at with our friends who live near Hemel Hempstead. Whilst we were there we decided to pay a visit to Willows Activity Farm. Willows Activity Farm is located near Saint Albans and has a Peter Rabbit theme with a number of the play areas and shows being themed around the story. There are also character meet and greets held throughout the day. The weather was glorious, which really was a bonus. There’s quite a lot of different play areas located outside so it was nice that the children could play on…

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Days out

Red Kangaroo Nottingham

AD: We were invited by Red Kangaroo in return for a review. However, as always our review gives our honest thoughts and opinions. We were recently invited to Red Kangaroo Nottingham to see what we thought. The kids have been to parties at Red Kangaroo before, but this time was the first time we’d visited as a family. Here’s what we thought. Red Kangaroo is basically a trampoline park and I think the Nottingham one has been opened around 18 months. It’s situated  on an industrial estate, about 5 mins from Junction 26 of the M1 and has plenty of…

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Europe

24 hours in Barcelona with kids

Earlier this year we went on a cruise from Barcelona. We’d booked our flights and cruise separately. Whenever we do this we always like to fly out the day before, just in case we encounter any issues. It’s also nice to explore whichever city we’re departing from. We had a great time exploring Barcelona, so I thought I’d share our suggestions for how to spend 24 hours in Barcelona with kids. We arrived at Barcelona airport at around midday and took a short taxi ride to our hotel, Hotel Catalonia Port, which is literally a 5 minutes walk from La…

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Lifestyle

January 2019

Since I’ve changed the direction of our blog to focus more on travel I’ve realised that I’m perhaps not capturing some of our important memories and moments, so I’m going to attempt to do a monthly roundup, so that nothing gets missed or forgotten about. Here’s what we got up to in January. We began our January in Tenerife, which was the perfect way to begin the year. We stayed at the Hard Rock Hotel, which was amazing. You can read all about our stay here. Oscar’s birthday The day after we got back from our trip it was Oscar’s…

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Tips and advice

Ockyz swim socks {review and giveaway}

Recently we were approached by Ockyz to try out their swim socks and with our holiday to Tenerife on the horizon we jumped at the chance. Here’s what we thought. The Ockyz swim socks, which they call Sweakers® are available in a wide range of colours. My three each chose a different design, which helped ensure we were able to tell which pair belonged to who. The socks are designed to prevent slipping when children are playing around the swimming pool. They are also anti-bacterial, quick drying, light weight, breathable and washable. We took them with us on our recent…

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Europe

Our stay at the Hard Rock Hotel …

A few days after Christmas we headed out to Tenerife to see in the New Year and indulge in a bit of winter sun. We stayed at the Hard Rock Hotel Tenerife. Here’s what we thought. We booked the Hard Rock Hotel as a package deal with Jet2 Holidays. We’d spent a long time looking at various options, but kept coming back to the Hard Rock Hotel Tenerife. Initially, it was out of our price range, but during the summer (we were actually on our summer holiday at the time) Jet2 had an offer on and we were delighted when…

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UK

Novotel Birmingham Airport

A few days after Christmas we went to Tenerife. Our flight out was quite early in the morning, so we decided to spend the night before at the Novotel Birmingham Airport. Here’s what we thought. We arrived at the hotel on a Friday evening at about 7pm and my first impression was that it was really busy. However, we didn’t have to wait long at all to check in. Whilst Simon checked us in, a member of staff came over with a little soft toy for each of the kids. They were over the moon and it was the perfect…

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Further afield

Our 2019 travel plans

As 2018 draws to a close its time to start thinking about where we want to explore in the year ahead, in fact planning our holidays, helps me to get through winter! I thought I’d share our 2019 travel plans on here. Tenerife Technically this one commences in 2018, but as it also falls in 2019, I thought I should include it. We’re heading to Tenerife on 29th Dec for a week and I can’t wait. The last couple of months have been a bit stressful with one thing and another. Plus, I always find the run up to Christmas…

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Europe

Things to do in Marbella with kids

When you think of visiting Marbella – or ‘Marbs’ as it’s often referred to – you perhaps don’t immediately think of it being particularly family friendly. Whilst there are the fair share of stag and hen dos, there’s also plenty to do in Marbella with kids. Here’s our roundup of things to do in Marbella with kids. We’ve been visiting the Marbella area of the Costa Dol Sol for over five years now and one of the things that surprised me is that Marbella is actually quite a big area. Although there is an old town in Marbella, when people…

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Days out

Visiting Santa at Friezeland Farm in Bosworth

Friezeland Farm in Bosworth, is a pick your own Christmas tree farm. Just over a week ago we decided to head there to get our Christmas tree and also pay a visit to Santa. We originally were planning to spend the day at Center Parcs as we had a one-day visitor pass from a friend who works there. However, the week before our visit Center Parcs had put a hold on guest passes during December, so we weren’t able to go. Unfortunately we’d already told the kids that we were going to Center Parcs for the day, so they were…

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Restaurants

Juni Nottingham – launch night

We were recently invited to the launch night of Juni Nottingham. A new gin bar based in Nottingham city centre. I’m a massive fan of gin, so jumped at the opportunity to attend. Juni offers around 20 different gins and has three of its own signature gins – a dry gin, a plum and raspberry gin and a juniper cask aged gin. They also offer a selection of gin cocktails. At the launch night the dry gin and the plum and raspberry gin were the two gins on offer. I tried the plum and raspberry gin, which was delicious. Simon…

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