There is nothing that my children love more than making things.  They will happily stick all sorts of things together to create lovely crafts all day long.  But they especially love when they can create something truly special, which they can do with these books on the Ooks app that we've been reviewing.  They get to create their very own digital stories which you can then order as real printed books to keep forever.



It's so easy to use, you can simply download the Ooks app and then hand it over to your child.  The instructions to make a book are very clear, they start by designing their own Ook, who is the main character in their story.  They then begin the story and get to make all sorts of decisions about what their Ook should do, which leads their story in different directions.  They also get to design and draw different elements to the book, which they really enjoyed and look fabulous in the printed books.


Like this page from Ivy's book, where you can see her Ook, which she name Lvyfh-OOK (I'm not quite sure how to pronounce that, but it's what she chose!) And you can see the torches on the wall which she has drawn, and are now part of the illustrations in the book. She loves to flip through and find all of the little things that she drew herself.



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* This is a review post, we were given Ooks books to create, and two tshirts, all opinions are our own.*

Over the summer Ethan was lucky enough to attend the Harlequins Rugby Camp so that we could review it.  I won't leave you in suspense, he absolutely loved it!  It was three full days of learning rugby skills and playing rugby games, he came home each day exhausted and excited to go back again.


Ethan is just six years old, so he was one of the youngest children at the camp and he doesn't have very much rugby experience.  But don't let that put you off if your child is in a similar position, as Ethan felt comfortable from the moment that he arrived and picked up the sport so quickly in those three intensive days.


We happen to live in the area for Ethan to attend the camp at The Twickenham Stoop (where the Harlequins play) but there are other camps located across the south east of the country, so do have a look to see if there's one nearer to you (there are camps running across October half term too, so you don't even have to wait that long!)


I dropped a very excited Ethan off each morning, dressed in clothes suitable for rugby (we had bought him a Harlequins training top, so he wore that with football shorts, long socks and football shoes as those are what we had, and they worked perfectly fine), I signed him in and left him to go have fun playing rugby for the day.


They do a morning session of playing rugby in their age range groups.  There are plenty of coaches to go around so the children get a lot of individual attention to help increase their skill level.  You also send them in with a packed lunch which they then have before going back out for their afternoon session of playing more rugby!


Ethan learned so much from the coaches and it was incredible to see how much his skills improved in just three days.  Now when we're just throwing the rugby ball around he's able to do it properly and with accuracy (and teach me the rest of the rules of rugby too!)


On the last morning the children at the camp were very lucky as they got to watch the Harlequins in their first training session of the season on the pitch at The Stoop.  Then they met all of the players and got their autographs at the end!  Of course this is not a standard part of every camp, but there are certainly little perks and opportunities that can happen if you happen to time it right.


At the end of the three days each of the children gets a little gift to take home and the encouragement to keep playing rugby and come back for more camps in the future (which we definitely will!) Take a look at the information about the Harlequins Rugby Camp and how to book your own child in for a future camp.

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* This is a review post, we were provided with a spot at the Harlequins Rugby Camp for Ethan in order to write this post, all opinions are our own.*

It's almost time for school to begin, and each year I struggle to find cute signs for the children to hold up for their first day photos with English school year titles on them.  So this year I've made my own, and they'll be easy to print out for each school year (even at the last minute!)


This year Ivy is starting Reception!  But we've made signs for Nursery and Preschool too, no one should miss out on the first day of school photo fun!   (You should be able to right click on the photos to open them up larger and print them out).


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