PRETTY YOUNG THING

Croome

If you follow me on Instagram you might have noticed that we've joined National Trust. It's only £6 each or £10 for a couple a month which I think is a bargain. Some of the National Trusts are up to £12 each and some are even more depending on where you go. You also get discounts into other local attractions.

We've had some wonderful days out. We only joined in January and have been to 5 National Trusts so far! It's such a fab day out, Amelia loves being able to run around the grounds and exploring the houses. It's nice to get outdoors and try some new places! They are so clean and have loads of walks and trails to choose from. The staff are all wonderful, so friendly and helpful. They have great facilities and the cafes do lovely cakes!

I'm so excited for it to warm up and for us to explore our local National Trusts. We are really lucky to have quite a few in the surrounding area. Baddesley Clinton and Packwood House are literally up the road.

If you are doing the 1000 hours outdoor challenge then you should really look at National Trust membership, it's just lovely being outdoors! Getting some fresh air and exercise and I love that Amelia is so comfortable and loves being outside and exploring. Kids are free up to 5 years old and the some of the sites have playgrounds and woodland play areas for the kids to get involved. They also have trails and activities for the kids to take part in and during the holidays they have even more fun going on.

They also have beaches and forests which you can visit using your National Trust membership which I'm looking forward to checking out!

Baddesley Clinton

Charlecote Park

Hanbury Hall

Packwood House

* disclaimer, this coat has been gifted in return of a review on my blog.

With the summer holidays nearly here I thought i'd share a few days out that we have done recently or intend to do over the next few weeks. It can be overwhelming choosing things to do especially during the summer holidays as places can get really busy and you can end up spending loads of money trying to fill your weeks with things to do with the kids. As Amelia is only 1 we don't have to worry about the school holidays just yet but it's nice to have a few things planned whilst the weather is good! Most of these days out are affordable and within 2 hours of Solihull/ Birmingham. 
 Amelia absolutly loves feeding the ducks! We take her to Brueton/ Malvern Park in Solihull town centre. We head over to the Parkridge nature reserve where they sell duck/bird seed for 50p a bag and go along to feed the ducks. Sometimes we bring a picnic and make a day of it and sometimes we just go of an afternoon to kill some time.


St Nicholas Park in Warwick is one of my favourite things to do in the summer. It's a great day out! The parking is cheap, bring a picnic (there is a little cafe) Theres a sandpit, climbing frame/ park and the paddling pool, theres also some fairground rides. This is such a great cheap day out especially when the weather is good!


Strawberry picking, we did this right at the beginning of the season and we want to do it again. Another cheap day out! We went to Manor Fruits Farm over Tamworth way but theres a few dotted around. We liked Manor Fruits because they had a little cafe and kids bouncy castles too!

[AD-Gifted]- Our meal was kindly gifted in return for a review. My review is honest and my own views and opinions.

We went into Birmingham today for a day out! It was lovely, we had a little 'date day' just the two of us! We love visiting Birmingham and are lucky enough to live in this fab city. We have stayed in Birmingham city centre a few times and there's loads of lovely hotels if you fancy a stay. Head over to Hotels.com to check out the best hotels in Birmingham.

We started by heading into the Bullring and had a little look in the shops, I love Birmingham as they have a really good selection of shops, there's Selfridges inside the Bullring aswell as John Lewis in Grand Central. I had a look in the Next for some clothes for Amelia.

We then headed for food, there's so much choice for food in Birmingham. There's the usual chains inside the shopping centers, Pizza Express, Pizza Hut, Ed's, Nandos. You get abit more choice just off the high street, we had a look at the menus and decided to go to Bodega, they are a contemporary cantina bringing fresh, homemade South American. I had Quesadillas and Clint had Tacos and we shared some Nachos. The food was so good really tasty, and really affordable, they have a lunchtime menu during the week so you get a main and drink for £7 which is really good! Some of the other places I would recommend this area is The Botanist, they do some really good Cocktails, Head of The Steam have a great drinks selection! The Ivy, this is just at the end of the road and is a little more fancy, they offer afternoon tea, so if your heading into Birmingham for an occasion i'd check them out.




We wanted something sweet but didn't really fancy anything off the Bodega menu, we stumbled upon a desert place within the bullring called my cookie dough which did these amazing cookie dough deserts so we got a couple of these and found a spot to sit outside the bullring overlooking the Cathedral.





Then we headed towards Digbeth to the Custard Factory as we booked a game of mini golf at Ghetto Golf. It's an 18 hole mini-golf experience, with a cocktail bar. It's like an abandoned warehouse which is covered in graffiti and the mini-gold is really unusual, It's such an experience. It's only £10 per person which I think is quite reasonable.



We had such a lovely day, I love exploring Birmingham and as I mentioned before we are so lucky that it's right on our doorstep. Where are your favourite places to visit in Birmingham. What hotels would you recommend?

We were kindly invited along to The Head of Steam in Birmingham on Wednesday night for their press launch night. Located on Temple Street it's in a fab central location, just up the road from the local transport links and around the corner from The Bullring, Selfridges and Grand Central.

The Head of Steam has a very impressive drinks menu, there's pages and pages of beers from all around the world, cask ales, cocktails, ciders, spirits and soft drinks. I worked my way through the cocktails, they were lovely. I had the Cherry Lollipop which is a mix of Disaronno, Midori, Lime and Cranberry, it was super sweet and fruity, it was amazing. I've never had Disaronno in a cocktail before but it's one of my favourite spirits. I also had a Louisiana Rum Punch which is a mix of Old J Cherry rum, blue curacao, passionfruit puree, pineapple and lemon juice, it was so fresh and summery, it reminded me of holiday. I think the cocktail prices are really reasonable and I think they were quite strong which is always good in cocktails. As I mentioned above they had a huge book of drinks so if cocktails are not for you they have a huge range of other drinks. Clint was actually spoilt for choice and didn't know what to go for so he just asked for an American beer, he was given Motorhead Road Crew which is a pale ale and he said it was good, and tasted a bit like a light beer and he really enjoyed it.

They have a really good variety on the food menu, as well as the main food menu they do Breakfast and Brunch which is served till 3pm, I don't know of many places that serve breakfast that late, it's usually around 12pm but I love breakfast food and loveee brunch so i'm always drawn to places that serve a late brunch. They also offer a selection of sandwiches, wraps and light bites, perfect for lunchtime or early dinner. They also do Pizza's, burgers, hot dogs, pies and much more. I had the BBQ pulled pork stone baked artisan pizza which was gorgeous, i'd say Pizza is up there as one of my favourite foods. The pulled pork was really tasty and the base was lovely, the sauce was very tomato-ey and fresh. The pizza was a really good size, we shared some onion rings and could'nt finish it, I left a slice of pizza as I was stuffed!! Clint had the 12" Chilli Dog which was topped with a 3 bean chilli, it was a really good size and it looked great and came with fries so again was a really good portion size.

I have a sweet tooth and there was a few things on the dessert menu that tickled my taste-buds so we got the Trio Sharing board and picked the Salted Caramel and Chocolate Torte, Strawberry and Rhubarb cheesecake and the Profiteroles with Butterscotch Syrup. We expected them to be smaller portions of the puddings but they were full size, it was huge so it's such a good value for money, you basically get a dessert free. The Torte was a little bit rich for me so I only had a little bit but it was really good, my favourite pudding was the cheesecake, it was really light and fluffy. I wasn't too sure about the Rhubarb but it was lovely very fresh and not overpowering at all. The Profiteroles were soo good, the cream was really fresh and light, they were lovely and it was unusual to have them with butterscotch but it was really nice.

Overall we had a lovely time, the venue is gorgeous very clean and looks really impressive! There's lots of different areas so you can go for just drinks or go along for a whole meal. It would be a great place to go as a group. You order at the bar and this works well when there's a group as you can just go and order and pay for your own. The staff were incredible, we had the best time! Every member of staff were lovely and couldn't have done more for us, they made sure we always had drinks and even when we asked for a little break before we ordered puddings they were happy to leave us to it. It's dog friendly and child-friendly so don't let that put you off. It had a really good vibe and atmosphere and we will definitely go back and we will bring Amelia along with us. They had baby changing facilities and highchairs so it's baby friendly. We both had a lovely night and it was nice to have a night off, have a drink and a catch up and it was such a lovely launch event, we had a fab time. Thank you to Head of Steam for having us.

* my visit to the salon was complementary, I have not been paid for this review.