Ghostwritermummy

It truly is never too early to start reading to your baby. In fact, many experts recommend starting from as soon as they’re born! But when approaching something that is so crucial to your child’s overall development (and, studies show, lifelong earning potential), it is only natural to want to do it as efficiently as possible.

Here we discuss four key techniques to help you and your baby get the absolute most out of reading time.

#1: Choose a Suitable Venue

First things first: we need to get into the right mindset to read. The easiest way to do this is by designating a specific area for reading time. Stick with the three C’s here: find somewhere cosy, comfortable and calm.

You want somewhere familiar to the baby so that they feel completely relaxed, but also somewhere without distractions such as toys or pets. This is quiet time for just the two of you to bond over what should blossom into a shared love of reading.

Keep in mind that your baby isn’t the only one susceptible to distraction! Make sure you’re not reading to them while keeping one eye on the TV or your phone. If you’re not fully engaged, how can you expect them to be?

#2: Make it Entertaining

It can be such a temptation to keep a young child entertained or occupied with the mesmerising flashing lights of one of the many screens readily available in the home today – be it a phone, tablet, TV or computer. But recent studies have shown that increased screen time in 2 to 17 year-olds correlates to a multitude of mental health and cognitive issues, such as anxiety, depression and lower levels of self-control. This information should not be taken lightly, especially in conjunction with the fact that the World Health Organisation recommends no screen time whatsoever for any child under two years old.

But how, in this day and age, can a book hope to compete with technology for a young child’s attention? The onus falls on us parents to make reading as exciting as possible, through funny voices, actions, singing, or anything else you can think of to bring the story world to life.

Another great idea is personalised baby books, which add the baby’s name to their favourite stories or nursery rhymes to make them a tangible part of the book. This can help them feel like the star of the show, an instantly engaging emotion at any age!

#3: Choose Baby-Friendly Books

Let’s be honest, one of the most exciting parts of having kids is the excuse to go back and relive our own childhood, including our own favourite kids’ books. But as much as you can’t wait to revisit the Harry Potter or Twilight series, patience is a virtue.

Instead, make sure you select a book that is easy for a baby to understand and which relates to their surroundings. For a very young or even newborn baby, opt for books with bright colours, textures and patterns. Board books are a great choice, as they have rounded out edges and can be bashed and thrown and chewed without posing any danger to your baby.

A slighter older baby (1-2 years) will be ready to engage with an actual story and characters. Still try and keep it simple though – farm animals are tried and tested, of course, and offer the opportunity to make use of all the barnyard impressions your loved ones have banned you from performing at parties – don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about!

Picking a book on a subject or character that they’re interested in is always going to ensure they’re more engaged. Only you will understand what they like, so it makes sense to choose a book on a subject they’ll love.

Babies aged three and above should be beginning to get to grips with numbers and letters, and hopefully will have developed a passion for testing themselves and trying to read the odd words by themselves, so pick books that encourage this. If you read together regularly, you should naturally recognise their progress and be able to decide when it’s time to upgrade to the next level.

#4: Get into a Routine

The final and perhaps most important technique for an optimum reading experience is to view it not as a singular effort, but a solidified part of this and every other day. Having reading time at the same time every day makes it easier to focus on the task in hand, for both you and your baby.

If you have a busy schedule or generally find it hard to stick to a routine, don’t be afraid to start small. Even if you read for only a few minutes, it’s a start. Then, your next step is to increase that time a little each day, until you’ve been doing it long enough that it becomes second nature. Consistency is key here.

Always remember, this isn’t a fad or hobby; this is the start of a lifelong parenting journey, a quest to equip and prepare your child for the big, wide world as best as you possibly can. What could be a better use of your time than that?

It’s nearly Valentine’s Day and that means our TV screens are going to be jam-packed with rom coms, break up films and romantic movies. Hollywood loves a romance and there are hundreds upon hundreds of movies covering the topic, many good, many truly awful.

Either way, you’d be hard pushed to find a couple that won’t celebrate the day with a movie this year and thanks to Moon Bingo, a popular UK bingo site, you can do so in style with a very special Romantic Movie Bingo card.

The card allows viewers to add a little friendly competition to their film watching, with you required to mark off all the circumstances and scenarios on the bingo card through watching romantic films. You could mark them off all in one film, or it might take a marathon of The Notebook, Mamma Mia! and Casablanca for you to do so. Either way, it ramps up the fun on the most romantic day of the year.

The bingo card features a host of different scenarios that are all too common in romance films, from the likes of the love triangle, to interfering exes and more. You’ll find the bingo card below, with a selection of Moon Bingo’s top picks for romance films to watch this Valentine’s Day…

Valentines Day Bingo by Moon Bingo

Titanic

If you’re looking for a tear-jerker this Valentine’s Day, then Titanic could be the one. Starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslett, the movie is a modern classic and a story many of us already know, and probably have already seen. It’s the perfect day to rewatch this movie though, and you’ll find plenty of instances that will require you to dab that bingo card!

The Notebook

Perhaps the ultimate soppy romance film of modern times, The Notebook was released in 2004 and stars Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams as a young couple who fall in love in 1940s South Carolina.

The movie is as gushy as they come, but if you’re looking to set a romantic mood, then you won’t find a better option.

If Beale Street Could Talk

Released in the same year as A Star Is Born, this 2018 romantic drama is based upon the 1974 James Baldwin novel and is a must-see movie for anyone who is a fan of the genre. The film stars KiKi Laye and Stephan James and follows a young woman who seeks to clear the name of her lover who has been wrongly charged, in the build-up to the birth of their child. It was highly praised upon release and was nominated for multiple awards, including Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Original Score at the 91st Oscars Ceremony.

I was recently asked to try out a new app, Jonple. On first glance, Jonple appeared to me to be just fitness app- which it certainly is, but it’s also so much more than that. The principles behind it are fairly simple: to help and guide users towards a better understanding of their emotional and physical fitness, and how the choices they make each day can affect their health. With its promises to be more than a short-term fix, rather a ‘service built upon three distinct but linked areas; nutrition, fitness and psychology’ I have to admit I was really intrigued to find out more. Read on to see how I got on!

Note: before I start, I just want to say straight away that I haven’t yet been able to fully put all of the features of Jonple to the test. Earlier this month I managed to injure my knee, which seems to be taking a lot longer to heal than I assumed it would! Therefore I’ll focus this review on the nutrition and psychology elements of Jonple, and I’ll post another update soon on the fitness side, once my knee has fully healed. Fingers crossed it won’t be long!

First impressions

I don’t know why, but I’m often a little daunted by new apps. Some of them seem quite involved and I don’t always feel I have the time to learn how to navigate them properly. Having four kids, a job and a side-line in homeschooling, getting to grips with a complicated app isn’t always top of my priority list! That said though, my first thoughts when I opened the Jonple app was that the layout actually makes it really simple to find your way around.

Once you’ve created an account and entered your personal details, the app takes you for a virtual tour around the features: how to edit your account, where to find the nutrition section, how to record meals or ‘motivation hijacks’, how to access the psychology section. You get guidance on how to navigate the nutrition log (each day, meals and snacks are recommended for you as part of a daily plan, tailored according to the goals you set when you create your account, eg: fat loss, muscle gain etc). So far, so good.

Nutrition

Locate the nutrition dashboard via the apple icon at the bottom of the screen. Here you ‘swipe between your set meals and snacks for the day’- any you don’t fancy, you can swap. Each meal has a calorie count, with macros set out and full recipe with a video so that you can easily make the dish at home. I love this feature- especially if you’re stuck for meal ideas or you don’t have the first clue where to start. You can see ahead to the whole week’s meal plan (makes it easy to do the grocery shop) and you can access news articles on nutrition too.

When you set up your account, you can indicate if you want a vegetarian menu and soon there will be the option to really dial in on your dietary requirements/ preferences. The updates will allow you to get really specific about the foods you want to eat, which I cannot wait for. Personally, I tend to function better on a low carb menu, which isn’t at the moment isn’t always catered for in the Jonple app. That said, I do love the inspiration the meal plans provide, and I often use them to plan my week’s meals- even if I don’t stick to the recipe 100%. They’re a great guide and a good way to get used to tracking calories and macros if you’re not used to doing that.

Psychology

This section is pin-protected (a feature I think is just brilliant) and this is where you can record your thoughts and feelings as you embark on your fitness journey. There’s a short psychology questionnaire to complete, and then you can explore exercises and articles on motivation, choices, and obstacles that can crop up when you least expect them. I find this element of the Jonple app so interesting! It’s really useful to be able to look back on things like how sleep can affect your performance and mood, how certain triggers can ‘derail’ your best intentions, and how you can ultimately learn to overcome them, and be a little kinder to yourself when you do stumble. There’s a journal feature which is lovely- you can record a few sentences a day on how you’re feeling, what you’re proud of, what you’ve achieved… so great to read back on when you need a little boost, or a reminder of how far you’ve come.

Motivation Hijacks:

“Sometimes things in life, even our own thoughts, can cause us to react in ways that on reflection we’d rather not. This could impact plans we set out around nutrition and exercise.’- this is a motivation hijack, and there’s a specific section within the psychology dashboard to record these. What an eye-opener. Understanding the things that hamper our own progress is powerful because the control comes back to us to ultimately make changes to obstruct the obstacles. I love that!

Fitness

Like I said, sadly I can’t tell you too much about the fitness aspect to the jonple app right now- but I’m working on it! Before you start, you’re given a short fitness test that assesses your overall fitness level, and after that a programme is designed for you. Once you have your schedule, you’re good to go. I chose my initial goal as ‘lose weight’ (other options are ‘stay healthy and ‘improve fitness’.

My first impressions of the routine I was sent… very different to how I normally work out! I’ve been strength training with heavy weights for around 4 years now, and since the first lockdown I’ve ditched the gym in favour of my own set up at home. I’ve worked my way up to some pretty impressive lifts and I love how strong and powerful those workouts make me feel. I have to say, that the routines the Jonple app presented to me at first had me doubting my abilities!

The first routine I was set was a tabata style workout- 20 seconds of intense work followed by 10 seconds rest, then move on to the next workout. Six rounds, with 6 exercises in each round. Six rounds! A fairly challenging routine, especially for someone not used to so much cardio! That said, I was up for the challenge… until my knee injury. I’m really looking forward to getting stuck into this side of the app really soon- but for now, I’m still able to access lots of really interesting articles and there are some cool challenges I hope to tackle soon too. Mount Snowdon 19008 steps challenge anyone?

Conclusion

Jonple is a really nice, easy to use app. It’s bursting with articles and information related to emotional, physical and mental wellbeing and the people behind it really know their stuff. There’s a real emphasis on the science and psychology behind fitness and nutrition and it uses proper scientific calculations to formulate specific meal plans and workout routines for each individual user. I love this aspect, and I think it has real potential as pocket-trainers for fitness lovers, especially during lockdown, or in place of expensive gym memberships. I love the psychology section and I’m literally devouring the news articles right now, as understanding my overall health better has always been a priority for me.

The Jonple app does have a couple of drawbacks for me, personally. As already mentioned, I ‘m looking forward to being able to tailor my nutrition a little more precisely to incorporate a more lower carb way of eating. I also practise intermittent fasting, which again is not really mentioned within the app- perhaps some more articles on the pros and cons on that way of eating, plus the scientific research behind how fasting can affect weight loss/ muscle gain etc. There is a great article that debates fasted workouts, so I’d love to see more like that! That said, there is the option to skip meals within the app, so I am still able to record my meals.

Initially, my thoughts on the fitness side of the app was that I would like to see a more rounded fitness program- some resistance training in place of cardio perhaps. Then I discovered how to make those adjustments- simply by changing my goal. Duh! By choosing ‘stay healthy’ the app generates more resistance training exercises, and you can even toggle to a gym-based workout by clicking the small barbel icon. If you have access to a gym, or some equipment at home, you can choose these workouts- can’t wait to get stuck in! Choosing the ‘improve fitness’ goal will bring up more HIIT (high intensity interval training) workouts, which are great to add in to your usual routine if you want to up your game a little. I like that you can switch up your goal depending on your progress, although it would be good to be able to have perhaps one or two HIIT sessions in between traditional resistance sessions too.

All in all, the Jonple app is very impressive. It’s backed up by the latest research and it’s so easy to use- all your health and fitness data in one place, which is really handy. It’s great to track progress and to set and achieve goals. I can’t wait to see how 2021 shapes up for me with Jonple!

Find out more about Jonple here, register your details, download the app and go!

One of the worst things about being in lockdown is not being able to visit or socialise with friends and family. It is nice to video chat, but it’s not the same as being with them. It feels awful to speak to someone and see the sadness in their eyes without being able to reach out and hug them. 

But that does not mean that you can’t lift their spirits. If you feel comfortable doing so, sending them a small but thoughtful gift is an excellent way to let them know you are thinking of them. It does not have to be a big thing. Here are a few ideas to get you started.

Products you know your friend enjoys using

If your friend enjoys vaping you just have to click the link to be able to buy them some of the best e liquids on the market. The UK firm who makes them have been in business for a while, so they offer a really big range of products, making it easy for you to pick one that your friend is likely to enjoy.

On a similar theme, you could send them a bottle of their favourite beauty product. If your friend has a bath you can’t really go wrong with something they can use to have a nice soak and relax.

Buy them access to an online class

At the moment, many of the online learning platforms are running special offers. So, now is a particularly good time to buy someone the gift of a course. For example, if you both like to cook, Masterclass could be a good platform to look at. They offer several cooking classes as part of their all-access pass deal. So, if you both want to learn from the likes of Gordon Ramsay, Dominique Ansell, and Massimo Bottura, you can. If you act fast and use their special offer package you can get access for half-price.

Access to a streaming service

Being able to sit down and binge-watch a box set is a great way to take your mind off of the stresses and strains of life. So, if your friend has not already got access to a streaming service, why not consider buying them a pass for a month or two.  This article does a good job of comparing most of the best ones. It includes pricing details and an explanation of the various available features.

An activity pack style gift

Gifts that offer someone the chance to do something different are a good idea. There are all kinds of options available. Craft kits are one example. 

Toys adults can enjoy with their kids

Another option is to send them a toy, like the ones suggested here. They are all designed to provide fun for kids and adults alike. Some of the suggestions are crazy expensive, but there are also some decent ones at the lower end of the price scale.