Autumn in Joules wellies

I love everything about Autumn. I love the changing leaves, the smell of fires being lit, the stunning light through the clouds, and the warm food. 

I also love putting on wellies and going outside with my family to play in the leaves, walk through the mud and take in all the seasonal colours. It's even more enjoyable with Nate in tow. I love nothing better than rediscovering the world through the enthusiastic eyes of a one-year old. 

I was given the opportunity to choose a set of wellies for me and Nate for the Autumn from Joules. They have a HUGE range of cute Women's wellies and they even had a teeny tiny pair small enough for Nate who is a size 4. There is a boys wellies range from Joules too if you have an older son. It took me ages to finally decide on a pair for me. I went for dark green ones with little foxes on it because I wanted something more understated, but they have excellent patterns to suit all types of styles. 

When they arrived I took Nate straight into the back garden to try them on. Nate has a pair of cheaper wellies and he hates them because they are so stiff and he struggles to walk in them. I was worried how he would react. But these Wellies are seriously soft and squishy and he loved them straight away! He noticed the tractors on them and kept pointing to them, then looking back up at me and smiling. 

The only thing left for us to do was to get out and go exploring! My husband and I took Nate and the dogs to our local nature trail. It was Nate's first proper walk in the woods and he was in his element. 

I honestly love these Wellies.  They are reasonably priced and so comfortable and light. And because they are super soft, they slip on and off so so easy, which is of course essential for me so that I can get to my cup of tea as quickly as possible after walking in from the Autumn chill. 

You can have a look through all the Wellies on the Joules website here. 


We were sent these wellies free of charge from Joules for the purpose of the review, but all opinions are my own and are 100% honest. 

bubbles!

On Thursday, I took Nate to our local Children's Centre. We go all the time, I love it there! They have a big tube filled with water and plastic fishes in the corner of the play room. When it is turned on, the tube lights up in different colours and bubbles shoot up the middle.

Nate has always been mesmerised by the tube, staring at it from afar since he was only a few weeks old. On Thursday he was gesturing that he wanted to get closer so I perched him up on some cushions right next to the tube. His reactions were so cute, I just had to share. 

If you are in England, I definitely recommend checking out your local Sure Start Children's Centre. The centres are government funded and completely free to use. 

treasure basket

Busy at play

Over the last month I have noticed Nate really taking an interest in toys with different shapes and natural textures, particularly wood. He spends hours rummaging through the treasure baskets at our local children's centre. I spoke about his interest in these objects with someone at the centre and learned that treasure baskets encourage heuristic play. Heuristic play is where children play with objects from the real world - natural objects with different textures, tastes and shapes. A good article describes it here.  

And for the past few weeks I have been eyeing up this treasure basket for Nate, but oh my gosh, it is so expensive at £75 - I simply can not justify purchasing it. 

So last week I decided to start making my own, cheap version of a treasure basket. It is not as beautiful or as perfectly complete as the pre-made basket, but it is cheap and, you know what, it's great! I think it's going to take a while to build up a full basket worth of goodies, but here is what I have so far. 

I got the basket from TK Maxx for £5. It's not round, but it is shallow and has a nice liner in it. I would have preferred if it did not have handles though because Nate keeps picking up the basket by the handle and tipping the contents out, but oh well. 

I also bought a children's baking set at TK Maxx for £2, which included a small wooden spoon, a metal whisk, a rolling pin and 5 cookie cutters. I bought bells, a wooden boat, a wooden bowl and a set of plastic nesting eggs (I couldn't find any wooden ones) from Mothercare for around £7. And the rest I found from around the house - an old scarf, some large pieces of potpourri, a toilet paper roll (which I have since removed - it quickly got chewed into pieces - bad idea!). 

And there you have it. A treasure basket for under £15 and Nate loves it. Here are some shots of the first time he played with it. 

Too cute!