Thanks to @alphamummy

I know that I have already posted today - but this afternoon I came across an article from yesterday's Times that fellow attendee Jennifer Howze wrote.

It was a great piece - that summed up BlogHer09 really well.

So a big thanks to Jen for the mention - you can read what she had to say about her BlogHer experience here.

Shhhhh......I haven't told her yet that she features on my crazy CheesburgHerz photo montage - perhaps I'll keep that one to myself!

Stokke News. Kids go Dotty for Sleepi™ Spotty

It has been a good couple of weeks since I bought you any Stokke® news - so here you have it hot off the press once again. New for August across the world you'll be able to get your hands on this lovely new bedding collection.

Made from beautifully soft high grade Egyptian Cotton the new bedding is totally fab. I know that there are going to be lots of people out there saying that they don't have a Stokke® Sleepi™ but that doesn't matter at all. The Stokke® bedding can be used in any nursery and the Spotty comes in pink and blue.

If you'd like a more zen option that the dotty spotty - take a look at the new Classic White, it has beautiful detailing and feels so soft and yummy.

The bedding collection consists of Sleeping bags, cot bumpers, Bedlinnen (pillow and duvet) and also the shaped Sleepi™ cover and will be available from all Stokke® retailers soon.

Whilst I am talking about the new textiles I should also give the Sleepi™ a mention. I love this cot. FunnyGirl had one and loved it from the moment she first went into it. To be honest I didn't think that we would use it past cot size but we so did. Off went the side when she was big enough and then we bought the Junior Bed Kit. At five she has just gone into a big bed but she still loves her Sleepi to bits.

All of my other children had this thing where they went round and round in circles in their cots. We put them down facing one way and in the morning they would be in totally the other direction. FunnyGirl didn't do this once in the five years that she slept in her Sleepi.

She went down easily at night and has always been a fantastic sleeper. There is something about that cot that is calming and welcoming at the same time and it really is something that is built to last.

If you are looking for a crib, that can be used as a cot, a cot bed, junior bed, sofa and two chairs then i challenge you to find anything to match the beautiful Stokke® Sleepi™.

Info at Stokke.com

BlogHer09 round up .. some great blogs to read.....

In response to the live Q&A over at British Mummy Bloggers yesterday (If you missed it you can view it here) - we had a few people wanting us to suggest blogs to have a look at, here are a few yo get you started. I do still have a huge pile of business cards to go through as I came home with about 300, so I will keep updating as I go through them!

Here are a few perspectives of BlogHer.

This post from Charming and Delightful sums it up exactly for me. I guess that there were lots of us walking around feeling that we were totally out of our comfort zone but too scared to admit it.

Another interesting point. Does having 10,000 Twitter followers make you an expert? Stephanie Bam Bam thinks not.

BlogHer09 from a founders perspective.

An interesting round up from the Chicago Tribune.

A post from the best session at BlogHer - blogging through pain. The women on this panel were an inspiration to the whole room. Six Until Me

An ode to BlogHer from a man's point of view, and he wasn't even there in person! TellingDad.

But the true encapsulation of the whole conference doesn't come any better than the Community Key Note speeches. It gives blogs a whole new meaning when they are read aloud with the raw emotion of the original author. The 21 bloggers had us laughing and crying in equal measure. It was an emotional ride for the room packed with over 1000 attendees. If you only read a couple from the 21 listed then these are my top picks. If you want to laugh read my new buddie Danielle's post and if you would like to capture a bit of that raw BlogHer emotion have a read of this from State of Grace.

And finally... I should have added this earlier, but it slipped my bedraggled mind. This is a great post by fellow UK blogger Sandy Calico that was inspired by me enquiring about others blog life balance.

Enjoy

BlogHer09 round up

I have just about settled back in at home. The last couple of days have been a bit of a whirl as I arrived back in the UK and had to go pretty much back to work.

I have taken a couple of days to digest everything that I saw and heard whilst over in Chicago and I must say that the whole event was one big roller coaster ride.

I was so excited about going to the conference and I had no idea what to expect when I got there. I did the full three days including the Business BlogHer session on the Thursday. I found this really interesting but the case studies that were highlighted as successful campaigns were so individual that it's difficult to take any ideas that you could incorporate into your own projects. But I met some really great people including Bridget Brennan author of Why She Buys who was great company throughout the conference (even if she did make me eat re fried bean stodge for lunch).

So what did I come away from BlogHer with (apart from a hangover and the lingering reek of Cheeseburgers)?

I have been sitting on answering this since I came home. I thought that if I sat back and let it digest I would be able to say I have come away with x, y & z - but it hasn't worked out like that. I do however feel a pressure to come forth with lots of forward thinking ideas but if I am totally honest what I came away with was more of a gut feeling, that I am on the right path. That I know what I am doing in the social media arena and that I should have more confidence in my abilities. Not just in the blogosphere but in all avenues of my life.

I met some beautiful people, each one with amazing inspirational stories to tell. Some that I will keep in touch with and others that I will not. One totally amazing thing is that in an environment packed with over 1500 women the vibe was really friendly. If you sat down alone a group would quickly gather around you likewise if you chose to join a group you were welcomed with open arms.

I am thrilled to be one of social media's early adopters and for the first time in my life I feel like I am at the forefront of a revolution. It excites me to see where this will lead me personally and professionally as the UK market tries to catch up with what has been the norm over in the US for years.

The social media revolution is huge over there - it has to be for global brands such as Pepsico and Johnson & Johnson to see the importance in sponsoring a Women's Blogging conference. They see the importance in being able to tap into their key target consumers for what it is - essential.

I missed my family dearly and them me. When I came home I felt such a surge of love that can only be felt by absence so another thing that I have learnt is that I shouldn't take those close to me for granted.

You may want to take a look at the pages of some of the lovely people that I met. Knotty Yarn, Grasping for Objectivity, Moosh in Indy, Chronic Babe, Advocation me, and the lovely Tim Gunn - who is so nice. He signed a pic for my hubby!

And finally I have learnt that the American's love the word Awsome! On Saturday I decided to count just how many times I heard it and by the time I passed out from an OD on cocktails courtesy of Knotty Yarn the count was nearly at 700! Awsome!

I will add a list of good stuff to look at later on today. I wanted to get this post wrapped before we did the live chat on BMB. If you were there, thanks for joining us. If you have any more questions about BlogHer and what i got out of it, please leave a comment and I will come back to you.

DinoBoy Reviews Gulliver's Kingdom

Whilst Mummy was in Chicago at her BlogHer09 conference Daddy took us to Gulliver's Kingdom for a day out. We don't usually do things without Mum - so that was a bit odd but we had a really good time.

The best ride was the Junior Drop Tower which is a ride that takes you up really high and then just drops you down.

When we first got on it I was really excited then it dropped about 5ft and my tummy went funny inside - urghhhhh.....

It was just ModelGirl and me at first, FunnyGirl was scared but came on when she saw us having such good fun. She screamed loads and daddy told her to stop!!

We had a go on the fire engines which I really liked. I was playing with the hose and when I lifted it up the water ran straight down my sleeve into my top and left me with a big cold wet patch on my side! We did manage to put out a big fire though.

I really wanted to go on the Log Flume - but no one else did. I talked the girls into it but dad said NO WAY! But we begged and begged and begged and finally gave in (I think that he only did that so we would shut up!).

I sat at the front, then ModelGirl, FunnyGirl and Daddy at the back. FunnyGirl and Daddy got soaked - we thought that was hilarious - but Daddy didn't! He wouldn't take us on a second time because he was too wet.

Then we went over to the Princess Play area where the girls dressed up like princesses - they really liked doing that, Dad and I hung around taking pictures of them.

For lunch we had kids meals - we all had chips and sausage. The meals were big, but I ate all mine - if you know me, you know that isn't a surprise. (I did feel a bit sick afterwards but I didn't tell Dad. Good job we didn't go on anything swirly or there might have been trouble!)

After lunch we went on the Big Wheel. At the top you could see the entire park - it was a really good view. Then we went into the Mini Maze, I was obviously the first one to make it to the middle - the girls got a bit lost because they went the wrong way. I had to be a hero brother and rescue them. I was being totally nice and got them back out again - I could have left them but I that would have been mean.

We went on the Jungle River Boat three times. That was so much fun. The ModelGirl went on a big carousel swing all by herself, she said it was not scary at all.

I really wanted to go on the Bumper Cars but i wasn't tall enough to go on my own unfortunately and Dad had to look after the girls. Next time when Mum is with us I'll be able to do it with her, or maybe I will have grown that extra millimeter by then!

We had a really good day at Gulliver's, but we had to leave to get home to let our dog out. There are lots of other fun things that we didn't make it to like the Dinosaur Eco Farm park. I would really like to go back so that we can visit them. After all I am DinoBoy!

We visited Gulliver's Kingdom Milton Keynes.

BlogHer Update

It's the final day of BlogHer today and I have to say that it has all been a bit of an emotional roller coaster. There are some truly inspirational women here that have amazing stories to tell.

On Thursday evening I chanced across a couple of great women that I clicked with right away. They both blog on the issues surrounding living with pain, an issue that's very close to me. They were hosting a session today that was amazing. The strength and vulnerability in the room was quite something else, the session ran over and there wasn't a dry eye in the house.

Then on to the community key note speeches. A select group of bloggers took to the stage to share one of their posts with the rest of the conference. Heart rending stuff, one minute you were in tears and the next laughing so hard. Take a look at the featured bloggers and their fabulous posts here.

I had to dive out of there early to move on to the Stokke® party at the Chicago retailer Land of Nod. This is the best nursery store that I have ever been to. So beautifully put together with stuff for older kids too.

I love these Space Invaders wall stickers and the Mojo play table and chairs, 8 stickers are $40 and the furniture from $59 to $479.

The US Stokke team had invited 10 Mommy Bloggers to come along for full product demo's and I was in charge of my favourite product Xplory® (well I'm not sure that it is my fav, that might be Tripp Trapp or Sleepi - hell who cares?).

Sophie4Sophie would have been proud of me as I enlightened them all of the potential mix and match fabric options - even giving her yellow and turquoise a mention!

After an evening of Tapas it was back to the hotel and straight to bed - I was exhausted after such an emotional day. Alas my jet lag woke me up at 3am and I couldn't really get back to sleep.

So final day....

I'm going to try and keep away from the emotional stuff today and hit the Geek Labs, then take a break (shop) this afternoon before the closing speeches and the parties tonight. I'm going to the CheesburgHer party.......

more later...

Chicago the Shopping 1

That was a bit of abrupt ending last night but So you Think You can Dance came on Fox - and I love that so it won!

I know that you are all dying to know what I bought on my shopping trip last night and as I am the worst person in the world at keeping secrets I have already shown everything to the crew back home thanks to our Skype call this morning!

The first store that I came to got me so excited I thought that I was going to pass out! I Love Supermarkets - especially foreign ones, they do it for me!

Once I'd worked out how to get in (this city has an obsession with revolving doors that i can't get my head around!) I was greeted by a whole isle of nail varnish and other suitably girlie exciting stuff that my girls love.

I was secretly pleased that I was there on my own because although @byyanto likes supermarkets too - I think that my open mouthed gazing would have been too much for even him to bear, (and he loves me).

I spent about an hour in there and managed to only spend $20. I could have easily bought more but I'm not sure on what the rules are about bringing food back into the country at the other end so the Spicy Jalepio Cheesums didn't make the cut. One thing did puzzle me though....

In whose mind is is right to place the most delicious looking biscuits on the same isle as foot care preparations?

So I bought, some little jewels for the girls to stick on their nails, lipstick, nail varnish, root beer (yum), some very nice looking sweets and that's it.

The next place I chanced across was TJ Maxx (not TK here). I do like a rummage and love to shop but this place was too much even for me. We have picked up some fab stuff for the children here over the years and it was straight to the kids dept.

Excitement highlights are - Boys Calvin's $5 for three pairs. Paul Frank PJ's for FunnyGirl $10, a black & white striped maxi dress for ModelGirl $10 and the icing on the cake - A Hello Kitty sewing machine for $14. The girls will be over the moon that they can make the curtains for our dolls house project. Spend in TJ Maxx $60. Happy I went in search of food.

I settled on Wow Bao, @byyanto loves Bau. They are one of his fav eats. Me, I can take them or leave them and settled on some dumplings and noodles instead. Food was OK, but no one can ever make dumplings like my hubby he has a technique that he has finely crafted through the years and his recipe is a closely guarded secret! Apart from his fashion and style they are the other thing that makes him legendary where we live!

It's Thursday morning here now. I have been awake since 4am - so today is going to be another long day. It's the first day of BlogHer, but today is business based not the regular conference and it doesn't kick off till lunch time and I'll probably go for another wander when the shops finally open.

News from home is that they have found a frog in the garage - who ModelGirl has named Sonny (she says because they don't know if it's a boy or a girl?!) and that the shower door fell off it's hinges and smashed into thousands of pieces leaving a naked cold husband stuck in the shower with glass everywhere and no one to help him. FunnyGirl came to his rescue with a pair of shoes but boy what a mess....

Off to Chicago - Day 1

Before I begin I would like to thank everyone for all of the positive comments that you left for DinoBoy on his guest post yesterday. It has inspired him to start his own blog! That and the fact that the lovely @eburypublishing have sent him some more books to review. In my absence he is reading and as soon as I get home we will create his site.

That is so exciting. He will at the very least have something to show his teachers when he goes back to school in September and at the highest level. Who knows? The sky is his limit!!So here I am one day into my American adventure. I don't know why it is but whenever I fly anywhere it always involves me getting up at stupid o'clock and today was no exception. The only difference was that by the time I left the house and hour later both of the girls were awake.

FunnyGirl came into my bedroom still half asleep with tears streaming down her face.

"I don't want you to go mummy - I need you..."

I had to really hold it together not to loose it myself, picked her up and gave her the biggest cuddle in return for one of her special soft kisses that she keeps just for me and took her back to bed with promises of an American bammy (she collects pandas) - still sobbing, a bag full of tat from the $ store - still tears and a big bar of chocolate - bingo.

As I came out of her room ModelGirl's door opened. Last night she had very kindly entrusted me with her prized cuddly bunny and one of her snuggy's. (The said bunny I gave to her for her very first Christmas and that was what started her whole bunny thing) Anyway she didn't want me to be on my own and thought that Manky bunny (as he is fondly known) would be able to keep me company. To be fair he looks to me like he has his mind on other things but hey - who am I to judge? It's his first time in the US.

I digress..... ModelGirl is by nature very sensible and trustworthy. Very unlike Dino & Funny who live quite happily in their own little worlds. ModelGirl is well and truly here on Earth with you and I which is why she is the only person that I could entrust with general day to day 'motherly must do's'. By that I mean, feed the cat, feed the dog, remind you brother and sister to clean their teeth.....

She told me and Manky to have a lovely time, gave me a lovely cuddle and went back to sleep.

So I escaped whilst I had the chance. After an emotional farewell to my Mr off I set. My journey took me from home to Birmingham airport. From there to Philli and then on to Chicago. All things considered not a bad day's travel.

Oddly, it is the first time in my life that I have ever travelled in that direction - our family destination of choice being Thailand is totally the other way. So going backwards through time feels bit odd and only something that DinoBoy understood in our phone check in.

It is only 9pm here in Chicago but it's 3am at home - which means that in an hour i've been up for 24 hours. Shit.... I really need to go to bed....

So, I landed down in Chicago, jumped on the airport express and got to my downtown hotel that Mr has lovingly paid for with the 8 years of Amex Points that he has been collecting, saving and toying with since he started collecting when DinoBoy had only just hatched. I thank him:)

Her I am then in Chicago - it looks slightly odd to every British person I would think. It looks all very new - like Milton Keynes or Telford but with the tallest buildings that you have ever seen - that and a lovely river view that to be fair is not to be had absolutely anywhere in Telford or Milton Keynes.

Before you UK peeps start having a go at me - I was born in Shropshire and I had my very first McDonalds ever at Telford shopping centre in like 1980 and I have been to Milton Keynes like loads of times OK. Geez....

So I dumped my bags and I went in search of shops......

Guest Blogger.... DinoBoy does Torchwood

As I am off to BlogHer in the morning I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to host a guest blogger.

Being just 8, this is DinoBoy's first ever blog post. He's just like me in his love of reading and he is mainly to be found with his nose in a book (dinosaurs or his other true love Dr Who usually).

When I heard that Ebury were looking for people to review the new Torchwood books I put him forward.

For days he sat engrossed and then a week went by while he thought about what to write and here is his eagerly awaited review. Please be sure to show him your love by leaving him some feedback.....

Torchwood - Bay of the Dead by Mark Morris

I love Torchwood and Dr Who so I was really excited when my mum told me that I was going to get sent a free book to read. no one has ever sent me a free book before!

An amazing book deserves an amazing report. Bay of the Dead was exciting, thrilling and fantastic all at the same time. I have to admit that it was a little bit scary sometimes too - so it probably isn't for children younger than me.

I would recommend that if you are Torchwood or Dr Who fan then you really should go out any buy it.

I would like to read the rest of the Torchwood books now - so if that nice lady would like to send me some more I promise to read more and play less computer games.

Well that wraps it up. A very big thanks to my little fella. I thought that you might all enjoy this pic of him dressed as Dr Who. We had his suit made in Thailand and he wore it to death. I sent it to the kids Dr Who mag and they featured him as best Dr Who look alike! We think that DinoBoy is far better looking!

10 Things that I Love (finally)......

Following on from my SpongeBob and other irrational hates post a few weeks ago, I had promised that I would turn it around and get you all feeling warm and fuzzy with a follow up on 10 Things That I love - but I hit the wall. It seems that it's much easier to rant about the things that you don't like and quite a struggle to list the things you love (without being all mushy that is).

So 10 Things that I Love - in no particular order before you ask....

1. My hubby and children - they might drive me mad sometimes but I wouldn't be without any of them for the world.

2. The feel of the hot sun on my skin - I would love to live in a hot country and not have to battle with the wind and rain and all of the wardrobe malfunctions that shoddy weather reports ensure.

3. My cat. Hubby bought her for me as a wedding present. She's getting on now has recently started to go a bit whappy but I adore her, especially her soft little nose and cute ears. She is a Persian and her nose feels like velvet and she loves it when I rub it, she goes into purr overdrive!

4. Chanel handbags.

5. The smell of Scotch Tape - I am aware that makes me technically a glue sniffer but hey.....

6. The Smiths. My band of choice since I was just 11. If I had a pound for every teenage night that I cried myself to sleep listening to Morrissey then I wouldn't have to work at all!

7. The pride that I feel when I watch my children doing simple everyday stuff. They are so full of life, love and talent and yet to be disillusioned by the world. I would like to keep them like that forever.

8. My orange Mini. It's the smallest car that I have ever owned and it's far from practical seeing as No1 Son is six ft tall but driving it makes me happy.

9. Sunday mornings - Sunday is the only day that we don't have activities to go to and the only chance that we really get to veg out during the whole week.

When No1 was little, we used to stroll down to the shops to buy a packet of chocolate snowballs and then stuff our chops till we felt sick, go back home and watch Star Wars over and over! Now that we live in the countryside, we don't have any shops so during the spring and summer months we head out on a car boot sale adventure and then a walk or bike ride in the afternoon. Perfect.

10. My hubby's talents - He is a media man by trade, we met when he employed me to do PR for a project that he was working on (in fashion incidentally). Now eleven years on and in the full flow of a recession times are really tough in his industry and he hasn't been happy in his work for a long time.

His true passion has always been fashion and this year (with a bit of pushing) he's let his creativity loose and has produced his first collection. He has his samples, he has a very influential London stockist and he has a list of people waiting for the final production pieces. I am so proud of what he has achieved and on a slightly different note, he makes the BEST Dim Sum. Our children's parties usually have more adults there than kids as word spread like wild fire that we do food for the adults too!

What will I be wearing at BlogHer????

Some of you already know that I am off to Chicago on Wednesday for the annual BlogHer conference. It was a bit touch and go as tickets have been sold out for ages and I had to put my hard earned PR skills into over drive in order to get it all sorted.

So tickets are in place, flights and hotel booked and hubby and the kids are ensuring me that they will be fine without me. I know that they will but will I be OK without them?

So to the main reason for this post. Tim Gunn of Project Runway fame will be there talking fashion and to celebrate BlogHer are holding a comp to win a one on one style consultation with the driest man in fashion - and I want to win it!!

So to what I will be wearing at BlogHer..... weather dependent you understand!

From left to right - my outfits pictured above.

1. My custom made blue jacket with white trim and my beautiful Balmain jeans with glad sandals and my limited edition Chanel Union Jack bag.

2. If it is a bit chilly I will opt for my flowered Luella dress, maybe a jumper and tights and my flat DM boots.

3. Blue Luella dress can work for day or night. Flat boots for the day and tights and high boots in the evening.

4. I will probably wear my suit to the business conference on Thursday. I had this made for me in Thailand this year. Team with a pair of classic red high DM boots and Chanel necklace and away you go.

5. And finally - I love this mixed up look! My satin LBD was lovingly designed for me by my hubby, the crankiest pair of socks that I could find (they are Mary Quant from the 70's and were 10p from a car boot sale but work in an odd twisted kind of way), my faithful high DM boots and my Top Shop Leopard print silky swing jacket.

and I know that you are going to ask..... ModelGirl is wearing Blazer by Joules, red tartan jeans by Zara and her copy of my Chanel bag from ASOS.

So that's it - have I done enough to win???? Watch this space!

Walking with Dinosaurs rocks!

Last night for the first in a selection of school holiday treats. We took the little ones to see the stage show of Walking With Dinosaurs. As you have probably worked out by now - DinoBoy, is mad on dinosaurs (and has been since he was old enough to hold his very very large dinosaur encyclopedia at about 14 months).

It has been eagerly anticipated by all of us for months - so excitement was running high! But before we could get into the dino spirit FunnyGirl and I had a whirl-wind visit to London for a casting. So quick was it that I was back at my desk in time for lunch!

The start time of the show was 7pm and we left early enough (or so we thought) to get something to eat before the show. Now eating out is limited with them as they are such bad eaters. I would feel totally dreadful about it but as I have managed to raise one child (No1) with normal eating habits I have to lay the blame with the series of nannies that led the childcare / feeding situation in their formative years (sorry Nat!).

So.... there we were in Pizza Hut (urghh). That particular establishment is seen as a compromise in our house - which means that I will actually eat there if forced.

Problem 1 - it was packed. I informed the guy (who had taken ages to even acknowledge our very existence) that we were on our way to a show that began at 7pm.

Time check 5.45pm. He told us that there was a longer than usual wait as they were busy but that we should have our food in about 30 mins.

Math check. 5.45pm + 30min = 6.15pm - perfect. That gave us enough time to eat and ten mins to walk to the venue and get seated.

6.30pm...... no food.

6.35pm...... no food + 3 hungry, fussy eaters + no food = disaster

At this point we decided to pay for our drinks and leave. Obviously the show wasn't going to start on time but we didn't want to chance missing the beginning.

6.50pm by the time we left bloody (excuse my language) Pizza Hut after signing my life away to say that I didn't want to accept their hospitality! What bloody hospitality is that then? Sorry I think that I blinked and missed it and whilst I am at it their toilets were awful too.

So.... now time is of the essence and we also have three grumpy hungry kids and one grumpy hungry mother (OK, so I know that you all know that one of me is totally worse than all 3 of them put together but this is why the whole thing = one really grumpy hubby!).

Bonus, chip shop on route... We dive in buy chips, that were if you are interested really greasy and not at all nice. Kids stuff faces, I moan a bit (lot) more whilst steeling chips and moaning about wanting a real meal.

Destination - the show.....

Now. Hubby had kindly got us some hospitality tickets and quite frankly we should have been behaving a whole lot better. The kids were fighting, I was moaning about them fighting, we were hungry, greecy and not a happy bunch. When we arrived the kids had their manky chips taken off them - as I knew they would (phew), that saved them having to not eat them and me going into moan overdrive. After all there is only so much moaning one mummy can do in one day. And we were shown to our box.

We sat down and our waitress came in and handed us a menu - a bloody Pizza menu......Urghhhh.

You get the picture. So we could have just saved ourselves all of that hassle and had a pizza in our beautiful box at the show........

I have been harping on about the problems for so long that I have failed to mention the actual show.

Well... tension was high... Emotions were high.... DinoBoy was excited... ModelGirl was excited..... FunnyGirl was excited..... mummy was hungry... daddy was grumpy....

No sorry, there I go again!!!

The show was simply spectacular. We are huge dinosaur fans in this house. Have seen all of the Walking With series, have all of the books, DVD's etc - so we are total target market.

The dino models were totally exceptional and DinoBoy loved it. I would have loved to have seen Nigel Marvin in the role of the narrator though, it would have really made it. The dinosaurs were to scale and that did make it pretty impressive though to be honest we were all totally in awe of the inflatable palm trees that got bigger as the show went on!

I have had lots of questions about the show being suitable for young children and I would say, that yes it is. But go for a matinee show. The evening performance wasn't overly long - we were back on our way home by 9pm but the kids were wiped out.

Must say have just been watching Rick Stein's show on TV - very impressed at seeing how rice noodles are made.A staple of the adult diet in our house! Not the kids (obviously) being half chinese - there is no way they would eat that...

I would like to take this opportunity to thank @that_kat for helping me out with the old spelling problem of mine!