Shellybobbins meets Ben Shephard raising money for Childrens Heart Unit Freeman Hospital

I'm taking part in a Coast 2 Coast challenge - 28 July to 3 August 2011, Tynemouth to Whitehaven to Tynemouth. Across the width of mainland UK and back again, 280 miles, in a week. Sores and blisters are a given, let alone the dreaded chafe! But it's all in aid of an amazing charity - The Children's Heart Unit Fund (CHUF). More below...

Details

I’ll be leaving on July 28 to cycle 140 miles, travelling East to West, arriving in Whitehaven two days later where myself and the team of fundraisers will promptly turn round and run the 140 miles back to Tynemouth over the remaining five days.

70 of miles cycling a day for the first two days, before ditching the bikes and running over a marathon a day (28 miles to be exact!) for five consecutive days on the way back. And I’m a bit worried. I consider myself a fairly fit and determined bloke but this is daunting!! I’ve run marathons before, climbed Kilimanjaro however this is without doubt going to be one of the biggest physical challenges of my life to date. 

But I and the team are pushing ourselves to the limit for very good reason - The Children's Heart Unit at the Freeman Hospital and for Seb, the son of a very good friend of mine.

So please dig deep and donate what you can to an incredibly worthwhile cause, if only to make up for my pain and physical humiliation come the 3 August. YOU WON’T REGRET IT! 

More information is below on the amazing work they do every day at the Children's Heart Unit is below:

 The Children's Heart Unit at the Freeman Hospital

Around 300 small babies and children are operated on each year by the children’s heart surgeons at the Freeman Hospital.

Heart problems, including Tetralogy of Fallot, which Seb was diagnosed with, are among the most common types of abnormality found in newborn babies. Many of them are tiny infants who, up until a few years ago, would not have survived. Out of 33,000 babies born in the Northern region each year, around 300 will require surgery and many more will require medical or outpatient treatment in the Children’s Heart Unit (Ward 23).

Not all children are born with heart disease. Viruses can severely weaken the heart and cause it to fail. The Freeman Hospital is one of only 2 hospitals in the UK that performs children’s heart transplants and that use mechanical hearts to keep these children alive until their heart either recovers or can be transplanted. Since 1987 over 250 children have received a transplant.

Because of the special expertise at the Freeman Hospital, children are referred from Ireland, Scotland and many hospitals throughout England. On a rare occasion, they may even be referred from overseas.

For more information about the children’s charity CHUF, visit http://www.chuf.org.uk/  and Seb4CHUF http://www.seb4chuf.org.uk/index.html .

Today I wanted to support this amazing event today & Ive spent alot of time in the Freeman hospital with new knees & an elbow replacement - they are amazing in that hospital.  This is a very special family that keep repeatedly raising money for the freeman hospital. I got to meet Seb to & his amazing family.

first things first I had to get a heart painted & it will cost you of course - worth every penny !!

It was great everyone was walking around with red hearts on there faces all supporting a great cause xx

Here's me sat with gorgeous Seb ! looking through the bag of goodies I had x

Pink heart for mummy & Blue heart for daddy, Seb's daddy was also running with lots of other lovely people including Ben Shephard, good job I brought lots of hearts !

This is Nadine what an amazing mummy, Nadines eyes filled up & mine too - really overwhelmed at everyones support today

Celebrations In Carlisle you really are fantastic !!!

click here for details on this amazing dance school they sang like angels all had red hearts too xx

And here they come !! everyone clapping and cheering Seb's Daddy is the one in the blue !

lots of well wishes, hugs & kisses too they all did so amazing

Ben Shephard High Five !!

Group picture please amazing runners ! bless Seb with Daddy (bottom right)

Alot of you know already that I run a competition called "Heart Of The Month"  where everyone comments on the competition and a winner is chosen who ever they have nominated gets a handmade heart & a signed certificate. I decide to sign a certificate and frame it and take a bag of handmade hearts for Ben Shephard, When I told Ben about this he smiled rubbed my back & gave me a kiss, thought this was a wonderful idea & also loved the fact id nominated him - takes alot for someone to do things like this and raise awareness ! Bens also wearing Harry Moseley bracelets (Harry raises money for brain cancer tumours, Harrys 11 & also suffers with this hes raised £500,000 so far) I love harry hes amazing too  http://www.helpharryhelpothers.com/

JUST TO SAY THANK YOU MADE MY DAY

What a fantastic picture ! Seb & his daddy

Shellybobbins stood with the lovely & very caring Ben Shephard

Shellybobbins Guest "The Bellingham Soap Company" Northumberland Plus double Giveaway

The Bellingham Soap Company carefully hand makes luxury artisan soaps and skincare in a converted barn nestled in the vallum of Hadrians wall in Northumberland. We only use top quality ingredients from sustainable sources. We don’t use petrochemicals, phthalates or SLS, nor do we use artificial colours of fragrances. We do use pure essential oils and organic herbs in our soaps which are made from scratch with olive, palm, castor and coconut oils. Our skincare is made from emollient oils, organic beeswax and gorgeous butters, we use a preservative system which is paraben free. We began making our soaps in 1997 as a way to use up our surplus goats milk, they proved very popular with family and friends so we began to sell at farmers markets in 1999 and have never looked back. We are a small company that fully intends to stay small to ensure quality by only making in small carefully controlled batches. We only package our products in fairly traded handmade paper, natural cellophane bags and recycled cardboard boxes. We sell retail via our website http://www.workingwithnature.co.uk/ and wholesale by arrangement allysonx@hotmail.com

You can read all about us on our blog http://bellinghamsoapcompany.blogspot.com/

DOUBLE GIVEAWAY  THESE GORGEOUS SETS !!!!!

Thank to the lovely Allyson from Bellingham Soap Company for this  gorgeous double giveaway ! It smells amazing !!

To be in with a chance of winning all you have to do is:-

QUESTION :-  Name a Very Famous Wall that runs though Northumberland

Competition ends 4th Aug at 8pm 2011 2 winners will be picked ~~ good luck

Handmade natural soaps & luxury paraben free skincare as seen in Vogue, Marie Claire & Prima. Handmade in the UK. Handmade soaps, natural skincare, luxury serum, Lip Balm, wholesale soap, gift boxes

Thank you so much allyson these are beautiful gift sets  

Love Shellybobbins

Marika Rauscher Opera singer for Harrods of London & #SBS Theo Paphitis winner

The Amazing Marika Rauscher Small Business Sunday winner !

Entered #SBS on twitter & has never looked back

5pm every sunday and finishes at 7.30pm

Theo Retweets 6 winners

The Competition is amazing !!

http://www.marikarauscher.co.uk/

click here to follow on twitter

Thank you for doing your very first audio blog just for me im so honoured Marika

Harrods are very lucky to have you !!!

I hope one day we meet darling as its been wonderful these passed few weeks tweeting & speaking over the phone You are VERY inspiring

Love Shellybobbins xxxx

Shellybobbins #sbs winner now on Audioboo Radio Station

Its fantastic to use all the different kinds of Free advertising thats around, I got introduced to http://www.audioboo.fm/Shellybobbins a while back by a lovely lady called Lynsey @mummypreneur who is also on twitter, Lynsey uses it in her business too and a great way of getting messages across http://www.queenofeasygreen.co.uk
you can tweet from it too, use as an mp3, So ive decided to give at ago ! Im going to use mine in a special message way, so if you would like to email me and send me a message for a birthday, get well, anniversay Or just a message then send me an email shellybobbins.2010@yahoo.co.uk I can tweet it to you so dont forget to include your @name Or simply let me know the email address its going to and ill do the rest.

Charitys welcome too !!

I will also be using this to let you know about any competitions I have on or coming up, keep you updated with the rag dolls im making etc

I hope you will join in the fun and email me


Love Shellybobbins xxxx

#SBS Winner from Theo Paphitis & #WOW Winner from Jacqueline Gold ~~~ Gabriella Buckingham @moobaacluck tells her amazing story plus 6 winner giveaway !!

Hello, I’m Gabriella, I’ve been an artist and illustrator for 21 years setting up “Moobaacluck – handmade happiness” in late 2008 from my garden summerhouse when my children were toddlers. From memory I joined twitter in 2009 and I have found it to be a wonderful help to me in my business and in my personal life too. I love to support people where I can and find that many people feel the same. One of you could one of these prizes for your comments on Shelly's blog!





                                                             6 PRIZE GIVEAWAYS

In the last 10 months I have come to the attention of two very prominent business people!

On Sunday 31^st Oct. 2010 I saw a few tweets about a competition @TheoPaphitis was running: between 5.30pm-7.30pm he was inviting you to tweet about your business including the #sbs tag and of course @TheoPaphitis so that he could find it J He would then chose his favourite six sites and RT (retweet) them to all his then 60,000 + followers later that night!

This was my entry:

@TheoPaphitis Moobaacluck - Handmade Happiness for children and the young at heart www.moobaacluck.com #sbs

I did it quickly near the end of the first session, little knowing what it actually meant… Then congratulations started to flood in and I realised I’d won!

Hits went up on my site and I definitely gathered more followers and orders on notonthehighstreet.com/moobaacluck increased. Subsequent winners have made far more of the opportunity than I did at the time – contacting media for example. It really is a new democratic way for the small business to be noticed. A virtual business revolution!

Reading one of @Shellibobbins tweets on Wednesday 29^th June 2011 I found out that Jacqueline Gold was about to start a similar process of “Women on Wednesday” – literally that day! I thought I’d enter #WOW and I won the very first time!!! This is what Jacqueline wrote to me and all her thousands of followers:

@Moobaacluck Love the concept of “handmade happiness”. Beautiful, well-designed website.”

This means such a lot especially as I had only recently designed a new shop site myself.

This time I blogged about it on my new site which I had already updated with a gorgeous #sbs badge. Later this week Jacqueline sent me a #WOW badge which also looks stunning on my site… and the hits on my website quadrupled on the day I won J

Do enter yourself!

See the badges and my work here:  http://www.gabriellabuckingham.com

If you are a facebook user this is my page http://www.facebook.com/MoobaacluckUK

Tweet me here http://twitter.com/Moobaacluck

Read my http://www.gabriellabuckingham.com/blog/   about #WOW and click through to my main blog for lots of articles about how I run things in my own creative way!

Im sure you will agree and join in on congratulating Gabs on her double win YOU ARE AMAZING GAB's thank you for being on shellybobbins blog.

 Each comment will be entered into competition a winner will be chosen using a random generater and competition will end on 28th July Thursday night at 8pm winners names will be posted on http://www.facebook.com/TheShellybobbins and on here too as well as twitter

good luck and dont forget to comment please

Love Shellybobbins xxxx

#SBS winner Shellybobbins Nominated for a National Award "The MumPreneur Awards 2011" Judged By BBC TV Duncan Bannatyne from Dragons Den

               

 Shellybobbins has now been entered into a National Awards
On the panel of judges is BBC TV star Duncan Bannatyne from Dragons Den (which also starts on the 31st July BBC2 at 9pm)

My entry will be put forward to awaiting the judges panel, Who'll begin reviewing entries as soon as the awards close on 29th July 2011.

Ive been entered by my lovely daughter, who has seen first hand of the hard work involved in trying to set up business, she has seen my determination to succeed, my daughter has also seen the frustration, tears too as setting up business is not easy at all, having my family here everyday has helped me so much and being nominated is such a boost for me.

The Conference with be held on the 25th September two days after my 40th Birthday

Ive been sent a badge for my site which says nominated but I really would love to be shortlisted ! if I am this badge will change and everyone will know about it ha ha ha Id love to be shortlisted so much, this would make my husband and my children so proud, Ive been nominated in "Best Sales Woman Award"

I'm so proud to have this badge on my site and let everyone know my daughter has nominated me !!

Click here to read more on "The Mumpreneur Awards"

So Fabulous that Ive been nominated

thank you gorgeous Daughters I love you with all my heart

To my wonderful husband couldn't do any of this without your support I love you so much

Love Shellybobbins xxxx 

Lovely MiniBobbins makes amazing cakes ~ You can make them too heres the Recipe x

Hi everyone, I'm MiniBobbins!!

I thought I would share with you, a few things about me, and tell you what it is I love to do in my spare time :0)

I have just finished my first year at College, studying food preparation and cooking as well as food and beverage service. I won Student of the month in October 2010 and was later awarded Student of the year 2010-2011 for all of the hard work I had put into my studies. As well as this, I won a Kitchen Essentials book which tells you everything about everything, It's a really good book, really easy to follow and you can literally find an answer to anything in it.

I love to bake, so I thought I would share with you a recipe that I used not long ago to make some beautiful cakes with.

It's not like any other sponge cake mix, there's a bit more work needed as it doesn't use self raising flour, it uses plain flour, but, this method also cuts down on half the butter you would normally use.

This mix is what you would normally use for desserts such as Baked Alaska, It is VERY aerated and should be very moist and light too.

                      Genoese (pronounced Jen Oh Wheeze) Sponge

6 Eggs

6oz - 150g Caster Sugar

60z - 150g Plain Flour (Sieved- this also adds more air into the flour and removes any small impurities)

30z - 75g Butter (Melted. you may find when melting the butter, that it splits and the impurities sink to the       bottom. If you wanted to use Clarified butter you can do, this has had all the fatty                                   impurities taken out of it so when you melt it, it just stays clear.)

              (To make your own clarified butter, put some butter in a pan, and put it on a VERY LOW heat, let                it just melt VERY SLOWLY and then separate the two parts. Keep the clear butter and throw the                  rest away)

Method

1. Whisk the eggs and sugar with an electric whisk in a bowl over a pan of hot water. (not too hot or the eggs will scramble!) Continue until the mixture is light and creamy & doubled in bulk. 

2. Remove from heat & whisk until cold and thick (Ribbon Stage). (- here you are looking for something that resembles Meringue, VERY LIGHT, and it should almost fill the bowl.) Fold in the flour VERY GENTLY.

3.Fold in the melted butter VERY GENTLY and SLOWLY

4. Spoon the mixture into cake cases (Silicone ones are best if you want the cakes to rise a lot, if you don't have these, use ordinary cake cases but put them in a Muffin tray. this will keep the cases from flattening with the weight of the mixture)

5. Bake in a Moderately hot oven 200*C (Gas mark 6) for around 10-20 mins (Depends entirely on the oven, keep checking but don't open the oven if possible)

6. The cakes are ready when either the end of a spoon or a metal skewer comes out of the cake cleanly with no residue on it

I hope you like this recipe, it's pretty much how i do all my cakes now, makes them taste really good.

*REMEMBER- if you are making your own clarified butter, be sure to use more than the 3oz because you'll be throwing some away.

As well as Cooking/ Baking I love making things. Cards, Pincushions, Christmas Baubles etc..

I have my own shop on Etsy CornDollyCards  

There's a blog link for you as well corndollycards blog

I sell Handmade/ Handsewn/ Hand crafted items at very good prices, I do hope you'll take a look.

I plan on doing a give away on my blog next month, so you'll have to keep an eye out for it :0)

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Lots of love from

MiniBobbins

xxx

#SBS Winners recommending Theo Paphitis Small Business Sunday, Facebook & Twitter to promote your business.

   

Facebooking, twittering, (shelly calls it) blogging, to someone who doesn't understand these words and how they can help your business here's what it has done for John from the Bedsite in Ireland, having never used these kind of promotional tools like this before and also last weeks winners from The Old Vicarage Country Guest House in Cumbria.

The Old Vicarage Country Guest House chosen by BBC dragon Theo Paphitis as SBS winners

On Sunday 10th July 2011, The Old Vicarage Country Guest House was chosen by the BBC Dragon Theo Paphitis as one of the winners of his 'Small Business Sunday' (#SBS) event on Twitter.

Theo Paphitis uses his high profile on the social networking site to promote small businesses each week. Every Sunday, between 5.00pm and 7.30pm, Theo invites people to Tweet him telling him about their small businesses, with the tagline #SBS which stands for ‘Small Business Sunday’ and he chooses his six favourite and re-tweets them to his followers. This Sunday Theo chose The Old Vicarage as one of his six favourite small businesses and re-tweeted our business details for his 140,816 followers to see.

Last month, following an overnight visit by the AA inspector, we were fortunate to be awarded five star status so it was a good opportunity to let people know about that too. This was the first time we had ever entered the SBS competition, and we still can’t quite believe it. We were so pleased to be picked by Theo and that he chose to send our message out to all his followers. After we won, we sent Theo a message of thanks and invited him and the rest of Family Paphitis to come and stay at the guest house if he’s ever up in the Lake District.  We were flooded with lovely messages of Congratulations from our followers on Twitter, as well as gaining a huge amount of new followers in no time at all. Traffic to our website has also increased considerably since winning #SBS.We contacted our local paper about our #SBS win, and they were really excited about our news. Following a telephone interview and a visit from the photographer, our #SBS story was posted on their news pages online, as well as appearing on the front page of the Friday edition of the newspaper!

My husband Peter and I have been running the guest house for five years now, and we have been fortunate in that we have a large percentage of our guests who come back year on year. However, attracting new customers can be a challenge when you are located in a small Cumbrian village, and are competing with any number of guest houses and bed and breakfasts across the Lake District for business. As such, this year we decided that it was time to revamp the website and make a concerted attempt at marketing the business.

We are new to Social Networking, and initially we didn’t think that it was something that our guests would be particularly involved with, but it was something that was strongly recommended to us when we attended a course run by The Cumberland News on ‘Social Networking for Business’ and they told us that it really is an essential marketing tool for small businesses. Since then, with the help of our two daughters, we have set up on Twitter and we also have a Facebook page too. It has allowed us to connect with our existing customers as well as reaching out to a whole new audience. You can follow The Old Vicarage on twitter StayInLorton  or we can be found on facebook This week has gone so quickly and already it is Sunday once again. So it is time for us to take our final bow, so that this weeks’ winners of ‘Small Business Sunday’ can take centre stage; but before we go, we would like to take this opportunity to thank one or two people for their help and support this week:

Firstly, thank you again to TheoPaphitis for taking the time out of his busy schedule each week to run ‘Small Business Sunday’ and support small businesses, it really is amazing what effect a mere retweet can have for small businesses such as ourselves.
Secondly, we would like to thank Shellibobbins, who is an avid supporter of SBS, whose advice and support this week has been invaluable in making the most of our SBS win. We would encourage all new #SBS winners to seek out this lovely lady and heed her words of wisdom!

And last but not least, we would like to thank all of our lovely followers on Twitter (old and new), friends on Facebook,and former and future guests. We hope that you enjoy our Tweets, Facebook posts, breakfasts, rooms and dinners, and we look forward to welcoming you to The Old Vicarage Country Guest House in Lorton, when you next come and stay.

Social Networking and how it has helped BEDSITE.ie

We have all placed huge importance in the power of advertising to get recognised and create awareness of our business and ultimately increase turnover. We have used traditional methods of advertising, the press, radio, flyer's and brochures to get our message out there and our products noticed. Over the last number of years we have seen an explosion in usage of the Internet to promote business to a much wider audience than ever before and have learned to ignore it at our peril.

And so we have recognised the power of Facebook and Twitter Social Networking as very important business tools. As a very active user of Twitter we have gained recognition from BBC Dragon Theo Paphitis. We were one of his winning selections on #SBS Small Business Sunday on 5^th June 2011. This has given us extraordinary exposure which we would not have achieved otherwise and we have achieved extra sales.

We also run a Facebook Business Page BEDSITE.ie http://is.gd/PaFi0K and here we can display products, interact with our fans and now even sell directly from our Facebook Shop. The customer can purchase without leaving our Facebook page.

It is indeed extraordinary how technology has developed and how social networking sites have become part of business life. Some comment that using Facebook and Twitter can be time consuming, well that’s up to oneself to decide. I try to utilise my usage wisely and understand how social networking will work for me personally and for business. As a small business we have benefited hugely by working with social networking, it has helped to increase our market size, the opportunity to sell to a wider customer base, gain credibility, be seen globally, communicate easily and conveniently and enjoy the entire fascinating experience - for example, in my case we received an order for a theme bed from a customer in Turin Italy recently. Amazing, we got the order delivered from Ireland and we now have a very happy customer in Italy!

To conclude, I always remember to note that Social Networking means “being sociable” and respecting others. It is not just for business, it has helped me make contact with old friends, I have gained many new friends and exceptional people who I hope will remain friends forever.

Many thanks for giving me the opportunity of writing on your blog today about Social Networking you are a great friend and an exceptional person

Kind regards

John Cahill

www.bedsite.ie Ireland

Its been my pleasure helping you all with promoting your businesses Ive loved speaking to you on the phone, ideas via, emails, tweets etc thank you so much for your really lovely kind words, lets hope more businesses take notice and start promoting theres the same way.

Really lovely guess on shellys blog this week im so lucky to have made such wonderful friends x

Love Shellybobbins xxx

©Shellybobbins™ 'Heart Of The Month' Competition Its Time To Nominate Please

Hello Welcome to heart of the month this competition will run every month for a whole year, what I'd like you to do is very simple 'Just write a comment' and 'Nominate'

Nominate someone you think deserves shellys heart of the month, maybe your sister, your mum, It could even be someone you've never even met but get to know either through twitter or facebook,

Its nice to be nice, smile at someone, or simple just send them a message knowing you care, life is really too short, so take just a couple of mins to nominate someone - make them smile xx

A winner will be chosen at random on the 23rd July 2011 at 8pm I will announce the winner on here, facebook & twitter too - I will then need there name and address to send there heart & certificate out in the post by recorded delivery                                                                                

  Its so nice just to give, doesnt matter how much it costs, how big it is, where its from, designer or not, handmade or bought. Making someone smile and feel special ~ cant get any better than that xx

This will be your gift Its been handmade & embroidered too, the certificates lovely with nominated by .... so don't forget if your the winner to include your name too. then ....a space for the nominees name & also signed shellybobbins

Its a lovely gift, its rolled up & sent in a tube

PS. please no nominating yourself x

With Love Shellybobbins xxx

Ive been asked if people can nominate loved ones who have passed away the answer is yes, I would get the certificate laminated xx

June's Heart of the Month winner was the lovely

Zoe's lovely if you haven't met then please go and say hello zoe on twitter

Zoe is a marketing consultant for Noisette Marketing, Zoe is a self confessed fabric addict also lovely to tweet very helpful too, Zoe is a mum to 5 children and a great wife to a great husband

http://www.noisettemarketing.com/

Zoe was nominated by the lovely Isa Maria also on twitter to so why not pop over and say hello

www.twitter.com/isa_noisette

Love Shellybobbins xxxx

Mum & Dad Preneurs balancing Working from Home, Children & School Holidays ~~ how do you cope ?

My question today was how will you cope running a business from home with your children off on school holidays ?
Do you still have to pay and send your children to nursery just to keep there place open ?

I had to blog about it as so many mums & dads tweeted me so Ive invited a couple of mums and a dad  to give use there story and share ideas, if you have any tips on this please feel free to leave a comment your tips will be so helpful xxx


MumPreneur Rachel tells her story from KoolsunKidz

Time is precious! We are all controlled by time, but it's the way you use it that counts! Time with my children is one of the most important things to me. Running a business and spending time with the children in the holidays is one of the hardest things a mother has to deal with. The work/life balance in the holidays becomes a total nightmare and the guilty feeling that you're not with your children is unbearable. I have three children - now 16,14 and 12. It is so much easier now they are older, but I still try and balance my time between the home/office and the house so I can at least be with them and do things with them.  I always try to do the main bulk of my work in the holidays first thing in the morning - either when they are all still sleeping or busy doing their own things.  I get so frustrated when work takes over and I don't have any time with them.  Again, now they are older they stay up later and I get more time in the evenings with them.  More often than not they don't necessarily want to do things with me, but I think the important thing is making myself available so that if they do want to, we can do things together.  When they were younger, my business partner would bring her three similar aged children to work and they would all play together which worked really well, but it still doesn't stop the guilty feelings that you have as a mother. I've never had help with the children and my parents and in laws all lived too far away to be able to 'pop over' and lend a hand.  Summer clubs were great when they were younger, but also expensive! So one week out of 6 doesn't go very far! A family holiday too takes up another week or so, but the rest is left just generally muddling through! Luckily now they all arrange their own social lives and I am called upon as a taxi so invariably spend my time ducking and diving in and out of the office to suit around them! All three children are hugely supportive and interested in the business, however it's my youngest that will come into the office and help.  She notices if I'm stressed and will ask if she can come and help.  She loves being with me, but I'd say she knows the stock just as well as anyone that actually works for me! So I'm very happy to let her come and pack parcels. I don't think it gets any easier however old the children are, but somehow I manage and we all muddle through!
KoolSun
http://www.koolsun.co.uk/
www.twitter.com/koolsunkidz
Facebook: www.facebook.com/KoolSun
Theo Paphitis #SBS winner April 2011

MumPreneur Kate tells her story from Growing Spirit  

Summer Fun!

Well the summer holidays are almost upon us and for us Mumpreneurs it can mean child care nightmares. I am fortunate because I do juggle my business and my son 6.5days a week anyway, so I book most of my clients for evenings and the morning he is at preschool, and if necessary my mother in law or husband can usually take him out for me. I am a healer and spirit artist so all my painting is done during nap time, or evenings and I do a lot of distance work while he plays around my feet. I have to say though when my daughter is off school it’s a very different story, partly because I value my quality time with my children and partly because she is more demanding of my time. I organise my time well; book all my clients into one day a week and send Daddy out with the kids for the day, I do still do my evening work (unless we are having a day out) and I do work harder in the run up to the holidays to allow this to happen. I love my children and I love spending these precious years with them and no matter how much I love my business my kids will always come first. 

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Growing-Spirit-Reiki-Healer/113810688632801

http://twitter.com/#!/Growingspirit 

www.i-Meditate.co.uk

DadPreneur John tells his story from SlabAds

I work Monday to Friday 6am to 2pm & I have 5 children, 2 of whom are at School & one in nursery, but my youngest two(twins) have to be put into childminder as my wife is at college full-time, she also works Friday nights 230pm-8pm, Saturday 730am-4pm & Monday 230pm-8pm, and as I believe a marriage is a shared responsibility I finish work & try take my children out or take them to another room or garden, this lets my wife relax & sleep if she wants, but the most annoying thing about having all children in the holidays, is that the childminder must still be paid even if the girls are not there? this policy was put in place in Private Nurseries & childminders about 10 maybe more years ago, & to be honest I do agree & don't agree, because every town is crying out for carers/nurseries, but on the same hand I'm continually paying out regardless?

We are lucky that my wife is in full-time college, as they cover some costs for our children(after school/childcare), School holidays are great.......for me, but my wife really has a hard task everyday she is off college......my next present to her is a superwoman t-shirt!!

My wife Cat, children Taylor(12), Callan(8) only boy, Bailey(4 next month), Lily(2) & Ava (2)

Thank you, John
www.twitter.com/jtfaelivi
 http://www.slabads.com

28 Carlisle Cadets at unveiling of Canadian Memorial With His Royal Highness Prince Richard Duke Of Gloucester

James Nutt Photography

28 Air Cadets from Carlisle (Over half of the squadron all aged between 13 and 19, some of which attended the celebration of the 90th anniversary of the Royal British legion on 28th May 2011) & 4 Members of staff travelled to Stoke (A journey that took 7 hours round trip) To act as a Guard of Honor for the Duke of Gloucester as well as Station Commander of RAF Leeming (Rank- Group Captain), Station Commander of RAF Linton on Ouse (Rank- Group Captain), The Previous Commandant of the ATC (air training corps) (Rank- Air Commodore who also visited the cadet squadron in November 2008 for the launch of the new flight simulator) Many Veterans and relatives of those lost in battle were also there.

 

The reason the cadets had the opportunity to attend and take part in such a big event, is because 1862 city of Carlisle squadron are formerly paired with 609 squadron Royal Auxiliary Air Force whom the Canadians served with during the war.

Symbolism of the Memorial

The shadow of the central column of the memorial falls at the 11 O'clock position of an imaginary clock face on the outer circle on the 11th November each year. at that point there is a maple leaf set into the ground with the Royal Canadian Air Force Crest. it has been funded entirely by donations from the UK and Canada

 

James Nutt Photography

 

Cadets Who attended

 

CDT Flight Sergeant Dan Knight

CDT Sergeant Steph Williams

CDT Sergeant Matt Hogg

CDT Sergeant Dan White

CDT Corporal Fraiser Pickthall

CDT Corporal Michael Peden

CDT Corporal Katie Middlemore

CDT Nathan Davidson

CDT Ally Goodfellow

CDT Hannah Shepherd

CDT Cara Johnston

CDT Jonathan Atkinson

CDT Alicia Blackledge

CDT Jack Blackledge

CDT Alex Forster

CDT Aaron Cockbain

CDT Jake Reed

CDT Stephen Byers

CDT Hannah Graham

CDT Joe March

CDT Dan Wilkinson

CDT Aiden Ling

CDT Emma Cairns

CDT Ferguson

CDT Joshua Glover

CDT Andrew Stevens

CDT Sanderson

CDT B.Taylor

 

Staff Members Who Attended

 

Flight Lieutenant Brian White

Flight Lieutenant Simon Walton

Civillian Instructor James Nutt

Civillian Instructor Paul McVittie

 

 

Michelle wall - quote

" Im a mum of 2 of these cadets I know how hard they work taking pride to look immaculate and making sure they can attend everything, as a mum for me its very important to support my children in all there hobbys and as a very proud, its also very important to recognise all there hard work thats why I wanted to blog about it to show what 28 of the children from Carlisle Air Cadets did that day"

 

 

please feel free to leave any comments below, Carlisle Air Cadets rely on donations thats how the petrol & hire of a bus for this day where possible.

 

What a fantastic Squadron to be in 1862 !

James Nutt Photography

Spitfire Fly passed tilts his wings

#SBS MumPreneurs 20,000 Hits Milestone ~ Celebrates with Guest blog & Giveaway

Earlier today I reached 20,000 hits on this blog I still cant believe it !!! Id like to thank everyone for taking alook I really didnt ever think this was possible, So in true shelly style Id like to invite a couple of previous Small Business Sunday Winners to this very special virtual celebration !

                                         *Clinks Glasses & says Cheers Everyone thank you*

My first Guest has done so fantastic he really im so proud to call him my friend

BEDSITE.ie has been an active user of Twitter and it’s been nine months since we first started submitting #SBS Small Business Sunday tweets to Theo Paphitis our favourite BBC Dragon. On 5^th June 2011 we were selected by Theo and became the first business from the Roi to win #SBS. After so many months of trying and perseverance , I was completed overjoyed and totally overwhelmed  with the win. I would like to thank Theo for selecting us and for his continued support to small business. As I always repeatedly mention in my tweets “small business is the lifeblood of every economy” so is #SBS a very important platform to promote small business on twitter and I would recommend all small business to participate. Since our #SBS win we have gained new followers and many new friends, both in Ireland and the UK. We have seen a huge increase in traffic to our website www.bedsite.ie and have secured new orders as a result. It has certainly given our business badly needed exposure.

We have had an article published about our win in the Leinster Express and shortly a piece will run in the Irish Daily Mirror.

Our participation in #SBS doesn’t stop now that we have won, we continue to support it and encourage other small business to get involved.   

Of course all this would not have been possible without Theo Paphitis and a special mention about someone who has been very passionate in promoting #SBS and a great help to others ShellyBobbins.

WOW ~~~ John this is fantastic news thank you for your kind words my friend, cant wait to meet up with you #SBS winners reunion !!

click here to follow john on twitter

Thank you for being shellys guest on this very special day  

Love Shellybobbins xxx

My next guest is so lovely ~~~ Aimee from Revitalize Fit
 

Hiys Shelly x Thanks for including me on your blog and for all your help and support over this last crazy week!! There isn't many genuine people in the world but i'm pretty sure you are one of them!!!!  Many thanks, Aimee xxxx

Winning SBS on Sunday has made this one crazy week!!! In the half hour after getting my retweet from TheoPaphitis I had about 150 lovely new followers.  My phone just kept pinging with many many mentions with words of congratulations!  As a result I have press releases to write, radio interviews to prepare for and 3 new clients sign up!!  I am sad that my winning week is coming to an end but I am proud to have been inducted to a warm, welcoming and positive #SBS community that I will enjoy being a part of for many more weeks to come.  Thank you Theo for making my week crazy!!!! 

Visit our website to find out more information about Revitalize Fitness 

Follow lovely Aimee on twitter

Revitalize Fitness on facebook 

WOW ~~~ What an amazing week you had Aimee well done im so proud of you ! Im sure as a small business you will join in keeping up supporting #SBS as much as you can as It really is one big family.

Thank you for being a guest on this very special day

Love Shellybobbins xxxx

GIVEAWAY ~~~~~~ GIVEAWAY ~~~~~~~~ GIVEAWAY ~~~~~~~~GIVEAWAY

This lovely lady called val from SlickSilver Our last guest blog along with a gorgeous double giveaway

I am a jewellery-making late starter after crafting all my life in various forms.  I've always loved sewing and I often incorporate embroidery techniques in my silver work, but my greatest joy comes from unpredictability!  I love reticulating silver and have no idea when I start with a sheet, what I'm going to end up with which is probably not the ideal way for a silversmith to work!  I have tried working to a formal design but inevitably I come back to what I love best!  The attached photo features a piece of reticulated silver which I have cut, turned and then reattached and set off with a bezel set piece of turquoise seaglass from one of my local beaches.

I apply the same principles when working with my other great love, anodised aluminium.  This allows me to freely express my love of colour and I apply the specialist inks, dyes and textures in a variety of ways.  I use many ways of applying them, dyeing and overdyeing until I reach a design that I'm happy with.  I work on a small sheet of aluminium and sometimes I have a clear design in my head, although it doesn't always work in the way I'd planned.  Back to the unpredictability!! I can look at a sheet after it's been sealed and be disappointed, but after it's cut and textured suddenly it can be transformed into pieces of stunning jewellery that I absolutely love.  I keep the pieces totally unique by only ever making a small amount of any one design, which I don't repeat, and I cut it so that the patterns run in different ways.

I get completely absorbed when I'm making jewellery in my studio and I find that there's a kind of 'cross pollination' with my work and that of my husband's (he's an artist/composer).  We both love texture and splashing colour around and there are often some amazing similarities in our work

This is just a small bit of what val does

Val has sent these two gorgeous giveaways ~~~~ for 2 !! lucky winners all you have to do is tell me what her companys name is

Competition ends 8pm on the 13th July 2011

TWO WINNERS choosen

Please leave a comment

I hope you have enjoyed reading this blog post and joining in this virtual celebration

Love Shellybobbins xxxx

winners

Sparrow primitives

Nick Goddard

please email me your address you will find my contact email address at the top of the blog in "Contacts" thank you so much for entering & well done to you both I hope there will be a lovely follow up to see please email me pictures once you have received your lovely gift donated by Slick Silver Jewellery

Love Shellybobbins xxx