Bittersweet February

Our beautiful dog Max was put to sleep at home this month.  Poor sweet boy, apparently his heart was still healthy, but his joints were paining him too much.  I was too upset to post straightaway, but we can remember him with smiles now.  

Like when he was half grown and a dalek (compost bin) was delivered over the garden gate. His barking changed from a proud defensive woof, to a panicked little boy yelp as this black monster appeared in his garden from nowhere. He turned back to brave when I went outside to see what was going on. And bit that dalek as I picked it up and moved it into place. What a sweetheart.

A few little wins - 

Ivan Ramen - book - cut out and keep
A Most Wanted Man on bluray - heyuguys
Mornflake gift pack, cereal and wartime cookbooks - Eat In clickies
Cuddly comforter, little soft orange thing from Hipp
Birds of a Feather The Complete ITV Series Two - Yours clickies. Not sure why I clicked for this one.
Villeroy and Boch 3 hanging daffodils - just in time for St David's Day.

So I'm really trying for a holiday now we don't have a dog to keep us at home.  Or a weekend or even a night somewhere fairly close.  See what the comping fairy brings.

Wins and TWINS

First my January wins.

Not a car but a lovely little trike thanks to Bex. This Gorgeous trike  has found a home with Daisy, and when she's grown out of it, her brother Sol will enjoy it I'm sure.  Their Dad is a useful man to know; he used to be a plumber and is now a paramedic.  Thanks to Bex for running the comp, and thanks too to costcuttersuk.com for sending it so quickly. It was here the next day!

I'm on a list for a heart shaped hand warmer, see if it appears, Natures Finest

The Pizza Bible thanks to cut out and keep

Pair of cineworld tickets thanks to Freesat, nearest cineworld is Llandudno, so I sent these to my daughter.  Handy little treat for her.

A voucher for baby kale

And a cheque for £15 for finding Rebus the dragon in a local info leaflet. So check your junk mail for comps before you chuck it in recycling.

And now for TWINS

My neighbour came round last night waving her scan. TWO little peanuts! A bit of a surprise for her. Dad is thrilled, mum doesn't know yet whether to laugh or panic.  I've been entering for baby stuff, they will need it.  Oof!

December wins

I didn't do many of the advent comps this year, there were so many of them it quite put me off.  There are enough other prizes to win, so never mind.

6 Cadbury chocolate bars
Art Nouveau Pattern Give-Away, 12 cross stitch patterns in pdf, really pretty designs. My mum's got them, to share with the village craft group if she likes.
I have been selected to be a Pukka Supper Pie-oneer. So that's 36 vouchers for family size pies appearing soon. I'm so glad they say I can share, I like pastry, but can't eat that many.
Thank you Agata@BarkTime, I've won a Zoflora bundle and £25 pets at home voucher.
Thank you over40andmumofone for Blanche, the blue nose stoat. Very cute.
Nice Pecks calendar from the Happy Egg Company. Very handy. 
Three lovely coffee table cookbooks, thank you tinnedtomatoes.
And on the last day of the year, email from an Eat In clickie win, Dreamboys 2015 Calendar. Hilarious. Those lovely roosters are more fitting for this house.

My Big Christmas Giveaway

No, I don't mean it's MY big Christmas Giveaway, but that's what it's called.  It's actually Michelle at I Shall Not Covet that is running this huge competition.  If you haven't seen it already, then go have a look.  If you are overseas, then sorry, but you can still go look at what you could have entered to win.

There's a rather enviable list of prizes from 15 sponsor companies with a combined value of over £1400.  I'm not going to give a complete rundown of each one, go have a look, but here are my 3 favourites.  And they aren't the most expensive items.

Olivia Burton watch, supplied by The Dressing Room
Paul's Boutique Mila bag, supplied by  My Bag
Masterful Collection Pearlescent White Makeup Brush set, supplied by Nanshy

Funny, I don't even wear makeup, but those brushes are just so pretty.  We could give them a good home, you can see that Lisa likes playing with makeup, even if not exactly in the usual fashion beauty sort of way.

November wins

Lisa won the first prize of the month - first prize for her Halloween fancy dress on November 1st.  She says if she had known she was going to win she wouldn't have encouraged the landlord to choose goodies from Lidl.  Still, we enjoyed the shell chocolates and fizz.

I had a fairly quiet month for new prizes, but still fun, and there were enough parcels arriving from previous wins to be most satisfying.

Manny dvd and poster - Bike magazine daily clickies
YA novel Demons and Thieves - UKMums.tv
Couple more chocolate bars from Cadbury
Cinnamon disinfectant, most festive, useful to have with an elderly dog at Christmas
Voucher for a Co-op Christmas pudding - Lisa gave this away, neither of us like it

Fancy dress

No, this isn't me.  This is Lisa getting ready to go to the pub.  Max wasn't at all sure about it all.

She won first prize, which she does find funny as she's in her normal clothes.  She only decided to go as a werewolf when she saw a latex prosthetic to buy very cheaply.  So she watched a few vids on youtube on how to apply fur and that kept her quiet for a bit.  Some cheeky sod asked how she'd got grey bits in her hair to match.  Hmm.  No, that's called being 40.

October wins

Lots of little and not so little wins in October, I've been very lucky.

Boardwalk Empire Season 4 On Blu-ray - Empire daily Extra Entry
Arm and Hammer tote bag
Pair OM Yoga show tickets - Win Something daily EE
Extendable Tub & Tile Scrubber‏ - Zoflora
£200 shopping vouchers - Made for Mums and Baby Expert
Cadbury Starbar x 2
60 nectar points
Toffee Apple Set - thanks to Jac @tinnedtoms
Sudocrem goody bag - thanks to Ness at Always be a friend
Steam Fresh voucher
Leather skull necklace - Urban Male
Haribo Despicable Me Night In, sweeties and dvd - thanks to Jo at Given to distracting others.

Only one place to spend love to shop vouchers in Ruthin - Boots.  I couldn't think of anything I wanted until I remembered that my shaver gave up the ghost the other year.  And Rachael's did too, so we are having new ladyshaves.  And Lisa has had lots of fun buying smellies.  So happy early Christmas to us from the comping fairy.  Yay!

I've shared the Despicable Me Haribo with the girls next door.  Far too many for me.  At least, I could eat that many, but it wouldn't be a good idea.