Tag Archives: ENTERTAINMENT

Travelling With Children: Tips and Tricks

Posted on by

Going abroad on holiday is often an event that is looked forward to for the entire year. Jetting off to far warmer, sunnier climes is a real treat, and pretty easy to do if you’re a young couple with a lot of free time and disposable income. Once you become a parent however, things get a little more difficult. Even if you can rustle up enough dough to go away, travelling with the kids can be a real headache, fraught with all manner of difficulties. For single parents, this can be even more difficult due to having to handle all the responsibilities by yourself. With this in mind, we thought we’d offer a few tips to help you have a wonderful holiday with your children – whether you travel as a single parent or a two parent family.

DSCN8034

Explore

Choose your destination carefully. Spain, Greece and the Greek Islands, Portugal and the Canaries offer shortish flights, lovely sunshine and are family friendly. Make sure there is plenty for the whole family to do and try not to limit this to just pools and beaches, look for culture and heritage to do.

The Canary Islands offer volcanoes a and mountains to explore, whilst Greece has ancient ruins that are steeped in history. Both Rhodes and Crete offer stunning archaeological sites that children will enjoy just as much as adults. In Rhodes the old town is best explored on foot, but the best way to explore Crete is by car, particularly with younger children. You can get great deals at auto-huren-kreta.nl and can then explore much further afield.

Nannies

Chances are you’ll be staying in a family friendly hotel if you’re going away with the children. Family friendly resorts have better facilities, better layouts and don’t mind as much about noise compared to hotels aimed at either couples or singles, so you should definitely think about booking a room in one of these hotels. One of the draws of family friendly resorts is the ability to hire a hotel nanny during your stay. Sometimes included in the room price, these nannies will come and look after your children whilst you go out, meaning you can enjoy some quality time to eat and explore whilst your child sleeps!

Go Out

Utilising the above tip, use the late evenings to explore your surroundings and take in a little local flavour whilst you visit; you don’t want all of your memories to revolve around being by the sea or pool, after all! Enjoy a romantic dinner together at a local restaurant and sample some cuisine, or perhaps dress up glamorously and visit a local casino.

Don’t Succumb

It can be quite easy to fall into the child-led trap whilst you’re on holiday. Instead of visiting the museums, galleries, local restaurants and places of beauty, you end up almost purely frequenting water parks, beaches, play areas and western-themed restaurants, catering almost entirely for the kids. The tip here is to do a healthy mix of both types of activities. If you enjoy exploring and experiencing your destinations, then teach your kids why travelling in such a manner is so wonderful; they’ll learn a lot and you’ll be surprised by the lack of tantrums!

DSCN8055

Take Time

Perhaps our most important point is to simply take it easy! If you have younger children you simply must factor in the endless stoppages, toilet breaks, crying and general tedium that makes up a regular day, then multiply it by two! Trust me; rushing around an airport is no fun at the best of times, but with a young child it’s nigh impossible!

DSCN7796

 

Breathe New Life into nights out

Posted on by

Finding a new partner, or just finding time to date when you have all the responsibilities of family, children and work can be tricky. These days it is much easier to find someone due to the rise in free dating sites, but then finding the time to date can be difficult, and there can also be the financial implication of sharing the cost of your dates and trying to find something to do to please both yourself and your potential partner. No wonder it can seem more hassle than it’s worth!

But you can’t be so defeatist. New dating sites are helping more and more people to find love, with one Derbyshire dating site actually helping people to create the perfect profile, in fact just looking at dating sites in Derbyshire show that there is love out there for everyone, and it has never been easier to meet someone who might just be the one.


But once you’ve met that date, what should you do? Where should you go – especially if you are looking at keeping it low key and casual at first. Dating is a financial burden that more often than not is shared by both parties, so as much as tea at the Ritz may sound brilliant, there might be better and cheaper alternatives near by.

Don’t dismiss your local pub

Local pubs offer great entertainment these days, with many putting gigs, sports and quizzes on for the regulars, but even these events can get a little staid and dull.

Take a look around next time you’re at your local – how many people are actually staring at their phones and texting away rather than speaking to their friends or partner? You’ll most likely find there’s a fair few – doesn’t bode well for a fun night out does it?

But you can breathe new life into an old routine. As well as looking for new gigs, places to go and things to do you might want to check out something that will offer an alternative to a normal night in a pub. So how about Speedquizzing. Putting a brand new twist on the old stalwart, the classic pub quiz, Speedquizzing gives you a fabulously interactive experience. Dispensing with all the bad bits of the old style pub quiz (dodgy questions made up by the quiz master, people sneakily cheating on their smartphones, boring rounds and, most tediously of all, the sheer length of time it takes to find out the scores and name the winning team) and keeping all the good bits ( amusing questions, loads of variety, seamless questions) Speedquizzing is a totally different way to play.

Food

A pub is also a great place to have a bite to eat that is not going to cost the Earth. Restaurants can be amazing, chic places for if you want to impress, but they may also a financial burden that you just can’t afford, particularly when you first start dating and spend lots of time out and about.

A local pub often has a cosy atmosphere, a decent menu that covers all bases when it comes to food, and still manages to be something that is affordable. It is also somewhere you could go for a lunchtime date as well as an evening meal, which again may be a positive if your new date works evenings,

 

Top Theatre Dates for 2018

Posted on by

When it comes to choosing the perfect place for a date, one that will both impress and delight, a night at the theatre is hard to beat. Whether you be interested in seeing a highbrow play, indulging in a night of comedy, or singing along to a much loved musical, getting theatre tickets is a way of showing someone that you really care and are interested in their interests too. If you have recently found love through the Birmingham dating sites, you have a vast array of theatres at your disposal, including the Birmngham Hippodrome which is soon to show the iconic Evita, and the Birmingham Rep, which has a treat for music lovers with a tribute to Nina Simone arriving next week.

Here are some more theatre treats to consider if you are planning a theatre date night.

Isle of Man

If you are dating in the Isle of Man, you must check out the Edwardian splendour that is the Gaiety Theatre, often described as the jewel in the Manx crown. The theatre plays host to a range of entertainment this Spring, from the comedy of Father Ted, to music from Heather Small, but my pick would be a new, stripped back version of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, which promises to tell the story as Shakespeare would.

Berkshire Theatre

If your current internet search includes dating Berkshire but you are then not sure where to go for your hot date, you must take a look at the listings for The Watermill Theatre. This small, rural theatre has become one of the most influential in modern times, and the listings for Spring/Summer have acclaimed productions including ‘Crazy for You’ and Terrence Rattigan’s Separate Tables. My pick is Sheridan’s classic ‘The Rivals’, the play where we meet Mrs Malaprop and her hilarious mangling of the English language. This is definitely the choice if you want to laugh your way to a second date.

Oxfordshire Theatre

If you have found love through the Oxfordshire dating sites then the New Theatre Oxford has something suitably steamy and sexy coming your way. Former Strictly Come Dancing regulars Vincent Simone and Flavia Cacace are bringing their own touch of magic to the theatre next week with their show ‘Tango Moderno’. Expect to see sensuous sharp dance moves and lots of passion from the pair who are still one of Strictly’s greatest partnerships.

Theatre in Belfast

My final port of theatre call is Belfast, the cultured capital city of Northern Ireland. Whether you are currently part of the Belfast singles scene, or are just looking to enjoy a much needed date night, you need to pencil this weekend into your diary, for it is the Belfast Arts Weekender, a glorious mix of theatre, comedy, workshops and gigs that will be happening at venues all across the city. With many of them being free to attend, you will have extra money for food and cocktails, a total win-win situation.

What are your thoughts on taking your date to the theatre? Are you a fan of live shows?