Nottingham Forest - Football and Family

Last season, I headed down to the City Ground on a typical English day, cloudy, sunny with a chance of rain, to watch my first ever Forest match, I absolutely loved the buzz around the ground and seeing the way it bought people together.

After much internal debate about whether I could manage it on my own, I decided to take my children along for the next home match. Thankfully, they loved it too and despite being sat in the cold, they loved the excitement of the game and listening to the cheers, chants and boos of the crowd.

One thing that occurred to me that night however, was that I was possibly one of the only women there alone with their children and it got me wondering why? Is it really just 'a man's game' as I'd heard often from those around me at my first match?

Undeterred, we kept on going and the more we went the more we loved it. I sometimes got annoyed at the the occasional archaic comments, but we didn't let it spoil our enjoyment.

We'd wrap up warm when it was cold, I'd take a blanket and hot chocolate and we'd sit there and be a part of the fun. What I loved most was that it gave us something to look forward to as a family; something that we could all get in to.

My daughter joined the Junior Reds 7s scheme in the following weeks and got her first Forest Garibaldi shirt. She wore it with pride to every match and even created her own hand drawn Forest flag, inspired by the other colourful displays around the ground.

Football isn't necessarily hooligans, swearing and an expensive habit; it can be about family bonding and for us it has been just that.

This season, I'll be working alongside Forest to showcase that a trip to the City Ground on a matchday can be the perfect family activity, no matter what your family dynamic.

Plus the club have made it even cheaper to get to games now; with their children's season tickets starting from £15 for up to 11 and then £70 for up to 17.

Even if you just fancy going to the odd match here and there, Forest's regular Kids for a Quid promotion has meant we have managed to get to lots of games for under £30 for all three of us. And considering how much the cinema can cost these days, it's great value.

Football doesn't have to be about the 90 minutes the players are on the pitch, Forest are striving to make more of the Match Day experience. The Family Area in the Peter Taylor Stand has some great new pre-match events with the club mascot lined up.

Plus with the ground being a stones throw from the wonderful West Bridgford and Nottingham itself, it really is a great way to spend the day with your family.

A few weeks ago we went to pick up our season tickets from the newly refurbished ticket office and whilst we were there couldn't help checking out the club shop.

We'll be there in the Family Area, cheering on the Reds this season. #COYR

This is a collaborative post, we are working with Forest in return for our season tickets. All words and opinions are my own.

A Visit to CONKERS! in the National Forest

We have seen the signs on the A42 for CONKERS! many times but never really thought to head over there with  the children, as we normally head to the north of Nottingham. So, when we were invited to spend the day there I was really interested to see what it had up it's sleeve.

The day was planned out with a few tasks to get us exploring the site, we started with some orienteering, this not only tested out map reading skills to find the letters around the park, but there were also clues that got us using our heads to work out a password that would get us some extra treats later.

We figured out the word, which was amphibian, and headed to the meeting point in the Bush Craft area, a wonderful wooded location where we were asked to make our own den/shelter and fire. My two are seven and four and both relished this task, with each of them helping both mum and dad to find wood for the fire and sticks for the shelter.

We were shown how to build a fire and then set about lighting it with flint, steel and some nice dry cotton wool, my son was really good at it and Daddy was alright but Mummy excelled at the task, certainly makes me wonder whether it was cave man or woman that had this sorted?!?

Once we had the fire going (with a little help from the lovely Becky at Baby Budgeting and her family, thanks for sharing your fire guys) we were on our way to marshmallow toasting heaven. We all love toasted marshmallows and it is a really great experience to share with the children, really getting back to the basics.

Once we had finished toasting our marshmallows and had basked in the almost success of den building we headed to the Barefoot Walk, we saw one of these at a farm we visited in France a few years ago but never got to do it as the children were too young. Both said they'd give this a go and, although it was cold when walking through the water sections and slippery on the mud parts, we all really enjoyed it.

After lunch we had free reign over what we did next so we headed to the sensory trail to see what we could see, smell and feel. This was something we had done previously elsewhere and I have to say this one wasn't as good, some of the contents of the boxes were worn and the plants for smell etc long dead and it certainly wasn't as good as it could of been, none the less the children didn't notice and enjoyed running round the woods.

Afterwards we explored the labyrinth and went over to see the low and high ropes, a new installation for July which looked awesome. We didn't have time to book on to one of these otherwise I think my son and husband would have liked to gone on them. This is an extra charge but I don't think it's too overpriced for what is a very unique experience, even without this, there are plenty of trails and assault courses (for teenagers and adults only) to keep you busy which don't cost anything extra.

There were so many of the other areas that we didn't get to visit around the site, we could have spent all day just exploring the woodland and countryside as there was so much. There is a huge playground over at the Waterside Centre which is accessible by the conkachoo train and more woodland to explore but that will have to wait until another time.

Before we left, we did pop into the Discovery Centre, sadly a few of the interactive exhibits were broken and in need of repair, the toilets were covered in toilet paper as the dispensers were empty and new rolls just left on the side. This was a slightly disappointing end to the day and there seemed to be very few staff about at this point, the staff members we did come into contact with though were helpful and polite.

Overall we did have a great time and I think we would go back again, there were so many butterflies, insects, flowers and trees, if you like exploring the outdoors then this is certainly a great place to go. As the children get older and can go on more too, I think it will be the perfect place to take them for a run about.

NB: We were given free entry for the day to the park to form this review, all opinions are my own.

Visiting the Major Oak

Nottinghamshire has a lot of history, one of it's most famous residents of course, was Robin Hood. If you are visiting the area then one of the most likely places to be on your must see list is the Major Oak. This beautiful piece of forest is filled with the most majestic oak trees and the one everyone wants to see is the Major Oak.

At between 800-1000 years old, it is now held up by supports, but this is only to help it live longer! On our visit there, we learnt about oak trees, how they take 300 years to grow, live for about 300 years and then die over 300 years, the supports on the Major Oak help this process and mean the tree stays here for people to enjoy for much longer.

Oak trees are beautiful, the shapes they form and their leaves are unmistakeable, some of the older trees in this forest have bands on them to help them stay alive.

We looked at the tree stumps to see if we could figure out how old the trees had been when they fell, there were lots of information points, to help us learn about the wildlife and we saw lots of fungi.

Some of the stumps had been made into fairy houses, we loved this sign that told you not to poke things into the trees trunk as it is a home to many little creatures.

On a few of the trees there were these fab faces made from clay, feathers, twigs and leaves, we are definitely going to give these a try!

Onto the major oak itself, you can't really tell from the pictures the size of the tree, but believe me,  it is big.

The trunks on oak trees are hollow yet the outside keeps on growing, the hole in the trunk here an adult could get through standing up, the reason for the fibre glass on part of the trunk was due to some ignorant person trying to burn it down and this will stop any mold setting in.

This weekend there was an archer talking about the bow and arrows that Robin Hood and the knights of the crusades would have used, he gave an awesome display of archery.

He then went on to tell us about the different arrows, allowed the children to try holding the sword and went on to tell us about the battle of Agincourt. It was really interesting and gave an insight into the world of Robin Hood.

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