Hot Milk Review and Giveaway by The Rare Bit

....and the winner is

JennLovesAustin! Please contact me within 48 hours to claim your prize!


When I was pregnant with Blondie Boy my Dad sent me over some XXL t-shirts because I had nothing that I could sleep in. I loved sleeping in those big t-shirts but it would have been nice to have some cute, pretty pajamas that fit over my bump, too. The review below is from my friend and fellow expat Meg from the Rare Bit who's expecting her second baby this June.

Want to hear a pitiful story?  Of course you do!  When I was preparing for the birth of my son, everybody told me not to bother packing any nice pajamas to wear in the hospital.  “Everything will just get gross, so just bring something you don’t mind getting ruined” seemed to be the overwhelming advice.  So I resisted the urge to buy something pretty and special, and just threw some old things in my hospital bag.  But after my little boy was born, and we were happily ensconced in the maternity ward, I wanted something a bit nicer to put on.  It seemed that all the other mummies were wearing cute PJs, and there I was in my ratty old yoga pants and t-shirt.  Don’t get me wrong, I was ecstatic to have a healthy baby and with my new role as a mother, but as trite as it sounds, it would have been nice to have something special to put on that matched how special I felt.

So now that I’m expecting another baby, a fun new set of PJs was definitely on the list of things to pack in my hospital bag, which is why when Hot Milk approached me about reviewing some of their night wear, it felt like kismet.  My knowledge of Hot Milk mostly centred around their fab nursing bras, which I had seen both in store and online through different retailers.  I always noticed how their nursing bras never seemed to compromise between style and function, and I was hoping the night wear would live up to the same standard.

Hot Milk sent me a set of “Lost in the Moment” pajamas to test out.  I thought I’d be brave and post a picture of myself in these gorgeous PJs, but I’m afraid I’ve chickened out.  This has nothing to do with the fit of the PJs, even though I’m nearly 9 months pregnant, the size medium they sent fit me just fine.  It’s just that Hot Milk promises to “reveal the sexy woman inside the loving mother”, and they don’t let down on that promise!  The camisole top has a flattering cut that definitely plays up the voluptuousness of a pregnant woman’s body, and the boobiliciousness was just not something I’m ready to put up on the interwebs.  But, hey- just look at the pretty model wearing the same thing!

I really loved the PJ pants that came with this set.  Seriously, the cotton is so fine and soft that it feels silky to the touch, and they’re super comfy to sleep in.  At first, the drawstrings that adjust the length of the legs annoyed me, as they kept coming untied, but I soon figured out that a double knot will keep them nice and secure- even when you’re tossing and turning your way through a night in the third trimester.  The camisole also doubles as a pretty nursing top, each side unhooks at the strap for easy and discreet breastfeeding.  I haven’t used this function yet, but I’m sure I’ll appreciate it in a few weeks time!

These PJs are definitely destined for my hospital bag!  I can’t wait to wear them after meeting my new baby for the first time.  But I also have my eye on some more night wear from Hot Milk- I especially love “Calm Rebellion”, pretty, no? 

****PROMOTION & GIVEAWAY****

Right now, Hot Milk is having a great promotion that’s good through the Bank Holiday Weekend!  You can buy one bra and get the 2^nd for half price, which is awesome.  All of you breastfeeding mothers out there should take this opportunity to stock up!

Also, Hot Milk has generously offered to give away a set of “Lost in the Moment” PJs to one lucky Transatlantic Blonde reader!  

To enter, simply follow both of these steps (both of these steps are mandatory):

- Follow both Transatlantic Blonde and The Rarebit and head on over to http://www.hotmilklingerie.com and take a look at all of their pretty things and leave a comment saying what product you love!

Extra entries (leave in separate comments)

-Follow me @Melaina25 on Twitter and tweet: "I entered to win @HOTmilkLingerie PJs with @Melaina25 & TransatlanticBlonde.com! You can too!: http://tinyurl.com/3qn92my " and comment to let me know (1 extra entry)

-Follow @HotMilkLingerie on Twitter and comment to let me know (1 extra entry)

Make sure to leave each entry in a separate comment.

All entries will be verified and deleted if not valid so make sure to leave the usernames you subscribe or tweet with.

One winner will be chosen by random.org on Monday June 6th 12:00 GMT. Winners must contact me within 48 hours or another winner will be drawn. This giveaway is open to everyone anywhere! Good luck! CLOSED!

The Rare Bit was provided pyjamas to review but the opinions expressed are her own.

In the Kitchen with Abby

Abby, from Life with B&A, is one of the amazing group of women that I'm part of that all have babies around the same age. She's a fellow Midwesterner and one of the most upbeat and generous people I know! She's going to help y'all with one of the things I am absolutely horrible at: cooking meat :)

Hello everyone! I am A to to the B @ Life with B&A. I'm Abby and native Midwestern gal raising my now 9 month old son Drew that I personally think it adorable, but I could be bias. I'm married to B, hence the Life with B&A....You get the the picture. We like living our little life in Iowa, and have no complaints, other than the really cold winters and really hot summers, but what are ya gonna do?

So you're probably wondering what the heck I'm going to talk to you about today. Well, so glad you asked! Since I'm a busy working mom, I find little time to cook. Although I still love me a good dinner at the end of the evening and it has to happen when the little man is awake. So we have to juggle. I like to find some recipes that are easy peasy, have few ingredients and I can prepare early.

So today I'm going to share with you a recipe that was shared with me a few months back and Brendan, my hubby says it's company good. As in if we have company over, I can make it, it's that good. It's called Asian Style Pork Chops and just writing this has me drooling because I'm now craving them!

So here's what you will need:
3/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup white vinegar
1/2 onion chopped
3-4 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons peanut butter

Blend above in blender and out in put in large gallon Ziploc bag, add in 4 pork chops and marinate for 6 hours. Grill when ready. We also baste with the extra sauce. These seriously are the mostly delicious pork chops we have ever had! I hope you enjoy them. I usually make the sauce and marinate the chops overnight, this way the next day we just throw them on the grill and VIOLA, dinner is served!

Who CARES?

Being a Transatlantic Mom means the inevitably you will take your baby on a transatlantic flight. Andrea, a former expat, has made the trip with her cutie son Finn more than a few times and recently tried out the CARES harness on her latest flight. Blondie Boy is still too small too use the harness so I was interested to see how she, and Finn, liked it.


Traveling with a toddler is never easy. Traveling with a toddler while lugging a car seat through an airport is even worse. So when we found out about the CARES harness, we knew it was the way to go. Who wouldn't choose a 5 point harness that actually folds up and fits in your bag?

We recently took a trip overseas with our 2.5 year old son, and while this is a trip we have made many times it was the first time we have done it without carrying on the car seat. We weren't sure how CARES would work, especially on the overnight flight, but it was fantastic. He feels like a big guy sitting in a regular seat, and his legs aren't long enough to kick the seat in front of him, a huge drawback of the car seat on board. He slept just as soundly as he ever has.

The harness, a 5 point system that works like a car seat in the sense that it gives your child the same safety features of a car seat without the bulk, is perfect for kids who can sit up and are over the age of 1 and 22 pounds. It is the only FAA approved device of this type. After the initial use it takes us less than 3 minutes to 'install', which consists of sliding it over the back of the seat, underneath the tray table of the person behind you, and looping the airline seatbelt through the bottom. It comes with an instructional dvd, as well as a sheet you can bring with you, and it shows it is FAA approved, in case anyone questions that.

I won't say this revolutionizes travel - and as the parent of a toddler on any flight you still get those looks from people who think your child will scream the whole time - but CARES definitely makes the whole process a little bit easier!

*************
Looking for some new reads? Check out the December BMB Blog Hop!

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Christmas Decorating Tips from Norcutts

MAKE YOUR HOME MAGICAL THIS CHRISTMAS
Notcutts present step by step video guides for simple festive style

This festive season, Notcutts, one of the UK's leading garden centre groups, has teamed up with top interior stylist, Pippa Jameson, to bring you the latest Christmas colour trends and secret decorating tips, ensuring you make your home stand out from the crowd.

Famed for their opulent displays and magical decorations, Notcutts present special ‘Secret Styling’ films - a series of videos showing how you can make the most of this year’s Christmas colour themes, including cream and green ‘Frosted Mistletoe’, and bright teal ‘Cool Yule’, using simple stylistic steps.

For those of you who your love your traditional decorations, but just want to add that extra sparkle and splash of colour, why not try the following top five tips from expert stylist, Pippa Jameson:

1. Christmas Wreath
Save time and buy a ready-made wreath, then add on festive touches such as cinnamon sticks, dried oranges, berries and lots of other foliage. Hook it on to your front door or suspend it with ribbon to hang in front of the window.

2. Festive foliage for the stairs
Add pretty foliage to your stairs to make your home feel warm and Christmassy. Use a combination of fern, ivy, and pine cones and then add some clear glass baubles to create some sparkle. Finally, finish off the look with some bright red berries (Ilex aquifolium are a great option).

3. Fairy lights
Fairy lights are a simple and effective way to add Christmas sparkle to your home. They can be hung in a multitude of places but our favourites are above a mirror, on the banister, or over a doorway. If you are buying lights suitable for outdoor use, then hang them along a fence, in a tree or over the porch.

4. Table centrepiece
This is a must for the ultimate Christmas dining experience. The type of centrepiece you opt for should depend on the rest of your table accessories. Below are three of our favourites:
- Bright coloured baubles in a glass vase
- Single fern stem in three or four tall votives
- Berries and twigs in glass vase

5. Decorate the mantelpiece
Christmas mantelpiece garlands are really simple and effective. Choose your favourite foliage and tie the end with string first, then ribbon. Place them flat on your mantle, and then add your berries for a Christmas feel. The use of flowers can also give the garland a real injection of colour and elegance.

Notcutts stock the very best in Christmas products, from exquisite ornaments and luxury hanging decorations, to beautiful baubles and Christmas trees. Products featured in the ‘Secret Styling’ films are available both in-store, and online at http://www.notcutts.co.uk/.

Don't call me Sweetheart

by Arlene, Blondie Boy's Grandma


The power of words – well for starters there are few more devastating weapons or ones more capable of inflicting lasting damage.

As a feminist – however aging! – it makes my blood boil to hear language used as a mechanism to objectify and denigrate women. My particular quibble is with the pejorative use of terms of endearment. How often are the words “love” and “sweetheart” accompanied by a sarcastic tone to indicate that a woman’s viewpoint is irrelevant. Call me “love” if you mean it and what’s more, don’t call me “love” or “darling “ if you don’t know me.

On the positive side and with my mum’s hat on, I like to think of words as way of empowering children, of making them know they are loved, capable, valuable human beings. I hate to be in a supermarket and overhear a parent telling a child not to be so stupid. The very least our children deserve from us are kind and positive words; words of reassurance which build their confidence and let them know they can achieve anything.

If my own children are able to say that they know they are loved then I am right about the power of words. However, reading this, they might say, “For God’s sake, Mum!” Did I mention the power of words to embarrass?

Call me Mommy?

by Sabrina, the BFF


As a first time mother of a 2-month old, I’ve been thinking a lot about labels lately. Particularly the term “Mommy”. I am incredibly happy and proud to be my son’s Mommy, just as I am happy and proud to be my husband’s Wife. We’re still working out what being his Mommy means, and chances are that will evolve for the rest of our lives.

I’ve found that people outside of my family feel comfortable referring to me as Mommy, and that’s an issue for me. I’ve never been good at conforming to expectations that come with a label. When my husband and I were planning our wedding, I was often told what the bride-to-be wanted. I sat through 20 minutes of an elderly florist explaining to me why I really wanted red roses and lots of them. (I didn’t hire him, but I didn’t have the heart to storm out on a 90-year old man who wasn’t going to listen to me). I was told about how I’d dreamt of this special day since I was a little girl. Which was patently false. I did picture being married and having a life with the man of my dreams, but I never dreamed of being “the bride”. Wedding planning was hard for me, because as a seriously Type-A over-achiever, I struggled with not meeting people’s expectations.

Now I’m a mom. And yes, I love this little boy more than I ever dreamed possible. But as a mom-to-be, I had no interest in getting a plaster cast of my pregnant belly, or wearing shirts that said “Baby on Board”. I already dread the idea of getting a Mother’s Day card with a 3 page sappy poem on it (I much prefer lame greeting card humor). As a new mom, I like to think I’ll be able to hold onto my own sensibilities and values while raising my son. Most of all, I hope I impart the knowledge that people are individuals. He is no less a boy if he doesn’t want to play sports or get a certain car. I hope he grows up knowing that labels can be a useful starting tool, but people are much more than labels. To my mind, gender equality starts when everyone is seen as the individuals they are.

Slut Walk

by Sabrina

This weekend, the city where I live is going to have its very own “SlutWalk” (if you aren’t aware of this movement which hopes to assert or remind people that a woman, no matter how she dresses, should be safe from physical or sexual assault, you can read about it here. 

I’ve known about this movement for awhile, and while I support the goals, the name makes me cringe every time I read it.  “Slut.” I’ve read the assertion that these walks are going to help women take back the word. Personally, I’d rather not take it back. And using it in the context of a march asserting a woman’s right to make decisions about her body and her sexuality is beyond ridiculous to me.

At its core, slut is a demeaning term which reduces a woman to an object that doesn’t need to be treated like a person, an object who no longer has the same presumed rights to decide what she does with her body. It is also implies that the value of a woman is closely tied to her sexual inexperience. 

Calling a woman a “slut” isn’t simply saying she is a woman who enjoys sex, is open with her sexuality or who may in fact be promiscuous. It is taking choices she has made at one moment in her life and reducing her permanently to those choices. As a feminist, I support a woman’s right to make decisions about her body and her sexuality. Sure, some of those decisions might be healthier or less regrettable in the long run than others, but unless she puts her life in danger, they shouldn’t define her. Most importantly, the right to make a decisions about your body isn’t a one-time thing. A woman can make the decision to fool around with a random guy at a party one night and the next week decide that she wants to be more reserved.

What perhaps bothers me most about the term is the fact that it’s most commonly bandied about in regards to young women, teenagers and college students. At a time when young women most need support, while they try to negotiate changing bodies, surging hormone and try to figure out relationships and their place in the world. When I thought about writing this, I imagined overhearing my son calling a girl a slut (he’s only a year now, so at this point I’m not too worried about it). I remember the term being used alot in high school, sometime even in reference to girls who wouldn’t put out. A guy I was friends with told me at one point that the theory was a girl would be more likely to “give in” to a guy if everyone already thought she had. It depresses me to realize how right he was. Girls were probably as likely as guys, if not more likely, to use that term to hurt and demoralize someone they had a problem with.

So instead of taking the word back, let’s just bury it.  Let’s work every day to define violence against women (or men) as indefensible, and let’s work so girls and young women grow up feeling empowered to make the right decisions for themselves and to know that if the decisions they have made start to feel wrong, they are always free to change course.  

Hosted: Feminism & Children's TV Merchandise

Sharon (aka @gavroche2000) 

I don't have any children, so you will have to excuse my lack of daily experience with them. However, I do have two small nieces, one of whom is almost 4 and therefore a person, or rather, in the eyes of the media, a consumer.

Since she was born, my partner and I tried to get her gifts that were both fun and educational. This meant lots of books, but also themed educational toys such as the modern version of speak n' spell. Now, these days, when you go into a toy shop, many items are themes according to the popular child "celebrities" of the moment. Batman, Harry Potter, High School Musical, whatever. And these well known icons, more often than not, are from television, so we know what awesome power it can have on kids. If you can have all of your learning tools, your books, your lunchbox , your thermos, your clothes, all branded with Bob the Builder, your exposure to him should be a healthy one.

So Little Niece's mum is with me on the phone. I'm looking at a mountain of electronic reading toys, I explain. What would she like for her birthday? "well, she's really into Peppa Pig right now. Everything has to be Peppa". Fair enough, I think. I'm not wild about her because all the merchandise is pink, but, in her defence, she is a pig, thus pink by definition. So I got the reader helper, deftly by-passing the cooking set (which was not available, I noticed, in any "boy" colours or themes). I ensured that Peppa Pig was a balanced programme and then happily gave Little Niece her gift.

That was last year. This year she is into Dora the Explorer and I have heard of her. She's great with the exploring, but I have been told that a boy explorer has had to be introduced because "people" protested. We can't have a female protagonist without a boy to prop her up? *facepalm* . Also, she's had something of a makeover recently and is now a "fashionable tween". Do those pumps keep your feet protected in the jungle, Dora?

But I acquiesced, partly because I can't police children's desires and partly because she REEAALLY wanted it. But I remember that my childhood was filled with televison characters who were both inspirational (Sesame Street, Nils Holgerson) and not (Thundercats, My Little Pony, Smurfs) . Whether I like it or not, these shows were formative experiences, the legacy of which remains with me today. So I think it's our collective responsibility to look at children's programming critically and call the makers of them on anything that is disappointing or just plain wrong. Because our kids clearly won't.

But you know what? At least she wasn't pink.

Feminism Starts in the Home

Elizabeth Creehan
@creehanwriter

I believe being a feminist means that a woman has the right to make her own choices. Of course, those choices are always bombarded by outside pressures. But as a feminist, I have the ability, the intellect, and the moxie to pave my own way. Any way I see fit…and feel good about it.

Becoming a mother is when I found myself in the midst of the culture wars. Was I a woman first? A mother first? Maybe a mo-man or a wo-ther?

When I was pregnant with my first child, some told me I should stay at home for a year and then go back to work. Some co-workers eyed me suspiciously. Others just assumed I would stay home.

Well, since it was my life, I thought I’d make the decision. A copywriter for a marketing communications company in Cincinnati, Ohio, I worked full time from when my daughter was 3 months until she was 12 months old. I enjoyed the work and its continual variety and challenges.

However, my heart increasingly told me that I wanted to be home full time with my daughter. She was my passion, my joy, and my can’t-miss opportunity.

What I ended up with was the best of both worlds. As a mother, I was home with my daughter, having a blast. As a writer, I could freelance. I was there to change the diapers, but I also could exercise my brain beyond diaper duty.

It’s been the right choice for me.

My now ten-year-old daughter talks about what she wants to do when she grows up. I know her dream of a career will change thousands of times, but when she was in her teacher frame of mind, I wanted to scream “Yes, do that!” As a teacher, she could have a job she loved and have summers off…perhaps to spend with children.

But as a feminist, I know it’s her choice. Just as it was mine.