Miracle Growing in My Garden

This is a review post, not a sponsored post. I was provided with a free sample of the product but the opinions are my own. 


When I received an email asking if I would like to review a product that could help clear up the brown spots on my grass, I was delighted! I was sent a sample of Miracle-Gro Patch Magic Dog Spot Repair. 

This was what our grass looked like before.

The Patch Magic is easy to use. You simply clear away the dead grass, rake the ground, water the ground and spread the Miracle-Gro grass seed onto the patch and water again. You continue to water the patch regularly after application. It really is idiot proof.

Well, not exactly.

The first time I left Hubby to do it and he did one patch. He mustn't have done it properly because there was no change at all. I don't think he raked the soil enough and didn't water it first before laying down the seed. In his defence though, it did rain terribly for the few days after application and totally flooded the whole garden. I don't know if this affected it but I won't be telling him that.

This was the result . . .

I tried it again with another patch and I'm happy to report that I did a pretty good job. You can see here from this photo that the grass seed is beginning to grow and hopefully the more I water and cultivate my little patches the fuller they will become!

starting to sprout

Starting to look greener!

I am planning on buying more of this product to treat the rest of the garden. As you can see, I have plenty of patches to work on. I would recommend this product as it is an easy product to use (providing you don't give it to your husband who doesn't read instructions). The product is a reasonable price too, I've seen it being sold from £10 - 12 depending on where you buy it from.

So in a nutshell . . .
The Highs

• Easy to use, mostly idiot proof
• Reasonably priced
• Award winning technology
• Superior Grass Mix compared to other brands

The Lows

• My grass seed didn't grow as well as I'd hoped, probably due to weather as well as birds stealing the seeds. 
• It doesn't say on the pack how long the growing process is likely to take. 

I'd still buy it again and I plan on working on the rest of my 'patches' this summer. Once I have fixed my grass I will need to find a way to protect it from further damage. That might be more difficult!

It Wasn't Me - 130/366

It wasn't me is the look the dogs were giving me when I came home to find JC's train set like this...

The Great Outdoors - 115/366

Who Made This Mess? 59/366

The Dogs: "it wasn't us!"

JC is like a tornado. When left to play while I was cooking the dinner he decided to a) reorganise the furniture b) pull out every toy and every dress up outfit within reach c) go off the bed to leave me to clean it up! The poor dogs looked shell shocked and worried that I thought they made the mess!

Begging for Snuggles - 42/366

Kaiya is not allowed on our bed. Since JC came along we have really tightened up on our discipline. However, she gives me this look and I just know she's asking for a snuggle. She hasn't been feeling very well this week so I let her come up for 5 minutes!

Lets Share - 3/366

Kaiya loves to play in his tent and he loves to cuddle into her. He waits for her to stop chewing her cracker toy and then he runs away with it, screaming with laughter because he knows that he shouldn't be touching her toys!

And the Oscar goes too . . .

Disclaimer - this is a sponsored post but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy writing it and hopefully you will enjoy reading it. 

Our dogs should each win an Oscar for the best 'sick dog' performance. It's just as well we have pet insurance or we would be rooked! Tell me though, why is it that they seem to be terribly ill when you phone and make that emergency appointment but the minute your foot steps over the threshold of the Vets they instantly spring to life, bright eyed and bushy tailed? 

Being pedigrees, their breed has quite a few 'common ailments' attached. Ours seem to suffer from quite odd problems though. Kaiya has a terrible wasp allergy and comes out in awful lumps all over her body if she is stung, although as previously mentioned, she does like to play it up for her audience. Ruby is slightly hardier but has problems with incontinence, poor old girl. You don't get Tena Lady for dogs and those stupid looking pants you can buy in pet stores would do nothing for our Ruby and her JLo bottom. 

Although Kaiya wins the best actress award, Ruby comes a close second. She got what can only be described as cramp in her leg when she was out for a walk one day and she started holding her paw up and refusing to walk. My Mother in Law, who was out walking her, thought she was going to have to carry her home. She had a wee stretch and managed the rest of the way home. Funnily though, every time she gets into trouble now the 'limp' reappears! 

Boxers may be the clowns of the dog world but they certainly know how to wrap me round their paws! 

Naming Ceremony

Well, I thought it was going to be a disaster! At the last minute, lots of things starting to become unhinged. Technology failed us, cars broke down, guests cancelling and to top it all off I managed to get the balloon strings tangled up bringing them in from the car. However, once I took a few deep breaths, enlisted the help of some family on arrival at the venue and had a big cuddle with the guest of honor (JC of course), I started to relax.

Everything was just beautiful. We had a humanist service, delivered by Gillian, who also married Steven and I. The service was personal and child focused with thoughtful poetry and prose throughout. Steven and I declared a parental pledge and I read an extract from Kahlil Gibran's 'The Prophet'. We had a powerpoint slideshow of JC's photos on display and some of his favourite music (Lion King soundtrack and Ma Maw's a Millionaire) on in the background. Afterwords there was handprinting , photos taken, signing of the certificate and most importantly, cutting and eating of cake! Delicious cake may I add, made lovingly by Grandma and Grandpa Duncan.

We asked all our guests to bring a piece of fabric with them as their gift to John. It was to be something personal to them or just a colour/pattern that they liked. We are going to make it into a patchwork quilt for him to treasure as he gets older. Our guests were really very generous, some of them cutting up very sentimental pieces of baby blankets, wedding dresses, beloved outfits and favourite scarves. We are so very grateful for their effort and thoughtfulness.

Some of our guests also brought additional gifts, which was unnecessary but equally kind. Here are just a few of the very cool gifts he recieved . . .

A John Connor (Terminator) action figure 

lots of Peter Rabbit toys, books and blankets

and a Tooth Fairy pillow (which I thought was very quirky!)

Steven's Grandad, who he was very close to, died before Steven and I met each other and Steven's mum bought a lovely pendant for John which she enclosed with a heartfelt letter to John from his Great Grandad Wilson and a photo of him.

Steven was very emotional when he read this and although I never met him, I too was touched by this gift. It is during times like these that we realise that certain significant figures in our lives are not here to share in our joy and regardless of your spiritual or religious beliefs, I think we all like to hope that wherever they are, they are sharing our lives and proud of our achievements. I personally, have never experienced such a loss but I have to admit I did miss the presence of my Dad today who unfortunately could not attend as he lives abroad. My Dy (Scottish for granddad) is suffering with dementia so neither him nor my Gran attended today which was a shame.

On a lighter note, there were two other important people who couldn't attend. A little bit racist that they don't allow them entry into functions suites. Even when they dress up in their most sparkly tiaras: