New Nordoff Robbins video

If you love music watch Nordoff Robbins' great new video that they have done with the help of Annie Lennox

Very inspirational, we are super proud of what they do!

Duck Pond Market

Ready for market!! Today we will be at Duck Pond Market in Richmond's Heron Square selling Tara's Music Magic, balloon modelling, glitter tattooing and generally having loads of fun!!


- Please excuse
any misspelling this was posted using BlogPress on my iPhone

Location:Richmond

Movie review

Yesterday it was the first day of the summer holidays and it was pouring with rain so I went to see Ice Age 4 with two 4 year olds, one 6 year old and one 9 year old.

Armed with popcorn, flavoured water and pick n' mix the only sound I heard, other than munching, was laughter. They LOVED it and so did I. Although I did not love that Odeon have stopped doing small popcorn and now only offer medium and large sizes. I insisted that they split the medium between two cups which they were very happy to do. Portion size is a hot topic at the moment so probably best for another day!

The main feature was brilliant but it was almost worth going just for the wonderful four-and-a-half-minute animated short film 'The Simpsons: The Longest Daycare' which sees Maggie Simpson being dropped off at daycare and start on a butterfly saving adventure. The children I was with really don't get on with the 3D glasses which was a shame as it would have been amazing to see this in 3D which is for what it was intended.

The main feature like the 3 before it was really well done with very clever dialogue and a great story line tugging at all the heartstrings. The poor squirrel still hungry for nuts and still never quite getting it right causes a continental drift causing our heroes Manny, Diego and Sid being separated from Manny's family. It has pirates so the boy loved it and the girls loved Sid's crazy granny who pays a visit. It was packed full of great lines and the time flew by as we were glued to our seats longing to find out what happens next.

Great for a rainy day, thoroughly recommended.

Snuggles in Scotland trailer

Check out our trailer for 'Snuggles in Scotland'

Buy your copy on Amazon now and £1 from every copy will go to our supported charity Nordoff Robbins.

We'd also LOVE to know what you think so if you have a copy please post a review, thanks!

We took the play dough pledge

This was an inspirational idea from three UK blogs Sun Hats & Wellie Boots, Naturestore and The Imagination Tree who all last week were encouraging their readers to take the play dough pledge and try something new with play dough, be it by making their own or by trying a new play dough activity. Every day of last week they shared recipes and new play dough ideas and we couldn't resist joining in!


We used Sun Hats & Wellie Boot's no cook recipe and it couldn't have been easier as we had all the ingredients already in the cupboard. They cost pennies and were all natural ingredients.  The recipe also included some great ideas to add colour to your play dough by making your own natural fruit and vegetable dyes.


What surprised us the most was how quick and easy it was and it was such a great texture it was irresistible to play with. 


Inspired by Sun Hats and Wellie Boots we did self portraits. We thought about everything that we would need to make a face and were very clever and found a mirror so that we could have a proper look at our own faces. We then found a bucket and went into the garden to find things that would make good noses and eyes etc. We also raided the kitchen cupboard as we thought that pasta shells would make great ears and hair. Once our bucket was full we went to work. 


This is what we created: 

Tara's self portrait. A spitting image don't you think? especially the crazy hair! 

Snuggles our panda friend. He used a colouring pen to colour in his eyes, ears and nose

Snuggle's friend, The 4 year old

Because we were having so much fun we decided to make some more play dough this time adding some green colouring to it. The four year old made this amazing tropical island

then decided it should be part of the UK (still inspired by the Queen's Jubilee) so drew a Union Jack onto a piece of paper, used tape to attach it to a stick and stuck it into the sand. 

He also made a secret garden:

No snails were harmed during the making of the secret garden, they had already left their shells! 

We really did have the best fun and could have played with it for hours. A word of warning though, naughty dogs like to steal it off the counter and eat it, it doesn't stay down long!! 

If you click on Sun Hats & Wellie Boots: 100+ Ways to to Play with Play Dough you'll find a whole load of really great creations that people have made and emailed in. 

We hope that you have been inspired to play with play dough and recommend that whilst you do you have Tara's Music Magic Summer Fun CD playing in the background! 

Nordoff Robbins

We are very pleased to be supporting the charity Nordoff Robbins

Nordoff Robbins is a specialist music charity, dedicated to transforming the lives of vulnerable children and adults across the UK.

Nordoff Robbins provides over 50,000 music therapy sessions each year to people struggling with a range of challenges including autism and other learning difficulties, dementia, mental health problems, stroke, brain injury and depression. Some of their clients have a life-threatening or terminal illness, such as cancer.

All of the people helped by Nordoff Robbins music therapy have one uniting factor - music dramatically improves their quality of life.

Every time you purchase our DVD 'Snuggles in Scotland' and our CDs 'Summer Fun' and 'Winter Fun' £1 from each product will go to Nordoff Robbins. Every time you download a song from Amazon MP3 or itunes 20p will go to Nordoff Robbins. 

To find out more about the work that they do visit their website www.nordoff-robbins.org.uk

To make a one off donation click here

You can also follow them on Twitter @NordoffRobbins1 and like their Facebook page NordoffRobbins.MusicTransformingLives

Nordoff Robbins is a Registered Charity No. 280960

Make your own Rock Robot!

Last week a friend of Snuggles', the 4 year old, made a Robot.

To make one at home you'll need the following, or similar:

• 3 small cereal boxes
• 3 toothpaste boxes 
• 1 cling film roll, cut in half
• tape
• decorating materials - they used felt, foam and stickers for clothes and pipe cleaners for hair
• children's glue
• some wool
• some brown paper

Using brown tape to secure them in place they used 2 of the toothpaste boxes as legs, 1 of the cereal boxes as the head and one as the body.

To make the arms they got a grown up to make two holes, one each side of the body cereal box, to fit the cling film roll that had been cut in half. They secured them into the holes by using tape.   It looked like this: 

They then clothed the robot by cutting and glueing bits of felt and foam and sticking them, using glue, onto the arms, body and legs. To make the hair they stuck pip cleaners into the top of the cereal box head. They used all sorts of pretty colours such as gold, silver and blue. They then put stickers on to make him look really great and made sure that he had lovely twinkling eyes, a nose and a big smile.

They then decided as he looked like such a rock robot that they should make him a guitar.

To do this they wrapped the remaining cereal box and the remaining toothpaste box in brown paper and stuck them together using the tape.

To make guitar strings they cut 3 lengths of wool the same length as the guitar and attached them using tape. They got a grown up to cut two rectangles of brown paper which they glued on top of each end of string to hide the tape.

To make the guitar strap they cut a long piece of wool, folded it in half and taped one end onto the edge of the kitchen table. They then twisted the wool again and again until it made a lovely cord. They attached each end of the cord to each end of the guitar using tape. To complete they hung the guitar around the robot's neck and he was ready to rock!

The final thing to do was to give him a name, the 4 year old and Snuggles decided on 'Vin the Rock Robot'!

Do you think you could have a go at making your own 'rock robot'? perhaps yours could be a drummer or a singer and then we could start a band!!

We would LOVE to see photos of your completed robots so please email them to tarasmusicmagic@gmail.com 

We will choose a handful of our favourites and if we can form a band the winning band members will win FREE copies of Tara's Music Magic 'Summer Fun' CD and 'Snuggles in Scotland' DVD