Archive for the 'Review' Category

Spring has sprung and it’s time we started thinking about our garden landscaping and decor ready for the Summer months. I’ve wanted a fun, colourful outdoor space for as long as I can remember and it always bothered me that in our old rented house we just had concrete, concrete and more concrete outside. Now we have two whole gardens to play with and I’m excited to get to work!

It can be very dark on our street when you’re getting home later at night so when the LED Hut asked me if I wanted to try one of their outside lights I thought it was perfect timing! Our front garden is mostly neat and tidy with a small lawn and some shrubbery so adding an outside light is almost all the work we need to do on the space.

The Mr Beams LED spotlight from LED Hut is a lot bigger than I was expecting, with the light itself (minus the fixture) being about the size of a mug of tea. It really does beam out a lot of light too and works solely when it detects motion – there is no on or off switch.

Colour wise it is stated as brown, but it looks pretty much black to me – it’s quite subtle compared to the light that was installed outside by the previous owners of our house, so it looks so much nicer outside by the front door now than it used to!

It’s really easy to fix the light to the wall and comes with a set of wall plugs and screws for fitting. You need to drill three small holes in your outside wall to properly secure the light as it is quite heavy with the batteries inside.

I do think three chunky D batteries seems a tad excessive for the light, but I’m hoping they last a long time to make it worth it. I haven’t been using the light long enough to comment on battery usage unfortunately, but I will report back in a couple of weeks. I do like that the light doesn’t need to be wired into your electrical supply though, making it super easy to install.

The back garden is a bit of an insane jungle at the moment, so it will be a while before we’re ready to add lights and accessories out there, but here is my garden inspiration board from Pinterest to give you a little bit of an idea of the sort of look we’re going for.

I think the LED Hut spotlight its a great piece of equipment for such a low price and when our back garden is up to scratch and usable I think I’ll be getting another one for out there too!

Loves x xx

Oh I take waaaay too many photos that I never do anything with, so I am determined to finally get them out of the depths of their memory cards and dig them up from my hard drives and actually make a feature of them in my house as we get closer to decorating. You know what it’s like though, so many plans you never actually get round to, so I’m really thankful that Epson asked me if they could send me a Epson Expression Photo XP-960 Printer to try. How did you know, Epson?!

I already have an A3 office printer for my business which is a huge beast, so I was really surprised that the Epson XP-960 is quite compact for an A3 printer – it actually fits neatly on a shelf and all it’s extremities tuck away when it’s not being used.
It’s really easy to set up, especially with Mac as you don’t need to use the installation disc, you just download the driver from the Epson website. They also have an app for your smartphone which connects up over the same wifi connection your printer is set up on.

I want to use the printer for large prints to decorate my walls at home and also for making small prints and printing my Instagrams for scrapbooking. If you’re printing one photo, the Epson iPrint app is super easy. Just a quick click opens your photo library and another to select the paper size.

A3 paper is actually fed in one sheet at a time from the paper feed at the back of the printer. Flip out the cover and extend the paper feeder, but wait until you’re prompted on the LCD screen before you put the paper in. Load the paper print side up.

I used Epson Photo Paper Glossy and chose the ‘best’ setting for my print. You can select from a huge range of different papers so the printer knows how to best align with the product.

I used a photo I took on my DSLR that I had uploaded to Google Drive so I could access it on my phone. The print quality is absolutely excellent, I was seriously impressed for such a large print and it’s definitely good enough to frame and hang on the wall or give as a gift.

Scrapbooking wise I wanted to print multiple photos onto the same sheet so I could trim them down to go in my scrapbook. I found it frustrating that the iPrint app doesn’t let you do this, but there is an Epson Creative Print app that you can download to make a collage and you can even connect it directly to your Instagram account. That’s what I’m talking about Epson! Nice work.

Again the print quality is excellent for scrapbooking! Here are my top five tips for creating an awesome scrapbook using your photos:

// Use a guillotine to trim down your photos – they’re a bit more expensive that scissors, but so quick and easy to use to cut your straight lines!

// Prepare your layout before you glue anything down! If you’re really unsure, try using blu – tack and setting out each page before you commit to using your photos and craft supplies on a specific page. You can even buy photo corners that your pictures just slip into.

// Leave space for little notes that remind you of the moment you took the photo. You can get great papers to write on and glue in alongside your photo or you could use washi tape that can be written on too.

// You don’t just have to use photos, you can use clippings, beer mats, receipts and anything you’ve collected on your travels in your scrapbook to really bring it to life.

// Try making a scrapbook for each holiday you go on and line them up on a shelf at home, or even make a scrapbook of your time together with your partner as an anniversary present or a gift for your bestie on their birthday.

I think the Epson Expression Photo XP-960 Printer is a great choice for home photo printing and a great accessory for scrapbookers! You can currently get the printer on Amazon for £179.99 and there is also an A4 scanning function that I haven’t managed to try out yet.

Loves x xx