A recipe for success?

I love food. Growing it, cooking it, eating it... it's amazing! So it's only right that I should enjoy foodie competitions - yet the one accolade that has always eluded me is winning a best recipe competition. Now, I'm no Masterchef, but I do love to cook so I had to enter the fabulous Tesco Diets weekly £1000 competition that's running until 13 December on Facebook. To enter, submit an original healthy recipe along with a photo or video - judges from Tesco will assign points for originality, creativity, practicality, cost, fat content, preparation guidelines, fruit and veg content, portion size, nutritional value, taste and use of unprocessed ingredients. The maximum point score for these is 80, and you're able to add to this total with an extra 20 points by being one of the top 4 most 'Liked' recipes. This competition was originally designed for the winner to be solely decided by 'Likes' and it's disappointing that even with the introduction of judging criteria, it still boils down to how many friends you have on Facebook and how much time you've got to spend on vote swapping sites.

Despite my reservations, I've put a lot of effort into my recipe and have tried to get myself creativity points by submitting a video rather than a photo.

Hopefully my root vegetable tagine will tick all the right boxes on the judge's checklists! If you do enjoy my recipe then it would be great if you could pop over to the Tesco Diets Facebook page, 'Like' it and then also 'Like' my entry here. If you're inspired, then why not submit your own healthy recipe too?

If you're so inclined, here are a few other culinary comps to tickle your fancy!

• If you submit the tastiest meat-free dish at lindamccartneyfoods.co.uk/tastiestmeatfree/ by 28 January 2011 you could win a cooker, a kitchen table AND your photo on the product when it launches!
• Rombouts want your Christmas coffee recipes, enter by 13 December and you could win a cafetiere and loads of goodies at rombouts.co.uk/christmas-recipe-hunt.asp
• Or how about creating a new classic with Bramley Apples? You could win yourself a masterclass with Mark Hix at bramleyapples.co.uk/bramley_classics_entry_form.html - enter by Christmas Eve.
• How do you fancy having your cupcake recipe on sale at Asda? Submit your recipe at asdamagazine.com/2010/11/cupcake-recipe-competition/ by 31 December and it might well happen!
• I love chestnuts! If you do too, submit your favourite Christmas chestnut recipe by 10 December at merchant-gourmet.com/recipes/christmas-chestnuts-challenge/Information/ to win a Merchant Gourmet hamper
• Pilgrim's Choice want your cheesy recipes at pilgrimschoice.com/recipes/win-hamper - if they use one online you could win a cheesy hamper!

Not much of a chef yourself? Then how about winning one for the night instead! Check out the competition at bighams.com/win-stuff/win-one-of-my-chefs/ and enter before 17 December to win a chef to cook dinner for you and 7 friends. I won a chef for the night once and it was fantastic, he brought his own waitress and wine and even did all the washing up... heaven!

Blog comp round up

Morning everyone! Anyone feeling festive yet? You absolutely must check out Heston's Prize Pudding on Facebook - there's a prize in every pud so if you don't win something, one of your five mates will (I've just won a mini panettone!). Look out for pudding slices to grab on your friends' walls, and keep an eye on the Waitrose Facebook wall for entry codes. Here are this week's plentiful prizes:

Closing today
• Win Nicky Clarke hair straighteners at Given to Distracting Others

Closing 27 November
• Win a Buzz Lightyear Model Kit at All About the Boys
• Win a Moroccan leather pouffe at Torie Jayne (open internationally)

Closing 28 November
• New Mummy's Tips have a Walltastic mural up for grabs
• Win a Sound Asleep pillow at Typecast
• Win a £50 Mothercare voucher and a month's supply of Fairy Non Bio at Baby Genie

Closing 29 November
• I feel like I dreamt it has a £30 Hamptonblue.co.uk voucher on offer
• Win Red or Dead tights at Given to Distracting Others

Closing 30 November
• Mummy Loves has 3 Nuby beakers to be won
• Win a Tidy Books children' bookcase at Playing by the Book (open internationally)
• Submit a travel blog to GranTourismo and win a £500 stay at a Home Away Holiday Rentals property of your choice
• Onemorelipstick are giving away two Les Fleurs de Bach gift sets
• Wish Life is Better On a Happy Birthday and win a Flip Mino HD Camcorder
• Win a kids shatterproof mirror at Me and My Shadow
• Win a VTech Kidizoom camera at New Mummy's Tips

Closing 1 December
• Win a Christmas book for baby at Alexander Residence
• Sandy Calico Reviews is giving away a £50 Mothercare voucher and a month's supply of Fairy Non Bio
• Win Clynol hair products at Mirror Mirror on the Wall
• Nottingham blog Left Lion has ten copies of Liam Bailey's debut EP to be won

Closing 2 December
• There are TEN pairs of Miffy adult pyjamas up for grabs at White Lily Green

Closing 3 December
• Beautylicious Love is giving away Emporio Armani Diamonds perfume sets
• Win one of 15 copies of the new Wii Raving Rabbids game at A Modern Mother
• Given to Distracting Others has a Little Dish cookbook up for grabs
• Win an Arbonne Skincare Travel Set at Mummy's Busy World

Closing 4 December
• Tell Kavey Eats about your top Christmas foodie gift and win an Interflora Christmas Comforts Hamper

Closing 6 December
• Win a Christmas break at Butlins at BabyTod

Closing 7 December
• Guess the famous lips to win Vaseline Lip Therapy goodies at Mummy's Busy World

Closing 10 December
• British Study Centres want to see your photos of the Real Brighton to win a Cybershot camera

Closing 11 December
• Win a Christmas tree (your choice of artificial or real) at Ryan's Garden

Closing 15 December
• Win Organix goodies at All Baby Advice

Closing 19 December
• There are 3 Separado! film posters signed by the gorgeous Gruff Rhys to be won at the Soda Pictures blog

Closing 22 December
• Win a Sleek Bad Girl palette and Avon Supershock eyeliner at The Beauty Scoop

Good luck folks - and if you enjoy my comp round ups, don't forget to become a blog follower!

Be quick - Conran Shop Twitter giveaway!

The Conran Shop has to be one of my favourite places - I have dreams about reclining in an Eames lounge chair or leaving my copy of Grazia on a Noguchi table - but of course my bank balance advises against it! Never fear though, because Santa's here to help... Tweet them your Christmas wishlist item and three winners will win their choice (to a maximum value of £500) from www.conranshop.co.uk on Monday. Be quick though, you need to get your entry tweeted before midnight tomorrow (Friday 26 November) - to enter, just find the product you want and then Tweet:
I want this (enter the product name and link of the product you would like) from @Conran_Shop for Christmas #wishlist

You can read the Terms and Conditions here, but they don't state whether only one entry per person is accepted - I'll leave that decision up to you!

As for me, I would love this amazing toybox for baby boy... just in time for the onslaught of Christmas and first birthday gifts!

How to get on a TV gameshow

People always think that it's impossible to get onto a gameshow, but believe me, it's not. If your job is flexible so that you can fit in auditions and filming, then it's an easy way to earn tax-free cash!

In the last four years I've appeared on The Price is Right, Supermarket Sweep, Divided, Are you Smarter than a Ten year old, Word Play, 1 vs 100 and Dirty Rotten Cheater. I was offered a spot on Goldenballs (but decided I couldn't be nasty enough!) and should also have appeared on Donny Osmond's Pyramid Game, but the contestant on the previous show rolled over as a champion so I didn't get a turn (I did, however, enjoy getting my make-up done whilst Lionel Blair tapdanced around me!). Just to give you an idea of statistics - I've applied for 25 gameshows, and asked to audition for 16. Of the 7 shows I've appeared on, I've been successful in 3 and won a total of £10,500... not bad for a few days' work!

So, how do you go about getting onto a gameshow? First of all you need to find out which shows are currently taking applications - try UKGameshows.com, 12yard.com or Starnow.co.uk. My favourite website for information and chat is Quizzing.co.uk, which is currently undergoing a revamp, but you can click through to their Facebook group until the site is live. Usually you will email the production company and get an automated response with an application form attached. These forms look really daunting, with questions ranging from 'How would a big cash prize change your life?' to 'Are you a good bluffer?' and 'What's the biggest risk you've ever taken?'. Once you've completed one application, you'll realise that most questions cover the same ground so you can copy and paste answers from one form to another. Often the production company will want to know interesting facts and stories about you - this is what makes your application stand out, so try and write something memorable. The stories of mine that have proved popular are my competition wins (in particular a butler for Glastonbury Festival, and my dad's weight in chocolate) and the time I met Bono backstage at a Beastie Boys gig. You'll need to send a photo too - make sure you're smiling!

If the production team like your application, they will call you for a quick phone audition, often asking a few general knowledge questions (if it's a quiz show). Be enthusiastic and remember to tell them why you want to appear on the show - and don't panic if you don't do well on the quiz questions! At the end of the phone call if you've impressed them they will invite you to audition. Be warned - it can be really short notice.

The audition itself will be at a hotel at a nearby big city (although there are shows that only do London auditions) and last a couple of hours. Some auditions have hundreds of people, and some just a dozen, and the production staff are invariably energetic twenty-somethings. Usually you will do a run through of the gameshow, a written quiz and are given five minutes on camera to talk about yourself. My advice for the audition would be to make yourself look presentable, and if possible wear something to make you memorable (an extreme example of this is the drag queen I sat next to for 1 vs 100 - unsurprisingly s/he was chosen to be a contestant!). Think carefully in advance about what to say about yourself - you need to stand out, but you also need the viewers to be able to relate to you - try and relax and have a laugh! At some auditions they will ask some of the attendees to leave after the first hour - these are usually people who haven't contributed much to the gameplay or group activities. As for the quiz questions, be aware that sometimes it pays not to be too clever, and it's not a great idea to answer all the questions correctly even if you do know them. An important thing I've learnt is to pad out your answers - never give your answer straight away, and talk through the elimination of incorrect answers. 'In it to win it' is a prime example of this technique!

Once the audition is over it can take weeks to hear back from the production team - if you're not suitable then they rarely let you know. If they like you then they will ask you to be a contestant or a standby - as a standby contestant you're not guaranteed to get on the show, but it's worth doing to get your foot in the door. You'll be told the date of your show - this can change for a show like Divided or Who wants to be a Millionaire, as the game could end after one question or fifteen (when I recorded Divided it took almost 4 hours!) Your travel expenses and accommodation will be covered, as will your meals, and you'll need to take along at least 3 outfits to ensure you don't clash with the set or the other contestants.

On the big day you'll do a walkthrough of the show and be taken on a tour of the set - you'll spend hours with the same people in 'The Green Room' and if you're so inclined, you can spend this time swotting up. You'll also have your hair and make up done - but be warned, they put on a LOT of make up - you would not believe Dale Winton's mascara! When the time comes to start filming just try and relax, and have a joke at the presenter's expense if possible (well, I find this works for me!). If you go home empty handed then don't fret - you'll have the experience of appearing on TV under your belt and this will work in your favour in the future. And if you do win, then you'll have caught the bug... and maybe I'll see you on a show in the future!

Blog comp round up

What have you won this week? I won some cute dotty Laura Ashley coasters from Mums Like You and have my fingers crossed for a £100 American Apparel voucher in the I Love My Jumper competition at Global Cool!

Before you start on my list of comps, you must get yourself over to Babygurgles, a new mummy blog. There's a lovely GroBag and Swaddling Blanket on offer to one of her first 35 blog followers - so hurry!

Here are this week's blogtastic prizes:

Closing today
• At the Tidy Books blog you enter their Facebook comp to win a kids bookcase and books
• Win face paints at Mostly Yummy Mummy
• Tell 2become4 what 'cwtch' means and win sheepskin booties!

Closing 20 November
• Win Chocadores goodies at Me and My Shadow

Closing 21 November
• Win an Inside Santa's Toy Shop Book at New Mummy's Tips

Closing 23 November
• Win two adorable Moomin mugs at Playing by the Book (open to international entries)

Closing 24 November
• Who would you like to take a photo of? Tell Slummy Single Mummy and win a Samsung camera!
• New Mummy's Tips have two fabulous Oh Baby London outfits on offer
• Win Red or Dead tights at Given to Distracting Others
• At Baby Baby you can win a fab VTech Kidizoom video camera
• Red Ted Art have a Summerland Crafts gift voucher up for grabs

Closing 25 November
• Win this fab Toyella Christmas Tree at Red Ted Art

Closing 27 November

• Win £50 to spend at Clothing at Tesco at Mellow Mummy

Closing 29 November

• At the Equipio blog you can design a pair of sports shoes and win £100 to spend at Mi Adidas

• Win cupcake goodies at Beckicklesie

Closing 30 November

• Tell Voucher Mum your fave Jamie Oliver recipe and win his '30 Minute Meals' book

• Win £50 Sainsbury's vouchers at Mums Like You

• Beckicklesie is giving away Guitar Hero for XBox

• Also at Beckicklesie, win one of 3 copies of 'The Second Baby Survival Guide'

Closing 1 December

• Madhouse Family Reviews have £100 of Spinmaster toys to be won

• Win a £50 Burts Bees hamper at Green Mum's Blog

Closing 4 December

• Mellow Mummy is giving away Rainbow Collections Children's CDs

Closing 10 December

• Post your top ten toys at the Baba Me blog and win a £100 voucher to spend on them!

Closing 13 December
• Win a Maxi Micro (surely a contradiction?!) Scooter at Parentdish

Closing 15 December
• Win an Orchard Toys puzzle at All Baby Advice

Closing 22 December
• Win a professional artists' oil paint box set at Artsbowl

Closing 3 January
• Nominate a good tenant or landlord at the Deposit Protection Service blog and win an iPod Nano!

As usual, the best of luck to you all... have a fab weekend!

How compers do their Christmas shopping!

I'm determined to be organised this year and buy all my Christmas presents early - the ones I haven't won yet, that is (some lucky family members will be waking up to some lovely Dermalogica goodies in their stockings this year!). So I spent Wednesday evening happily buying gifts online, because of three excellent competitions running with PayPal, Visa and MasterCard:

• Buy online with PayPal and you'll be entered into the weekly draw to win £40,000 (ends 5.12)
• Use your MasterCard and enter online (up to 3 times daily) at mastercard.co.uk to win one of 1278 prizes (ends 24.12)
• Enter your Visa transaction details online at visa.co.uk (up to 10 per day) to win a £2000 daily prize (ends 9.1)

Yesterday I decided to walk into Nottingham City Centre on a mission to pick up some boots at Barratts for their photo competition and do some shopping the old-fashioned way. I soon realised Christmas shopping with a pushchair isn't the easiest day out!

Whilst in town I popped into:

• Early Learning Centre - their catalogue has an entry form in to win £500 ELC vouchers (closes 31.12)
• Clintons - buy anything from the Boofle range of knitted toys and enter your receipt details via form or online at clintoncards.co.uk/boofle to win £4000 High Street vouchers (closes 5.12)
• Lipsy - their free mag has a comp in to win a £1000 wardrobe which can be entered online at www.lipsy.co.uk (closes 15.12)
• Debenhams - pick up a Vivienne Westwood Naughty Alice leaflet, visit naughtyaliceviviennewestwood.co.uk and hold the barcode up to your webcam to enter a draw to win a £450 goodie bag. Also in store, I found an entry form on Triumph bras to win a Style Makeover (closes 5.12)
• Currys/PCWorld - pick up a free gift guide and enter the unique code online at www.15milliongiveaway.co.uk to see if you've won a prize (closes 20.12)
• Furniture Village - Complete a Toy Story entry form and post in store to win one of two family adventures to the Caribbean (closes 23.12)
• Beaverbrooks - There's a postcard inside their free magazine to win £2500 to spend in store (closes 7.1)

The best way to comp and shop is to plan your route beforehand so you don't miss anywhere out - it might seem like a hassle to try and fit comping in around your shopping, but once you get used to it, you'll love to come home with an extra bag stuffed with magazines and entry forms - it gives you lots to read in the evening, too! Don't forget to pick up local free magazines when you're out and about at the hairdressers, coffee shop, leisure centres and shopping malls - these usually have very few entries for their comps.

That's all my tips for now! I'm off to enter my receipt details at the Visa website - £2000 would be a great Christmas present!

Comping on Facebook (Part 2)

Welcome to the second part of my guide to comping on Facebook (you can find Part 1 here) - I'm certain there will be future installments as there are so many new promotion types appearing on Facebook. I'll admit I'm no expert either - I'm still learning new things about Facebook every day - but I hope the information here might be helpful to those of you struggling to get to grips with this new world of comping!


Finding comps on Facebook
Personally, I find the Facebook 'Search' mechanism really difficult to use - you can easily search for people, groups or brands using the main Search box at the top of the page, but searching status updates rarely results in anything useful. Instead, I recommend 'Liking' as many brands as you can, and regularly checking your News Feed for updates from compers and companies.

• If you regularly read magazines, browse through and do a search on Facebook for the brands that you like - for example, cooking, fashion or home magazines will have details of many companies with fan pages. 'Like' the pages and have a browse down the Wall and across the 'Tabs' to see if there are any current giveaways.
• Be nosey and have a good look at your comping friends' walls to see which brands they like and where they've been 'Liking' or Commenting... then follow the links to the comps!
• Read your 'junk' emails - scroll to the bottom of most of them to find a Facebook icon, which will link to their fan page - often they'll be running comps there.
• Use the search mechanism to look for 'Facebook' on sites like The Prizefinder
• Search on Twitter for 'Facebook win competition' - luckily US brands use the term 'contest' or 'sweepstakes' instead of 'competition' so the majority of results will be UK comps. 
• Using the Promotions HQ App, you can search for comps run on the Wildfire platform - use 'UK' in the search box.
  

How (not) to annoy your friends
I have around 900 Facebook friends now and around 70% of those are compers. People tell me they have set up separate profiles for comping so they don't annoy their 'real' friends, but personally I can't see the benefit of this - it's far too confusing, and it's also against Facebook rules to have multiple accounts! Right now I'm logged in to Facebook and so are 34 of my friends - of these, only 4 of them are non-comping friends. Unless your friends are logged in they will not see your updates in their live Newsfeed, so why worry about it? If they're good friends then I'm sure they know about your comping hobby and won't mind - and if it does annoy them they always have the option to remove your updates from their Newsfeed. A useful feature is Facebook Lists where you can distinguish between your comping friends and other friends by adding them to separate 'Lists' - to do this choose 'Edit Friends' from the Account Menu (top right of your Facebook window) - you can click on 'Create a List' and add friends to it. You will then have the option to view a Newsfeed of just your friends, or just compers - the screenshot below shows the 4 lists that I have set up (you can add friends to as many lists as you like - I have several comping mum friends!)

When entering competitions on Facebook, try to avoid posting competitions on others' walls, too - it's better to post it (or 'Share') on your own wall, and do be aware that using the Pop-up chat windows to ask friends for votes can be considered annoying and intrusive. Promoters seem to like photo tagging competitions because it's an easy way for them to get a photo (essentially an advert for them!) posted on multiple walls, but in reality they're an impractical promotional tool because Facebook will only allow 60 tags on one photo, so often promoters will have to keep adding the same photo to their album or ask you to add a comment to say 'Tag' underneath the photo. You might also find your friends tagging you in competition photos, resulting in the photos appearing on your Wall - this can be irritating. There's a great article on Facebook Privacy Settings at Allfacebook which can help you cut down on unwanted tagging or stop certain people from posting on your wall. Don't forget you can delete posts from your own Wall too - but remember they will already have appeared in the live Newsfeed that your friends see. 

Facebook v Twitter
I enter competitions on Facebook and Twitter, and both of them have their advantages. With Facebook the prizes are bigger and better, and the competitions more interesting, but if you're on Twitter all day and are quick at typing, you have a great advantage as so many comps have a short timespan. If you want to remind yourself to enter a competition later on, with Twitter you can quickly and easily add a Tweet to your favourites, but unfortunately there's no way of bookmarking a post (yet!) on a Facebook newsfeed. I usually take an iPhone screengrab to remind me to enter when I'm back at my desktop Mac! Twitter competitions are easier to find, but because of that there will be more entries - it's also easy to know you've won on Twitter as you'll see a tweet or DM mentioning your name. On Facebook you have to hope that the promoter will send you a message to let you know you've won - or if you've missed a status update announcing you as the winner, that one of your friends will see it and let you know!

Comping on Facebook is still a relatively new thing and from my own searches I know there's little guidance online, so if you have other suggestions on how to comp successfully on Facebook, I would love your feedback!

Tesco & Debenhams £5000 giveaways

Great news if you'e a Facebook comper - and perhaps tempting enough for those of you yet to sign up - because both Tesco and Debenhams have announced huge £5000 giveaways this week!

Debenhams are giving away 100 £50 gift cards, one every hour from Sunday 14th November at 12pm until Friday 19th at 8pm. You can enter via Facebook or Twitter, but you can only do ONE ENTRY all week so choose your time carefully and don't rush into it like I did!

You need to either:
Send a message using a Twitter account, including the web URL http://bit.ly/dreamingof and a message explaining what gift or item you are dreaming of for Christmas, then ‘follow' Debenhams at twitter.com/debenhamsretail - or alternatively enter at www.facebook.com/debenhams. There will be 4 giftcards given away during the week in other competitions too so keep your eye on their Facebook page!

Tesco Diets are giving away £1000 gift vouchers every week for the next 5 weeks for healthy recipes posted on their Facebook wall. This week's competition is purely a fight for the most 'Likes' but as a result of a public outcry (which I hope I instigated!) as of Monday 15th November at 10am there is a detailed judging criteria, which combines popularity with lots of other factors. This comp is a great excuse for me to eat a bit more healthily... and I look forward to trying out your recipes!

Blog comp round up

Oh, here we are again... hope you've all had some super wins! One of my readers emailed me to let me know her mum had won a cool £1000 from the Morrisons Hula Hoops text competition I blogged about - nice! Here are this week's bloggy prizes...

First of all, if you subscribe to the email updates from My Daddy Cooks you'll be entered into the big birthday draw taking pace daily next week!

Closing today!
• Win a Fibrevolution scarf at Two Become Four

Closing 14 November
• Win a Charlie and Lola hot water bottle at New Mummy's Tips
• At Diary of a Frugal Family you can win Just Dance 2 for the Wii

Closing 15 November
• Pop over to Transatlantic Blonde to win a Soap and Glory Sexy Mother Pucker lip gloss!

Closing 16 November
• Win dinner at the Delhi Grill in Islington at the Qype does London blog
• Mummy's Little Monkey have a Little Dish cookbook to be won

Closing 22 November
• Win a Lego Creator Jet Set at Sticky Fingers

Closing 24 November
• Win Gadget Glamour iPhone/iPad skins at Madhouse Family Reviews

Closing 28 November
• Love my Dress are giving away a lovely bespoke vintage framed canvas
• Win a copy of 365 Games and Pastimes at Madhouse Family Reviews

Closing 29 November 
• Rmontalban is giving away 3 Scottish calendars in a fun competition (open to international entries)

Closing 30 November
• Pyjama Drama have ten Monopoly Crazy Cash games up for grabs
• Win £250 to spend on clothes at Question Air at Fashion 156
• Win a selection of books at the Eclectic Reader (open to international entries)  
• Blog about December and win a family trip to the theatre at Beckicklesie

Closing 1 December
• Submit your little one's artwork at the Monkeying Around linky to win a Sheer Cover Beauty Kit

Closing 3 December
• Mum Unplugged are giving away five sets of gorgeous Bedeck kids bed linen

Closing 6 December
• Win Baby Sleep Comforter iPhone Apps at All Baby Advice

Closing 12 December
• All Baby Advice are also giving away a £25 CSN Stores voucher

Good luck compers... and don't forget to let me know when you win!

Smile for the camera...

It's been a great week for wins at SuperLucky HQ, because I've managed to win not one, but TWO pushchairs! Cosatto promoted a competition in their recent email newsletter asking fans to submit photos and videos of their kids enjoying Cosatto products - their favourite photo and video would each win a Supa Lite Stroller. I couldn't resist the challenge, and I also needed to get a new highchair for Mum-in-Law (the legs on her 1970s model are a lethal trip hazard!), so I bought a second hand Cosatto 'On the Move' highchair on the Netmums website, and filmed Ryland eating his meals for a day...



I was delighted to receive a WEM (winning email) from Cosatto to say how much they enjoyed my movie and that I'd won a stroller - the added bonus with video competitions like this is that I now have a cute home movie of my son!

I was also successful in the Autumn photo competition on the Graco Baby Facebook page - we'd planned to go to the Attenborough Nature Reserve with friends on Sunday so I made a special effort to take close up photos of Ryland enjoying the berries and trees and I was really pleased that this photo won the competition, and a prize of a Symbio pushchair.

Lately I don't really have the time (or inclination) to sit and enter hundreds of web and email competitions, so instead I choose the competitions that I know will get fewer entries, and will be fun to take part in. Whether it's stripping in a car showroom, dressing up as Wonderwoman to do the hoovering, tweeting photos from Sainsbury's or wrapping Ry up in bandages as a Mummy, comping certainly makes the life of this stay-at-home Mum a lot more exciting!

Win the Accolade Golden Ticket: a charity competition

How do you fancy winning a fantastic comping prize worth over £300? To support Rainbows Hospice for Children and Young People, Accolade Publishing are running a great Golden Ticket competition to win:

• 12 issues of Competitor's Companion magazine
• 12 issues of Compers News newsletter
• 12 issues of Prize Draw Winner magazine
• 12 issues of Competitors Update
• A year's access to the Chatterbox comping messageboard 
...and lots more!

We launched the competition at our charity event Raising for Rainbows last month, but I'm delighted to let you know that you can access the entry form online too. To enter, you need to use your skill and judgement to put 6 statements about comping in order of importance:
A. Comping is fun
B. Comping is rewarding on so many levels
C. Comping is educational - you learn something new every day
D. You win some amazing prizes
E. Comping is exciting - you never know what's round the corner
F. Comping is such a diverse hobby - it offers something for everyone

Judges will decide the correct order of importance - the winner will be the person that places the statements in the matching order (if nobody matches all six, the prize will go to the person who matches the most). To enter, print off the Golden Ticket entry form PDF and post it off with a minimum donation of £1 for each entry - you can enclose cash, postal order or cheque (made payable to Rainbows Children's Hospice). The closing date for entries is 31st December 2010.

Even if you've never tackled an 'order of importance' competition before, please do give it a go - we raised £3800 for the Hospice at our Raising for Rainbows day and we'd love to take the total to £4000 by the end of the year!

Compers' Fashion Fix

It's two years since I last bought a pair of jeans, so when I saw that if I booked a Levis 'Curve ID' fitting online before 30th November, I'm automatically entered into a draw to win one of 50 six month subscriptions to Elle Magazine, I couldn't resist. Whilst squeezing into a pair of 'Demi Curve' skinnies in the Nottingham store, I noticed another competition poster in the fitting room: try on a pair of 519 skinny jeans, take a photo and win tickets to see Gaslight Anthem and £519 of Levis clothing. After much persuasion, the shop assistant eventually relented and brought me a pair of the men's jeans to try on and took a quick snap with my iPhone. I've uploaded the photo at the Levis Facebook page and have my fingers crossed! The closing date for this one is 17th November.

Possibly one of the greatest competitions I've ever seen is Sarenza's fabulous High Heel Race, with a top prize of £2500 of shoes! Taking place on 3rd December in Paris, it pits 12 French teams against 12 UK teams in a relay race - in high heels. Check out this video footage from last year's event, which looks hilarious! 

To register, you need to convince two of your friends it's a brilliant idea, and then sign up online with a team name and a photo. The team from each country with the most votes will automatically get a place in the final, and the remaining 11 teams will be chosen randomly. Now, here's the good bit: there are currently just NINE teams registered for the UK, and registration closes on 14th November - so you'll be pretty much guaranteed a spot in the French final! Sarenza will cover your travel costs and two nights accommodation. And yes, you need to dress like an idiot and run in your heels - but think what a laugh you'll have with your mates! I considered signing up but I can't justify leaving baby boy for a weekend to run a race in high heels (...but maybe next year!). The other good news is that if you vote for either the most popular French or UK team, you'll get entered into a draw to win €600 of shoes yourself - so if any of you sign up for the race, please come back here and let me know your team name so I can round up the votes for you and maybe even win some shoes myself.

If you're more into boots than stillettos, then how about entering the Barratts Facebook photo competition - upload a photo of your Barratts boots in a 'weird and wonderful' location and if your photo is judged as one of the four best, you'll win £500 Thomas Cook vouchers (closes 30th November).

And last but not least is a great competition for fashionistas running on the Ford Ka Facebook page to win one of 4 style shopping sprees with a fashion blogger, plus a Ford Ka for two months. You need to upload a photo or a video to showcase your style, and the 20 most popular will get judged for the 4 prizes - I know we all hate voting contests, but most of the current entries only have 1 or 2 votes so with some support from your friends (and me) it should be easy to make the top 20. Again, if you enter this one let me know! I'll be making a video for my own entry at the weekend when I've had time to comb my hair and wash the baby sick off my favourite cardigan... This one closes on 28th November and the prize must be taken week commencing 13th December.

And that's your lot - I'm looking forward to seeing your stylish snaps!

Blog comp round up

Happy Bonfire Night everyone! I'm currently pondering whether to brave the fireworks with baby boy this weekend... although he'll probably sleep through it all anyway.

This week I won a Lansinoh breast pump and accessories from New Mummy's Tips, a Ralph Lauren colouring book (!) from www.alexandalexa.com and a lovely prize of a £75 Plum Baby Hamper with £50 Riverford voucher from the Plum Facebook Halloween competition: I knew that my top class bandaging skills would eventually be recognised!

Here are this week's fabulous prizes... 

Closing today

• At the MSDN UK blog there's a caption competition to win a Windows Phone 7
• Win a family ticket to see the movie Despicable Me at Mellow Mummy
• Baby Budgeting is giving away Montagne Jeunesse Totties

Closing 8 November
• Win luxury Lubatti handcream at Mummy's Busy World
• At Montessori Goldmine you can win a $20 gift certificate for Diana's Handmade (open internationally)

 Closing 9 November
• Are we nearly there yet Mummy? are giving away a Lego City Passenger train

Closing 10 November
• At New Mummy's Tips you can win an Edenesque nursing top
• Win a scary remote control tarantula at Given to Distracting Others

Closing 11 November
• Flower Fairies and Fairy Cakes have a Dora the Explorer Doll up for grabs

Closing 12 November
• At Red Ted Art you can win a 'Make Your Own Advent Calendar' kit
• Win a luxury Christmas wine hamper at Flabby Mummy Reviews

Closing 13 November
• At I Feel Like I Dreamt It you can win a £25 Spoiled Brat voucher

Closing 17 November
• Win a Cadbury chocolate hamper at The Further Adventures of a Thrifty Mrs

Closing 18 November
• Beautylicious Love has 2 new Sugababes fragrances up for grabs

Closing 22 November
• Win a Moxie dress, gorgeous jewellery and more at Sitting Pretty

Closing 27 November
• Win vintage inspired handmade earrings at Cherished Trinkets
• It's Beckicklesie's birthday and to celebrate she's giving away loads of goodies, including these beautiful Pierre Hermé macarons!

Closing 28 November
• Wn £200 to spend at Queens and Bowl at Love My Dress

Closing 29 November
• There's a Christmas cheese box on offer at Jam and Clotted Cream

Closing 30 November
• Win £100 to spend online at Victorinox at Beckicklesie
• All Baby Advice has Hipp Organic babyfood to give away
• Win a signed piece of art by Hayden Kays at Opus

Closing 30 December
• Win Neuner's Herbal teas at the Mummy Grapevine

If you enjoy my weekly blog round up please use the buttons below to share it on Facebook or Twitter - hope you have a fabulous weekend!

Win £40,000 with PayPal

Ah, giant cash prizes... what all compers dream of! I think quite a few of you will already have heard about the fabulous PayPal promotion to win £40000 - that's the prize on offer every week until 5th December, simply for making a purchase with PayPal.

One of my favourite aspects of comping is the positive thinking, and whilst out walking with baby boy in his buggy I often daydream about what I'll do when I win such a huge prize... £40,000 would be a big step towards my dream of creating a 'Grand Designs' style home. And for those of you that still don't believe people really win such giant amounts of cash, a good friend of mine recently won £20,000 in a Morrisons prize draw and a few years back another friend won £50,000 in a Mars promotion at Sainsbury's. There's a PayPal winner every week until 5th December, so it must be worth a shot!

All you need to do to get entered into the draw is to make a purchase using PayPal - I'm a huge PayPal fan as I've been buying and selling on eBay for years and it's the simplest method of payment. I was also lucky enough myself to win £1000 cash in a PayPal slogan competition back in 2003. Many people still associate PayPal with eBay but there are a whole host of sites that use it for payment - you can shop online at TopShop, Halfords, Toys 'R' Us and many more. It doesn't matter how little you spend, and you get an entry into the draw for every purchase you make - so why not find out more and start your Christmas shopping now? Just to inspire you, here's what I've been browsing on the Internet this week:

• WeeRide baby bike seat at www.halfords.co.uk (because I failed to win one on Facebook - sob!)

• Lace up high heels from www.asos.com (for when I run the High Heel Race in Paris next month!)

• Sony Clock Radio from www.houseoffraser.co.uk (for all those early morning radio competitions)

• A Smart Trike from www.toysrus.co.uk (for Ry's first birthday)

• Moleskine notebooks from www.heals.co.uk (for those endless lists of competitions...)

As well as the main promotion, PayPal are running other competitions on their Facebook page and Twitter, so it's definitely worth becoming a fan or a follower. So, if you want to be £40,000 richer by Christmas, enter now for your chance to win!

This is a sponsored post

Next Baby Boutique Competition

Although I haven't entered my boy into the Next Baby competition, I feel I need to blog about it simply because it has turned into such a high profile fiasco and is a good example of why voting competitions are such a bad thing.

Since it started a few weeks back, there has been nothing but bad publicity surrounding the Next Baby Boutique competition. The sheer volume of entries has resulted in Next working flat out to get the photos online, whilst impatient mothers post constant 'Where's my baby's photo?' messages on the Next Facebook wall. Babies have been rejected because of birthmarks being mistaken for make-up, and even for wearing glasses! Celebrity Danielle Lloyd has entered her baby in the competition and infuriated mums by asking her 46,000 Twitter followers to vote for him. And even worse, a rumour that the entire competition is fake has created internet-wide panic, with Mums desperately phoning Next and even the Police to ask for their babies to be removed from the competition - I even had friends emailing me to warn me about it!

Next had to post up a status confirming that the competition is genuine:

If you want a chuckle just pop over to the Next Facebook wall to see the chaos that is post after post of 'Vote for mine, I'll vote for yours!' requests, interspersed with Mums threatening to call the Police! The 12 most popular babies in the 2 age groups will take part in a photoshoot, from which two babies will receive £500 and a 12 month modelling contract. Mums, just ask yourselves - with 80,000 babies entered already, is it really worth the stress? And as for Next, I hope you've learnt your lesson and will think twice about running this competition again!

Just from a personal point of view, I do enter my son into photo competitions but I prefer the ones that are a bit more fun (like Halloween fancy dress!) and I definitely prefer the ones that are judged because it's nice to make an effort and see it rewarded. Trying to round up votes for a competition is hard work and can lose you friends... don't say I didn't warn you!

Let's dance: new video & photo comps

I think you all know by now that video competitions are my new 'thing' - anything that requires the use of a comedy wig or fancy dress outfit is guaranteed to have me rushing to get my Flip camcorder! So this week I have to thank my good friends Liz and Laura for bringing a couple of potentially hilarious competitions to my attention. 

At the iPulse Facebook page you can win a Boots Smooth Skin hair remover - these retail at around £300. Just tell them why you want to win one (by uploading a video, photo, song... anything!) and the most innovative, creative and persuasive entry will win. There are 4 weekly competitions, the first closes on Tuesday 9th November. I have something rather special planned for this one... bet you can't wait to see it!

Vist Aldo-Dance.com to check out the Aldo Shoes competition - upload a video of you dancing to the track 'Sweet Sixteen' and you could win CAD$2500 cash plus $500 to spend on Aldo shoes - there are 5 runners-up prizes of CAD$500 to spend at Aldo. The competition is open to US, UK and Canadian entries, and the main prizewinners will be the six videos that are the most popular - points are gained for YouTube views and Likes, Tweets and Facebook 'Shares'. But don't worry, if you don't like the voting element the judges will also choose their favourite video (judged on clothing, dance style and creativity) and award the winner CAD$2500 plus CA$500 Aldo vouchers. Entries close on 6th December, and I'm already planning a girl's night in with some rosé to get us in the mood for dancing!

If making movies is a bit too advanced, how about entering a photo competition? Joules want to see a photo of your 'Country Side' - upload a photo to the Joules Facebook page and if yours is judged the best you could win £1000 to spend at Joules. This one closes on 14th November. And don't forget the Baileys competition - upload a photo of you and your friends enjoying Baileys to the Baileys Facebook page by 16th December - the photo judged the best in each country will win a trip to New York.

Superdrug are running a photo competition in conjunction with Britney's new fragrance, Radiance. Upload a radiant photo to their Superdrug Flickr group - you'll need to register with Flickr to do this - and Superdrug will choose their top ten photos on 26th November. Then the public can vote (groan!) on their favourite to win £1000 vouchers (your choice of Apple, New Look or Lastminute.com) and a bottle of Radiance.