Man Wrap

Man Wrap

Man Wrap is a wrapping paper made from thick foil, basically it allows you to wrap a gift in seconds without the need for scissors or sticky tape.


I have to admit that although it is a snazzy idea and perfect for men .. its not entirely brilliant.

Great points:

• Fantastic for wrapping odd shapes such as the bottle in the video above or erm... Easter eggs!  
• It also looks shiny and is pretty simple to use.  
• I have run my finger along the edges and so far I haven't been able to cut myself (which I was a bit concerned about).
• Not only it is easy to wrap stuff, it is also easy to unwrap too :)  so great for people with arthritis or a disability who find wrapping or unwrapping a problem.
• You do not need to struggle and muck about with sticky tape, in fact you could wrap 3 gifts in the time it takes to find the end of the tape on the roll.

Bad points:

• The roll isn't very wide, it could do with being twice the length that it is to be able to wrap more items effectively.  
• You only get 5m for the £5.99 rrp .. so at £1.20 per metre it is quite pricey.
• Its basically thick tin foil!  You may as well just buy some extra thick Baco Foil and have the same effect, plus you can get it in extra widths for your turkey.
• I have wrapped up Andy's Xbox controller (as it was next to me, that'll fool him later when he tries to find it) and it looks like a cruddily-wrapped melted Easter egg, not a brilliant look.

Oh course you can still tart up your foil wrapped presents with bows and ribbon if you wish too, but then that kind of defeats the object.

The foil comes on a handle which will help for wrapping upright stuff (not entirely sure what??) but I am sure it could be handy.

I am not entirely impressed with this product, as a Secret Santa fun present then it is fab!  But as a usable item, unless you have a special need and require help with wrapping .. its not worth the price and I would stick to traditional wrapping paper, even if you do get stuck together with tape and curling ribbon.

Available in red or blue, 5m for £5.99 (rrp).

Please visit www.themonsterfactory.com for more information.

Slinks

Recently featured on Dragons Den, Slinks are a new type of flat shoe that can be dressed up or down for any occasion.

More and more women are opting to wear fashionable flat shoes when out on sociable occasions.  Be it the Christmas party, a friends wedding or a night out on the town, Slinks can be either worn from home or popped in your bag to change into during the evening.

Each pair comes expertly presented in a silk bag, I was very impressed with the presentation of the shoes - the whole package feels very luxurious and special.

So whats the big idea?

The package contains a plain pair of handmade leather bases (the bottom bit of the shoe), this has three loops on it ready to be made into a pair of posh flat toe post shoes to your liking.

Each pack contains two different styles of straps, these fix onto the base to make the design of your shoes.  The silk pouch keeps all the bits and pieces neat and tidy, basically ready to go ... be it in your handbag or overnight bag.

First up you choose the colour of the base (you only get one colour of base in each pack), black, chocolate, truffle or ivory.

Second step is to choose which straps you would like to add to the shoes.

Each pack comes with two different types, but you can also buy further styles.  The silk pouch has extra sections to keep extra strap uppers.

Finally put the uppers (straps) on the bases (bottoms) and they are ready to wear !

Perfect as a gift for Christmas or even for the bridesmaids if you are getting married (even the bride as there have some gorgeous Ivory styles).  I know its winter coming up but if you are planning a beach wedding next year Slinks would be perfect for your trip, easy to pack and interchangeable so you can enjoy wearing them on your honeymoon too. 

The collection are priced from £70 per set which contains 1 silk bag, 1 pair of leather bases and 2 sets of straps.  The sets are versatile and the price tag reflects the amount of wear you will get from the shoes.

Extra uppers (straps) are priced between £15-£30 depending on style.

Take a look at Slinks Facebook Page for more ideas.

To purchase Slinks please visit: www.rubbersole.co.uk/

For more information please visit: http://www.slinks.com/

Photobox - Photobook

Photobox - Photobook

I decided to gather together all of my daughters baby photos and have them printed into a book as a keepsake. I do have an album of her photos but since 'scrapbooking' has become popular I find that traditional photo albums look old and boring compared to what scrapbooker's are producing these days.

So why don't I whip out all the photos form my album and scrapbook them? Good question ... I don't have the time and I personally find scrapbooking really really fiddly.

This is where Photobox comes in. Photobox have some brilliant 'scrapbook' style photobooks on their website that you can personalise and there is no glue involved !

I registered for a free account on http://www.photobox.co.uk/ and chose which style of photobook I would like from the huge range available. Do not worry if you 'don't have a clue' as they have a guide to give you inspiration http://www.photobox.co.uk/content/do-it-with-a-photobook

I chose the baby style as featured in the image at the top of this page. You get a choice of layouts and you can preview each style, this is quite a handy feature as depending on your type/style of photographs you can find a layout to suit.

Following the instructions I started to upload my photos to 'my account', this seemed to take forever as even though I had chosen a 26 page book ... I didn't know how many photos it would hold and so didn't know how many to upload.

After about an hour all my photos were ready to use, I know an hour seems a little long ... but the time will depend on your Internet connection speed and also how busy the Photobox site is.

To add your photos to the pages is really really easy - you just drag and drop them into the spaces. You can resize and move each image around until you are happy with the presentation. I only had to tweak a few photos as the rest looked brilliant straight away.

There is also a guide as to how 'good' your image is, is it too light or dark? in focus? fuzzy? not a good upload etc... this tells you how clear the image will be once printed in the book.

A brilliant feature (which other personalised product photo sites do not offer) is that as you use each photo it puts a tick next to it - so that you do not accidentally use the same image twice. I found this fantastic as I had used another site to make a calender and I got very muddled with my images - Photobox was a much much easier set up to use.

You have te option to add captions and to remove the Photobox logo from the back page.

http://www.photobox.co.uk/content/the-book-of-wonders this link shows an example of the types of fonts, colours and sizes you can use to annotate your personalised photobook.

The photobook's are printed on 170gsm gloss paper, I am actually really impressed with the finish as it is a good quality hard wearing book. The images are bright and clear which I am surprised at as we didn't use the best quality camera back in 2000 to take them. You can tell the difference between the camera used on our later photos as they have come out a little less grainy ... so if your photos are good quality you will be seriously impressed with the printing quality of the book.

Each book will take around 5 working days to be delivered, so if you are ordering for a Christmas present then I would order as soon as possible in the run-up to Christmas to make sure it is here on time. I ordered mine on a Tuesday night and it was delivered to me on the Saturday - so they can be pretty quick!

The prices vary depending on what you order: style, size, how many pages, etc.... I didn't find the pricing very clear which was a big downside. I did get a little worried about costing and so chose the Classic A4 Photobook (basic one) this was £22.99 + postage.

I am really really happy with my Photobox Photobook, it is something this I will treasure and I hope my daughter will too.

My rating: 9/10