Festive Ice Skating!

The festive season is upon us (our favourite time of year at Ellie Ellie), and a great way to get the kids and the whole family out and about is the Royal Pavilion Ice Rink in Brighton, which opens every November for ice skating!

Opening for the festive season, till January, the ice rink is a great excuse to try something different if you haven't tried it before, or get back on the ice for people who love skating. In one hour slots, you can book your tickets online and then all you have to do is turn up, get your boots on and get onto the ice.

For the kids, the pavilion have Mr Penguins, who help the little ones feel confident on the ice!

For more informaiton visit the Royal Pavilion Website and book your skating session!

Christmas Markets!

Every year, towns, villages and cities get ready for their annual Christmas Markets, we've picked a few of our favourites we can't wait to explore!

Oxford Christmas Market: 11th December - 21st December
- Located at the heart of Oxfords historic Broad Street, Oxfords market includes a selection of Christmas gifts and seasonal treats.

Winchester Cathedral Christmas Market: 20th November - 21st December
- With an ice rink to keep the kids entertained, this Christmas market sees a bustling festive atmosphere with an array of Christmas gifts and festive food.

Brighton Christmas Fair: 15th November - 16th November
- In this two day Christmas shopping event, happening this weekend you will find loads of Christmas gift ideas, as well as festive home accessories and food and drink.

The Hop Farm, Kent - Weekends in December
- Hosting a series of weekend Christmas markets, you will find locally sourced products, crafts and seasonal food and drink at the Hop Farms Christmas Markets throughout December.

What Christmas Markets will you be visiting?

Guy Fawkes Night!

An annual celebration on the 5th of November, Bonfire Night sees many cities, towns and villages celebrate with fireworks, bonfires and parades.

Whether you are celebrating at a big bonfire night event, with family or having your own party, we've got our bonfire night essentials.

Our Retro Sweets Jar Giant Marshmallows are great to toast on the fire

Great for the kids this bonfire night, this Make Your Own Toffee Apple Set is the perfect bonfire night treat!

Our Check Recycled Wool Rug is perfect for settling down (with a mug of hot chocolate) to watch the fireworks. 

Where will you be going to celebrate Bonfire Night?

Brighton Digital

Brighton is a thriving digital and creative community and this Month it is hosting the Brighton Digital Festival, a community driven grassroots festival celebrating digital arts and culture!

Brighton Digital Festival has a whole host of events for everybody who wants to get involved, showcasing the variety of activity that goes on across this marvelous city.

If you are after some inspiration, art, culture or workshops, Brighton is the place for you this month. With a whole host of seminars and workshops for free this month, there are endless possibilities.

Some of the great things going on include: geo-writing, the hidden web, mind of the city, comics and computers and career advice!

For more information on this jam packed digital festival visit the website now!

We're all moved in!

Thank you so much everybody for your messages during our big office move. We are now all moved in to our new HQ in Hove, after a big weekend clearing out the old office and then moving everything into the new one.

We've shown you some sneak peeks along the way, but we can now show off our new office to you, which we hope you love as much as us! We will be posting new photos on our Instagram over the next few weeks, showing off our brilliant new space!

This was our old space, all cleared and cleaned with everything on the way to the new office:

Here's some snippets of our new space:

Keep up with the Ellie Ellie journey on our Facebook! 

Ellie Ellie Big Office Move!

As you will know, Ellie Ellie are moving to a lovely new office space in Hove. Leaving our current office for a new adventure. Time has gone so quickly since we got the keys and we have been busy preparing the office for the big move. We don't want to give too much away until we move in but we have some sneaky pictures to share...

The big move is happening this weekend so keep you eyes peeled for another update where we will share our new space! Hope you are having a great weekend!

www.ellieellie.co.uk 

Happy Birthday to us!

Happy Birthday to us! 

Ellie Ellie is celebrating its 2nd birthday today! We are celebrating the Ellie Ellie way, with a lot of cake and bucks fizz, thinking back on the past year and what are best moments have been! Here are some of the moments we came up with (it was so hard to choose). These have been our most funniest, challenging, happy and exciting times at Ellie Ellie over the past year!

Using our Christmas trolley fun!

Big Easter Bake Off (Ava was crowned the winner) 

A visit from the Easter bunny

Having fun playing with our new sports day games! 

Seeing Little Mix in Brighton as part of Ellie Ellie's birthday celebrations (Best surprise ever) 

Walking 13 miles at midnight for the Martlets Hospice, through pouring rain we did it!! 

Ellie Ellie's exciting new office (stay tuned for more in the next few weeks)

Ellie Ellie featuring in the new Notonthehighstreet book 'Shape Up Your Business' 

Winning the Online Business Award at the Sussex Women of the Year Awards 

The whole team with the award! 

Here's to an even better year ahead! 

www.ellieellie.co.uk 

Say Hello to the New Ellie Ellie Office!!

We had some very exciting news at the beginning of July which means we are getting ready to start another Ellie Ellie adventure. The whole Ellie Ellie team are getting ready to move into our new offices in Hove, which is a converted old soap factory! All the team are very excited about this move, which will see us move to a bigger office which much more space for our growing team. We really love our current office and have made it our own working space, changing the layout numerous times to fit the needs of the business, but there is no longer enough space for the growing team, so Hello Hove!

We are in the midst of organising our big move and will keep you updated every step of the way! Here are some pictures of our new space... Keep your eyes peeled for more!

www.ellieellie.co.uk 

The Big Beach Clean!

This week marks the 30th anniversary of Volunteers' week, which is a week to celebrate the contribution of millions of volunteers across the UK. Many different volunteer projects are getting underway this week, with challenges and events taking place throughout the UK all week to celebrate. 

Hayley and I got involved with the big beach clean up on Brighton seafront last week, joining loads of helpful volunteers to clean the beach of litter and rubbish. Organised by The Argus, teams of volunteers and individuals to met on Brighton pier from across the city to begin cleaning up the beach. 

I was very surprised at how much litter there was on the beach, considering we had had a rainy bank holiday Monday the day before. What was also surprising was the type of litter we picked up, i was expecting crisp packets and drinks cans, however, the rubbish we were picking up was much smaller pieces such as bottle tops, string and small bits of plastic that could easily not be seen and therefore stay among the pebbles. Which would ultimately increase the amount of litter on the beach. We even found a pair of headphones buried in the pebbles! 

Thank you to The Argus for organising the beach clean up. We will definitely be taking part in the next one!

Read more about the Big Beach Clean up here!

Find out more about Volunteers' Week

For Fabulous Foodies Out There!

The Foodies Festival arrived in Sussex on the first May bank holiday last weekend at Brighton Hove Lawns and what a great event it was. Perfect for food and drink enthusiasts, budding cooks and bakers too.

On its fourth consecutive year, each year the event brings together some of the best food around for visitors to try and sample. With cookery classes and how to sessions as well, the event catered to everybody no matter how you wanted to spend the day. 

I arrived to the glorious smell of different types of food and drink and found it hard to decide what to eat first, a lovely choice of pad Thai and satay chicken, along with freshly cooked dim sum won the contest and i was not disappointed (even going back for seconds). This was not the only tasty food on offer, with Paella, duck wraps, noodles, bbq, hog roast, olives, cheeses and chutneys on offer! 

Here are some of the pictures i snapped throughout the day!

This event is not just limited to Sussex, and the Foodies Festival visits different places throughout the summer! Find out more about where you can find the next festival here and enjoy!

Brighton Arts Festival!

Brighton Festival is a celebration of theatre, music, circus, dance, literature, debate, film and family events. It's now in its 48th year and takes place in venues across Brighton and Hove for three weeks in May.

It's England's biggest curated mixed arts festival and attracts some of the innovative artists and companies from the UK and the world.

Starting on the 3rd of May, the Brighton Festival has a whole host of different shows, activities and arts to explore. A good way to start the festival is with an explosion of colour and activity with the Children's Parade! With 5,000 young people involved and 83 schools involved, the parade is sure to be a vision of activity and colour.

Different sections of the parade will focus on difference arts, including dance, film and books. With music and dance this parade is going to be a great activity to go and watch next weekend! The parade starts at 10.30am in Kensington Street!

For more about the Brighton Festival, visit the website now!

Fun at Plumpton Racing

One of the many delights of Sussex at Easter Time is being able to pop along to the races in Plumpton! Plumpton racecourse has been a a venue for racing horses since 1874 and is an event on many families calendars this Easter!

Plumpton racecourse is holding its Totepool Easter Sunday and Monday family raceday (Sunday 20th and Monday 21st April)! This two day festival is Plumptons most popular event, and as well as horse racing there are a number of great activities to keep the kids entertained.

Kids can get involved in the Easter bonnet competition, or have a go on the traditional funfair rides and get their face painted.

An ideal day to get the family together for a picnic and some horse racing this is the perfect day! Hopefully the weather will be glorious too!

Find out more information about Plumpton here!