The humble little bee is such an important part of our ecosystem helping to pollinate our food crops and kindly producing more honey than they need for the hive for us to enjoy. We can help them to survive by planting bee friendly flowers like bluebells and lavender, building bee homes from bamboo rods and by avoiding bee harming pesticides.
We have a wide range of products for babies and toddlers that celebrate the bumble bee by featuring cute little striped motifs and honeypots including our 100% cotton knitwear in white and yellow. The honeycomb design pram blanket and the striped cot blanket make great new baby gifts as do the traditional double-breasted pram coat, cardigan and button crew neck jumper available in sizes 0-6, 6-12, 12-18 and 18-24 months and our cute knitted jumpsuits available in sleeveless and long-sleeved versions for babies aged 0-6 and 6-12 months.
Other bee themed gifts include our striped bib which is edged in bright yellow with a large bee motif with voile wings and our tooth fairy cushion which can hang by the bed safely storing a precious tooth until the tooth fairy makes her appearance.
Bees also feature on our stretchy leggings and moccasin slippers in bright blue stripes with contrasting yellow cuffs and pastel-coloured flowers. Our lemon checked bumble bee dress for girls up to 6-7 years features a scalloped trim around the neckline and lace around the hem and two cheerful bumble bees. It is perfectly complimented by our 40cm rag doll who wears a matching yellow gingham dress. Little girls love our pretty white lace-trimmed short-sleeved nightdresses embroidered with cute stripey bees which is available up to 8-9 years.
While bees make really cute motifs for our beautiful clothing more importantly, they make delicious honey for us to enjoy. Here’s a recipe from Leon for yummy granola so that you can savour the delicious sweetness of honey every morning!
Honey granola
Granola is like a slightly sweetened roasted muesli, which gives it a lot more crunch and chew, as well as some baked nuttiness. It's the honey that really brings this together: as well as being a preferable form of sweetener, it binds the ingredients to make fun clusters. Try blossom or heather honey for a proper taste of the British countryside in your breakfast bowl. Once you've made your own granola there's no going back to shop-bought.
Makes around 1kg
150g honey
60ml sunflower or groundnut oil
250g rolled oats
100g bran
150g sunflower seeds
100g hazelnuts
150g dates
100g dried apricots
100g wheatgerm
100g sultanas
1 Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/gas mark 4.
2 Pour the honey and oil into a pan and heat gently until the honey has melted.
3 In a bowl, mix the oats, bran and sunflower seeds, then pour on the liquid from the pan and mix well. Spread out on a big baking tray.
4 Roast for 20-25 minutes, turning everything three or four times, then leave to cool.
5 Meanwhile, roast the hazelnuts until they turn a golden brown (which takes about 10 minutes), then roughly chop, along with the dates and apricots.
6 When cool, mix everything together with the wheatgerm and sultanas. Store in an air‑tight container; lasts for about a month.
