On Sunday 31st May, me and S (and of course T) were invited to attend the Sussex Pregnancy and Baby Show at Brighton Racecourse.

A few years ago we had attended a similar baby show, maybe the same, at Brighton Racecourse but it was much smaller. This one, however, was so much bigger! I was so excited.

As bloggers, we were allowed to enter the hall at an earlier time – which was a blessing as it was pouring with rain and the queue was already making its way out the door! On top of this we were also kindly given a lovely goody bag!

Getting in early gave us an opportunity to see the exhibitors in their entirety and have a gentle stroll round. It also gave us the opportunity to meet up with other local bloggers (Big wave to Chelle, Claire, and Kath) as well as meet Naomi from uflourish who organised the event.

Although we had the pram, I decided to practise my new wrapping skills for the day and carry T. This made getting through the crowds a lot easier and T pretty much slept all day! The pram still got put to good use though, by carrying all of our shopping!

The show itself had a huge variety of exhibitors. Shopping stalls included organic baby clothing, cloth nappies, wooden toys, books, maternity wear, slings, and so much more. There were also “service” stalls that such as massage, holistic therapy, doula services, swimming classes, nurseries, you name it – it really catered for pregnancy up to birth.

***You can see our favourite stalls here***

During the show there were also several talks and workshops running throughout the day, not to forget constant entertainment for little ones. You can see the entire list of talks Here.

As part of the day we were invited to attend a talk of our choice so we chose a talk on sleep by Sarah Ockwell-Smith. It was perfect timing as we’d just had our third night of poor sleep. The talk itself was also perfectly timed as T needed a feed, and we needed a sit down.

I really enjoyed listening to Sarah and we definitely went away knowing a lot more about sleep. We also got some extra tips about making bedtimes easier (for us and the babies!).

After the talk, we returned to the hall to continue shopping. By now it was packed, so we decided to cash in the cake voucher we’d been given and have a well earned rest.

I, as expected, had a slice of rainbow cake and S had a slice of chocolate (and Guinness) cake. They were delicious.

What I really liked about the show was that every stall was either a local shop or they provided services locally. It really made it feel like a community fair. You can tell the organisers put every effort into the fair, wanting it to be enjoyable for everyone in the family, not to mention comfortable. I was most impressed with the makeshift feeding area that had been created. 

Thanks to the amount of stalls and talks available you could easily spend all day here. We only went to one talk but we still managed to stay for the duration of the day thanks to all the stalls and networking opportunities.

The fairs happen regularly, the next one being in Chichester and then Worthing. I’d highly recommend you pay them a visit if you’re in the area.

You can find out more information about the shows here.

K