Okay, this one I'm excited about.

At this point I've got a half dozen products laying around waiting to be written about. My Tropical Traditions coconut chips came yesterday, a huge, just gigantic 2.5 gallon bucket of coarsely shredded coconut. I can't WAIT to get moving on that one, of course, because anything that involves me developing recipes I find thrilling.

That's not what I'm so excited about today, though...I'm reviewing a hard-cover Mixbook through Tomoson. This one is gonna be big. I've been playing with the website for over an hour arranging my custom ordered scrapbook.

Holy-hannah heaven, is it EASY to work with. Oh. My. Heavens, I'm in Heaven. I know, that's a lot of Heaven, but we are talking about a girl who managed to superglue her own fingers together in art class.

I can't even manage to make a box. You know, with four even sides. If I measure. It's really bad. I've got zero craft talent. All my talent lends itself to food and having babies. And that's why Mixbook is perfect for me.

It really appears to be Heather proof. I've spent time making collages online for gifts before, only to have the final product arrive all blah. Fuzzy pictures that looked just fine to my untrained eye, look TERRIBLE on the finished product. Mixbook flags those with a big, yellow exclamation point. I can't wait to see this book when it's done, and to let you know how it turned out!

Please, give them a look up for your Father's day ideas...I think it may be a little close to Mother's day, because I've done about three pages and it's taken me an hour playing with the various features, stickers, shapes and photo effects. I'm really just thrilled with the website so far and can't wait to finish my official review.

Disclaimer: I'm going to receive a product soon after I finish designing it through tomoson. My opinions are my own and I'm not being paid.

Saturday Hopping

Please follow publicly and leave a comment to let me know where to find you!

The Internet Makes the World a Small Place.

My thoughts and prayers are with the people of Alabama right now, specifically a couple of ladies I've gotten to know and like in the ladies' political forum I moderate. Two of them are missing, and the forums are quiet as many of the mommies are gathered in chat. That's quiet as well-most are just there, comforting each other with their presence and an occasional update on the various news channels.

It really is a small world.

The Red Cross is taking donations, of course. Text "REDCROSS" to 90999 to make a ten dollar donation, or visit their site to help.

Blessings to everyone in stricken areas right now.

A Loss.

We had a long day. Our family experienced a loss last week, and we gathered at a beautiful church to bid farewell to a wonderful man, my grandfather-in-law.

How many people are lucky enough to not only have a grandfather-in-law, but one that is as wonderful as sunshine? I've been truly blessed in the family that I married in to, you couldn't hand pick a more fabulous group of people. I've always felt welcomed and comfortable from the moment my then-future husband introduced me, and we've enjoyed several wonderful afternoons in their home since.

He will be missed- his wife, a study in grace and elegance as she greeted each fellow mourner. I can only hope one day to have an eighth of her composure. She is truly a remarkable lady.

I've been blessed to know them both, to know their wonderful family.

I'm Really Not EVER going to pay to write reviews.

I got an email invitation today, and I'm slightly annoyed about it. First off, I didn't sign up to be on this email list. I'm guessing the site is owned by a blog I subscribed to, you know, to help out a fellow blogger, who then took my email and published it in the CC column to everyone she's ever met EVER.

Yeah, thanks for that, by the way. Not the most annoying thing about it though.

Whoever this random person is, I'm not sure, wants ME to pay THEM for the OPPORTUNITY to do reviews. They want to charge the BLOGGERS since the COMPANY is providing THEM a service.

Really? My free ad copy on my web page and my time, and the companies are providing ME a service? No, they're providing me a sample, so I can then use my time and my circle of influence to promote their product if I like it. I take this pretty seriously. If I love something, I'll tweet about it and talk to people about it. I don't sign up for every opportunity that comes my way, because I don't want my blog to become some kind of giant tchotchke ad.

So now I'm supposed to PAY for the opportunity to write ads.

Yeah. About that? No. And I'm really exercising some restraint here, since my gut reaction was to copy and paste the email along with links to the site in question to give you all a warning, but I'm going to keep in neutral.

Don't pay to write reviews. If any money is changing hands, it should be going TO the blogger, not FROM the blogger.

Public service announcement over. I'll be blog hopping later, so see you all then!

Well, it appears I will be fat for yet another year.

I spent the bulk of the first two thirds of my life terrified of gaining even one ounce. I went to crazy extremes not to gain weight- eating one small plate of french fries or a bowl of soup...EVERY. OTHER. DAY. I supplemented my low solid intake with copious amounts of coffee, then as I got older, alcohol, and diet pills.

Fast forward a decade, three children, and a love of baking. I know there's still a skinny girl in there somewhere. But the skinny girl had to sleep a lot, and I really have no desire to spend hours on end pumping myself full of vodka, ephedrine and caffeine anymore.

It would also appear that I'm not going to be done breastfeeding anytime soon. That really limits my diet options, as it's super unhealthy for the toddler (can't even call her a baby at this point) can't consume ketones. Since I shot my metabolism in the foot years ago with my desperate desire to maintain a size zero, I just get to stay fat until I can basically starve without harming one of my children.

There's got to be a better way, really. I've tried counting calories. I've mentioned my excess weight to my doctor, who drew me a rather insulting diagram of how calories work. Um, yeah. I KNOW how calories work. I plateau at this weight while breastfeeding. As soon as the child stops breastfeeding, without adjusting ANYTHING, I lose all the weight.

There's got to be a better way to do this, BEFORE I'm done nursing, which at this point according to the toddler, may be NEVER. I'm destined to be fat forever.

Monkey T-shirt Review

Isn't this monkey guy cute? He's featured prominently on the nice, high quality T shirt I received from Tshirtprinting.net. They do fabulous custom work, and offer a ton of style options! Sweatshirts, work gear, hooded tops, and the nice, soft T-shirts.

These would be a great option for a team sporting event, or maybe a nice touch for a family reunion- matching shirts would make a totally cute touch, right?

You can check out their available styles and colors at Tshirtprinting.net They accept orders from 12 to 100,000.



I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com created by WebBizIdeas a Minneapolis SEO and Web Design firm. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255 Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising. Tomoson Product review & giveaway Disclosure.

Never cook dinner in a fog when you have food allergies in your family.

I've written this week already about the plague that has infected my family. It's knocked down child after child, and I've been kind of wandering around in a painful haze of quasi-sore throat and extreme exhaustion from the kids not really sleeping. This is compounded by my usual spring allergies- I should be dusting madly right now, but I'm still trying to shake the fuzzies out of my brain.

Yesterday Miss Angel Little Girl woke up fever free, and we thought the worst had past, until she looked at me with THAT LOOK. Her temp was 101.8 when my hubby left with her for the doctor. It hit 104 while why they were there. 104. That's the stuff nightmares are made of, folks. I stayed home with the baby, who's doing better than most of us on copious amounts of breast milk. The provision of which is making me even more foggy.

So basically at this point, I'm bordering on complete idiocy.

I'm stupid enough that I fed my child, who is allergic to tree nuts, store bought pesto. This ensued after she had a particularly bad meltdown, so now she thinks I tried to kill her because she was mouthy. This is very true. She's continued to shoot me dirty looks for multiple hours after the incident, and I thought I was doing something NICE by making two kinds of pasta. She loves veggies! I figured I'd do a primavera with some nice pesto genovese along with our usual spaghetti and sausage. Too bad the pesto had CASHEWS in it and her little face swelled up and I think I just added ten grand to the inevitable therapy bill.

Color me mother of the year. I'm hoping today goes better as little girls are happily jumping up and down and eating again, and I'm sending them off to my dad's and going to work.

Thursday Hopping!

Please leave a comment so I can follow you back, and I would LOVE it if you entered my pizza giveaway while you are here!

My house has been cursed with a plague.

It's evil. I don't know what I've done too the universe to deserve this, but I'm STILL going from ill child to ill child to run down mommy. Watching online clips of TLC's Extreme Couponing has given me self doubt about my money management skills, and I've stepped up my effort to lower our already minuscule grocery bill.

This is now taking up about 8 hours a week. The other catch is, I really need to get used to buying things I don't need for the week. I spent thirty dollars this morning- and for that I received two bottles of salad dressing, three cans of pineapple, two containers of coffee creamer that I love but never buy, two bottles of alfredo sauce, two containers of sour cream, a big bottle of body wash, 3 containers of Crystal Light, 3 mangoes, 2 boxes of simply gogurt (no hfcs, also no Scooby on the label. This produced a meltdown)1 box of triscuits pepper crackers, 2 pounds of sausage. Not a bad haul. The totals prior to all the discounts came to $95. Triscuit dollar of one coupon is on their facebook page.

I learned that if I want any of the Freebies from CVS I probably need to go at 8 am Sunday morning, and that Tuesday is NOT the day for me to go to Weis. Weis evidently offers a senior discount of 5% on groceries for the above 55 set- the place was jam packed, wall to wall, with people with multiple carts of groceries. I had forgotten the option to bring a grandparent...it appears that many people did not, however. I wonder about the ethics of this. Is it unethical to take your mom shopping so you can snag her sweet 5 percent off?

I don't think I'll be partaking in this trend.

CVS was out of two out of three things I'd gone in for, and I was slightly aggravated because I spent probably three post-childcare hours matching coupon to deal. Oh well, my fault for being lazy and taking all THREE hours I got of sleep Sunday morning. I know better now!

Better luck next week!

Blog Hopping

Hey, thanks for stopping by...leave me a linky so I can follow you back!
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An Open Letter to Idiot Advertisers Who Apparently Use Their College Education to Wipe Their Collective Hoohahs.

Dear Car and Driver, (and any other stupid subscription service that sends out idiot things.)

You sent me a letter. The letter had "SECOND NOTICE" stamped all over the front. I opened it up, of course, quickly, wondering if I'd actually forgotten to pay a bill. This was, of course, the full intention of your letter, which was simply a pathetic attempt to get me to purchase your magazine at a SPECIAL!!!!! DISCOUNTED!!!!RATE!!!!!!!

I didn't forget to pay you. Your magazine is expensive, overrated,and you make millions of dollars on the advertising you fill the pages with. You just made me look like an ass in front of my mail lady, who happens to be my next door neighbor. I pay my bills. Just because you sent me a letter with ONE BIG OPTION-YES!!! SIGN ME UP!!! and I didn't respond, doesn't mean you get to mail-stalk me with dozens of harassing and tree killing envelopes intended to make me look like a deadbeat.

You can take your crappy, aggressive, evil marketing strategy and shove it up your, well, no need to go there, right? Why not try following me on twitter? I'll follow you back, and then you can tweet me your ads. I still won't be interested, but at least no trees will have died in the making of this unwanted ad.

Sincerely and thanks!

Are you a bzz agent?

I am.

I kind of gave it up for a while because the first sample I got was kind of cheesy, and it just didn't seem to be worth the time involved to review a couple of packets of hair cream. I completed the job, of course, because when I take on a job, I do it, but never bothered to answer another request for reviews.

I changed my mind when I got a review request from Covergirl the other day...it couldn't hurt to give it another shot. My beauty budget has sunk from Sephora to clearance Tar-jay with each passing baby, so the chance to try the new Naturaluxe foundation I've been coveting without forking over a ten spot.

This is what they sent me...yes, those are full size samples...I can't wait to try it!

I can't wait to see how it is!

Free Candy Deal at Walgreens

Buy 2 Starburst Jelly Bean Eggs $0.75 each
Use $0.50/2 – Skittles or Starburst candy – (smartsource.com)printable

And Use $1.00/2 Skittles, Starburst, Life Savers or Hubba Bubba Easter Item Walgreens April Booklet
Final Price: Free

Thanks Cindy for the deal idea!

Freschetta Pizza. Yummy Yum Yum! a Giveaway!

Is there such a thing as bad pizza? Of course there is! There's bland, flavorless, soggy, icky. There's low quality toppings, too many toppings, too few. Then there's frozen pizza. I'm not usually a big advocate for frozen slices- I make handmade dough, age it for days in the fridge, and carefully top it for pennies.

Freschetta may have changed my mind on frozen pies. They sent me a lovely review package- six sturdy containers, along with coupons for two products to try- the Simply Inspired line, and the nice, crispy By The Slice line.

I think I ran to the store. We selected a Hawaiian Style Simply Inspired Pizza, and a six Cheese By the Slice. The store only had three of the varieties of the pizza By the Slice, and I would have liked it better if there was a meat only option, like pepperoni and sausage. There wasn't. The closest slice that would suit my finicky taster was the plain- so that's what I chose.


It was yummy! The crust was surprisingly delicious and pleasantly crunchy out of the microwave. It has just the right amount of robust sauce, and the cheese is perfect. I hate when you get a slice of pizza and an oily landslide of poor quality cheese just oozes right off. Freschetta's By the Slice is delicious, although you should bring a salad or another snack to go with it to make a full meal. Altogether, though, it's a nice, fresh slice of pizza with an appealing taste and aroma.

You can sign up for coupons here.


The Simply Inspired pizza I would definitely spend money on. Thin crust, crispy pizza is my absolute favorite, and it had just the right amount of Canadian bacon, pineapples, and smoky bacon for a very reasonable calorie lode. Since I'm a bit of a bacon-o-phile, I was a little disappointed in the bacon bits. I would prefer large chunks of crunchy pork fat- these were the smaller ones you would put on a salad, but very plentiful and flavorful.

Buy It: You can find many of Freschetta's selections in your grocer's freezer.

Win It: Freschetta is offering a set of three food storage containers (these are very cool) and a coupon for a free By the Slice pizza slice. To enter to win visit Freschetta and tell me what you think of their By the Slice flavor varieties. You must be a PUBLIC GFC follower to win.

For an extra entry...share this giveaway on your facebook wall or twitter, or stumble it. You can share once a day for an extra entry each day. Please leave a link for confirmation. Giveaway ends 4/27/11.
Rules:
You must be 18 or older, resident of the US, to win. Winner MUST leave some form of contact information in each entry or on Blogger profile, and respond within 48 hours or a new winner will be chosen. Prize ships direct from Freschetta.


Full disclosure- Freschetta sent me pizza and food containers to facilitate this review. All opinions are my own.

I just wanted to take a minute to let all of you know that I DO have a filter.

I was up at five am. This is highly unusual for me, normally I'm just going to sleep, but I had to complete my good deed for the day...a LONG car ride.

I couldn't go back to sleep when I got home. Too much coffee. Very stupid.

So, I figured I would take a minute and make my eldest darling daughter a nice, hot breakfast- dippy eggs with sea salt and cracked pepper, whole wheat pancakes, turkey sausage and milk.

It ended badly-tears on her part, dismay at the general degradation of society as a whole on mine, and the whole story would make a pretty funny blog post. You don't get to hear it, though. She asked me not to write about it. So, no preteen angst sharing today!

I'm just going to sip my third cup of coffee, very quietly, and visit everyone else's writing for the day. Pizza giveaway to get posted tonight or tomorrow!

Great deals at CVS today!

I got all this for $4.24 today!

Here's how.
From CVS circular- $1.66 each: Kellogg's Rice Krispies, Corn Flakes, Raisin Bran.
From Kellogg's.com $.70 off one raisin bran, printed two. $1.00 off two Rice Krispies, Printed one. Limit 4 per customer.

Choose any candy bar or beverage for FREE up to $2 by going here.

They were nice enough to give me two four dollar off twenty coupons as I checked out...I foresee stopping back to pick up Easter basket fixings tomorrow with a stack of coupons! Yay!

Hey, Hoppers!

Please LEAVE YOUR LINK below. If you don't leave a link, and it's not easy to find on your profile, I can't return your visit. That makes me sad.

Little Girls getting dressed.

I'm making crumpets today. These are a big favorite around here, and so easy to make! The nice thing is, I no longer have to get the three-almost-four year old dressed. She does it herself!

Today's outfit is very special. First, she carefully chose her underwear-Dora. Then, a pair of purple leggings that saw better days with the first child, but I keep forgetting to make disappear. A brightly colored rainbow striped sundress, which she thoughtfully covered with the black shrug from her Christmas ensemble. The final touch? Hot pink winter gloves and a purple Easter hat from the dollar store.

Fabulous.

I tell you, life doesn't get any better than this. And no, I haven't googled Rainbow Brite and shown her pictures.

Really, When Do You Shower?

I've got a lot of babies. I think three is a lot. They out number me, that's for sure, and when the add the damn dog into their shenanigans my defeat is all but certain. They're small, fearless, destructive, sweet, and I wouldn't change a thing.

Except for the fact that I look like a train wreck most days. I can't reasonably figure out a system to complete the entire getting ready process in one sitting without actually having one child murder another. Since I'm kind of partial to them all, it's not really an option, but if I were a betting kind of girl, my money would be on the small one. I'm a total cliche-the mom with the hair in the proverbial ponytail- usually covered in some little person's extraneous body fluids.

Bathing is the one thing that's really hard to accomplish. Today, I brought some toys up to their room, gated it, drew a bath, rearranged the furniture in a way that I thought they couldn't climb it, and then shouted orders down the hallway as I shaved my legs. "Don't hurt your sister! Leave her alone! Just play for five more minutes! Oh! For Pete's Sake!" Until MissAngelLittleGirl shouted that Ella was using the dresser for a stage and I ran, naked and dripping wet down the hallway, much to the delight of the dog, who thought we were now playing a game. For some reason, towels never unfold fast enough when there's a dancing emergency, and it took me all of thirty seconds to get myself covered decently enough to begin negotiations with the child that was doing an exuberant jig on top of the top of the highest chest of drawers in their room.

They saw that I had moved the furniture, and if I could do it, they could, too!

This is never good. The entire room was rearranged so that it created a reasonably slanted hill/slide of furniture, and all the bedding and most of their (clean) clothes had been mounded at the bottom. So yeah, they were climbing the furniture than sliding down it into the pile of clothes.

Little Miss actually had the nerve to complain that their slide was bumpy.

The baby intensified her dancing, squealing at the thought of my discomfort, and the subsequent snatch and cuddle scenario that was about to occur predictably. We've done this before, you know.

No children were harmed in the writing of this blog. I'm still laughing too hard to be mad- I just want to know what you do with your children while you get cleaned up? Do you just give in to the filth? Bathe after they are in bed? Get up before the chickens? Tie them to a ceiling in a cage box like the go go dancers used to perform in?

Get Out Your Credit Cards, Girls! Sephora is Having a 15 percent off sale!

You have to be a beauty insider to participate, but it's easy to sign up for.

When you get done, search "sale" in the search box...and select from items already fifty percent off, then use the code BICHIC to get 15 percent off all your orders. Sadly, I'll be sitting this sale out, as I couponed (that's totally a verb) my way through Target's clearance section last week, and I'm not going to be a beauty piggy.

The sale starts April 15 and ends April 21rst.

Snapily Review

I hate card shopping.

You go to the brightly lit store (florescent lights do nothing for my complexion) and look at rows and rows and rows of overpriced cards. Paper. There's a genre for everything! Funny! Sarcastic! Sappy! Generic! Show your emotion, appreciation, and love for the recipient, for the bargain price of 4.99 and up! They've got organic! They've got shoebox greetings! There are children crawling all over my legs as I pick up and read card after card in an attempt to make the intended recipient smile.

It's not pretty. Of course, the dollar store has more reasonably priced cards, but I still have to drive there, and wrestle two kids while I sift through row after row of missives. It's not what I'd call fun.

I recently found an alternative to the generic offerings of the local mass market retailers. Snapily,offers great 3d animated cards. You simply pick two pictures you like, along with a format, and give them a couple of days to create your masterpiece! And the price? Totally reasonable, about the same as one of those mass market cards.

Plus, I can shop from home. With gas prices being so high, that's a big deal. In addition to the already reasonable prices, Snapily is offering a Mother's day promotion. , up to fifty percent off. You simply choose the discount you wish to purchase, much like a restaurant.com gift card, and then spend the code on any of their many personalized gifts. We're talking notebooks, scrapbook pages, business cards and bookmarks. How happy would Mom be with a personalized 3D card of her darling grandchildren with a special message from them on the back?

I received one of these 3D cards for review, and it's just lovely. I wasn't super in love with envelope that came with it, but I've got something prettier on hand.

You can find Snapily on Facebook,and don't forget to check out their Mother's day discount promotion. You could get all your Mother's day shopping done right now!

I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255 Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising. Tomoson Product review & giveaway Disclosure.

Oh, My Heavens, another great sale!?!?

From my email bin, today! Remember when we hosted a giveaway? Did you miss out? Here's your second chance!

BabyBond: buy one get one FREE*

Buy a BabyBond online from Babies R Us or buybuyBABY and get a second BabyBond for FREE* !!!
Act fast... this limited time offer is only valid today 4/7/11 between 4 pm and 8 pm EST.
Oh yeah, it would be nice if you "like" us, too.

*TERMS & CONDITIONS: Customer buys one BabyBond online from Babies R Us or buybuyBABY and receives another BabyBond from Slurp & Burp LLC with only paying $10 shipping/handling. Email receipt from Babies R Us or buybuyBABY dated 4/7/11 to pr@babybondnursing.com along with your choice of BabyBond. We will invoice $10 via PayPal for shipping/handling ($15 for international shipping) and ship your FREE BabyBond once shipping/handling fees are paid. Receipt from Babies R Us or buybuyBABY must be dated 4/7/11. We must receive your receipt and choice of BabyBond between 4 pm and 8 pm EST on 4/7/11.

Inspired by Finn is having a HUGE sale today! Check them out!

One day, 40 percent off all youth jewelry.

This is huge, people. These are the necklaces that relieve teething pain around here. They are so effective, I bought myself one!
Enter code BIGSALE. Only valid on youth sizes below 16".

Python Printables Luau Party Package-review.

Favorite thing #2 about blogging- the free stuff.

I got a Python Printable Games Luau package for review through Tomoson. This is a fun little bit of goodness- you get 18 brightly colored games to print up at your discretion for a bit of island-themed fun, plus luau invitations.

The games include Survival of the Fittest, Hot Actor Trivia, Beer trivia, and a whole lot more. They're cute, well designed, and look like a lot of fun.

Expect to see some beer trivia coming to a summer birthday party near you. The website is easy to work with, and I love the fact that you can print up as many of each game as you need, rather than purchasing packages of games only to have six of something YOU WILL NEVER USE AGAIN laying around for the rest of your life.

Not that I've done that.

It's definitely got some super cute ideas.

The downside? It's kind of expensive. $19.95 plus the cost of paper and ink. I can see this being a huge time saver if you don't want to put the time and effort into googling and choosing games, and you do get A LOT of games for the cost. I also would have preferred to download the entire thing in one shot, because I'm lazy like that, but I had to download each game individually. I may have missed one or two.

All in all, though, it was a good experience, and I definitely have some new Hawaiian Luau Party Ideas for our summer gatherings!

You can find Hawaiian Luau Party Ideas here.



I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255 Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising. Tomoson Product review & giveaway Disclosure.

Am I uninspired? No, I am not. I'm proscrastinating. That doesn't count.

I just wanted to take a moment to thank those of you that keep coming by, and commenting, and let you know how much I enjoy your work.

These are quality blogs, people
XLMIC at Taking It On- She's funny, she's smart, she's been photographed with Fidel Castro, and she's off to Paris right now. Am I jealous? Yes, I am!

Suze over at Suze Vinton photography. Um, hello! look at those pictures and crafts! I'm totally going to figure out how to make that apron since I'm a whole foot taller than she is!! Crafts, giveaways, good stuff. (She's really good at explaining how ribbons work.) Two separate blogs there, people, don't miss out on one of the links!

Really pretty necklace giveaway here.

LaVonne over at long wait has great thoughts on life. She always makes me think, yeah, I should get on that, too. Like going away for a weekend with my husband, in, I don't know, ten, fifteen years. I'm kidding. This is definitely going to happen when the baby gives up nursing.

Mrs. Tuna makes me laugh. And, the girl can cook. It's a win-win.

More blogger spotlights to come. You all rock!