A few weeks ago I won a giveaway for a $30 Gift Certificate to Sweetie Pie Baby Boutique.
You can find out more about my winnings in the original post: Wanna Stand Next to Me?.
I was very excited to win this prize because Sweetie Pie Baby Boutique sells organic clothing. Ever since my daughter has been having skin problems, I was wondering if organic clothing would make a difference.
Continue Reading……
I went to Wal-Mart tonight with the kids. I needed some cheap rugs for my laundry room and was kind of desperate to get out of the house. We had a lovely dinner at Taco Bell where we froze while eating our tacos. The good news is that Jake ate 2 whole tacos!
Anyhoo…then we made our way to Wal-Mart, or should I say “Planet Wal-Mart”? You could seriously live in this store. It is the ’super’ kind and had the following things INSIDE the store (like you would never have to leave):
And considering they are your typical Wal-Mart PLUS a full blown grocery store, it seriously could be its own planet!
Too bad their bathrooms are the slums……
In the next few days we are going to be running a giveaway for a cookie bouquet basket from Cookies by Design.
I will have all the details and the official entry post up soon, but I’m so excited I just wanted to let everyone know to be on the lookout for it.
Here is a photo of the basket we will be giving away (I’m still waiting on all the specifics, but this is close):
Hungry?
Don’t forget to subscribe to our updates so you don’t miss the contest announcement!
Yesterday, I had this conversation with Olivia while I was in the shower.
Me: “Olivia, I can’t hear you, is this an emergency?”
Olivia: “YES! My sleep mask fell in the toilet!”
Me: “Did you get it out or flush it?”
Olivia: “No, I got it.”
Me: “Well, put it in the sink. Did it fall in before or after you went to the bathroom?”
Olivia: “I already put it in the sink. I don’t know when it fell off - it was just in there when I stood up!”
Can I go back to bed? I am NOT ready for parenting.
I’ve never really considered men’s jewelry aside from a watch, as a gift for my husband or any man I know. I realize that some men must wear this kind of stuff, otherwise it wouldn’t be sold, but I don’t know any who would and don’t believe I’ve ever seen anyone who does.
In general that ring is not too awful or tacky but you still would have to pay my husband a whole lot of money to be seen wearing any ring other than his wedding ring.
Speaking of rings, do you know any men who still wear their high school or college rings?
I broke down and ordered myself a laptop. Being a blogging addict, I want to be able to stay connected but not stuck at my desk so a laptop was the natural way to go, especially considering we have a wireless network.
I always thought that laptops were ultra-expensive even now-a-days with the prices of computers dropping way down, laptops still seemed costly.
On a whim, however, I went to Dell.com to see what they had and I discovered happiness….
The Dell Vostro 1000 starts at $399! Yup, only $399. And for that $399 you actually get a lot. That is, unless you want to run the Space Station off it, but for everyday tasks, it is more than enough. I did make a few upgrades since I was forced to get Windows Vista (memory hog I’ve heard so I upgraded to 2GB RAM) and want to make sure I have enough range on my wireless network to cover inside and outside of the house (so I got wireless-N instead of wireless-G). I also upgraded the battery to double the run time ($15 more). My final price with tax was $516 and that included free shipping.
I can’t wait to get it and sit outside on my deck and blog, blog, blog (I think I just invented a new verb)!
BTW, I had to order the Vostro 1000 through the “Small Business” division of Dell because they do not sell it in the “Home” division and the “Home” ones didn’t start nearly as low priced.
We are in the midst of our weekly How-To Series about how to participate in FREE PAID SURVEYS. There have been other detailed articles written so far which you can find on our Free Paid Survey How-To Series page.
The GlobalTestMarket Consumer Panel has been around a long time and are one of the largest and most reputable I’ve come across. It should be one of the first ones you join in your foray into free paid surveys.
How to join?
How often do they send surveys?
I get at least a few surveys a week, sometimes I get more than one a day. I qualify for maybe 1/4 to 1/3 of them and even if you do not qualify I believe you get 5 points for trying.
As always, your experience may differ based upon your demographics but overall I believe them to be quite consistent with sending surveys.
What do I get for taking the surveys?
GlobalTestMarket pays in what they call “marketpoints” and the average survey is from 5-50 points. 5 points if you don’t qualify and 50 if you do. Although some surveys are worth much more. Each point is worth .5 cents, so a 50 point survey gets you $2.50. The 50 point surveys are not really that long and are well worth the $2.50 and you get .25 cents even if you don’t qualify. You can redeem your points once you reach 1,000, which ends up being $50. It does take a few weeks or more to get your check once you redeem your points but it will come and I’ve had no problems cashing their checks.
Synopsis
GlobalTestMarket is a worldwide survey company that is legitimate and consistently sends surveys and payouts. In 2007 alone they awarded over $7,000,000 to their panelists. I recommend them highly and have not had a single problem with GlobalTestMarket in the few years I have been a member. My Mom is also a member and she was shocked to learn she had accrued enough points to cash out for $50 just the other day.
Definitely don’t miss out on your opportunity to sign up for GlobalTestMarket.
I wanted to get a picture of Jake with his cool new haircut.
Just a nice smiling picture.
Here is the first shot I ended up with:
As usual, the kid can’t keep his eyes open when he smiles.
So I tried again..
I’ve mentioned before that we recently painted my daughter’s room, and that we painted it pink…pink on pink.
Here are a couple of photos, we love the way it turned out!
during painting
Guess who got stuck doing the taping?
finished product
Yes, even the ceiling fan is pink, er…I mean light red!
(By the way, the whole room isn’t striped, just that one wall)
If you are in the market for a Britax Car Seat, The Land of Nod has a deal going with free shipping and a FREE $25 gift card with purchase.
Ends July 1, 2008
Sign up for their newsletter and receive a coupon by mail for a FREE full-size bottle of Country Bob’s All Purpose Sauce.
The coupon does come, I got it recently.
Oh and the sauce is pretty good!
I have pretty much worked since I was 15, at least when I wasn’t going to school. After college in 1995 (gasp) I started working a full time professional job and did that until November 2007. That is when the hard work really began.
In November 2007, right before the birth of my daughter, I became a stay at home mom. Basically it is everything I thought it would be, but it certainly has presented some challenges that I never expected.
First, I can no longer use “a hard day at work” as an excuse for my behavior. Sure, full time mommy is not easy, but seriously - I don’t have to deal with anyone else except 2 people that I have complete and total control over (snort). But at least I no longer have to deal with clients and weather and deadlines and all the rest of the stuff that goes along with it.
Second, at the end of the day there is no longing to “finally get to see my kids,” it is all about trying to get Daddy to take them so I can have a few minutes of peace. Or at least go to the bathroom - finally.
Also, there is an extreme lack of adult interaction and conversation. It’s no wonder so many of us have taken to our computers and created a world of blogging friends.
And finally (and I say finally for the purpose of this post…I could go on for days) there are a number of words that describe bodily functions that I never would have even spelled out loud in the past that now get used practically hourly in my vocabulary.
Here are a few other observations I have made since becoming a stay at home mom:
All in all, though, I think I’m adapting pretty well. My kids get outside as much as possible, we visit parks and have even ventured out to Chuck E. Cheese. They haven’t made any complaints about my presence in the house and I enjoy that my job is taking care of my kids.
If I could only get the stains out of my shirts and get Abby to stop pulling my hair, then it would almost be perfect!
This post was written as an essay for entry into a Makeover contest where you can ENTER TO WIN a FREE $10,000 makeover from Artefill! Sign-up and entry are easy and the essay just has to be 500 words or less about change in your life. You must be 35 or older though! We’ve all experienced change, go write about it for a chance to win a makeover.
We decided to spend our “stimulus refund” on enlarging our patio, adding a sidewalk to the backyard, and a putting in a pad for a shed. We are one of those families ignoring the current state of rising prices and spending our rebate on something we don’t actually need. Not really a frugal decision but one we are quite happy with.
Below are some photos that show some of the progress.
Make sure you check out all of them, my son has invented a unique past-time!
This weeks blurb is about:
My Life at Ninety: Looking Back and Moving On.
My Life at Ninety is the personal blog of “Grandma Julie” and contains the wisdom, experience and stories of a neat lady.
From her “about me”:
I am 90. A grandma so many times over. To borrow a line from a song, I have lived my life with no regrets. Not all of my life is a bed of roses. The joys that came into my life made me thank God I am alive. The pains I went through made me all the more want to savor the joys of living.
Grandma Julie is one cool lady! Her blog is eloquently and beautifully written and contains the wisdom of her years. I love the stories from when she was younger and her perceptions of today. Go visit Grandma Julie at My Life at Ninety: Looking Back and Moving On and get lost in the nostalgia and marvel at the life experiences. You’ll be drawn in to her world and not want to leave!
Have you ever had one of those moments with your kids where you stop and look and are hit with the reality that time passes way too fast?
Today I put Abby in her high chair to give her some of her favorite snack, some blueberries, and I turned and looked at her and noticed how much higher she sits in the seat. I also noticed how much more steady she was sitting up instead of leaning to one side like she seemed to do just yesterday.
And now as she sits up in her bouncer that she is way too big for, and leans over the side and plays with the carpet I realize that she is almost 7 months old. Soon her main goal will be to crawl and then walk and then run away from me rather than be held by me. I’ve already started to notice a bit more independence when she plays on the floor with her toys, or lets someone else besides Mom entertain her.
As much as she has NOT been an easy baby, I’m pretty sure I’m going to miss her being a baby. I am going to miss the adorable way she shakes her hands even when she doesn’t have a rattle in them, almost like she’s testing to see if there is anything there and the way she imitates me when I blow raspberries in the air at her or squeal.
I’m not usually this deep and introspective, as you could probably tell, but this morning it really hit me hard. We have a little chant around here that goes something like this:
“no more babies”
“no more babies”
“we don’t want, no more babies”
My son and I chant that at Abby when she is particularly crabby (you know, most days) and although we mean it, and she is our “last” baby (not kidding, no way, no how, no more), I think there will always be a part of me that will yearn for, if not another baby, the days when mine were babies.
In the end, this post really did end up being an “Accidental Mommy moment” because I never would have thought I’d experience these kinds of thoughts over anything other than a cat.
I have no idea what is going on in this picture, but I actually like not knowing. It’s like they have a secret joke or something fun they were sharing that only they know about.
I have this afghan that my Mom made that I keep on the back of our couch in our living room. It’s the middle of summer plus I like that afghan to remain where I put it, on the back of the couch.
Inevitably, Jake removes it and I find it in a pile on the couch or the floor.
Today I found it that way again and our conversation went as such:
Me: “Jake, I told you to leave the afghan alone.”
Jake: “I didn’t do it.”
Me: “Well then who did?”
Jake: “I didn’t do it.”
Me: “You must have.”
Jake: “Pablo did it.”
Oh, Pablo did it.
By now you should be wondering who Pablo is.
He is one of the characters on The Backyardigans.
So, in trouble for not telling the truth is balanced out by extreme creativity?
What do you think?
We are giving away a $10 Best Buy gift card to one very lucky person (and rest assured I myself cannot enter) who simply does the following:
HOW TO ENTER
It’s pretty easy!
EARN ADDITIONAL ENTRIES
You can earn an additional entry for each of the following activities:
Please make a separate comment for each additional entry and be specific as to what you did to earn the entry in your comment.
Any comments that simply say “enter me” or something like that will not count. Please indicate that you have or are already subscribed to our emails.
Entries will be received until Wednesday July 11, 2008 at NOON Central Time and is open to US and Canada. Winner will be chosen at random by Random.org.
Good luck!
