Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Christmas

Well posts have been a bit slow around here, I cut off the tip off my index finger - not all off it but enofe to seriously hamper my ability to type - try it some time, typing without your index finger, it sucks LOL. I am still typing without it but at least it does not hurt as badly now.
Our Christmas was great, my family was trilled with all my winnings, my mom loved her two book Cd's. My young's just loved her piggy key chain, her papoose for her baby in bright pink,  her ballet puppet, and her bag with amazingly sweet faces on it. My oldest loved her Cat book. My husband got some all to yummy hot sauce. Considering I did not start entering contests until the summer I got allot off my Christmas gifts this way. I intend to start right away with putting allot of my winnings aside for birthday and Christmas gifts this year - see if I can have a very cheep year next year, would be so nice! I am going to make a chart and mark off who I have got something for so as I win things I know who is left, should work well, and be very efficient/effective - what I did learn is to not have my list on a loose piece of paper. I am going to put it in my Mom's diary that I won just last week (have not posted about it yet). It will be my own little contest with myself to see if I can will all my Christmas stuff, with the exception off a couple for my kids of course. Do any of you do this?

Monday, December 20, 2010

My Secret Santa arrived!

Well on Friday my package from my Secret Santa present arrived, first of all my buddy ended up being Katie from concertkatie.blogspot.com she has a great blog all about her concerts that she goes to (she goes to a lot of them!) and photo taking, scrap booking ect. Go check her out. So my gift was one of my favorite things, bath goodies, two Christmas tree bath bombs, three tiny wash cloths that looked like candy! and a soap that also looks like a candy, very unique, and not anything that I had ever seen before. I can not wait to use the bath bombs, I am just finishing a three day work week, and then I will be soaking in a nice bath tonight :)  Thanks so much Katie - so appreciated, believe me, I do not get a lot of bath stuff and I just love it!

Friday, December 3, 2010

Dewey's Nine Lives

A book came in the mail the other day, that I was hoping would come in time for Christmas. I wanted to win this so badly for my animal loving daughter. She will just love this book, then I will sneak it out of her hoard of books and read it to :) It looks amazing, and uplifting. I won it from Nolie at  http://www.noliesplace.com/ she made my day with that e-mail! This cat was a rescue, and and lives in the town library who goes on to inspire the entire town and beyond. My daughter often looks on the darker side, and I think that this book might help her to look at things a little lighter. I look forward to her putting a review on her hopefully after Christmas. But for now I just wanted to post that this great book is here and you can get it on Amazon or at your book store, a great Christmas gift for sure!




Friday, November 12, 2010

Cupcake Necklace

My daughter is having a cupcake themed birthday party soon and when I won a gift certificate to BeatBlack.etsy.com I knew that I had to get this to sweet/grumpy cupcake for her to wear to her party. It came a couple weeks ago but I have been working crazy hours and have not had time to update my blog. The amazing thing about this, is it came all wrapped up for her, with a bow and sweets inside! She was just thrilled. She is not allowed to wear it yet but is so excited and sadly is not allowed to be on my blog (I am one of "those" parents LOL) so I am modeling it but it is just adorable. My older daughter wants the Brain Matter necklace badly - it suits her! Her is a picture of the cupcake on my neck, not the birthday girl, it will look even sweeter on on soon to be 6 year old, but I will have to do, thanks so much Sarah from http://www.beatblack.com/blog.html for this lovely necklace for my lovely birthday girl - she will cherish it and it will be the hit of the party I am sure!



Wednesday, October 27, 2010

hairykids

I won a Hairy Kids set from The Spilt Milk Moms ages ago and it did not arrive, I really stewed over contacting them after a very bad result from contacting another blog about something not arriving - I finally did perhaps on Sunday, could even have been Monday, they were SO gracious, and polite to me. I was honestly floored by how they treated me after my last experience with this sort of thing.  Anyway. Today this lovely little package came from hairykids, they are from  Salt Spring Island, which is just a Island hop from where I live, a lovely little art community - very nice. These are just so nice - they smell amazing. My oldest daughter is already asking where we can buy them - I am hoping I can buy them in a store, and not just online, I have to go and find that out myself :) They have smells like Lemonade, Tropical, Unscented, and Seaside.  My youngest was our lucky guinea pig tonight and will give a little blurb in a second here - but first I have to say my bit, she smell like candy - honestly, this stuff has nothing  in it to harm my lovely little girl, nothing toxic (there is a huge list of what you do not want on your child and what they do not have on the sheet that it comes with- look on the web site!) http://www.hairykids.ca/  She used the Tropical scent, she used it all, bubble bath, shampoo and conditioner. They used the tiniest about of bubble bath and had a massive amount of long lasting bubbles. My husband was amazed at how easily the shampoo and conditioner washed out of her long curly hair, and really she smells like candy. now in her words:
"it was very smooth, and it smelled goooooooood. The bubbles were HUGE, they almost went over my legs. The shampoo is great, I loved it, it is white but that is fine. The conditioner is good to.And I love how I smell :) I will use this again and again and again.....I think I will try the other smells to. " My youngest, aged 5

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Chocolate Yum!

I had a huge box of Nestle chocolate come in my mailbox the other day - it is already half gone. We are just loving the pre Halloween treat, thanks Jessica from all my family who each got a favorite in the box. There are Smarties, Kit Kat, Coffee Crisp, and Aero - so we are all covered :) You can look up Nestle at
http://www.nestle.ca/ to see what other goodies they may have for you or pop off to your grocery store and buy the big 94 bar pack that I got to sample - you won't be sorry. OR you could be more noble than I and give them out to the nice little kids coming to your door on the 31st! My kids will be a witch and a veterinarian - if you happen to see them, they love Smarties and Kit Kat's!

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Ficklets eyeglass Jewelry

My daughter get her Ficklets Eyeglass Jewelry a couple weeks ago and I have meant to post about it, but between the stomach bug going threw out home, and thanksgiving have not had time. She put them on her glasses and honestly has not taken one or the other pair off since. She got the Ballet Slippers and the Jewel Butterfly's.  Everywhere this child goes people comment - kids and adults want to know where she got them, are they a part of here glasses, can they get some to LOL, she is a trend setter in this town! If I had business cards for Flicklets I could make them a fortune I tell you! Truly http://ficklets.com/ this is the coolest thing for kids glasses ever! She is in LOVE and wants more!  My daughter is pretty outgoing and loves to show people new things, she loves attention and I tell you things brings her attention.  The pictures I took did not do the jewelry justice so PLEASE go look at the site - they are SO worth the money p- if you have a child with glasses order some, really I am telling people they should get things but if you must wear glasses (I did as a kid and still do, both my girls do) then at least you should look cool. They have a piece for everyone, animals, sports, just jewels, you name it they have it. Even some movie stars are getting them for their kids now apparently!  So worth the $$$ In my opinion, and we will be getting her more.

Saturday, October 9, 2010

The Bourne Objective

My mom loves to listen to Audio books while she drives - just loves it! She is utterly tone def which is part of it, and part of it is she is a avid reader with a social life of a teenager, so her car is a great way for her to get some book time in, if that makes sense. I have been trying to win her some Audio books for Christmas to get her a stash for the year. I won her The Bourne Objective by Robert Ludlum, it is 12 Cd's  and 14.5 hours long ,so should keep even her occupied for a bit. it is read by Scott Sowers.  This is a part of a series of books, The Bourne Identity, The Bourne Supremacy, and The Bourne Ultimatum  I have seen one of movies and loved it, so I am sure she will love the book, but will have to wait until Christmas to let you know about it :)  I won this from Deb at DebsHere.

An Observation of My Winnings

On the 18th of Sept or thereabouts I stopped using my email as my full e-mail and started breaking it up as is advised to stop spam, at that point, I seemed to stop my winning steak on winning blog contents as well. So on the 6th of Oct, when it dawned on my that this may be why I was no longer winning (it also had occurred to me that I had posted a blog about my luck and that may be why to) I stopped with the space and the typed out AT and DOT and went back to the spam drawing out e-mail, well on the seventh and today I have won -not sure at all if it proves a thing, but it is really interesting for sure, to me at least. I for one with keep my spam LOL. I just delete all those RRussian women that want me, it is easy enough to do :) I will have to wait and see if this carries on but it sure is interesting. The Sukey thing is that there was one thing in this dry spell, in fact the ONLY blog contest I have ever really ever tried to win, where I have done every single thing asked that I could do and I was doing this e-mail address now that I suspect did not work. It was for these super cool shoes that my youngest would sell her left leg for LOL, they are like a animal, three dimensional, crazy looking dog shoes (well the ones she loved were dogs) she wanted them so badly. I am sure I probably would not have won them anyway, but I would have loved to have for her. She would have worn them to the a pulp!

Sunday, October 3, 2010

Piggy Keychain

I got this lovely e-mail from Paige telling me that although I had not won her giveaway the etsy owner loved what I had posted about my daughter falling in love with the piggy key chain on her Etsy shop http://www.etsy.com/shop/snis so she decided to send her that key chain! Now this is not just from Canada or the States either, it is all the way from Serbia! It came this week, and under top secret tactics we picked it up from the post office and got it home (she will  get her beloved piggy for Christmas) So you can see how sweet this thing is here is a picture:
Now this little girl of mine, is five, and has loved pigs since she could talk. She has been collecting them since she was two. She stopped eating pork oh when she was perhaps three and a half when her sister told her what it was, then started telling us that her pigs did not like us eating them - we don't eat pork at home anymore :)  She will be thrilled with this piggy!

Friday, September 24, 2010

Beryl:A Pig's Tale book Review

Here is another guest post from my five year old who will review the best book we have read in her life - and one of the best books I have read to be honest it is just lovely and sweet, and sad all the things I look for in a good book. It is by Jane Simmons and it is honestly not written with the average 5 year old in mind but my 5 year old is pig mad and this book is all about two pigs, a "pork pig" and a "wild pig" who become best friends and there adventures. It is 215 pages long and full of the most enchanting pictures you will ever see!

From My youngest:
Beryl is cute and kind and loving. I loved this book. I have read it twice with my mom.

This book was read by us in two days the first time, then she handed it over to her Grandma to read! And she actually did (amazing really! she enjoyed it as well) and now we are re-reading it more slowly to enjoy it again, truly this is a magical book, full of adventure, and life. I highly recommend it for the 7-10 year old set. But honestly I was hard pressed not to pick it up when my daughter was asleep and read it myself and  Grandma could not put it down either!

Allison Strine Designs

Today my Ladybird Pendant came in the mail, I was so excited to win this from Liv Lane's blog at: http://www.choosingbeauty.com/ her blog is wonderful - full of happiness and good will :) go check it out, it will put a smile on your face for sure, it does for me every time I go there.  So onto my pendent! It is a lovely lady in her rain boots with her wand that I would call magic LOL and on the other side it says  "she did not know what she could do until she got off her ass and did it"  so great! I will wear it with pride, and love turning it over to surprise people when they ask me about the little lady it is very funny, and inspirational. It is true, if you do not get up and just do it, you never know what you can do. I have tried to put a picture in as I always do and for some reason my blog is not taking my picture link... not sure why but please go check out Allisons site - she has the most amazing jewelry and I will try again (or my computer geek hubby will I should say)  http://www.alisonstrine.com/

Private Audio Book arrived

My mom loves to listen to audio books in her car while she drives, she lives about an hour from the "big city" and us and drives allot, so this is how she passes the time. She also has no "ear" for music. So I have entered a few contests thinking I would get her a couple of these for Christmas, well this was one I won for her. She will love it I think, it is about Jack Morgan, a Helicopter Pilot who runs a PI company that branches all around the globe.It has murder, suspense, and a workplace love affair :) she will love it I think. Hopefully she can keep her eyes on the road at the same time, and remember not to listen to it while my kids are in the car LOL
.

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Kimochis Review

My daughters are the proud new owners of Cloud, the Happy, sad, angry, happy Kimochi who lives in the big sky :) If you have not heard of these lovely little guys - there is Cloud, Bug, Huggtopus, Cat, and Lovey Dove each one represents different emotions. They come with a book that tells you about not only your Kimochi but all of them so you get a great sense of their world - it is just like my girls world, sometimes hurtful, sometimes sad, sometimes volatile and often full of forgiveness. These little guys are just lovely they are so soft and the perfect size for my five year old who has ADHD and has such a hard time with boundaries and space as well as knowing when to say what. We have already identified Huggtopus as the one for her, she is all smiles and hugs, she is sometimes carried away by her personality and strength that can be a little overbearing, she needs to work on respecting others boundaries :) Much like my little one - she already wants this purple one for Christmas!
My nine year old identifies more with Bug, he is thoughtful and cautious he is a great conversationalist and is known to talk himself and others out of any given situation. He is afraid of change which being a Caterpillar is a problem :) He secretly dreams of flying. She is not as taken with her cloud as my five year old who has not put him down in two days - really, and on the street today three people stopped her to ask what he was! She really enjoyed letting them know :)  You can find these wonderful creatures that your child will just adore at:
http://www.kimochis.com/

Secret Santa

So I have signed up to do this very fun sounding secret Santa blog swap threw one of my favorite blogs, I am Wicked Cheap - http://iamwickedcheap.com/2010/09/22/fyi-for-bloggers-secret-santa-gift-exchange/  please go check it out and sign up if you have a blog it looks like so much fun. I went to  boarding school for a year and at Christmas we had a secret Santa that we left goodies for - it left a huge warm spot in my heart, I do it for a neighbour some years and every year or two one of my girls will do it if they have a very close friend - leave treats outside a friends door each night for them to find in the morning, or because we home school in the day for them to find when they come home from school or activities in the afternoon. It is always such fun to come by on Christmas a revel our self :) So when this came up on  I am Wicked Cheep's site I had to do it - it is almost no money obligation, only $15 for the gift, and I am really hoping that they pair up countries Canadians with Canadians so I do not have to pay so much in shipping etc - Totally love the idea of getting a nice surprise from a (hopefully) thoughtful woman as my husband, love him I do, is not a great gift giver, I often get a very utilitarian, cheap gift LOL, we do not have allot of money, so I get the cheap part, but I would love to see some thought put into it :)  Last year he did good guy- after 10 years of marriage!  So go check it out, sign up and lets all see what sweet things we can do for each other! Women are just better at it (usually) some of you are lucky I admit.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Crocheted Humpty Dumpty

Today in my mailbox came a crocheted Humpy Dumpty. My youngest daughter became the recipient of this little guy, so she's going to write the review. Here goes:

I had a really fun time with him. I like my Humpty Dumpty more than I like Hobbes. I like Humpty Dumpy more than I like our house. I like his pants. I really like the pink on him.

Clearly she's a girl of many words. It's funny because she won't stop talking usually except when I'd like her to say something. Anyways, The Humpty Dumpty was made by Clare Tovey, who has a web site: http://www.clare-tovey.com/. My daughter has taken quite a liking to him, insisting that we bring him out on our excursions so that he can see the world.

Here is a photo:

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Sweat and Snack Kit

The Post Man brought one of the biggest boxes to enter my home outside of Christmas time ever today, it caused a ruckus like nobodies business! What is ended up being, once we got into it was my Sweat and Snack Kit from Rice Thins and Jo-Ann James, founder of Vital Steps Inc. It came with the most amazing snacks ever - these rice crackers are so good, we opened the Salt and Pepper, my favorite flavor these days, and ate them (my two girls and I) So then we cracked open the work out kit to burn off the calories. We jumped rope with the coolest jump rope you have ever seen, it count calories, miles and kilometers!! Then we used the Yoga Mat with the workout included and I helped my oldest daughter figure out the resistance bands, she loved them. We are going to get the Stability Ball blown up tonight, should be great fun! It is just a wonderful pack, including a bag to hold it all and another bag for the yoga mat. I had to put the rice crackers out of my own reach, they are just to good. They come in Salt and Pepper, Sour Cream and Onion and Sweet Mesquite Barbecue.  you can find out all the info about them at kraftcanada.com

Uglee Pens

Well they arrived! I had thought, after e-mailing the blog - oh weeks ago and not hearing back and not seeing my pens in the mail that they were not coming, not a big deal really three little pens but it did bug me that the blog owner did not even respond to my e-mail. Well this week they showed up! They are very strange/cool pens. They write like silk, it is rare to write with a pen that smooth  and they feel like a very cheap pen - that sounds awful, what I mean is they do not feel high end, not sure what they cost. Now the pen is covered in the squishy plastic, to make you hold it properly, I love it, how it makes me hold it and that it is soft - BUT I could see that as a kid who had major sensory issues I would not have touched it - my oldest touched it and I kid you not said "hey mom, it feels like boogers!" it is sort of sticky and squishy so ya, I see where she is coming from LOL. I really like these pens and if they are in my budget they will be my new usual pens - they are NICE!!! They are black ink to which I love.  Sorry no picture this time, they got taken too fast!
www.ugleepen.com

Monday, September 13, 2010

My "mojo"

Recently someone from another blog commented on my lucky "mojo" with regards to all my blog wins, I wanted to say something about that, I started to blog to document my starting off on this road of doing contests mainly and then it very quickly started going down the blog contest road to. Now I would say I enter 80% blog contests and 20% Canadian sweepstakes, and essay type contests, I really like those, the ones your write in for - the $100 gift card for Canadian Tire was one of those. I learned very quickly that I was not winning any sweepstakes (that I could see anyway) and within a week of seriously entering blogs I was winning. Now I enter ALOT of blog contests, I spend about two hours each morning and another two each evening, and that is all I do - enter, enter, enter - so for those wondering - that is why I am winning so many. I am not sure this will carry on forever - I would LOVE to win most if not all of my extended family Christmas gifts this way - but who knows, I am finding a decent amount do not show up to LOL. After Christmas I may slow down, stop, who knows I am having a blast right now and that is what matters :) I do my morning blog entries while my kids are asleep and my evening entries while DH has them so I can have a much needed break.  There - explained :) I feel better, I was feeling guilty of all things LOL.

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Lolligag Bag Win

My super cute Lolligag (limited edition no less!) bag came this week. It is the sweetest thing, I am going to give it to my oldest daughter for one of her Christmas gifts. She will just love it. It is the perfect size for her to take to some of her classes, or to her friends houses filled with all the things she "needs" to take along. You can find Lolligag at : http://www.lolligagworld.com/ or at http://www.lolligagworld.blogspot.com/  They have they sweetest bags you have ever seen, shirts, umbrellas, some undies that I am hoping will be in my stocking this year (Santa take note ;) and even bedding and other clothing! Go and check them out - here is my daughters bag - pretty cool isn't it? Bet you want one :)

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Stash Momma

So over on Stash Momma they are having the first ever Psychedelic Sunday - here is the link
http://stashmama.blogspot.com/2010/09/psychedelic-sundays-1st-ever.html go and check it out, there are already almost 30 blogs linked up there to explore. Something to do this holiday weekend!  Enjoy.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Peace Love Cupcake Tree Bag

My bag from http://www.cupcaketreedesigns.blogspot.com/ came today, it is just lovely. It is a brown tote bag with hand appliqued symbols of a peace sign, a heart, a cupcake, and a tree. My youngest daughter is just in love with it but I have told her it is mine, all mine LOL. It is the perfect size for a few groceries or books, or just lugging my stuff that I always lug around. Being a homeschooling mom I always have masses of stuff on my person and this beautiful bag will come in handy. Go check out Cupcake  Tree Designs when you get a chance, Olga has lovely things there to see, and a lovely blog, right now she is talking Halloween :) Here is my bag:

Chicken Lunch Bag

Today my very fun Lavish And Lime lunch bag came it is a chicken of all things - it is so very funny. It is made neoprene like fabric, so when you put your cold items in it they stay cold, I intend to put a frozen juice box in it with my lunch and see how it works. It is really big for a "kids" lunch bag. My husband and I are wondering which of us get it though :) We both take packed lunches to work and this is to fun to pass up.
Lavish and Lime also sell a Apple, Ladybug, Cow, Monkey, Rocket and a Cupcake (my favorite) of the same size, style. They are all so sweet. They have backpacks as well - in tons of styles. Pop over to their site and check them out, they are a Vancouver company - yay Canadian!
http://www.lavishandlime.com/ they have tons of great products. I won this from
http://www.everythingmom.com/ a great site, I glean so much local info from them, they are well worth checking out as well, especially if you are Canadian, they also have AMAZING contests.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Tree Of Life Necklace

I am so excited to have won this necklace, about three months ago I gave my daughter my only good necklace as she just adored it (it was a Ankh and she is very into Egyptology) so I have not had a really nice silver necklace in all that time. Well in the mail today came a new one, a Tree of Life. Jacaranda Designs Jewelry, these are "handcrafted, unique and sassy" says so on the card :) and it also says that custom orders are welcome! I won this perhaps 10 days ago - or less, and to have it arrive today was a complete surprise, again great customer service, that impresses me. It came just beautifully wrapped - sadly my picture of that did not work but it was so pretty and it came packaged in such a way that it would not get damaged. Please go check out Jane's sites - really you will be impressed - her blog is
jacarandagal.blogspot.com and her website is jacarandadesigns.etsy.com
go check her you - you will love it!!!! Here is my pic, of my new prize possession!

Today I Ate a Rainbow

My daughters prize pack came, it consisted of a book, magnets (she did not like the eggplant LOL) a sheet to go on the fridge that is the rainbow and a pad of paper. The purpose of all this is to encourage your child to eat the rainbow of fruits and veggies each day. So when she eats a red fruit for instance she moves a red magnet to the red area of the sheet on the fridge. She loves it - and is eating a wider variety for sure. I wish that the actual sheet was a magnet because it keeps sliding from my fridge -but hey it is pretty cool anyway. The book is pretty fun, about eating your fruits and veggies etc as well. The pad of paper is in colours so you can grocery shop in colour I assume - making sure you get each colour of the rainbow :) All in all, a success with my 5 year old, my 9 year old looked at it for 30 seconds and moved on. If you would like to buy this set for you lovely little one go to www.todayiatearainbow.com
Here is my set all of it and just the magnets and sheet on the fridge as my five year old and I set it up.



Little Lolita Drawing

Gossamer Hollow sent me a wonderful picture that is now gracing my daughters wall. What honestly impressed me so very much about this woman was that I had contacted her because it had not shown up and the conversations we had back and forth we so amazing, I was awed - truly! This business has some serious customer service and I was just a winner of a blog contest. That goes a LONG way with me. My daughter says "I love it" (she is nine LOL) I tried to get more out of her ;) Here are some pics, I put it in the frame with the backing, it is just red paper but it looks great with it in my opinion. Here are some address that came with it
www.customzombie.com

www.customzombie.etsy.com

www.facebook.com/customzombie




Panty by Post

I received my Panty by Post at the beginning of the week - it was great except that I had got a e-mail last week telling me they did not have what I had ordered so they were "going to surprise me" - I am sadly not big on surprises, but it worked, they are very pretty. Very small -as in not much to them, but very feminine and pretty :) The company is kind of neat in that it comes once a month, you can order for three months or a year I think, if I had the money I would sign up for a year just for the fun of some really high end knickers every month. If you are so inclined go have a look see - they are gorgeous!! at www.pantybypost.com
Here is what I got.



Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Wins with no warning!

Today I had the postie show up with a package for a contest win I had not had any notification for that I had won - now I am not complaining - just very surprised. The win was for a book I really wanted called Connected Parenting, Transform your Challenging Child and Build Loving Bonds for Life, but Jennifer Kalari The contest was from Today's Parent/Chatelaine and when I entered it was with my whole address -so maybe this is the norm - you just get it in the mail? Nice is all I can say. This book excites me in a HUGE way, one of my girls is bipolar and the other is ADHD, to say we have challenging children is to put it mildly - there are days where I am so exhausted at the end of the day I can't wait for my husband to come home. I love my girls to bits, and they are great kids but they do have some pretty heavy challenges. This book -just from flipping threw it, has some great ideas, tips, skills ect. I think I will get allot out of it and if I can get my husband who reads nothing by computer LOL to read it then he will to.



Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Guest Post, Zebrafish tween book win

My daughter won this book from Mom-Blog for being such a great kid! And will not do her first ever guest blog in the form of a review of this wonderful graphic novel. So I hand over my key board (She is nine)

The book "Zebrafish" was written by Sharon Emerson and drawn by Renee Kurilla, and it's a lovely story about five friends who start a band called Zebrafish to raise money for a machine for research for cancer because one of the friends got Leukemia. I liked it a lot, and just so you know, it's 119 pages. I would definitely recommend it to my friends. I loved the drawings. I really like the character Vita, she just relates to me a lot, and that she has purple hair and a purple dog! :) You can get this book at Simon & Schuster

Whiteduck6



My Cami Came!

So today we came home to two packages, one was my beautiful cami, the other was my daughters book which she is going to guest blog about after this post :)
So onto my Cami, it fits me like it was made to measure! I am TINY and this is just right, though not sure who else in the contest it would have fit, but I love it! The feel of this fabric is to die for, like Egyptian cotton sheets, truly my kids both came up to me and rubbed it and commented. I am going to wear it out tonight to our monthly dog park BBQ to show it off. Now here are some picks - oh and here is Liesl's Blog within you will find a link to her amazing store Her clothes are just amazing, truly!



Thursday, August 12, 2010

To those that enter contests

I would love to hear from you that enter contests, how often to you receive what you win? How often to you ever hear that your "wins" have been sent from a blog contest? I have only had confirmation of my wins being sent from a few places and only received one win - my wonderful Belvedere Designs wall clings came and are up on my walls looking oh so good. I have had a e-mail from my book win saying it is in the mail and my Panty by Post has said it is in the mail as well as Green Eyed Monster, but these are all Businesses that have something to loose, except the book which is just a lovely blog owner :) I do have a nine year old asking me about ten times a day if the book has come LOL. The others - nothing, no e-mail, no mail, hmmmmm. So tell me other contest enterers. Do your wins show up? At what point to you contact the blogs, or do you? Do tell, I want to know the etiquette as I just don't know. I do intend to mark somehow my list as to things that have come and things that have not - so people know honest companies/blogs and not so much. But have not figured that one out yet LOL still a newbie :) Tell me how you all handle this!

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

My Green Eyed Monster Win!

Yesterday I won a ten dollar gift certificate from a wonderful online store called Green Eyed Monster, they have all sorts of Enviro friendly goodies, jewelry, clothing, bags, and what I loved was this:


We will use this for treats, sandwiches at the beach and all sorts. Not quite sure how we will decide which of the three of of girls will get to use it on any given day LOL. It will be well used I can assure you!

Monday, August 9, 2010

New Contest Win Today

Well I received this in my e-mail this morning:"Congratulations! You are the lucky winner of the Panty By Post giveaway from A Busy Mommy. Please reply to this email with your choice of Panty as well as size, along with your mailing address so I may forward it along to our sponsor." Just lovely, my nickers are all kind of cheep La Senza on sale nickers so to have a pair that will look sexy on my new body is super exciting to me. I picked a bright pink pair, I can not remember the name but they will be very sweet, and like nothing I wore at 230 pounds I can assure you :) This company Panty By Post is really neat, they do a monthly pantie mail out! Really - if I had the money I would sign up in a instant there things are just lovely, not trampy or little girly in the least. I would love to get a new pair in the mail each month, how nice!

Friday, August 6, 2010

Contest Wins

So I have been entering a lot of contests for about six weeks now, and I all of a sudden have come up with some wins, I just not have had my dear husband around to help me with the pictures :) I am going to get to it tomorrow though. I have won a book for my lovely oldest daughter though, and a $100 gift certificate to Canadian Tire from a small essay I wrote about water safety (a small passion of mine). So I am a very happy lady. It does seem to be paying off so to speak, I would love to win something for my youngest daughter, she is going to be sad when the book comes for the older, and there is nothing for her, but something will come. What I am trying to win for her is jewelry as it is what she likes :) Or backpacks LOL, odd that my home schooled child likes them so much but she does.

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Please vote for me!

So I have entered a pretty great contest at Sears Canada about my youngest daughter, to do a MUCH needed makeover on my daughters bedroom. We have lived in our home for 11 years next month and we have done almost no renos - we bought it as a total fixer upper. The house is 120 years old and really was last decorated in oh, 1960 so we could so use this win. Not to mention I think that my little story about her first year is pretty good, it was a hard year, to put it mildly. Here is the link. Look for the story called "My Crying Baby" submitted by mom2girls on August 3rd. I wish I could put a direct link, but their web site doesn't seem to be ready to accept that type of thing.

Monday, August 2, 2010

I won a Cami

Well I am having a great start to my day! The reason I just posted about my weight loss is this win really, I posted over on this blog (and a few others) about my weight loss as reasons why I should win their contests - and this one I did win!
Go check it out! Her shop is just lovely, beautiful hand made clothing, so nice, so feminine. I can not wait to get this in the mail, my husband will be so happy to see me in something a little more classy than Old Navy LOL. Just a perfect start to what will be a great day, I am sure!

My weight loss -before and after

So on a number of blog contests I have entered I have referred to my 100 pound weight loss that I have gone threw this year, I thought perhaps I had better back that up a bit. I started last June with some serious changes to my diet - portion control in a HUGE way and exercise in the form of one mean Wii coach LOL and walking my dog every morning rain or shine, and living where I do it was mostly rain LOL. No one noticed the first 30 pounds, I started at 230 pounds but once I broke 200 pounds people started to comment. Then when I broke 165 pounds people really took notice - 165 is the "normal" weight for my height. I am now 130 and just loving it. I have never been the thin one, I have never in my life had a hard time finding clothing because they have not had clothing SMALL enough for me LOL got to say I like it! So here are some picks for you - a year and a lot of hard work, and family support later.

July 2009 - 230 lbs


Aug 2010 - 130 lbs

Sunday, August 1, 2010

I won a Uglee Pen set!

So yesterday I won another blog contest from Mommy Moment. I am getting a three pack of the very cool Uglee Pens - though my daughters say they are very cute LOL. I am so excited - perhaps a bit to much for just pens - but hey, I am new to this! So go over here and take a look at my prize - and look at the blog to it is great and she always has amazing give aways, a lot for us Canadians to!

Friday, July 30, 2010

Review - Dinner For Schumcks

Well I won tickets to the preview to Dinner for Schmucks last night so I went with my dear husband. He so deserved it after all the hours he has plugged into this blog of "mine". We went to a great dinner first at a Greek place, had Calamari, and Tzaki with pita as well as Greek meet balls and Humus. So good. Then the movie. Well, what to say. What we saw of it was really good, really touched on the delicate subject of making fun of people (a subject I really am very sensitive to as I was always "that" kid in school). Now we missed allot of the movie for two reasons, first at least 1/2 the movie had no sound!!! BUT they kept playing the movie LOL with no sound, so my husband and I made our own dialogue which to be honest was allot of fun and was a pretty good bonding experience for me, if that makes sense. They also seemed to cut parts out when they turned the movie off three or four times to try to fix the sound problem then the movie would seem to jump ahead a bit - not to mention all the time we had missed the dialogue on the movie. But being that it was comedy it was pretty easy to follow what had happend. It was really funny and the audience for the most part was really good natured about it all. We got free movie passes out of - as we should of if my mind. All in all I want to see the movie when it comes out, with sound :), it was all about people getting along, despite our differences. I like that.
It was very funny and I also like that feel good feeling of laughing for two hours. Not a kids movie though -at least not for my kids - there was a young teen there and I would not have wanted my kids of that age there if I had them, but to each there own. I would recommend this movie for sure, not sure if it is a big screen movie if you are not REALLY into that kind of comedy or you have allot of money - but it is defiantly worth renting. We rarely go to movies that are not ones that "should be seen on a big screen" if you know what I mean. But we are a single income family. I would love to go to allot more, if we could I love going to them.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Busy Weekend

My husband and I went to Wild Play Elements Park, the web site is www.wildplay.com it is simply put being a monkey for a hour or two :) This is the second time we have gone, last time we were both scared to death the whole time and came down (you are WAY up in the trees) this time we both enjoyed it - without fear - but did not get the same adrenalin rush from it. It is a great work out, and trust building within yourself. There are three courses in BC, one in Nanaimo, one in Victoria and one in Whistler. They are all different from each other and we intend to try them all :) The one we go to has zip lines, rope swings, wobbly bridges, tightropes, ladders, obstacle courses (way up in the trees remember) swinging logs to walk across. It takes allot of courage and mental awareness to do and it is just relay good for your self esteem to do it.
We did this for our 11 year wedding anniversary which was on Saturday! I can't believe it has been 11 years already! We got married on the beach at my mom's house, with only 18 people there, we spent next to nothing and got married in bare feet. We only had our best friends there and every one said it was the best wedding they had ever been to (perhaps everyone says that to the bride and groom LOL) To top it off it was a pot luck! We are very nontraditional people and we REFUSED to go into debt to get married, not us LOL. It was a day to remember anyway, as they always are.
Have not won anything else - yet - but will keep you posted as it goes/comes.

Friday, July 23, 2010

Another win and a Welcome!

Well I have a Follower - that is as good as a win any day -welcome Eileen -welcome, you are my official first and the "other" is just my husband LOL. I am happy to have you here!
I also got a e-mail this morning saying "I" won tickets to Dinner for Schmucks I say "I" because it is not really my kind of movie and as we can not really afford a sitter for a movie that we don't REALLY want to see my hubby is going to try and go with his good friend. They will love it, I think it is more of a guy movie anyway. I do no really enjoy movies that make fun of people,it's sad - as I was that kid in school :( and I guess kind of still feel that way if you know what I mean? But I won - that is two wins in 24 hours and I feel good LOL.
Still entering like a fiend to. The one I really want to win is for these Worry monsters - called the WorryWoos - I have entered two different blog contests for them now, one for just one monster and one for a set - I would so love to win, one of my daughters has pretty big worries and I think having a little guy/or gal around to worry with her might help a bit. I intend to get her one for Christmas if I don't win but I will enter every contest for them that I come across (for us Canadians ;)
My other obsession is clothes for me - I have lost 100 pounds in the last year and for the first time in my life I feel sexy - really really good about myself and I do not have allot of clothing -and NO good quality clothes as all as we are a single income family in one of the most expensive cities in Canada LOL. But I make do and I look a heck of allot better now than I did - but still - I am entering :)

Thursday, July 22, 2010

I Won a Contest!

Well after three weeks of entering religiously I have won my first blog contest. I am so proud of myself :) I won from a lovely blog : http://couponclippingnutritionist.blogspot.com/ she has the best contests for natural/healthy products - very cool. What I won was a $30 gift certificate for Belvedere Signs, I have already used it (I won this morning LOL) I bought a simple sign that says "Love is spoken here" then I had enough left over for one animal sign. - We could not as a family of four decide which animal character we wanted though so we put them in a hat and voted - My daughter won a wiener dog - she choose purple! So now we will have a BRIGHT purple medium wiener dog on our living room wall in 5-10 days LOL. I will post a picture once they are up. I am just so happy to have won something, and this is honestly the one I was hoping for this sign "Love is spoken here" is so lovely, and kind, and such a great reminder to walk gently. I will put it right in my entrance way so it is the first thing I see when I walk in my door. Thanks so much Amanda, if you read this - truly, I appreciate this more than you know! And to Belvedere Signs, thanks to you as well, your signs are just amazing, beautiful works of art it took my family and I the better part of 30 minutes to figure out how to spend that last $12 LOL, the signs are just so good!



Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Schleich Give Away at Organic Girl



Organic Girl is doing one of the best give aways I have seen yet (for my kids anyway) it is for an assortment of Knights, she has a picture of all sorts of creatures, Knights, dragons etc on her blog. If your kids like Schleich or if you have kids that have not experienced them yet but are into imaginary play go and enter - these are the best of the best of play figures in my mind - we have hundreds of them in my living room right now. I can actually hear my girls playing with them as I type.

Monday, July 19, 2010

Sunday at Leaving the Lights On

I went to a great event yesterday called Leaving the Lights On - put on my a friend of mine. It was for women, about women. There were speakers and tables set up with different products - some to try, if you were willing to stand in line you could even get a manicure! There was someone doing Airbonne makeup as well as massages being done. This was all free once you were in the door. I had such a nice kid free four hours. The speakers talked about relaxation, sexuality, reproductive health, and of all things burlesque! it was fabulous. We all walked away with a goody bag of coupons, a few samples, condoms from the Sexual Health Center, and lots of other fun things. I came aways with a brilliant book for my daughter called:
Little Women's Guide to Personal Power - how to turn your monthly menstruation into your biggest blessing of your life. Written by Kyla Plaxton. Her web site is : wwwilovemyperiod.com
and it is published by Little Goddess Enterprises
If you have a daughter coming into puberty and you want her to see this as a positive - this is a great book - I am thrilled with it. this book alone was worth the entrance fee to Leaving the Lights on. My daughter has already been into the book - read most of it since last night and is really liking it as well. Kyla writes in a easy to read manner and talks about girls bodies in a non-embarrassing way (at least for my daughter). There is a work book section in the back for girls to try and work out ways to deal with their PMS in a positive way as well and to chart their cycles. The actual reading part is only 70 pages long and the rest is the work book part - about 100 pages of that - so they can really grasp their cycles.
So it was a great day, well worth it and I had a afternoon off from the kiddletts :)

Saturday, July 17, 2010

Ah Saturday and Costco!

I went to Costco this morning with the youngest - we were there at opening, it was very quiet and civilized, within an hour everyone in town must have been there - really! It went from easy shopping to fender bender shopping. Crazy, we almost always go there on a week day evening, not sure what possessed me to go today - oh yes I know. We shop on Pay Day and today was the day LOL. Perhaps I should have fed us rice until Monday and gone Monday night instead! Must say though the staff were just amazing! They went and got me a icing sugar when I told them at the till that the box was closed (I was just suggestion someone be informed so they can open it for others I was OK to go without this time), they refunded my coupon I forgot to use then brought in ten minutes later without the product only my shopping list and the coupon. They were just great. Then my youngest and I gorged on the famous hot dogs and if that was not enough we had to share a caramel Sunday after that! I rolled home to put my loot away.
I go to Costco with a list from my menu plan for two weeks - I almost never veer off of it - and I write down the cost of every last dime I spend as I spend it - I know when I get to that till exactly what it will say. I have caught them out big time more than once and I am always right!
I recommend everyone become a granny shopper like me - though no one else ever does - I have never seen another 36 year old doing it - heck I have only ever seen the 80 plus set doing it. And once this older woman came over and congratulated me on doing it! But I save a ton of money.

My sad news today, at least for me was I woke up this morning to eight - yes read it eight- e-mails from blogs telling me I did not win there contests! How is that! I felt like e-mailing them back (poor looser that I was by the third or fourth e-mail) and asking if they would like to pour some salt in my wounds LOL. NO really I am just fine, a bit sad, I am yet to win and I have entered HUNDREDS of contests, blogs, sweepstakes ect. I so want to win, I really do...... I honestly thought for the first couple e-mails that I had won and I just about died LOL - I am learning, won't get so excited now, just hopeful. These e-mails have not happened before today though so not sure what happened there.

Friday, July 16, 2010

Review: Bio-Groom Dog Shampoo & Ear Cleaner



Today I tried out a new Shampoo on my Black Lab Dravyn. The Company is called Bio-Groom and the shampoo was called Natural Oatmeal Anti - Itch. It smelled so good compaired to her usual shampoo - really sweet, almost like mint though I am not sure that is quite what it is. I did not use very much and that dog was sudsy for the full scrub - I have never had her this bubbly with shampoo before. I bought the bottle - 355 ml thinking it would last 2 months tops with a weekly bath and now I am thinking perhaps it will last three or more! I am impressed, and will be buying this again, perhaps not the Oatmeal everytime - I bought this kind because it was on sale, they have lots of scents/formulas.




At the same time I bought Dravyn some Bio-Groom Ear-Care Ear Cleaner, I have used a ton of different products to try and keep the ear mites at bay on this dog - any of you having Labs, or any floppy eared dog really will understand I am sure. Well I have used this three times this week, and she is now not rubbing her ears AT ALL - this is huge - just huge! This actually works! You put a squirt in your dogs ear, rub her ear vigorously then become a human cotton swab with a piece of cotton and wipe out all the black gunk. The first day there was four cotton pads worth (from her "bad" ear) the second time I filled two pads, and today - the pad was light brown!!! WOW! I am sold impressed. I think Dravyn is too :) I bought these at a small specialty pet store, they were areound $13 Canadian each - well worth it in my mind.




Bio-Groom also makes products for Cats, Ferrets and Horses :)

A Clean & happy Dravyn ->

Cakespy Contest

http://www.cakespy.com/blog/2010/7/15/cake-byte-and-giveaway-cupcake-plates-by-michelle-miller-now.html

So I am not able to enter this wonderful contest as it is only for Americans you lucky people but it is for the most beautiful cupcake plates ever (in my most humble opinion). So if you are reading this - and you are American - PLEASE pop over if and enter. You will love it - if you make cupcakes you will love it even more (I do can you tell LOL)
I have had unbelievable frustration trying to bring links from blogs here to show what they have for contests - and then to show them that I have linked here - I have spent a couple hours trying now with not much luck. Just goes to show how compter illiterate I am really, not something I can brag about, but I am trying hard.
I spend about an hour each morning bright and early having my piece of toast and coffee doing sweepstakes on Win Free Stuff it is a great Canadian contest site that tells you what you have entered, also when you need to enter them ie if it is daily or weekly, or a one off. It also has checks to mark off if you are uninterested - I just love this site. In one hour I can do the whole site and it is fun for me. I must say though now that I have found blog sites I am prefering the intimacy of them. I like feeling like I am getting to know some people (I know I am not really) but I am going back to these blogs again and again and reading them. I look at the contest sites and actually look around at the places I really like. Some of them I intend to do some Christmas and birthday shopping on. I would never have found these places without these contests. It is just wonderful.
I am learning alot, hopefully over the next few weeks/months I will learn alot more. Hopefully I will get some readers other than just my husband :) Nice as he is! I need to know how to get a counter, have tried to google it but no luck, if you know how let me know please - it would be great to know if there is anyone comming here or not yet.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

If you pop over to Survery Junkie (in my contest favorites to the left )right now, she has a great contest on for a shower curtain from the brilliant company Izola Shower. Forgive me the simplicity of my post with no links, I am a baby at this and am on a very steep learning curve - I would love tips, about all this as I really have no clue how to do any of it! But go over to Survey Junkie and try and win one of these beauties - they will make any bathroom look better - I am in - are you?
Well this is new for me, I have been trying to win a contest - both blog and sweepstakes for about two weeks now with no luck so far - at least I have not heard from anyone that I have won yet but we will see. I keep opening my in-box thinking today is the day LOL. I am ready to win something now. I have entered some blogs that I would so love to win, one is for a amazing Bear Mug - it is just beautiful, my daughter would so love it for Christmas.

The sweepstakes I wants to win, oddly, are for cleaning products. I am a bit of a cleaner and I spend far to much on them so if I can win them - great :) I guess that says something about me though doesn't it.

I have two girls, one with ADHD and one is Bi-Polar so going on trips would be hard unless we could all go together, so I do not enter to many trip contests, though I do like the odd - girlfriend - trip :) I would like to go off with the girls to New York to shop or something, who wouldn't.