Review: Green Giant Veggie Snack Chips

As I have said before, I am a BzzAgent! This means I test products for different companies for little to no money. This review is on Green Giants Veggie Snack Chips!

These chips come in two different flavors that I was able to test.

The first was Multi grain Sweet Potato Chips with Sea Salt. To me, these chips tasted a bit like SUN Chips and that was a nice change. My boys were NOT fans of these chips! And these are the ones I got not only a full sized bag of but 4 "snack bags" of as well. The kiddos were not pleased to see the snack bags in our picnic basket a few days after they had the big bag. And I can not really blame them! These "chips" seem to have the same texture of a pressed and dehydrated mashed potatoes! No good! (Just being honest here!)

The second flavor was a HUGE hit in my house! Roasted Veggie Tortilla Chips in Zesty Cheddar flavor! (Pictures in the above photo!) These tasted a lot like Doritos' Nacho Cheese Chips and the kids ate the entire bag real fast! They loved them and keep asking me for more! The price however is a bit out there! I wish they were not so expensive! (Nearing 4 and 5 dollars a bag and just like any other chip, mostly air!) If the Dollar Tree picks these chips up I think I will be more likely to purchase them. For now, they remain at the store and I continue to listen to my kids ask for them! 

Those are my thoughts on these chips! Enjoy!

~TTFN!

Review: Schick Hydro Silk Razor!

As I have previously stated, I am a BzzAgent. This means that I get offered opportunities to try out products for little to no cost. I test the product and give my feedback to BzzAgent and I also tell you here!

This time I got the chance to try out a new razor! I have not yet been able to get my legs nice and silky smooth since the birth of my youngest son. I am not sure if that has to do with my other medical issues that took place after my little guy was born or if my body just decided I no longer need to have smooth legs! I was so excited and had hopes of this razor being the end all for that issue I was having. Sadly, for me at least, it was not. I get to have soft silky smooth legs for roughly an hour after I shave and then they are back to icky and dry again! (Until I get to another product I am testing, that one has started to work on my legs! I will post about it another time though!)

On one hand, I enjoy this new razor for it's easy to grip handle, swivel head, multiple blades and the fact it takes up a little less space in the shower than my Schick Intuition does! (Yes, I am a Schick gal!)

The other hand though, I have to use shave cream with this new razor. This is something I have not had to use for YEARS! (I think I started using the Intuition when it first came out.) So, it ends up taking me just a tad bit longer to shave when using the Hydro razor instead. And often I do not have the time for that with being a Mother to four rowdy boys!

I may or may not continue to use the Schick Hydro Silk razor in the future. I also still have 3 coupons that I am willing to share. They are for $5.00 off and if you use them at Wal-mart it makes this awesome razor $0.97!!!!!!!!! WOW!!!!!! So, if you would like one of the coupons still available just comment below or if you followed this link from Facebook you can let me know there as well! (Blog Facebook)

All in all... I give this razor a 3.5 star rating. I do not hate it, but I will keep a tight grip on my Intuition if push comes to shove!

~TTFN!

Review: Redbox Instant By Verizon

I have mentioned before that I am a BzzAgent. This means I test items for little to no money and then give my opinion to BzzAgent's website! They go through all of their reviews and then give the feedback to the company that owns each item. The following is a review on Redbox Instant By Verizon!

I have come to find that I enjoy a lot of the features of Redbox Instant! I have been able to watch movies I had not yet seen and also ones that I have been wanting to see for a long time! I have also found movies I never even knew existed!

Even though I can not currently watch the movies on my computer (my computer does not like the player they use for some reason) I am able to watch on my phone and I love that! I also have my oldest son set up to use it on his computer and my husband as well! Here are some of the facts given to me by BzzAgent...

1. The $8/month subscription gives you the best value for your bucks: unlimited streaming + 4 DVD credits per month (1 DVD credit = 1 night rental) to use at over 40,000 Redbox locations nationwide.

2. You don’t have to be a Verizon customer to sign up for the service, but you do need high-speed internet access to use it.

3. You can weigh in on what would make Redbox Instant even better and report any service issues via the Help Center at redboxinstant.com

4. Instantly stream Hollywood mega-hits to any internet-connected device, including smartphones (iPhone and Android), tablets, computers and Samsung Smart TVs and Blu-ray Players.

5. The Redbox Instant by Verizon app is limited to certain devices, but is not needed to stream content.

6. You can buy and rent movies digitally without a subscription, including today’s newest releases.

7. Browse Redbox locations and reserve movies at the box of your choice using the app, too!

For $8 per month I think this is going to be worth it! Knowing us, we will only rent kid movies from the kiosk with those 4 DVD credits (the price is different for blu-ray rentals and the credits for them, $9 instead of the $8). I think we are going to be happy with what our $8 is going to get us!

The following are some of the movies I have enjoyed so far... 

Wake... A movie I was unaware of ever even existing and I am glad I found it! I love Ian Somerhalder in The Vampire Diaries (he plays Sexy Vampire Damon Salvator) and I also love him without all of his Vampire Super Hotness! LOL! Great Movie! Slightly Morbid... But it is good! Ha ha!

Thor! A pretty dang good movie as well. I was on the fence about watching this one. I was not sure I wanted to and now I am happy I did! Loved it!

 I found this one in the subscriptions and the main reason I watched it is for another of my beloved TVD (The Vampire Diaries) actors... Torrey Devitto! She is Dr. Fell on TVD and also married to co-star Paul Wesley, Vampire Hottie Stefan Salvator! This is a great movie about friendship! Has some pretty funny moments!

Another one I happened to stumble upon. I am also a huge Anna Paquin fan! Her put together with Josh Duhamel and Katie Holmes made this a pretty good flick. Sort of slow at times and different, but it is a good movie as well! I have not found one I didn't truly like yet. Some I couldn't get behind, but not ones I didn't like!

I believe that is it for my review here! This is in Beta testing still so you must have the invite codes to use it. However, once it is out there and going I hope a lot of people take advantage of this awesome website and app! I will be!

~TTFN!

Review: Post Alpha-bits Cereal

I have mentioned before that I am a BzzAgent. This means I test items for little to no money and then give my opinion to BzzAgent's website! They go through all of their reviews and then give the feedback to the company that owns each item. The following is a review on Post Alpha-Bit Cereal.

While this cereal looks like your typical "sugary" cereal it is full of all the goodness that we, as parents, want our little ones full of! Unlike other cereals of this variety, this one does not taste like cardboard! My boys were more than willing to dive right in and munch on this cereal. They each had a bowl or two with milk included as well as munching on the cereal all by itself! They were extra excited to have a box a cereal that was sponsored by Super Why! My 4 year loves that show and the other 2 older boys have been known to enjoy it as well! The minute the box was empty they cut out the Super Why! mask and had a ball playing! (Sadly, I did not get a photo snapped of that one!) I do believe that Alpha-Bits will be finding it's way into our cereal cupboard a lot!

Here are a couple photos of my boys with their Alpha-Bits Cereal! (ignore the Kellogg's bowls! LOL)

That is it for now! I hope that everyone (who eats cereal) gets a chance to try this yummy breakfast treat!

~TTFN

BzzAgent Review: Glade Expressions(R) Collection

I hope you have noticed by now that I am a BzzAgent. That means that I get selected to test out products for little to no money. And then I submit my reviews to BzzAgent and then they determine if they want me to review anything else for them based on the reviews I submit. Previously I have done reviews on Dr. Scholl's(R) for Her High Heel Insoles and The Dark Monk (Kindle eBook). Both of which I was pretty happy with as far as the "product" doing what it should! (Keeping my feet comfy-ish and engaging my mind!) I am not a huge High Heel wearer because they hurt my feet and I just could not wrap my head around the story of The Dark Monk. However, this one I love!

In my Kitchen

My most recent campaign was the Glade Expressions(R) Collection. I so far have only been able to try the Pineapple and Mangosteen scent (I was one of "those"customers in Wal-Mart and sprayed the Linen and Italian Mandarin and found I still prefer the Pineapple and Mangosteen) but I look forward to having the other scents in my home in the near future. My next favorite, as far as preferences go would be the Fuji Apple and Cardamom Spice scent. I love Apple Scents. Sadly, I have not been able to find that one in my area.

Pineapple and Mangosteen

All 4 scents are pictured below.

From my Pineapple & Mangosteen I can't remember my house not smelling like to the Lavender & Juniper Berry that I am leery about. (Simply because I can not stand Juniper Berry scented anything.) These have got to be some of Glade's better products and scents in my opinion! Please take the time to stop in your local store (Wal-Mart, Target) and at least sniff the bottle(or box)! The scents are awesome!

Linen and Italian Mandarin

One thing I was told when this campaign first started was that you had to be careful with the Oil Diffuser because it "ruined" someones $300 coffee table! Well, I do not have any of that back story but they are pretty simple to use and I am not sure that the person understood the extra easy directions. The diffuser comes in a box that also has directions on how to assemble it that also has pictures to use as references on how to put this neat, stylish little thing together. Open box, take out parts, snap card into oil base, set in "frame" and you are done! Easy right? I thought so! So how on earth did it "destroy" that coffee table? I have no idea!

Fuji Apple and Cardamom Spice

What scent do you think you would be most willing to try? I am looking forward to finding that Fuji Apple! When it comes to my home smelling good I want it to be a scent that friends and family can enjoy as well. I have found that, even though some people like the scent, I can not stand the scent of Cinnamon! I like the flavor of ground cinnamon but I can not stand the smell! It gives me a headache! It takes a lot for me to smell that scent and not have a headache. So, I am glad that Glade has these "fall-ish" scents for me to enjoy instead of the "normal" cinnamon scent that naturally always comes out this time of the year!

Lavender and Juniper Berry

With all that being said, I give Glade Expressions(R) Collection a giant A++++!! The scents are appealing, they warm your home without being too over powering! (Unless you set your chair right next to the diffuser sitting on the counter top, then it can be just a bit much! LOL) And they come in packaging that is even more appealing than the scent itself! Most of the "Air Fresheners" now have packaging that you may not want seen by the guests in your home. Both the diffuser and the mist both have appealing packaging you can set anywhere and it will look like it was made to go right where you set it. Our diffuser sits next to the school computer while the mist can is above the mirror in the bathroom. Neither one look out of place! If you happen to try any of the Glade Expressions(R) Collection please let me know what you think. My vote is cast! But I value everyones opinions!

~TTFN!

The Dark Monk.... My Review on the book....

If you haven't caught on from reading other posts, I am a BzzAgent. Basically, I am sent items to review and then give out my opinion. Using word of mouth advertising and my opinion, you buy the item and enjoy it for yourself. I am only on my second campaign so far, my first was Dr. Scholl's For Her High Heel Inserts (I still have 12 $4.00 off coupons for anyone who is interested) but those did not get their own dedicated post for their review! Anyways, The Dark Monk.... 

The books were sent directly to my Kindle Fire within a week of signing up for the campaign. Unlike others who also signed up and have Kindle Fire's, I have not had any issues with getting the book to load on the screen. I received both The Hangman's Daughter and The Dark Monk at the same time. In the start of The Hangman's Daughter I was thrown at first. The main character, Jakob Kuisl, is a 12 year old boy who wants to become the Hangman himself. A 12 year old? Yikes! He had seen hangings and such before, his first at age 6! I am not giving much away there, if you read just the first few pages, you get that much.However, the Author of this book, Oliver Pötzsch, tends to go a little too far into detail on some things for me. To me, a book with extra detail, makes it boring and snore, possibly drool, worthy! Which is what makes it difficult for me to get into the books. I have a great imagination, so reading extra detail is not something I enjoy! 

However, that was just the start of The Hangman's Daughter. I got into The Dark Monk a lot faster and easier. It seems Pötzsch may have fixed some of his long drawn out details, not too much though. I still had to step away from the book just a few pages in and could not get myself interested in it again!

If you like books with a darker side, they are both available on Amazon.com!

Click the following links to get them going for yourself!

The Hangman's Daughter

The Dark Monk

 Feel free to leave me any of your own comments on the books. I don't feel I was able to give these books my all right now and I just can not make myself read them. I will keep them on my Kindle until I can read them. That time is just not now! Thank you for letting me share this with you! I hope that you enjoy the books if you read them!

~TTFN!

Preparing for the big baby shower!

With getting ready for my sister's baby shower on Saturday, I have been sort of scrambling around trying to get projects done so that she gets more than one gift from me (which is all I have 100% completed). I was finally able to finish one project the other day, which was a no sew project so it was finished rather quickly. I then started another that I have been working on and all that is left now is the sewing part. Yippee!!!

I wish I could share photos of the things I am working on, but how much fun would that be if my sister were to read this and see the photos... Not much! Not much fun at all. So... Until after Saturday, y'all gotta wait! Sorry! But I promise, I will share with every one what I made for my sister and her baby. My Mother is helping a lot with finishing touches on all these things too. There is one thing I am slightly panicked about, but I am sure that if I do not have it done for the shower, she will get it before the baby gets here.

My oldest son is with my sister now and when I spoke to him on the phone the other day, he was super excited! He always gets his birthday gifts from his Aunt and Uncle early. He spends the time around the 4th of July with them every year (this could be his last year with them though) since they moved up to Washington(5ish years ago). Last year they gave him his own laptop computer (he has been on computers since he was about 4 months old!!!) and he has had a blast with it. One of his favorite things to do while at their house is to play World of Warcraft on their computers. Well, that is what they got him, on his computer, for his birthday this year! Apparently he had been spending all his time on his Aunts computer playing from there but now that they got it up and running on his computer, he is even happier! LOL His words to me were: "Mom! I am playing WOW on MY computer!!! It is sooo cool!" It was great to hear him so excited! Of course, I seem to remember that he had the same sort of response last year when he got the computer! Still, it is cute how excited he gets!

My 6 year old is working on his behavior while his brother is gone, and this is working out well too! My Mother and I discussed giving him 1 Quarter for each full hour he is good during the day. This means that he does everything he is told and does not back talk and is not rude and we do not have to remind him of his manners more than once, if that! He loved the idea! And as a bonus, for each 8 hours straight that he doesn't lose any Quarters, he gets one extra Quarter! The most he has made in one day I believe is 13 Quarters and this has only been going on for 3 days! LOL and we told him we would keep up this earning money thing for the entire time his older brother was out of town and that he is not allowed to spend any of his money until we go to Portland for the Baby Shower! The reason we went with 8 hours is because that was about how long he was away from home and working on his behavior while in school. From the time he left home, until he came back home each day. He has been doing great. Most of the time all we have to do is remind him that he will lose the Quarter if he acts up and that snaps him back into good behavior real fast. He wants to earn the money and he truly wants to be a good kiddo! He has had his moments, he lost 2 quarters ion a row tonight. So, see, no kid is perfect! Ha ha! He also did not enjoy his second week of camp as much as his first. He said his Dinosaur class was boring. And I would have to agree. The dinosaur teacher did not seem as enthused as the twisty tales teacher did. And this kiddo has decided that he wants to be a Paleontologist when he grows up and I think that is AWESOME!!! But oh well, win some and lose some! Not all teachers can be #1, that would defeat the purpose! LOL!

The 4 year old has been sort of being his normal crazy and wacky self! But that is him! He has decided that he does not like our bigger pool again this year and that he does not want to get into it. I wish I could get him to realize how much fun it is and keep him calm. I almost had him there the other day but he just kept yelling in my face to let him out of the pool, so I did. Other than the pool thing yesterday he has been good and taking all his medicines and he even stays on top of it! I guess the kid likes to feel well rather than sick all the time. Go figure! Since his most recent doctor visit, he has had less of an issue with his allergies. Of course, he has a mommy who gives him allergy medicines and his inhaler like they are his life support! Which is how it should be, because they are. And this kid is the easiest as far as taking his medicine. He sits there and breaths in on his puffer machine for his inhaler and then picks up the allergy medicine and takes it and then puts his head back and is ready for his eye drops, they go into his eyes and his blinks away the extra stuff and he is good to go!

The baby, he is still low on the growth charts, but someone has to be there! Last doctor appointment he had they said he was still below the 10th percentile for weight but he was shooting up there on his head and length! I know that my son is healthy and happy. He does not have to be a chunky baby... I know a fat baby is a happy baby, but this kid just does not put on the weight like other kids do! I do not know why, he just doesn't. A lot of people have been asking me in stores lately how old he is and when I say 7 months they say things like "There is no way!" or "Is he ill?".... No, he is not ill and Yes, he is 7 months old! Another lady asked his age and after her reaction of "no way!" I told her he was 9 pounds at birth and her reply was the best I have heard ever..... "What is he now, 10?!?!?!" LMBO!!!! Too funny! I seriously laughed out loud at her for saying that. He is creeping up on the 20 pound mark, but not too fast! He is just a happy little baby!

As far as the diet goes, I am stuck on my same weight for a while now. My Mother and I have discussed doing sit ups to lose more belly fat and I think that is a great idea! I also need to start getting up, eating breakfast and then going for a walk with the kiddos (at least the ones who want to join, depending on the day I may go before they get up or Daddy might be home to take care of those boys not wanting to go for a walk with Mama)! I also need to make sure I am tracking my food intake somehow and also need to ensure I am eating 3 full meals and at least 2 small snacks a day! Does any one have any ideas on how I could get going with this diet better? It is basically a low carbohydrate, Atkins-like diet.

Oh, I also found that I am super into the second book in my 2 book series for my BzzCampaign! Being a BzzAgent is Awesome! I just wish I could get on more campaigns! I am only on my second one! I will be posting a review here on both my Kindle Books, The Hangman's Daughter and The Dark Monk, A Hangman's Daughter Tale. I was not too into The Hangman's Daughter from page one. The Dark Monk is another story though, only a few pages into it, but I LOVE it! I am struggling with the fact that I still need to read my most recent Sookie Stackhouse Novel, But I will get to it after the Baby Shower and After my BzzCampaign!

So much for typing up a quick and short blog tonight LOL.... For now, I hope everyone is enjoying their summer and families! I will try my hardest to post some of the pictures of gifts after the shower so that everyone can see my craftier side! He he he! But, like I said, for now... The suspense wont hurt you too bad! Or all least I hope it wont! Until another day....

Baby in his newest on sale Ross Dress for Less outfit!
$2.99 and it has a frog on his rear!
Plus came with the super cute hat!

~TTFN!

Recent Funny Moments! (Long)

To start things off... We bought the baby a new (to us) high chair. I was browsing Craig's List and found this high chair for $10! Awesome deal! Specially since all we had for Little Man was a bouncy chair and a Bumbo. Now, the Bumbo works great and I love, love, love the tray with it. But you are only supposed to use it at ground level and on a flat surface. Well, that is a long way down to the floor to sit and feed a baby at! So, High Chair time it was! And I am super happy with it. However, the little booger does not like to sit in it for long enough to get to eat in it. He wont even sit in it for Dad and I to eat dinner! He is spoiled I think!

Beware of this post... I feel it is going to be "picture heavy" since my last one was "picture lacking"! LOL

So first off this week. I was driving into town and off the side of the road I noticed something rather crazy. I had to do a double take because this is something I have never seen in my entire life growing up in Central Oregon. I looked out the window to look at this thing that caught my eye and I was in shock! It was a Wild Turkey! Live, wild turkey. Just walking down the highway! It was the funniest thing I have seen, at random, on that highway in a long time! So, that was funny #1!

Tanner, just after getting his hair cut! Yippee!

Funny #2: I am sure that my 3rd son is going to be completely angry with me when he gets older for sharing this, but it is going to happen. I was sitting on my bed in the late hours of the night nursing the baby the other night when my 4 year old gets out of bed and asks to go potty. Of course, I say yes and he walks out of the bedroom. Well, he turned to the right (our bathroom is to the left of our room) and just as I was getting ready to say something, he comes walking back down the hall. So I kept my mouth shut! Bad move mama... Bad move! He stopped just before the bedroom door and started peeing on the wall! The sound of him peeing was met with me yelling at the top of my lungs "OH! NO NO NO! TANNER WHAT ARE YOU DOING???!!!" He pops his head around the corner and says "What?" So I repeated again... Calmer this time... "What are you doing? Go to the bathroom." His 4 year old fashioned come back... "I am!"... LMAO... The entire encounter had my Husband and Mother both in the hall trying to find out why I was yelling at the 4 year old when everyone else was trying to go to sleep. My Mother took Tanner to the bathroom to finish going potty while my Husband cleaned up the puddle that was forming in the hall and I calmed the baby back to sleep/nursing (I managed to startle him awake by yelling almost in his ear. Poor baby). My Mother brought Tanner back to bed and he was out within seconds of his head hitting the pillow again. That was, by far, one of the funniest moments I have had with any of  my kids! The next morning, he did not remember any of what had happened.

6 year old after his hair cut! (Little brother in the background)

On to my 6 year old...

He has been on a behavior card since February at school. He was acting out and the teacher was having a really hard time gaining control of him during the day. So, we agreed to do this card. It worked great for my oldest last year at school so I had high hopes it would do the same for the 6 year old. Well, he did good for awhile and then went back to a lot of the old "naughty" behavior. It is now getting closer to the end of the school year and field trips are starting up. He really wants to go! But, he had been bringing home some really bad reports with 3-4 negative marks per day! Terrible reports. So, I told him that I was not going to send him on any of the trips if he could not act correctly during the day before the trips. This coming Friday he gets to go to see baby chickens and all sorts of other things on a farm! And he is super excited for that because of his Aunts chickens. He is officially the chicken whiz due to his Aunt having 3 chickens. (I don't know where kids get some of this stuff sometimes) In any case, he has been informed that he has to act better at school in order to be allowed to go. He has had 3 days at school so far and.... drum roll please...... he has only brought home ONE negative mark for the entire 3 days and even that wasn't such a terrible thing! Monday and Tuesday he had terrific days! All "smiles" all day, both days! (the reports are designed so that he is either graded, per half hour, by a smiling, a straight mouthed or a frowning face, depending on his behavior) But today he brought home one single frown on his report. I was able to hear from his teacher that she had talked to him and that he says he is not going to let it happen again. So, as long as he brings home one more good report, he gets to go on Friday to the farm! And then at the beginning of June the class is going to the new swimming pool and they are walking there... Yuck! and Yikes! This is a Kindergarten class... walking over a mile, maybe 2, to a swimming pool and then back to school... not my boy! LOL. I spoke to his teacher about this as well and for every one's safety I am going to drive him to the pool and drop him off with his teacher. This way he also knows that I can come back and pick him up if he gets out of line as well. This may not be as easy as it sounds since I am dropping him off at the pool at 9 and then the baby has a doctor appointment at 9:50! But, his teacher has my phone number and she knows where I will be. All in all... He is turning things around for himself! I am so proud of him. Sadly, he will only be in that school for about 5 more weeks and then it wont really matter as much.

Oldest son after his hair cut!

My oldest, he finally let me cut his hair! (gasp!) He kept telling me that he wanted to grow his hair out so that he could put it into a ponytail like the guy on his video game does. So, I let him since it was cooler weather anyways so it didn't much matter to me. Weather warmed up though and we used our normal "ploy" to get him to cut his hair, "If you don't let Mom do it, Aunt Marcy will shave you bald when you see her next!" And he is in the hair cutting chair and ready for a cut! LOL I even told him he would feel much better having shorter hair since the sun was coming out more. He now tells me I was correct. (Gee, ya think?)  It was rather interesting to cut all 3 of the older boys' hair and my Husbands (no picture of his hair cut since he hates pictures of him... but scroll down and see the one I was able to sneak in... he he he...) all of their hair has a slightly different coloring to it. There is a dirty dishwater blonde, a light pale brown and a light brown for the kids and Hubby has about the shade of hair that would be the two brownish colors mixed together. (The baby has mama's dark brown hair, for now) We did the hair cuts outside and left the hair for the birds and they have so far made off with most of it!

We skipped our day trip, Nature Adventure, this last weekend because Daddy was home and off work. So, I opted for the kids to spend some time with their Dad. That seems to have helped them since they have all been missing him. This coming weekend/Monday (Holiday, no school) my Mother and I are planning on taking the kids out and about for the day. It should be fun... although, I do not have anything specific planned yet. I will have to update on that at another time.

I got my BzzKit on Monday and wore my Dr. Scholl's For Her High Heels Insoles for the first time ever on Tuesday! They KILLED the balls of my feet, but the arch support was great! I have a bunch of coupons if anyone is interested. I may try them again in the future but right now they are not for me. I think once I lose more weight it will be easier to get around in heels but for now... ouch! I also feel that if you are going to wear them you should have smaller feet than I do! I am a size 10 and the insoles hit my feet funny so that I was constantly walking on the part where insert meets shoe and it it was I think made my feet hurt more. It could have been the heels I picked to wear as well, but either way, not a comfy foot day for me. I may have a better review for them in the future, but as of right now, 3-4 stars out of 5!

I picked up the photos of the baby last week as well and I am hoping to be able to put together a few different things with the disk pictures for a few different family members. However, I have to finish all my Baby Shower gifts for my sister before that happens and I really did not help myself by finding a new site online that had a bunch of "fast to create" patterns on it. Now I have about 15 more things I really want to make for my sister and her baby. It is now to the point that I need to decide what to finish now and what to wait to finish to give to her after her shower and when the little one is born and there is also Christmas and other "events" after the baby is here where a gift from Auntie would be great!

In my hunt for free and/or cheap cloth diapers I found The Honest Company. They have a "Free Trial" on their diapers for $4.95 (the cost of shipping). Below you can see photos of what I got in my package. They allow you to choose boy, girl or mixed prints when selecting your package (I chose boy, duh) and then you could also choose to get the "essentials" package as well. This included Hand soap, body wash & shampoo and some other "soap like" products 5 in all. Although I have no issues with Jessica Alba, I feel she doesn't have the best product as far as "bang for the buck" goes. I will be posting pictures of the baby in these diapers this summer since I got them the size above what he is in now and the fact that they are printed makes me want to have them on him in "diaper only" weather!

For all who may be interested, The Mom, The Wife, The Low-Carber and The Learning Coach now has a Facebook page as well! Check it out and tap the "LIKE" button if you feel up to it, here! I set up the Facebook page in hopes of getting more people interested in my blog here. I like to see people caring about what I have to say. Plus, when 500 people have hit that like button I can get myself entered to win some really nice and some really useful cloth diapers! I really think I could do the cloth diaper thing for my last baby. We need to save money and what better way to do that than to not have to buy diapers? The contest I was going to enter before seeing the "500 likes minimum" would have given me a variety of 30 cloth diapers, cloth wipes, a wet bag and a few other things that would be great when cloth diapering! Sadly, no likes, no Facebook page, it kind of put a damper on things! Now, Facebook page and 5 likes, as of today at least! LOL.

The picture of Hubby I mentioned above!
Little Man was craving Daddy time and was not
into anyone else trying to get in on it! See the look?

Now I need to get off my computer and head on to crocheting some more so that I can maybe have one more thing for my sister completed in time! Knitting and sewing are also still on my To Do List as well. But they will have to wait for a time I feel more awake! The thing I am crocheting at the moment, I could do in my sleep! Not that I will try that. I also have a few other things I would like to type out on here but I am starting to feel my eyes slam shut and my fingers slow down! As always, Thank you for reading and taking the time out of your life to read about mine!


~TTFN

A not so short, short little bit by me....

Everything is listed today in bold, italic and underlined "topics" so that you can pick and choose what you read!

Sorry in advance for the lack of photos. I will try to not leave them out again. I love photos and hope others enjoy them when I post them as well.

ENJOY!

My Diet: I have noticed the last several week/months that my diet seems to be on a flat line. As in, I am not losing a pound from week to week. I think I need to get this part of me under better control. I was "Journaling" on my computer for awhile (I figure it could make for an interesting read one day) but I seemed to have stopped that once I started this. (Here's hoping for my reader's sake's that I never start a new blog without telling them, I may disappear here and be lost in new blog land! Yikes! LOL) I was keeping track of exactly what I ate, how many carbs were in each and every meal and every part of that meal. Such as; if I ate a salad I listed every single thing I put into it and that items carb count and then added it up!

I know that not many people would want to read the lists of things I consume on a day to day, week to week or even month to month basis. So, I do not plan on listing my food intake here, but I need to do something to get myself back to losing rather than being stuck. Or even worse, gaining! Ugh. I have lost around 35+ pounds since I had my baby almost 6 months ago (slow down time, slow down!). Only about 17 of that is from this diet though. The rest was all the "pregnancy" weight. I gained well over that during my pregnancy so it feels good to be below my pre-pregnancy weight. 

Deliveries of the package kind, not the baby kind: I have been waiting and waiting for my BzzKit from BzzAgent to arrive so I can test out the super cool Dr. Scholl's For Her High Heel Insoles. My mother went and picked up the mail today and brought back a package. Sadly, it was not my BzzKit. But thankfully, it was another package we were waiting for! My Husband's Aunt recently went to Florida and offered to buy our family T-shirts while she was there. (She really is one o the neatest Aunties in the world! I love her to pieces.)She sent me a bright pink shirt that I absolutely love since pink is my favorite color. and the hubby and all 4 boys each got a shirt as well. The baby however got 2! LOL. He will have to grow into them but that is OK. It is the first "way too big to fit" thing he has gotten. I will post photos after I get them de-tagged and washed! One of them says "LIFEGUARD" on it and is red... too cute. Another is neon orange. I completely love them!

Online browsing, cloth diapers: I spent a lot of time today looking into cloth diapers. I guess simply looking for see if I could find any super cheap ones or even any companies that are giving away free cloth diaper samples or things like that and I entered a few contests to try to win some of them. I would love to do this. Specially after seeing all the super cute ones my sister has gotten and the fact that they have gotten super easy to do from back in the day when they were all the "fold your own" type. I love the All-in-One kind that you basically slap the thing on the kiddo and go. But I think I would prefer the pocket style. I am not sure since I do not own any. I even posted a craigslist ad as well in hopes that someone may donate to myself and my sister. And I even stated there that I do not care if they are pink! I will for sure put a boy in pink. I have no issue with that. (My 6 year old is the one who hates the color pink for boys and I have no idea why.) I tend to stray far from dresses on my baby boys, but pink is alright! I know how hard it is to afford diapers when 3 to 4 adults are working to make ends meet but now that only 1 person has a job, diapers will be even harder to afford. I would like to take as much stress off my family as possible and I wouldn't mind using the cloth diapers on little man. Also, I know this is something my sister will be using and she is getting all my boys' old clothes no matter what she is having. And to be honest, I will probably use any older looking items I get and leave the newer looking stuff for my sister that I get. But, I am not as "crafty" as she is and I do not think I could make my own cloth diapers like she can/does.

Plants: I started a "garden" inside last year. it consisted of a couple types of flowers, tomatoes, bell peppers and parsley. Well, all of the plants were taken outside except the parsley. I believe I have posted photos of it here recently. Now the plant is too tall to take photos of the entire thing! I would say that the entire plant stands roughly 7-8 inches tall and has started to sprout off of the other parts of the plant. I will attempt to keep better record of the plants growth as it was my first attempt at planting anything other than pre-grown flowers bought at the store! Even those never lasted long! This baby is growing though and just in the last month! Maybe it got jealous of the huge Avocado tree growing next to it (which appears to be waiting for the parsley to catch up!)

Well, that  is all for tonight. I am pretty tired and think that I can hold off until tomorrow to type a bit more! As always, I hope everyone out there is happy safe and healthy! 

Until next time....

~TTFN

Sunday/Monday were busy... And other fun info!

Picture A

On Sunday, my Mother and I took my 4 boy on a "Nature Adventure"! At first, they did not like the idea of not being able to take ANY electronics in the car with them. My kids are way too high tech! LOL. Once we got on the road they found that things can be more interesting if you actually take in your environment instead of letting it fly by you while you have your nose in a game. We got up that morning, ate breakfast and had showers and got on our way. My husband had worked the night shift the previous night so getting the kids out of the house was a bonus for him. He got to sleep in a silent house! Lucky him. After the kiddos got passed the fact that they could not have any electronics we found our way to Sheep Bridge. Not as impressive as it was when I was last there and could remember it. We ended up only stopping to use a campground potty and to let the boys run off some steam there. They ran back and forth between the "road" and a picnic table. They had a blast with that. Back in the car we got and drove a few miles down the road to South Twin Lake. Once there, we did not park or exit the vehicle. We found there that they are now charging for day use. This is new to our family. If it is a yearly payment, we may consider giving them our business. If it is a daily due, they may have lost us. We usually go to the lakes a lot during the summer, that one in particular, and if they are going to charge us then we simply can not afford it. After that disappointment we drove up to North Twin Lake to see if the "parking fee" was required there as well and... We were in luck! No fee required at that lake. Not for day use at least. Since we were there, we got out and let the boys explore for a bit. (Picture A) The boys did great here until they started throwing someone else's firewood into the lake. That is when this mom decided to say we were don there and start walking to the car. This got their attention and made them realize that Mama was not fooling around with the misbehaving stuff!

Picture B

After getting back into the car and getting the boys to calm down we drove a little ways down the road to Fall River Campground. (see Picture B) There we walked down to a bridge where the boys got to look down at the water and see that people often toss coins into the river and use it as a wishing well. They found that to be very interesting and spent a bit of time looking into the water and finding different types of coin on the bottom of the river. They also found a larger chunk of "Witch Hair" and decided to toss that into the water to watch float down stream. (Picture C) All in all, we had a pretty good day. After the river and lunch at a picnic table we loaded back into the van and drove down to The Fish Hatchery. While there the boys spent $1.50 on fish food and fed all the different sizes of fish. from the tiny sardine sized fish to the ones that are almost as big as the baby! This was the stop that the 4 year old requested at the beginning of the day. He just had to go to the fish place. I remember also going there as a child. We even bought some of the food there and after feeding the fish at the hatchery would bring leftovers to my guppies who loved that stuff.

Picture C

Once the Fish Hatchery trip was over, my Mother and I decided we were getting tired and that it may be time to head home for the day. We left the house at 9:30 A.M. and at that time it was 1:30 P.M. We used the restroom at the hatchery and loaded up once more. The boys had began to act as though we could do these kinds of trips once a week (and that is the plan now) so we felt a treat was in order. Instead of turning to go home, we drove down to Thousand Trails and took the boys the the little grocery store there and let them pick out an ice cream each. Logan, my oldest, picked out Vanilla DIBS. Riley, the 6 year old, chose an ice cream SNICKERS bar and Tanner, the 4 year old, decided to follow in his mothers footsteps as a child and got the classic, ice cream sandwich! Yum! It was a great day all together. The boys had ice cream in their bellies and they were all happy little campers. We came home, Dad was still sleep and slept like a log while we were away, and Logan returned to his computer while Riley watched him play games and Tanner went to the bedroom for a nap. (He did this without too must of a fight)  This left me with some time to catch up on "games" and getting all of my pictures from the day onto my computer so that I could share them here! I have found that since I started my blog I tend to have my memory card inserted into my computer more than it is in my phone. I have it in my phone while out and about and then when we get home I usually will turn the phone off, remove the card, place it in the computer and off I go with getting all my photos onto the computer. I feel a blog without pictures can become boring after awhile. Speaking of pictures from the other day, my mother got some great shots of all 4 boys by themselves while we were at the river eating lunch. After she sends them my way I will share them here. Her phone was almost out of battery yesterday from taking so many photos that she wanted to wait until we got back home. Soon enough she will send them. She is a woman of her word! (And I love her for it!)

In other news...

I am still awaiting my BzzKit for the Dr. Scholl's For Her High Heel insoles BzzCampaign. I am super excited to do this campaign. It is my first campaign and I have a thing for heels! I love to wear them but they hurt my feet! I have pretty high hopes for this product. I want to be able to show off my "killer legs" LOL. (I have no idea if they are that great, all I know is what I am told. Ha ha...) It has only been 4 days since I signed up for this campaign and i am impatient. I want this product really bad! But, they say to wait 14 days before "searching" for the shipment. We shall see how long it takes. In the meantime, I will sit back and wait to see if any more BzzCampaigns come my way. I hope so, because who doesn't love to try out new products and state their opinion? I know I love to! Keep looking forward to the Dr. Scholl's For Her post!

Picture D

I have to say, all my children have their own little "ticks" or things that make them unique. The Baby's latest thing is how obsessed he is with the strap to his changing table. If he is crying and I can't get him to stop, 9 times out of ten all I have to do is put him on his changing table and hand him the end of the strap to play with. (Picture D) It really is sort of cute. And since it calms him down almost instantly, it is a little relaxing as well! LOL He has also started to stick out his tongue while watching me eat my dinner. (Picture E) This is from a few nights ago when he decided he had to be held while I ate dinner. (This being held thing is not something I consider to be "cute" at all) However, the tongue was popping in and out of his mouth the entire meal. Sometimes he would just let it hang out. Which is how I got the picture. I think it may be, in part, due to teething. his top 2 teeth have been working on coming in for a couple weeks now. He has also managed to rub his bottom lip raw on the inside with his 2 bottom teeth because he sucks on his lip. All of his little baby habits really are cute. I am just thankful he has decided to start sleeping through "most" the night. Granted, he is a breastfed baby so I am sore by the time he decides to wake up between 4 and 5 am to eat! LOL.

Picture E

That brings us to today! Since the Husband had to be to work at the butt crack of dawn, I got to get up and take the kiddos to school. And that means up and ready to leave for everyone by no later than 7:45 A.M. but that wasn't such a big deal. My oldest even woke me up today. He came into my room shortly after the alarm went off and told me it was time to wake up his brother. Alright, the 7 year old's internal clock is set to school time. Just in time for the school year to almost be over with too! LOL He has always been pretty good at getting himself up and going. When he first started school, he was always in bed first and always awake first. Most of the time he was up and dressed before I was. But back to the day at hand. We got up and dressed and showered and fed. Finally followed with loaded into the car and on our way. The boys got to school with about 5 minutes to spare to get to class. Now it was time for my Mother, 4 year old, 5 month old and myself to head to town for a fairly busy morning. We went straight to the coffee shop (Starbucks, of course) and I ordered a Venti Sugar Free Mocha Breve Latte instead of my regular Carmel one and I was not impressed. Tomorrow is another day however and I shall order my normal drink and be happy with a caffeinated beverage to keep me going that also tastes super duper yummy! I went into my OB-GYN's office today for my 10 days off blood pressure medication blood pressure check and my BP was pretty great, for me, 118/80. I normally have a pretty high BP but when I had my youngest son I ended up having postpartum pre-eclampsia. Typically, women only get Pre-E during pregnancy and the best cure for it is to deliver the baby. Well, I had already done that part. This is what caused my entire family to panic. How could I have been saved if the "cure" was to deliver the baby that I already delivered? Lots of BP medications! I was on 4 different types while in the hospital and when they sent me home, they sent me with 2 of them. I took one once a day every day for 3 months and another twice a day for 4 months (roughly). Now the hope is that my BP can stay in check. How do I manage that without medicine? I breathe and attempt to ignore those things that bother me. I even have to ignore a lot of what other people are saying so that I don't snap at them. But, when I do this, it tends to start an argument. So, I will listen to everything... But I am going to stop responding. Hopefully this doesn't cause any sort of issue when it comes to the safety of anyone and everyone. I am to return to the office again in 1 month to see how my BP is then. If it is still in the pretty good range then, no more medicine! That would be nice! But if it is up the Doctor will decide how to adjust my medication levels to keep me on track. Hopefully, I will be able to stay well at the same time. I ended up having a pretty bad head cold and my Primary Care Doctor (a nurse practitioner) gave me a medicine that she did not check to see if it was compatible with my BP medication and caused me to have an extremely painful 3 day migraine! That sucked!

Tomorrow should be a rather "easy" day to done with. I will be taking the kiddos to school again and then taking my Mother to pick up her car at the hospital (where Hubby works) and then I get to entertain the 4 year old and the 5 month old until my appointment. (Therapy, oh joy) I was supposed to take the time to look into a couple websites and a conference call line for women with postpartum depression, I just didn't have the time. which I will let the therapist know and I am sure she will be alright with my slacking as long as I promise to look into them before our next, and last, visit. One of them I am not sure I will be doing however. It was nice of her to find the information for me on the websites and chat groups and all but one of the sites costs $45 just to be able to discuss how you feel. I can tell everyone here all that for free! Why waste money on a place to vent when I have a blog (and Facebook!) After my appointment I will meet back up with my Mother and leave her car for Hubs to have a way home. I believe we are going to be hitting a few stores tomorrow, but I could be wrong. Those may be waiting until Wednesday or later. My Mother has a dentist appointment tomorrow afternoon and I may take the 4 year old and 5 month old to check out the new church next to the dentist called "The Door". However, it will be close enough to time for the big boys to be getting out of school that I can zip over there (also next door to my Mothers dentist) and pick them up instead of letting them get into trouble on the bus... Again. If they had a pretty good day at school we will head over to the library (again, also next door, but technically across the street) so they can each pick out a movie or two and a book. My boys love the library and I think that is awesome and just how it should be. Then home for the family and Dinner time. Tonight was spicy cheese stuffed burgers on a bed of lettuce topped with ranch, mustard and "Chipotle Madness" BBQ sauce (YUM!)... This sort of feels like our fall back meal. When we don't know what to cook, we cook burgers and put them on top of lettuce and call it a meal. Not bad since it is quick and painless with the Foreman grill. Hmmmm..... What to eat, what to eat. I will have to update everyone when I know!

Sleeping Wyatt after our fun filled Sunday.
(He just so happens to also be asleep as I finish up this post)

Thank you for taking the time out of your busy day to read about my busy days! I do enjoy sharing with everyone. Even my readers in Germany and Russia! You guys are great! Thank you for returning to read the way you do. I think my boys have the right idea....

~TTFN

Been a busy Mama!

I know I haven't posted in a few days but it was sort of a busy week/weekend...

This was last summer while #4 was still in his womb!
My how they change.

I spent the weekend keeping the kiddos calm and relaxed (for the most part) so that they were not disturbing their Dad. He started his job Friday night and was asleep all day long to be able to go to work all night. The boys and I made the most of our "alone time" together. They had Root Beer Floats for dinner one night and to top that off they also got to have cookies with their floats. That was the highlight for them.

During the days we would spend the majority of the time just being quite and not waking up Dad. My oldest spent most of his time playing computer games or playing on some sort of an electronic toy. The 6 year old spent a good chunk of his time playing with Lego's! He enjoyed the time away from little brother (the 4 year old) since he always knocks over his big brothers creations. Now that little brother is home again, the Lego's have found their way back into hiding... in other words, his box on the end of his bed! LOL! I am surprised that my husband was able to work all nights, sleep all days for 3 full days/nights and then still manage to sleep an entire night to be awake in the morning. I would not have been able to sleep that first night. But I guess it just shows that I am getting used to being sleep deprived! LOL.

On another note: I am a BzzAgent! I mentioned this before in a different post. Well, after almost convincing myself I was NEVER going to get on a campaign, I checked my e-mail today and there was the invite! I get to take part in the Dr. Scholl's For Her BzzCampaign! Yippy! I am excited. Heels have always hurt my feet and now I have the chance to wear my heels and dress like a girl! Woohoo!!!  I will be letting all of you know how well I enjoy them once I have then in my hot little hands (or on my feet rather) and rockin' my high heels again! I am one of those women who is a "closet fashioner" (if that makes sense) . I completely enjoy getting all dressed up and girly looking. I have several pairs of high heels, yet I never wear them because they hurt my feet. And who wants to get all dressed up and then be in pain? I know, I know... No pain, no gain... Well, I say forget that! I want to be pain free and all pretty at the same time. However, I have no clue where I am going to go all pretty and girly looking. But I am going to dress up, feel good and look great! And my feet will thank me for it! Can not wait! Ah! *End side note!*

I know this is also off subject of my "normal" topics, but I feel it should be out here. Anyways, I am glad that I am not on unemployment at this time. They are making it crazy to just claim a week of benefits. You have to claim either online or by phone and then you have to record (by text or voice recording) where it is you have applied for work at and what the out come was. At least that is my understanding. When I was on unemployment they just had you call in, do your thing and hope and pray you were honest! Of course, I was in a program, so I was being honest. It took me well over 2 years to find a job. I worked that job for roughly 4 months and then I found out I was pregnant and with the flick of a pen, I no longer had a job! And once my hubby tried putting me on his insurance during said pregnancy, they fired him as well! (I have not nice feelings toward that place now) I will not say what place of employment that was though. I am happy now to be a stay at home Mommy to my boys and I am so excited for next school year. I will get to have nice kids again. LOL. Anyways, I have noticed that 9 times out of 10 that unemployment pays better than actually working. some people will earn twice the amount they were. Where others will make half the earnings. But the other thing I have noticed and what brought this thought to my mind. Was celebrities help out the "down and out" type of people most of the time. At least that is what I notice. But these people all look as though they haven't really had it all that bad. The one family that came to my mind was recently on the Ellen DeGeneres show. They made $500-600 every 2 weeks. That is more than my own husband got on unemployment. He only made around $450 or less for every 2 weeks. This family got a car, $10k and because the Dad did a "dance dare" he also got a $100 gift card. Now to me, the gift card was an alright prize for the dance dare, go Ellen for giving those braver than me people a little something. But Whoa! $10,000 and a new Ford Escape (coolest new car around with that wave your foot to open the back hatch thingy) just for being "down and out"? Oh... My... Word! **love you Ellen, come visit me please!** LOL. I would have a heart attack if Ellen actually showed up here. Not only do I love her, but I think the shock of a celebrity giving 2 plops about me and my family would do me in. Then again, never going to happen... So no need to dwell on my chance to meet one of the funniest, bravest women I have ever laid eyes on.

Just finished nursing, waiting for brothers at the park!
He is not amused. LOL

Now, I have come to a point this evening where I feel that if I continue to write, nothing will make sense anymore. So I leave you all with my "broke lady" rant on celebrities and how they help the "down and not as out as they seem", while the rest of us "simple folk" pull up the rear! .....sigh.... 'Til next time....
~TTFN!