We can all use a few more hands
A friend of mine posted this on facebook and it totally cracked me up! Great way to solve that awkward moment when you’re not quite sure how to eat a cupcake without looking like a pig or without frosting on your nose! Solution in the video below!
My 2 little girls have a case of the stickers…. and it’s apparently highly contagious 🙂 It also normally appears after Grandma comes over.
Do your kids love stickers as well? Have you ever found any stuck in weird places?
I recently had a reader ask me about Groupon Getaways. Are they for real? Can you really take a trip for THAT low of a price?
The answer? ABSOLUTELY! And I’m proof that it’s so!
A couple weeks ago we bought a deal for a hotel in Helen, GA (no longer available). We called and made our reservation with ease and the hotel was prepared for the Groupon callers. When we arrived, we simply handed over our certificates and were good to go. Our hotel room was just as described, if not better. And as you can tell, we had a BLAST!
We’ve used Groupon Getaways 3 times now and I love it! It’s always fun to try out a new place at a discounted price.
Will you have to sit through a timeshare presentation? NO! Unless for some reason that’s in the terms, but I have never seen in it a Groupon Getaway terms like I have on other sites. It’s always been a very easy and pleasant experience.
I will suggest that whenever you do purchase a getaway that you look at all the fine print. Sometimes they are only good on certain dates. Sometimes there are extra fees for certain things. For this particular giveaway, we just had to pay tax when we arrived and that was it. Often the certificates are stackable, meaning that you can use several of them in the same visit.
Here are some of the current deals you can grab now. CLICK HERE to see all of the available deals:
Savannah, GA: Country Inn & Suites $53 for 1 night, $99 for 2 nights! Combine up to 6 nights! Had indoor pool!
Kissimmee, FL: Comfort Inn Maingate – $55 for 1 night or $110 for 2 nights with a FREE pizza. Combine up to 4 nights! Includes shuttle to Disney World!
Outer Banks, NC – Ramada Plaza Nags Head Beach – prices as low as $44 a NIGHT! Includes indoor pool!
As you can see, the deals are great, you just have to look and see what is best for your family. Every Tuesday they pop up with a whole bunch of new deals and some will sell out. Keep checking and you’ll find the right one for you.
A little late posting this, but life happens! My oldest turned 9 in August and is a HUGE animal lover. She came up with the idea to have a birthday party but give her presents to the local animal shelter instead of getting gifts for herself. I was so super proud of her. I contacted the Madison-Oglethorpe Animal Shelter to find out a list of what they needed and when I was talking to them, they said we could come and have a tour of the Animal Shelter with her friends for her birthday!
Here was their wish list:
I’m sure other shelters have very similar wish lists.
To start the party, each child was able to “adopt” a Webkinz when they arrived. I had purchased a set of these from the Graveyard Mall deal a while back. It comes back every now and again.
We served our guests delicacies such as cat litter cake and poop! The kids thought this was GREAT. Poop was simply raisinettes and the cat litter cake was super easy as well. Kitty Chow was simply Annie’s Cheddar Bunnies (you could use Goldfish instead), cheerios, chex mix, and raisins all mixed together.
Cat Litter Cake:
Bake 1 Chocolate and 1 White boxed cake mix according to directions. Crumble into a CLEAN and NEW cat box. Prepare 1 large box of vanilla pudding acccording to instructions and pour over crumbled cake. Smash 1 package of vanilla sandwich cookies into crumbs and pour on top. Lightly melt tootsie rolls in the microwave for a few seconds and then shape into “poop”. Serve with a CLEAN and NEW scoop.
The cute little water bottles were made from the small water bottles with labels removed. Then I used colored Duck Tape to give it the pattern. It was so easy and took just a few minutes to do.
We also served Dog Food (cocoa puffs) and Mouse Munch (Crackers and cheese cubes), and of course animal crackers. 
And of course we had our cute veggie garden as well as Littlest Pet Shop plates.
After the party, we went over to the Animal Shelter for the tour. It was really neat to see the “Behind the Scenes” of how they do everything at the shelter. Of course we got to love on the puppies and sweet kittens as well.
All in all, it was a very fun party and even better knowing that we helped out a local shelter. Here are the kids with some of the donations.
This boy has had a loose tooth. Very loose. His first one. For days. This is my child that turns white as a sheet and nearly passes out at the sight of blood. The fact of him having a loose tooth caused all sorts of drama around here…. “Mommy, I don’t want it to fall out”, “Mommy I want it out NOW”, “Mommy pull it out!”, “Mommy DON’T!!!”. It’s been an interesting journey. To top it all off, he was really freaked about the idea of having a hole where the tooth used to be and of course the blood.
I asked advice on the Mommy Octopus facebook page the other day about how to get him to move past the fear of losing a tooth and got some great feedback. You guys rock, by the way!
We ended up trying to redirect him as much as possible away from the fear, read books about loose teeth, and had big sister talk to him about how it wasn’t bad. We even fed him corn on the cob and many apples with the hopes it would pop right out.
No luck. Finally last night after Awanas, he was begging me to pull it out since it kept bleeding. I used a reader’s tip of a little orajel to numb it a touch, cold washcloth, and it came right out! YAY!
My son was so super excited to have it out! And I admit I’m a touch sad that my sweet little boy is growing way too fast, but we’re enjoying every minute! Thanks again everyone who posted tips the other day!
Last night my friend and I went on a Mom’s Night Out. As frugal moms often do, we ended up at the thrift store. We visited America’s Thrift Store in Athens and found quite the bargains! What’s neat about this thrift store is that from the ceiling, you’ll notice a sign like this:
That means whatever items have an orange, yellow, or white tag are marked down! The thrift store prices are low as it is, but being able to take an additional percentage off is awesome!
Here are some of the deals I found:
As you can see, I bought CUTE name brand items for a fraction of the cost. I’m all about buying used and saving the difference, especially that I have 4 kids to shop for! Also, if you are in Athens, be sure and swing into Ingles to grab one of the gray coupon books before you shop. Inside is a coupon for 10% off your entire America’s Thrift Store purchase! My grand total for everything (boots, skates, costume, dress, 2 jeans) after all discounts was just $13.63 with tax! That’s cheaper than just the skates alone! Or just the costume alone!
My friend Janet was able to score a shirt for $.79 that had a white tag, which meant 70% off that $.79!!! Only $.24 for a shirt! You can’t beat that at all! She also grabbed fleece sleepers for her son for $.59 and $.79 each. They looked brand new!
Unlike Good Will, everything is all sized and organized by sizes, so it’s easy to find what you are looking for. I shop here all the time!
My Tips:
What is your best thrift store or yard sale tip? What is the best deal you’ve found?
My grandfather recently moved to the area and he absolutely LOVES Butter Pecan Cookies. With my son’s allergy, store bought cookies are out of the picture. I don’t mind baking, in fact, I love baking! I looked around and found a couple recipes that looked intriguing but nothing that sounded perfect. I mixed and matched and came up with my own recipe. I might add that my kitchen smells absolutely wonderful right now!
The only problem? Between the 4 kids (and okay I may have had a couple myself), we are going to have to make Grandpa his own batch! They were THAT popular! Hopefully there is one or two left for hubby to try when he gets home.
Ready to make your own? Here goes:
Ingredients:
This weekend, my husband, father in law, and I tackled the kitchen counters using the Giani Granite kit. Our counter tops are the original ones in the house when it was built and they definitely needed a little updating. (And yes, the walls will be next!)
Here’s before photos:
Prepping took about an hour or so, taping everything up, scrubbing counters, washing counters, and all. This was probably the longest part of the whole process. Making sure everything is properly prepared is essential to making the counter tops look great. We followed the instructions completely.
Here’s the difference as we painted on the first coat:
Makes a big difference!
Next comes the fun part! Stamping on the colors!
We followed the directions again and stamped the colors all over in the way the instructional dvd suggested. Here’s how one of my counters looked after the first color:
We got the other colors applied and then it was finally time to seal!
I’m loving it! Doesn’t it look great? Here’s a closeup:
And final photos:
(ignore the stuff piled in the sink! That’s what happens when you have to have everything off the counters! lol!)
My thoughts and tips? It went much smoother and easier than I anticipated. Be sure to have an entire weekend free. It’s best if kids can go to Grandma’s and plan to eat out or prepare meals in advance to be warmed in the microwave. I LOVE the end result and can’t wait now to finish up the rest of my kitchen so it will be all up to date!
For more information on Giani Granite, please visit the Giani Granite website and their facebook page. Lots of before/after shots on their facebook page!
HUGE thanks to Giani Granite for my kit to try and for providing this giveaway! The winner will get to choose between the 7 different Giani Granite colors available.
To enter the giveaway, fill out the rafflecopter below:
As I’ve posted before, we’ve been working on repurposing a lot of things in our house rather than buying new things for $$$ and less quality. I had this dresser that we no longer needed that really didn’t match anything in our house.
First we removed the drawers and sanded the dresser down. We removed the old drawer pulls as well.
Next it was primed and ready for it’s color.
It’s color we bought from the OOPS paints at Home Depot. I love the color and it was just $5 for the entire gallon! I love checking the OOPS section for nifty colors!
Next my husband cut plywood to make a top shelf and used braces and brackets to keep it in place. We put new drawer handles on, cut a hole in the back for cords and it put it back together.
Finished product! My husband needs to add one more brace in the middle of the shelf to support the weight and then it will be perfect. We were able to fit all our dvds in the drawers, all neat and organized, and away from little fingers pulling them out every 2 seconds 🙂 I’m very pleased and can’t wait for my next project!
Project total was probably around $15. The most expensive part was the new drawer pulls. We had the plywood leftover from a previous project. Much cheaper than buying new!
My other Do It Yourself On a Budget Projects:
Today’s Weekend Boredom Buster is different than the typical fun and carefree ideas we post to help you get rid of the weekend bores.
Many of you may remember me posting back a few months ago about a sweet little girl in our church named Piper. Piper passed away from Leukemia in April of this year, after fighting nearly all of her 2 3/4 years of life. Today Piper would have turned 3.
In Piper’s memory, her parents are planting something special today to remember their sweet girl. You can read her mom’s blog post HERE about their plan to plant. Piper’s mom has such an incredible strength that can only be described as God-given, and her faith is tremendous. If you ever have some free moments, I encourage you to read HER BLOG. You will be encouraged and strengthened through her words.
Keeping with the spirit, we are joining Piper’s family in planting something special today. We took the kids to the local plant nursery and they chose a gorgeous butterfly bush to plant in memory of Piper.
Piper was just 5 days older than my Anna.
If you feel led, I encourage you to take a moment and grab something to Plant For Piper today. If you do, I’d love for you to take a photo, email it to me, and I’ll pass it along to Piper’s family. If you can’t, head outdoors and weed your gardens, play with your kids in the sunshine, or snuggle with them on the couch. I also encourage you to keep Piper’s family in your prayers – her mom Susanna, dad Chad, and sister Linley.
