Whole Foods Ground Beef Special (Giveaway!)

For Labor Day, Whole Foods is running an awesome deal on ground beef! Nationwide, the stores are offering ground, grass-fed beef at a special price of $3.99/lb! Grass-fed beef is much leaner than grain-fed and considered better for you. As always, they have some great recipes on their website that would be perfect if you're throwing a Labor Day picnic. I think we're going to try the Bahn Mi Grass-Fed Beef Burgers this weekend. (We've been watching the Food Network's Great Food Truck Race show and I've been intrigued by the Nom-Nom truck that serves Vietnamese sandwiches)

If you don't make it in time for that sale, if you live in Southern California, Arizona and Nevada, they're offering 20% off burgers from Saturday - Monday.

To sweeten the deal a bit more, Whole Foods has generously offered to send a $10 gift card to one of my readers!

Giveaway Name: Grass Fed
Mandatory Question: What's your favorite burger topping?

Enter this giveaway by filling out the giveaway form with your information. The form keeps track of all of your information, without exposing your information to the Internet.  I always delete the entries after submitting the winner's information.  Comments left on this entry are not entered into the giveaway. For all my giveaway rules, check out this page.

Giveaway will end on Monday, September 6, 2010!

*Disclosure: I received a gift card, and one will be provided to my readers thanks to Whole Foods Market*

I Love Shutterfly (and a Giveaway!)

Colin was born almost 10 years ago, and we got our first digital camera around that same time. I wasn't sure what to do with the digital photos, and remember trying out Shutterfly. I'll admit that I tried other online photo sites since then, but I have always come back to Shutterfly and don't even bother trying other sites (even when lured by free prints.)

Over the last decade, Shutterfly has helped me print my photos, create thank you note cards and holiday cards, and given me an easy way to put together photo albums by creating photo books.  (In fact, I just finished another one of our trip to Camp Verde this summer.)

Shutterfly has excellent customer service.  I have had only one problem in the last decade (they sent me the wrong photo book before the holidays.)  I emailed them the day the wrong book appeared, and they had my book sent to me within a day.

When anyone asks me to suggest an online photo source, the only place I send them is to Shutterfly. The pictures I uploaded 10 years ago are still safe on their servers.  The site is easy to use, and shipping is fast.

I couldn't be happier, but I'm even happier to tell you that I have codes for 10 cards for two of my readers to give away!

Giveaway Name: Shutterfly!
Mandatory Question: Tell me about your favorite photo.


Be sure to click through to the giveaway form to enter this giveaway. The form keeps track of all of your information, without exposing your information to the Internet.  I always delete the entries after submitting the winner's information.  Comments left on this entry are not entered into the giveaway. For all my giveaway rules, check out this page.

The giveaway ends on September 10, 2010.

How We're Adjusting

A couple people have asked how we're doing, and I'd say we're adjusting.  Today was the beginning of the 3rd week of school. 

Overall, it's been a positive experience.  The hardest part is things like tonight -- I worked today and pulled into the driveway in time for the boys to hop in the car so we could go to their music lessons.  Bo took Lydia to parent/tot baseball and we went immediately from music to the field so Nate could play coach pitch.

Game ended at 8, so we arrived home at 8:30 and ate some KFC that Bo picked up and now Nate is sitting next to me finishing up an assignment that must be turned in tomorrow.  And he still has to shower before he can get into bed so Bo can wake him up at 6:15.

When we were homeschooling, there wouldn't be any homework, and they wouldn't have to wake up at 6:15 tomorrow.  I know, we've been spoiled the last few years, but that is why this is an adjustment.

I met with Nate's teacher and speech therapist today to discuss the plan for him this year.  His teacher said that Nate is obviously a very intelligent boy, but he's struggling with time management and classroom management.  I expected this, and so did she, and she did say that every day he gets a little bit better.  He wants to strive to do his best, and sometimes gets frustrated.  We also talked about a test they do that involves oral reading that he bombed. He bombed it not because he can't read, but because he can't read aloud fluently. Just now he shared with me that he'll never earn a Blue Zone bracelet because he needs to score a 135 on this test in order to earn one (he scored a 32 last week)  We're confident that the score will increase as his disfluency lessens, but it'll be a long road.

Colin is also struggling with classroom management and learning the ins & outs of what's expected for various assignments.  He had a vocabulary assignment last week to use a set of vocabulary words in meaningful sentences.  He wrote sentences and used the words appropriately, but was scored down.  When we inquired as to the reason, we were told that he didn't define the word within the sentence -- he just used the word.  I understand the difference now, and I assume that is how this assignment has been approached for the last couple years.  Colin, however, just thought he had to use the words correctly.  His teacher did say that his sentences were very imaginative.

As for me, it's been as hard as I imagined it would be giving up the knowledge and control I had of their curriculum.  We are attending "Curriculum Night" tomorrow to learn more about what's being covered this year, but it can never be as specific or targeted as we did while homeschooling.  It's also hard knowing that our time is no longer our own -- there is homework every night, which must be done in addition to sports, music, and family time.  Previously, our schooling was completed during daylight hours and never slopped over into our evenings.  And, personally, I have much more energy to cope with schooling at 10AM rather than 7PM.

There is plenty of good as well.  Chess Club begins meeting tomorrow, and Colin is enjoying orchestra. Nate continues to receive an hour of speech each week and I don't have to scramble trying to figure out how to get him there. I have an almost completely booked calendar work-wise, so I know that this is necessary for our family right now.

Getting everyone out of the house by 7:15 is a struggle.  Homework is a hassle.  But I know we'll all find our groove, and we're looking forward to the upcoming 3 day weekend!

A Cheese Party

A couple weeks ago, we were in Whole Foods Tempe looking for some back-to-school snacks.  We were by the cheese display, and Nate was amazed at the size of some of the rounds of cheese.  He didn't believe me at first when I told him that was how some cheese was made, and then pieces were cut from the large round.

We talked a bit about cheese, and then I suggested we pick up a few varieties to try. He thought that was a neat idea, so we chose 8 different chunks of cheese and planned to have a cheese party.  We also picked up a couple different varieties of crackers.

It took a week or so, but one night everyone was home early enough that we were able to enjoy our cheese spread.  We had some delicious green grapes, and Bo would slice one type of cheese and we'd all try it.  Everyone was great about trying the different varieties -- even if some insisted on only eating Ritz crackers with their cheese.

Not surprisingly, we all loved the Wisconsin aged cheddar.  But, we also all liked Leerdammer (a semi-hard cheese with many holes like swiss, but not as strong) and I doubt I would have ever picked up a chunk of it if not for Nate's excitement.  In fact. of the 8 we chose, none were deemed yucky!

It was so much fun that I think we may make it a new tradition!  Our cheese dinner occurred a couple nights before school started this year, so maybe we'll tie it to every new school year.

On a completely silly note, here's an ad I found for Leerdammer cheese . . . it's so silly but it made me laugh!

Crayola Giveaway

My kids have been back in school for 2 1/2 weeks now.  We're still adjusting . . . some days I think that I'm adjusting more than anybody else.

Before they started school, we went shopping for supplies. Just like always, I purchased Crayola crayons. We've tried other crayons over the years, but I always go back to Crayola.  I love the way they glide across the paper, and during back-to-school sales they're always an awesome price.

Blog Spark and Crayola contacted me and wanted to send me a couple Crayola products, which I wouldn't refuse! We always need more crayons, markers and colored pencils! I was very interested to read about the efforts that Crayola is making to be environmentally friendly.

One of the cool things they do is use more than 26,200 solar panels to convert sunlight into electricity, generating the energy required to make 1 billion of the 3 billion crayons Crayola makes each year! (equal to 60 million 24-ct. boxes!)  Living in Arizona, I think solar power is an underused resource, and wish that we could find a way to harness the sun to help us generate electricity.

You may have noticed that the markers now have a black barrel instead of white.  This is because the barrels are all made from recycled plastic bottle caps -- more than 1 million pounds of them!

This video shares more details:



If you need more crayons, I'd love to send you some!  Crayola (through BlogSpark) has a package of crayons, markers and colored pencils to send to one of my readers!

Name of Giveaway: Crayola
Mandatory Question: What do you do to conserve energy?

Be sure to click through to the giveaway form to enter this giveaway. The form keeps track of all of your information, without exposing your information to the Internet.  I always delete the entries after submitting the winner's information.  Comments left on this entry are not entered into the giveaway. For all my giveaway rules, check out this page.

The giveaway will end on September 1, 2010.

*Disclosure: I received Crayola product for my family, as well as the products to give away thanks to Crayola and My Blog Spark. All opinions and words are my own, the video was created by Crayola and embedded from their YouTube channel.*

Tell Me Thursday - Flagstaff

On Saturday morning, Bo took Nate to baseball and I took Lydia to a birthday party.  Before I left, I had been looking at cabins to rent, but they were almost 5 hours away.  While at the party, I texted Bo and asked him to look for a hotel in Flagstaff.

He did, and packed, so when Lydia & I got home, we were able to hop in the car and head to Flagstaff.  I had piles of laundry to do, and the boys had a bit of homework left, and . . . we decided to go anyway.

I'm so glad that we did!  About 1/2 way up there, the a/c in our van stopped working.  Thankfully, Flagstaff was about 20 degrees cooler than Phoenix so it wasn't so bad.  We were a bit concerned about the noise, however.

We were well on our way, though, so we kept going and arrived in the early evening. We stayed in the ugliest hotel room I have ever visited!  The place was clean, so I wouldn't call it a dive.  BUT!  The walls were red.  Very, very red.  And the bedding was black.  As was the dresser and tables.  And the epoxied bathroom floor. (As an aside, why do hotels/motels use carpet?  It is always filthy!  I'd much prefer a solid floor and I think it would be easier to keep clean.  Because, yes, while the place was clean, the carpet was filthy.)  The sheets and towels were just this side of threadbare.

It was cheap, however, and we were only staying one night.  (OH, I forgot -- there were striped curtains. Tan and cream and maroon.  Which were raggedly cut off at the bottom so they didn't cover up the air conditioner.)

We went for the sights, though, and after dinner we headed out to Lowell Observatory.  The boys were able to look at the moon through some of the telescopes, and we were able to listen to part of a lecture about the galaxy. We spent a couple hours there, and enjoyed it.  During our last visit, I purchased a membership, so we visited for free.

The next morning, we tried to find a place that might be able to look at the van, but didn't have any luck.  Bo looked around in the engine and decided that it should hopefully make the trip back home. We wanted to visit the Arboretum and the Planes of Fame Museum, but decided to choose one so we would make it home before dark. We chose the Arboretum, partly because I was pretty sure either our Boyce Thompson membership or our Desert Botanical membership would get us in for free. 

I was right -- and our Desert Botanical Garden membership meant that we could wander around without paying another admission fee. We all enjoyed the Arboretum at Flagstaff.  The weather was warm (not hot, not cool) and we were able to walk around outdoors and look at the many plants. (I'd include pictures, but they're on my other computer.)  It wasn't crowded, so the kids were able to wander freely (within eyesight) and they had a blast.

We headed home, and the van made it the entire way.  Thankfully, a good friend was able to help us get it fixed, and within 2 days I had icy cold air coming from the van.

It was a great weekend, and I love that my kids are great travelers. Thanks to our various memberships, the weekend was an inexpensive trip away from home!

Wordless Wednesday - Flagstaff

Favorite Links of the Week

When I find links that I like, I tend to share them almost immediately on Facebook.  I thought I'd share a few of my favorites here this week :)  Enjoy!

This site -- Smarthistory -- is amazing!  Tons of pictures & commentary about art through the ages. I was blown away and had a great time clicking through and listening to various people talking about great art.

There's a zombie adventurer living in my sister's house and she's keeping a blog for him.  Cracks me up!

I have always loved Calvin & Hobbes, and thought this was genius -- a searchable database of Calvin & Hobbes comics.  Unfortunately, it looks like there are copyright / server issues so the comics are no longer loading.  But, I'll still link in case they get things straightened out.

Interesting article from Newsweek about why teenagers seem to mature so slowly these days -- I think it makes a number of good points.

And, finally, a wonderful poem/video that I truly enjoyed this week!  (Video by Andrea Dorfman, poem by Tanya Davis)

Tell Me Thursday - First Day

Yes, they survived.

When Bo brought the camera home and I saw this one, I almost cried for my crumpled on the curb boy.

But, they both did fine.  It wasn't spectacularly exciting (but was grade school ever?) They both found their classrooms, the bathrooms, the lunchroom and the bus home. The teachers were nice.

Colin came home with homework and was annoyed, but survived. He also told me that books were not exaggerated. (We had a conversation a couple days ago where he shared that he thought maybe he had read too many books talking about negative things about school.  I said that books are often exaggerated to create a good story.)

Nate admitted that it was a pretty good day.  The biggest complaint is that he has to sit next to a girl.  (When I tell him that most of his favorite people are girls -- me, his sister, his aunt, his grandma) he explains that it's different.  We're his FAMILY, she's just some girl. 

They will do fine.  I will do fine.  It's a new chapter in our ever-evolving life.

We chose to homeschool because it helped us have time when we needed it for the family, I liked my kids, liked doing things with them and felt that I could do a good job at it. (And it was great visiting museums and zoos when most kids were in school! It meant there were no crowds.) When we first made the decision, Bo was working extremely long, erratic hours.  Even 2 years ago, it was common that he would leave for work after 9 or 10AM and not return until 9 or 10PM. Those early morning hours meant the boys could spend time with him and we felt that was extremely important.

This year?  I'm working consistently out of the home. Bo doesn't have as many evening or weekend calls. Our lives have shifted and it makes more sense for the boys to attend the local school.  Will we ever homeschool again?  Never say never!  But, we are committed to completing this year to the best of all our abilities. We loved homeschooling, but that doesn't mean we can't make different choices.

First Day (and the positives!)

 The boys headed off to their first day at our local public school.  This year marked the end of our homeschooling journey -- something we had discussed for months -- but it was still hard.

In the past, they had attended a weekly enrichment program for homeschoolers through the public school system, so we had these pictures for "First Day of School" the last 5 years. This year was different, though.  Instead of driving them to their program, they took a bus down the road.

I already talked about the hard parts of yesterday, but I wanted to balance it with some good parts. I have always wanted them to take music lessons, but a variety of things stood in the way. The school offers orchestra for the 4th grade and we told Colin he would be participating.

I believe music lessons are important and worthwhile and I think that he will enjoy it. He refused at first, but when we went back to the multi-purpose room after meeting the teachers, he saw a table for chess club.

Another pastime I think is worthwhile, and one that I know he enjoys.  So, I bribed him a bit and said that I didn't want to hear one more complaint about orchestra and I would sign him up for Chess Club as well.  He loved that idea, and Nate was happy as well.  (He was bummed he couldn't join orchestra yet!)

Lydia was still sleeping this morning, so Bo walked them to the bus stop. I'm anxious to hear how their first day went (especially recess!) and I don't feel very motivated to get much done today (although I have a to-do list that needs to be tackled.)  I think Lydia & I will go run some errands and wait for them to come home.

We had an amazing summer -- culminating for the boys with a trip with their dad to Milwaukee last weekend.  They had an awesome time with dear friends & their cousins (who they haven't seen in years) We're headed into new territory, but I know we're all up for the challenge!!