Wordless Wednesday: Brothers

Free Sample of Enfamil

Click on the banner above to get your FREE sample of Enfamil.  It is a printed coupon… there is no request for information from you.  As always… I believe breastmilk is BEST for any baby… but it doesn’t always work for everyone.  I nearly threw in the towel with SuperBaby because it was SUCH a struggle… so I get it.  If you don’t need the formula…don’t you think someone out there does? For many its an expense that is very difficult to deal with.  Why not get your sample and donate to your church or local shelter?

March 7 P&G and a Great Cause All in One

I’m so intrigued and excited to share this information with you, I hardly know where to start!

This Sunday, March 7 will host the LARGEST P&G brandSAVER insert EVER (I’m not exaggerating…it really is the biggest savings they’ve every put out in one insert) ! It has over $160 in savings inside!  There are great high dollar coupons and several B1G1 coupons on what are quickly becoming some of my favorite brands: Tide, Swiffer, Cover Girl, Crest, Pampers, PUR… the list goes on and on.

Here is the kicker: This month, for every single coupon redeemed from the insert, P&G will donate one day’s worth of clean drinking water to a child in need via the Children’s Safe Drinking Water.  As if it wasn’t a big enough problem already, with the recent earthquakes in Haiti and Chile there are even more children in need of clean drinking water.

I visited the Children’s Safe Drinking Water site before I wrote this post… I certainly want to be informed when I’m sharing information with you!  I am amazed.  Here are some links that prove to be very interesting and inspiring reading:

Children’s Safe Drinking Water program through P&G

Facts About Contaminated Drinking Water

Information about the PUR Packet and a very cool video showing the packet in action

Dr. Greg Allgood’s Work with CSDW

So there you have it… a VERY exciting P&G coming your way this weekend (I’ve seen it…its MARVELOUS) and a chance to help out a great cause by SHOPPING.  Best of both worlds!

*If you are near a Kroger store…there is a Cart Buster Sale going on right now that features a large number of P&G products…these will be great match ups come next week!

Wordless Wednesday: Independence

Random Tuesday Thoughts: Vampires and Bloggers

I haven’t read a book other than Harry Potter in four years. Seriously. How sad is that? Then I got this Kindle… and I’ve managed to read the entire Twilight Saga in under a month. I keep having these crazy dreams… not like crazy sexy… just crazy vampire dreams. I read a blog post from one of my favorite bloggers one night while I was breastfeeding…then dreamed that she was a vampire (you can see now why I’m not linking her). I read all of the Vampire Chronicles back in the day, too. Now what shall I read? I hear True Blood is some full on vampire porn… maybe I should go there. Heaven forbid I should read something of SUBSTANCE that might improve my brain function…. isn’t that what Words With Friends is for?

I’m amazed at the retention rate of my 4yo. He is unfortunately, quite the good listener…even if he pretends not to be. I try to make sure he is listening by having him look at me…. the other day he was rambling about something while I was changing SuperBaby’s diaper and he says to me “Mom. Look at me so I know you are listening.”

I’m a little worried about what the future holds for him, however. The other night he was shaking his head back and forth as fast as he could…making silly noises all the while…making himself as dizzy as possible. When he stopped his eyes were glazed and he slumped back in his chair and said “Niiiiiiice” with a dopey grin on his face. DH and I just looked at each other and laughed, despite ourselves.

Have I mentioned yet today how pure and wonderful and calm SuperBaby is? Even at his WORST moments… he soothes me and makes me feel calm and protected.

We booked our HONEYMOON! Five years in the making DH and I are taking our honeymoon….to St. Lucia! We are staying at an all inclusive resort with the WORKS and I am so excited!! Want to know the best part? We are paying cash! Saving and putting money away we were intent upon having this trip be fun and extravagant… without pulling us into debt and WE DID IT!

I’ve got nothing else today. I’m not random…I’m sleep deprived and under medicated. Better luck next week!

For some other random individuals…be sure to visit Keeley at TheUnMom. If you are random in your Tuesday thoughts…leave a link here and I’ll come ponder your views.

Welcome!!

Welcome to all of my new subscribers…and especially to those of you visiting after our Coupon Class in Lawrence last night!

Every time I teach a coupon class I think of all of the information that I should have at YOUR fingertips here on my blog… so I want you to EMAIL ME and tell me if there are links you would like to see or information that I can provide to you!

In the meantime… here are some helpful links that you might enjoy

StretchingABuck has a great list of the catalinas currently running at Kroger (Dillon’s). These are the deals that print off “$ On Your Next Order” after you check out.

If you haven’t read it before… you can follow our local deals through Shop Talk With Jenn & Julie at the Lawrence Journal World Online. Your best bets will be to check in on Sundays and Wednesdays.

VocalPoint is a great place to sign up to receive coupons and samples of new products.

If you haven’t yet signed up for SWAGBUCKS this is the time to do it!  They have revamped their entire system for their 2nd Birthday and you can earn MORE free stuff!!  Swagbucks is a search engine powered by Google and Ask.com … you earn “Bucks” for your normal, everyday searches.  Cash these “Bucks” in for real prizes…my faves are the gift cards!  SwagBucks traded in for Amazon gift cards makes all of those sweet deals I post even sweeter!

If you do a lot of Amazon shopping you can visit them through this link and support your local coupon friendly blogger

Loading coupons to your Dillon’s card through CellFire and Shortcuts are a great way to save you even more money when you shop for groceries.  Both are free and take only a few minutes to set up.  Totally worth the time and effort!

If you are interested in winning a Coupon Binder you can do that HERE. This giveaway runs until Sunday.

If you would like to get in on the $3/3 Bags of Gevalia Coffee Deal you can do that by clicking on THIS LINK.  If you are interested in going bigger you can click on the banner below to get a 12 cup coffee maker and 2 bags of coffee for $14.95 with no obligations!

If you shop online at all you should consider shopping through Ebates. You earn cash back on your purchases and you can find all types of online coupon codes for your favorite store.  Complete a purchase within the first 90 days of signing up and get a $5 sign up bonus!

Random Tuesday Thoughts: I Finally Figured it Out

She emptied my dishwasher.

I’ve had a DAY.  More like 5 days all wrapped up in one.  I seriously thought it was Saturday night a few minutes ago and realized that it was, in fact, still Monday.

Right before Christmas my dear friend Aprile had the kids and I over for lunch and her husband had the unfortunate experience of running a T-Bone on my minivan, parked securely in their driveway.  I felt bad.  They have insurance, we made arrangements and I finally got around to getting it fixed … TODAY.

The plan was to take it to Kansas City, pick up the rental car and come home.  We left half an hour late…big surprise.  I was pretty pleased with myself for getting the van cleaned out before we took it in…fairly certain that the mechanics at O’Neill Honda would not want to deal with mounds of half – finished coloring book pages, random socks (SuperGirl likes to de-sock herself in the car)…the occasionally snot rag and errant shopping receipts running amok.

I digress.

We head to Kansas City…about a 40 minute drive to the Honda dealership.  We get there…they call the rental car company and I go wait patiently in my car.  I’m in an strangely calm mood.

Then I begin to dig through the diaper bag for my driver’s license so I would have it ready when the rental car arrived.  I dug, and I dug…and yet…. no license.  I’d left it at home.  There was nothing to do but turn around and go get it.

That’s okay…this was the only thing I had planned for today.  No sweat.  I have a DVD player in the van and my kids REALLY like Sonic.

Drive back to Lawrence. Stop at Sonic and pick up lunches for the kids.  Drive all the way across town to our house.  Pull in the driveway as SuperGirl begins to shriek “Iiiiiicccckkkkyyy!” and proceeds to spew vomit all over herself.

Again, I’m calm.  Odd? Yes!  I clean her up…comfort her…grab my driver’s license, a plastic bowl and an extra set of clothing and head back out the door.  We drive BACK to Kansas city… SuperGirl vomits again as we pull into the dealership.

And AGAIN…I clean her up.  Its a little worse this time.  I change her clothes and clean everything up.  Transfer all car seats to the rental van… slyly stuff all of the vomit evidence into empty Sonic bags and slide them into the back of the rental van praying that the nice man picking us up would not notice.

Fill out paperwork at rental place.  Kids screaming.  SCREAMING.  SuperBoy doesn’t feel good….SuperBaby is starving and sick of his carseat.  The rental van has no DVD player.

And yet, I’m calm.  I drive to a parking lot and pull over.  I feed SuperBaby and we are on our way home.  Kids all snooze for a short period during the trip.  We get home safely…. six hours after we left the first time.  I’m still able to get dinner made and a load of laundry done.

I’m baffled.  This is NOT NORMAL for me.  I should be freaking out…stressed to the max…cursing my husband when this CLEARLY has no trace of being even remotely his fault….  but I’m not.  I know that because I was calm my kids were happier…and handled the situation better.

What could it be?

I finally figured it out:

She emptied my dishwasher.

Last night our sitter unloaded our dishwasher and put away the dishes for me.  I didn’t realize this until I was fixing breakfast this morning.  It was such a pleasant, happy surprise.  Having an empty dishwasher in the morning is one of my household-chore fantasies.  It was random.  It was nice….and it set my mood for the day.  I truly believe that I was calmer and able to take it all in stride…not simply because the dishwasher was empty…but because of the random kindness and the pleasant surprise it added to my day.

And on other random notes: Bella Swan irritates the bejeezus out of me.  I cannot stand the self-loathing weak woman that she is.  It is very irritating.

Visit Keely at TheUnMom…the creator of all things Random and Tuesday.

That is all.

Oh….and link up if you think you have something random to say.

Coupon Binder Giveaway!

I haven’t done one of these in a loooong time but it always seems to be a favorite! Part of playing the coupon game is getting yourself organized. I have done several posts about how to get yourself into a frugal mindset, how to obtain coupons for yourself, and then what to do with them once you’ve got them! Now is your chance to win a coupon binder like mine!!

To win a coupon binder with dividers and inserts I ask that you subscribe to my RSS feed and remain a subscriber through at least the duration of the contest… I will try to be interesting so that you don’t want to leave me when the contest is over!! LOL  You can click on the SuperFeed button to the right.  Leave me a comment below letting me know that you subscribed.  That’s it!

However… this is by far my MOST POPULAR giveaway.  If you want MORE chances to win you may do any/all of the following to earn yourself additional entries.  Please leave a separate comment for each entry:

*Follow me on Twitter. Leave me a comment with your Twitter @ so I can say howdy when I follow you back

* Blog this giveaway and link back to me. Leave me a comment with a link to your post…I’ll be sure to visit!

* Tweet this giveaway. Please don’t spam twitter, one tweet a day will be accepted. Leave me a comment with a link to your tweet.

* Follow SuperJenn on Facebook (Networked Blogs)

*Post this giveaway on Facebook. Again, one post per day will be accepted. Leave me a comment with a link to your Facebook post.

That is FIVE additional ways to enter to win this binder!! (More if you tweet every day!!)

The winner will be drawn using random.org from the list of comments on this post. Please make sure that I can contact you through your comment. Only comments/entries left on THIS POST will be accepted as valid entries into the giveaway.

This contest will be open from Sunday, February 21, 2010 until Saturday, February 27, 2010 at 11:59 CST.  You must be 18 to enter and it is open only to US residents (Sorry!).

Thanks and Good Luck!!

Wordless Wednesday: Cake? What Cake?

Random Tuesday Thoughts: Weaning, Weenies and an “F”

Randomly stopping in again this week…because its the middle of the night, I have a stomach bug and NONE of my kids are sleeping well….so why not blog?

To wean or not to wean…that is the question. No, not SuperBaby. SuperGirl. That’s right…the 2 year old. Let’s be more specific…the 26 month old. She CAN do without it…and, as it turns out, might actually be better off without it (all this time thinking she could finally tolerate milk in MY diet….oops…not so much)… but she is such a whirlwind of activity it is my only snuggle time with her some days…

Speaking of weaning…or weenies, actually… another grave decision: To have SuperBaby circumcised? Thaaaat’s right. The poor boy is 5 months old and we haven’t circumcised him yet. Mainly because I don’t want to….I’ve put it in DH’s lap…and it isn’t getting done. Now it will be an ordeal if we do it…anesthesia, urologist… all that and SuperBoy has to have his “fixed” because the doc who did it botched it, in a manner of speaking.

And finally….I’m very put off by the sign off conversation I just heard on our local news station KCTV5 in Kansas City… apparently there is a discussion on the table where if your child receives an “F” in any subject they will have to sit out of the next semester’s extra curricular activities. The news personalities thought this was ridiculous?! They actually said “Can you imagine having to pull your child from speech, drama, choir, band or SPORTS just because they got an F in like French?” Um… yes. ABSOLUTELY. If your child is FAILING a subject in school it seems to me that perhaps they need to be a little more focused, supported or aided in their studies. Whatever. In my life an “F” in ANY area of my studies was unacceptable…and it will be the same for my kids.

That’s all I’ve got.  No offense, but I don’t REALLY want to hear your opinions on circumcision or nursing a toddler…I’m just thinking outloud.  Feel free, however, to comment away about the whole extra curricular activities thing.

I’m going to go and dream about vampires now.  Damn you, Aprile  and your introductions to the world of the Twilight Saga.

If Zombies are more your thing…or you want to read some incredibly random and entertaining stuff… go visit the Queen of Random… Keeley at The UnMom. If you, yourself are random, feel free to leave your mark in the Mister Linky below.

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