Daisy's First Snow

Daisy didnt seem to mind the snow, until she got her feet in it....LOL
then she was homeward bound.
That's SpoiledChild2 in background.

Come on Spring!!

Crazy for the Peep

photo by: Antigoni Gouras

Peeps as Colorful Pin Cushion

New Uses for Peeps

RealSimple.com pays homage to the Peep by putting its gooey, sugary, not-found-in-nature brightness to use in the kitchen, springtime decorating schemes, and even weddings.


Over the years, Peeps has become quite a cult icon. Once known for only their pink and yellow standard at Easter. After the stash left by the Bunny, aka "Peep Dealer", was devoured, and the sugar high was gone, many a child, and adult, went Peep Mad until next Easter.

This Peep Craze was behind Just Born's move to manufacture Peeps at every major holiday in various shapes and colors. This year, Just Born unveiled the Easter Tulip Peep for 2008. Thus, giving all Peep Addicts another "Peep of choice" to choose from.


Crafty Peeps:



Original Purpose: In-demand marshmallow model.


Aha! Use: Tired of stepping on push pins or being limited to the same chubby tomato pin cushion your granny (and her granny) had? Spritz a little craft sealant on your favorite Peep, then poke away.


Fun Fact: Peeps were made by hand using a pastry tube until 1954, when a machine was invented to create multiple marshmallow chicks at a time. Prior to this time it took 27 hours to make one Peep.


Find more innovative uses for Peeps at: realsimple

Letters From Home April Campaign for Soldiers

It is time once again for Letters From Home to send out their items received for the Spring Campaign. The ship out date is April 20, 2008. Therefore, you only have a few weeks to get your items together. I suggest shipping Priority Mail due to the deadline.

They ship three times this year:

April 20, July 20, and November 23, 2008.

The mailing address is:

Letters From Home Program
Ms. Christine Jovenitti, Director
6631 Ridgway Jbg Rd
PO Box 125
Johnsonburg, PA 15845

There are also drop off locations if you live in that area.

Christine's email is lettersfromhome@windstream.net

My daughters' school participates in our local program that was spearheaded from this chapter. The soldiers love phone cards, they have to be international, so they can talk to their family when they have opportunity. Also, the Soldiers just love, love, love, the cards they receive. This campaign is taking Valentine's Day, Easter, and Spring cards. Thank you cards are always welcome. The volunteers stuff your card in a SASE for you. They can not give out Soldiers' names due to Privacy Act. However, if you put your return address inside the card, you may hear back from the Soldier that received your card/box.

It is a great way to help out the Soldiers and let them know they are not forgotten. It is also a great way to get your child/children involved in helping and thinking of others. Have your smaller children make homemade cards. LFH just asks that you NOT use GLITTER, as it gets on the other products in the boxes. I know, I know, how can you not have glitter???!!!
I understand their request and wouldn't want glitter in my candy either! LOL ;)

Donations can be more than cards. They lists all the donation requests on the website.
For more information on Letters From Home click on the title above or here: http://www.lettersfromhomeprogram.org/ Make a Soldier smile!

Happy Monday!
Chrissy :)

Click to Give @ The Hunger Site

Co-blogged with SpoiledChild1




Click to Give @ The Hunger Site: Free Ways to Help
Send an E-card
Sign Up & Give More

SpoiledChild1 and I were surfing today and found this awesome site that I wanted to save as our last post for the night. This site is more than awesome it is AMAZING!!
We signed up for the free blue "Stop Hunger" wristbands, and the Breast Cancer wrist bands, (of course)! We are still in the process of checking it all out. There is also a store where proceeds go toward the product's charity. SHOPPING!!!

Give me feedback on what you think. It makes me feel wonderful to feel like we are making a difference no matter how big or how small. More wonderful than that is seeing my daughters' faces when they find a site like that and want to help. Whenever they want to help anytime. Our big thing is Trick or Treat for UNICEF. We have been doing it for 5 years now. We will talk more about that @ Halloween.
Check out this site and let me know your feelings. I will let you know what I pick up!

:) Chrissy

Celebrities known for....what?

Annoyed Americans are uniting with a growing trend. Talentless celebrities who are Famous for Nothing. These stars have literally not done anything, and yet the paps follow their every move. These stars court big headlines and big bucks for zero talent. America is becoming fed up.
Kevin Federline got paid between $100,000 to $300,000 for um, well, nothing. Nothing except for his Las Vegas 30th birthday, and maybe a little attention, that is. While attempting rapping, K-Fed got booed off stage by the very people he invited to the soiree.
This list is already long and growing. Including the likes of Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, Kim Kardashian, Kevin Federline, Lauren Conrad and posse, Lindsay Lohan, Kimberly Stewart, (do I have to keep going??) Just pick up any rag mag at the check out and they grace the cover of five to ten every week. How many times to we have to see Britney's barefoot, vajayjay hanging out, Starbuck's toting, sideswiping, ratty weave, can't get custody of her kids, mug splashed across every mag in the store? I know I don't have to look, I don't. You just can't help but notice when it is EVERYWHERE.
Why not put pictures of each soldier that lost their life or a limb. Why doesn't one of these mags contribute a story to these heroes each week. I would buy it, would you? Editors do not want those stories because they hit too close to home. There is a reason for that. It is real. It is home. I would love to know what the men and women that are fighting for my peace and my rights love to do in their spare time. I would love to know about their dreams, the kids they left behind. I want to know this about not just the ones who have lost their lives, but the ones still fighting the fight, the ones who have been wounded. How are they? How are they healing? How is their family?
Why do we pay our hard earned money to look inside the lives of these talentless, uneducated stars? Myself, I do not buy them. I do not want to further their stardom or their vanity. I, for one, do not want these girls as role models for my daughters.
As long as these known for nothing stars keep getting attention and money, they will keep treating the world as their own private party.
This I know for sure, my daughters will grow up with more dignity and respect than all of them put together.
God Bless Our Soldiers and let them come home safe and soon!

What Today's Teens are Thinking About

(Click on title for article)

During my usual lazy-Sunday-Blog-Surf, Starbucks Frappe in hand, I stumbled-upon a "new-to-me-blog" that is going to quickly become a daily go-to.

Tweens and teens alike have so many things going on today. Times have changed and it is not the "oh so lazy days" of our time. I find myself spending so much time thinking "If only I could get inside their head". I despise the one-liners for answers, i.e. Fine, okay, no, yes...etc.

I am just blessed today that they are alive, healthy, smart (and cute, too) and able to have the sense of humor to come up with a few zingers of their own that make me laugh.

http://www.vanessavanpetten.com/

Credit to Vanessa Van-Petten for this enlightening post.

Whole Foods Kids Contest

Blogged in ca-hoots with co-bloggers SpoiledChild and SpoiledChild2



This just in...

Seventh Generation is sponsoring some Whole Foods Earth Day fun: the Whole Earth Generation, in which we're inviting anyone and everyone between the ages of eight and 17 to create a short video that shows how they’re making a difference in the health of the world we all share. To learn how you or someone you know can get in on the action and maybe even become a Whole Foods Green Ambassador, click on over to their special YouTube page and start shooting your shot at stardom.

Earth Day is April 22. Good Luck!

Keep checking back for lots of Earth Day fun from SpoiledChild and SpoiledChild2.

» Permalink

Don't Forget Earth Hour!

Blogged in cahoots with co-blogger Spoiled Child2

TURN OFF THE LIGHTS!


We invite everyone throughout North America and around the world to turn off the lights for an hour starting at 8 p.m. (your own local time)–whether at home or at work, with friends and family or solo, in a big city or a small town.

You can follow these suggestions to help make a difference everyday.

1. Switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs to save money and reduce emissions. Lighting accounts for around 5% of household greenhouse gas emissions, and compact fluros use 75% less energy than an equivalent incandescent bulb. Although the bulbs cost more up-front, you will actually save money through the energy saved and extended life of the bulb.

2. Turn appliances off while not in use. Unplug any appliances like mobile phone chargers, TVs, microwaves, MP3 players, which are not being used and are on standby. In Australia, appliances on standby consume up to 10% of your electricity bill.

3. Turn off anything that doesn’t need to be on. A good rule is to turn off anything not being used. When you leave a room or leave the house, turn off your lights or appliances like the TV or computer.

4. Switch to green power. This is one of the best ways you can make a difference. Contact your electricity provider today and switch to green power, a cleaner, more renewable form of energy that does not contribute to global warming. If all Australians switched to green power today, Australia’s total greenhouse pollution would be cut by 30% in one year. That’s the equivalent of more than 40 million cars!

5. Use less hot water. This is not only a good water saving tip, it saves electricity too.

6. Spend one minute less in the shower.

We would love to hear what you will do or did during your hour in the dark!

Sign up for Earth Hour 2009 at www.EarthHour.org/sign-up

Check out Google in the dark!! http://www.google.com/ (March 29 only)

Fun Facts for This Day in History

Compiled by co-blogger Spoiled Child.

For your perusal, events that occurred this day in history.


March 29, 1973: US Withdraws From Vietnam War

Two months after the signing of the Vietnam peace agreement, the last U.S. combat troops leave South Vietnam as Hanoi frees the remaining American prisoners of war held in North Vietnam. America's direct eight-year intervention in the Vietnam War was at an end. In Saigon, some 7,000 U.S. Department of Defense civilian employees remained behind to aid South Vietnam in conducting what looked to be a fierce and ongoing war with communist North Vietnam.
_____________________________________________________
March 29, 1951: Rosenbergs convicted of espionage

In one of the most sensational trials in American history, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are convicted of espionage for their role in passing atomic secrets to the Soviets during and after World War II. The husband and wife were later sentenced to death and were executed in 1953.
The conviction of the Rosenbergs was the climax of a fast-paced series of events that were set in motion with the arrest of British physicist Klaus Fuchs in Great Britain in February 1950. British authorities, with assistance from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, gathered evidence that Fuchs, who worked on developing the atomic bomb both in England and the United States during World War II, had passed top-secret information to the Soviet Union. Fuchs almost immediately confessed his role and began a series of accusations.
____________________________________________________
March 29, 1939: Clark Gable & Carole Lombard Marry

Clark Gable and Carole Lombard marry on this day in 1939 as Gable is filming Gone with the Wind. The marriage was considered one of Hollywood's happiest but ended in tragedy when Lombard was killed in a plane crash in 1942, en route from a War Bond drive. Gable joined the air force shortly after her death, rose to the rank of major, and won several medals.
___________________________________________________
March 29, 1929: First Telephone in the Oval Office

On this day in 1929, President Herbert Hoover has a phone installed at his desk in the Oval Office of the White House. It took a while to get the line to Hoover’s desk working correctly and the president complained to aides when his son was unable to get through on the Oval Office phone from an outside line. Previously, Hoover had used a phone located in the foyer just outside the office. Telephones and a telephone switchboard had been in use at the White House since 1878, when President Rutherford B. Hayes had the first one installed, but no phone had ever been installed at the president’s desk until Hoover’s administration.

TGIF

Thank goodness its Friday!! I would if it were any Friday but not this Friday. One of my computers is down. My refrigerator is broken. Yes, broken, as in, "Ma'am it can't be fixed" broken. But thankfully, it can be replaced since what "broke" was under a five year warranty. But today is Friday. When will I receive my sparkling new fridge? When will I get this call to replace my fridge? Will they call today? Will they really call? I only have today for a "business day". Tomorrow starts the weekend. Thirsty kids, hungry kids. And it is supposed to rain, so that means bored kids. And bored kids means computer. Someone will be left out. Maybe computer guy will make a Saturday call. They can't use my laptop! Why would a perfectly good refrigerator go out 3 years in the running and why did it conspire with the computer?
To irritate me. Plain and simple.
Then the computer on top of that, double whammy. Sneaky.
There is a bright side to all this chaos. We have an older fridge in the basement and a dorm fridge in the upstairs office. The kids will just have to walk farther to get something to drink or eat. It is supposed to rain. The kids will have to be inside with me. Maybe we can catch up on a movie. We could watch the Bee Movie for the 10th time or Akeelah and the Bee for the 17th time. They are that good. The kids could get caught up on their Accelerated Reading for school. We could just hang out. That would be wonderful!
Yes, thank God its Friday!

Viva Viagra!

Get out your party hats! A little invention that is important to a lot of people (ahem, men) is turning 10 years old today.

Yes, it's true, Viagra turns 10 today. According to drug company, pfizer, it has been prescribed to more than 30 million men.

I know this has been a miracle for some couples out there, but I would like to know how much harm than good it did. You have heard of deaths, seizures and other health related conditions due to the effects of the "blue wonder drug".

I also wonder how many marriages that by the spouse taking Viagra, it has caused to end or at least caused heartache in. And I would also like to know how many by the spouse taking Viagra has helped.

I know, it's not the drug, it's the person taking the drug. Anyhow, Happy Birthday, Viagra!

stock photo