The Swiss Colony Review and Live Giveaway!

We have been receiving The Swiss Colony catalog every year for as long as I can remember. One year I asked for one of the boxes of treats for Christmas. It was one of my favorite gifts that year. It was full of delicious candy including a chocolate Santa. I have the opportunity to include The Swiss Colony in my holiday gift guide this year. I received the Holi-bars set. It has Cheddar Cheese, BEEF LOG ® and Summer Sausages, Smokey Cheddar 'n Pecan Cheese Log, Dobosh and Double Chocolate Tortes. I received the set of 8 so it also had Kreme Kaese Cheese and Swiss & Cheddar/Almond Log. Right now they have a bonus gift with the Holi-Bars which is 24 mini petit fours. Noah actually opened the refrigerator and got in to the mini petit fours. I caught him before he ate the whole box, which he would have done if he had the chance. He really likes the petit fours. I have to agree with him there. My favorite were the meats. We made a great platter of meats and the cheese. We also had crackers for the cheese logs. Then for dessert we had tortes. You could make a meal out of the goodies in this box or a beautiful snack tray for your holiday guests. It would also be a wonderful gift for those that live far away especially if The Swiss Colony is a family tradition like it is for my family.

For more information please visit The Swiss Colony.

Thank you to The Swiss Colony for sending my family a sample box of the Holi-Bars for my family to enjoy and providing the giveaway prize.

I have a LIVE giveaway for you.

One (1) lucky winner will win an item from the Swiss Colony of their choice under $30.

Mandatory Entry: Please visit The Swiss Colony website and tell me what you would like to win.

You may comment as many times as you want after that about whatever you want. The comments have to be at least a full sentence to count. No copy and pasting the same comment over and over again. That is not fair to those who actually take the time to comment honestly.

This giveaway will end at 11:59 pm ET December 16, 2010. I will use random.org to pick a random winner.

This giveaway is open to US Residents only.

Are You Really Getting A Deal?

I consider myself a very savvy shopper. I try and use coupons whenever I can, I shop sales and match up coupons with sales. I get a rush when I get a great deal. A lot of stores do ten items for ten dollars sales that you can mix and match or buy ten for ten dollars get the eleventh free. They seem to be popular sales from what I can gather but now a warning. Be careful; make sure the deal is really a deal and not something that they put up to make you think you are saving money when you aren’t. I wanted to share with you these two instances where I was in fact not getting a deal, one of them being that I was essentially paying more.

Back when Noah was still eating baby food, I would buy him the two pack fruits and veggies. A local store always included them in the buy ten for ten dollars get the eleventh free. I must have done it ten times before, until I noticed something. The baby food was 88 cents not on sale. I am not sure why I looked at the actual price; maybe I was looking to see where a certain food was supposed to be using the price tags on the shelves. I started thinking of all the times I had bought baby food during those sales. Was I really paying 12 cents MORE during the sales? Was I really getting one free with my other items? I tracked down an employee who was as dumbfounded as I was. I mean it happened all the time that they were on sale like that. Were they sticking it to the consumers with babies and making an extra 12 cents? Noah doesn’t eat baby food anymore so I am not sure if they are still running that sale. Be sure to check the original price with the sale price to make sure you are really getting the savings it sounds like. If it something I buy all the time and don’t pay attention to the non sale price, how would I know the item was not actually on sale and inflated?

Another time I have noticed things are not on sale are when they try and say it is when it really only costs $1.00 to begin with. For example 4 packs of pudding are $1.00 and they are often included in the 10 for $10 sales. I know you can mix and match but if you are raising a bunch of pudding monsters and buy the 10 for $10 you think you are getting a deal when you aren’t. In this case you aren’t paying more but you aren’t saving either. You are paying the same as you were if it was on sale or not on sale. It makes me wonder if we put too much faith in those sale price tags. I am sure not everyone takes the time to make sure they are getting a deal. I know that some people see the sale signs and decide to stock up. I know I have been known to do that as I am sure you have at some point in time. Most of the time you do get a deal, but occasionally there is no deal in sight. You have to also make sure you are getting a good deal.

Taking A Compliment...

I know that I am guilty of not being able to take a compliment. I am working on it and not being obstinate when someone says something nice about me. I smile and thank them and I start to believe them most of all. I mean I know I am a nice person. It just really bothers me when I compliment someone and they most of the time say not really or not so much. I can understand having low self esteem but really, I have no reason to lie or embellish the truth to them. Then I start wondering, do they not trust me? I mean do they think I am up to something? Do they think I have some ulterior motive? Of course I don’t. I say nice things to people because I mean it. I like to make people feel good about their selves because I care about them. I wouldn’t make up something just because I could, if I tell you something about you then it is because I really think that about you.

I don’t understand why it is so hard to be able to take a compliment for some people. I wonder if it has to do with some kind of deep seeded thing that happened in the past that like makes them feel like someone said something nice to them and it ended up being the butt of a joke because they believed it and it really hurt them. I am not sure and I probably will never know the reason why. It is just annoying to me because I don’t like when people get down on themselves and say insulting things. Maybe I feel like they are dismissing my opinions of them. I know everyone has an opinion but really I wouldn’t lie about it. I guess some people just really think that way about their selves. I do understand that as someone who was in an abusive marriage and now still suffers with the emotional scars from my ex and the damage he did to my self esteem.

Maybe some do it for attention, fishing for compliments as it sometimes called. I mean everyone likes their ego stroked once in a while. You just have to learn to take a compliment. You might not completely believe it, but most people are not out to hurt you and some day hopefully see what it is that person sees in you and that you are really not an ugly ne’er-do-well after all.

I Love The Curvy Arch - Guest Post

Hi, my name is Noah. I wanted to share with you my favorite things about our trip to St. Louis. I can’t really write or type yet so I asked my mommy to help me with this post. I really loved seeing the curvy arch. It was really awesome. It was giantic, mommy says you mean gigantic, but I think it is giantic because it was bigger than a giant! The first thing we did was go on the riverboat cruise. Mommy got us popcorn to enjoy while we rode on the boat. I loved watching the paddle wheel go round and round. It was really cool. It makes the boat move and I love boats. We had a great time on the riverboat cruise. I didn’t really like the whistle though; it wasn’t that bad if I covered my ears.

We had a really nice hotel room and we could see part of the Arch from the window! I liked looking out and seeing it. It was fun to look at the lights of the city at night too. I got to push the elevator buttons every time we went up or down. Mommy said I did a great job because I pushed the right button every time. The hotel was really big and I liked to run down the ramp. I even made my car go down the long ramp to our elevator. We had special valet parking and I really liked the men that brought our car down. They would all talk to me. Everyone that works in the hotel was really nice. They all would talk to me. I was sometimes shy though. We went swimming too. I like the pool. I swam with mommy and we danced in the pool and mommy sang me songs. It was fun! We had a very comfortable bed and I had my toys to play with when we weren’t busy around St. Louis.

I didn’t know we were going to go up in the arch in a little elevator. I think it looked like a space elevator, but we went up up and away! It was so neat to ride in the elevator with the nice man and woman. They even offered me a piece of gum but I would just swallow it, so mommy said no thank you. When we got to the top I looked out the windows and wow it was really cool. Everything looked really small. I felt so big! I am big though since I am 4 now. I brought my Thomas flashlight that my uncle Mike gave me and it was so curvy at the top that I set it down and the Thomas Flashlight rolled away. I am glad it stopped and a nice man that works at the Arch was able to get it back to me. I didn’t want to come back down when mommy said it was time to go. I finally decided it would be ok because we had something else planned.

After we left the Arch we were going to The Magic House, Children’s Museum. That was really cool. I had to wear a sticker so they knew we were allowed to be there. I got to play! I got to explore everything. I thought it was awesome. I played with all the Legos you can think of. I have never played with that many Legos! I raced cars I made with other kids. I really wish we lived closer to this place. I also played in the big water table and got soaking wet, but it was fun. I went to the play stores and pretended to work at a grocery store. I found a loaf of bread and I tried to take a pretend bite of it. I got to change tires and fix a car too. Mommy even drove the play delivery truck. I could stay there for days. We didn’t get to see everything but we had fun. I already told mommy I wanna come back to St. Louis.

We also went to the Zoo one day. We saw bears, penguins, tigers, elephants to name a few! We rode on the train too. I liked the train. It was fun to take a little break and just hang out and look around. The conductor was very nice. They had some kids that were little conductors. Mommy said we could maybe come back when I get a little older and I could work on the train too.

We had a lot of fun and ate a lot of yummy food at St. Louis. We ate at a factory with spaghetti. It was really fun but, my favorite was The St. Louis Bread Company because they have bagels. I love bagels. Grandma and I walked over there in the mornings because it was so close and it was fun. I did a lot of walking and I can’t wait to go back to St. Louis really soon.

Thank you to the people at the St. Louis CVC for sponsoring this awesome trip for my family.

It's Time to Buy New Luggage.

In June, I am planning on visiting my best friend Brandy. She lives in New Hampshire which means I will be boarding a plane to do so. I am really excited to go out there and spend some time with her. I am certain we will have a great time just hanging out and doing some girl things. Brandy is such a positive person and she is very funny. We even plan on getting all dressed up and going out, which is luxury for both of us. I have never been to New Hampshire or Vermont, I am sure we will go out to her dad’s farm while I am there too. I definitely need to buy new luggage sets before I go. The suitcases I have traveled all over the place. They are starting to get a little too worn. The wheels and/or the handles on each suitcase are messed up in some way. I have been pretty creative at rigging them so they work but it would be nice not to have to worry about my suitcases falling or running over my feet or someone else’s.

I also want to get Noah a little suitcase that he can manage even if it is just a small one. I would love to get him one he can pull behind him because he is getting too big for a stroller. We are planning a trip for Noah’s 5th birthday and my 30th birthday too. This is a trip I have been thinking about since I knew the date of my scheduled C-Section and realized our birthdays are so close together. I am so excited about these trips but going to the airport, riding on a plane and sometimes handling an adorable yet curious preschooler can stress this mama out. I am hoping that if Noah has his own little suitcase he can pull along it will make things easier for us all, and that the next time I fly with him that I don’t start crying going through security.

Magical Unicorn My Pillow Pets Reveiw and Giveaway!

It’s a pillow, it’s a pet, and it’s an addiction. I am talking about My Pillow Pets. The first time we saw the My Pillow Pets commercial, Noah just had to have one or ten if he had his way. Ten is the ultimate number to him so; naturally he would want ten of them. They are snuggly, cuddly and really soft. We have FIVE My Pillow Pets. I am sure our My Pillow Pet family will grow again in the future. Let me explain why I feel that it is important to have more than one My Pillow Pet, we went on vacation to St. Louis. Noah got sick the last night and the poor turtle ended up getting the brunt of the sickness. Thankfully, I was able to give him another My Pillow Pet to sleep with. Noah loves all his (and my) My Pillow Pets but, he loves the turtle just a little more. It’s his favorite, if something happened to his turtle I am not sure what he would do. He would be heartbroken. I love that My Pillow Pets are machine washable. I have washed ours a few times. I would have hated to throw his beloved Turtle away because of sickness.

Let me introduce you to our newest member of our My Pillow Pet family. We now have the Magical Unicorn. It’s a mommy My Pillow Pet. I decided to make the rule that we all share the My Pillow Pets minus Noah’s Turtle. The Magical Unicorn is so soft with chenille fur and it’s just the right size to cuddle and love. You can fasten the belt and have a pet or a 18 inch pillow. My Pillow Pets are awesome for plane rides too. They are so comfortable you forget you are on a plane. Definitely beats those little airline pillows that everyone uses, the person on the flight before yours could have lice or pink eye.



My Pillow Pets are not just for kids. I recommend that everyone has a My Pillow Pet or two for traveling, for sleeping or just hanging out. You know that My Pillow Pets are an iconic thing when an adult is walking around carrying one and there are at least 5 different kids saying something like Mommy look My Pillow Pets. I want one really bad. I think that My Pillow Pets should hire people to walk around carrying them so kids will ask their parents for one. I thought it was a good marketing scheme personally. I was actually surprised that so many kids commented. Seriously though, my family highly recommends My Pillow Pets for everyone. It makes a wonderful holiday gift that will not be lost in the shuffle of your children’s toys.

For more information visit My Pillow Pets website.

You can also check out the My Pillow Pets Blog!

Thank you to My Pillow Pets for sending my family the Magical Unicorn My Pillow Pet and providing one to give away!

I have a giveaway for you! Yes! You can score your own My Pillow Pet!

One (1) lucky reader will win their very own Magical Unicorn My Pillow Pet!

Mandatory Entry: Tell me another My Pillow Pet you would love to own and who you will give the Magical Unicorn My Pillow Pet to if you win.

Extra Entries:

Subscribe to my blog via email must be verified

Follow my blog on GFC

Follow @Sheilacakes7 on Twitter and tweet about this giveaway including a link to this post. This can be done once a day.

This giveaway will end on December `16, 2010 11:59 pm ET.
This giveaway is open to US Residents ONLY!

Help Your Children Track Their Money With Allowance Manager

I am trying to teach Noah about money. I thought that now that he is four years old, he should start getting an allowance. I think it is important to teach him about saving and spending even at his age. I am hoping to prevent him from going out and wasting all his money on something silly when he gets a little older. Right now his allowance goes in his piggy bank and it is saved. Today is St. Nicolas Day and he woke up to find 4 shiny quarters in his shoes along with a treat. It is my job to teach him that he has to earn the things he wants and that money is something that isn’t just handed to him at his command. Thanks to my sister and brother in law they taught Noah how to hold up a cup and say to strangers “please can I have some money?” He even said it to a police officer who thought it was hilarious. I hid my face in shame. Now he kind of has the mentality that mommy will give him money whenever he asks, not happening.

I came across a website called Allowance Manager. It is a great way for children to keep track of their spending and how much money your child has. Just think, your child doesn’t have to count the change in their piggy bank anymore. All you have to do is create a free parent account and then you can create an account for each of your children each of them will have their own password. It is really easy to sign up. I personally hate long sign up processes. It takes like 2 minutes to completely set up the whole thing. One of the features I really like is the printable chore chart that we will be using for Noah to start doing chores like picking up his toys, cleaning up his dishes after meals and picking up his trash during the day. Your children can’t update any of the parent settings so it is secure and it remains accurate. You can easily reward your child for good behavior by adding extra money and even penalize for bad behavior by subtracting money from their account. It will also serve as a reminder or as evidence as to why their allowance is a few dollars less. It also teaches them the basics of banking if your child is a little older.

I am still thinking about how much money to give Noah for an allowance. How much do you give your child or children and how old are they?

For more information please visit Allowance Manger.

I received a gift card for my review of this website. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Mickey Mote Review

I wanted to share with you guys about a fun and interactive way to watch DVD’s. My son like most children answers the TV when they ask him a question. I think that the Mickey Mote is a great way to be involved in the DVD. Noah loves to play little games so, he loves the Mickey Mote. The Mickey Mote is a child’s sized remote that you can use to play along with specially marked Disney DVD’s. This would be a great gift for your preschooler. You get the same game system feel without the expense. I had bought him one of those baby game systems when he was younger and he never really played it, so I am leery to spend a lot on another game system for him.



I think that the Mickey Mote is perfect for the price and the enjoyment that your child will get from playing this. I wish they had something like this when I was younger. You know that almost all kids love playing with the remote. I had bought Noah his own little toy remote, but this Mickey Mote actually does something. It is really easy to program with your own DVD remote. You just press the buttons in a certain order and you are good to go. I had to program it on my DVD player up in my room because I didn’t know where the DVD remote was downstairs. I found it the other day and I am excited to program it to that DVD player so Noah can play with it downstairs.
How It Works:

The Mickey Mote works with any Disney Preschool DVD that includes Discovery Mode(tm), the interactive "Watch & Play" feature on the DVD! All parents have to do is program the remote control - there's an easy and quick set-up guide in each DVD- and select the Discovery Mode feature on the menu screen. Within minutes, kids will be easily responding to questions, throughout the story, about scenes they just watched (such as "What color is Goofy's hat?") by pressing one of four color-coded buttons on the device -- a yellow star, green circle, orange triangle or blue square - to click in their responses. Discovery Mode features include two levels of play, which provides more challenging questions as the child grows.

Why Parents Will Love It:
Once families have purchased a Disney Preschool DVD that comes packaged with the Mickey Mote, they can continue to build their Disney Preschool libraries as the Mickey Mote works in compatibility with any Discovery Mode enhanced DVD. For example, kids can immediately use the remote with any of the following titles:


* Mickey Mouse Clubhouse: Road Rally
* Mickey Mouse Clubhouse: Mickey's Adventures in Wonderland
* Mickey Mouse Clubhouse: Mickey's Choo Choo
* Mickey Mouse Clubhouse: Minnie's Bow-Tique
* Handy Manny: Manny's Motorcycle Adventure
* Handy Manny: Manny's Big Race
* Little Einsteins: Fire Truck Blast Off
* My Friends Tigger & Pooh: Super Duper Super Sleuths
* My Friends Tigger & Pooh: Bedtime With Pooh

Discovery Mode can also be played with any DVD remote as well.



Noah received the Mickey Clubhouse and The Handy Manny DVD’s. He likes to play along and also just watch the DVD’s when he just wants to relax. I think that they help with memory and helps preschoolers recall something they saw, which is great for cognitive skills. His favorite is definitely Handy Manny. Noah loves to fix things like Handy Manny. We even have a Handy Manny toy or two. Noah likes the Mickey’s Clubhouse though too. I played for a while at first to figure it out and I had a lot of fun. I had to make sure I knew how it worked so if he had questions I could show him how. He was able to figure it out quickly and he was very interested in what was going on. I am definitely going to buy some more of the DVD’s for the Mickey Mote as they become available. If you have more than one child you could easily purchase two sets with remotes if that is an issue but I like good old fashion sharing and taking turns.

You can find the Mickey Mote at most retail stores. You can find it in the Electronics department with the kids DVD’s. The sets with the remote are $29.99 with a bunch of DVD’s you can purchase for endless hours of play. Recommended Ages are 2-5 years old.

Thank you to Walt Disney Entertainment for providing my family with a complimentary Mickey Mote for us to try out. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Dream, Dream, Dream.

I am sure I have told you about my weird dreams before. Definitely about Kevin, the alien that when he gets mad turns in to a queen. For a while now, I have been dreaming about one of my old houses. The dreams I had started out riding my old school bus, from elementary school. I would be on the bus in my old neighborhood and I would get off the bus at my old house and by the time I got off, I’d realize that I don’t live there, and I would start chasing the bus, Mrs. Macy would never stop. I would then somehow try and figure out how to get where I really lived, I never quite knew where that was. Sometimes I would visit my old neighbors. Other times I lived in the house, my mom would open the garage door and I would go inside. It was really weird and had become a reoccurring dream for a while. Then the dreams stopped for a while. It wasn’t like a nightly thing, but it was enough that I would remember it happening quite a bit.

Now, I dream about living in that house like every other week or so. It’s normally that I moved back in. It would look different inside almost every time, never like I remembered it. It never has the basement where I used to sing and dance or the place under the stairs I would have my club house in. It is weird. I know it’s normal to dream about things in the past. I have definitely had weirder dreams, but it is crazy that it is the same theme and almost the same dream or variation of it. I am an adult and Noah is with me. Every time I dream it, I think well now I don’t have to dream about living here anymore. I had the dream very recently, and once I said that, I woke up. I had one of those abrupt where am I wake ups. I woke up in my house. I don’t think I have ever had a dream that I dreamed about waking up like a dream inside a dream. Maybe I have, I don’t really know.

I don’t know if it has to do with something going on in my mind or what that is making me dream about that particular house. I don’t talk to my old neighbors or anything. I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about that house. Dreams are such a weird and complex thing. I am not sure what causes some of them. I had a dream about my Grandma Rose where I was at her house and she let in an escaped mental patient and he came after us. I think it would be really cool to watch our dreams. I am pretty good about remembering my dreams. I would love to see the ones I don’t remember though.

Do you have weird dreams? Do you dream them more than once?

Losing Noah's Stroller in Vegas

I love to fly, I prefer it to driving any day. We don’t always fly though. It depends on the length of our trip, where we are going and of course the cost of the flight vs. gas. When we go to visit my aunt and uncle in California we always fly. It would be an extremely long drive, although my aunt and uncle have made the drive many times. The last time we went to visit them, Noah was a baby. We always took his stroller with us and checked it at the gate, as we had done before. We were able to use it at the airport and also during our layover. When we landed in Las Vegas, our stroller was there waiting for us at the gate. We had over an hour layover that I spent time playing the slot machines in the airport. When it was time to board our flight to Reno, we left his stroller at the gate as we boarded the plane.

We landed in Reno and waited for his stroller in the jet way. It didn’t show up. We met with my aunt and uncle to get our baggage. We also made a stop at the baggage office to see if our stroller ended up there. It was not. They couldn’t find it. It was very late as we didn’t land until around 11pm Pacific time being that we live in the Eastern time zone, it was 2 am. We had been traveling all day and were ready to just get to my aunt and uncle’s house. We assumed that the stroller was put on the wrong flight in Vegas, even though we parked it right outside the plane. The baggage office gave us a loaner that was no doubt from the 70’s. It was so old and dirty. It was really hard to open and close. My aunt and uncle live up the mountains so we didn’t do a lot of things that required a stroller, if any. I don’t think we used it the whole time we were there. I was worried about the stroller though, what if they didn’t find it? What if we had to brave the airport and the layover without it and all our carry ons? I hadn’t purchased flight insurance so it would be a loss. It was just a ten dollar umbrella stroller, it wasn’t Noah’s expensive stroller thankfully.

We had a great time with my aunt and uncle just visiting, watching movies and doing some sightseeing in the mountains. We even went to Antelope Lake. Antelope Lake is somewhere we went with my grandma when we were out there years before. My mom ended up getting sick when we were there. She had something called altitude sickness. When we were sightseeing, my mom, my aunt and uncle went up in a really tall tower. My mom ended up getting really dizzy and felt sick during part of our trip. She didn’t have to go to the doctor, but I often wonder what people who are traveling do to cover doctor’s visits or if they have to go to the hospital. I guess they get visitor’s health insurance when they travel abroad just in case. When we said our goodbyes at the airport I was very nervous as we walked in to the baggage office. We had to return the stroller, that we jokingly dubbed the death trap and see if Noah’s stroller had finally made it safely. I had never been so happy to see his stroller in my life. It was a very sad goodbye to my aunt and uncle because we only get to see them once a year.

Have you ever lost anything during a flight? Please share your stories.

Winter Survival Basket Made With Cold Stone Cocoa!!

Cold Stone Creamery now makes delicious and creamy cocoa. As a fan of their ice cream I had to buy it! With the holidays coming and the cold weather that is now here, hot cocoa is a staple in my house. I headed to Wal-mart to shop for things to put in a winter survival kit. My family always does a lot of baking during the holidays and I thought that would be something to base my basket around. Unfortunately, it gets very cold here in the winter and we spend a lot of time indoors. I decided to make a winter survival gift basket for my family to use. You can make gift baskets for gifts but who says you can’t make one for your family to enjoy too?

I went to a very crowded Wal-mart to shop for the items I wanted to put in it. I love shopping at Wal-mart and Noah love to get the stickers from the greeter. He gets so excited, on this particular trip the greeter asked him how many he wanted. Noah said ten and they gave him ten. I got 2 boxes of Cold Stone Creamery Milk Chocolate with marshmallows cocoa for us to enjoy this winter. I don’t know about you but extra mini marshmallows are a must. If for some reason I only have big ones, I cut them in fourths. I still make cocoa the way my grandma used to make it. It is the only way to make it. I know some people use just water or just milk but I use a very scientific formula for my cocoa. It is one of those secret family recipes.

I also picked up some easy things to make as treats, some mugs, a game and some other goodies to help this family brave the cold and snowy winter. I had a lot of fun shopping for this basket, I hope you have just as much fun seeing my Whrrl Post and I hope it inspires you to make one of your own. Look for Cold Stone Cocoa at your local Walmart! You can check out my Whrrl Post below.

More check-ins at Walmart Supercenter #923

Powered by Whrrl

Be sure to check out all the awesome posts and tweets using the hashtag #coldstonecocoa on Twitter.

E!'s New Show- Bridalplasty- America's New Self Esteem Killer!

I was watching E! tonight, Bruce Almighty was on. It is a great movie. I was watching the commercials and twice they showed an ad about a new show premiering tomorrow called Bridalplasty. The show is about a group of brides that leave their fiancee for four months and they compete and get plastic surgery and the winner gets a dream celebrity wedding. The winner has her new whatever she gets and shows her fiancee when he lifts up the veil. I am not sure if all the brides go under the knife or not. I am sorry but I think that is the dumbest most superficial show that I have ever heard of. I hope to get remarried some day. Who knows what the future might bring but I am telling you what, my future husband will love me for me. He will have to love all my flaws, because they are mine. I am not talking about my inner flaws I am talking about my outer appearance. My freckles, my imperfections that everyone has, after all, no one is perfect, say it with me now, no one is perfect. Everyone knows their flaws, they don’t need someone else pointing them out. I think that it gives people the wrong idea, the impressionable children, people that have self esteem issues. Actually, it is plain sick honestly.

I am ashamed to be in this society, where everyone obsesses over their appearance. Where kids are bullied because they look different, because they aren’t “perfect”, maybe they have a different body type. Some kids’ lives are made a living hell because of those things. It is crap TV like this that encourages bullies to pick on other kids because they are different. Those kids that are being bullied are someone’s daughter or son. There are quite a few adult bullies out there too. Some people call them grown up mean girls or mean boys. Their whole purpose in live is to make someone else feel like crap. It doesn’t end after you leave school. There are 30 and 40 year old women who make fun of people for no reason. They talk about them behind their backs and make them feel horrible. When someone says something hurtful it doesn’t matter if you are 8 years old or 48 years old. It still hurts. Sure, you deal with it in other ways, like ignoring it, but deep down it still hurts the same.

Last night I was watching Pauley Perrette’s YouTube videos, she was talking about bullying and how things get better, they really do. She said that she wore glasses and an eye patch in school and that she was picked on a lot. She said she was never mean to anyone. She is now an amazing actress on NCIS and instead of being spiteful; she is very humble about her life. She doesn’t pretend to put on this glamorous Hollywood lifestyle; she is just herself, very down to Earth.

I am a firm believer that everyone is beautiful. I always look for the good in people. I think to truly love someone is to be able to find them beautiful or handsome inside and out. To embrace their flaws and love them, we are all jigsaw puzzles some of our pieces are different than others but they make up who we are. We need to understand that what is to love is to love the whole person. Not the parts that we want, but each part the same. Learn to accept those flaws and erase them in our minds and hearts. You know, something could happen and someone’s beauty could disappear, but to people who love you, you will always be beautiful in their eyes and heart. God made each of us the way he wanted us to look. He made us all unique and put love and care in to molding us from lumps of clay in to the person we became. I would not want to say something God made was ugly. God does not make ugly things.

Black Friday?

Call me crazy, but I don’t understand the hype of Black Friday. I mean seriously, what is the point? Maybe there is something I don’t see. I hate crowds of people, grabbing things out of your cart when you aren’t looking, waiting in really long lines just to get a deal. It seems silly to me. If it is something you enjoy that is wonderful. It’s just not for me. One year we went to Wal-mart on Thanksgiving, just to go and get out for a little bit. It was like 8 pm when we left, we drove buy Best Buy and there were people standing in line already. It was cold and was weird to see people waiting for that long just to go shopping.

I haven’t really seen anything that would be worth my time to wait that long or go out period on Black Friday. I have only really done Black Friday once, that was enough for me. I went with an old friend so he could have company. I was very cranky at the end of it. I did not have any fun what so ever. I don’t think he even bought anything because the lines were ridiculously long everywhere we went. There are sales all the way up till the week before Christmas. I just don’t know why it is that big of a deal. I could see if you were buying like a TV or something that was extremely marked down that normally would cost a fortune. Otherwise, just to get a toy for your child for Christmas? With online sales and websites you can pretty much find anything online from the comforts of your own home.

It’s not like when we were kids and our parents or grandparents had to actually go to the stores to buy the hot item of the year. I think that anything I wanted for Christmas I always got, or if I didn’t it didn’t traumatize me enough that I remember now. I survived. There were not huge tears and disappointment on Christmas Eve or Christmas Morning unless you count the whole silts, Barbie bed, Cabbage Patch cradle Christmas, which started with me crying on Christmas Eve, followed by my sister crying on Christmas morning.

Black Friday has turned in to this HUGE ordeal. I mean I think I have heard a lot more about Black Friday than Thanksgiving. That makes me very sad. Thanksgiving is an actual holiday when we remember what we are thankful for and about family. Black Friday is a day of greed and sales. It’s not even a holiday yet it gets more attention than Thanksgiving.

For Black Friday I will stay home. I will spend time with my family and play games and drink hot chocolate and snack on treats and make memories with my son, because Black Friday does not matter to me. There is also a Law and Order SVU marathon on. I can still find good deals on gifts; I am not worried about that.

So what if it costs me a little more, it is too much hassle and stress for me. I might shop online, but I haven’t found anything really worth it.
If you are going out for Black Friday, I wish you luck on finding deals and hope that you have a safe and happy experience.

Swanson's Broth Great Stuffing Debate and $50 VISA Gift Card Giveaway!

I love chicken broth, especially Swanson’s Chicken broth. When I had my son, I had to have a c-section. The morning after my c-section they wanted me to eat something, I had to choose something off the liquid menu as I just had major surgery. I found that they had chicken broth listed. It was the only thing that sounded good, so I called “room service” and ordered some chicken broth. It made me feel so good inside. It made my incision feel better inside. The rest of my meals I ate when I was in the hospital were accompanied by chicken broth. For two or three weeks after my c-section, I drank a lot of Swanson’s chicken broth. I prefer the kind that is in a carton because you can close it. I had used chicken broth in cooking but I had no idea how good it was just in a cup warmed up.



I love to cook and I had the opportunity to participate in Swanson’s Great Stuffing Debate. The basic idea is that if you make stuffing with Swanson’s Broth than it will be more flavorful than stuffing made with just water. Everyone has their own favorite brand of stuffing so you can take part in the Great Stuffing Debate and share your favorite stuffing with people across the US.

My favorite stuffing is definitely Stove Top. I love how delicious it is. I am not a huge stuffing fan really but I will eat it occasionally. It is a nice holiday compliment to a meal. If I am going to eat stuffing I prefer it to be Stove Top and it has to be made the right way. Stuffing is something that my family enjoys to eat. I usually only have a couple spoonfuls because there is so much other food to enjoy and I like to sample almost everything we have on our table. The few things I won’t eat are anything Pumpkin or Cranberry relish or yams. Otherwise I gorge on Thanksgiving foods.

Thanks to Swanson Broth for providing me with a $50 gift card and providing the giveaway prize. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I have a giveaway for you.

One (1) person will win a FIFTY dollar VISA gift card from Swanson to participate in The Great Stuffing Debate.

Mandatory Entry: Tell me your favorite brand of stuffing

Extra Entries:

Subscribe to my blog via email. You must verify

Follow my blog on GFC

Follow @Sheilacakes7 on Twitter and Tweet about this giveaway including a link to this post. This can be done once a day.

This giveaway is open to US Residents ONLY

This giveaway will end on December 3, 2010 at 11:59 PM ET

Kodak Gallery Review

Two things I love about the holidays are the food and family. I also love to take pictures of my loved ones, especially my adorable son, Noah. I wanted to share with you a promotion on the Kodak Gallery website where you can take your pictures and put them in books. No bulky albums and pictures falling out after it stops sticking. My Grandma liked to write on the backs of her pictures, so pictures were taken out of albums over and over again to see who is in the picture or when it was taken. Her albums were in poor shape by the time everyone looked through them so many times. They even have something called SmartFit Technology that helps you create the best photo book possible. It makes it easier to arrange your photos in order, and add extra touches that make your photos just pop.

You can also make a recipe book on the Kodak Gallery Website of all your favorite Thanksgiving or Holiday foods. I know when I look at cookbooks, I love looking at the delicious photos of the food. Also if you are giving this as a gift, it will help the recipient with presentation and if it is a dip with assembly. I think that this is an easy and affordable gift. I remember when I was in first grade, my class made cookbooks for our moms for Mother’s day. My mom still has the cookbook my class made her, granted none of the recipes are actually makeable, it was more for the cute factor. It would have been nicer if it was made from Kodak Gallery and not just stapled printed pages.

I think it would be a smart gift for grandmothers to give their daughters and granddaughters with their special recipes. You can order as many copies as you want so, you can sit down once and mark off many people off your list at once. Every Grandma, Grandmother, Nana, Gram, Grammy and G-ma whatever you call yours has their own recipes. Then those books can be passed through the years to their children someday.

For more information please visit Kodak Gallery

They also have free shipping on orders of $30 or more by using the coupon code SHIP30

I received a gift card from Kodak to check out the website and create my own book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

How to Alter a Tin

Thanks to Scotch(R) Double Sided Tape for sponsoring my writing about crafts. Add your comment below to be entered for a chance to win free sample rolls to help with your upcoming holiday needs.

I really enjoy doing crafts. I have found that double sided tape works really well when you are taping pictures on scrapbooking pages. As someone who has broken every tape runner she has owned, I think that double sided tape works really well. You don’t have the extra bulk of using normal tape in a loop. In my opinion unless you are using something to purposely make the picture pop out it should be flat.
I wanted to share a quick and easy craft with you. I thought I would show you an easy way to alter a tin. Maybe it is an old holiday cookie tin or popcorn tin or a coffee tin, almost any tin will work. I bought some little tins that I keep some of my crafting supplies in.



You need:
2 pieces of Patterned Paper (same print)
Double sided tape
Any sized tin
Scissors
Ruler

First take your paper and wrap it around the tin. Make a mark on your patterned paper on the white side at where the groove at the top. This is so you can put the lid on your tin. Take a ruler and make a line horizontal and cut across. You might need another piece of paper to cover the rest of your tin depending on the size. Remember to keep the lip of the tin exposed because it will not matter once the lid is on.

Carefully put double sided tape on the paper and line it up around the tin. I find that it works better if you stick the paper in the metal rim at the bottom. It not only looks cleaner but it helps it stay. If you need to cover more of the tin, just cut out a strip of paper to fit the area and tape. It can be the back of the tin.

Trace the top of the tin’s lid and cut it out. You will also need a thin strip of paper to go around the bottom of the lid. Tape the paper to the lid.
You can decorate any way you would like.

Please learn more about Scotch(R) Double Sided Tape and other Scotch(R) Products, and join the conversation on the Scotch(R) Brand Facebook Page
and via Twitter.

I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity, as I do.

I have a giveaway for you.

Ten (10) Winners will each win a roll of Scotch Double Sided Tape.

Main Entry: Tell me what you think of my craft idea

This giveaway will end Friday November 26th at 11:59 pm ET
This giveaway is open to US Residents ONLY

If It Sounds Too Good to be True.....

I am watching Cops today. Yes, I love watching Cops, it was the same one I have seen a million times. If I was in a dark room and that “lady” would speak I would know her voice without seeing her face. She is the one that says Excuse my beauty. Well, I notice a commercial for a website called Bid Rodeo. I was like ok I will check it out. I put in the code for the 10 free bids and started bidding. It was such a waste of time and such a scam if you think about it. You have to pay for your bids. You can bid for free on Ebay. Everything goes up by a penny. Not only that but they extend the end time each time someone bids. Let’s crunch some numbers shall we?

Each bid raises the price by a penny, that undoubtedly sounds like a really good deal seeing as you can bid on ipads, ipods, and Amazon Gift cards to name a few. Well, me being the skeptic I am, was thinking where is the catch? I thought it might be extremely high shipping, no it seemed about normal. I thought what the hey I’ll use my 10 free bids just to see. After the clock just kept winding down and adding more time. I started imagining those people that were counting down the clock as if the space shuttle was about to take off, to win their prize. Of course someone out bid them by a penny and the vicious cycle went on and on.

Out of curiosity, I wondered what the prices of the bids are. Some of the items included what the company calls bid packs. So, then I scoffed at the ridiculousness of this website. You can get 800 bids all for the low price of FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS ( which is equal to 8 dollars of bids) Now here comes the math.

I will use an ipod for example since that is what I used my bids on:
Let’s say you and another person each bid each bid 800 times for the iPod. You are the only two bidding and it ends at 16 dollars even. You also have to pay the bid price plus shipping. You might think Yay! I just got an iPod for 16 dollars plus shipping in reality, you paid 516 dollars plus shipping for the iPod. The company made $1000 of the iPod through the bids. You could buy an iPod and an iPad for $516 I am assuming. I don’t own an iAnything. Let's also remember that even if you bid you are NOT guaranteed to win anything. After you bid 800 times you might end up empty handed, with nothing to show for your $500.

Two pieces of advice:
If it sounds too good to be true, than it probably is. My second piece of advice is If it doesn’t make sense than it’s not true.

I am sure Bid Rodeo will in fact bilk innocent people out of their money with promises of cheap goods. These are just MY OPINIONS, you can decide for yourself. I just felt like I needed to warn my readers.

Playing Radio Station

When I was younger, I used to play radio station with the neighbor kids. It was a full on production. I am talking we used to “broadcast” it on a speaker on a cordless phone, my neighbors mom would listen to the show faithfully. There would be music, talk, even commercials. It was my sister, our old friends Brad and Mike and of course me. There was occasionally another person but we were always the constant staff. We would play radio station all the time. My sister and Brad were the DJ’s I can’t remember what Mike did. What did I do…. I am sure you really wanna know. I was the sectary, because I didn’t have a good radio voice. Yes, poor little me had to pretend to write things. I didn’t even have the cool job. I was not allowed on the radio.

Even though I got the short end of the stick, it was still a lot of fun. Then again we always had fun with Brad and Mike. I have a lot of memories of them. We used to play baseball, Double Dare, and of course, Nintendo to name a few. I remember when this boy was picking on me and riding his little bike with his little friends in front of my house, Brad stepped in and protected me. I used to have a crush on Mike but yeah that was a million years ago. He’s a year younger than me I think.

Playing at the radio station was definitely an experience. I know it was kinda dorky but really we were semi dorky kids. I can’t remember what the radio station was called. I wonder if my sister remembers. Those were really good times although I am still haunted 20 or so years later that my voice isn’t radio worthy. What does that mean? Did I have like a squeaky voice or a man voice? Maybe it was a way for Julie and Brad to be in a spotlight and me chained to the desk pretending to answer phones. Don’t get me started on the Hamburger Dress incident. That is a whole other traumatic event, that needs it’s own post.

Please Paypal me to help pay for my therapy.

Noah and I Are So Alike.

It is so funny to watch Noah. He reminds me so much of me when I was little. If you were in my family you would know about the infamous Here’s Bozo video. I think I even talked about it on my blog before. I said something like Ladies and Gentleman Here’s Bozo and ran in the room over and over and eventually fell down. Recently, Noah was running around the house saying Ladies and Gentleman, Start your engines or something along those lines. Another thing he does is he talks like I did when I was little. On the same video I am sitting in our plastic swimming pool and I ask my mom to get our beach towels and I said We have towels. Noah says we have *insert whatever he is talking about* and he says it the same way I did when I was well his age.

Today, I had a mess to clean up. I am assuming it was payback for the baby powder from when I was little. I dumped a whole bottle of baby powder on myself, my old best friend and all over the room. It was that dreaded Talc kind and I am sure I inhaled a ton of it and I turned out ok. Well, I thought I would be smart and put the baby powder up where Mr. Noah couldn’t reach it. He found some Wilton powdered royal icing that I totally forgot I had bought, it was in a cupcake kit. I guess I should look on the bright side and he only opened one package and not everything. It was a total mess though. Powdered Royal icing all over the counter, the floor, the stove top, and my son who decided it would be fun to make foot prints with it. He also was rolling his trains and fire trucks in it. He also had a whole package of cupcake wrappers strategically placed on the floor. I thought maybe he was trying to make cupcakes or a treat for his mommy. Well needless to say I was not amused. It was kinda funny but it was a pain to clean up. It took forever to sweep it, mop it etc, while not making icing because that would have been a total pain in the butt.

I was reminded of my grandma Rose as I was cleaning it up. We used to make paste for crafts with flour and water all the time. I also remembered doing Paper Maché with my cousin Susie, I think it was Susie. It was a long time ago, if it wasn’t Susie, it was Rory. I can’t count how many crafts we did with my grandma and assorted cousins.

After I cleaned it all up, I sat him down for a talk. He was in trouble. I wanted to know what he was doing exactly. He told me he was making it snow inside. I explained that it doesn’t snow in our house and to not get in to things he knows not to get in to. He doesn’t like to talk about it, because he knew he was in big trouble. He also learned that even mommy got in trouble when she was little. I always follow up time outs and punishments with hugs and kisses and I love yous.

Noah is definitely a character, like I was. I wonder where he comes up with this stuff.
Do you see your children doing the same silly things you did when you were a child? I would love to hear your stories.

St. Louis Hilton at the Ballpark Review

I wanted to tell you guys about the hotel, we stayed at in St. Louis. We stayed at the St. Louis Hilton at the Ball Park. It is extremely close to Busch Stadium like across the street. It is in downtown St. Louis and it is an easy walk to the Arch and many restaurants. We didn’t have to do a whole lot of driving when we were there. It is a great location and a gorgeous hotel. The lobby is beautiful. There is even a Starbucks and a restaurant in the hotel. There are also two bars. It was amazing. The hotel staff was all very nice and made our stay very comfortable. We had valet parking. It was my first experience with valet parking and it was really neat. The hotels parking lot is across the street and down the road a little ways so not having to carry our luggage that far was great. Not only that but the bellboy brought our luggage up for us and unloaded it. We were all pretty tired at the end of each day it was nice to just be able to pull up and get out of the car and walk in the hotel. The valets were very nice and we didn’t have to wait long to get our car. We had a lot to do so not spending the extra time was great.



The room was so comfortable. The beds were so soft and it felt good to lay down on them and just hang out. The view was breathtaking. We had a view of part of the Arch, the old capital building and a couple fountains. St. Louis is a gorgeous city. The TV was a nice one. It was a flat screen. Noah’s favorite channel was the hotel channel. It was pretty funny to hear him to ask to watch it. It was great to have such a nice room that we didn’t have to worry about anything to come back to.

Every night we enjoyed the pool and hot tub. This pool and hot tub was featured in George Clooney’s movie The Air Up There. I have never seen the movie but it was cool to think that George Clooney could have been sitting where I was sitting. Yes, I am a huge George Clooney fan. Noah and I danced in the pool in my arms. I sang him songs and we just had some special mommy and Noah time. He had a huge smile on his face the entire time. It was nice to have his little warm body in my arms because the water was pretty cold. My favorite thing was the hot tub. It felt so nice to be in it after a long day. It was huge. It is the biggest one I have ever seen or been in. It would accommodate a lot of people. They also had a dry sauna that I would sit in too. I love saunas. I would rather be hot than freezing cold. There was hardly anyone in the pool area when we were there which was nice. I don’t like a lot of noise when I am trying to relax. It felt like our own personal spot to go and relax.

Unfortunately, the night before we left, Noah got really sick. I was lying in bed watching Locked Up Raw. All the sudden I heard someone throwing up. I jumped up because it scared me. I was almost asleep and so I got up and my little boy was sitting up extremely sick all over the bed. I will spare you the details but it was really gross. The comforter, the sheets, his pillow pet was all covered in it. I felt so bad for Noah because it happened over and over again. I called Guest Services and explained the situation. I wasn’t sure if they were able to do anything because a lot of places don’t have overnight housekeeping. Thankfully St. Louis Hilton at the Ball Park does. Housekeeping came up to our room and changed all the bedding for us. She even left an extra sheet incase it happened again. The other times we were more prepared with towels. I was sad to check out of the hotel because it was so nice and everyone was great.

If you are in St. Louis you should stay at the St. Louis Hilton at the Ball Park because it is a great hotel that has lots of great amenities and is even there for you when your child gets sick in the middle of the night. It is a beautiful place and I would love to stay there again the next time we are visiting St. Louis.

Thank you to The St. Louis CVC for sponsoring my family's trip to St. Louis. All thoughts and opinions are my own.