Thank You Brandcation #Gulfcoast Sponors

This past weekend I went to my first blogging conference.  I went to Brandcation Bloggers Gone Coastal.  It was hosted by Brandfluential  and Momdot. It was in Pensacola Florida.  I am not sure if I had ever been to Pensacola before and it was absolutely beautiful.  The scenery was nothing compared to all the wonderful women I met. I had spent almost three years chatting with these women so having the opportunity to meet them was so exciting. We spent time bonding together and learning about brands and going on adventures.  It was definitely the experience of a lifetime.   We had some amazing sponsors that made this whole thing possible, without costing a fortune to attend.  

I want to take a little time to thank all the sponsors:

Adventures Unlimited  invited us out to go zip lining and tubing.

Portofino Island Resort  was our accommodations in beautiful condos.

Dunkin Donuts Thanks for the bagels and coffee. An Everything bagel hit the spot after a long trip in.

Jambu sponsored the wacky Blog Olympics where we had to do all kinds of silly things. They also provided us with awesome tote bags for our swag.

Hotel Coupons  for sponsored our Murder Mystery Night. They have awesome coupons to help you save on travel.

Circle PR made it possible to go on the Dolphin Cruise

Dole  provided us with some healthy condo snacks.

Stargazing with Dewey was such an experience.

The Swag Sponsors:

Mogo Charm sells adorable magnetic charms for kids that Noah loves.

The Tervis Water Bottle  was one of my favorite swag items because it is a great water bottle that is pretty much leak proof. They also sell glasses that contain patches of different things like sports logos and even monograms.

Capsul Cases are hard wallets so you don’t have to worry about your cards getting all bent up.

The Village company  makes Mr. Bubble products and other luxurious bath items.

Hasbro provided us with The Game of Life zapped for iPad and you play with both a game board and your iPad. 

Noah is so excited to listen to the Kidz Bop CD I received.

Carex  sells all kinds of cool products. We all received a Pediatric medical kit complete with a thermometer and different items to dispense medicine. We also received a detachable pill box that some of the proceeds go to Breast Cancer awareness. My favorite item from Carex is the Neck Buddy pillow. You heat it up and it is heavenly.  I have it on my back right now after having it on my neck.

Lush Gourmet Foods makes delicious gourmet nuts and I was lucky enough to try some.

Nivea provided everyone with a sample of fifteen lip care products, Sun Kissed Lotion and body wash and a men’s product to try out. I love Nivea!

Lady Fortunes makes beautiful cookies and treats with your company’s logo on them. 

I don’t know how many times I have had to lug my purse somewhere because I had no pockets for my phone.  I am so excited that I received Pami Pocket because now I don’t have to worry about carrying my purse with me, which weighs a ton.

Island Def Jam Records provided us with some music to jam to long after Brandcation is over.

Ayala’s Herbal Water provided beverages for all the ladies to drink during the conference.

Wikki Stix is one of Noah’s favorite items I received. He loves shaping them in fish and sting rays and other assorted sea life.

Phone Fetcher will definitely be a life saver.  I am always losing my phone in my purse. I really need to clean it out.  I am so glad that I don’t have to spend time looking for my phone because I can attach it to my purse.

Page Stationery makes really cute personalized stationary and cards.

Cereusart provided everyone with a wine charm. I love that mine was a starfish.

Annemarie Gianni Skin Care provided everyone with a sample of their organic, wild crafted and natural  skincare products.

Veri Peri Sauces makes sauces with a kick of spice and they had me at Garlic!

Twin Cottage Industries  makes really cool bungee bookmarks. They hire mentally disabled people to make the bookmarks which are absolutely awesome.

Kids Gear provided me with kid friendly headphones. If you know me I am always breaking head phones and these are well made and will survive the headphone curse!

Smart Mouth makes Activated Mouthwash that uses patented Smart-Zinc Technology.

Sacs of Life  gave me my favorite swag item so far. They gave everyone a brown diaper bag that doesn’t look like a diaper bag and makes a great bag for a mom on the go.

Bright Star Kids provided me with a really cute cupcake bag tag. They must have known I love cupcakes!

KleenSlate makes dry erase paddles for classrooms so children no longer have to shout out the answer and it helps shy children participate too.

EAD Designs provided everyone with an owl decal and a blogging geek car decal.

Wahmies Eats makes reusable casserole covers which is awesome because I am always fighting with plastic wrap and losing.

Blue Orange Games provided everyone with a game to share with their families.

DVO Enterprises  makes the Cook’n Recipe software. I have so many random recipes that are written on paper, from the newspaper or printed out. I tend to lose them sometimes and with this software I can keep them all safe digitally and access them on my laptop and tablet.

When I was in school I was always forgetting my locker combination.  I wish they had Wordlock when I was in school because I could remember a word to unlock my locker.

Our Giveaway Sponsors:

Rubbermaid provided the prizes for the Blog Olympics teams.

Etching Expressions makes really cool etched wine labels and personalized plaques.

Belkin makes all kinds of fun tech things. I received a tablet holder for when I am cooking in the kitchen and don’t want to spill anything on my tablet. The coolest thing is it does not use screws so it won’t ruin your cabinets.

Velvet Pepper makes beautiful purses and bags.  I really need a new purse.

Frangelico is Hazelnut Liqueur and everyone received a bottle and hand crafted Frangelico chocolates.  

Tiny Love provided the Musical Stack & Ball Elephant as a giveaway prize. I know one of the other bloggers would have done anything for her son to get one.

Atlantic Luggage makes great luggage that is lightweight. My mom has a suitcase that weighs 17 pounds which is a pain when you have a weight limit of fifty pounds. I will look in to purchasing her some new luggage.

Drama Queen Bows makes really sweet bows for little girls.

I also wanted to thank our wonderful hosts who spent 5 months organizing and planning:

Trisha

Kim

Lynsey

Blondie

I plan to go in to more detail about our adventures and some of the awesome sponsors and swag items we received. Noah has already gotten in to and ran off with quite a few of my swag items.

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Sometimes You Just Have to Let Them Go.....

One of the hardest things is letting go. It is important to let go those that have hurt us repeatedly. Those people who do not have your best interest at heart, those that think of only themselves.  Unfortunately, I have a big heart. I say unfortunately because as I am aware it is a great thing, it is also a curse at the same time.  I look for the good in people as I have mentioned before, but sometimes you can’t find good in everyone. There are bad people in this world that want to hurt you, that don’t really care about you and it sucks.  Sometimes you just hit your complete breaking point and you have to just cut your losses, cut ties and hopefully learn something in the process.  Losing someone is never easy; you end up mourning the loss of a friendship or a loss of a relationship with a family member.  You go through a grieving period and it hurts. I will always care about those people, but my heart can’t take the pain that they caused. It is really hard for me to stop caring about someone.

 Sometimes I wonder if I gave too many chances, maybe I would see a difference, maybe they would change. The truth is you have to accept someone for who they are, not for what you see them to be. I really need to stop looking at a person’s potential and see them for what they really are. I guess I expect more in people, and when I find out I was wrong, I become disappointed in them.  I don’t expect much, I expect someone to be caring, compassionate, loving, and kind. It is so hard to know what kind of person someone is. You don’t want to push everyone away because people have hurt you in the past, but there is no way of really knowing.  It would be a lot easier if I had an eggdacator like in Willy Wonka, that would tell me if they were a bad egg or not.  If only I could line everyone up and have them step on the machine and see what happens.  If they were a bad egg, like Veruca Salt, down the garbage chute they would go.  I have learned there is not good in everyone. Something must have happened to make them this way.  Some people are just bitter jerks.  It has taken me a long time to learn this.

The worst feeling in the world is when you find out a family member is this way.  Especially when you have given your all to make things work, devoted so much time and energy to be there and when you find out who they really are, it is just like a slap in the face. Maybe I had hoped you changed, and it didn’t happen. There is just so much pain you can take before it eats you alive and you just can’t allow that person to hurt you anymore.  I guess you get to a point where the emotional pain is normal; it really messes with your other relationships and human dynamics.  Hope is a funny thing, it is good to have hope, but sometimes too much hope can distort your reality and make you hurt in the long run.  Some say you are in control of how you feel, and that you only allow someone make you feel a certain way, that is true, but there are a couple exceptions to the rules, one being when it comes to family. You spend your whole life looking up to someone, loving them, trying as hard as you can to have that relationship and bond with them and then one day you come to find out that they never cared and it was all a sham.  One of the quotes from Fools Rush In that I think about is “Love is a gift, not an obligation.” That basically means if it is a gift to love someone and be loved, not something you do because you have to.  I just feel like they were obligated and all those words and memories were a lie, because actions speak louder than words.

 I am not sure I can remember a time where I thought wow, he really loves me, I am sure there was one but it is just weird I can’t remember it.  I think that is the hardest truth to understand.  Now, it is time to let go of all of the pain and the hurt and the sorrow.  It’s time to live a happy life full of laughter and love, and put all that suffering behind me and leave those who have hurt me behind, no matter how hard that might be.  I am at peace with my decision, it probably is something I should have done a long time ago, but that little imp called Hope was playing a trick on me again. It’s good to hope, just don’t hope yourself in to a bad situation, see people for who they are, not what you potentially see in them, use caution and set a limit and once the limit exists be brave enough to just let them go.

I will instead of becoming a bitter person, and giving up hope on humanity, and losing my faith in those kind people, I will still take those chances and open my heart up; I will be a little more guarded about who I associate with.  

Teens are Drinking Hand Sanitizer to get Drunk

I was just watching the news. I have heard of teenagers, huffing paint, doing whip-its, which is with whipped cream cans, sniffing rubber cement, inhaling duster among other things while are all extremely dangerous. Now teenagers are drinking hand sanitizer.  I think that is disgusting. Hand Sanitizer is mostly ethanol alcohol so I guess they drink it to get drunk. It ends up having a really high proof, since the proof is the alcohol volume percentage times two. I think that is so sad, that kids feel that they need to get drunk so bad that they are drinking hand sanitizer.  Are they going to start making it hard to purchase? Of course a teen can walk in to the store and buy a bottle of hand sanitizer and the cashier will think nothing of it. Now, I am not sure why anyone would wanna drink it, have you smelled it? I have accidentally tasted hand sanitizer from using it and then eating and it is nasty.  It makes me so sad that kids will find any way they can to get high, or drunk without understanding the consequences.

I am not sure who gets the idea of doing these things. I know I grew up with Mr. Yuk and I know you aren’t supposed to drink things that aren’t drinks. I grew up knowing that there are poisons out there that will harm me and I learned not to drink things that are just handed to me. You don’t know what harm they can do. You don’t know if you will die.  You never know. Today, Noah and I were pretending his lamb was sick, so I gave him some imaginary medicine to give to her, well he ate it. I took the opportunity to tell him how you never take anyone else’s medicine; you only take medicine given to you by mommy or a doctor.  We have been talking about it a lot because he keeps asking for higher doses of Tylenol when he has a fever.

When I was 17, I met this girl who huffed rubber cement when she was 14 with her best friend. They went on a hayride that night, came back to one of the girls houses and huffed rubber cement and went to sleep, in the morning her best friend was dead. This is a very true and very sad story. No high or getting drunk is worth dying for or causing serious bodily harm.

Please talk to your children about the dangers of drinking hand sanitizer.

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The Long Term Effects of Bullying

When you are bullied as a child, it causes long term effects. Those names people call you, they cause long term effects.  You could carry it with you for a long time. It can play a huge part in decisions you make in your life.  It is something that could ruin your life when you are a child or even as an adult. When I was younger in elementary school, I was bullied; I was constantly called names, called weird, called crazy. I wasn’t crazy or weird. I was bullied by classmates and even by a couple family members. My own family members would call me crazy.  My dad’s mom and my aunt would tell my cousin I was crazy.  They would say oh you are in one of your moods.  It really hurt me and it still makes me want to cry to this day. I was just a kid going through a lot. My parents were divorcing and I was just trying to find my place.  I was treated like crap for no reason. I wasn’t a mean child, I was in fact the complete opposite, I was a sweet and loving little girl. 

When I was in jr. high I was made fun of. Everyone knew my name, not because I was popular, because it was some big joke. I am not sure what I did, or said to make everyone taunt me or whatever. I never knew. I was a sweet and loving girl. I had some friends who were nice to me when I was in elementary school and in jr. high, I just don’t know why I was the butt of some joke. I wasn’t doing anything crazy. It makes no sense. I wasn’t the most glamorous girl but I didn’t think I was too bad. I was average in my opinion. I think that bullying affected my life.  I made choices that weren’t smart. I chose toxic friends over and over again.  I just was so used to being made fun of and people being mean to me, that it was normal. I guess I allowed friends to be mean to me and hurt me over and over, because when you have nothing, anything seems better than that and you can take what you can get.

In high school, things got better. I had more friends, granted most of them were not the best choices. Especially my old best friend, she was so mean to me. I took it anyways. I wanted to have friends, so I looked the other way. Even when she and a bunch of people wrote a hateful note to me and it really hurt my feelings. There are many other times this girl has severely hurt my feelings, thankfully she is not in my life anymore. I have learned that there are good friends out there. 

I also think that the fact that I was bullied and called names had something to do with my relationship choices especially my ex-husband, who was abusive.  I am not saying it was my fault because no one deserves to be abused, physically, emotionally, mentally or verbally.  I just think it goes back to one of those things where when you are used to nothing you take what you can get.  I have completely changed my mind set when it comes to friends. I am no longer friends with anyone I deem toxic.  I am so blessed now to have so many great friends, who would never hurt me in the ways I have been hurt before. They love me for me, and I love them for them. We look past each other’s flaws and totally accept one another.

Those names you call others, those mean hurtful words, they do cause damage.  They are more than just words, there is a real human behind hearing them and you are crushing their spirit, self esteem and self worth. If you think that someone will forget about those mean things you said, chances are they still remember, and they probably are still hurt deep inside. They probably still think about you and how much you hurt them. I am sure you are thinking oh they need to get over it, or we were just kids, but really those are excuses. The words will linger for a long time.  You can steal their childhood, or part of their life, because of the turmoil and pain you caused.  You never know what someone is really going through, have some compassion. Teach your children compassion and empathy.  Teach your children to think before you speak or type you don’t want to be responsible for someone else’s pain or worse.

Teach Your Children Responsiblity with My Job Chart

MyJobChart.com, an online chore chart was designed to teach young people the concept of responsibility, work ethic and the value of money by giving them a way to earn points for completing their chores.
The free site has always offered a way for young users to ‘spend’ their points on rewards they want, ‘share’ what they earn with a chosen charity, or to ‘save’ for the future.”

Kids are able to experience the tremendous rewards of earning money for themselves and then of accumulating that money and saving for the future. As they do this they will get a $20 bonus into each child’s account just for signing up for a kids savings account.

My Job Chart is easy of use and the high-tech approach have made MyJobChart.com a hit with more than 140,000 kids in just over a year since its inception with kids completing over 9.4 Million chores using the site!

How to Make Foaming Soap

I love Bath and Bodyworks soap. I also have a five year old that loves to pump the foaming soap and waste it sometimes. It can get expensive to keep buying soap, and I really need some more and I am not able to make it to Bath and Bodyworks for a while. I already add a little water when it is getting low. I thought since it is just soap I could fill them with a little bit of body wash and add some water. I have body wash that isn’t enough to use to wash myself, so I poured that in the soap container. So I made some new soap. I feel kind of like Tyler Durden.

Here is how you do it:

Take an empty foaming soap container and the body wash of your choice, you can also use hand soap or shampoo and put some in the foaming soap container. Just make sure it is liquid and not the creamy lotion kind, because I have added water to that before and it is just a mess. I would also stay away from the kinds with the little scrubbing beads because they will clog the foamer.

Add some water and mix it up. It is best to fill it before you shake it so you get more use, if you shake before like I did the bubbles will eventually dissolve.
Put the lid on and Voila! Your soap container is full again and you are able to re-purpose the container and that little bit of soap or shampoo or body wash that isn’t really usable.

You can also refill your travel body washes up with more of the same scent to save on buying more travel body wash or if you don’t have more of the scent, you can always use it to make foaming soap.

It’s good for the planet too.

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