Fun Stuff – Page 8 – Chocolate 'N Children

April 9, 2012

Bringing up Bebe

Just finished reading an interesting book on childrearing. Bringing Up Bebe: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting. This was a fascinating book. The author is an American who’s living and raising her family in France. She covers the many differences between American and French parenting styles and philosophies.

I didn’t agree with every French parenting decision that she liked in the book, but many of them were quite insightful, and some were useful. She talked about things like how is it that French children eat a variety of foods including vegetables while American children will spend months refusing to eat more than peanut butter and jelly? And why do French children rarely throw temper tantrums?

Definitely insightful and a great look at some different parenting styles. A fun read, and a book I would recommend.

March 18, 2012

Smarterer

So, for bzzagent.com I tried out this website called smarterer.com. Basically, you take and contribute to “tests” about all sorts of different topics. I tried out the bzzagent test and the adobe illustrator test.

And then you can compare your score against other test takers. Really, in my opinion it’s an interesting idea but there are some flaws. You loose points for wrong answers but since all the test questions are user generated I’ve actually answered some questions correctly and it’s been the wrong answer so I loose points.

You can report this but there doesn’t seem to be a really good review process to ensure that the questions are accurate and make sense. Also, you get points for creating questions, so it’s possible for someone to be doing better on a test than me simply because they submitted more questions than me.

All in all, this site just felt like a waste of my time. I didn’t learn anything new about adobe illustrator and how can I accurately know how much knowledge I have about a topic if all the questions aren’t accurate?

February 17, 2012

New Black Dress for the Baby

So…shiny black dresses are apparently hard to photograph, but I think you can get the general idea.

I found this huge skirt at a yardsale this past summer for $1 that I decided to make a dress for the toddler out of. You can’t see it really well in the picture but it has embroidered flowers all down the front of the skirt. The minute I saw it I knew it would make a cute dress, and I even had enough fabric for the bloomers!

Up close on the front of the dress. You can kind of see where I did some altering to the from to make the very top section of the front see-through.

If I ever do a project like this again I’m going to remove the waste band from the skirt before I start cutting. It was a little difficult to cut out a pattern because the skirt was gathered at the top and I couldn’t get the pieces to lie flat.

I tried it on the baby already and it’s so cute! Now, on to my Easter dress project!

February 1, 2012January 30, 2012

Comforts for Baby

I really enjoy trying new products, and my favorite product review site is BzzAgent. I get to try out real products for free and leave my feedback.

My latest campaign was from Kroger’s line of baby items. Comforts for baby.

I received a free box of diapers (96 diapers in the size that I got), a free container of baby wipes, and two free sippy cups.

1. I loved the baby wipes, they’re store brand so a lot cheaper than a name brand but they’re still thick and soft. Walmart’s baby wipes are really thin so I don’t use them, I’ve been using pamper’s instead. But I think I’ll switch to Comforts. I like them just as well as pamper’s baby wipes and Comforts are a lot cheaper!

2. The diapers are ok, they’re a little smaller than the same size in Pampers so I wish I’d gotten one size larger. The weight limit was the same on the size 3 comforts and the size 3 pampers so I expected the same size diaper. They still fit my toddler but a slightly larger size would have been better.

I think they’re a little rougher feeling than Pampers but my toddler doesn’t notice the difference. They always seem more saturated to me when I change my toddler but I haven’t had any diapers leak or any rashes on the toddler.

They’re cheaper than Pampers and work as well even if they seem less nice to me. I still have half a box of diapers to go through before I have to decide which I’ll purchase.

3. I did not like the cups. My kids don’t like cups with the rubber stoppers so I had to pull those out. Which wouldn’t have been terrible, but the cup is tall and skinny so it tips over easily, and without the rubber stoppers, they spill everywhere.

I liked the flip lid that is on the cups, it’s a great idea, but the cup still leaks when it’s on if I don’t have the rubber stoppers in. If you have a child that drinks out of cups with the stoppers in it, you’ll probably like this cup, but it just doesn’t work for me.

December 13, 2011December 12, 2011

Graham Cracker Houses

My husband had a great Christmas idea four years ago. This is the fourth year we’ve done it and we always have a blast! Instead of gingerbread houses – which are a lot of work – we make graham cracker houses.

We invite a bunch of friends over and make graham cracker houses. This year, I assembled the houses earlier in the day so they were set before the party and kids trying to put candy on them. It worked out really well.

Graham cracker houses are really easy, and a great holiday party idea if you have kids (or if you just like playing with candy and icing)

My house. I actually did this the day after the party before I cleaned everything up. The trick to a good house (in my opinion) is the icing. It’s just powdered sugar and water, and you want it to be thick enough that it doesn’t run but thin enough that you can pipe it. I put my icing in a plastic bag, cut a hole in the end, (a very tiny hole) and pipe the icing out so I have good control over where it goes.

Side of my house

My 3yr old’s “house”. It looks like a tent to me. She made two other houses as well. The party this year was so much fun for her and her little friends! I just handed them bowls of icing with spoons in them, piles of candy, and let them have at it.

And, a melting house. This batch of icing was a tad thin and ended up slipping but I think it looks pretty cool!

And, as a plus, these houses are just as much fun to eat as they are to make!

December 4, 2011December 2, 2011

Candy Tree

Let’s start off the holiday food posts right. With candy! A friend of mine made this great candy tree for us.

I think it’s so creative and so much fun. I just have to keep everyone from eating it until Christmas 🙂

There was a yellow star at the top but my 3yr old removed it with the lollypop that was attached to it at the top. And of course, ate the candy, so I couldn’t put it back on the tree…

November 10, 2011

Style Find

Today, I’m just doing a quick review on a clothing site. Stylefind.com. I’m testing out this site for a site called bzzagent.com, but don’t worry, I don’t have to say anything special, just what I think.

Pros: for this site, they have a lot of fun features, a find your shape jean selector, style suggestions such as what’s new in style, a page of my favorite stuff, and a lot more. It’s a fun site to play around on and see all the styles.

Cons: The clothing on this site costs way more than I am willing to pay. The cheapest pair of jeans I saw was $80. I realize for some people, this is a great deal, but for me, with two kids who stain my jeans within weeks of purchase, I just can’t justify spending this much on clothing.

So, go check it out for fun, but don’t get attached to the clothing, it won’t be good for your budget.

October 25, 2011

Burt’s Bees Natural Skincare

My latest product test from BzzAgent has been Burt’s Bees Natural Skin Solutions for Sensitive Skin. They sent me two full sized products. A face cleanser and a face lotion. I was in the market for a new face lotion so I was really excited to try this out!

I’ve been using it for a couple of weeks and I’m really happy with it. After my second child I’d been having trouble with my face breaking out, and I’ve never had trouble with this before. And the Burt’s Bees Natural face cleanser and lotion haven’t given me any trouble. My face has completely cleared up. And it’s gentle enough that I even let my child try it out on her face when I’m doing mine.

At $15 a bottle they’re affordable and I plan to buy more when I use up my current bottles of product.

Want to discover more about Burt’s Bees®? Head to burtsbees.com/sensitive to find a complete product list (for your whole body), special offers, and information about Burt’s Beest.

October 12, 2011

My New Etsy Site

I have finally opened my new Etsy site. If you’re not familiar with etsy it’s an online site where individuals can sell vintage items and/or handmade items made by themselves. You can rate the sellers once you purchase from them so it’s pretty easy to see if you’re purchasing from a reputable seller or not. I’ve made several purchases off of this site and never had any trouble at all. Most people are happy to make a sale and want a good rating so they can make more sales so they’re going to make sure you’re happy.

I also have so much fun just browsing the site and looking at all the cool stuff people have made!

If you want to see what I’m selling without going to Etsy you can see it on my blog here.

I have a few more things planned that I haven’t posted yet, some hairbows for little girls, bibs, burp cloths, baby quilts, and more! I’ll be posting updates as I get those finished and for sale.