Only brush the teeth you want to keep: $100 giveaway

This is a compensated review by BlogHer and Tom's of Maine.

Only one natural oral care company carries the ADA Seal of Acceptance for a children’s toothpaste, Tom’s of Maine Anticavity Children’s Silly Strawberry with Fluoride. And because we care as much as you do, we’ve never tested it on animals or added artificial flavors, colors or preservatives. It’s flavored with natural oils for a great strawberry taste they’ll love.

My dentist always said, "Only brush the teeth you want to keep." (shout out, Dr. Lamb!)

My family was asked to review Tom's of Maine Natural Care Toothpaste. This particular product of Tom's is an anticavity fluoride toothpaste for children--our flavor was called Silly Strawberry.



The lack of artificial colors in this product keeps it natural--you'll notice that it's actually an off-white paste even though it is strawberry flavored? The ingredient list on the box says this toothpaste is flavored with fruit extracts of strawberry, banana, and other natural flavors, as well as "carrageenan (Chondrus crispus) (seaweed)..." Eh? There's seaweed in the toothpaste? Maybe that's why it's 'silly'? Certainly natural!

I put together this little video of my two youngest kiddos trying out the new tube in a creative way. They are 7 & 5. And yes my house is always this loud.



For the sake of the review, I did try the toothpaste as well. It actually tastes like a strawberry/cherry combo and for that reason, I'd never be able to use it again. [I have a severe adversion to anything cherry flavored as it only reminds me of cough syrup I was forced to take as a child when sick. See what you've done to me Mom? I can never eat cherry-flavored candy, cough drops, mixed drinks, and now, I can't use Tom's of Maine Silly Strawberry flavored toothpaste.]

The kids liked it about as much as their regular toothpaste and I feel good knowing they're using a natural product without artificial colors or flavors.

Now the good stuff! To enter the $100 Visa gift card drawing, tell me how you get your kids to brush! Leave me a comment below or you may leave a link to your post on your own blog in the comments below. Contest will begin at 12/15/2009 and will end 1/15/2010. Make sure that the e-mail address you leave is correct.

Rules:

• No duplicate comments.
• You may receive an additional entry by linking on twitter and leaving a link in the comments.
• You may receive an additional entry by blogging about this contest and leaving a link in the comments.
• This giveaway is open to US Residents, aged 18 and older
• Winners will be selected via random draw, and will notified by e-mail.
• You have 48 hours to get back to me, otherwise a new winner will be selected.
• Please see the official rules here: Official rules

Be sure to check out other Tom's of Maine products and check out other reviewers' blogs and contests here on the BlogHer.com special offers page.


Please check out my blog at Life with the Boys.

spreading the holiday calories—uhh, I mean--cheer (now closed)

(this contest is now closed)

This is a compensated review from BlogHer and Hershey's

So, my mom is a baker. A fantastic baker. Every holiday there were always mounds and mounds of treats of all varieties. Christmas was always amazing with red & green candy cookies, coconut christmas tree cookies, wreath sugar cookies, fudge, wassail, and more. For each holiday during the school year, she’d make literally dozens and dozens of holiday-shaped sugar cookies that we would share with our classes in school. I could go on and on but I just gained 4 pounds thinking about her yummy treats.

All this to say that, baking is in my blood. My mom practically lived in the kitchen when we were growing up—partly due to the fact that we didn’t have a dishwasher—but mostly due to the fact that she cooked and baked and gave things away as charitable acts of service. Someone’s sick next door? Let’s take them over a casserole. So and so had a baby? Let’s take them some chocolate cake. Your friend had a bad day? Go take her these cookies.

I have to admit I’ve taken after her just a wee bit when it comes to giving away food. Since I too love to bake, but unfortunately am an eternal dieter, I often bake dozens of cookies just for fun, only to give them away to neighbors and friends so I don’t have to be tempted by them. I have a friend who is going thru a rough pregnancy and I’ve volunteered to take them a meal every single week if to help out just a little bit. I remember when an old friend had a horrific miscarriage—I showed up with some cinnamon rolls and said, “I don’t know what you’re going through, and I don’t know how I can help, but I can bake, so please, eat.”

One of my favorite ways to share treats, like many of you, is to make goodie plates during the holidays. Yes, Christmas—there, I said it. =) No political correctness on my blog! And like many of my neighbors, I like to come up with some special recipes, some tried and true, and some brand new what-do-you-think-of-these treats.

For this review I was given the opportunity to test out several of Hershey’s Kiss varieties. I baked and baked one Saturday afternoon, standing for approximately 4.5 hours (and yikes did my back hurt the next day!), taunting myself because I was on a liquid cleanse that week and couldn’t taste test what looked like master succulent creations. I had fun trying new things and make a humongous mess of my kitchen.

And forgive me, but I had my kids and hubby snap pictures of my journey along the way. I leave it to you to guess which shots were snapped by my hubby of eleven years. :)

I tried the recipes listed here on Hershey’s Kisses baking website. I made the Chocolate Thumbprint Cookies, the Triple Chocolate Cookies, and the Peanut Butter Blossoms. I also made the Kisses Cocoa Cookies but those didn’t turn out right. (I now know precisely what happens when you accidentally add twice the amount of required butter to a cookie recipe.)

I used the Hershey’s Milk Chocolate Kisses for all these cookies—minus the ones that failed, I used the Hersheys Meltaway Kisses (which are oh-so-yummy)—and then shared them with friends, neighbors, and my kids’ friends. I’m still finding Hershey’s Kiss wrappers all over my house!

Anyway, it was interesting to see how people responded to the three different kinds. The Chocolate Thumbprints have a lot going on—chocolate cookie covered in peanuts and then a dollop of white icing and the Hershey’s Kiss on top. It gives a nice blend of sweet and salty. These were a favorite of some.

The Triple Chocolate variety consists of a chocolate cookie with chocolate chips inside and then a Hershey’s Kiss on top. Many said this cookie tasted like a brownie and it was the overall favorite. [It will in fact be the big Go To Cookie for the neighbors for Christmas this year]

My favorite was the Peanut Butter Blossoms as I am a huge sucker for anything peanut butter. The cool thing about these is they were made with sweetened condensed milk, which I do not bake with often. I love how soft the milk made this recipe. Several said there wasn’t enough peanut butter for these to be true peanut butter cookies—but the softness and consistency easily made these my favorite.

Ummm…yeah….there’s one of my hubby’s shots.

What’s your Go To Cookie for the holidays?

To enter the drawing for $100 Visa gift card from Hershey’s and BlogHer, comment or you may leave a link to your post on your own blog in the comments below. The contest will begin 12/4/09 9:00am and go until 12/31/09 11:59pm. It makes is much easier for me to contact winners if they include their email address in their entry. Please make sure that the e-mail address you leave is correct.

Rules:

• No duplicate comments.
• You may receive an additional entry by linking on twitter and leaving a link in the comments.
• You may receive an additional entry by blogging about this contest and leaving a link in the comments.
• This giveaway is open to US residents 18 and older.
• Winners will be selected via random draw, and will notified by e-mail.
• You have 48 hours to get back to me, otherwise a new winner will be selected.
• Please see the official rules here.

You have 8 chances to win! Enter them all here at the BlogHer.com special offers page.

Check out many more recipes on the Hershey's Holiday website.

Please check out my website Life with the Boys.

Legos Giveaway Winner!

My official winner was #53, Jana of TigWeb!

Congrats!

imaginations home grown (closed)

This is a compensated review from BlogHer and Duplo

I see them here

I see them there

I see those LEGO® bricks

everywhere.

Under couches

in the hall

beneath the table

near the wall.

Red, yellow

green and blue

LEGO®bricks come

in every hue.

600 LEGO® bricks

the box said

But at least half of those

are beneath my bed.

LEGO® bricks

seem to repleat

Mostly

underneath my feet!

I see them here

I see them there

I see those LEGO® bricks

everywhere.

I wrote this poem a year or so ago when my little guys were having issues cleaning up after their toys. Since then, we actually had to take all the toys out of my 7 year-old’s room because he was so bad about not putting things away. He’s slowly earned them all back, and things have gotten much better.

I was thinking though, how I wouldn’t have these itty bitty surprises underneath my feet as much if my kids just stuck to the larger LEGO® DUPLO® bricks. Have you seen these? They’re kind of the middle-man between the little LEGO® bricks and the larger meatier can-fit-one-in-the-palm-of-your-hand variety. My sweeties have been playing with this set this past week and have been having so much fun with them—and bonus, I haven’t found any little pieces beneath my couch!

I love catching them so deep and into their pretend play. Whether it’s the DUPLOs®, their trains, cars, or whatever, they get so wrapped up in their make-believe world and it does my heart good to see them using their creativity and imaginations. They usually get along better when they’re using their minds too. There’s something to be said about taking away all the bells and whistles and electronic items and just having good raw Imagination Play. In their made up world they are pilots and firefighters, presidents and artists. They scale 10 story buildings and shoot off into outerspace, drive big trucks and dig big holes. They fly and fall and become superheroes.

A couple of days ago, my 5 year old came up to me and said, “I know what I want to be when I grow up.” When I asked him about it, he said, “a creator.”

“A creator?” I asked. “What kind of creator?”

“Any kind…whatever I want,” he confidently answered.

And I thought, yes, yes you can.

Check out other bloggers' reviews and giveaways at BlogHer.com's special offers page.

To enter to win a $20 LEGO® DUPLO® gift card, leave me a comment below and tell me how you get creative and stimulate development in your kids. The contest will begin at 9:00 a.m. (PST) November 23, 2009 and will end 8:59 a.m. (PST) November 30, 2009. Make sure that the e-mail address you leave is correct.

Rules:

• No duplicate comments.
• You may receive an additional entry by linking on twitter and leaving a link in the comments.
• You may receive an additional entry by blogging about this contest and leaving a link in the comments.
• This giveaway is open to US Residents, aged 18 and older.
• Winners will be selected via random draw, and will be notified by e-mail.
• You have 48 hours to get back to me, otherwise a new winner will be selected.
• Please see the official rules here: Official rules

Please check out my webpage Life with the Boys.