Our school work is revolving around the ancient people and the nomads and first cities. We’re also reading some Old Testament Bible stories to go along with it. They love it and are pretending to be hunter/gatherers, or making “stew” out of random foods they’ve found.

Meanwhile, MG is our entrepreneur, and so of course she has to invent something something new and different to sell. This time she is creating fake chocolate bars. They are cardboard fake chocolate wrapped in a white label and then they have the description and the price on them. Our friend who is teaching in Japan will probably get a few mailed to her in her care package. Cardboard is lighter than real candy!

A little more creativity from our wonderful friend JadenKale, who has a new design up for voting now at Threadless! Hot Night Out is a lot of fun, and it’s easy to vote: just create an account, click on “I’d buy this as a Tshirt”, and then click on the number 5. No need to buy anything, even. JadenKale has sent a couple care packages here, including one with an autographed shirt for BG. She’s lovely, and always makes such fun designs!

Two of our other friends have shirts up for voting at Threadless for one more day – check out those details, too!

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If you’ve ever bought anything at Threadless, I have another favor for you. If you haven’t before – go pick up one of their shirts that are on sale for $9 or $12 until Monday If you don’t want to buy a shirt, you can still go there and register (but then I don’t get any “points” for referring you), and then vote for my friend Sharp. I was brainstorming with her when she came up with this design months ago, and I’m thrilled to see how it has evolved into this design! It’s now up for voting at Threadless – just click on the “I’d buy it as a T” and then “5″
PS – while you’re at Threadless, check out the awesome vampire shirt that glows in the dark AND reacts to sunlight!

Every week there is a Derby at shirt.woot, where people vote for their favorite designs. Voting starts midday Friday, and ends midday Thursday. The top 3 vote-getters are printed Fri, Sat, Sun. Right now there are a few great designs by some of these wonderful friends, so please check them out! Clicking on the design thumbnail will take you to the full design, where you can vote if you have bought anything from any of the woot.com sites. If you haven’t bought anything, may I suggest BG’s favorite, Oh Burned!!! by JadenKale, which she recently modeled at the beach.

This week’s theme is “At the Luau”, so if you’re interested in any Hawaiian themed shirts, this is a good time to vote for a few you’d like a chance to buy! (You can vote for as many or as few designs as you would like) Some of our faves this week, in alphabetical order by designer’s name:

Ansharp’s Sometimes I explode, and I don’t know why
Chris Risse’s Tiki Gods Bless This Limbo Pole
• EyesLikeSugar’s Monsters like luaus, too
• Geekfactor12’s Fine Young Cannibals
• JadenKale’s Tiki Treat
• Patchitect’s Oh! The Cocanity!
• Sokowa’s Luau Fire

A couple other fun designs are the always-unique- Edgar’s (Title eaten by giant fruit.); Tgentry’s Tiki Beast from 50 Fathoms and Luau Beast from 90 Fathoms; rglee’s How Baby Islands are Made and Maiself-tai; and SkekTek’s Let’s All Go To The Luau!!!. Happy voting!

Hope everyone has a great (if rainy on the East coast) weekend!

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Mom Central and American Standard are running a contest for parents in the Boston area, where you can win an Accuclean heating and AC system – here’s my post with more info, and the contest link. Check out their Accuclean site where you can get info about indoor air quality.

My recipes and recipe blog will be up at Wellsphere.com when their Food Allergy network next month. Check ‘em out, they’ve already got a lot of info there, and more is coming.

I’m taking a couple days off again to visit my Nana and Grandpa Bob, she is doing much better a month after her stroke, and I’m looking forward to spending time with her and cooking with her around. Here’s hoping the 2 days don’t hit me the same way 4 days hit me last time!

Sometimes the girls take sweet pictures. I have such a crush on that puppy!

The weather is finally turning beachy – yippeeeee! Watch out for more beach pics.

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1. You can win a contest for a lavish trip to London if you’re over 40

2. One of the books I reviewed, Blood Moon is a part of a charity auction, the hardcover includes a quote from my review, so go vote!
3. My shirt.woot! entry this week has more votes than any of the previous ones! I also tend to think it’s more well done than the earlier ones, too.
4. We just ordered BG’s 10th birthday invitations from Tiny Prints, and are really looking forward to them! She’s having a party at the Roller Palace!

That’s all I’ve got. Hope everyone had a lovely weekend!

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This week’s Derby theme is greed. There are a lot of gorgeous designs, and if you’ve purchased anything from any woot! group at all, you can vote. The shirt in the top 10 that I’m pushing for are:

• Greedy hermit crab

• Greedy conquistador
• Greedy Astronauts

There are a lot of others I like, too. I may also like this Greedy sea gull:

because the girls and I drew it.

Anyone else have a favorite design this week? The girls and I are loving looking at all the designs each week and trying to come up with our own! A (mostly) inexpensive hobby with plenty of art appreciation.

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5 Minutes for Mom is giving away a fabulous book – The Sky Isn’t Visible from Here: Scenes from a Life, by Felicia Sullivan. I raved about it in my review. I’m planning to go to a book signing on 3/3 in Cambridge. Leave a comment on this post for an opportunity to win a copy! This is an incredibly intense book, but ultimately very hopeful. Go comment!

Don’t forget to comment on my review of The Woman Who Is Always Tan And Has a Flat Stomach: And Other Annoying People- I’ll be giving away one copy on 3/3, and it will definitely give you a well deserved laugh during the bleak times at the end of winter. Keep your eyes on the book review site, as the authors agreed to do an email interview! I hear they are just as funny in person as in the book, so I’m looking forward to their responses. Go leave a comment! Check out this video of the authors – they’re hysterical!

Meanwhile, there are a bunch of book contests at WriterSpace – new ones each month, and lots of writers involved, so lots of chances to win great books!

While you’re in the contest mood, visit the current WantNot contest and check out Contests For Moms, with lots of contests.

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WIN IT!!!

Leave a comment on the book review, and you could win a copy of The Woman Who Is Always Tan And Has a Flat Stomach: And Other Annoying People! Winner will be selected at 12 noon March 3.

Lauren Anderson and Lisa Perry have written the ultimate book to help imperfect parents feel normal – The Woman Who Is Always Tan And Has a Flat Stomach: And Other Annoying People. Have you ever felt like the only woman who doesn’t knit? Have you ever wanted to thwack your husband on the head for obsessive video camera use? Have you ever felt intimidated by the homes that are decorated for every holiday? Have you ever needed an antidote to the Martha Stewart factor in suburbia? Don’t worry – The Woman Who Is Always Tan And Has a Flat Stomach: And Other Annoying People is here for you!

But wait, there’s more! Read the rest of the review

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To fill your giveaway needs until then, check out Jo’s fruit roll up giveaway!  I’ve also got information about the Room a Day Giveaway over at Spotlight Reviews – that’s a lot of money they’re giving away!

Sometimes joys are big, and sometimes they are little. No matter what, if it makes me smile so hard that my face hurts, it’s a Good Thing!

Biggest Joy – my evil headache/migraine has lessened enough that I can think coherently. Woot! They fussed with my meds a bit, and other than feeling logey for a day, it seems to have no side-effects. (knock wood)

Another Big joy – I got paid for a book review!!! I’ve been published a couple places, I’ve been quoted several places, but only received honorariums for book reviews – never real money. Woo-hoo! (before I agreed, I made sure that I could write a negative review, but Flight turned out to be a good listen)

More book-geek joys – I got a numbered galley of an upcoming book from a Big Name publisher. Then I was contacted by a publicist for a NYT bestselling author with an offer to read and review an Advance Reader Copy of his new release.  Heady stuff!

Plus, I got lovely warm fuzzies about my book reviews. “You’re an excellent reviewer: comprehensive, insightful, thorough, and crisp writing that’s a pleasure to read.” Woot!

To top it all off, I got a lovely award from SMS Book Reviews!

My cheeks are hurting from the grinning. I highly recommend days like these!  They could become addicting.

Now it’s back to the grindstone – dinner to serve, books to read, more book reviews to publish (currently working on 3), and a Winter Reading List to update!

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While I am not Christian, I still found some great ideas for family activities as well as parenting survival tips, which you can see at my review. However, the book is definitely aimed at Christians; it intersperses funny family anecdotes with Scriptures and religious discussions. A Christian mom will get the most out of The Minivan Years, so I’m offering to send it to the contest winner.

If you want to win a copy of The Minivan Years, as well as a couple surprise books, just leave a comment on the review at A Gaggle of Book Reviews by Friday 1/25 at midnight! I’ll draw a winner, and ship it out soon after that. For my own financial well-being, I would prefer entrants to be in the US and Canada only. C’mon go enter!

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