Moms

It’s not every morning that you begin your day on LIVE TV. Angela Ganote and the Fox59 Morning Crew reached out to feature KidVentures on air, and we were happy to bring the whole fam!  Live television usually comes with some anxieties for me. I work better with lots of tries, but I was pretty pleased with how it all turned out. {Biggest self critic}  The boys did amazing (minus Henry chewing on the stick)– they love the opportunity to ham it up with the camera guys. Overall, I love talking about one of my passions, getting kids outdoors, with any listener, so it was great to give some ideas and encouragement as well as give the book a shout-out! Have you got a copy of KidVentures yet via PDF, Kindle, or Nook?  What do you think?!!!! I’d love to hear your feedback!

This post on travel accessories for women was inspired by product provided for review.  This post contains affiliate links. All opinions are mine and mine alone. Lately I have found myself traveling more often.  When I first started traveling, I had no idea what to pack or what was involved. I found myself taking things that I did not need to bring and leaving behind things I wish I brought (like Tylenol).  With my latest trip to Austin, I thought I had done pretty well.  I managed to get almost everything into the one carry on suitcase I was allowed.  I remembered my Tylenol and only brought the clothes I was certain I would need.  Since I shared a hotel room with my sister on that trip, we managed to streamline things we both wanted (like a blow dryer) so only one of us brought it. As luck had it, I did manage to forget one thing that I really should have brought… something comfortable to relax in once I got back to the hotel room.  After a long day of conferences and meetings, the last thing I want to do when I get back to the hotel room is stay in my jeans and shirt.  Wandering around in anything too skimpy is definitely not an option when sharing a room though. I forgot to bring along something light and comfortable to wear during my down time.  I’ll be heading to Arkansas in about a week and a half for another event (more coming soon) and this time, I am prepared. Travel Accessories For Women Chilly Jilly Lounge Pants are an amazingly soft, wrinkle free pair of pants that feature a fold over waistband a long inseam that can be cut to fit. They are made of a high quality, brushed micro fiber that is super soft and comfortable. Each pair of Chilly Jilly Lounge Pants comes in its own drawstring bag which makes them ideal for travel.  They take up practically no room at all in your suitcase. They are available in either black or dark brown. I am a huge fan of lounge pants to relax in at the end of the day. Since I’m 5’8″, one of the issues that I have is that the lounge pants are too short. I really don’t like pants that skim my ankles.  With the Chilly Jilly Lounge Pant, I can cut them to a length that works for me and it leaves behind a smooth unfinished hem. If you are traveling anywhere warm and have long hair, I have one other thing to add to your must have list of travel accessories for women. Remember to bring a hair band. My sister spent several unhappy days in Austin because she had forgotten to bring along a hair band to put her hair up.  The problem with most hair bands is that they we don’t really think about them until we need them.  Chilly Jilly The Duelette is a stylish bracelet that is also a hair band.  The beads are 14k gold and silver plated for shine and durability. Bands are available in black and white.  Beads are gold, silver, or a combination of both.  You can easily leave this on your wrist as a bracelet until you need it to put your hair up.  You can wear it alone or stack it with other Duelettes for added style. The non fray band means that it will stand up to constant use. These travel accessories for women are ones you won’t want to leave home without. Chilly Jilly travel accessories for women can be purchased direct from their website or from Amazon. This post on travel accessories for women was inspired by product provided for review.  This post contains affiliate links. All opinions are mine and mine alone. The post Travel Accessories For Women appeared first on Confessions of an Overworked Mom.

The only sounds are the steady hum of the gymnasium's a/c on full force as it desperately attempts to triumph over this sudden and oppressive heat wave. I can see my 7 year old's gymnastics' team through the viewing window and it isn't difficult to spot my own child in the sea of flipping girls. Her green and orange tie-dyed leotard screams for attention. She is so... strong. Hours and hours of dedicated physical work have transformed my baby girl into an Athlete with a capital "A." Never again will I be able to watch gymnastics during the Olympics without knowing how much time and dedication they have invested... To say nothing of the cost!She is on the bars now, doing an extremely repetitive drill: pike and swing, pull-up and over, cast and flip and land. And again. And again. AND AGAIN. A break to chalk up her palms... And Again. Small corrections to toes and elbows... And Again.Wherever her determination comes from, it definitely isn't from me. Wherever her drive and push stems from, it isn't from her Momma. In many ways, I do see myself in her, but I see myself at 37, not 7. When I WAS 7, no adult outside of my immediate family could have known how blue my eyes were as I didn't want anything to do with them and wouldn't look them in the eye, but this girl? This girl will introduce herself to you and your children and invite you into a conversation so detailed, you would think she was an adult instead of barely out of first grade...This girl has confidence and curiosity and a fearless quality about her that most adults envy.I know that I, for one, do.More Just Write pieces found here...

Krissy Sherman Bonning, 5 Minutes for Mom contributor, is here to share her insights into SimpliSafe through this review and giveaway. While we were compensated to write this post, our writer’s views and opinions remain her own. As moms we’re always worrying about our kids. Worrying about whether we are playing with them enough, teaching them enough, nurturing them enough. But what is really our biggest worry for our kids? Keeping them safe (so that we CAN play, teach and nurture them), right? Well SimpliSafe can help ease that worry at home with their simple and secure home security system. SimpliSafe is Easy & Affordable! Regardless of the neighborhood or area in which you live, you still want to feel that your kids and family are as safe as can be. SimpliSafe makes home security in any area and for anyone simple. I have to be honest and admit that when my SimpliSafe Deluxe Home Security System arrived in it’s little box I was intimidated. I was sure that it must be too complicated for me to install alone. It sat for days while I waited for my busy fiance to help install it. Finally I gave up; he wasn’t going to have the time. I had to tackle this myself; mama-style. I was ready to dig out the tools and get my hands dirty. THEN I watched the 5 minute installation video… and I couldn’t believe I had waited for help. This was EASY-PEASY! No tools required. Wireless and simple. I honestly never thought I would be a person that could afford my own home security system. But the best thing about the SimpleSafe Home Security System is that it’s affordable enough for any mom to make home safety a priority. Unlike other home security systems that charge high monthly fees and require an expensive landline phone, SimpliSafe is only $14.99 per month for 24/7 LIVE monitoring through a cellular connection. “No extra charges, no activation fees, no installation fees, NO PHONELINE needed.” So if you want to set aside the worry of keeping your home safe and intruder free so that you can focus on the playing and teaching and nurturing, try out SimpliSafe. In fact, you can enter for a chance to win your very own 8 Piece Plus Home Security System today! Enter to Win Your Own SimpliSafe Home Security System! One lucky reader is going to get their chance to win an 8 Piece SimpliSafe Plus Home Security System. Use the Rafflecopter form to enter this giveaway. New to Rafflecopter? Watch this 45-second video on how to enter! a Rafflecopter giveaway Krissy is a former art teacher turned full time mama of 3. She blogs at B-InspiredMama.com to connect moms with kids crafts, easy recipes, learning fun, and creative parenting tips.

At Radical Parenting we always want special occasions to be celebrated right. What about when you want a gift the whole family can enjoy? This is hard to find especially when you have different age groups. Our interns have come up with some great gifts for families of all ages: Best Family Gifts 1. Wii Family [...]

5 Minutes for Mom contributor, Emily, shares her insights on Sun Angels Sun Sleeves in this review. We were compensated to write this post and Emily was provided a sample, however all opinions remain her own. Sun Angels UV protection sleeves are designed to keep your little angel sun safe without overheating.  Have you ever been out in the sun and wished you had an extra layer of protection for your child’s skin? When the temperatures are already 90+ degrees adding a bulky shirt isn’t something we can do. Sun Angels are sleeves that are designed to protect your child’s arms without the added bulk of another shirt. Sun Angels sun sleeves are made from a 60% polyester/35% cotton jersey/5%(latex-free) spandex fabric blend making them lightweight, breathable, and easy to put on.  With a UPF of 50+ you can feel comfortable knowing your child has another layer of protection from the sun.  Plus, Sun Angels offers a variety to cute and fashionable designs to choose from like the Summer Strips Blue. Each sleeve is made with a thin elastic band at the top to keep them from slipping while your child plays.  Not only did the sleeve slip on with minimum effort, my son was able to play all day at the park without complaining once about his arm sleeves, or having them slip at all. Unlike his hats which he begs to take off again and again, he has yet to ask me to remove his Sun Angels. Emily’s Thoughts on Sun Angels Sun Sleeves I try to find shaded places for my son to play, and I always insist on sunscreen when we are heading out to play.  Being four my son is wiggly and anxious to get playing.  Slipping on Sun Angels just added a little piece of mind for me knowing that he is as covered as I can get without taking a lot of time.  I also have an infant who loves to be outside with his brother.  I have looked, but not found many sun options for him.  Sun Angels makes sleeves for babies as well as boys and girls.  I look forward to getting a pair for my baby as well. The sleeves are also machine washable which makes them easy to care for. Like most moms I have a ton of things in my diaper bag, and space is at a premium.  Since the sun sleeves are so thin they take up barely any room at all in my bag.  I like knowing I can slip them into the pocket of my diaper bag right next to our sunscreen and have them for all our summer trips to the park and more! You can find Sun Angels on Facebook and Twitter. How would these sun sleeves benefit your child?

I took the day off Monday.I wasn't going to write and I certainly wasn't going to write about birthdays. Not here. Mainly because I had little to say that hadn't already been said at some juncture before - emptying the well every year only to refill it again with the same regurgitated meaning, grasping at straws in attempt to suck the remaining moisture out and into my throat - gurgle, gurgle. And yet, here I am. Spit over ice, served with a twist of lime.I had big plans for my birthday. Plans that fell through and the kids were at camp and Bo and Revi were down for an early nap and what now, self? It's your birthday. Go do something different. Go be something new. I used to close my eyes and grab a book from the shelf and put it in my bag and wait until I was at the park to open it. To see what I had chosen. I would then sit for hours and read and notate and collect wisdom I had convinced myself was exactly what I needed to hear. I was my own fortune teller and someday, when I die and my kids go through my library, they will laugh together at how seriously I took every line of text."THIS! Exactly!" in the margins of every book.Because every question had an answer on the page of something.So yesterday, that's what I did. I grabbed a book and I went to the park and sat under a tree like I used to when I worked nights and had the days to myself. Me and the dogs parked under a tree outside LACMA.Yesterday's book was Balthazar by Lawrence Durrell. A book I read a decade ago. I unfolded my blanket and sprawled out under a tree, seeking the wisdom of pages covered in ink, paragraphs underlined, exclamation points in the margins.Except forty-seven pages in, nothing struck me as fortuitous. The wisdom I had hoped to inherit went unrevealed.Had I become more cynical? More closed off to the words I was once wide open to receive?I sat up, turned the page, kept reading until my eye wandered off the page and into the park... past the lawn and out at the winding cement path, a boy on a bike, his (father?) holding on to the back of the seat, ready go...I followed them back and forth several times, watched as the dad let go, his hands in the air for a moment and then back on the seat, up, down, let go, hold on, let go, and then BAM... a crash in slow motion, the boy's legs tangled under the pedals."It's okay, you're doing great."And up came the bike and then the boy.You're doing great, kid. Good hustle, come on, you got this. "Ready?"I gave up trying to read. This was the story. This was every story ever told. It took two hours for the boy to get the hang of the bike he was riding.Not once did he cry. Or kick the pavement. Not once did the father throw his hands in the air out of frustration. They were patient with each other and the winding path that made turning difficult. They were there to learn. To teach and to learn.And then... he let go. He let go and watched as the boy kept going, his feet planted, his body still. There was no cheering. No clapping. Just awe.Underlined. Exclamation points in the margin. All the answers are right here in front of you. When I left they were still there. It was already past 2:00 and I had to sprint to my car to get home to the kids.Later on, Hal and I watched the Bill Cunningham documentary, which had been on deck in our queue for months.I had told Hal about my day - about the boy who learned to ride a bike and how spectacular it was - the moment - like life happening. How if I hadn't looked up, I would have missed it. How it had nothing to do with me but everything to do with everything and everyone. How I remember the feeling of riding my bike without training wheels for the first time. How this boy will remember it, too. And how proud the dad must have been. He did it! They both did it! I didn't realize that Bill Cunningham New York was all about a man on a bike. It was about his photographs, sure, but mainly it was about a man who spent his life moving from one street to the next with a camera on hi

My Dad is a primary school teacher so the end of term was always a fun time in our house. Partly as we got to have him home with us for the holidays, but mainly because sometimes he would also bring home the school’s BBC computer and my sister and I could play Malory Towers. Malory Towers was the very height of technological sophistication – a text based murder mystery where you had to type in things like ‘go to garden’ and in return would get such edge-of-your seat replies as ‘the gardener is here, do you want to talk to him?’ Nail biting stuff. What was also quite fun was getting to see all the gifts he brought home at the end of the summer term. I would say it was pretty much a fifty-fifty split between edible things like chocolate oranges and tacky gifts emblazoned with ‘World’s Best Teacher!’ – mugs, coasters, that sort of thing. Buying a gift for a teacher is really hard though, and generally fairly low down on a parent’s list of priorities, so you can see why as a teacher you might end up with one or two more boxes of Toffifee than you might normally buy for yourself. (Does anyone ever buy Toffifee for themselves?) It won’t come as a surprise to regular readers that I am normally a typical Toffifee parent, but this year I am ahead of the game. Oh yes, I am already in possession of what could possibly be the coolest teacher gift I have ever seen. It’s Belle’s last term in primary school, so about time I did something right. For Belle’s teacher this year we have this personalised notebook from James Ellis: It’s a really lovely site for gifts generally, and you can personalise all kinds of different notebook designs and invitations. At around £10 each they’re a little higher budget than a chocolate orange but then I live in a bit of a yummy mummy part of Bristol so reckon £10 is about right. They are excellent quality and come on, who doesn’t love a notebook? We chose this one as Belle’s teacher is a really keen cyclist but there are  masses of different options. One of my favourites is the typewriter: There is one tiny issue. I have a feeling that in our class we all chip in for one big present and that actually what I should have done is give one of the other parents a fiver. Damn. What do you buy your teachers at the end of term? Is it every man for himself or to you have a class whip-round? I was sent this notebook for the purposes of this review. I was still thinking ahead though. It definitely still counts as me being a Good Parent. Apart from the class collection bit. Ignore that. The post Gifts for teachers appeared first on Slummy single mummy.

What’s Cooking Wednesday Recipe Linky Turning The Clock Back and Confessions of an Overworked Mom have teamed up to bring you this What’s Cooking Wednesday recipe linky. This is your chance to showcase your recipes each and every week! Just to make things even sweeter— each week, post your fabulous recipes for the opportunity to have your recipe featured on What’s Cooking Wednesday the following week!! Here are a few suggestions on how to make the most of this recipe linky: While not required, I would love it if you would: Link back to this blog in some way. You can grab my button at the bottom of this page or add this blog to your list of places you link up to/party at on your Link Parties page. The more people who link up to this recipe linky, the better it is for all of us. Please follow this blog in some way, shape or form…you can see all of my social media links at the top of my blog. Please only post directly to your recipe link. No giveaways, etsy shops or anything not family friendly. Make sure your recipe contains photos of your own and give credit where credit is due…if you were inspired by another blogger, make sure you link back. By linking up you give me permission to use these photos (with proper link backs) in my feature post next week. Come back next Wednesday and link up! Our Featured Recipe This Week is: Fettuccine with Cauliflower Alfredo Sauce From Tonya Staab We encourage you to stop by other blogs and their recipes! Feel free to leave comments for your fellow bloggers too… we just love comments! Also, please DO NOT post your main blog page here, POST RECIPE LINKS ONLY! The post A Few Suggestions For Dinner Tonight appeared first on Confessions of an Overworked Mom.

One thing I have always regretted about our property is that it’s not really big enough to have larger animals.  While we have two acres of land, most of it is wooded and hilly. Having a horse or a goat would have been wonderful but we really don’t have room for a barn and grazing land. I really enjoyed the time I spent at the Hyatt Regency Lost Pines Resort and Spa.  I loved getting to meet the horses and it has really made me miss not having a horse of my own. tt Related articles Making Friends With The Horses Relax In Style: Hyatt Regency Lost Pines Resort and Spa Desert Terrarium DIY The post Missing the Horses appeared first on Confessions of an Overworked Mom.