Smile 360- what it's about

Smile 360 is a free review site that I recently learned about where members can write reviews, participate in surveys, and receive free products to try & tell people about. 

You earn smile points for participating on the website. The more smile pouts you earn, the better off you are for earning free products to try!

If you are interested in checking them out, you can follow this link, which lets them know that I sent you!

 http://smiley360.com/1385850.cfm

*I will receive smile points from smile360 for people who click on the above link

PottyCover: disposable potty covers for kids GIVEAWAY!

Parents of potty training and older kids! I have a fantastic giveaway for you!

Now that I have reviewed the awesome PottyCovers, it's time to give away a pack of potty covers to one lucky person!

Rules to enter: 

The giveaway will run until March 16 9:00pm PST

You must do the required entry to be entered in the giveaway.

You can do the extra entries for added chances to win.

1. Go to PottyCover.com and post a comment of one thing you learned about PottyCovers.

For extra entries:

1. Follow @Pilzburyfry on twitter & leave a comment below with your twitter handle

2. Tweet about the giveaway & leave a comment below with a link to your post

 (can be done once a day, each tweet is an additional entry)

I will announce the winner about 9:25pm PST on March 16.

 The winner will have 48 hours to contact me at moosesmommy11@gmail.com with their contact info or a new winner will be picked.

This giveaway is sponsored by the PottyCover company and Tomoson.com.

Your contact info will be forwarded to Tomoson.com for the PottyCover company to send out.
If products are not received, please contact me so that I can try to fix the issue with the companies.

The great UGLee pen, an ergonomic pen review & giveaway

I write and draw, a lot. Lists and charts for everything around the house, ideas, brainstorming for my hat shop; sketches and designs for Moose's room. I have notebook upon notebook full of writing and everything is done in pen. With all of that writing, I need a pen that is going to be ergonomical, comfortable in my hands. That is where the UGLee pen comes in.

The UGLee pen isn't pretty. Ok, it's pretty ugly. But that's not how it got it's name. The name actally stands for Ultimate Grip by Dr. Lee. Reguardless, with how comfortable writing is with the pen, how can I complain about how it looks? 

You might be thinking, "How is the UGLee pen any more comfortable than any other "comfort pen""?

Well, let me tell you. Unlike most other pens, the UGLee pen was created by a doctor to make writing more comfortable. 

The UGLee pen has a full sized comfort grip with specifically designed contours that fit to and grip your hand so you don't have to grip it. 

The pen also only weighs 11 grams, which is equal to only less than half an ounce. A super light weight pen means more inertia and more comfort.

Other than the pen I recieved being pretty ugly, I have had a bit of an issue with it writing. It seems like I have to scribble a bit every time before I can actually write with it. The click part at the top is pretty loose too, so the pen tip often sticks out of the bottom of the pen, which could be an issue if it is in a pocket.

The good news is that not all of the pens are rediculously ugly. If you order pens from UGLee pen's website, http://www.ugleepen.com, you can choose what color you prefer and most are decent looking.

Now for the giveaway! 

The giveaway will run from March 9- March 16

All steps must be done to win the giveaway. I'll be checking!

I will contact the winner on March 16 to get their contact info so their UGLee pen set can be sent to them.

The winner of the giveaway will receive a 3 pack of UGLee pens from the UGLee pen company. It will be in a random color of the company's choosing.

To enter:

1. You need to either "like" The UGLee pen on Facebook: http://Facebook.com/UGLeepen and leave a link to your Facebook page in the comment section

And/or follow on twitter http://www.twitter.com/UGLeePen and leave a comment with your twitter id

2. Leave a comment below of something you learned about the UGLee pen from ugleepen.com

Extra entries:
1. Follow @pilzburyfry (http://twitter.com/pilzburyfry) and leave a comment below with your twitter handle.
2. Tweet about the giveaway and leave a comment with a link to the tweet post. (this can be done once a day for a possible 8 additional entries)

That's it! Happy winning!

I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

Potty Cover: disposable toilet seat covers for kids- A review

Potty training has been a recent on and off adventure in my house. I'm fine with setting my son on our toilet at home as I know what germ may touch the seat, but public toilets have always made me a bit nervous. You never know who has been in the seat before and what germs they may or may not have. Then I received PottyCovers to try and review and I will never be nervous about public toilets again!

PottyCover is a toilet seat cover designed with children in mind. Rather than just covering the seat with a flimsy piece of paper, it surrounds the seat in non-woven fabric with a layer of plastic that creates a waterproof barrier between the child and seat. So you no longer have to try and wipe off unknown watery substances off of the seat in an attempt to remain dry and germ free. To make them even better, PottyCovers are disposable and come wrapped individually to fit easily into a purse or even a pocket.

 While PottyCovers were designed with kids in mind, they are great for everyone who wants to remain germ free when they use public restrooms.

 You can find PottyCovers at Amazon.com, EBay, all Buy Buy Baby stores around the country, and select Bed Bath & Beyond stores. They sell for $5.99.

 You can find more info at www.PottyCovers.com.


All opinions in the post are mine and mine alone. The product information included was provided by PottyCovers. All pictures included are taken by me unless noted otherwise. I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

Parenting Decision #3: extended breast feeding

The decision of whether or not to breast feed, how long to breast feed (if you do), and where to breast feed are all very personal decisions. 

Breast feeding is not easy, it's not a walk in the park.

It is extremely time consuming. Especially early on and during growth spurts.

It can be uncomfortable when you are just beginning & getting the hang of it, and again later when the child decides to be a acrobat while latched in.

With the down sides, it also has some great up sides that (I feel at least) far outweigh the down sides.

The nutritional superiority and special connection that I felt were & are amazing.

I'm not saying that someone won't feel a connection to their baby while bottle feeding. You definitely will. Bottle feeding won't ruin your relationship with your child, nor will it scar them for life.

Take it from a bottle fed child who's mom is one of her best friends.

Once you decide to breast feed, how long do you do it for?

Making sure baby gets colostrum is super important, but after those initial weeks how long do you go?

At first, I thought 6 months was good. Breast feed until he started eating baby food. Then we could wean him and I could have my body back.

After reading a little, I realized that it would be pointless to wean him at 6 months when breast milk is free and formula isn't. If I'm going to be home with him, why not continue it? I had fought to keep going that long. What's 6 more months?

Then I started reading more and researching more. 

I discovered that in some cultures it isn't uncommon to breast feed until well into childhood and that the WHO (World Health Organization) recommends at least 2 years due to the benefits for growing, developing children.

I had a new goal! After all, my baby at 12 months was just that, a baby.

 Why would I stop breast feeding my baby?

I wouldn't. So why not wait until 2 years when he isn't a baby anymore?

It hasn't been an easy journey getting to 16.5 months if breast feeding.

I struggled through the first few weeks with supply issues and recommendations to supplement with or switch to formula.

Then Moose started having tummy issues. Recommendations to switch my diet, or switch to formula (again).
I refused to stop breast feeding and worked through the problems with the support of my husband and kellymom.com (a great resource for all things breast feeding!)
Then came the long days and nights, where sleep was scarce.
Watching my little bit growing up bug and healthy gave me the push I needed to keep going.
Once he got teeth, a new struggle showed itself. Occasionally he would (and does) get careless and will bite. It's painful and has been difficult at times to prevent the behavior.
I thought about throwing in the towel in more than one occasion, but then I'm reminded how happy and healthy he is and I couldn't imagine quitting on him yet.

At 16 months, it's less of a problem to go out now that he nurses less often, although he still nurses at bedtime so being out too late or a mini baby less vacation isn't in the cards quite yet. We know it will be soon enough since they grow up too fast.

So why extend breast feed?
Nutritonal value
Added connection
And most important:
Let them be little.

Snow day!

We have snow!

Before he left yesterday, my hubby told me that we had a winter weather advisory with possible snow starting at 4 this morning.

I have been looking forward to snow for months and was hoping to wake up to fresh snow on the ground.

Needless to say, I was a bit disappointed when I woke up to no snow and only rain in the forecast.

Well, about 8:30am, I happened to look outside and I see white flakes floating toward the ground.

I couldn't believe my eyes!

I grabbed Moose, ran him downstairs (disrupting breakfast) to check it out. 

Sure enough, we're getting snow!

I hope it decides to stick, I'd love to take Moose out to play in some fresh powder!

Parenting decisions part 2: cloth diapering

Cloth diapers.
Old fashioned.
Ugly.
Difficult.
Big safety pins.

Those were all words that I associated with cloth diapers the first time that I heard modern parents talking about using cloth diapers.
Why would I want to use cloth diapers? I saw the horrible things that were used on my generation.
A piece of cloth, pinned to your child using gigantic safety pins, then sticking them in an awful plastic diaper cover. Like a big torture device created to breed diaper rash and make the parents petrified of stabbing their child.
With disposables so easy to use, why not ease your mind and go with that?

Then I actually looked into cloth diapers and realized that my thoughts were old fashioned.
Cloth diapers have come a long way in 25 years.
Now they are cute, stylish, easy, environmentally friendly, cheaper than disposables (in the long run).
Rather than using a huge pin and ugly plasic diaper cover, they come in cute fabrics, several different styles depending in a families need,  that wash easily in the washing machine and are better for both the environment and baby's skin.
There are a million different brands to choose from, can be bought from regular people who make them to supplement income, or can be made on your own.
They come in all different prices depending in the company they are bought from.

I purchased my first set of cloth diapers in June 2012 when we finally had our own washer and dryer and have never looked back.
They are the best investment we ever made.
The list of words at the top may have been my initial thoughts before cloth diapers.
The following list covers my thoughts now.

Adorable.
Colorful.
Cute designs.
Environmentally friendly.
Less diaper rash.
Easy.
No pins.
No danger.