One World One Heart

I am a very happy girl!

I spent much of this last week entering the multitude of giveaways in the One World One Heart blogger's giveaway event! It's a fantastic event where many artistic bloggers are giving away little pieces of art they have made in an effort to introduce themselves to new readers and make friends from other blogs.

Well, I actually WON one of them, and when I say "little pieces of art", in this case I really mean it! Magic Gypsy, with a blog of the same name, offered up a piece she made called Altar-In-A-Box, and I just fell in love with it. It's a decorated mixed-media box with a little figure of Quan-Yin, who in Buddhism is the Bodhisattva of compassion and mercy. But it's not just a box... it's a tiny little box, like a matchbox, which you can pop in your suitcase or your purse! Check it out here...

Magic Gypsy is from Arizona, and is an artist who makes really lovely jewelry, has the cutest dog EVER, and also works in mixed media. Like me, she seems to like both vintage-y things, and is inspired by other cultures and religions and it shows in her work.

I am really proud to be Magic Gypsy's winner! Go visit her, and check out her little corner of the world!

Sweet and Simple

I've been meaning to write this post for awhile, and keep putting it off. Things are going to get busier and busier though, what with the holidays and shopping and visits from friends, dental stuff I have to take care of...

But every time I am rushed and crazed, it seems something comes around that gives me a little peace and happiness, and though I am not one to get all "into" jewelry, I actually got all giddy about winning a lovely necklace recently, and I wanted to show you.

I used to enter blog giveaways like a fiend! But then I gave that up to more wisely spend my time. But I ran across a giveaway at SimpleMom.net for this gorgeous, sweet necklace, and so I spent a few minutes to put my name in. My first giveaway in months, and my only one.

I was shocked a couple days later when I got an email from SimpleMom saying I had won the thing! And I have barely taken it off since opening the simple, charming box it was sent in. And I get a crazy amount of compliments.

Lisa Leonard began making jewelry so that she could work at home and be there to raise her boys. She is inspired by nature and artists and poets, etc. Her stuff is simple and elegant. Natural and clean-looking. She will make you a piece with all your kid's names on it that you will be proud to pass down through the generations. Go check out her stuff. She has a great blog, too.

Thank you, Lisa. And thanks, too, to SimpleMom, which is a great resource for decorating, menu ideas, holidays and such for the busy mom.

SeaWorld and the Sesame Street Bay of Play GIVEAWAY!!!

You may have read in my last post about my family's invitation to the opening of the new children's play area at Sea World called the Sesame Street Bay of Play. The invitation was extended to lots of Southern California parent bloggers, and so Noah and I went to check it out.

We had a really fun day.

At the reception for the bloggers, the kind folks at Sea World welcomed us with gift bags that contained a commemorative cookie jar with the logo of Sea World's Bay of Play on the front, and a plush Cookie Monster doll on the inside.

The kind folks at Sea World have a few of these cookie jars left and offered to mail one out to one of my readers if I wanted to hold a giveaway! And so, on YOUR behalf, of course I said yes.

Leave a comment here (one per reader) and I will draw a number with the help of random.org sometime on Wednesday the 4th of June. They didn't say how far they are willing to ship, so I would say if you are from Canada, its probably cool, but international readers (further out)... maybe not so much.

Good luck!

Zen and the Art of Thanksgiving

A couple weeks ago, Bloggy Giveaways hosted the Spring Edition of the Bloggy Giveaways Carnival. I had participated in this with a contest of my own last fall but this year, with the random craziness, I passed, and barely had time to even enter.

I spent the last couple days of the carnival, staying up WAY too late in the night entering the ones I really wanted to win out of the nine hundred and nineteen giveaways offered this season!

And I won a couple of them! YAY!

One of them was what looks like some really yummy (and healthy!) Bossa Nova juices from a review and giveaway blog called the Beauty Counter! I am really looking forward to those.

Then there was a book I was really crossing my fingers for. Its called Momma Zen: Walking the Crooked Path of Motherhood by Karen Maezen Miller, which has been described as "an extraordinary book of practical wisdom offering a way to peace and freedom amid fatigue and doubt." Karen is, believe it or not, a Zen Buddhist Priest and a Mom with a great blog. Her book has 15 reviews on Amazon and they are all five star reviews.

I have been thinking about this book over the last couple months, while doing a bit of self-examination, and I think (I hope) it found its way to me for a reason. It has spoken to a lot of women. I look forward to hearing what it has to say to me.

Lastly, I never got around to saying thank you to Mary Ann of Pink Papillon Jewelry, from whom I won a stunning hand stamped sterling silver bracelet way back in January. I never posted about it, but I LOVE THIS BRACELET and where it often. Its bound to be a hand-me-down keepsake in our family. Why? Look here, and you will see:

Yeah, nice, eh? She does great work. You should go check out her stuff.

Anyway, just wanted to get right with the karma, giving my thanks and appreciation so good things will keep coming my way. Spreading the love, as it were.

Thank you, ladies!

Green Week

Last week was "Green Week" at Noah's school. They spent a lot of time teaching the kids about the environment, recycling, saving water and electricity, keeping our air and water clean. Most every day he came home with a new tip for us like it was some great revalation!

Noah: Mom! Mom!

Mama: What, baby?

Noah: (Imagine his arms waving emphatically!) You know those lightbulbs?? The ones that look like a spiral?? You know those??

Mama: Yeah, honey, what about them?

Noah: (really, REALLY excited!) If you get those lightbulbs? ...and you put them in your lamps? ...someone will totally give you lots and lots of MONEY!!

Mama: WHOA!! Who??

(beat)

Noah: ... i dunno.

I had to sit him down and explain again about how the electric company makes us pay money for each bit of electricity we use, and how those spiral lightbulbs use less electricity. We then went on a little hunt around the house to see which lamps had those bulbs and which didn't.

To celebrate Green Week, Noah and I made a hat out of only recyclable materials!! The base was a milk jug, and on top of that was a styrofoam mushroom holder in which we stuck pieces of soda-12-pack boxes to look like hair. No hat is complete without eyeballs, right? So we used toilet paper rolls with pieces of cookie box cardboard glued to the ends, and purple granola box cardboard for the pupils. Noah liked that we made it look like a crazy monster.

Pretty great, eh? Ironically, those materials can no longer be recycled because the hat is so cool, we can't just dump it in the bin, now.

...sigh...

Over at Mommy Blogs Toronto, they are having a challenge to get rid of all those plastic grocery bags you have stored up in your kitchen cupboards. And to stop using them completely!

We have been working on this, buying a few reusable canvas bags which we keep in the car we usually take to the grocery. But I still have a stash (smaller,but a stash nonetheless) of plastic bags we get because I sometimes take the other car, forget to bring the reusable ones into the store, or we sometimes buy more food than we have bags for.

I could use some more reuseable bags! That way I could keep some in each car, and have enough for those big loads. That is why I am including this beautiful photo of one of my lovely trash cans. At Mommy Blogs Toronto, if I take a photo that shows how I deal with those plastic shopping bags I still have, I have a chance to WIN some really funky and cool reusable bags.

Yes, I spent ten minutes colorbalancing and framing a picture of my bathroom trashcan. I even placed it in attractive lighting!

So, here is how I am working the stash down... we use them in the bathroom trash cans so emptying the trash is a little neater and less yucky!

Keep your fingers crossed for me to win some new bags, courtesy of the lovely ladies at Green Mom Finds.

And The Winners Are...

What a fun bloggy giveaway that was!

I tell ya, after just starting to make jewelry, its worth it to have a giveaway just so you can be swamped with compliments about how lovely your work is and how talented you are! I may just keep this up every few months just to keep my spirits high!!

But who won, you ask??

The winners were chosen by the number generator at random.org. And our first winner was #68, Sara at Be Thrifty Like Us, who has a wonderful blog dedicated to helping you save money. She shares tips on being frugal and spending money wisely. Its also a good place to learn about sales and great deals on shopping. Sara had first pick and chose the brown/silver/mustard colored earrings.

Our second winner was #139, Heather, over at a sweet little blog dedicated to her daughter, Eliza Valentine. Perfect for this time of year, right? Apparently, the happy couple found out they were pregnant on Valentine's Day (so sweet!) and decided to name their child after the day. Heather was really happy to get the burgundy and black earrings, which were the ones she was hoping for!

So everyone is happy!

I am happy too! Over on the blog, Mommy Brain, I won a copy of the book, "The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency" by Alexander McCall Smith, a highly praised book about a woman detective living in Botswana.

And I also won a another great looking book, the Toddler's Busy Book, with 365 activities for one-and-a-half to three-year-olds using things found around the home! This should be a boon for me, because the twins need more stimulating play activities and sometimes I am just stumped, and find myself doing the same activities over and over. This giveaway was from Melissa over at Organized Chaos. She is a SAHM living in Canada currently studying to be a Post Partum Doula.

If you are looking to blow a little MORE time reading blogs, go check these fine ladies out! And be back in about 3 months for the spring Bloggy Giveaway Carnival!

Hear Ye, Hear Ye!! Let the Madness Ensue!!

It's Giveaway Time again in Blogland!

Shannon, over at Bloggy Giveaways has done it again, hosting the greatest blog carnival around. Hundreds of bloggers will be doing giveaways, trying to drum up a little interest in their blogs.

For my giveaway, I am offering up two pair of earrings that I made recently! I was going to give both to one winner, but since some folks enter a bazillion giveaways and win not a thing, I decided to spread the love and give each pair to different winners!

If you have a preference, please state it in your comment, and I will attempt to accomodate, but can't guarantee you will get your choice!

Here's the goods:

Each of two winners will receive one pair of earrings. Both are made with stone beads, pewter accents and sterling silver ear findings. If you have a preference toward one pair, I will try to accomodate, with the first winner getting their choice, and the second drawn to get the other. If the first drawn has no preference, the second drawn will get hers. (Or his, as it were.)

Pair number one is a bright golden brown bead with black ribbons through it, a mustard colored stone and pewter diamond-shaped bead.

The second is a rich burgundy (darker than shown) with black ribbons through it, an onyx oval and pewter bead caps.

I know most of you are just popping in for a moment to comment and will be off in a flash to enter more giveaways, but...

...let me tell you what my blog is about so if it sounds interesting, you can bookmark it and come back later!

I am a mother of three boys, two of which are twins in their terrible twos. I am from Ohio, live in San Diego with my sweet hubby, who is a very patient and tolerant man!

I used to work in stage management in professional theater, but now am a stay at home mom who is learning how to excel at light sabre battles and make Rube Goldberg machines with my sons. I love photography, Photoshop, and have just begun to design my own jewelry!

HOW THE GIVEAWAY WORKS:

1) Leave a comment (and only one!) on this post, any comment at all! (okay, rudeness will be deleted!)

2) Sometime on Sunday, Feb. 3rd, using random.org, I will draw two winners from the comments I receive and post the winners names on this page. I will also contact the winners via email. Please make sure you include your email address if I cannot find it in your profile.

3) If I cannot contact a winner by Feb 7th, I will draw another name.

4) Shipping costs will be covered by me (only to addresses in the US).

5) Once you’ve posted a comment, be sure to visit Bloggy Giveaways to check out the other giveaways going on this week!

HAVE FUN this week, and good luck!!!

Excuses and a Whole 'Nuther Distraction

Didja miss me?

Yeah, yeah, I know. It’s been forever since I posted, and the last thing people want to read after a dry spell is a bunch of excuses. But I have some good ones, I DO!!

First off, my parents came and visited for 10 days. We did a whirlwind of touristy activities, giving San Diego a run for her money. Luckily, we loaded the big ticket items at the front end of the trip; what with the sporadic rains we had leading up to this weekend’s big storms.

I usually do my blogging at night after everyone goes to bed, but the computer area shares space with the guest-sleeping area here, and while I felt free to read nearby sleeping folk at night, rapping at the keyboard seemed right out. So, posting was kept to a minimum.

And then there is the other thing that has consumed me lately…

…my new mistress! (Can a straight girl have a mistress?)

Actually its more than one thing I have fallen deeply for, so maybe “my new playgroup” is a more accurate metaphor!

I speak of my love for all things digital that have come into my life lately… I have been set up by generous gifts all around… my new Canon Digital Rebel XTi, my super-narrow depth of field lens that makes me feel all squishy inside, and my update to the latest Photoshop combined with the super-awesome Lightroom program which is a database for professional photographers (which I am not) to help them get organized (which I try to be) and manage their “workflow” (a fun new term I learned while trying to learn how to work the damned thing).

Lightroom absolutely rocks my socks off. It imports photos, renames them to however I have set it up, moves them to where I want them to live, does simple and more than simple processing of one or whole sets of pics at the same time, allows you to flag pictures as “picks” or as “rejected” or rate them by numbers of stars, or by color, allows you to imprint metadata (copywrite info, my phone number, etc) on each photo, set up sets of photos, allowing one photo to be in more than one collection at a time without having to make a copy of it, arranges slide shows, AND!! AND!!! I got a plugin which allows me to send a photo to my flickr site with one click!

It basically rocks.

Oh, I said that, didn’t I?

Did I mention, though, that it rocks?

But the problem is that it is a fairly complex program and is not all that intuitive. So with much of my free time, I have been watching video tutorials and reading Lightroom blogs, and trying to find answers to my questions.

And this all went on while I was wandering all over San Diego, taking a million different photos with my new camera and lens, creating a huge backlog of photos which I didn’t want to import until I had a new system in place, folders and hierarchies set up, and such, in which to receive and welcome my new digital creations!!

And so, instead of posting all the glorious fun we have been having, I have been reading technical drivel.

But wait! All is not lost!

The folders are now in place! The perfect naming scheme has been devised! The doors have been thrown wide open and the red ribbon has been cut!!

Whoo-hoo!!! NO MORE WAITING!!

Glorious Blog Posts with New Fantastical Images, HERE I COME!!!

Huh?



What’s that?

Oh Lordy, is it really THAT time of year already!??

OOOH, its Bloggy Giveaway Time, baby!! And you know what that means, don’t ya?

YEAH!

It’s ANOTHER week of not making any new blog posts because I am spending every free moment I have entering the literally HUNDREDS of giveaways held by bloggers around the blogosphere!

So, um, bear with me one more week, and I will be back to my regularly scheduled blogging, with all those fascinating updates about our lives that you guys live for. And I might even have a giveaway of my very own!! So stand by me. I shall return.

I swear.

Pinky swear!

Daddy Needs a New Pair of Speakers!

My sweet hubby has been shopping around for something cool to hook up our iPod to, so we can listen to our music around the house. Well, over at 5 Minutes for Mom, they are having a giveaway for an Insignia® - 75W DVD/CD/HD Radio Compact Shelf System with USB Port!

Wow, that was a mouthful!

And to be entered to win one, all you have to do is leave a comment on the giveaway post and be sure to make a link to Best Buy where this puppy is on sale right now, and you are in!

So that's what I did.

That is all.

Homespun Goodies

While I am still a giveaway fiend, I have decided to minimize the amount of contests that require you to blog about it on your site so as not to exasperate those who come to see what our family has been up to. But my new friend, Lorien, has posted her very first giveaway and I want to give her a little linky love!

Lorien is a Southern California mom who is into organic foods, knitting, birthing, and her sweet little three year old girlie-girl, Nina. She has knitted up some cool little products and has an Etsy Shop. She is giving away any one of her products of the winner's choice. You just blog about the contest and leave a comment on this post.

When I was at her house a couple weeks ago, I discovered a stack of little homemade scrubbies sitting in a dish by her sink. I recognized them as the ones she makes for her store, but realized how handy and simple they were, how well they worked, and they were so pretty! You just scrub a few times, and toss them in the washer! They could save a bundle on paper towels (and trees!!).

She also knits some sweet little kiddie hats and pretty scarves.

So, go check her out!

Go! Scram!!