Traffic pro

It is time to start getting ready for Christmas! These cute and wonderfully smelling ornaments are a great addition to holiday crafting and decorating. They are simple to make and kids love them. They also add a great homemade touch to gifts if you use one or two to decorate a wrapped present.

FRAGRANT CINNAMON ORNAMENTS

You will need:

1/3 cup ground cinnamon

1/3 cup applesauce

1 tablespoon white school glue

Optional: puff paints

Instructions:

1. Mix ingredients together.
2. Knead dough in hands for several minutes until a ball is formed.
3. Dust work space lightly with additional cinnamon.
   
4. Roll dough 1/8"-1/4" thick with a rolling pin. Cut dough into a variety of shapes using cookie cutters. Suggestions: gingerbread men, hearts, stars, Christmas trees, bells, wreaths, etc.
5. Poke hole through top of dough using a straw or toothpick for hanging later.
6. Air dry for several days, turning twice a day until completely dry. They can also be baked in a 225 degree oven until dry.
7. Decorate with paint if desired and allow to dry before hanging.
8. Hang from fancy ribbon or cording.

I am starting to become addicted to online shopping. The economy has forced stores to lower the inventory that they have on hand so it can be really hard to find what you want. Online stores allow you to look through the full inventory. The inventory that online stores carry can be much greater than any physical store.

Recently we headed to a home improvement store looking for a new lights. I was very disappointed by the selection. You do not want to settle for something that you do not really like when it is something that will last for years! I found a kitchen light that I liked but I decided to keep looking for a bathroom light fixture.

I have checked out a few sites already. One of the best parts of online shopping is that it is like window shopping without annoying sales people following you around. I was checking out home lighting at LightingSale.com and found a few bathroom lighting fixtures that I love. Now I just have to decide if I want a more elegant feel or a more modern feel. My bathroom could go either way. The one pictured is my favorite though I think. I love the look if it!

Thanksgiving is over and you still have a ton of leftovers. That is the problem many families have this time of year. Everyone loves the Thanksgiving dinner and most people like the sandwiches later in the night. Once it gets to the next day people tend to have no interest in the leftovers.

My family HATES leftovers and I HATE wasting things. This means that I am very good at looking at a fridge full of leftovers and creating something that they will eat.

I thought it would be fun to share with you some of my families favorite dishes made out of Thanksgiving leftovers. The list is in the order that I would normally make them in. The Thanksgiving Casserole uses most of the leftovers. The other two I do when I just have turkey to use up.

• Thanksgiving Casserole
• Turkey Pot Pie
• Turkey Asparagus Bake

I love finding different ways to use up leftovers but these are my families favorites. Does your family have a favorite way to use up your leftovers?

As the year comes closer to an end we find ourselves looking back on the year. At the beginning of the year we have such big plans. More often than not we made New Years resolutions that we did not follow through on.

A big resolution that I keep making... and breaking is to find time to get away and relax. My life is always so crazy and stressful. I really could use time away but I never can find the time.

Just once I would love to just forget about everything and get away. I would love to take a month long trip like my old friend Glenna did. She just dropped everything and went backpacking through Europe. The trip sounded awesome. She did not plan anything ahead. She just hopped on trains and buses through the UK. Then like many people in the UK she took a Ferry to France.

This incredible trip was possible for her because she did not have any children yet. I guess I will have to wait until all of my kids leave home before I can make a trip like this. I still need to plan some time away though. Everyone needs to take a break from everything once in awhile.

It is time for a new giveaway! This giveaway is for a 16x20” Rolled Canvas. How awesome would it look to have your favorite photo enlarged and printed on canvas? I have been anxiously waiting to do this giveaway. I can not wait to get one of these. I think I will buy some stretcher bars and do a galley wrap with my rolled canvas.

Giveaway Prize: (1) 16x20” Rolled Canvas for One Lucky Winner

Size: 16x20 rolled canvas

Shipping: FREE UPS Ground Shipping in the US

Eligibility: Limited to US Residents due to shipping costs.

This giveaway ends December 6th. Feel free to check out more info on Canvas Printing. You can also check out Printing Reviews. The Canvas Print for this giveaway and a free Canvas Print for us is provided by our sponsor Online Poster Printing.

HOW CAN YOU ENTER?

Your main entry will be to comment about what photo you would like enlarged and printed on canvas.

EXTRA ENTRIES

• Blog about the giveaway and include a link back to this post. Make a new comment here with the URL to your post. This will give you three additional entries!
  
• Follow this blog - It is on the left sidebar. If you are already a follower it still counts. Make a new comment here that includes your follower name.
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed (left side bar) and make a new comment.
• Add the Your Fun Family Blog to your blogroll. Make a new comment and be sure to use your URL when you post it.
• Fav the Your Fun Family Blog on Technorati and make a new comment.
• Follow us on Twitter and make a new comment.
• Share this giveaway post on Kirtsy, Digg, Twitter, Stumble, or anything else you can think of.
  


Each one counts for one entry so each should have a separate comment. It must include the link where it can be found to count. I will be deleting comments that do not follow the rules so others get a fair chance.

We have a winner to announce in the 18x24 Photo Enlargement Poster Print Giveaway!

The winner is Erica Rooks! Congrats!

Thank you to Digital Room for sponsoring this blog and providing us with tons of products and giveaways.

For generations women have convinced themselves that eating chocolate is beneficial. Now medical science has found that we were right all along. Every news headline that announces a new reason that dark chocolate is good for you has women everywhere jumping for joy. There is just something about chocolate!

I have only met three people in my life that do not like chocolate and I am convinced that they must be aliens. How could you not like chocolate? Years ago I worked with a woman named Lynn. She would buy expensive chocolates for us at work. She would hide them so we were the only ones that would get any. We both agreed that good chocolate would be wasted on such chocolate amateurs.

Lynn and I were great friends through all three of my pregnancies. She knew all about my cravings and made fun of many of them. She insisted that my children should have been shaped like an egg since I ate a ham, cheese, onion, and tomato omelet almost every day. I also craved lots of rootbeer floats. Who knew that dark chocolate for pregnancy would become prescribed?

Now I see that in a new scientific study by Dr. Triche research at Yale they have found that dark chocolate is very beneficial to pregnant women. This new study found that pregnant woman that ate dark chocolate were 69 percent less likely to develop preeclampsia. I should call Lynn and thank her for all of that chocolate.

Right afterward I should head to Intentional Chocolate and buy some chocolate. Yummy!

Here is a cute little project for kids. This cute little craft stick basket can be easily made by kids. It could even be used as a bread basket on the table this Thanksgiving. Your kids will love showing off their basket at dinner time. All you need is craft sticks and glue. For a basket that lasts longer you can use wood glue. You could also get creative with the shape and design. When you are done simply add a cloth on the inside and you are ready to add bread.



Place three sticks down in a pattern so it looks like a hexagon with three missing sides. Put a dot of glue on the ends of the sticks. Then put three more sticks down in the openings so that they over lap and glue to the original sticks.


Continue adding sticks in the same three at a time back and forth pattern. When you are at the height you want stop. If you are unsure stop because you can always add more after the bottom is made.



Starting The Bottom

What you are going to want to do is, add the next three sticks a bit more "inside" than the other ones. You want to make it so that the sticks aren't overlapping. The first one will barely fit but all the others will have plenty of space.

Keep doing that until you can't without overlapping sticks. At this point you can just cover up the opening with a row of sticks.

Playground season is almost over now. That seems so strange to say. I miss Arizona where we could go to the playground all year round. It is great to get out of the house and spend some time on playground equipment for awhile. My kids love going to the park and have a ton of fun. It also wears them out so they will go to bed nice and early so I can get some things done.

It does not matter how old they get they still love playing on tire swings. From what I hear that is all they play on at school too. I can not really blame them though. Even as adults we still love swing sets. I find myself sitting on a swing most of the times that we head to the park.

Do we really ever get over it? I still remember going to the park one year with my parents when I was a teen. I think we were site seeing and noticed a park. My mom and I sat side by side swinging until she fell backwards and broke her finger pretty bad. It was nice until then though.

Every year millions of people make turkey and stuffing. Most just make the normal sage stuffing. Now that we live in the day and age of instant everything even our stuffing is instant. I am willing to bet that most people just grab a box or a bag of stuffing each year.

I will admit that I use stuffing mix. One of my little known secrets is that I cheat at cooking often by adding extra things to prepared mixes. It speeds things up and still tastes homemade.

For stuffing I add onions, celery, and real broth to the prepared mix. This year I wanted to do something a bit different. As I thought about it I realized that I have never made my mother's sweet stuffing. When I was growing up my mother always made two pans of stuffing. One was normal sage and one was sweet. This year I will try to make her sweet stuffing.

This will be more of a guideline than a recipe. When I called my mother for the recipe she laughed and said that she has never wrote it down so she has no clue. She gave me her best guess at amounts though. I will just try it and see what happens.

Sweet Stuffing is made with sage stuffing mix to make it easy right from the start. Yes my mother cheated while in the kitchen just like I do now.

Sweet Stuffing
(this recipe is all estimates... change amounts according to taste)


Dry Mixture

Stuffing Mix (already seasoned "sage stuffing mix")
Diced Onion
Diced Celery
Raisins
Peanuts or Walnuts (unsalted)

Wet Mixture

3 cups of warm broth
1/2 cup brown sugar


Bake

Combine wet and dry mixtures without breaking apart the bread cubes. It is good to have a little extra broth on hand just in case. Place the stuffing mixture in a buttered baking dish and bake covered for about 45 minutes at 350 degrees.

We recently became members of Sam's Club again. We went years without a membership because we had moved somewhere that did not have one. It was not until I walked in the door that I fully remembered how much I love the place. James loves it too so we bought a ton of stuff.

I forgot how much stuff they have though. I love all of the savings on bulk groceries but I forgot about all of the extras. We could spend hours there. Especially now that Christmas is coming. The decorations, toys, and dolls are all getting stocked and the savings are just waiting and calling for me.

Many people do not realize that if you have a membership you can access their website full of savings to. They have a huge selection of kids toys and baby dolls. I even found the Cabbage Patch Kids Surprise Newborn Twins there. They are very hard to find. When my girls were into children's dolls they loved Cabbage Patch Kids. The Surprise Newborn Twins are $27.98 at Sam's Club and the only other place I have been able to find them is on Ebay for $39.99 to $49.99. I might have to do more Christmas shopping at Sam's Club!

Making a Thankful Tree could become a wonderful tradition for years. It is a wonderful project that keeps kids giving thanks all November long. This Thankful Tree is made using a branch and regular paper. The paper is cut into leaf shapes and then painted. You can make your Thankful Tree out of anything. All that matters is that you make it together and give thanks.

First you make your tree and then you can start adding your leaves or hands. Everyday the members of your family get to write something that they are thankful for and then add it to the tree. By the time Thanksgiving comes along you have a big full tree.

This one is made from construction paper and displayed on a window. You can get creative and make your Thankful Tree out of anything. You can cut out hand prints or leaves for your tree. It is all up to you.

If you have a small family you may want to add more than one a day. Make sure that you all discuss the things you are thankful for as you do it. That is the best part.

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Hoover and Dirt Devil. All opinions are 100% mine.

Dirt Devil has put together an awesome gift buying guide. The Dirt Devil site has savings and special offers that start Wednesday November 25th, but the guide covers way more than just their products. The Dirt Devil Holiday Gift Guide is packed full of great gift ideas, tips on saving money, and a list of over 300 recommended websites. They have covered everything!

Want to know what websites have Black Friday deals? Want to find the best Cyber Monday sites? Want to find sites with promotional codes to save money when you order? Want to know what the heck all of those abbreviations mean? Learn tricks on how to use Google to easily find the promo code you want. You can even find sites that are just dedicated to free shipping offers.

I like the Gifts for Her, Gifts for Him, and Family Favorites sections. I never even knew they had a Designer Series that offered sleek looking versions of their products. I would love a Dirt Devil Broom Vac and a Easy Steam Deluxe. I would not care how it looked though. Some women want they cleaning tools to look good but I just care about the power.

It is time for a new giveaway! This giveaway is for a photo enlargement poster print from Digital Room. We recently got a poster of this photo. We absolutely love it! It looks so good that I am planning on having it matted and framed for in the livingroom. It will fit in perfectly with the World theme that we have going on. I can not wait to get another one!

Giveaway prize: (1) 18x24 poster print for 1 Lucky Winner

Paper: High Gloss; Semi Gloss

Shipping: FREE UPS Ground Shipping in the US

Eligibility: Limited to US Residents due to shipping costs.

This giveaway ends November 22nd. Feel free to check out Digital Room for more info on Poster Printing. You can also check out Printing Reviews. The poster for this giveaway and a free poster for us is provided by our sponsor Digital Room.

HOW CAN YOU ENTER?

Your main entry will be to comment about what photo you would like enlarged into a poster.

EXTRA ENTRIES

• Blog about the giveaway and include a link back to this post. Make a new comment here with the URL to your post. This will give you three additional entries!
  
• Follow this blog - It is on the left sidebar. If you are already a follower it still counts. Make a new comment here that includes your follower name.
• Subscribe to the RSS Feed (left side bar) and make a new comment.
• Add the Your Fun Family Blog to your blogroll. Make a new comment and be sure to use your URL when you post it.
• Fav the Your Fun Family Blog on Technorati and make a new comment.
• Follow us on Twitter and make a new comment.
• Share this giveaway post on Kirtsy, Digg, Twitter, Stumble, or anything else you can think of.
  


Each one counts for one entry so each should have a separate comment. It must include the link where it can be found to count. I will be deleting comments that do not follow the rules so others get a fair chance.

I have just become an Official Event Chaser. How awesome is that? I used to go to concerts all the time. My friends loved going to concerts too so we would all go together in a few car loads. We had a blast! Some great memories were made.

When I had kids the concerts stopped. Now my teenage daughter has been after James and I to take her to concerts. That is when I realized how long it has been since I went to a concert. My kids are older now so I need to get out and have fun again!

When the opportunity to become an EventChaser came around I was thrilled. I could get out, have fun, and write about it. As an Event Chaser I can get free or drastically reduced Concert Tickets. That is a pretty awesome deal if you ask me!

I was asked for a list of things that I would be interested in and as soon as I saw the All Time Low Tickets for The Rave/Eagles Ballroom I knew I had to add it to my list. My daughter has gotten me into All Time Low and I have some great memories of that place. I have seen some great concerts there.

Since I work with General Mills I have been contacted a few times to vote on covers and headlines for the Betty Crocker magazines. As a thank you they always send me a copy when they come out. I got so excited yesterday when I saw that the Betty Crocker Christmas Cookies issue came.

It is actually all pull out recipe cards and the recipes are awesome. We love making Christmas cookies and have gotten stuck in a rut so I can not wait to try these out. There are so many that I do not know where to begin.

Once again I am getting excited and want to get started on the holidays.

The weather this weekend was wonderful! I loved being able to open up the windows and get some fresh air in the house. The sun was out so we spent a lot of time outside. I am really going to miss days like that over the winter. Many people in my area love winter but I hate it. I really miss Arizona and being able to spend time outside all year long.

Today we were back to cold weather. There was even frost on the ground when I took the kids to school. Right now I am curled up on the couch with a blanket over me. If I could build a house and start from scratch, I think I would get under floor heating.

It just sounds so comfortable and cozy. Having a gas furnace means I have to get cold before I can get warm again. When the furnace kicks on I always get a cold breeze where I sit on my laptop. Plus it blows around dust and we all know how much I hate cleaning.

There are so many neat options for homes these days. I was looking at Floor Heating Online and found some really cool Mirror heaters too. You flip a switch...they heat your mirror...you keep a perfectly clear mirror. How awesome would that be? I hate trying to clean off the mirror so I can do my hair after a shower.

I love pumpkin pie but I also like to find different types to make. Have you started to think about your Thanksgiving menu yet? Most people want a simple and traditional menu so you can not get too creative with dinner. You can get creative with dessert though. This pumpkin pie is wonderful. Pumpkin cheesecake is a perfect combination and the gingersnap and pecan crust is the perfect compliment.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 1/2 cups crushed gingersnap cookies
• 1/2 cup finely chopped pecans
• 1/3 cup butter, melted

• 2 (8 ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
• 3/4 cup white sugar, divided
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup canned pumpkin
• 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). In a medium bowl, mix together the crushed gingersnap cookies, pecans, and butter. Press into the bottom, and about 1 inch up the sides of a 9 inch springform pan. Bake crust 10 minutes in the preheated oven. Set aside to cool.
2. In a medium bowl, mix together the cream cheese, 1/2 cup sugar, and vanilla just until smooth. Mix in eggs one at a time, blending well after each. Set aside 1 cup of the mixture. Blend 1/4 cup sugar, pumpkin, cinnamon, and nutmeg into the remaining mixture.
3. Spread the pumpkin flavored batter into the crust, and drop the plain batter by spoonfuls onto the top. Swirl with a knife to create a marbled effect.
4. Bake 55 minutes in the preheated oven, or until filling is set. Run a knife around the edge of the pan. Allow to cool before removing pan rim. Chill for at least 4 hours before serving.

We have a winner to announce in the 100 Brochures Giveaway!

The winner is CuriousGirl! Congrats!

Thank you to UPrinting for sponsoring this blog and providing us with tons of products and giveaways. We are still doing giveaways so make sure to check out our Current Giveaways.

I recently joined The Blog Frog and it is certainly addictive. I am new so I would like to join the communities of other bloggers and have people join mine.

If you are on The Blog Frog please leave a link in a comment here so I can join your community. If you want to join my Your Fun Family Community on there I would love it.

If you have no idea what I am talking about I will try to sum it up...

You join, you add a widget to your blog, and then you have a community your readers can join and you can join other people's blog communities. Many members (I do) have a widget with recent visitors so if you log in to The Blog Frog and then visit their blog you will show up with a link to your blog.

If you join other blog communities you can talk in their forums and a link to your blog shows up with every comment. Your new blog posts and Twitter updates show up in their community too. I have been addicted to the forums and have been getting new traffic from it.

Long story short, If you are a member or join now please let me know. I would like to make more friends on it since I am new to it.

As children grow they go through many stages. Many of these stages drive us crazy! One of these stages that many children go through is a regression back into the baby stage. Just as your baby starts to turn into a big kid they claim that they can no longer do all of the things they learned and they need you to do it all for them.

They just got some independence and it gave you a tiny bit of time to yourself. Then all of a sudden you are back to square one. Maybe they miss being your pampered baby. Maybe they realize that the rest of their life is downhill once they are expected to do everything for themselves. Whatever the reason, as parents we want our "big kid" back.

I have one tip for this stage that is assured to help out. The main idea is to get your child excited about doing things for themselves again. You can do this by creating a "big kid" chart or making a "big kid" jar.

Simply create a list of all of the things that your child should be able to do for themselves. Make a chart with this list or tape it to a jar. If you make a chart the child can add a sticker every time they accomplish a big kid task. If you make a jar they can add any object or just a penny to the jar.

At the end of the week they can count up all of their big kid tasks and get a prize. They will get excited again about being a big kid. They may even surprise you and find new things that they can do to get big kid points.

There has been a lot of talk about getting housework done in the communities I visit lately. #1 - I would say GET OFF THE COMPUTER!

Okay I am obviously just kidding because I spend way too much time online and I would hate it if my readers spent less time online and did not have time to read me.

Most of you know that I have the lazy approach to almost everything. Ironically, I work hard at finding the lazy way to do things. I make laziness an art form. So what would you expect from me other than a lazy approach to housework?

All moms struggle with how to have time for kids and housework. I love spending time with my kids and hate housework. No child will grow up and look back at their childhood and say, "Mom always had a spotless house". They will however remember how much fun you had together.

When my girls were little I had a strategy. I made a point to stop what I was doing every hour and get a quick chore done. I also never cleaned anything that would get dirty again through the day. Then 30 minutes before James would get home I would race through the house putting things in baskets and cleaning.

I still have baskets. It is like filing toys and clutter. I file things away in baskets according to what room they should be in and put them in that room. Now that my kids are older we even have a clean laundry basket for each child. I separate laundry into the baskets and when the kids get home from school they have their own baskets of laundry to put away.


*To read more about our family chore lists check out our Daily Chores post.

*Also make sure to enter our Current Giveaways.

I do not think any one way of organizing chores works for everyone. We have gone through many ways of organizing chores. We keep changing as I learn what works with my kids.

I will begin by saying that I do not pay my kids for doing chores. James has been known to give them money to do things from time to time but I will not. Part of being a family is helping each other. You should not have to be paid to help out. I already spend way too much money on my kids.

If they ever complain I just ask them if they would rather get paid an allowance and then have to buy everything for themselves. They quickly realize how little they could afford and change their mind. If they want extra money for things they know that they then must also do extra work.

We have done spreadsheets with each child having assigned chores each day. At first they changed what jobs they did everyday. They then complained about the person before them not doing a good job so they had to do more work.

I then had two different ones and they changed jobs back and forth each week. This meant they got to change jobs once in awhile but could only blame themselves if a job was not done well the day before. They still did not like all of the jobs and I would get busy and not keep track of what spreadsheet they should be on.

Through time the whole system changed to what we do now. Each child has things that they would rather do and are better at so we sat down and chose permanent chores. I wrote down all of the jobs that I want done on a daily bases and made sure to make it an even list. We then all sat down and split them up. The girls talked it out and decided who got what.

My life has gotten soooo much easier with this method. The girls all have things they are in charge of so when they see it needs to get done they do it. If they get busy and forget I just say that something needs to get done and the person who has that job does it.

On special cleaning days I make a list of jobs. I am sure to make them all even so everyone will get around the same amount of work. Then I am done and my "cleaning fairies" go to work. I let them choose and initial one job on the list and start working on it. Then they do not get to choose the next job until they finish the first one. This continues until the last job is done.

They become super fast cleaning fairies because they do not want to be stuck with a job they do not like. The big one is cleaning up after the dogs. The child that cleans the slowest is on pooper scooper duty. This turns even the laziest child into a fast cleaner. I even use this when kids do not want to get up for school. I inform the children that the last child fully dressed has pooper scooper duty after school. In a flash I have 3 fully dressed kids that are ready for school.

When my kids were little I had a simple rule. You can whine all you want but you have to do it in your own room. I think the normal no whining rule is not healthy. It tells kids that they can not get upset. You want your child to learn when it is okay to be upset.

Kids are full of emotions and they have to learn how to handle them or they grow up to be adults that still can not handle their emotions. (I see them everyday)

When my kids started to whine I would say, "I understand that you are upset but it is not something that is important enough to put you in such a bad mood and ruin your day. I want to have a good day and have fun so if you want to continue to whine you have to do it in your room."

I did not physically force them into their rooms because that escalates the emotional outburst. They do not have to ever actually go to their room they just need to know that they can not whine anywhere else.

When I was done talking I would just walk away and continue with what I was doing. If they came up to me a second time I would remind them that they could whine all they want but they have to do it in their room.

After that if it continued I would just ignore them. They do it for attention. If they do not get the attention they want they stop. It helps if they see you doing something that they want to do. Then they really see that whining is a waste of time and they could be doing something more fun.

It takes time for them to catch on but they will learn that whining is pointless.

Well yesterday was my second round of unfollowing on Twitter. You may remember awhile back that I unfollowed all of the annoying people that Tweet every five seconds about stupid stuff. I really have no interest in your bowel movements by the way.

Well, yesterday I unfollowed everyone that did not follow me back. I really am finding Twitter to be a waste of time and space. It is like a huge crowd full of people yelling but no one is listening. I still keep following people who's sites I like out of politeness. I also follow almost every person that follows me. There are some exceptions. I have no interest in following some internet whore that is trying to become a porn queen. They always seem to follow me though. It must be my big 80s hair that gets them.

To cut this shorter, I will say that I am sick of people just following me so that I will follow them back. Then they unfollow right after. So I am starting a new weekly routine. Every Wednesday I will be going to Huitter and doing their free manual version of Mutuality. I will dump all of the people that are not following me to make room for new people. If you have not used it yet...It is super fast and simple.

Any one that wants an assured follow back simply needs to follow me and keep me on follow. If you would like to let other people know that you are a guaranteed follow back leave a comment with your Twitter name so other people can follow you.