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Crest – Smiley 360

Posted by Brande on June 24, 2014
in Children's Health, Family Stuff, Health, Health and Fitness, Health and Nutrition, Men's Health, Parenting, Personal Care Products, Uncategorized, Women's Health

“I received this product for free from Smiley360 in exchange for my honest review. You can join Smiley360 here!”

Smile! Crest has some fabulous products out there. I was lucky to be able to test out Crest Pro-Health Tartar Protection with Fluoride Rise and Crest Pro-Health Clinical Plaque Control Toothpaste.

I’m usually on the hunt for the best deal with coupons and sometimes buying substandard toothpastes and rinses. After trying these Crest products my attitude has changed, I will no longer be buying cheaper toothpaste. I really enjoyed the flavor of each of these and how my teeth and mouth felt so much cleaner!

Crest Pro-Health Toothpaste says that it provides benefits to control cavities, gingivitis, plaque, sensitivity, tartar, whitening, and freshen your breath. That’s sounds like a lot of great benefits. Crest also reminds us to brush regularly to achieve the full effectiveness.

Crest Pro-Health Rinse claims many of the similar outcomes of the toothpaste with regular usage. The bottle also states that protects surface stains and rebuilds enamel. That sounds great for a coffee drink like myself.

I’ve been using both products regularly for about a week and my teeth and mouth have felt much better and fresher! I will continue to be using Crest products!

Make sure to head over to Crest’s Facebook Page for upcoming offers and promotions. To learn more about Crest Products click here to be taken to their website! #TartarRinse

Happy Brushing!

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Beautiful Sunrise – Wordless Wednesday

Posted by html404 on June 18, 2014
in Family Stuff, Fun Stuff, Photography, Uncategorized, Wordless Wednesday

This was the beautiful sunrise this past Saturday on my way home from doing the paper routes. It was gorgeous and the photo does not do it justice at all.

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Week #25 Saturday Top Five Laughs

Posted by html404 on June 14, 2014
in Animals, Family Stuff, Humor, Kids Stuff, Saturday Top Five Laughs, Uncategorized

Can anyone help me slow down time? I cannot believe another week has sped by! I wasn’t very good about keeping track of our family funnies but I’ll do my best to give you a few for our top laughs, as we join Mel over at The Mommyhood Chronicles for week #25 (for us) in our Saturday Top Five Laughs of the week.

5. Miss Moo had quite the adventure this week dragging us with her. She got out of her stall and tramped through the garden, through the pasture and right into old barbed wire fence. At least it stopped her and she wasn’t hurt, just a surface scratch. I watched from the window until I saw B go down and Moo go over her….yeah, talk about heart failure. Thankfully, Moo jumped over her and did not walk on top of her. Seriously though, it was like that scene in Anne of Green Gables where Anne is chasing after what she thought was HER cow through Rachel Lind’s garden, but it turned out to be Rachel Lind’s cow. Do you remember that scene? It’s funny now, but I wanted to turn Moo into ground beef if she didn’t stop running. Once she got caught, B was able to talk her down.

4. There was a ding dong on the door. I went to answer it, while walking to the door it ding donged again and I knew it was the children because no one else rings the door bell that many times in the span of a few seconds. When I answered the door Jr. was there and said, “I have 99 eggs?” We have been having quite a few customers come buy for eggs and other products so they younger children have been ringing the door bell and pretending to be customers too.

3. O’s face when she saw a new visitor on our farm:

2. I was talking to my mom and we were talking about animals and she told me how she had always thought rabbits and cats tried to mate each other. I go, “What would those be called catbits or rabats?”

1. My oldest son just said to me, “I”m not short, I’m fun size!”

What’s your funny of the week?

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Have You Seen Maleficent?

Posted by html404 on June 13, 2014
in Entertainment, Family Stuff, Fun Stuff, Kids Stuff, Movie Reviews, Movies, Reviews, Things to Do in Chicago, Uncategorized

We had a child ask to see Maleficent as part of their birthday celebration and we obliged. We went on opening weekend. If you haven’t gone to see Maleficent yet, it is still playing in theaters near you.

Maleficent is the backdrop to a movie many of us are most familiar with, Sleeping Beauty. There is more to the story than we originally thought. I really enjoyed the way the creators gave us with the reason for Maleficent’s curse on Aurora. I think we can all resonate with a broken heart, right? And many of us can probably also relate to being betrayed. It’s what we do with that betrayal and heart break that make us stronger or weaker. Maleficent did not initially choose wisely, unfortunately, and that led to her downward spiral.

It was hard not to love the characters in Maleficent, except King Stefan. My view of King Stefan completely changed, as did my view of Maleficent. Funny, isn’t it? Angelina Jolie was amazing as this character. I actually haven’t seen many of her movies and I think the last one I saw was SALT. My husband and I enjoyed her performance in SALT, but this movie made me want to see more her work, just to compare them.

I found the relationship between Maleficent and Diaval, her pet raven interesting and the relationship she formed with Aurora perplexing. Her relationship with Aurora showed the softer side of Maleficent’s younger days and it is what ultimately brought her out of her downward spiral. One of their last scenes together brought tears to my eyes.

We took all of our children to see Maleficent and we all loved it. It is rated PG. Our youngest just got a bit scared in the Wolf scene but that’s about it. No one had bad dreams or anything. So if you plan to see it, use your best judgement as you know your children best. Our youngest has seen so much more than our other children did at his age just because he has older siblings and he watches super heros so we knew he’d be ok.

Maleficent gets two thumbs up from us!

Learn more:

Website: disney.com/Maleficent

Like MALEFICENT on Facebook: facebook.com/DisneyMaleficent

Follow MALEFICENT on Twitter: @Maleficent

YouTube Playlist: http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTnR43JTLNs8AKNpJ4KFI6SSdpTzkcXjw

Instagram: http://instagram.com/disneystudios

Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/disneystudios/maleficent/

Tumblr: http://disney.tumblr.com/

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Haying with Horses – Wordless Wednesday

Posted by html404 on June 11, 2014
in Animals, Family Stuff, Farm Stuff, Fun Stuff, Things to Do in Chicago, Uncategorized, Wordless Wednesday

I am barely getting much blogging done lately. It’s been busy here on the farm, plus we are homeschooling through the summer and I’ve just been enjoying life too much to sit very long in front of the computer!

Haying with Horses

Yesterday we went to a fellow farmer’s to learn how he farms with draft horses. It was very interesting. He owns two Percheron horses, along with two Morgans which is is also training to work like his Percherons.

We actually got to see Farmer L hay. He had already cut the field so we got to see him use his hay loader (which he purchased for just $90, if I remember correctly) and a hay wagon he built himself.

The reason Farmer L farms with horses is because of his dislike for the use of petroleum. He is self-taught and very good at what he does. He teaches driving lessons (learning to drive a team of horses) to another farmer friend of ours and she is enjoying the lessons a lot.

As crazy as it sounds, I’d love to farm with horses. It would give me an excuse to own horses because it would give them a purpose on the farm. Not sure I could convince hubby though as he is very much a tractor man.

What do you think of farming with horses in this day and age?

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Alone Yet Not Alone

Posted by html404 on June 10, 2014
in Books, Entertainment, Movies, Reviews, Uncategorized

We have the original book Alone Yet Not Alone so when I agreed to this review I mistakenly thought it was a review of the movie that is coming out in theaters (only a select few!) this Friday, June 13. It looks really, really good! Check out the trailer below:

The book review below is written by my 15 year old daughter, B. By the way, this book is based on a true story about two sisters during the French and Indian war (1755). It is written by Tracy Leininger Craven, which is the great something granddaughter of Barbara Leininger, one of the main characters.

Alone Yet Not Alone Book Review

By “B”

This may be the “movie version” of the book Alone Yet Not Alone: Their faith became their freedom, but it is almost exactly the same as the original we own, which I haven’t read it in a while. But you will hear no complaints from me about the new version! The only difference is there are photos from the movie.

I’ve always admired and respected Barbara and Regina. Not just for their strength but also for their love for God and their hope.

I hope I can be as great a big sister as Barbara. She never gave up on escaping and finding Regina.

I liked how Barbara never gave up on her faith. Sure she went through trial after trial but she never gave up. She is a big inspiration to me. This book made me think, “What would I have done in her situation?” I don’t know if I would have been able to stay strong, but the knowledge of their story has helped me strengthen my own faith in God so that I can stay strong.

To learn more about the book and movie visit: http://www.aloneyetnotalone.com/

Buy it Now

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Week #24 Saturday Top Five Laughs

Posted by html404 on June 7, 2014
in Animals, Family Stuff, Humor, Kids Stuff, Saturday Top Five Laughs, Uncategorized

Another week has sped by and it’s time for Saturday Top Five Laughs with Mel over at The Mommyhood Chronicles for week #24 (for us) in our Saturday Top Five Laughs of the week.

5. You know you live on a farm when your daughter says, “I hate it when I go into heat.” Then goes, “Wait, I’m not a cow.”

4. Our goose was attacking Annabeth (our pregnant goat) and Lokie (the new “kid”) actually pummeled the goose! I am proud that he has such spunk but a little concerned at the same time when thinking ahead to when he is older. We will be keeping him since B gave him to O for her birthday.

3. We discovered Atlas, our male ram, was nursing off of Hazel, Lokie’s mom. As endearing as it is, he shouldn’t be! So we had to go back to separating the goats and sheep.

And I was horrible keeping track of things this week so only have three things.

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Sheep – Wordless Wednesday

Posted by html404 on June 4, 2014
in Animals, Family Stuff, Farm Stuff, Uncategorized, Wordless Wednesday

Couldn’t resist sharing more lamb or sheep photos!

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Budsies

Posted by 278Wife on June 3, 2014
in Gift Ideas, Kids Stuff, Reviews, Uncategorized

What if your child could draw anything they wanted and have it turned into a stuffed animal? Basically their drawings could be brought to life. Now it is completely possible thanks to Budsies. Their simple and fun process makes getting your custom stuffed animal as easy as 1,2,3.

First your child needs to draw a picture. It can be anything really. The Budsies website even offers templates for you to use. My son is really into monster trucks so he wanted his very own custom monster truck. He drew it all by himself and colored it. I asked him if he wanted to add windows or use different colors, but he drew it completely on his own.

After it is drawn you need to send Budsies your artwork. You can upload a picture of it or you can take a picture of the drawing with your cell phone and text it to them. I used my iPhone and texted them a picture. After that you finish checking out. They ask you a series of questions to understand the drawing. This was my son’s favorite part. We told them that the monster truck was angry, had lots of blue hair, and had big teeth. Finally, you sit back and wait for your custom stuffed animal to arrive. I have to say my son was very anxious and could not wait to see his creation come to life.

At last it arrived and my son could not stop smiling. He could not believe he had an actual monster truck that looked exactly like he drew. He goes absolutely everywhere with his Budsie. He sleeps with it every single night and plays with it all day long.

I have to say the quality of Budsies is superb! The material is super soft and cushy, and the colors are very bright. My son just lit up the second he saw his monster truck stuffed animal. The customer service at Budsies is exceptional. At one point I contacted them to find out how much longer it would take to receive the stuffed animal. My son kept asking me when it was going to arrive. They have a chat option available on their website where a real live person talks to you and tells you what is going on with your order. The person I chatted with was so nice and really cared about my order.

I honestly cannot say enough good things about Budsies. I would highly recommend them to anyone with children, young or old. They would make an excellent gift. Check out their website, you won’t be disappointed!

http://www.budsies.com/

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Week #23 Saturday Top Five Laughs

Posted by html404 on May 31, 2014
in Family Stuff, Humor, Kids Stuff, Saturday Top Five Laughs, Uncategorized

Another week has sped by and it’s time for Saturday top Five Laughs with Mel over at The Mommyhood Chronicles for week #23 (for us) in our Saturday Top Five Laughs of the week.

Our two youngest (both boys) questions to hubby comprise 3-4 of this week’s laughs:

5. Jr. to hubby: “Your arm pits smell like cow patties.” (Yes very similar to a laugh a week or two ago).

4. 6 year old to hubby: “Did you fight in WWII?”

3. 6 year old to hubby: ” What color was grandma’s hair when she was young? (hubby answered) What color was Grandpa’s hair? (hubby answered) Was your hair grey when you were nine?” lol! Hubby has mostly grey hair now!

2. “That hurts. It really, really, really hurts.” Can be heard around our house when someone gets hurt. After the video below, even though it’s been a couple of years since we first watched it!

1. The other day in the down pour was the time our dog decided to get loose and run across the road to our neighbor’s. Thankfully our son saw him bolt but my oldest and I were soaked to the bone by the time we caught him and brought him back home. It couldn’t have taken any more than 5-10 minutes!

That’s about all for this week! Stay tuned until next time!