"Little Mommy" Children's Book by Sharon Kane - Review

This is the most adorable children's book I have stumbled across in a very long time. Maybe in my life... Seriously I adore it! It has a lovely innocent childlike tone and is written in sing-song rhyme that is engaging. If that weren't enough the precious illustrations call up nostalgia and the beauty of a time when little girls were actually allowed and encouraged to be little girls rather than made to feel like such things were a prison and mind control and taught instead that perpetual dress-up and rowdiness equal true femininity. The child in the story narrates her day with her three dollies; "This is my house and I am the mommy. My children are Annabelle, Betsy, and Bonny (Bonnie)..." the book begins. Throughout the 22 page story we see the child and her dolls playing house, baking, laundering doll clothes, and cleaning. She interacts with other children, having a tea party with the neighbor and cooking supper for a little boy who appears briefly playing the role of daddy to the dollies. The little girl must call Dr. Dan (another little boy) when one of the dollies takes ill. A precious book that exhudes the sweet, busy, innocent, feminine spirit that I want my daughter to emulate! And what does my 3 year old daughter think? It's one of her favorite books to read at bedtime. :)

 
To read more about this book, CLICK HERE!

Awesome Giveaways! (October)

Awesome giveaways I have found! Check back frequently as I will be crossing out the ones that are over and adding new ones almost daily! 

••Giveaway for the most adorable baby/toddler shoes on Penelope's Oasis! ENDED OCT. 2nd
••A good reminder about good giveaway manners, plus tons of links to awesome giveaways! :) (Thanks Annie!) CLICK HERE!
••Win a cute turquoise knit baby RuffleButt bloomer on Piece of Me! ENDS OCT. 9th!
••Win a baby outfit from Kumquat on Piece of Me! ENDS OCT 11th!
••Win a gorgeous hand-smocked dress by PerryWinkles on Piece of Me! ENDS OCT. 13th!
••Win a bingo game from Work and Play Day by Day! ENDS OCT. 15th!
••Win Christopher Bean coffee from Take Time To Smell The Rose! ENDS OCT. 15th!
••Penelope's Oasis is doing a giveaway going for a darling "Flirty Apron!" ENDS OCT. 16th!
••Piece of Me is giving away an adorable coveral pajama from Hatley! I have to say these are the most adorable pajamas I have ever seen! ENDS OCT. 16th!
••I Thode You So is doing a giveaway for a Happy Baby Foods gift pack! It's organic, people- check it out! ;) ENDS OCT. 23rd!
••I Thode You So is giving away a full sized plush blanket from Modern Baby Co. ENDS OCT. 28th!
••Enter to win a Starbucks gift pack from Mevolving! You know I love me some DCCF from SB! ENDS OCT. 29th!
••Piece of Me is giving away as $50 gift card to Just Ducky Originals. Boy do they have some cute stuff! ENDS OCT. 30th!
••Win a set of Vision Forum CD's on Joyfully Living. These look like  some really good info! ENDS OCT. 30th!
••At the Well is also giving away some Vision Forum CDs, so go check it out! ENDS OCT. 30th!
••Familylicious Reviews is giving away a BornFree sippy cup! ENDS OCT. 30th!
••Win a cute pair of piggy tail bows on Mommy Chic! ENDS OCT. 31st!
••Win a classic children's book (The Story of Ferdinand the bull) on My Review Blog! ENDS OCT. 31st!

••OODLES of giveaways HERE and HERE!



Your turn! :) MckLinky up! You can still link your giveaways even if I have already highlighted them above. ;)
In the space that says Link Title, use this format: YourBlogName - Giveaway Title [End date]. Link to the giveaway post specifically, not just to your blog in general. You may make a new MckLinky entry for each giveaway.
PLEASE make sure you follow this format so it is easy for me to maintain and easy for people to view and use. Entries will stay on the list until they expire (until the giveaway ends). I will try to delete expired giveaways daily to keep this list fresh and easy to view.
I will create a new list each month. This MckLinky list will run now through Oct. 31st. Check back Nov. 1st for a new list.
>>>>MckLinky for October is now CLOSED<<<<

Pennies

This week for homeschool with my 3 year old we played with pennies. :) We count them. I quiz her on how many pennies is a nickel, dollar, etc worth. We arrange them to form pictures and then act out stories with the pennies as people. We played bank with an empty wipes box and were making withdrawals and deposits, counting how many we took out and put in. We counted how many would fit in between our toes and then tried to walk without dropping any. It's been quite fun inventing games to play with my Chicklet. :) The hard part is keeping the pennies put up when my 1 year old is roaming. ;) He would put them in his mouth and that is just nasty.
Do you have any ideas for learning games to play with pennies with a preschooler?

Come back Tuesday for Toddler Tales! I have something great to share about Bug! ;)

Recipes for wild game? Please!

If you were noticing the lack of photos recently, my Camera battery died and I couldn't find the charger. I finally found it yesterday and charged it overnight so I am once again armed and dangerous! Lol!! So there will be more pics coming up soon. :)

As some of you have read in my prayer requests in the sidebar, my Nana fell off a stepladder on Labor Day and broke her leg. She was in the hospital and after 3 days of refusing to eat, they put a feeding tube in her. She had alot of swelling so they had her leg in an open topped cast. She was doing physical therapy and they would discharge her when she was able to see to her own basic personal needs again. Then I got an update a few days ago that she was discharged from the hospital and was home. I was supposed to go see her this past weekend but it did not work out for me to go. My husband had offered to help my sister move from near here to my parents house, and I was going to follow in the car to make sure the truck did not break down. It turns out sis was able to fit what was left all in the trailer they rented, and my husband did not need to take a load in his truck after all. So since my husband is going up there for deer/elk season next week, I will just go up there with him then. He will need me to follow in case the truck breaks down anyway. I wish we could go this weekend but gas is too expensive to go 2 weekends in a row - they live on the opposite end of the state! :( So that's what's up with that; I didn't go last weekend but I'm going next weekend. I'm so relieved that Nana is improving! Especially since my visit was delayed. Thank you to all who have prayed for her!

And speaking of my prayer list in the sidebar... My friend is pregnant and they saw a problem on the ultrasound a couple weeks ago. The cord was enlarged in one place. From my understanding, among other posibilities that are nearly as unpleasant, the enlarged place could rupture and the baby would die. They did an amnio on Monday to see if the baby's lungs were mature enough to induce. The lungs were NOT ready so they did not induce. My friend will be 36 weeks on Sunday. If you think of her, would you please say a prayer that the cord does not rupture and that the baby is born healthy and ALIVE? Thank you!

And back on the subject of travels... my husband was out of town on business for a few days and is currently on his way home! He just called to say he's almost here! Yaaaay! I just hate it when he's gone. I (we) miss him so much! Chicklet (3) at naptime was mumbling to herself and I overheard her saying, "Ooooh Daddy. Why are you not here? Why?" Poor little one! :( Made me so sad! She will be so happy tomorrow night when he comes home from work at normal time. It would have been nice if he could have gotten home in time to the kids goodnight tonight, but they kept him late so he didn't start for home until around 3:30pm. It's 9:30pm now.

Question of the week:
Do you have any recipes for elk and deer that would be good for someone who dislikes the flavor??????????? Lol! I used to like it but when I was pregnant with my Chicklet the smell made me get sick so now every time I taste or smell wild game I have the urge to hurl. Sorry, TMI! :p So if anyone has any recipes that disguise the flavor I would be eternally grateful! ;)

Never talk on the phone while carrying a pot of boiling greasy water

Never ever talk on the phone while carrying a pot of boiling greasy water if you're clumsy...
I was on the phone with my husband last night (he is out of town on business) when it happened. I had just fed the kids sandwiches and put them to bed and started getting shaky, realized I needed some protein, but the hamburgers were frozen. I decided to boil a couple because I didn't feel like taking half an hour to fry them apart without burning them (they were stuck frozen together). So I put the burgers in the pot with water and boiled them and as I was fishing the cooked burgers out the phone rang and it was my husband. As I was talking to him, I was carrying the pot of very greasy water to the sink and I'm clumsy so I stumbled a bit and it sloshed onto my belly. It started at the bottom of my ribcage and ran downward to my waist, boiling the skin off as it went, and soaked into the shirt spreading out to the sides too, all in less than a second and I screamed and plopped the pot into the sink to rip my shirt off. Thankfully the kids didn't come running in/start screaming sincethey were in bed supposed to be sleeping. So all of a whole 2 seconds after it happened I'm pulling off my shirt and look down and there's pieces of the top few layers of skin just hanging off in chunks. Ewwww! And OWWWWWW!!!!
I held a wet paper towel on it, then after about 20 minutes of pacing back and forth in pain with a wet paper towel on my belly, I told hubby I've gotta get off the phone to deal with this burn, it's BAD. I was trying not to cry. He's out of town and doesn't need to worry any more than he already was just hearing the whole thing happen. I got off the phone and slathered the burn in the salve I love so much (which it HURT super bad to touch it to put anything on it!) and then put a 6"x6" wet paper towel over that (nothing smaller would work- it was a large burn), then I put a dishtowel over THAT and put a bag of frozen peas on top, which I kept on there for a good hour. I had to take some extra strength tylenol because I was in so much pain. I thought I needed to go get it looked at but I was not in favor of getting the kids up and driving an hour to the city (our local hosp.- heard so many bad bad stories I would not go there unless I was dying!) with a bag of frozen peas on my stomach. Plus I'd slathered so much salve on there they wouldn't be able to see anything and that salve does not wash off... I put so much on there it had not absorbed yet and it would have to be scraped off. No thank you. Not signing up for more pain! Not to mention I would feel silly making such a big deal out of myself over something that was not lifethreatening. And then there's the money. So I opted to stay home and pray the salve would do the trick.
I spilled the grease at around 9pm and by 11pm I had had enough of the frozen peas and taken them off. By midnight the Tylenol and salve had kicked in and I was not in pain anymore. So I put a 6x6" gauze pad over the salve and since I didn't have any tape I held it down with band-aids. Lol!
It is sore today but I changed the bandage at 9am and the redness and swelling has gone on the sides. The stripe in the middle where the greasewater hit first is blistered and missing some skin but the redness has gone and it is only a little sore. The sides of the burn where there weren't blisters are not even red anymore and only a little tender to the touch. My poor skin where it got boiled off though... The poor skin that is left is not ready to be skin yet and is kind of oozing white blood cells and super tender.
There's no infection though and the swelling is totally gone. Just some blisters and missing skin now. I love that salve... I don't think any infection could live through it. It's better than neosporin! I am so pleased with how much better it looks today. Last night I thought I might wind up with scars on half my tummy but today it's only the boiled off blistered area that looks like it will scar. It might not though if it keeps healing at this rate. It'a amazing how much it's improved just overnight. I am glad now though that I didn't go to the ER or something, seeing how much better it was after only 12 hours. Yay! It hurt SO BAD for those first 3 hours though.


There will not be a giveaway this week. There may not be a giveaway next week either because I will be out of town. The week after that should be normal though and I am planning a giveaway. :)

I was going to post my Toddler Tales Tuesday last night but as you have just read, I kind of got distracted. I was going to eat my tasty boiled hamburgers while I posted it. *sigh* One of my hands was occupied holding a bag of frozen peas though so I did not do much typing after all. Oh well, there is always next Tuesday, right?

I finished my book finally. Only the River Runs Free by Bodie and Brock Thoene. It was pretty good. I enjoyed it. I had tried to read it when I was a teen but it was too slow for me then. I can't imagine how I found it too slow!!! It's very good and keeps you interested. I like a book that is interesting enough that you think about what could happen next when you are not reading it. I would be cooking supper and wondering what might happen next. :) It was not as good as some books I've read but it was good and I might read it again someday.
My favorite book ever ever ever is The Oath by Frank Peretti and if you have not read that one you need to. It's very scary but awesome! I loved the paralels of the dragon to Satan and how he rotted their hearts and controlled them. Peretti's newer one, Monster, is good too but it doesn't top The Oath.

Aaaaannnnnd I'm being "mommy"-ed at. Always in demand! I feel so popular... ;) I've got a busy day with hubby out of town. I won a cookbook which I am going to use to make some freezer meals for myself and others. Particularly my friend who is mentioned in my prayer requests in the side bar. I'm not sure when they are going to induce her but the baby's lungs are not mature yet. There is a problem with the cord and they need to get the baby out as soon as possible so we're hoping and praying the lungs mature ASAP!

Last night the kids kept waking up all night. So I'm really tired. I'm gonna go take a nap with my littles. I hope you all are having a great week so far! :)

Cookbook & Dishcloths giveaway winner!

And the winner is...

Annie! Congratulations Annie! Would you please email your mailing address to me - mamamirage (at) yahoo (dot) com? :) Thank you!

Thank you all for participating! I wish everyone could win! ;)

Mommy Moments Monday 9/28/09

~Mommy Moments Monday~
Lessons learned and memories made.

Do you ever start feeling discouraged? Wonder if you're really being the best parent you can be? Your child goes through a phase where they are constantly testing you and you begin to wonder if what you're doing works or if the anti-parenters have it right and we should all just let our kids raise themselves? My daughter has been going through a really rough stage. I have been just hanging in there, praying, trying to stay as consistent as humanly possible, trying to stay as calm as humanly possible... I thought I had the key by cutting out the television but it couldn't be that easy could it? TV was a part of the problem, yes. A large part I believe. She learned some of these behaviors from the television and stopping watching it is not going to undo what has already been done. It will help from here on out, but it can't undo the past. So I have alot of tantruming I'm dealing with and bad behaviors and some days I wonder if I'm getting through to her at all, and if the right things are getting through to her.
Last week I had a woven cotton blanket on her bed and she kept pulling the strings out one by one and then pulling so hard they ripped out. Literally destructively unravelling the blanket, ripping it up. Well needless to say she got in big trouble for that! At the time I wasn't sure if she had gotten the point of the disciplinary measure or if she was just using it as an excuse to pitch a fit.
Day before yesterday she was playing with her dolly Jane. She had made a nest of blankets on the couch and carefully tucked baby Jane in. Then she said to the doll sternly, "Baby Jane, no breaking the blanket!"
A minute later she agains told the doll, "Baby Jane! No breaking the blanket! Breaking is not nice!" and this time she picked the doll up gently with a sad look on her face and gave it two swats on the behind and then put it back down. Then she looked up at me and said, "Mama, Baby Jane is cryin'! Baby Jane is sad!" So I asked her, "What do you think you should do now?"
She turned back to the baby dolly, asked her so softly I could almost not hear, "You know breaking is naughty, right? Are you sorry for breaking?" ...picks up the doll and hugs it... "Awww! I love you baby Jane! I forgive you! No more breaking, okay?" Then she tucked the doll back in with a kiss and tiptoed over to me with a sweet smile.
And I had a tear in my eye because I realized she IS getting it. It is getting through. Even when I don't know if she's listening or paying attention or old enough to understand- she is. And it said to me, 'hang in there, the terrible twos don't last forever!'


~*~

Not too long ago, I was sitting on the floor playing with Chicklet (3) and Bug (13 months) came crawling over to me, pulled up to standing, turned around, and plopped his little tush down in my lap. A minute later he lurched off and took off to explore the toybox, then returned to again climb into my lap unassisted. I leaned down and kissed his hair and he basically ignored me except to lean back on me and get comfy, where he say and played for a while. And it made me think how precious babies and toddlers are, thinking particularly about how they don't have any insecurities or hinderances when they know they are loved. How my kids can just climb into my lap uninvited on a whim with 100% confidence that I'm going to receive them with a kiss and a snuggle, and they can leave with just as clear of a concience. Because just as much as they KNOW I love them and won't turn them away, they know that they love me too whether they're in my lap or across town and assume that I know that too. So precious and amazing! I think that is one of the reasons Jesus said that we must be like little children in our faith. Little ones know what they know and they don't overthink like adults do; 'what if I'm crawling into Daddy's lap and he misreads my intentions?' or 'What if I'm not good enough?' 'What if He doesn't love me?' 'What if He turns me away?' Little ones are so precious because they have to pomp, no facade, no mask. They are what they are. They love. It's what they do. Oh to be like a little child in my faith!


~*~