Online Labor Day Deals

Some of my favorite stores are offering great deals this labor day weekend:

1. Aeropostale: free shipping with code FREESHIP

2. American Eagle Outfitters: free shipping (no code required)

3. The Children's Place: 15% off any purchase with code FA78

4. Crazy 8: $5 tees and up to 50% off prices (no code required)

5. GapKids & BabyGap: Buy one pair of jeans and get the 2nd pair 1/2 off! (no code required)

Happy labor day weekend and happy shopping!

Summer Snowball Fight

Longing for cooler weather? Why not have a summer snowball fight?

Items needed:
Plenty of white pantyhose (check your local dollar store for these)
Lots of flour (25+ pounds)

Fill the bottom of one pantyhose leg with 1-2 scoops of flour. Tie as close to the top of the flour as possible and cut it off. Tie the next section of pantyhose and repeat until you have multiple snowballs. Make sure everyone in the snowball fight wears darker colors so you can see where you've been hit.

Be prepared for a bit of a mess, but great photo ops. The flour flying through the air in your pictures really makes it look like it's snowing!

Tip: Use leaf blowers to clean the flour off the kids before they come inside. And be sure to clean the flour in the yard up before the sprinklers turn on.

Ironing and Other Fun Jobs

"My second favorite household chore is ironing. The first being, hitting my head on the top bunk bed until I faint." ~ Erma Bombeck

And this is what I'll be doing today. Tackling Mount Washmore and ironing the pile. Good times. Good times.

Organizing School Papers

If you have kids in school, you probably have a mountain of informational papers from the school. Here's how I solved that problem.
1. I bought a 1" view binder for each of my school-aged kids.
2. I typed their name in a cute font with some doodle clip-art and placed that in the spine of the binder.
3. I 3-hole punched all the general information papers and placed them in the binder. You know the ones I'm talking about...lunch prices, school calendars, classroom wish lists, newsletters, etc.
4. I made a friends phone chart for the front of the binder. I have my child's friends' names, phone numbers, addresses, and the parents' names. When my kids make a new friend at school, we can easily add them to the chart. It's great because my older child can call friends to play and do it all by himself.
5. In the front inside pocket of the binder, I keep awards, photos, and any other special documents we want to keep.
6. In the back inside pocket of the binder, I keep artwork and papers from school that we want to keep. I'm very selective and we only keep the very best stuff.
**Here's a hint: If you have large artwork you want to remember, take a picture of it and place the picture in the binder.

Good luck and happy organizing!

Easy, Unique Wall Art for Your Home

I always love inexpensive, inventive ideas for decorating and sprucing up the house. When I found this idea, I bookmarked it for future reference. The squares are styrofoam blocks covered with scrapbook paper and ribbon around the edges. Think of the possibilities with all the cute scrapbook paper lines out there! I'll be trying this for sure. Here's the link with the instructions.

Grandma's Peanut Butter Fudge

The kids went back to school today. So, I'm making a batch of my grandma's yummy peanut butter fudge to eat with my son this afternoon while he tells me about his first day. Here's the recipe:

Grandma's Peanut Butter Fudge

5 c. sugar
1 stick butter
1 can evaporated milk (NOT sweetened)
1 t. vanilla
½ large jar of marshmallow cream (or 1 full small jar)
1 c. peanut butter

Cook the sugar, butter and evaporated milk to a soft ball stage (240 degrees). Remove from heat and add the vanilla, the marshmallow cream, and the peanut butter. Put the pan in a sink full of cold water and whip it until blended. Pour into a greased dish. *Makes about 70 pieces.

Awesome Old Navy Denim Deal (Hurry Saturday Only!)

Follow this link to get jeans for your entire family. $12/pair for adults and $7/pair for the kiddos. Plus, shipping is a flat rate of $7, so feel free to stock up and buy a bunch!

Family Night at the Arcade

Looking for something different to do with your family? Throw the kids in the car and tell them you have a surprise for them. Pull up at the local arcade and announce a family competition arcade night. Plan ahead for awards to give each family member: Valiant Effort, All-Around Winner, Skee-Ball Sister, Dancing Queen, Dead-Eye, Ticket Master, etc. Play for an hour or so before grabbing ice cream at an ice cream shop and having a family award ceremony on the spot.

Back to School

Most moms experience mixed emotions when their kids go back to school. For me it's a mixture of sadness and relief. I ran across this quote this morning and it made me smile.

"If there were no schools to take the children away from home part of the time, the insane asylum would be filled with mothers."-- Edgar Watson Howe

Top Ten Uses for Pencil Boxes

You can find pencil boxes for cheap this time of year. Walgreen's had them 2/$1. You can't beat that! I use pencil boxes for more than just pencils. Here are the top 10 ideas for ways to organize with a pencil box.

1. Store batteries - I buy batteries in bulk from Costco, but the packaging is big and bulky. I come home and dump the batteries into the pencil cases and they're neatly organized by size.

2. Make a nail kit - Include fingernail polish, remover, cotton balls, files, nail clippers, and all the nail accessories that seem to get lost under the bathroom sink.

3. Individual art kits for the kids - Dump out a box of crayons, a small notepad, and a pencil. Label the boxes for each of your kids. You have something to grab in a pinch when you need to entertain the kids in the car, at church or in a waiting room.

4. Corral the cords - I keep all the camera, phone and iPod chargers in a box.

5. Stash small office supplies - I keep a mini stapler, ruler, pens, pencils, markers, etc. in a pencil box in the kitchen.

6. Medicine chest on the go - Put vitamins, medications and first aid items in a box and take it with you on the next family trip.

7. House miscellaneous tools and junk drawer items - I use a box to store the miscellaneous small household stuff that ends up in the junk drawer (grabbers, sawtooth hangers, zip ties, etc.)

8. On-the-go Shower Kit - Throw in a mini bottle of shampoo, conditioner, soap, razor and a washcloth and you'll have a shower kit to throw in your bag for a vacation.

9. Sewing Kit - Store all those extra buttons you get on clothes when you buy them. Store a couple of spools of thread and some needles, a stitch picker and some scissors and you'll be all set the next time you need to sew on a button.

10. Store collections - If your kids are like mine, they collect stuff. For my kids it's rocks. These boxes are great for storing small collections...seashells, rocks, cards, stickers, etc.

What other ways have you used pencil boxes?

Hand-Stamped Card

I thought I'd share an old hand-stamped card I made with Stampin' Up! supplies. I don't know about you, but I love getting homemade cards.

Pudding Pops

Does anyone else miss Pudding Pops? I used to love them. My grandma always kept her freezer stocked with the frozen yumminess. My favorite was the swirl flavor. I can't find them any more.

I ran across this thread the other day about making Peach Pudding Pops and I thought it sounded scrumptious! I also found this version that would be super simple. I think I'll be making my own in the very near future...and I might even share with the kids!