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Winnie the Pooh Birthday cake ideas needed

Posted on April 27, 2010 12:30 pm by TheAngelForever

Yikes. . . my baby is going to be three in 16 days! Last year, we celebrated JSL’s second birthday at Walt Disney World. We actually had an extra special meal at The Crystal Palace where JSL began his love for Winne the Pooh, Tigger and friends.

During our first day at Animal Kingdom in February, JSL kept crying to see Pooh Bear. While we tried to go on rides, see animals and have fun with other things….he kept demanding to see Pooh, Tigger and company. After a while, we finally made our way to the area that had Pooh, Tigger, and Eeyore (my favorite).

Flash forward to the last month or so. JSL has been beyond attached to all things Winnie the Pooh. Thank goodness, I think we have all of his birthday presents set. Seems like it would be easy to find Winnie the Pooh things right? Well, we thought so until we started to look at stores and found next to nothing. Who knew that getting things having to do with Winnie the Pooh would be so difficult in our area? Of course, not having a Disney Store here does not help matters. Had we known this would be a dilemma, or seen JSL’s fascination continuing all this time, we probably would have bought a few special items while at Disney Social Media Moms Celebration. At the time, JSL bought a set of Pooh Bear characters that he loves and takes all over the place with us (another post on that coming soon – along with the items that we have found).

Later in the week, we have to go out and get a few birthday supplies. Once again, I plan on making JSL his birthday cake. This started with his first birthday and has continued with each subsequent celebration for the boys. Since we are obviously doing a Winnie the Pooh theme, I need to figure out a cake. I was thinking of taking the giant Wilton Cupcake pan and making it into a Honey Pot a la Winnie the Pooh style.

So my question: Do you have any other homemade cake ideas that would go along with a Winnie the Pooh theme. Remember, I am not trying to end up on Cake Wrecks here.

Thanks in advance for any suggstions.

Categories:
baking birthday Disney DisneySMMoms jsl photos shopping

Easy way to be green = reusable shopping bags

Posted on April 23, 2010 12:00 am by TheAngelForever

For at least two years, we have been trying to use reusable shopping bags whenever we go to the grocery store. At first, we picked up a few at the store and would forget them at home. Over time, we have obtained many bags and always have a few in the car for emergency trips to not only the grocery store, but any other location that we shop at.

It may seem odd, but we appear to have quite a little collection going. We have bags from Price Chopper, Wegmans, Hannaford, Trader Joes, Disney World, Target and one from Environsax (dream about owning more from them since they have so many gorgeous styles). Along the way, several have had to be retired from use, not being made as well as others, and being ruined from other uses. The reusable bags haul things to school, work for TechyDad, to Nana and Papa’s house when the boys stay there and other fun places near and far. No two bags are created equal and there are many different materials used to make them. We definitely have our favorites and know which do the best with frozen food, cans, boxed items or toys.

Of course, using reusable bags all the time does have a draw back or two. When you actually need a plastic bag for something, well it is often impossible to find one in our house. Those moments are few and far between, so we now keep a few plastic bags strategically located in our house. Of course, even the boys like the reusable bags. Check out the little guy playing with one the other day, and then resting by some on another shopping trip.

So my question to you this week:

Do you use reusable bags when you go shopping? If you use them, do you have a favorite brand/company? If you are not using them, is there a particular reason?

Please be sure to check out my Marcal Small Steps Products (great for Earth Month and beyond), National Geographic Little Kids, and Human Nature – Reach Out. Stay tuned because more will be coming next week.

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Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the MckLinky there if you are participating.

Aloha #96

Categories:
Aloha Friday Going Green jsl looking back photos shopping

Marcal Small Steps for Earth Month and beyond (Review/Giveaway)

Posted on April 22, 2010 12:00 am by TheAngelForever

As a community, we all need to work together to help our planet to stay clean and healthy for future generations. In our house, we have switched all of our light bulbs to the more energy efficient variety, the boys help us to recycle items, reusable bags are always with us when shopping, and we have our Nalgene bottles for water. Of course, we do other things like try to take lunches in reusable containers, plastic bags are used less often and paper plates at a minimum. I have always used scrap paper around the house to make lists. I think a lot of this stems from growing up with my Papa running a recycling plant when I was little. Seeing all of the magazines, newspapers, books and more in piles higher than my house was an eye-opener.

Recently, I was contacted by Marcal about their new line of products. They asked if I would like to review the Marcal Small Steps line of product

About Marcal Small Steps:

Marcal Smalls Steps makes toilet paper, napkins, and paper towels from 100% premium recycled paper- not trees. It may seem like a small thing, but it actually adds up. If every household in the U.S. replaced one package of traditional toilet paper with Marcal Small Steps, together we could help save nearly one million trees. And, in your own home, a family of four could save two trees a year (17 trees over 10 years) just by switching to paper products made from 100% recycled materials.

For those of us watching our budgets (who isn’t?!), Marcal doesn’t have the “green premium” often attached to earth-friendly brands. In fact, Marcal Small Steps typically sells for less than traditional paper goods that are made by cutting down trees and often contain dyes and fragrances that Marcal doesn’t use.

To celebrate Earth Month, we’ve created a calendar of the many ways you can help the environment with your own “small steps.” We hope you’ll visit our Facebook page and download this Marcalendar with some great ideas for getting a little more green this month and beyond! http://tinyurl.com/ykdm6cd

Small Steps paper products are:

100% premium recycled paper
Hypoallergenic
Virtually Lint Free
Free of Dyes and Fragrances
Manufactured without Chlorine Bleaching
Inner core is made from recycled paper

To receive a coupon and join the Marcal Movement head here to get more details. Price Chopper supermarkets carry these items. To find a store near you head to the store finder.

What we thought:

Marcal sent us a package that contained bath tissue, facial tissues, paper towels and napkins to try. We have already started to use the bath tissue. I must admit, I am a toilet paper snob. I do not use generic store brands since we have not found one that meets up to my standards. For the most part, I am loyal to a particular kind, unless sales woo me another way.

I was a little skeptical about using a recycled paper product for this manner. When I took the roll of toilet paper out of the package, the first thing I noticed was it felt similar to the toilet paper that we usually use. It felt a little different to the touch, but nothing drastically different. It was certainly not anything that my children and husband noticed. The roll was similar in size to our other rolls. It did a nice job doing what it is supposed to do, I was very pleasantly surprised. The other item I noticed, the roll seems to last longer than our other rolls. Seeing how many trees we could save with toilet paper alone, we will looking to see if the stores near us actually carry this for future use.

Given how we liked the bath tissue, my family will continue to try the rest of the products in the coming days and I will report back here.

Giveaway:

Thanks to Marcal Small Steps, one lucky reader will win a package similar to mine that will contain samples of their new products for your home.

Rules for Giveaway:

MAIN RULE – Answer the following questions: What is a "small step" that you will take beyond Eath Day to help our environment?
1 Bonus Entry – Which Marcal Small Steps product are you most interested in trying and why?
1 Bonus Entry – Tweet about the giveaway on Twitter. Be sure to include @TheAngelForever and Marcal Small Steps Earth Day Giveaway in the Tweet. Please leave a direct link to your Tweet in a separate comment for each daily entry. Example Tweet (feel free to use): Earth Day Giveaway! Win Marcal Small Steps products from @TheAngelForever to try with your family http://bit.ly/cu434Z
1 Bonus Entry – Subscribe to my RSS feed (or let me know if you already are) in a separate comment.
1 Bonus Entry – Leave a comment on any of my non-giveaway posts from the month of March/April. Be sure to leave a comment here to let me know which one. This Bonus entry may be done only twice per person.
1 Bonus Entry – Enter any of my other current giveaways (keep checking back – more being added all the time). Be sure to leave a comment here to let me know which one.
3 Bonus Entries – Add my blog button to your website and leave a link with the location. Be sure to give yourself 3 comments for credit.
5 Bonus Entries – Write a post on your blog linking to my blog about the giveaway. Be sure to leave 5 comments about this to get credit for all of your extra entries.

To enter, please follow the rules above within the comment section. Contest starts today April 22 and ends at 10:59 EST on May 6, 2010. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using random.org and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. residents only.

Disclosure: I received the Small Steps products complimentary of Marcal to facillitate this review. No other compensations was given. The opinions expressed in the review are my own feelings about the product that my family tried. The giveaway is also made possible thanks to Marcal.

Categories:
giveaway Product review shopping

Passover shopping at Price Chopper

Posted on March 23, 2010 11:40 am by TheAngelForever

In less than a week, my family will be celebrating Passover. Thanks to that, this time of year can be quite hectic. TechyDad is in the midst of transforming our kitchen. It is time to get rid of our chametz and have only Kosher for Passover items. He cleans everything out, quarantines off non-Passover food, and will switch out our Passover pots and pans. This takes a lot of time and patience to do. Something that I really do not have a lot of – especially with everything else going on.

In addition to this, we have to shop for Passover food items. During Passover, we do not eat leavened foods and must make sure that meats, dairy and food other than fruits and vegetables are marked Kosher for Passover. In the past, this was a lot more difficult. As a child, I still remember going to the store and only seeing Matzoh and a few other items (like candy, cookies and cake) on the shelves. Over the last 5-10 years, this has changed drastically. Stores have started to carry a lot of different Passover foods. In the past, there may have been only an end cap at a store containing Passover food, now some stores have multiple aisles.

On Sunday, we went to two different Price Chopper stores in a search for some last minute Passover items. We needed Passover yogurt and cottage cheese. When we arrived at the second store, I decided to take out my camera and ~~freak out the store~~ share our adventure with you.

When we unsuccessfully finished looking for the yogurt (Dannon Naturals w/ Kosher for Passover stamp on them) and Price Chopper cottage cheese for Passover, I took out my camera. As we went around the corner, we were immediately met by the two large displays of Passover ready made cakes and cookies. It looks like a lot, but was not the only area with these items. When you go and look at the candy section there are more cookies, marshmallows, gum, and fruit snacks along with other items.

From here, we went down the frozen food aisle. Almost half of the kosher frozen food section was filled with food for Pesach. I remember just a few years ago when there was just a small section of items. Now, you can find Dr. Pragers fish items (great for our kids), Meal Mart items including stuffed cabbage, vegetable soufles and much more.

Meanwhile, I was getting looks from some people. Not anyone in the store. No, my two year old was not a happy camper. This was his second grocery store of the day and he was tired and wanted to leave.

On the other side of the aisle were spices, baking goods, canned items and boxed mixes. This year we are trying not to buy much if any of the packaged items. We want to try to limit these to only things for an emergency and focus on making healthier options.

Of course, there was a lot of Gefilte Fish and tuna. Check out the price on Kosher for Passover tuna – Oy!

Then, we moved to the last aisle. Here, we found apple sauce, canned fruit, dried fruit, nuts, juices, soda and of course lots of Matzoh.

Across from here was the butcher counter. Check our options (try not to collapse from the prices of kosher meat – thus the reason we are almost vegetarian at home). We picked up some of the Kosher Valley turkey to try. While I was at the Price Chopper blogging event a week ago it was suggested that we try this over the Empire turkey.

In addition to this area, there was another large container with turkey and other meats for Passover time.

Aside from the yogurt and cottage cheese, we only need fresh fruits and vegetables for Passover. Pretty much everything else is set, unless we want to try baking on our own.

So, will you come help us organize all of this for Passover now? Please. . . I am willing to beg here! For more posts about Passover from the past click here.

Disclosure: This shopping trip was a family adventure that was to Price Chopper for our Passover shopping. I decided to share our pictures to allow others to see how the world of Passover food shopping has changed. I received no compensation from Price Chopper and only wonder if anyone saw me with my camera while shopping.

Categories:
food glorious food holidays jl looking back photos shopping TechyDad vent

Price Chopper hosts a Cook’s Ham blogging event

Posted on March 17, 2010 8:18 am by TheAngelForever

Long time readers are probably wondering: what is a nice Jewish girl that keeps kosher at home going to a blogging event about Cook’s Ham? Well, this blogger likes to support New York state businesses like Price Chopper grocery stores. This blogger is also trying to avoid Walmart because of something that they support in education that I am 110% against (story for another day).

A short time ago, Price Chopper announced on their Facebook fan page that they were looking for Mommy blogger to come to their first ever blogging event. Hello! Christina from CutestKidever and I quickly signed up and made contact with people from Price Chopper on Facebook and Twitter. I was excited to see what they had in store. Today, we learned that Price Chopper is branching out and trying to do more with social media. They are represented on Twitter, Facebook and reading blogs out there that mention their stores. Thanks to Cook’s ham, they decided to take the plunge and sponsor a Mommy blogging event at one of their stores.

Let me begin by saying that I went into this event with a completely open mind. I had no real idea what to expect. I knew that I would meet new people, learn about Cook’s Ham and hopefully have fun in the process. All of this was accomplished and so much more. As a person that keeps kosher at home, but has eaten and does eat pork products on occasion I did not think that I liked ham. I was not sure if I was going to try something – in the end I did (sorry to my relatives, but you know seafood also calls me when out).

I met Christina outside of the Price Chopper store. When we walked in, we were greeted by Liz and Heidi from Price Chopper. They were so sweet and knew us from Twitter. They could recall several of my Twitpics of items and knew that I had been Passover shopping recently. We also met the two women from Cook’s that would be doing the demonstrations and sampling of their products.

We sat down, looked at everything and then noticed something on the wall. Price Chopper has free Wifi in their food court. . . . sweet! Of course, we did not know this and never thought about bringing our computers to the event. I know I never would have kept up, but Christina is an amazing live blogger (saw it in person at Disney Social Media Moms Celebration last month). Several of us Tweeted during the event. @CutestKidEver and I used #CooksHam to make it easier to follow along. Here is a view of things in the food court area that held the event:

As I sat down with Christina and waited for other bloggers to arrive, I looked at the agenda for the Cook’s Ham Blogger Conference.

Introduction and Welcome

Meal Preparation Workshop

Spiral Sliced Ham

Ham carving demo

Recipe demo and tasting

Looking forward to Leftovers

Ham 3-ways

Grilling Ham Steaks

Shopping Cart Challenge

Group Discussion

Adjourn

Faith from Cook’s Ham introduced herself and explained about their products. Next, all of the people from Price Chopper were introduced. I even met the person in charge of buying all meat for the stores, including Kosher items – score! Kim and I chatted a lot about things during the event. After this, the nine bloggers, including myself, went around and told everyone who we are and why we started blogging. It was nice seeing many people that I had met online. From here, Faith started the demonstration on how to carve a spiral ham:

As someone who has never cooked a ham, and probably never will, I learned a lot. I did not know that you had to cut around the bone and slice it. I also learned that a lot of people have a hard time knowing how long to cook a ham. Eventually it was taste testing time. Here are some of the items that were given out to try:

From top right down to top left and down:

Slice of the Cook’s spiral ham
Piece of ham steak
Pasta salad with ham pieces in it
Panini sandwich with ham, cheese , olives and roasted red peppers
"Ham Tacos" – Crescent rolls with dijon mustard, ham, provolone cheese, and apple

Before we knew it, they were giving everyone a challenge of our own. The mission of sorts was to shop in the Price Chopper store and spend under $100 to supplement a ham to plan a list of meals. These included brunch/dinner, school lunch, after school activity, pot luck dinner, family game night and breakfast. Being the non-ham eater in the group, I opted to be paparazzi and follow Christina around to take photos as she planned her menu on the run.

The challengers were going to be awarded in three areas (1) Most Value (2) Most Creative and (3) Easiest Meals When the time was up, everyone went back to the food court area to present their meals. Let me tell you, I heard some amazing ideas. I especially loved the ones that really thought about kids and families and how they would be eating the items. There were items that I know I can switch up and even make in our kosher kitchen. I would love to link up to other bloggers at the event. If you were there, PLEASE leave me a note and I will add in a mention for you. Here are some photos of my fellow bloggers enjoying the afternoon event:

When we were wrapping things up, Maureen Murphy from Price Chopper came to let us know about new projects that Price Chopper is working on. I know that we will be signing up NHL for the Kids Cooking Club with Jodie Fitz. This program launched in September 2009 joins the Fuel AdvantEdge and Tools for Schools that are very popular in areas with Price Chopper stores. Price Chopper will also be launching tips very soon about healthy Easter basket options for kids and more fun cooking projects to do with your family.

Before I knew it, the three hours was up and it was time to head home. Here is my shopping cart as I left Price Chopper.

I know I look forward to many more events at Price Chopper! More items to share soon and a giveaway associated with the event as well.

Disclosure: Cook’s Ham and Price Chopper invited me to be a part of this blogging event. I did not pay for this, nor was I paid to go. I was not asked to blog about this, but wanted to share my experience with my readers. The opinions expressed in this are my own. I was not compensated, but did receive sample items, some groceries and flowers from Cook’s Ham and Price Chopper.