Free Veggie Tales Christmas Album!

Click here to get this fun mp3 Veggie Tales Album called
The Incredible Singing Christmas Tree for free from Amazon!

  

Free Holiday Magazine...

Looking forward to looking through this...  A free digital copy of the holiday 2010 Old School House Magazine!  

Blessed with 2 more kiddos! :)

Hi Bloggy Friends!  

Thanks so much for stopping by! It seems like forever since I've been in blog world...  If you were wondering where we've been, it's been a little busy at our house as we have been adjusting to having and loving 2 precious (foster) kiddos... bringing our kid count to 4!  We're finally back..stay tuned for more fun products, kid projects, reviews and freebees coming soon!

Walls That Welcome: Celebrations Special

Receive a FREE $15. Gift Certificate
On any order of $75. or more when placed before April 30, 2010. Place your order online at:

http://wallsthatwelcome.uppercaseliving.net

then send an e-mail with

Spring Celebrations Special

in the subject line to wallsthatwelcome@gmail.com
Include your name, phone #, and how you found out about this Special in your e-mail.

You will receive your Gift Certificate
in about two weeks.


Walls That Welcome: Celebrations Special

Build And Grow workshop this weekend!

We LOVE these Build And Grow workshops sooo much!  The suggested ages for these projects are 6-10 years, but we have been doing them with our kids since they were 3-4 (with extra help).  This week Saturday (4/10/2010) starting at 10AM you can build a wooden baseball game.  On Saturday (4/17/2010) you can build a see-through planter for mothers day.  Click here for details and to sign your children up for free!

Easter Egg Dye T-Shirts

Ever wonder what to do with that Easter egg dye when you're done coloring eggs?

 

We decided to tie-dye t-shirts... First we sectioned the t-shirt randomly with rubber bands.

Then we spooned the left-over egg dye onto the t-shirts until they were completely soaked with bright colors.

Removed the rubber bands and hung them up to dry...

We love how they turned out!

**We used PAAS brand Easter egg coloring.  Be sure to place them in the dryer for several minutes and/or iron them to make the color more permanent.

build a butterfly house

We can't wait to build butterfly houses this weekend at Home Depot!  These kid workshops are super fun and free! Your child will also receive a Home Depot apron and a project pin!  Workshops are from 9am-12noon on Saturday, April 3rd, while supplies last.

Looking forward to hanging these in our garden!

JumpStart World Winner!

Congratulations Hannah!  You're entry was chosen via Random.org to win the giveaway...a 3 month family membership to JumpStart World! 

Everyone else, thanks for entering!  Click here to log on and try JumpStart World for free...

JumpStart World Review and Giveaway!

Pros:

Great learning tools cover a wide range of subjects; exciting, attention-getting, complex, cool graphics; several learning levels; incentives; fairly priced

Cons:

Cool graphics and entertainment “fluff” take time to load and can even distract from educational objectives; no parental controls; no progress assessment tools for parents/teachers.

Summary: If you are not looking for a full curriculum but an excellent and wide-ranging unstructured and entertaining supplementary learning tool at a decent price, you'll love Jump Start World!  You can join JumpStart for free limited access to learning games...or become a member and get access to TONS more learning games and rewards... 

Full Review: My kiddos and I were very excited about the opportunity to review Jump Start World by Learning Adventure!  Although we use books, workbooks and lots of hands-on learning materials in our home, computers seem to be one of our favorite and most effective learning tools. 

If you've never seen Jump Start World online, it's a seemingly endless virtual world full of fun learning games for kids.  Story Land is geared towards preschoolers ages 3-5. Adventure Land and Marine Land are geared for ages 5-8, and Future Land is for ages 8-10. My kids have been exploring all of the "lands" not necessarily in their age group, and have barely scratched the surface!  There is sooo much more to explore.

You start out by creating a completely personalized avatar called a "Jumpee" and naming it.  My “spicy” little girl that just turned five was delighted that she could make her "Jumpee" have purple pig tails and put a flower in her hair!  She named her Jumpee "Julia Sparklewing".  "Kyle Firewing" is a Jumpee that was created by my fun six-year-old boy and is sporting a "fast-looking" flight suit.  

Enter JumpStart world and your child will be welcomed by cute animal friends with instructions and ideas on where to play.  The landscape in this world is colorful and creative and is decorated to match the current holidays and seasons.  Playing learning games earns virtual coins that can buy pets, new clothes for your Jumpee, as well as other things to decorate and personalize their "world".  “Kyle” loves earning coins to buy pets and pet accessories.  “Julia” loves earning coins to buy furniture and decorations for her virtual room.

These learning games cover a huge spectrum of different subjects... Math, Reading, Language, Spelling, Art, Music, as well as how to be a good friend, good sportsmanship, and caring for pets. “Kyle” is doing great with the spelling and math games in the“IQ actionizer” in Future Land. 

There are also parent content pages, parent forums and the Jump Start Blog.  The Blog has articles about new aspects of Jump Start World as well as hands-on family learning activities, recipes and projects to do together.

The site is so vast that I am not sure of anything that is missing, except the following:

• I found myself wishing for comprehensive parental/teacher controls to be able to direct a child to a specific learning activity, or to put a timer on their play time.  (My kids love playing soooo much that we often have to set the timer to keep them from playing all day or to give their sibling a turn.) 

• Wouldn't it be wonderful to see a “Land” in Jump Start that teaches foreign languages? 

• It would  also be nice to be able to access a progress assessment for my children. 

Overall, a very attractive package for a good price, but you need to keep your kids on task if you want them to get something out of it besides entertainment!

GIVEAWAY!  

Now for the fun part... Jumpstart is giving away a THREE MONTH family membership to Jump Start World!

**To win, just enter one or all of the following ways below and leave a comment for each entry.**  A winner will be randomly chosen on March 31^st and notified by e-mail. 

1. Click here and visit the “About Jumpstart” page.

2. Become a follower of Be Blessed, Fan Be Blessed on Facebook, or Follow on Twitter.  (1 entry each)

3. Post a button on your blog and post the link in the comments (3 entries)

4. Visit the Jumpstart Blog and tell me what you think...

5. Post this giveaway to facebook, twitter and/or your blog (3 entries each)

Bonus:  Leave comments about what you would like to see your child learn in Jump Start World. (Enter as many times as you like! :)

Happy Entering!

Disclosure: I was provided with a JumpStart membership at no cost by Knowledge Adventure in order to test the products’ abilities and give my own personal opinions on it. The opinions I have given are mine and may differ from others but were not influenced by the company or the free product provided.

Friday Blog Hop...

Free Pretzel Day at Auntie Anne's!

 

On Saturday Feb 20th, from 10am-3pm, Auntie Anne's will be giving away a free original or cinnamon  and sugar pretzel!  YUM! We'll be there! :)  Click here for more details on Free Pretzel Day! 

Burt's Bees Toothpaste Sample

Click here to get a free sample of Burt's Bees Natural Toothpaste!

Big Green Alligator Review

We LOVE music in our house!  We were delighted to receive Big Green Alligator by accustic/pop artist La La Lisa to review! :)

La La Lisa has a lovely mixture of upbeat kid-friendly songs about everything from silliness and monkeys to family and faith!  K, my happy six-year-old, said he thought the "My Little Brother" song was really funny!  J, my dancing 5 year old, said she likes the Big Green Alligator Song and the Count Down Song.  In addition to being silly and fun, the messages in the songs encourage kids to ask questions, to get along with each other and take pride in their work.  They also talk about the love, faithfulness and creativity of God.

Lisa will be donating a portion of her album proceeds to a charity called Teen Mothers Choices International, a program that allows volunteers from local churches to provide a support system for teen mothers to help them to further their education and learn how to be good moms for their babies.

If you are looking for something light-hearted and fun with a good message for your kids to sing and dance along to...I recommend this CD!  Preview the songs on this CD or order the mp3's individually here.  To order the CD visit Blue Myrtle Kids.

This was not a paid review.  The CD was sent by The Adams Group for review. 
Be Blessed's Disclosure Policy

Marriage Partnership

Marriage Partnership use to be an awesome magazine full of articles and stories on marriage, parenting, relationship, sex, and financial advice, etc...you name it... Now it is all on line, and you can subscribe to their on-line newsletter here for free! Check it out!

Twitter...

Finally I am fully socially networked :)  Follow me on twitter for great reviews, deals and giveaways...as soon as I figure out how to post them! :-D

Valentines Day French Toast Bake with Raspberries

Ingredients:
1 loaf bakery French or Italian bread
1 pkg low fat cream cheese
Small jar of raspberry preserves

8 eggs
1 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
2 Tbs Sugar

Frozen or fresh raspberries
maple syrup
whipped cream

Directions:
1. Make "sandwiches" by spreading cream cheese and raspberry preserves generously between slices of bread.

2. Slice sandwiches into cubes and pile into a 9x12 glass baking dish that is greased with butter.

3. Beat eggs, milk vanilla and sugar together.  Pour mixture over cubed sandwiches and mix till bread is well  covered in egg .

4. Bake at 350 for about 30 min or until golden.
 Serve with raspberries, maple syrup, and whipped cream on top.

Michaels Coupons!

Feeling creative?  Click here to print some great coupons for Michaels valid Feb 9st-Feb 14th 2010... Visit the Michaels website for lots of Valentines Day projects and craft ideas.

Finally Facebook...

Be Blessed has a facebook page at last!  Now all I need is a few fans! ;) Twitter is coming soon...

Be Blessed!

Promote Your Page Too

A few great bloggy giveaways this month!

Hope you are all having a happy January so far!  I thought I'd share a few fun giveaways I've found just from surfing around...even though I want to win! ;) Check them out...  Are you hosting a giveaway, or know of another good one this month?  Post them in the comments here so we can all enter!
Happy entering!
Click here for a chance to win a $25 Walmart gift card!

Click here to enter to win a Safe Sippy, or Safe Sporter kid cup that is BPA and chemical free!

Enter here to win an adorable flower headband and tutu for your preschooler!

Enter here to win a "Mop Top Hat"...

Read here  how to enter to win a Natural e Green gift pack full of organic bath things worth $125.   *This site is also donating a portion of their proceeds to an orphanage in Haiti this month!

Enter here to win a Parazul handbag!

Win An Uppercase Living Rebate!

To celebrate the new catalog coming out on Jan. 6th, Walls That Welcome is offering a $10 rebate challenge!  Find your favorite thing in the new catalog and be the first person to e-mail it to Walls That Welcome on Wednesday, Jan 6th and win a $10 rebate!  View details here.

Staples deals this week...

Check out the Staples Ad this week for freebies and tons of $1 deals!
Free after Easy-saver rebate this week include:  Pentel HyperG Retractable Gel Pens, Scotch Pop-Up Desk Grip Tape Dispenser,  and Heavy Duty View Binders!

Michael's Coupon

Create a new account here and receive a 50% off coupon at Michael's for any one regular priced item, and also receive more coupons to your inbox!