MamaBlogga

As part of a blog tour, I read Lost and Found by Carolyn Parkhurst. The novel follows the adventures of the contestants in a reality television show somewhat along the lines of The Amazing Race. The two main characters are a mother and daughter team, but the book is also narrated from the view points of several other characters, including the “ex-gay” Christian couple (who are using the show to promote their “ex-gay” ministry).

The book looks at the intricacies of parenting through traumatic situations, the nature of reality, what it means to keep a secret and the definition of shame. It also deals with the “reality” of reality TV. I know I wondered several times if Parkhurst had even been on one (nope). The changing of narrators every chapter in a way also reminded me of the way that reality shows have to jump from story line to story line.

Like Christine at The Bean Blog, I rooted for the “ex-gay” couple not necessarily to win the game (I was very pleased with who won the game!) but because I really believe that their characters largely represented how difficult it would be to choose to leave a gay lifestyle. They didn’t instantly change; they still worked on it every day. And like Christine at The Bean Blog, I was terribly disappointed when, as she put it, “when they couldn’t be true to themselves.”

It was a very fast read—I read it in two days and it’s nearly 300 pages long (and I have a part time job and a small child, so I thought that was pretty quick). It’s good for a fast summer read. Oddly enough, after finishing (though I was glad to be through), I wanted to know what ended up airing on the show (the book ends soon after the end of taping).

(I would be remiss if I didn’t warn you that there are a couple of scenes I considered quite graphic and it’s definitely not something you want your kids reading!)

My husband and I have a tough time keeping track of all our receipts.  To be honest, while we’re quite conservative financially, we don’t really keep track of where our money goes.

NeatReceipts Scanalizer is a nifty little device designed to scan your receipts to your computer and store that information.  For us, it would help us with groceries and budgeting as well as keeping track of my work expenses.

Unfortunately, it’s a bit on the pricey side (almost $200).  Fortunately, 5 Minutes for Moms (you remember them from our interview, right?) is giving away 10 of these babies to their lucky readers.  To enter, you have to comment on the giveaway post and either blog about it or, if you don’t have a blog, forward the post to two friends.

I’ve entered; have you?

Rating: ***** (5 stars: A great product/I’m truly impressed with this product/My child truly loves this toy)
Brand: LeapFrog (Learn & Groove)
Product name: Learn & Groove Musical Table
Age range: 6-36 months
Gender-specific?: no

Description: This educational toy is a square table. It has removable legs, so you can set it on the floor for children who can’t pull themselves to standing or stand supported yet. It has nine “stations” or instruments. These stations include buttons, slides, piano keys, spinning rattles and other toys. There are two modes (music and words), and each station makes a different set of sounds in the two modes. There are also two volume levels and English/Spanish modes.

Child’s interaction: He loves this toy! It can entertain him for 10-15 minutes (and sometimes longer). We can play with it together, which can sometimes be difficult with these types of toys. He’s had it for five months now and he’s never really lost interest in it.

Does the product require assembly? Batteries? Yes, you have to put the legs on it. It requires 3 AA batteries.
Did you receive this product as a gift, purchase it new or purchase it used? We purchased it new.

If purchased, where did you buy it? Target
Approximately how much did you pay for it? Around $40.
Did you consider this a good value at the time of purchase? I had hoped it would be a little less, but we had our heart set on this toy. Our son had already played with it at friends’ houses and we knew he’d like it.
Do you now consider this a good value? Yes.

Rating: ***** (Meaning: A great product/I’m truly impressed with this product/My child truly loves this toy)

Would you like to purchase this toy? Buy it online at Amazon today!

Okay, okay, I’m not jumping on the bandwagon, but this is the first post of my product reviews category. Don’t worry, I’ll keep them out of my feed and off my front page (unless you ask otherwise), other than the occasional really cool post. This is one of those.

---

This is a little bit hard to admit, since I really don’t want you all thinking that I’m the dirtiest person ever. It’s a long story (in fact, it started about the same time I started to blog), but the basic plot is that our old fridge slowly died. Who knew it would take two weeks to get a new one? Luckily, we had a minifridge from Ryan’s apartment days (and a kind neighbor with a deep freezer).The minifridge was our only fridge for almost a month. And it was good to us, but once our new fridge arrived, we were not good to the minifridge. We transferred our food out of it and then just left the dirty minifridge to rot.And rot it did. After 10 months, you can’t imagine what it smelled like. I’ll show you what it looked like, but please don’t think less of me!

So, there’s this Bounty One Sheet Challenge Contest, and I figured, hey, I’d like a $30,000 kitchen (even if it would make it hard to move away)—that’s the grand prize for 100-word “Challenge” stories entered before Saturday. So I gave it a shot.

Unfortunately, it took more than one paper towel to eradicate the quarter-inch-tall mold formations in my minifridge. Go look at that picture again: they’re in the crevices in the wall—they’re on the door shelves and seal, too. However, one paper towel did clean the walls, the wall crevices, the door, the door shelves, the rack shelf, the tiny freezer, the lid to the bin on the bottom (the dirtiest part) and most of the shelf behind it before it was just too wet and dirty to do any more good. It also held up incredibly—although it was soaking wet and really, really disgusting (did I mention this mold is probably deadly?), it probably could have finished the job.

I ended up using another paper towel, though, to clean off the bottom shelf and in and around the bin. On, and the door seals. Yeah, there was even mold there. Blech.

Let’s hope this makes little fridgie go to work with Ryan one of these days like we’ve been planning for the last two years.