Giveaways

Kids Bowl Free this Summer!

May 17, 2012 By Beth 2 Comments

What is Kids Bowl Free?

Kids Bowl Free is in 950+ locations in 46 states – plus Canada – and all offer any registered child two free games every day, all summer long (find the locations here). While there is absolutely no cost for children to participate, it’s easy – and affordable – to make it a frequent family event! The Family Pass was created to allow for adult familymembers to enjoy bowling throughout the summer as well. Starting from $24.95 and including 2 games per person per day for up to four family members, this makes bowling fun and frugal.

We love Kids Bowl Free. This is our third summer of participating. Yes, our kids are small but they love it. The kids bowl free and we buy the family pass to join in on the fun! It really is fun.

Our budget friendly tip: buy bowling shoes! I know this sounds pricey but if you more than one kid, it will pay off as you can pass the shoes down to the younger kids. Brian and I even bought our own bowling shoes. Mine are purple and I LOVE them! We don’t make it there every week but we find if we pick a day of the week to try to go that we get down to the bowling alley more. I can’t wait for this summer’s season.

Did I forget the best part? The bowling alley is air conditioned! When it is 110 degrees outside, we are having fun as a family inside … and not spending anything. Well nothing unless I cave and buy a bag of popcorn for me … no the kids …OK, I buy it for them with the intention of eating some of it!

Do you love bowling? We are super excited to offer TWO of our readers Family Passes.

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NOTE: We already purchased our Family Pass for this summer and were not compensated for this post. We love this program and wanted to share this family and budget friendly activity with our readers!

Filed Under: Giveaways, Promotional, Simply Family Tagged With: family pass, free bowling, giveaway, kids bowl free, Kids Bowl Free this Summer!, summer bowling

Coach Handbag Giveaway

May 16, 2012 By Beth Leave a Comment

Welcome to the Coach Handbag Giveaway Event!

Sesame Street Live “1-2-3 Imagine! with Elmo & Friends” – Charlottesville, VA #cville

May 15, 2012 By Beth 5 Comments

Sesame Street Live
“1-2-3 Imagine! with Elmo & Friends”
Charlottesville, VA; John Paul Jones Arena
Saturday, May 26 & Sunday, May 27, 2012

About the show …

Imagine singing and dancing with Elmo, Abby Cadabby, Big Bird and all your favorite Sesame Street Live friends! It’s as easy as counting “1-2-3 Imagine!” This high-energy musical will transport audiences to far away places as Ernie captains the high seas, Elmo dances to the rhythm of the African rainforest and Bert meets an octopus who has the blues. It’s a story of adventure and fun that teaches children they can be anyone, do anything and go anywhere with the power of imagination.

Details about the Charlottesville, VA shows …

Sesame Street Live is a larger-than-life, musical touring stage production featuring Big Bird, Elmo, Cookie Monster, Bert and Ernie…and more. Each performance is 90 minutes of singing, dancing and audience participation, including a 15-minute intermission. The perfect length for very young children!
• Tickets on-sale at the box office and all Ticketmaster locations.
• To charge by phone, call 800-745-3000.

• Ticket prices: $13, $18, $23, $28 (Gold Circle) & $50 (Sunny Seats).
• Group savings available. Groups 10+ call 434-243-4960.
• Get the ultimate fan experience with Sunny Seats! (The Sunny Seats Package includes a VIP Seat and a pre-show Meet & Greet photo opportunity with two Sesame Street Live friends.)
• Additional fees/surcharges may apply.

Performance Schedule

Saturday, May 26: 10:30 AM & 2 PM

Sunday, May 27: 1 PM & 4:30 PM

We are excited to offer a coupon code to our readers … $3 OFF EACH TICKET!

Sesame Street Live “1-2-3 Imagine! with Elmo & Friends ” is playing at the John Paul Jones Arena, May 26 & 27!
Use the passcode ERNIE at Ticketmaster.com to receive the special offer.
(Offer excludes Gold Circle & Sunny Seats. Not valid on previously purchased tickets. Cannot be combined with any other offer.)

We are also excited to giveaway a 4 pack of ticket vouchers to the Charlottesville, VA performance of your choice (dependent on ticket availability)!!

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Filed Under: Giveaways, Kids, Promotional, Simply Family Tagged With: Charlottesville VA, cville, giveaway, Sesame Street Live, Sesame Street Live Tour, Sesame Street Live “1-2-3 Imagine! with Elmo & Friends”, VA

Linksys EA2700 Wireless Router

May 10, 2012 By Beth 82 Comments

We recently had the opportunity to review the Linksys EA2700 Wireless Router (for the geeky ones it is the … Linksys EA2700 | Maximum Performance Dual-Band N600 Router with Gigabit).

Details …

High speed (up to 300 + 300 Mbps)
Extended range with MIMO antenna array
Gigabit Ethernet Ports for 10x faster wired speeds than Ethernet
Simultaneous dual-band to maximize throughput and help avoid network interference
Cisco Connect Cloud (Available summer 2012)- Get anywhere, anytime access to your home network from a browser or mobile device. Plus, optimize your online experiences with included apps.
Retail Price: $109.99

Our Thoughts …

We love Linksys products. Honestly all the way back to college when I ran the ethernet cord under the carpet and over my roommate’s door frame in that apartment so my we could be online at the same time, I have owned Linksys products. Man, wireless would have been nice back then! Now thankfully we aren’t running wires under the carpet, over door frames, or anything else crazy like that.

Here is our new Linksys EA2700 Wireless Router in use … sorry for the picture quality but I was NOT going to be the one to unhook it for a picture. As a result, you can see by all of the wires plugged into this right now that it is in high usage at our house right now!

Thanks to wireless technology, our router sits in the basement next to the desktop in the “office” area. We are able to hook up the laptop upstairs, the printer upstairs, the garage door opener (more to come on that!), our iPhones, my work laptop, the iPad, whatever we want to the internet! We love wireless needless to say. Now for the new Linksys router, I wasn’t sure what this router would bring us over our previous one but I knew the one had some vintage age to it so I was excited to the latest and greatest technology … my favorite feature of this router is the guest network. Yes, we have two networks in our house … our family network and the guest network. This is so great because when family or friends come over and want to jump on our WiFi with their smart phones, we can give them some funky password that isn’t our network password. I think we can have some serious fun with this guest password and see what we can get folks to type into their phones!;) I need some ideas though so more to come on that!

This would be a great Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, or graduation present for someone who is looking for an upgrade or maybe even starting on out on their own and needed to set-up their own space with a wireless network!

We are super excited to offer a giveaway with of the Linksys EA2700 Wireless Router to one of our readers! Yes, you read that right, you get the chance to win one of these!!

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Filed Under: Giveaways, Home & Garden, Promotional, Reviews, Simply Life Tagged With: dual network router, giveaway, Linksys EA 2700, Linksys EA2700 Wireless Router, review, technology, wireless rounter

OnePlanetglasses.com

May 8, 2012 By Beth 25 Comments

Last week, I had my eye exam. I should say yearly eye exam but I admit it only happen about once every two years. I gave in and scheduled this exam because my right eye has been blurry lately. Thankfully my eye ball (that is just so weird to say!) is in perfect health. Bad news is they had no reason for my blurry eye that I can still see out of so they are monitoring it right now. Eye health is so important. Did you know that some other health conditions can even impact your vision? An eye exam is so painless and yet so many of miss it because of our budgets. We need to remember to keep our health at the top of our budget.

After my eye exam, I talked to one of my coworkers about buying eyeglasses online. He was telling me how expensive his glasses are and how he only gets them every couple of years due to the cost. He sits at a desk on a computer all day and orders other stuff online but never thought about ordering his eyeglasses online. I explained to him it was cheaper for us to use our medical insurance for the eye exam coverage and then just pay for glasses online than to get the vision coverage my employer offers. He admitted that he had never done that math. He asked about the quality of cheap eyeglasses and I showed him mine that I bought online. I then told him about the glasses I had ordered for Brian earlier this year. I used an online deal to order Brian two pairs of glasses for about half the price of one pair at the eye doctor’s office! We use deals like this to stay on our budget and keep our vision the best it can be!

At Oneplanetglasses.com you can get a complete eyeglasses with prescription lenses starting at $27! You won’t see well know brand names but their lenses are made in the exact same labs as other well known brands! An added bonus to ordering online through this site is that a portion of each sale is donated to Unite for Sight to help get needy people prescription eyeglasses.

We really excited to giveaway a $100 coupon code which, in most cases, should cover the cost of a complete pair of prescription eyeglasses!

Plus we have a 15% coupon code that is BUDGET15.

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Filed Under: Giveaways, Health & Beauty, Promotional, Simply Life Tagged With: coupon code, eyeglasses online, giveaway, OnePlanetglasses.com

Announcing Nordstrom’s Gift Card Giveaway

May 8, 2012 By Beth Leave a Comment

Roofing-Directory.com

Filed Under: Giveaways, Promotional Tagged With: gift card, giveaway, Nordstrom's Gift Card

Gift Cards Rock

May 7, 2012 By Beth 86 Comments

Do you have someone in your family who is hard to buy a gift for? Do you just want to avoid shipping fees that seem to double the cost of whatever you buy online? Maybe you should look to buying gift cards. We don’t but gift cards often but those are two time that we do buy gift cards. Gift cards are a great option for Mother’s Day and graduations gifts! They are great to tuck into a card and drop in the mail. I have to admit that I still love the plastic kind instead of the you print kind … there is no rational reason why though!

Brian’s favorite gift cards are iTunes and Lowe’s. Mine tend to be any kind of store where I can buy shoes!

Thanks to the generous community at Gift Cards Rock!, we have a $25 iTunes gift card to one our readers!!

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Want more gift cards? Be sure to stop by these other great blogs to win from Gift Cards Rock!

Cocktails with Mom is giving away a $50 gift card to JC Penney’s
Oh Boy Oh Boy Oh Boy is giving away a $25 gift card to Applebee’s
What’s That Buzz is giving away a $25 gift card Applebee’s

Gift Cards Rock! is an online community for people who love to give and receive gift cards. It is an online community where you express your love for gift cards and share great deals and exciting gift-giving tips.

Filed Under: Giveaways, Lifestyle, Promotional, Reviews, Simply Life Tagged With: gift cards, Gift Cards Rock, giveaway, review

Fiberon – Kindle Fire Giveaway

April 30, 2012 By Beth Leave a Comment

The decking solutions company Fiberon is giving away a free Kindle Fire

(prize details)

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Filed Under: Giveaways, Promotional Tagged With: Fiberon, giveaway, kindle fire, kindle fire giveaway

4 Ingredients Gluten-Free Cookbook

April 26, 2012 By Beth 32 Comments

We recently received a copy of the 4 Ingredient Gluten-Free Cookbook and are excited to share a couple of the recipes with you!

Seeing that I had the review task for this cookbook, I went to the dessert section. The first recipe I tried out was the Peanut Butter Cookie recipe.

Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup crunchy peanut butter

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 egg

Preheat the over to 350 degrees F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. In a bowl, mix all ingredients. Using a tablespoon amounts, roll into small balls and place on the baking sheets. Flatten slightly with a fork, crisscross style. Bake for 10 minutes, or until a thin crust forms on the cookie. NOTE: These will harden as they cool.

My Thoughts: I love peanut butter cookies. These peanut butter cookies were really simple to make with what I had on hand. I admit I didn’t use crunchy peanut butter but went for the Skippy Natural Peanut Butter I seriously love. These are worth making again for sure!

Next up on the test list is the Flourless Chocolate Cake recipe!

Flourless Chocolate Cake

4 eggs, separated

1 cup superfine sugar

1 3/4 sticks (7 ounces) butter

8 ounces dark chocolate

Put a rack in the lowest position and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9-inch round cake pan with parchment paper. With an electric mixer, beat the egg yolks with 1/2 cup of the sugar. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until fluffy, then add the remaining 1/2 cup sugar. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until fluffy, then add the remaining 1/2 cup sugar, gradually beating until stiff peaks form. In a bowl set over a pan of hot water, melt the butter and chocolate, stirring regularly. Fold the chocolate mixture into the egg yolks. Fold in the egg whites. Scrape the batter into the cake pan and bake for 40 minutes. Serve warm or chilled.

I can’t wait to try this recipe since I have some baking time back in my life for a few weeks!

You can find this cookbook over on Amazon for a great price!
We are excited to offer one our readers a copy of this cookbook in a giveaway.

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Filed Under: Giveaways, Promotional, Recipes, Reviews, Simply Food Tagged With: 4 Ingredients cookbook, 4 Ingredients Gluten-Free Cookbook, cookbook, flourless chocolate cake recipe, giveaway, gluten-free, gluten-free cookbook, peanut butter cookies recipe, Recipes, review

Big G Curvy Straws

April 19, 2012 By Beth 61 Comments

Details …

Did you know that simply drinking the leftover milk from cereal bowls may help kids work towards fulfilling their body’s daily dairy, calcium, and Vitamin D needs? And what better way to slurp down to the bottom of the bowl than with the new Curvy Straws, available in-pack of specially marked boxes of Big G cereal!

Be sure to collect all six different colorful straws featuring beloved Big G cereal characters in participating Big G cereals including Cinnamon Toast Crunch® (17 oz.), Lucky Charms®(16 oz.), Reese’s® Puffs (18 oz.), Honey Nut Cheerios® (17 oz.), Trix®(14.8 oz) and Cocoa Puffs® (16.5 oz)!

PRINTABLE COUPON Details …

You can visit this link to download a printable coupon for $1.25 off of the purchase of (2) boxes of participating Big G cereal today!

Our kids don’t need another reason to drink the milk in their bowls but may yours do? I do have to say to take warning because those bowls are addictive! My kids like to fight over who gets that bowl. I love how flexible it is. And well the cereal … who can resist a box of Honey Nut Cheerios? I can’t. I still eat them … sometimes even without milk! shhh!;)

We are excited to offer one of our readers the same gift pack we received that will include …

1 box of a participating Big G cereal
1 Curvy Straw
1 ‘spilt’ milk bowl
2 glow cups
2 tangle toys

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Disclosure: The prize pack, information, and giveaway have been provided by General Mills through MyBlogSpark.

Filed Under: Giveaways, Promotional, Reviews, Simply Food Tagged With: Big G Curvy Straws, cereal, cereal printable coupon, giveaway, review

Kids Bowl Free this Summer!

Coach Handbag Giveaway

Sesame Street Live “1-2-3 Imagine! with Elmo & Friends” – Charlottesville, VA #cville