Ouiser's Freebie Round-Up 6/5/12

Ouiser here and I'm scouring the web today to find all the best freebies, samples and coupons for you! To start things off here's a PERFECT one for Father's Day:

Free Card (no shipping!) at Cardstore.com when you get to the check out after creating your Father's Day card enter "LUVDAD2" in the promo code spot and your card is FREE. I already created one for the Wee Man to give to Hubby and it should be here in a few days just in time for the 17th.

Free Wild Poppy Nourishing Cream from Bodycology

I LOVE Bodycology, especially the body sprays. I've never tried the lotions so I'm pretty excited to try this one out.

If your have furry friends try this pate topper from Meow Mix (they also send a 1.00 off coupon)
I've gotten lots of neat things from Start Sampling so anything they tend to offer is totally worth the few minutes it takes to fill out the forms.

(copy and paste this in your browser):
http://www.startsampling.com/product.iphtml?item=40376

Free Sample of 5 Hour Energy 

Okay why is this thing jacking up my text...seriously. Okay there we go. That took forever and a day...Anyway. I've received the 5 Hour Energy samples before and used them. Given my addiction to Monster Energy Lo-Carb though I couldn't actually tell you if they work or not. But, I work in a convenience store and we sell a metric assload of these and people swear by them. You'll get a random flavor but usually either Berry or Grape (I got lucky and got a Pomegranate one last time)

http://find-your-bliss.com/treatyourself.php

I just signed up for this one (I chose the dozy night dreams) so if I get it I'll obviously let you know how it goes.

Free Coupon for Small Sub with Purchase at Quiznos

I love Quiznos but haven't been in years. This offer expires on June 8th so don't delay.

AirCraft ScentSticks

I love smelly stuff (provided I'm not allergic to it), simply like them on Facebook and pick three scents to sample. I chose Night Orchid, Deep Wood and Summer Rain.

I will continue to look around today and see what pops up and post it on our FB page and here in bloggy format. Please note that I get a LOT of these links from other sources as well as my own personal research. In our next installation, I'll be sharing some of the freebie sites that I frequent.


xoxo
Ouiser
  

Tonight's Dinner: Delicioso

It's kinda Mexican. It's kinda awesome. It's Delicioso. =) Yea, my lame butt just came up with the name. So if you are looking for something scrumdiddlyumptious, try this out. =D

1. Take any thin cut beef...in the past I used thin sliced sirloin tip...today they had some thin sliced milanesa (i have no clue what it is other than beef, but it looks like it will be super tender!) on markdown, so that's what we are going with. there is 1-1.5 pounds of it...hopefully will feed 6 people and have some leftovers. Anywho, take your meet and cut it into strips roughly 0.5 in by 2 in...don't worry too much...just as long as it is fairly bite-sized, you are fine.

2. Toss your sliced up meat into a bowl. Top with a can of Rotel. I used original today. This recipe was originally created by throwing random things from my pantry together, so this marinade is just what I have tried. Originally I added, in addition to the Rotel, Frank's Red Hot and Tony Chachere's. Today I did Rotel, Frank's Red Hot, black pepper, and garlic powder. Just browse your cabinets and go with what feels right. Put saran wrap over the bowl and stick the whole kit'n'kaboodle in the fridge. Let it sit a little while...I think I let it sit for an hour the first time I made this. This time it will be in there 1-2 hours. If your meat is tough, let it go longer.

3. Get your pan smoking hot. Dump the entire contents of the bowl on in, juice, tomatoes, and all. Cook the meat until it's done, of course.

4. This next part is also a guideline of what I have done. Raid your cabinets and let your tummy and taste buds lead the way. What I do is take a 10 in whole wheat tortilla, heat it up, and spread filling on, then meat, then cheese. The first time the filling was black beans and brown rice that I had leftover from the other night. The cheese I used was Kraft singles. AND IT WAS DELICIOSO! Tonight I will be using black beans and refried beans as the filling and maybe some shredded cheddar cheese. The filling i usually cook in the meat's pan together when the meat is done.

Enjoy! Time for me to go wrangle the youngun and get to work on dinner.

<3
Truvy

Part 2: Friends

Yes, this seems like a strange topic to touch on in a money-saving series, but hear me out! When I was single, pretty much all of my money went into my friendships...gas, food, events, movies, shopping, you name it. While friends are amazing, they can be a huge financial drain. After I had Lil Bit, I had a friend in particular where everything it seems we did involved money.

Because of my personal experiences, I have found that friends that drain your bank account aren't always the best to have around for reasons other than budget concerns. If you can find a few friends who are more than happy to just come over and chat and do other free activities, chances are these will be the people you can count on in tough times also. But online friends can be even better.

When I was pregnant I joined a mommy website with a big community. One night when I was maybe 7-8 months pregnant I did a random "who's up and bored?" web chat with a bunch of girls, some of which I consider dear friends now over two years later. The lovely Ouiser is one of those dear friends. =)

We have been through a lot together. They are always there when I need them, and I return the favor whenever I can. After a life of having friends that always seemed to need a little more than friendship, this was big for me. I have a group of girls I can depend on without shedding a dime. If I ever do spend money on them it will be a grand meet-up vacation so we can finally see each other face-to-face.

I do have offline friends too, of course. After weeding out the toxic friends, I am left with a handful of people who "get it." Even if we rarely get to see each other, we can call each other up to chat and pick up where we left off a couple of months previous.

And I can't write a post about friendship without mentioning my hubby. =) He makes me laugh. He "gets" me and all my eccentricities, and he embraces them. We can have fun together just sitting home and playing video games or watching one of our shows. The other night we were watching "So You Think You Can Dance" and having a blast talking about the performances. Sometimes I can't stand him, but at the end of the day, he is my best friend. =p

So the point of this post...

Recognize when you are in a toxic friendship. If someone only wants to hang out when you have the money to do something, please examine that relationship to make sure they are really wanting to be there for you instead of looking for someone to do something with. If they understand that you can't go out to eat because you just paid rent or your electric bill without giving you a bunch of grief, that is someone you can benefit from having in your life.

Sometimes it is ok to be selfish. That was one of the biggest lessons in life that I had to learn. And when you are a mommy, you have to be selfish for your kiddo too.

Cherish the friends you can be your true self with without holding back...even the weird, gross, somewhat disturbing you. ;)

<3
Truvy

Let's Get Back To Basics

So we can be a bit unfocused...we apologize. Being the mommy of a terrible two drama queen is a tough job. But it is time we refocus a bit. To do that, we here at Champagne Mommyhood will be getting back to basic through a 10 part series inspired by our blog title. So without further ado, enjoy. =)

How To Have A Champagne Mommyhood On A Beer Budget

Part 1: Entertainment

Let's say you and your dearest have come upon the perfect storm....the stars have aligned and you actually have a day or night where you are both off work with no other duties...and someone is watching your offspring. *le gasp* Now, on a beer budget, how do we maximize our fun without emptying our wallets?

1. Movies - Nothing is nicer than watching an entire movie without having to worry about a short one burning down the house or maiming the cat. But that mess is expensive. How do we cut corners here? Make it a day date. Hubs and I had a wonderful day date on Tuesday. We went to the noon showing of "Chernobyl Diaries" and had a blast! By going to an earlier showing, we saved at least a few dollars. Another way to trim the cost...if the movie is showing in 2D and 3D, just go for the 2D. In my opinion anyway, 3D is very overdone right now..and since everyone is trying to get in on it, a lot of times it is just not worth the extra $3 per person. But if you have heard outstanding reviews for the 3D version and simply cannot pass it up, just go before 5PM (or whenever your local theater ups the price).

Now if you are looking to take your short one(s) to a movie, check the website (or box office/concession stand) of your preferred local theater for their summer movie schedule. One of mine will be doing a different movie a week, twice a week, for 9 weeks. Admission is FREE. w00t! My favorite of favorite words! And since the movie will be filled with other short people, noise coming from yours will be no issue at all.

2. Arcades, Bowling Alleys, Family Centers, ETC - After our movie on date day, Hubs and I went to the new bowling alley behind the theater. The prices are a bit higher than the other nearby bowling alley (and more than we were looking to spend) so we hit up the wonderful air-conditioned arcade instead. This arcade uses swipe cards instead of money or tokens. When you win tickets, they are deposited digitally onto your card also. We initially put $5 each on 2 cards, one for each of us. Since we had not been there before, we started small to get a feel for the place. After a round of fun, we decided to get another $5 each. I went over to one of those big prize drop games. This one was called Keymaster. You have to line up this "key" with the hole in a piece of plexiglass perfectly so it will pull on the plexiglass and release your prize...the prizes in this machine ranged from a few video games to a couple of iPads. I figured I would give it a shot to see how it worked. I ended up winning a $130 digital camera for my $1 investment! Hubs tried for the iPads and Kindle Fires, but neither of us could quite get them. So we moved on and played skee ball, this massive connect four game, and a few others. So the $20 dollars we would have spent on only 1 hour of bowling and shoes went into an hour or more of arcade games, a new digital camera, and toys for Lil Bit, which we used our tickets on. We maximized the fun while keeping the cost at a minimum. Putting just a little money at a time on the cards helped us not get carried away also. It's like, for me at least, putting $5 in gas in at a time versus filling the tank....the full tank makes me invincible and drive more than when I do just a little at a time.

I grabbed the price chart for the lanes...so maybe we will have a less expensive bowling option in the future. It never hurts to check in with even the pricier places to see when rates are at their lowest.

3. Parks - I am blessed to live an hour from the Gulf of Mexico (and glorious sugar sand beaches!) and about 10-15 minutes from Mobile Bay. There are also a ton of swimming holes dotted throughout my area, one about 5 minutes away. The bay does charge for parking seasonally, but I can go to our utilities board and get a free parking pass since I am a resident of the city. Otherwise it would be 8 bucks to get in. (Or a little polite sweet talking with the old guy manning the booth...a special thanks to him for letting me through for a friend's child's birthday party! I was upfront with him that I only had 5 on me, seeing as that was the first time I had seen someone manning the booth and had yet to get by the utilities board. Never underestimate the kindness of others, but never expect special treatment.)

Don't forget to check out your local playgrounds. In my little town we have a handful, so at least we have some options. The school I am hoping to send Lil Bit to in a couple years let's us visit and use their playground while we get a feel for the place too.

If you have a national park nearby, get a fee schedule so you can know the best times to go. Take a picnic lunch and spend a day in nature. The kids will sleep well that night for sure.

Kids+Playing+Sun=Happy restful night for mama...just keep the sun block handy. When you need a cheap way to wear the babies out, the outdoors is always one of your best bets. Lately Lil Bit and I have been going outside almost everyday to play with chalk and bubbles. We usually play in the water hose too. Even that little bit of play helps wear her terrible two-ness out. And she can play in the mud and get as dirty as she wants because I can just hose her off before we head inside...or just plop her straight in the tub.

4. Television - Heading back indoors...let's tackle the awful bills we accumulate so we can sit on our butts after bedtime and unwind...or so we can occupy the short ones long enough to clean the kitchen. Right now, I am so sick of our cable company that I could scream. Hopefully we can let them go soon. Once they are out of the way, we are planning to rely on Netflix and maybe Hulu through our XBOX 360. We can also browse YouTube through it and play DVDs. We may not see everything on the first run, but the money saved will be more than worth it...even if my husband is completely in love with the DVR. ;)

That's all I can think of for now, but if you have a topic you have not seen covered here, let me know in the comments, and I will add it to the list. Feel free to leave your own advice in the comments as well. =)

<3

Truvy

We KNEW!

     Ouiser here, and I feel a rant coming on.

     Now that the Mother's Day dinners have been consumed, the flowers are starting to droop a bit and the chocolate is starting to melt, let's get down to the nitty gritty here.  In the past couple of weeks, I've been reading the local paper at work (as usual) and on Sundays in the Life section(front page of it no less) there is a local columnist who is a relatively new mom herself.

     Now that's all fine and dandy, great! But she complains a lot. Or at least she has in the last two articles I've read of hers. Perhaps I'm just reading too much into it or making it out to be a bigger deal than it is. Sadly, the paper doesn't link to the article in question, but the gist of it is that the woman wants a vacation from her kid.

     She spends the entire column whining about how she wants to get away, doesn't want to be a parent for a day etc etc blah blah blah. This week she finally gets her way and spends Mother's Day AWAY from her child. Awww she feels SAD about this.

     Newsflash sweetheart. We KNEW what we were getting into the minute we saw that second line appear on the pregnancy test.  Your life is no longer your own. Sleep? Fuggetaboutit. Girls Nights Out? Goodbye! *unless you're like me, and never went on those ANYWAY, but I digress).  The point is. WE KNEW.

     There are no sick days, no vacations, no pay when you become a mommy.  If you have a spouse or a significant other, yes they will (theoretically) pick up the slack when you get sick, but guess what? Unless you're on your deathbed, YOU ARE STILL MOMMY and BABY will still need and want you regardless of whether you're sneezing, snotting, shitting or hacking your brains out. YOU ARE A MOTHER. Life doesn't stop just because you have popped a kid out of your hoo-ha and it doesn't go back to the way it was afterwards either.

     We KNEW this. For someone to whine and complain to get their way and then be all sad because they got what they wanted just literally makes me ill. There is a difference between venting and just flat out constantly complaining and then for all intents and purposes running away for a weekend which happens to be the very weekend you are celebrated BECAUSE you're a mom!

     Don't get me wrong, there are times that I'd love to just crawl into a hole with a blanket, a flashlight and a book and just be left alone.  This usually occurs when The WeeMan is showing his muscle in what we like to refer to as "99 Ways to Make Mommy Lose Her Schmidt'. This usually occurs right about the time I get home from work in the morning and he doesn't want to eat, doesn't want to sleep, wants to play play play, get into everything, bang on the walls with his toys. But the second he puts those chubby little arms around my neck and wraps those legs around me in a big bear hug, who cares if the floor is food covered and he's just stripped down to his diaper because he hates clothes? Not me.  He may drive me crazy at times but you know what?

     I wouldn't change that for the world.



    


     

Mommygasm: Defined

I got high tonight....on education. =)

In my hometown, where I still live, there is a magical secret which I have just unveiled...an Organic School. Not like crunchy, hippy organic...organic in the sense that every child is a unique individual. Their beliefs in childhood education mirror my own from learning through nature and doing to learning at their own pace.

I can already tell Lil Bit will learn by doing, much like myself. The kid just turned 2 in March, and she is already trying to sing the alphabet. She even gets it right some of the time, parts anyway. Like "ABC ABC ABC LMNO QRS ABC ABC Now I ABC ABC ABC ABC. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Thank you, thank you." Childhood prodigy I tell ya! Lol.

So I have dubbed my almost endless squeeing as a mommygasm. It was seriously like a high. I kept clicking different links on the school website looking for a bigger buzz. It's addicting. =) Luckily my sister came home, and I could force her to look at the website. That is the only way to come off a high that good. Bahahahaha.

And before I finish, here is an update on the bedtime front...SHE WENT TO BED AT 6:30PM TONIGHT and has yet to wake up. =D No tears, just some playing and reading and she snuggled in for a long summer's nap. Today was a day of win, really. Last night she fell asleep around 8PM, woke up about an hour later, went back to sleep about 30 minutes later, then slept until just before 7AM. We had breakfast, I tried to catch a few more winks, and then we went to the park and grabbed my Grandma's pants from the cleaners. When we got home we played on the porch and in the yard armed with sidewalk chalk, colored bubbles, and a garden hose. She had a blast. No nap, but we had an impromptu second lunch with my sister-in-law. After dinner we had another round of chalk, bubbles, and garden hose. Lil Bit got to run around in the front yard in her Applejack panties like a boss while she slung the garden hose around screaming "Got you! Got you!" at me. Then we both took a bath, put on jammies, and by 5pm, we were both ready for bed....of course, you see where I am now at midnight, but that is beside the point. Bahahaha.

And now, Mommy must head to bed to prepare for another potential 7AM wake up call.

<3
Truvy

Zombie Mommy

Sleep......it is so wonderful. So why on Earth does my child not like it anymore? She has been on the worst sleep regression of all time. Nap? No thanks. Go to bed before midnight? Psh, Mommy please. Oi. The worst days are when she doesn't take a nap at all...the lack of sleep causes her to want to stay up super uber late. If I can wrestle her into a nap, bedtime is a wee bit more manageable. But I have figured it out...if she isn't asleep before Tiana turns into a frog, naptime is hopeless. I was, however, able to get her to sleep before 9:30pm Sunday night. We will overlook the fact that the child who wakes up at 9am like clockwork usually decided to follow the advice of her jammies and get "up with the sun" at 6:40am. I blame my mom for picking out those jammies for her to wear that night. Lol.

But last night....was heaven! My sister-in-law asked if Lil Bit could have a sleepover. A choir of angels appeared as she asked. So when Lil Bit woke up from her noon-3pm nap, I took her on over. I actually got to rest! I made the most of it by having a red velvet cupcake and a glass (ok, maybe 3) of wine. Then I corralled my sister into a Bones marathon and junk food. It was marvelous! I even slept til noon today! Every Mommy needs a break like that once in a while. Especially during a 2 year old's unruly sleep regression. I'm picking her up tonight at 7pm...let's hope tonight is an easy one.

We are also potty training right now. Yesterday from about 7:30am-noon we went panties only. She has about 10 pair of panties. She peed in every single one...and 2 or 3 of them got peed in again after i did a load of laundry. But after the third accident, she start saying "Mommy help!" every time she got wet...so I will take that as progress. I think tonight I will make cookies so I can bribe her to actually go in the potty this time. Any tips and tricks are more than welcome. I keep her potty in the living room aimed at the TV in hopes it will help her sit still long enough to go. Hopefully Caillou can help us make some progress tomorrow.

And on that note, I bring you this...





I found it while searching for potty training videos. I want to put it on a CD so we can go down the streets ballin.

<3
Truvy