For The Girl -

Polly Pocket Set

Disney Princess Royal Tea Party Playset – Little H is still in the princess phase. We saw this playset while out shopping a few months ago and it stopped her in her tracks. When I told her we couldn’t buy it that day, she chocked back some tears. I can’t wait for her to see it…she’s gonna freak out! This playset from Mattel includes a castle, mini tea set and figurines.

For the Boy -

Tonka Chuck!

Tonka Chuck and Friends – If you didn’t see the Tonka Chuck Birthday Cake you might not know how much my little dude loves those funny faced trucks. But he does. If a commercial comes on tv he stops in his tracks and points. His sister had a few of the cars and he stole them from her at about six months of age. He’s just enamoured with them. So when I saw this Tonka Interactive Rumblin Chuck. I knew he’d love it.

For Me -

Shoe Heaven

Naot Shoes – the Kiss Wedge. You’ve heard me rave on about Naot shoes before, these are my fall pair and I wear them non-stop. They fit my wide feet and they are comfy and cute too. If you want a pair of shoes that can take you from jeans to your festive dressy outfit then these are your answer.

For the Man Child

Lego Star Wars – What geek man doesn’t love Star Wars? And Lego? I know mine does. And he’s loving this game we got him for his birthday…your Man Child will love it too.  It’s for the 3DS, he uses it when he’s on the road…or on the couch…or in bed…or, well, everywhere!

Really? Yup.

THE Cook Book – If your mom had written down all the tips she tried to give you as she taught you how to make basic meals they’d be in this book. ‘Cook’, is THE book that will teach you the basics of cooking for your family. And it’s full of recipes you can make with your kids. The author is big on making cooking time into quality time with your family. In amongst the wonderful recipes are tips on pretty much everything from buttermilk substitutions to menu planning. Get it.

*the shoes, Mattel playset and cook book  were provided to me in order to facilitate this post. Still, opinions on all items are true and my own.

Well, Coke has become so enamoured with the Polar Bears that have graced their holiday advertising that they’ve teamed up with World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and started The “Arctic Home” campaign.  By turning their iconic Red Cola cans white, they will help raise awareness and funds to support the WWF’s efforts to protect the polar bear and their Arctic habitat.

With nearly two-thirds of the world’s polar bears living in Canada, this Arctic species is an important part of our ecosystem and culture. Coca-Cola will contribute $2 million to WWF over the next five years, and through the “Arctic Home” campaign, will match consumer donations made by March 15, 2012, up to $1 million USD. Canadians can visit iCoke.ca to make their donation. Funds raised will go toward WWF’s conservation efforts to protect polar bear habitats – for their survival today and into the future.

“This campaign is about working together to save one of the most important places on Earth,” said Gerald Butts, President and CEO of World Wildlife Fund. “As sea ice continues to melt at alarming rates, polar bears and local communities alike are threatened. With Coca-Cola’s support, we can expand our reach and impact to help chart a sustainable future for this critical Arctic ecosystem.”

On iCoke.ca, visitors can explore, experience and learn about the polar bear and its Arctic home. They can watch video chats with WWF scientists, track virtual polar bear sightings, and make donations online.

You know, I’ve posted before about how much ‘stuff’ we have accumulated in this house and how I’m constantly trying to declutter. I know I’m not the only one who struggles with purging unused items from their living spaces. Maybe this year I’ll encourage people to donate to a good cause instead of buying me something that will sit in a closet or cupboard taking up space.

Aside from buying for the kids it’s getting increasingly hard to buy for my family members – nobody needs anything (we’re lucky to be so blessed!) yet every year I wander around the mall wracking my brain to find something they might like. I’m starting to think making a difference for our Canadian Wilderness might be a much better way to spend some holiday dollars.

Have you ever done a donation in lieu of a gift? Was it well received?

Wow, this has been a year let me tell you! I can’t believe my baby N is going to be ONE this month…and Thanksgiving is this weekend. I feel like I’m flying by the seat of my pants. Pretty soon I’ll blink and be wondering how it’s two days to Christmas and I have nothing done/bought/made. I’m so thankful for my family, for my husband’s new job, for my very good online friends who are quickly becoming offline friends. Our life is good. Hectic but good.

What are you guys making for dinner this Thanksgiving? We don’t really have any traditions yet for Thanksgiving but the whole Turkey thing seems overboard when it’s just the 4 of us. I don’t really enjoy a traditional ham so I’m thinking we might do a beef roast. I love a good beef roast! I’m going to read up at Urban Moms who’ve teamed up with Hunts to create Thanksgiving side dishes that are easy to prepare using pantry staples.

If you go to Urban Moms you can check out the recipes and comment on who created the best dish! The Potatoes Pomodori au Gratin look amazing and I think they’d go wonderfully with a beef dish.

When you comment at Urban Moms to let them know your fav recipe, you’ll donate Hunt’s tomato products to a local food bank and you’ll be entered for your chance to win a Slow Cooker prize package.

You all know how I worship my slow cooker and if you don’t have one you’ll want to go enter – it will change your life.  I’m not kidding!  We make chili in it on an almost weekly basis (Hunt’s tomatoes, some ground beef, onion, green pepper, chili powder, brown beans, kidney beans and voila!)

If you make one of the Hunt’s recipes from Urban Moms let me know what you thought of it.  I’d love to compare notes!

*** I’m a member of the Urban Moms Network and they asked me to share this contest with you.

My new loves from Naot Shoes!!

OVO is the story of a village of bugs who’ve come across a precious egg.  They squabble over it.  They worship it.  They celebrate it…all in bug fashion.  Well, not entirely in bug fashion because they are no ordinary bugs. No, they are trapeze artists and jugglers and tight rope walkers and trampoline trampers!

After seeing Kooza last year,I didn’t think much of anything could top it.  I was thrilled with it.  But then we saw OVO and it was just so…beautiful.  Not that Kooza wasn’t, but it was an entirely different show.  OVO has so much beauty all around it.  The costumes, the flowers in the set (which you can actually smell as they open) the acts…gorgeous.

Just take a look at the trailer…

There were plenty of oooooh and awwwwwweee moments but I have to say, I enjoyed the softer side of this show best.  The cocoon and butterfly, and the caterpillar (I think they were catapillars!) lovers were my favorites.  I also really loved the ants and their kiwi slices!

This was a family friendly show and if your kids are ok with a bit of drama (My little H is fearful of people in costume so it wouldn’t have been good for her) then by all means, take them.  My only warning is that it’s a bit long (for little ones…you know your child best.) so if you’ve got a squirmer you might want to find a sitter

Anyway, it was an amazing show and I’d recommend everyone go see it.  You’ll love it…I promise!

The shoes are freakin gorgeous!  I have a question for you though – I have hard to fit, large, wide feet.  How do the shoes wear?  Do you think they would fit my 10.5 (sometimes 11) wide width feet?

If they do, you’d have a fan forever because I have the hardest time finding shoes that are comfy and fit me.

I didn’t want to just say yes and then have the shoes arrive and not fit.  I didn’t want them to give me blisters like most shoes do because of fit and then feel like I had to write about them and how they might be the perfect shoe for someone else.

The rep suggested I head down to the store and try them on.  Normally, I don’t do run around work for an item I may or may not receive to review.  Maybe for a paid ad….but not usually on PR.  But I was intrigued and decided ‘what the hell, I’ll go and see what it’s all about.’

I tried on about 10 pairs.  Most of them didn’t work for me, they were too narrow.  The others that had adjustable straps, I wasn’t in love with the function ( I really wanted a slip on pair without buckles or snaps….SO much easier when trying to get out the door with kids)

But there was one pair.  One pair that had elastic in the right places and was the right look and that I could cram my foot into.

I took them home.

It was a very late start to summer so it was a few months before I really got to wear them.  I put them on and sighed…my feet must have swollen in the hot weather.  They were tighter than I remembered.  I stuffed my fat feet into them anyway and got to work on breaking them in.

Guess what?  Even though they were too tight I didn’t get a single blister.  It gave me hope.  I continued to wear them and each time I did they felt a little more comfy.  Each time I slid my feet into these sandals it felt like they were saying ‘Hi!  I remember you!  I think you could use a little more room over here….let me work on that for you.’

And they did.  The leather stretched.  The cork footbed gave way.  They became mine.

I walked around the mall.

I walked around the Filberg Festival.

I walked across rocks and driftwood and the beach.

I walked for over an hour down hill and then up again around our neighborhood.

I wore them to my parents’.

I wore them to my inlaws’.

I wore them to my grandmothers’.

I raved about them to my dad who needs custom inserts and these shoes allow you to take out the cork and replace it with your own footbed.

The shoes I was so hesitant to accept…so skeptical to love are now my very favorites.  When the weather gets cool, and the rain falls and I can’t go barefoot any longer I’ll be very sad to tuck these away until next summer.  But bringing them out again will be like having drinks with an old friend.  I’ll look forward to it all winter long.

First Glance

My FordTouch Console

The Ford Explorer we were given came equipped with a crazy touch control console.  It had a zillion options for heating and air conditioning (including heated/cooled seats.) It had an integrated GPS system.  It had a back up camera (in color!) It had integrated Sirius satellite radio.  It was crazy how many things you could fiddle with without even leaving the parking lot.

Keyless Entry

The first thing I enjoyed was the keyless system.  You put the keyfob in your purse and leave it there…then you grab your kids and all your junk and haul it out to the car. Without having to worry about fumbling with your keys as your kids wiggle out of your grasp the vehicle recognizes you and pops the locks.  Same thing with the ignition…just get in and push the button and you’re good to go.  As a mom, I loved this feature.  I do have some concerns about what would happen if your keyfob decided to go on the fritz or run out of batteries.  I guess you’d have to have a spare battery in your purse just in case.   While I loved it, not having a ‘real’ key kind of freaked me out a little.

Carseat Installation

The Explorer has a bunch of anchors for car seats.  You could easily fit 4 car seats in this baby – maybe even an extra booster too if you needed it.  I had no problem installing our seats in the center row (the model we had had two bucket seats in the center and I thought this was ideal.)

The Good

Stowaway Third Row seating

One of the reasons we bought a mini-van was for the third row of seats.  We don’t need them on a daily basis but when we have company from out of town we certainly DO need those extra seats.  However, pulling the rear bench seat from our van for extra cargo room is a HUGE pain in the rear.  I adored the folding stowaway third row the Ford Explorer features.  I’d have to say, if we owned one, it would be a feature I thanked heaven for over and over again.

Cargo Space

There was loads of space in here – more than I expected and while we tried, we didn’t come close to filling it to capacity.

Here’s a shot of what we crammed in, we could have fit a lot more had we organized and packed a bit better. Plus, you can’t see them but there are two large green garbage bags full of Christmas presents from well organized relatives and they took up a lot of room.  With this much cargo room it was nice not to have bags and stuff all over the passenger area.  We just had the diaper bag up with us.

Passenger Room

I also loved how spacious the general cabin area was.  Hubby and I are not tiny people.  We need leg room.  We need head room.  We need to be able to maneuver around comfortably and we had no trouble at all.  There was enough room to get past our front facing car seat to move around to the third row of seats.  I sat back there several times and had no problem getting in and out.  In fact, crazy as it sounds, baby N started to freak out while we were parked in the ferry line up and so I took off my seatbelt (we were parked) and crawled over the center storage hub, past the car seats and hung my butt on the folded back of the third row (talk about cargo space! haha!) so I could reach him and comfort him without having to take him out of his seat (it wasn’t safe to do so where we were parked waiting.)

The Bad

It wasn’t all perfection.  Even though I generally liked the Explorer there were a few things I want to mention that could have been improved.

Voice Activated GPS

While driving, the keypad for the GPS system is automatically disabled – it’s a safety feature so people aren’t trying to fuss with it while driving.  Fine.  But as a passenger I was annoyed that I couldn’t just type in our destination.  It forced me to use the voice controls.  And while that might be ok if they worked well, I found the voice controls were pretty fussy.  I mean, they mistook me saying ‘Tim Hortons’ for ‘Subway’.  SO NOT THE SAME.  Don’t they know a cup of timmies is essential to a road trip?  I mean, don’t you dare mess with suggesting Subway instead GPS lady!

I had this same issue with pretty much anything I tried to search for via voice command.  Honestly, I think hearing me fight with the GPS system was much more distracting  to the driver than it would have been if I could’ve just type in what I’d wanted.  Plus, there were plenty of other buttons that were just as distracting which were not shut down while driving.  While I loved having the GPS, I felt it could have been a bit easier to use.

Large Door Size

It appears everything on this vehicle was over sized and the doors were no exception.  I don’t know about you but NOTHING makes me madder than trying to get my kid in their seat if someone has parked a bit too close for me to open the door properly.  This is what I like about the mini-van.  As much as you might hate them, that sliding door has it’s benefits.

I guess you could just be super mindful of where you park but in the case of the ferry – it was very close quarters and we had barely enough room.  On the way there I had to pass the baby out the other side and crawl out after him.  On the way back – well, you can see the photo.  I’d say there was about 2 feet between our car and the truck that was next to us and we couldn’t open the door well enough to comfortably get the baby in his seat.  We managed…but it was still irritating.

Some Other Points of Mention

Fuel Usage

I was pretty surprised that the Explorer was so good on gas.  It was as good as or better (I’m leaning to better) than our mini-van.  For such a large vehicle, with so much power (it was awesome to drive through the mountains!) I expected to pay way more for our gas than we did.  For example – on the way out, we drove about 13 hours straight and it cost us about$125 worth of fuel.  We left town with a full tank and arrived in Comox with about a half tank after two fill ups along the way.  That’s pretty good considering the size of the car and how mountain driving can be hard on gas consumption.

Blind Spot Assistance / Reverse Camera

I liked how it warned me if I had a car in my blind spot.  That was a nice feature and I felt it functioned well.  Along the same lines, the rear view camera was just as handy and if you’re nervous about maneuvering such a large vehicle you’ll be happy to have these features.

Final Word

The Ford Explorer offers gadgets you didn’t even know you needed until you find yourself intuitively using them to make your trip safer and more enjoyable.  The spacious cargo area and passenger cabin will fit large families well and as a mom, there were many features I felt were built with me in mind.  Because I’m a ‘less is more’ kind of person, I felt that some of the gadgets were a bit unnecessary and worried about loss of functions if they went on the fritz (although, I didn’t see anything that made me think they would be ‘fritzy’. )  I really loved the amount of space in this SUV and while the large doors bothered me a bit, I’d say the benefits outweighed the negatives.  If we were in the market for a large family SUV, the Ford Explorer would land itself on our short list.  Overall I liked it a lot.

*thanks to Cesar Bistro for providing product to facilitate this post.

Santa!

A co-worker told me about this video service last year (thanks Mel!)  Sympatico has this amazing service where you can upload a picture of your child, input a few personal details like their age and what they want for Christmas and then it sends you an email from Santa.  Little H is absolutely enchanted by this and is asking to watch it over and over and over and ….well.

It only takes a few minutes to put together and it really is special.  Go check it out.  You can start making your own video at http://magicsanta.ca/ And you can watch H’s video here.