Life Proof Winner

I apologize this coming a week late.

Lets just say we have had the sickies around here for over week,

SOOOO over it.

 Congratulations Ashley. 

Email me with your address and choice of color and I will make sure your case gets out to you!

Hope you all have a wonderful Monday!

Happy Mothers Day

I hope each and everyone of you the most splendid of Mothers Days.

Even if you are not a mother, hope you are able to share the day with someone who is and express gratitude to them.

And just remember....

{I snagged this AWESOMENESS from Wit & Whistle}

PS
do not forget to enter to win a Life Proof Case.

Mom in the shot {Marriage Centered Family}

We are around six months out from celebrating 10 years of wedded bliss,

10 years of never fighting, always agreeing, kissing each others booties, and both of us being right.

Hold up, wait minute, thats not right.

Ok so maybe its been 10 years sprinkled with fights, agreeing to disagree, randomly not standing the sight of each other, and neither of us being right around 50% of the time.

But would I change that?

Nope.

Why?

 Because thats what makes us stronger.

We choose to take those moments and grow as a unit.

We do not hold grudges, well maybe there was that one week, but all the others we move on from.

My husband is my best friend.

He is the reason we are a family.

Without him in my life there would be no us.

Its so easy to get in the grind of your everyday and live for your kids.
But we are trying and trying hard to live for our marriage.
Living for our marriage will make not only make us happier, but our kids in turn happier too.
And please do not worry about my kids, they still get PLENTY of attention and lovin.
But for us to carve out the time for each other is important.
For instance this past Saturday, Hubs came to me and said "I am taking you to the movies tomorrow, I already bought the tickets and the kids are going to my Moms."



The fact that he took care of it and said I want to be with YOU, made my heart VERY happy.
I mean I am not sure about you, but I want my husband to WANT to be with me.

Another easy way for us to just be together, is randomly during the week we have couch dates.
Like the other night, I went and got gelatos, while he put the kids to bed.



Then we sat together eating our dessert and watched tv.
It was so nice to just be with him.
And yes it feels good to know that my man is still attracted to me after 12 years of being together.

Here is the deal, I am not sharing to preach our ways.
I am sharing cause maybe you do the same or you are looking for something to work you and your partner.

I realize that ALL marriages are different, just as all individuals are different, and I love embracing differences. 

So please do not feel like by any means I am saying a marriage centered family is the way you should live.
But for us its how we are choosing.
There will be a day that our kids will move out of the house and when that day comes I do not want to turn to my husband and think "who are you?".

 ___________________

A little fun side note, a local boutique Tuni's has hung one of our family photos up in their window for the month as part of their mothers day display!! Pretty cool to walk around the corner and see it!

 ______________________

Linking up with Emily cause its Thursday and thats what I do...

Life Proof Review and Giveway

*DISCLAIMER - this is a review/Bahamas Trip/Giveaway post blog smash up haha*

Back in March you might have heard a shriek, maybe you thought it was the wind whistling or it was your imagination.

But I am here to tell you that it was me.

Me screaming at myself as I did this...

Yep. 

That sucked.

But when you are a Mom and pick a designer Marc Jacobs "cover" over something that actually protects from clumsy little hands, thats what you get.

So when the opportunity came to review a Life Proof Case, I jumped and I jumped HIGH.

I had been asking around before "the drop heard around the world" on a case that I could use in water.

I am a Florida girl with Florida girl tendencies, beach, pool, water parks, you know LOTS of water.

And everyone said GET A LIFE PROOF.

First thing I did when I got my case was the suggested submerge test to make sure there was no leaks.

The very next day we were hopping on the plane to head to the Bahamas for our girls trip...

{all the images to follow were taken with my Life Proof Case on my phone}

As you can see we get right down to business...

After arriving we headed right for my parents boat {Fa-La-Me}

And then we started hitting up some of our favorite spots.

{love my girls}

After I took this photo a wave came up on me fast and my first thought was I need to save my drink, cause I knew my phone was A.OK, haha.

       

Unfortunately we unable to go fishing due to wind, just meant more time to shop, drive our golf carts, and hit some bars.

One of our spots to hit when we are down there is Man-O-War to Albury's Sail Shop, and to say our boat ride over was wet is UNDERSTATEMENT.  But as you can see in this picture my phone is just chillin, no reason to worry about the spray... 

 {I spy a Tiffany}

My new bag...

It turned into a cool rainy day but we for sure made the most of it, just how we do.

And my phone was there out in the open capturing everything...

These are images Tiffany was nice enough to let me borrow that she took underwater with her Life Proof Case on...

Yep this happened

 a lot...

As you can see having this case on does not effect your images...

And Buggie wanted in on the review, here she is during bath time doing her best Scuba Steve...

I do not have any videos to share but if you check out Tiffany's review she shared two great videos she took on her phone and You Tube is full of them.

Ok here it is, I love Life Proof.

Since I got it I have not taken it off.

I think it is practical, secure, great to use in and around the water, and most important kid proof.

I HIGHLY recommend it as an everyday case,

even with my one minor complaint, I cannot use my charges with the button releases on the sides.

So new car charger it is, but I would MUCH rather get a new car charger then have to get a new phone, again.

*ADDENDUM - I have since learned that Life Proof offers a dock extender for my charger issue. Prefect solution!!**

And here it is on the Bahamas, there has never been a full four days of my life that I have laughed so hard, had so much fun with my girls, and just enjoyed every single solitaire second 

{even when we almost got into a bar brawl, ha}.

But honestly there was so much fun, inside jokes, and moments of complete hysterical laughter that I can not even begin to share it all.

Maybe one day...

Back to Life Proof.

Ok now after my awesome review, bet you want one for yourself, right?!

Well guess what you have that chance!

Winner gets their choice in color, retail value of $79.99

You have 3 ways to enter {PLEASE leave one entry per option}

Here is how to enter:

- Leave a comment about how you think Life Proof could improve your iphone world

- Head over to Facebook and follow Life Proof - tell them I said Hi.

- Stop by Twitter and follow Life Proof 

Giveaway will be open until midnight on May 13th at midnight Eastern time.

Open to US only

Winner will be picked via random.org and announced on May 14th.

But if you can not wait to see if you are the winner and need your hands on a case now, you can get 10% off your order on Life Proofs website using this code: FBMOM10 til May 14.

With free shipping in the US!

Good luck!

Etiquette is not just for the dinning room table.

So it happened.

I knew it would someday but not sure when or what.

But yesterday, I found out someone stole a complete and entire blog post and shared it on their blog.

I was livid.

And sent about twenty texts fuming to friends to vent.

Then went and took a shower.

To cool off and think.

I was livid.

Here is the deal, I know I am not the first blogger that this has happened to or the last unfortunately for that matter.

But it happened to me.

So I am choosing to address it.

No I am NOT going to put this person on blast and call her out, thats not my style and frankly tacky.

I am not even going to share what post it was.

But I will do this,

I will address what I feel is a violation.

Dear "Blogger" who shall go unnamed,

Let me first just say, I get it, I get that my project was cool. Thats why I took all that time to make it, while taking photos, then uploading them, editing them, and writing a post all while taking care of my kids and home. What I do not get is your blatant disregard for me when you stole it and published it on your blog.

Taking someone else's words and images without their permission, then throwing a little teeny tiny "via" {no mention of my blog name at all} at the end does NOT make it right in my book. Great you linked back to me, but this does not make it any better that you took it in the first place.  And I have a feeling that little "via" makes you feel like this was all justified and you righted your wrong,

 sorry not the case.

Maybe if you had extended me the courtesy of a little email, expressing your desire to share MY project , post, and ALL images on your blog, I would have happily signed off on it.  BUT you did not.  So how can not be upset with you?  After a brief look at your blog, its seem you enjoy this type of blogging. And the fact that your header has an image with a istock photo watermark over it, shows you are not below all types of stealing. 

So I leave you with this to think about, the lack of morals that you are showing is one life example I will teach my six year old as something not to do.  Live the life you would want others to view you by, and right now I am viewing you as a thief. 

Signed,

The actual blogger of that post you stole.

I get it, we get inspired by one another on the internet and with pinterest and tumblr, it has been made that much more excess able. And for some people they feel the internet has not boundaries, and its theirs for the taking.  But its not.  We all love to share our ideas and projects, but I beg of you PLEASE PLEASE give credit where credit is due, and ASK permission when using someone else words.  I know images can be tricky with pinterest involved, but linking back to the original source rather then a repin of a repin, is ALWAYS the nice thing to do.

Ok I have said my peace.

*PHEW*

I feel better.

"Be kind whenever possible.  Its always possible."

-Dalai Lama

Now do not get me started on bloggy bullying....

Buggie turns 6. {Pretty Garden Party}

This past weekend my little Buggie turned 6. 

She kept telling me leading up to it "Momma, do not cry." 

She knows me so well.

But I held my own and did not shed a tear.

But what I did do was put together a sweet girlie party just like she asked for.

Of course I teamed up with my girlie Kori from Paper and Pigtails.

 Who just came out with a beautiful line made from her hand drawn illustrations.

Her take on a girlie garden theme was a beautiful inspiration. 

As I shared, I made some crepe flowers large and small for the table.

I also made a few cake stands with a couple old candle sticks I had and sprayed painted gold.

One thing that is ALWAYS a request for parties in our family are Oreo Pops.

And to make them have just a little sparkle I took some Wiltons gold dust and brushed them.

 

Another request Avery had was for powdered doughnuts.

I bought two bags of sweet sixteen one powder and on cinnamon sugar.

Then I took the bag of cinnamon ones added more gold dust and shook them to cover...

I would say in total it was around $80 for the whole table and food, not bad especially since it was all gone at the end.

And we decided for favors to give flower pots with some soil and seeds. Which the pots I got in the Target dollar bin, seeds were .99 each and the soil was $3.99 for a HUGE bag. So just $2 for each.

And EVERY kid was so excited to take them home.

One other thing we have done for the past three birthdays for Buggie is have a face painter.

And we have been lucky to have Carolina the Doodler for the last two of them.

She is AMAZING.

I highly recommend her for parties and other events.

The birthday girl was so happy which made us happy.

Good day for all.