Competition for Best Post by a Mommy Blogger

Calling all Mommy Bloggers!  Back by popular demand...Competition for Best Post!  This contest was a huge hit in September.  I received dozens of quality entries and in the end I selected What's Up Sippy Cup for their hilarious story about their daughter's purple chin and the reason behind it. 

After the last competition, I received tons of requests for another one, so as promised, this contest will be now be called the "Blue Ribbon Blog Competition" and I will now offer it four times per year, one for each season.  The Winter 2011 contest will be open from December 1st - December 19th.  The Fall contest was open only to humorous posts and/or stories.  The Winter contest is for any informative posts.  It can be informative because it's about crafts, cooking, or simply a life lesson.  The rules are simple:

1.  Send me an email (mommywithselectivememory@gmail.com) or comment to this post with a direct link to your favorite post that is informative.  It can be something you wrote in the past, and should be informative and less than 500 words.  (I won't be too particular about the word count)
2.  You must be a follower via GFC (this will be checked)

I will select a winner and a runner-up and they will both receive buttons to place on their blogs to brag about being the winner of the Blue Ribbon Blog Award for Winter 2011!  I will also post the actual the winning entry along with a bio of the winner.  The results will also be posted via Twitter and BlogFrog for maximum exposure.  This is a great way to get some recognition for your blog!

I am looking forward to reading all the great entries!!

The Joys of Stomach Flu

Why can't someone invent a shot for stomach flu?  I mean for crying out loud they figured it out for the regular flu so what are those slacker scientists waiting for?!?!? 

Here is a summary of my day today:

5:45 Wake up and do some relaxing yoga
6:15-7 Finish up several emails to my customers
7:00 Enter Children's room with a big smile on my face as it is usually my favorite part of the day.  The smile disappers when I am greeted with the umistakable smell of vomit
7:00-7:15 Clean said vomit out of crib, pull out all sheets, toys, pacifiers and begin lengthy clean-up process including opening windows and bringing in fans to air out the smell
7:15 Change disgusting runny diaper and put a pound of Butt Paste on the poor red bottom that has been sitting in diarrhea all night
7:30- Attempt to wrestle milk cup out of toddler's hands since I have now determined he has stomach flu and cannot drink milk
8:00 Scramble around the house in search of items the kids can eat.  It turns out I have no bananas and only one applesauce. 
8:30-10:00 Try to entertain sick children inside the house
10:00 Take children outside to swingset for a change of scenery
10:05 Step in giant pile of dog poop
10:05-10:15 Clean dog poop off shoe
1:00 Put kids down for naps.  As I carry my three year old daughter upstairs she wraps her arms around my neck super tight and whispers in my ear, "Mommy, you're my most favorite Mommy in the whole world."

At that point, I realize I'm lucky that I get to be home with the kids when they're sick.  They need their Mommy when they aren't feeling good.  I still have fond memories of my Mom taking such good care of me when I was sick.  In fact, I remember almost feeling lucky when I was sick because I knew my Mom would pamper me.  And I'm lucky they only have the stomach flu.  It could be much worse because at least they will get better eventually.

So yes, for now I'm grateful...until tomorrow when I have to pull sheets off the bed again that are covered in vomit and little pieces of carrots, bread, etc.  Kids sure can be fun.

Lipstick and a Kiss

Craft project on a rainy day

Hubby had to work this weekend and it was raining, so I decided to finally get around to a craft idea I'd been wanting to try out for awhile. 

This project is kind of like painting, but with a twist.  The idea at the end is to allow the kids to sort of paint, but have a paint "mixture" come out of squeeze bottles.  Stick with me, you'll see.  For it, we mixed equal parts of salt, flour and water.  I used 2/3 cup of each and ended up with two bottles with plenty of mixture.  At first I hated wasting so much of my salt, but I realized that an entire cannister of salt is only $.53 from the store so it's a really cheap project. 



Munchkin Girl loves to help me cook, but I'm a bit of a germ freak, so it's nice to have a project that we won't have to eat later. I let her do all the pouring and stirring.  


Once everything is mixed up, you pour it into plastic squeeze bottles.  I found some at Walmart for just a few bucks.  Then you have plastic bottles with this sort of gooey mixture and you can add Tempura paint so they have several color options.  Then you cut up some cardboard squares and she can now squeeze colored goo onto cardboard!  I used a cardboard box from some yummy dried fruit I get from Costco


Finally we were ready and voila!  Almost a full hour of fun of squeezing "paint".  She loved it and really like the final product.  This whole thing sounds like a lot of work, but only took about 10 minutes to prep and was definitely worth it!