Giving Back To Moms

The ultimate Stride Rite and Robeez contest which is being run on Facebook from May 3rd through May 10th in celebration of moms.  Stride Rite and Robeez are asking all moms to tell them why they are a super mom and include a picture to illustrate their answer.

Beginning this Monday you can enter the Giving Back to Moms contest on Stride Rite’s Facebook Fan Page as well as Robeez’s Facebook Fan Page.  Take a moment and go enter the contest, it gives you free range to brag about being a wonderful mother just in time for Mother’s Day.

Thanks to Global Influence and Stride Rite I am able to offer my readers an additional contest right here on my blog.  I am giving away one $40 gift card to Stride Rite to one lucky reader for Mother’s Day.

How to Enter:
I have a hard time saying that I’m a super mom even though I know it’s healthy to pat yourself on the back for reassurance you’re doing a good job.  Leave a comment on this post telling me ways you take a minute to give yourself credit for all you do.

Additional Entries: (one entry per comment)

• Follow @striderite on twitter and leave twitter ID in comment
• Follow @robeez on twitter and leave twitter ID in comment
• Follow @MommaDJane on twitter and leave twitter ID in comment
• Like Stride Rite on Facebook and leave FB ID in comment
• Like Robeez on Facebook and leave FB ID in comment
• Like MommaDJane Blog on Facebook and leave FB ID in comment
• Stumble this post and leave StumbleUpon ID in comment
• Blog about this contest w/ link back to this blog post and leave permalink in comment
• Tweet about this contest and leave permalink in comment

*Give­away is open to all U.S. Res­i­dents 18+  Entries will be accepted until Sunday, May 9th mid­night CST.  Any and all com­ments after that time will not be counted towards give­away entries.  Reader must leave a method of con­tact within com­ment and must respond within 24 hours of con­tact, oth­er­wise a new win­ner will be cho­sen.  Random.org will be used to select a ran­dom win­ner from com­ments on this post.

*Full Disclosure: Giveaway has been made possible thanks to Global Influence and Stride Rite.  I will receive one complimentary pair of Stride Rite shoes for appreciation of helping spread the word about their contest.

Giveaway Has Ended

Random.org was used to select a random winner from number of comments below.  Congratulations to Stephanie for winning and thank you to everyone who entered.

I know I have professed my love for my iPhone on twitter and Facebook numerous times and believe I’ve said it on my blog.  If not I’ll say it now, I love my iPhone.  I think I would be lost without it.  I am able to keep up with my social media networks as well as even blog on the go.  I check my emails several times a day while moving around instead of always being at my computer.  It’s a great way to keep in contact with my clients that I work with.

Another great thing that I love about my iPhone is all the wonderful apps.  I will admit that not only do my children play games on my phone but I do too.  I love Sudoku and sometimes when I’m sitting at a doctor office waiting or even at night if I can’t sleep, I’ll open a game and play it.  I have several apps on my iPhone that Gabby and even Noah play.  They are life savers at doctor appointments that involve the kids waiting around with nothing to do.  We watch Sprout cartoons on my phone and learn the alphabet.  Gabby’s favorite is the Crash Kart racing game.

So of course when I found this new site designed to promote the best iPhone apps for kids, I loved it.  I am still currently going through their recommendations and trying them out.  I am always up for new apps and will look into any suggestions someone has.  Have an app you recommend?  Can’t live without a specific app? Share with me in the comments so I can try it out.

Also in honor of Mother’s Day they are giving away an iPad.  I would love to own an iPad to try out and all my kids are already begging for one.  Gabby is especially excited about the iBook feature and I love the digital photo frame feature as well.  The 3G would be nice on an iPad so I have a larger screen to work from on the go yet not as big as my MacBook.

What do you want for Mother’s Day?  Wouldn’t it be nice to win a nice gift for yourself?

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of KAO Brands. All opinions are 100% mine.

I just entered the Temptation is Beautiful sweepstakes for a chance to win a trip for four to Las Vegas, Nevada that not only includes transportation and lodging but also $1,500 in spending money.  How awesome would it be to win a trip to Vegas for you and three friends?

Not only is a trip to Las Vegas for four being given away as the grand prize but a tempting beauty basket will be given away daily as well featuring the products shown on the right.  Don’t forget to enter the sweepstakes and you are welcome to go back to enter once daily for multiple chances to win.

After entering the sweepstakes I took a few moments to take the fun Temptress Temperature Quiz and found out I was JUST RIGHT.  Go enter the sweepstakes yourself and take the quiz, then share with me what your temperature is.  Are you ‘hot, hot, hot‘ or ‘cool as a cucumber’?  Leave me a comment below, I’m interested to know.  Also if you share your temperature with your social media friends on twitter or facebook you gain extra entries into the sweepstakes, can’t go wrong there.

*Contest is open to U.S. Residents only

I am beyond ecstatic that I was announced as a finalist in the My Domain Brand .Me contest today.  My brand MommaDJane which includes my blog, twitter account, Facebook and Fan Page is up against four other finalists.  My brand has been nominated in the category Hobby/Interest Personal Brand.

The grand prize in each category is a $1000 gift card to Apple.  If I win I am going to purchase the iPad for my family to use on trips and in the car.  The small portability would be nice while sitting on the couch or reading story books to Gabby at night.  They have seen all the commercials and everyone wants one.  It would be an amazing gift for my family to win for free.

I have never been entered into a contest before that requires votes to help boost my entry but one part of the judging is gaining votes.  So this is where I ask nicely or beg and plead that you take a few moments to stop by My Domain Brand .Me contest and click vote next to my name.  You don’t have to register to vote or do anything more than click vote and then click okay when it asks if you are sure.  While you are there you might enjoy taking a peek at the other categories and vote for the person you think best fits.  You can vote for one person within each category.

Thanks in advance for helping me!

Brandy is hosting Monday Moments on her blog for the next four weeks.  On each Monday you are suppose to share a moment you spent relaxing.  Anything as simple as drinking coffee, reading a book or participating in your favorite pass time activity.  She will also be drawing some lucky participants for cool Starbucks gifts including gift cards!  Woo-hoo.

So for my Monday Moments that I am sharing this week are from last week’s Spring Break vacation.  The first photo is Noah running around and playing at the indoor water park that we spent two nights at in Gatlinburg, TN.  He had so much fun and our favorite was going around on the lazy river.  Everyone loved that.  It was relaxing just watching him play carefree.

The second photo is of me up in the mountains.  We took a drive from Gatlinburg, TN up to the border of North Carolina.  My niece, Deianeira, wanted to be able to say she had visited even another state on our trip so crossing the border was important to her.  Plus it was fun and beautiful.  The weather was so cold up in the mountains that we saw snow.  The running water was gorgeous and I loved taking photos with the kids.  This one T took of me sitting on the rocks.

Once we reached the border of Tennessee and North Carolina the sun was starting to set.  We stopped for the kids to take photos next to the state line sign and I took some quick shots of this beautiful sunset.  It was so peaceful and relaxing to see up on the top of the mountain.

These are my most recent relaxing moments.  It was nice to have the kids out of school for a week so we were able to visit family, however it’s also nice to get back on track this week.

Don’t forget to go join Brandy’s Monday Moments, thanks to Starbucks.

I was recently asked if I would be interested in being an ambassador for The View.  I enjoy the show because I am the type of person who loves to look at all views on a topic.  Barbara, Whoopi, Joy, Elisabeth and Sherri are a very diverse group of women who discuss topics daily on their show while sitting around a table.  Since they come from different walks of life, different ages and have separate experiences majority of the time they have different views on the topic at hand.

I thought this would be a fun opportunity to be able to discuss or even friendly debate both sides to every topic.  For the next four weeks I’ll share upcoming news and my thoughts on some of the discussions taking place on the show.  Also some of the Ambassadors will be live tweeting about The View daily while the show is on air.  So join us in the mornings by following hashtag #theview to jump in the conversation on twitter.

Want a chance to win a trip to New York City to watch a taping of The View live? Mom Central is currently running a sweepstakes that is open until February 28th.  All you have to do to enter is fill out this form online.  Good luck and if you win, can I go with you?

Full Disclosure: “I am a participant in a Mom Central campaign for ABC Daytime and will receive a tote bag or other The View branded items to facilitate my review.”

Over the weekend while the kids were gone I cleaned the living room, rearranged some furniture and now have a photo hanging above the couch.  I enjoyed the living room so much better that I even set up a TV tray and worked from the laptop over the entire weekend instead of sitting on my bed or using the desk.  It was nice to sit in my chair and relax while looking at a completely organized living room.  *Deep Breath* Now I just can’t wait for the day that I actually get a new couch.  That will be nice!

The girls went to visit their grandma over the weekend and celebrated Christmas a little late.  For Gab’s Christmas gift her Meemaw ordered her a whole new bed set.  She was excited because this was something she had been wanting.  To make her bed look like a cowgirl.  The set is very cute and when she got home I washed the new sheets and now here is the final look.  For our Tackle It Tuesday we finished her bed.

and yes she really sleeps with that on…. so funny!

Congratulations to Jamie, Karen M and Sara Broers for each winning their very own copy of Wubbzy’s Christmas Adventure DVD.  Thank you to everyone who entered the contest.

As I stated in my Top Ten Thursday post, IzeaFest was amazing.  One of the prizes that I won from BenSpark.com was an XShot.  As soon as I found out I was going to receive an XShot I was thrilled.  I couldn’t wait to try it out.  After arriving in Orlando, FL I practiced throughout the weekend using the XShot for my first time.  I was able to capture photos of my new friends during the conference with me in the picture as well.  I didn’t even have to ask someone to take it.  This thing is so cool.  Since IzeaFest I have taken the XShot along to two other conferences trying it out and practicing at how many people I can get in one photo.

During Halloween my family and I went to a haunted theme park and were all able to get in the photo together.  The XShot has become an accessory that stays attached to my camera and goes with me just about everywhere.  I love how it slides down to a perfect purse size to make easy for carry-along and even has a strap.  Your camera screws right into the XShot just like it would on a tripod.  You can set the top piece at several different angels to be able to take photos from all views.  This is a truly great gadget and very easy to use.

Here is a short clip on how the XShot works and what it looks like.

Good news is Michael from XShot is allowing me to give one lucky reader their very own XShot.

How to Enter: (one entry per comment)

• Leave a comment telling me the first photo you would take using your new XShot if you won
• Tweet this giveaway including link and leave comment with permalink to tweet
• Follow @XShot on twitter and leave comment with twitter username
• Become an RSS subscriber to MommaDJane.com to stay in the know about future giveaways and leave email in comment
• Blog about this giveaway with link back and leave permalink in comment

*Contest ends Monday, November 23rd at midnight CST.  Contest is open to all US Residents 18+ in age.  All entries received after Monday, November 23rd at midnight CST will not be considered. Entries that do not follow the above entry requirements will not be considered.*

Full Disclosure: I won my XShot from entering the Ultimate IzeaFest contest on BenSpark.com.  I was not asked to write this review nor was I paid to do so.  Michael was generous enough to give me one extra XShot to give away to one lucky reader on my blog any way I felt since I enjoyed it enough I wanted to share with my readers.  I will personally pay to ship the XShot to the lucky winner within the United States of America.

Before Halloween was even over the stores around us were putting out Christmas decorations.  My kids and I have already been watching Holiday movies and Noah asked me yesterday where the Christmas presents were at.  *Giggle* I know, it’s early but we love the Holidays.  Christmas is my favorite and I just can’t wait to put out our tree the weekend after Thanksgiving.  If you are a subscriber to my Behind the Scenes newsletter then you know I’ve already been stocking up on Christmas gifts.  Needless to say, I’m excited.

We have received two new movies for Christmas already.  The one that has been watched the most lately is Wubbzy’s Christmas Adventure.  The first time putting this DVD in was just with Noah and myself.  The girls were at school.  It was very cute, plus Noah already liked the Wow! Wow! Wubbzy cartoon.  The first cartoon on the DVD shows them building a snowman and how it keeps getting knocked down.  It taught a great lesson of patience because they just kept rebuilding it until they figured out a way to include a tunnel in the middle for the sleds to travel through without knocking down the snowman.  Great way to teach not only patience but problem solving.  I’ll tell you, if I was Wubbzy I wouldn’t have been that happy if someone knocked down my snowman over and over.  Noah was getting excited and stayed glued to the TV.  I won’t even tell you what all happened when Wubbzy tried to help decorate the town tree…  Of course at one point Noah was asking if he could have a snowball fight which unfortunately living in Texas I’m not sure that’ll happen.  After all this crazy mess with Gab and late night ER visits we have spent a lot of time watching television this past week.  She has now watched Wubbzy’s Christmas Adventure DVD several times, herself.  She enjoys it too.

Children’s Christmas movies are a great way to get into the Spirit of the Holidays with your children.  Great family movies celebrating the Holidays really get us excited.

I am also very excited to announce that I’m giving away 3 copies of Wubbzy’s Christmas Adventure to 3 lucky readers.

How to Enter: (one entry per comment)

• Leave a comment telling me what you are most excited about for the Holidays.  Is it the weather, decorating, family gatherings…?
• Follow @MommaDJane on twitter
• Tweet this giveaway including link to post and leave comment with permalink to tweet
• Blog about this giveaway and leave permalink in comment

*Contest ends Sunday, November 15th at midnight CST.  Contest is open to all US Residents 18+ in age.  All entries received after Sunday, November 15th at midnight CST will not be considered. Entries that do not follow the above entry requirements will not be considered.*

Full Disclosure: MommaDJane.com was provided with a DVD to review free of charge and has been given the opportunity to host a contest giving 3 copies away to readers through a blog post.  The above content is the sole view of the blog owner and honest, personal opinion on the product.