I love my little blog.  It’s a great place to let out my opinions, share things I learned or bought and loved.  I love it when people leave comments or tell me they read my blog.  I love challenging myself to write better as writing has never been something I thought I was good at. I am improving.  I adore that Meg has started her own blog and is learning how to write and give her opinions.

My favorite posts for 2011 are:

5) Christmas Gifts And Heartful Giving I was so proud of how my girls were this Christmas!

4)  Book Review: All The Broken Pieces The first book review that I was ever happy with.

3) My Four Girls I think this post showed how exhausted and frustrated I get.

2) Puberty. WTH!  This one was featured on BlogHer!

1) Black Is Brown As White Is Peach  This post was featured on All.Things.Fadra.’s posts of the year!  I loved this post as it is so simple.

Blogging has been a great hobby and I really appreciate all my readers.  Thank you!

Photo Credit

Directed by Nicole Kidman and staring Selena Gomez Monte Carlo is fun and age appropriate for those who are not yet teenagers but like to act as if they are (all my girls at this point!).

I want to thank Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment for giving me a copy of this movie last September and for giving a new copy away to my local Secret Santa program!  I believe in the power of giving and am thankful for all that I have from the little things to the big things.  I encourage everyone to find a local organization and give what you can, even if it doesn’t seem like a lot.  Every bit helps!

Follow Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment on Twitter @FoxHomeEnt for more info on great DVDs!

I have been using some homeopathic products from Boiron for several years now and I was excited when the company was at BlogHer11 as they had been in 2010.  I love the ColdCalm and the ColdCalm for kids, as well as the famous Oscillococcinum^{® (please don’t ask me to pronounce that!)}   The company recently asked me to review their new Arnicare Arnica Gel and I gladly have.

Arnica is an age old treatment made from  a plant related to a daisy. It is helpful in aches and pains promotes healing and prevents bruising.  An all-around helpful product to have around with a growing household!

My kids have aches and pains like they are ninety. They play rough and bruise hard. Me, myself have back aches often as well. I really like the Arnica Gel. It is non-greasy, is unscented without smelling of medicine and works.

Boiron is a company I feel like I can get behind, because of their helpful products, the education their site offers and the fact that they are giving! They donated a case of Arnicare Arnica Gel to our local women’s shelter!  I was so pleased when they agreed to this.  Haven of Hope will be quickly given the case so they can pass it out to women who are starting over,  and possibly injured and in need of healing themselves.

Thanks Boiron!

To get a $1.00 off coupon click here. To subscribe to Boiron’s newsletter go here.

Mita's First Pie - All From Scratch!

I thought about writing a snarky post blasting what I am ungrateful for as a direct contrast to normal Thanksgiving day blog posts, but I didn’t. I don’t have the time or energy to be snarky at this point!

Christmas is my favorite holiday and (not just for the gifts!) but Thanksgiving is growing on me. I, of course, like the food.  I can take or leave Turkey, but the sides I adore.  Noodles, stuffing, deviled eggs, pie…… I can east several helpings if I leave out the turkey!  Mostly I like the time we take to be thankful. I think all of us are thankful for our blessing, and I also know that we are all so busy we sometimes forget to take the time, the space, the moment to give thanks.

I am thankful for many, many things, but here are just a few:

My hubby for putting up with me, loving me and being such a great Dad.

My girls – all of the them for bringing laughter and pride into my lift as well as challenging me to be a better person.

My parents for their continued support and help with watching my kiddos when I need it and having a great home to go relax in.

My mother in law for her love and generosity.

My brother and sister-in-law for giving hubby and I a great date weekend last week and watching my girls.

My job, for letting me come back to work for a few hours a week to help new families and help me regain my sanity.

My friends for giving me a circle to have fun with and complain with.

My upcoming breast reduction -  No more back/neck pain or skin infections!

My puppy dog for cuddling with me nightly.

There is more, but I will stop there for now!

Last October I was having coffee with MomOutnumbered, FireMom and our non-blogger friend (yes, there are people who don’t blog that are friend worthy).  I ordered my Chai,  paid for it and then helped FireMom down the stairs with LB…two hours later we are getting up to go and my keys are not in my purse.  Outnumberedmom says, “I saw keys upstairs on the bar.”  They were not there.

Search, search, search.  No keys.  My keys had  clickers for two of my cars. One of those cars was a lease that was about to be turned in. My Hallmark, CVS and Kroger card were on them as well as a key-chain with the girls’ picture on it.  A large set of keys.  The owner of our coffee place said that right after we went downstairs a busy family with several kids were there touching everything and she said they were not regulars.  Our guess was that one of the kids picked up the keys or one of the parents picked them up thinking that they were theirs.  Surely they would find them and drop them off soon….

I could in-vision my keys at the bottom of a diaper bag somewhere.  Those of us with children know that diaper bags are a catch-all for everything under the sun and that they are rarely cleaned out until the baby is potty-trained.

Well, somebody must be running around in big-boy underwear now because I got a letter from Kroger last week saying they have my keys!  Almost a year later.  They are in Kentucky.  I received them today and have to say it is nice having my clicker back.

The ironic thing is that my sis-in-law lost her keys this past summer and also got a letter from Kroger in Kentucky a few weeks ago.  So all lost keys with Kroger tags must be sent to Kentucky before their owner is contacted!  A lovely place, the blue-grass state is.

Thank you Kroger and thank you honest person who found my keys, looked at my kiddos faces and took the extra time to drop them off at a local Kroger. There are good people in this world who will do acts of kindness for strangers!

Have you ever lost your keys for real?  Where were they?

Tell me what you think of my new design!