Applied Label Review

Applied Labels™ are Applied Labels LLC's flagship and most popular product. They're extremely tough, ultra versatile and perfect for labeling:

*bottles

*sippy cups

*shoes

*school supplies

*gadgets

*summer camp gear

*all those little things that go to early childcare centers

I was so happy to get the chance to review these! We started a new church and we've been having a heck of a time with trying to keep Curly stuff to herself, especially her sippy cups. They have the cutest fonts and images to choose from. Makes it more fun to personalize items with cuteness vs. the boring sharpie writing.

I've never been a huge label fan, mainly because I'm so incredibly disorganized! But these were fantastic. They were simple to use, sleek and shinny. After numerous times of washing her cups, they never lifted up or lost the coloring in the font! PERFECT!

If you have a baby, they offer Bottle Labels! Definitely helpful if you have more then one in the house or if your little one attends daycare. You can pick different color blank tape to wrap around the bottles, along with preprinted single use date tapes, and named tapes. The combination of all 3, allows for peace of mind ensuring that there won't be any mixups with other baby bottles.


Interested? Thought so! Take a wander on over to Applied Labels™. See how they can help you or your kids.

You can follow Applied Labels, Inc on Twitter
Use Facebook? You can "Like" them there too!

Disclaimer: I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255 Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising. Tomoson Product review & giveaway Disclosure.

A sneak peek of Taken From Me: The Tiffany Rubin Story

Like most women out in the world, I have a severe addiction to Lifetime Movies! Doesn’t matter what the genere of the film is I watch them religiously. When Ihad the opportunity to watch an advance screening of “Taken From Me: The Tiffany Rubin Story” I just had to jump on it. While I have not been in Ms. Rubin’s shoes, I have unfortunately been in a position more times then I can count where I truly felt that my son would be taken. And to say I cried a little is an understatement; it made me think way too much of how fast my custody battle could have taken a turn for the worse. 

Taken From Me: The Tiffany Rubin Story is based on a dramatic true story of Tiffany Rubin’s (Taraji P. Henson, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button) daring 2008 rescue of her six-year-old son, Kobe, after he was abducted by his biological father and taken from his home in Queens, New York, all the way to Seoul, South Korea.  At the urging of her mother Belzora (Beverly Todd, The Bucket List), Tiffany sought the counsel of Mark Miller (O’Quinn) and his charitable organization The American Association for Lost Children.  With Mark’s help, Tiffany was able to travel to Korea to execute a high-stakes plan to bring her son home.

Taken From Me: The Tiffany Rubin Story will be airing on Monday January 31^st 9 PM (ET/PT), immediately following the movie at 11 PM (ET/PT), Lifetime will premiere an all new hour long documentary, Beyond the Headlines: The Tiffany Rubin Story. The documentary will re-tell the incredible story of Rubin’s experience in her own words, giving an extended account of her journey to save her son and revealing new details that have never been made public before.

Another plus to this movie were the actors! Terry O’Quinn, who plays “Mark”, is best known for his portrayal of “John Locke” on the long running hit ABC Series, Lost.

There has to be a line drawn in respecting other's space

Lil t’ came bursting through the door crying yelling. I truly thought he was hurt. As I turned the corner from the living room heading toward the front door I see him, the front door wide open and then my eyes landed.

Right outside our door literally not even a foot away from my truck laid a little girl in the road screaming for her mom, cars stopping, parents running to her.  

We live on a small street that dead ends directly into the elementary school here. Because of that you’d THINK that people would pay a little bit more attention on the kids around. However accidents happen and yesterday was a proven point. A little girl was running ahead of her mom, decided to cut across the street that already had cars waiting to enter and leave the school. Just as she jetted out in front of my truck ahead of her mom a car hit her.

Thank the Lord; all that was damaged was a broken ankle, some bruises and a lot of rattled nerves.

Where do we as people, as family draw the line in respecting other people’s privacy especially during a time where they need support not exploitation?

After I got the kids calmed down I stepped outside to see what had happened and if they needed any supplies since I still hadn’t heard the sirens. I looked over and saw our neighbor sitting on her front steps sipping an iced coffee like she was watching a parade or something.

I go back in the house to calm the kids down, post a unanimous prayer request on FB and left it at that. Going along my merry little way, I happened to get a text from Dirt Diver who was supposed to be sleeping to go check out FB. And that’s where I saw them, pictures from the accident.

Now let me just say the pictures were not graphic, didn’t show the child just part of her legs and her feet. My truck happened to be blocking the rest of the view. Another shot was of them having her halfway into the ambulance.

BUT

ohhhh yes there is a BUT

(and if you’re on my Twitter feed ya would have seen it!)

I could NEVER EVER do that to not just another human being but to a child and not just any child to a fellow Brigade’s family’s daughter who literally just said good bye to her daddy. I can not for the life of me begin to understand the internal justification for posting these morbid pictures. In her postings for the pictures, there were sayings like “this is what happens when people speed. Should have heard the angel screaming for her mom”. To me it just felt like a justification for her actions.

The turn of events with this action has just left me kinda flabbergasted at how our society thinks it’s okay to take pictures of other’s misfortune and blast it on the web. I am fully guilty of looking at the pictures and laughing my hardest but never at ones that bring someone’s life in to harms way. Not that makes it right but just putting it out there. I am huge visitor of People of Wal-Mart because well to be honest they are their own species and after having worked there for almost 4 years I know if they hired me then they DO have their own species. LOL

Mwhole point is, that at somewhere sometime America in a whole needs to stop worrying about what the next person is doing and focus on themselves and their own family. No one is perfect and we all have room to improve, myself included. 

Kisses of death upon their faces

‘Tater and Lil t’ started their new schools yesterday.  I’ve seen the kids nervous before yesterday takes the cake. ‘Tater who is normally 99% confident in herself and her sourroundings looked like she was going to pass out upon exiting the vehicle. Poor girl stood there clutching her planner and froze. I kinda gave her a shove and in the office we went. As we walked from her homeroom to the cafeteria to the gym where I finally abandoned her, her face grew paler and her body stiffened. As I left I tried to whisper ‘love ya’ but she was talking to some girl from the new class. I can only hope she makes friends quickly. I wanted to give her a big hug and kiss but I am willing to bet money that if I did, she would have thrown up on me as she passed out from humiliation. 

Lil t’ was rambucious today until he walked into his classroom and his teacher called out to him. He stopped dead in his tracks from Mr. Happy to Mr. Deer Caught in the Headlights. Poor kid, the whole class whipped their heads around and just stared at him. It’s 73 degrees and my poor boy was stuck wearing his black wranglers with his muddy hiking boots. He had to be dying is all I could think. Unfortunately when we left Oregon it was still in the 50’s and raining every other day so I made no attempt to try and get these kids summer clothes. It’ll be a couple months before I can get everyone switched over in clothing. I digress like normal. As I’m about to leave I ask him to step outside the classroom to remind him of what’s expected of him and I give him a kiss on the check. For the first time in I can remember he literally clawed his skin off were my lips had touched as if I left traces of acid on his perfectly pale as the moonlight cheek. I about died right there. He should treasure each and every kiss I plant on him. Sadly I think he will only despise my kisses as he gets older.

Now for the other exciting news…

Guess what that is! We picked the keys up yesterday. I love it. We will definitely be able to make the 3 bedrooms work for our family of 6. The bedrooms are fairly large; the walk in closet in the master is HUGE. The yard is going to be a decent size once we can afford for the company to come put a fence up. Sadly I won’t have a clothes line but once we are settled in finances I’ll go to Lowe’s and buy the supplies to make my own. Dirt Diver took lots of pictures for me since the first time we went I forgot the camera. I’ll share those in their own separate entry.

Schemed a little schemed, payback is not YOUR friend children

There is a rule in this house, if you can pick up a fork and eat my cooking, then you can pick up a sponge and clean up after dinner.

With that said, there is not a night that doesn’t go by that doesn’t end with someone getting in trouble for flinging dirty dish water across the kitchen, breaking a glass because they are too impatient to put it away right, half washed dishes put away with food still stuck to them clear as day. Actually I think that is my favorite way they do the clean up. I just LOVE getting a glass out, pouring ice cold milk in it, sitting down to eat my food, take a drink and discover as I’m in mid gulp that the remnants from another nights dinner has made its’ way inside my cup and is now crusted on. I am just a HAPPY mommy when that happens. The Man though, oh you’d think that someone had just committed murder right there on the table while we were eating when it happens to him.

Or I love it when one kid, usually ‘Tater, decides that they are going to sing a song horribly off key, purposely forgetting words, and increases their volume each time the other protests. (Seriously NO clue where they get this increase the volume tendencies either) I have even heard farm animal noises waft from the kitchen followed by either more outrageous singing or huge grunts that put a dog trying to pass a shoe to shame, sadly the animal noises and grunts is usually Lil t’.

These antics always end up in the same way EVERY. SINGLE. NIGHT. Me threatening to cut them off from everything sacred to them; the TV, cell phone, video games, library books, friends, and sadly they usually respond with “well you can’t take our imagination away”. At this point I say a silent prayer asking the Lord to please grant my loving beautiful children with a child themselves that will say these kind, sweet, sensitive words to them.

Now as a loving and devoted mother, who puts her children’s needs before her own, who NEVER gets tired, stressed, angry, or upset at them. A mother who has never yelled “O.M.G. You really irritate the piss out of me and my ears are shutting down now”. A mother who never drops the “F Bomb” as she slams the lid on the washer because she has hit her breaking point. A mother who never yells from another room to knock it off rather than go into the kitchen to assist with the problems. I take full control of this situation. I have schemed a little scheme. I am going to save their dirty plates, forks, cups, bowls and the next time I serve dinner, they will get to eat off their own handy work. The more I think of it, the more I feel it’s only fair. If they expect me to eat off half washed dishes then they should eat off them too. I WILL be on the lookout this week for their nasties because I am so ready to serve justice. Let’s see how Mr. Imagination will handle this when he comes face to face with it.

With that I tried a new recipe this week. The original looked a little dull to me, so I changed it up a little.

**This picture does NO justice to the dish especially since they are trying to kill me with the olives, but since my camera picks when it wants to work I found one thanks to Google**

Nacho Casserole

1lb. ground beef (we use only ground turkey)
1 ½ c chunky salsa (I just poured till the smell was strong)
Corn to your desire
¾ c. Miracle Whip (YES I am that person that LOVES my Miracle Whip)
Burrito Seasoning Packet
2 c. crushed tortilla chips
2 c. shredded cheese (I actually found a Colby mixture that had jalapenos peppers in it that scared the tar out of me. Another story for another time)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Brown the meat w/ seasoning packet. Since I use turkey and it really only has excess water, I always put the seasoning packet in with the turkey, but if you use regular beef, you’ll want to brown, drain then add the packet. Remove from heat, pour into bowl and add salsa, corn, and Miracle Whip. Stir.
3. In a 2 quart casserole dish, layer meat mixture, tortilla chips, and cheese twice. End with cheese on top.
4. Bake for 20 - 30 minutes uncovered. It will depend on the type of dish you use. I used my all time favorite Pyrex dish and it took about 23 min, however if I were to use my stoneware dish it would probably take about 45 minutes.
5. Serve with shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes, and sour cream.

It's fun to dress up and find freebies

And I’m sure everyone and their husband knows about Dockers’ giveaway during the SuperBowl but since I LOVE Dockers I have to share it as well. All you have to do is as soon as you see the Dockers commercial during the Super Bowl visit Dockers Free Giveaway to register for a free pair. And yes I do have that page booked marked so I can hit it the moment that commercial hits.

Babysitters are hard to find

Ever have one of those moments where you want to get away to dinner alone but as you’re half dressed in your best outfit you hear the yelling’s of children and are brought back to the reality of “who’s going to watch them?” I am a huge supporter of duct tape and a closet but I know not many out there support that kind of a babysitter. It’s okay it’s not for everyone I admit. As parents it can be trying if not almost impossible to find the right person to watch our most beloved children let alone our fur-babies. A little gem flew across my screen the other day and it needs to be passed on:

Military Families Get Free Access to Caregiver Network

By Elaine Wilson

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Jan. 28, 2010 – Military families now have free access to an online network of quality caregivers who can assist with everything from babysitting to dog walking.

Sittercity is the nation’s largest online source for local babysitters, nannies, elder care providers, dog walkers, housekeepers and tutors, and contains more than a million caregiver profiles, officials said. 

Military members and their families can activate their membership by going to http://www.sittercity.com/dod. 

The Sittercity Corporate Program, funded by the Defense Department, offers military families -- including active duty, Guard and Reserve -- with a paid membership to the site. 

“We believe that access to Sittercity’s nationwide network of quality care providers will be highly beneficial to our servicemembers and their families,” said Tommy T. Thomas, deputy undersecretary of defense for military community and family policy. 

The paid membership enables military families entry to a custom-built Defense Department Web site portal where they can match up caregivers to their situation; gain instant access to caregiver profiles that include background checks, references and reviews; and find military-certified care providers as well as caregivers who are military-subsidized and authorized access to a military installation. 

The site will help meet the unique needs of military families as they face deployments, long hours at work and assignments to remote locations, Thomas said. 

“Because of the mobile nature of military life, trusted community resources are often difficult to identify and locate,” he acknowledged. “These online tools will help service and family members attain the best match between resource and need.” 

Thomas said servicemembers and their families can rest assured that they’re being provided with top-notch care. The site “links military family members with somebody that the Department of Defense says, ‘We’ve entrusted you to provide this service to our people,’” Thomas said. 

“If that military member is out on the front line knowing that the family back home has a sense of ease and comfort, life is good for everybody,” he added. 

While the membership is free, servicemembers will be responsible for the hiring and payment of caregivers, officials said. 

Military members and their families can activate their membership by going to http://www.sittercity.com/dod. 

What Rock Band doesn't tell you when forming a band

When it rains practically every day, your funds are dried up worse then the Sahara Desert, and you really don’t want to venture out in public with 4 children; three of which are suffering from cabin fever; ya do the next best thing! I pulled out the one video game that doesn't bring my kids to tears and whines about being sniped from behind; Rock Band. We decided to have a jam session. Unfortunately our band turned into like many bands with too many Chiefs and not enough Indians. The older ones spent most of the time bickering.

It started with our bands’ name; ‘Tater wanted to show her love for Percy Jackson while Lil t’ wanted to profess his love for dogs. I finally became a tyrant and named our band “My Headaches”; the whining and complaining continued till I started to shut the game down. The next lovely argument was creating our player’s looks. Really? Do we HAVE to have an argument over whether or not one person has hot pink hair vs the other one not able to decide if they wanted to be punk or rock? Finally “My Headaches” have dressed themselves, taken in enough water, cleared the space around them ready to play. And another tiff erupted over which song was going to be our opening song. The choice was between Weezer’s “Say it aint so” and Nirvana “In Bloom”. Broke that tiff up when it looked like a drum stick was about to go flying through the air.

Once that was taken care of we played our sets only to be sabotaged by to short grumpy anti rock music patrons. The Princess kept unplugging my microphone. Some may say she was hinting to my degree of singing. It has been rumored that I can make anyone deaf when I break out in song. Let’s put it this way, my mom who has to wear hearing aids and will take them out anytime I break out into song. If I want to talk to her she makes me promise not to keep singing. As we battled The Princess from pulling the cords out of the Xbox 360, Monkey spent the time trying to pry the drum sticks out of Lil t’s hands using kung fu moves learned by a drunken spider monkey.

Our band played for 5 straight hours though and didn’t make it very far. We are terrible. I have absolutely no eye/hand coordination. It pains me trying to use both hands in different ways while my brain is trying to sort out which color I need to push. I hate to admit it but it’s actually pretty funny when I get into concentration mode, tongue stuck out, and head cocked to the side; wait I take it back, it’s not funny it’s painful to watch. Painful.

Poop Interference

This week started out with lots of fun. Princess had spent the weekend with a fever of 101, being very clingy and cranky, hardly drinking liquids, almost no eating. But I thought we were getting past it when she woke up this morning with a smile at 0600. It wasn’t until after her first nap during diaper changing that I noticed her chest, back; neck and arms were covered in little red bumps. First reaction: “OH SHIT! Not the pox!” Hurried up the change, picked her, and tried to navigate the clinic’s phone number.

Wouldn’t you know I ended up with the “sharpest” receptionist in the office? The conversation went a little like this…


Me: Yes I was wondering what exactly are the symptoms to chicken pox?

Receptionist: What makes you think your child has them?

Me: Well she’s had a fever for the last 2 days and today she just woke up covered in bumps, has been cranky since Friday, low appetite, trouble sleeping.

Receptionist: You could Google it.

Me: I prefer not to since Google always tells you you’ll die within a day.

Receptionist: What exactly would you like for me to help with?

Me: Well if she does have the pox then what do I need to do? I do have 3 other children 2 of which are school age.

Receptionist: Just keep her hydrated. Everyone else is fine.

Me: Can the others go to school? How long does Princess have to be away from other children?

Receptionist: I guess I’ll get a nurse to assist with these questions.

Me: Hmmm yeah I think you should.

Really now? Did a receptionist in a doctor’s office just tell me to GOOGLE how to treat my 1 year old in the event that she MIGHT have the pox?

After a quick rush to the office, Princess was diagnosed with a viral infection and is contagious as long as she has the fever.

Skip ahead to after dinner Princess blew through her pre-fold and her longies. I strip her down to her diaper and carry her straight to the tub. Monkey is pushing and shoving yelling “My turn My turn for bath”. I’m trying to block him while pulling the snappi off without it sling shotting me in the eye and not fling poop around the bathroom. Monkey’s almost made past me and the toilet to the running water half naked yelling “you bad mommy you don’t push” while I’m trying not to loose my patience by telling him it’s not his turn. Finally I had enough swung around with Princess still in my arms, poop all over her leg, prefold coming undone and hold her smack dab in his face like a carrot dangled in front of a horse. He jumps backwards, squints his face and says calmly “That’s okay I wait mom” leaving me in peace to bath the poor baby used to play interference.