Back to School with Shutterfly (Review & Giveaway)

While preparing for back-to-school this year, I came across Shutterfly's new lunch bags that they've paired up with Itsy Ritsy to make. I thought they were adorable! I soon noticed that you could also get water bottles through Shutterfly, so I contacted them about doing a special back-to-school review post and they were up for it! I'm excited to show you the products they sent us because we think they're so cute!

The girls and I got on the Shutterfly website and they each chose their favourite lunch bags.  Talia liked this polka dot style and I already had some cute photos that we took of her in her baptism dress that I could pop into the photo spots.  She chose the fancy font for her lunch bag and we were excited to see a matching design in the water bottle section! :)

I was really happy with the lunch bags when they arrived and I got to see them in person.  First off, they are super cute!  They have a great, strong handle with a little clip that allows you to attach it onto your backpack if you want.

They have a little zip pocket at the back for notes from mom, or whatever else you need it for (I'm putting a spare spoon in there because I already forgot to send spoons for apple sauce one day.  They each know there's an extra in the back pocket in case that happens again!)

I'm also very happy that I can fit our Easy Lunchboxes containers in them with no problem, because I use them every day!

Katrina chose this cute design because she loved the unicorns (Pegasus? )  It didn't have a matching water bottle design, so we chose a basic design with a spot for some photos and an initial.

I love that the water bottles don't have any parts that are tricky to clean.  I just use a bottle scrubber and they're quick and easy to wash.  (Can't put them in the dishwasher).  The only thing I wish I could change about them (but it's really just part of having them be metal) is that they're easy to dent if you drop them.  Katrina dropped hers (or maybe just put her backpack down kind of hard on the pavement) on the second day of school and it now has a couple of dents in it.

The last product we're trying out that I'm excited about is this Chore Chart.  It's vinyl, so it's like a big sticker.  It was easy to put on the fridge and it came with a dry erase marker with a little fuzzy part on the lid for erasing and a clip-on holder that also sticks on the fridge.  It seems to be designed more for one child, but we're going to have the girls share it (which means they'll both need to put a check mark in each box.. maybe we'll have them write their initial instead of a check mark, so we can keep track of who has done what).

Maybe you saw something in this post that you think would help you out with your back-to-school organization..?   Shutterfly is going to give one of you a $50 gift code to spend on their website for your own back-to-school organization needs!  Just fill out the form below to enter for your chance to win!

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Disclosure: We were provided with the products shared for review purposes. All opinions shared are my own!

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Our Canada Day 2014

Going back to the beginning of the summer... July 1st was Canada Day and we spent it at a Pioneer Village that had free admission for the day. We met some cousins and friends there and had fun trying out some games and activities and learning about how pioneers lived.

For dinner we headed to Gummy & Poppy's house (Ken's parents). They live on a court that has several neighbourhood traditions and for Canada day they all meet in the middle of the circle and have a picnic dinner with a bonfire, sparklers, and fireworks. The girls' grandma has a face painting hobby (which you may have seen in some of our birthday party posts here, here, and here.)  So they did a little festive body painting for each other while it was still light out :)

The girls had a lot of fun with the sparklers and then we all sat down for some fire crackers.  Katrina's face is in response to a "stink bomb" fire cracker!  Talia was loving tending to the fire (while I struggled to find a balance between "helicopter mom" and responsibly-cautious-mom as I watched her)!

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Summer Fun with Grandma & Grandpa

I am feeling a LOT better today than I have been since Thursday. It's nice to know that I'm going to start feeling like a normal human again soon. So, I decided I want to blog a bit more about some of our Summer adventures.

I've already blogged about our family trip to Palmyra and our visit to the Circus, my nephew's fun backyard birthday party, the backyard campout-turned-sleepover ;) and a visit to a farm with some awesome horse-related experiences involved.

Near the end of the summer, there was one thing left on our bucket list and my parents met us at a lake to make it happen- a beach day!  We made Katrina into a mermaid in the sand (and soon found ourselves helping to turn other kids into mermaids too!)

I didn't get any photos of Talia that weren't from far away because she spent a lot of her time making friends and playing out in the water.  Katrina preferred to create in the sand and had help from Grandma, Grandpa and Mommy (and sometimes Talia, but not while I had my camera on me!).

Because Ken is working hard to finish writing his thesis, we (the girls and I) took off to sleep over at my parents' house a couple of times in order to give Ken a quiet house to work in for some extended time.  Here is some of the fun we had while we were over there:

Sometimes my sister Amber visits with her daughter Tori and the girls get to help "mother' her- they LOVE it!  (and so do I ;)  In the top left photo (above), my mom is changing Tori's diaper with two little helpers to keep Tori happy.  One time we found my sister's old "Mall Madness" game.  THAT was a lot of fun for all of us- I think I had as much fun as the girls did!  And in the morning Talia got to help make the eggs and was amazed when we got a "double-yolker"!

I'll share a few more things from our summer in the next week.

What were some of the most memorable things you did this summer?  

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September 2014 Sharing Time - Week 1

Welcome to September's Sharing Time Linky!

Well, it finally happened... the summer ended! I wrote about my kids' first day of school and the fact that I'm home alone now! The first day of school I spent with my mom, the second day I was very productive, and then I was hit with sickness and I've spent a lot of time in bed. Taking some time to rest today and hoping to be back to normal when next week starts!

I also shared a Review and Giveaway of Kidecals Labels. 

Follow the link to enter the Giveaway!

For now, on to the link party- I can't wait to see what you share! :)

Please join the Raising Memories Sharing Time & add a link to your latest and greatest blog posts
about activities to do with your children or fun projects that you have done!

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If you're participating, please share the button on your blog & "hop over" to at least one other blog post that's been linked up- let's support each other!

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An InLinkz Link-up

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Kidecals Labels Review & Giveaway

As we've prepared for back-to-school this year, we've tried out Kidecals labels. The ones we chose are cute circle shapes and come in two sizes. We've used the small ones the most, and you can order a set with just the smaller size if you like or with half the larger and half the smaller which is what we did.  You can have your child's last name on the label as well (I've blocked ours out for internet posting purposes ;)

We've used them for shoes, jackets, tags on backpacks and clothing, and metal water bottles so far.  I love that they're washable (dishwasher or laundry safe) and so cute!  We got a different style for each girl and they had fun browsing their options on the website :)

Shown above are the small labels except for the bottom of the water bottle which is the larger size.

We've been really happy with these labels so far, and I thought you would be too, so I asked Kidecals if they'd like to do a giveaway and they said yes!  By filling out the form below, you can enter to win a $30 voucher to spend on their site! (They have free shipping anywhere in the U.S.  You can still win the giveaway if you're not in the U.S. because they ship internationally, but you'll have to cover the cost of shipping)

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Disclosure: We were provided with labels for review purposes. All opinions shared here are my own!

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Back to School and Home Alone!

Yesterday was the first day of school here. Here are my little students, ready to go:

I surprised myself with how much I was able to do before they left. I had ideas of things to do to make the day special and fun for them, but I wasn't sure that I would have the time to do them. The night before, Talia asked me to paint her nails and I did, then Katrina wanted the same but we were out of time, but I actually had time to do them before school in the morning. When I took them to school, I overheard Katrina happily telling her little friend (who was a boy) about her painted nails :)

I managed to crank out a fun breakfast that I saw online (apple shaped pancakes) and I made some little apple place-mats for our dinner that night and got out some cute napkins and cups and straws. Dinner was not fancy (it's so not my area of expertise or enjoyment).. we had "dippy eggs" and toast ;) Then we went to a local frozen yogurt shop (where you get to serve yourself & choose from lots of toppings) for a special treat.

Intentions

This summer I had a goal to do a lot of fun things with the girls to try to make happy memories for them. I made a plan at the beginning of the season, we made summer bucket lists and we talked about what we could do that would cost us the least. We did most of what I wanted to do and I'm really happy with the way that it went! Towards the end of the summer though, I started to think about how intentional I had been with making fun memories and though I felt good about that, I realized that I had let some other things slide a bit (we hadn't been very good about reading scriptures together daily or doing family prayer each day). I think those things are very important for our family, so I decided that I needed to be more intentional about fitting those things in, as we move into the school year.

Goals

Ken and I talked and decided that with the way his schedule is right now, we could all wake up at 7am each morning and have family scripture study and prayer together, to start the day. It's day two and we're going strong ;) haha I feel good about this goal and I think it's going to work as long as his schedule stays like this (we'll see what happens when he graduates in a few months- adjustments may have to be made).

Changes

It's hard to believe that I've really come to this point of having both of my kids at school all day, every school day. Katrina's in grade one and Talia's in grade three. I won't have any little side kicks with me during the weekdays anymore! I'm looking forward to the extra time I will have to get things done and hopefully keep things more in order in our home. I'm working on figuring out how best to manage my time so that I can be most present with my family when the girls (and Ken) come home from school. I have lots of ideas but instead of sharing them now, I'll share them when/if I do them!

Although I'm excited for the extra productive time I will have, I am also sad to see my little munchkins go for so much of the week. I have really enjoyed having them home during the summer. I can't let myself think too deeply about it, or I'm likely to cry, so I just stop myself whenever my thoughts try to go there!

Have you hit that stage when all of your kids are off to school?
If so, what have you learned along the way about how to make the most of your time both while they're at school and when they're home?

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