The Reason For #BehindthePaw

We all love our pets…

abby

I miss my dog, Abby. For us right now a dog just wasn’t a good decision. We didn’t have enough time to play with her like she deserved. Maybe one day we will get a dog again. They so quickly become one of our children. We spoil them, love them and want nothing but the best for them.

I’m excited to see what @Iams and @Eukenuba are up to as we probably further in the future will get a dog again. For now we love playing with the dogs in our neighborhood. And Connie, Summer, Christine, and Ashley all have dogs. So the odds of my readers you guys having dogs is pretty high!!!

I wish I was there but look forward to watching #BehindthePaw through these bloggers :

Diane from To Dog With Love, @ToDogWithLove, @CosmoHavanese

Wendy from PetSide, @PetSide

Kathleen from Examiner, @RileyRants

Susan from Best in Show Daily, @BestinShowDaily

Sandra from Alasandra, the Cats and a Dog, @AlasandraAFSS

Dorian from Your Daily Cute, @YourDailyCute

Dr. Huston from Pet Health Care Gazette, @LorieAHuston

Michele from Pet News and Views, @PetNewsandViews

Connie on behalf of MomStart, @miscfinds4u

Alison from the Ontario SPCA, @OntarioSPCA

Natashya from Living in the Kitchen with Puppies, @kitchenpuppies

Deborah from Raising My Boys, @Mom2Michael

Inside Krispy Kreme Winston-Salem North Carolina

Taking a tour through Krispy Kreme is not a lite matter, in fact it’s filling and quite sweet!

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This is a picture of the Krispy Kreme headquarters in Winston-Salem North Carolina. Inside there is the beginning of every Krispy Kreme doughnut. They create the beginning of the mix that is distributed world wide, so they have touched every doughnut in a way. The quality of every doughnut is of upmost importance to Krispy Kreme.

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The tour included a little history and that was the best part about Krispy Kreme to me was that it wasn’t just a boring history lesson it was a lesson filled with stories, personal connections with the brand. Like the photo above, this is how they used to cut their doughnuts. They would roll it out on a wood table, cut them with this and then after they were fresh and hot they would store them in a wood box.

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They didn’t know all the things about wood that we know now. Now every doughnut is made form a mix. that mix is created at the headquarters and distributed world wide. In each region of the world taste buds and regulations are different so the recipe is a little different for some of the doughnuts variations. However, the original doughnut is as close to the same as it can possibly be for each region.  They mentioned a green tea doughnut and I want to go to the country that sells that doughnut just to taste it. Krispy Kreme really understands their customers, it’s rooted into their company motto. Of course they care about how many doughnuts they sell but what’s even more important to them is enhancing the lives of others through joy.

Our tour included the store front model. Here they simulate how things are to be positioned and how they should look. Are the doughnuts easy to put together and how do the drinks come together. On day two we even went back there and created our own drinks. I’ll tell you more about that fun later.

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And it included ever so beautiful hair caps and lab coats. Pictured here is my friend Liz (A Nut in a Nutshell) and me.

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We also saw the doughnut assembly line. They make all the variations of doughnuts on this machine, they run them in shifts. That’s actually something I didn’t realize. I thought every store made only the glaze doughnuts  Plus we had an original doughnut hot off the line. YUM!

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Krispy Kreme prides themselves on their high standards. They don’t accept flour unless it’s up to specifications and they monitor everything with state of the art technology.

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We also had the privilege of seeing the original Krispy Kreme recipe.

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Behind this safe

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Inside this envelope. Ok, that’s as far as he got. He said it was his first time to ever hold the envelope, but no one gets to look at the original Krispy Kreme recipe, it’s TOP SECRET.

 

Travel and expenses were covered by Krispy Kreme.

Do You Have Time To Play? Holiday Showcases and Prizes

It’s certainly the Holiday Season now and time to get something for everyone on your list, or to give a toy to someone in need. Back in September, I couldn’t get into the holiday spirit, but Time To Play was ready. I attended an outstanding event and I’ve mentioned it a few times here in there in different toy reviews. The Time To Play Holiday Toy Showcase is THE EVENT to attend if you review toys. They announced their top picks for toys this holiday season and all the brands showed us the whole kit and caboodle. I LOVED this event and hope more than anything that I get to go back next year. Here are my highlights and toys you need to consider:

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At Time To Play you’ll find anything and everything toys. Buying advice, how long the toys last will the kids go back and play with them time and time again. You can watch the toys in action, and find out just about anything you wanted to know. It’s an amazing resource you should go and check out.

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PLUS

Time To Play Live Twitter Party Every Week.

As for Time to Play parties, we have two weekly initiatives:

· #TimetoPlayLive: a weekly Twitter game show where participants answer toy trivia for the chance to win prizes; every Wednesday 1 PM EST

· Time to Play with Jim and Chris: a live web television show on www.TimetoPlay.TV where Jim and Chris (and the occasional special guest) highlight what’s new in the toy world. Viewers can enter to win prizes by participating and answering questions in the chatroom; every Friday 12 PM EST

Types of Questions:

  1. Letter Play – Similar to hangman, players must fill in the missing letters of a toy, character or children’s entertainment word or name. Asterisks (*) denote a space between words, e.g., T_me*t_*P_ay (Time to Play).
  2. Web Play – Using existing knowledge or the internet players must answer a toy industry or TimetoPlayMag.com related question.
  3. Name Play – Several clues will be provided and players must guess the identity of the toy or children’s character.
  4. Final Play – Common Thread – We will provide a series of short clues that all have something in common. Using existing knowledge or the internet, players must identify what ’common thread’ ties these clues together

So let’s review, at Time To Play you can win toys, find toys, learn about toys. It’s your one stop for everything toys. If you need help finding the perfect gift for the little one in your life, be it, boy girl, daughter, son, niece nephew, or grandchild, Time To Play has the information you need to make the best toy decision.

 

Time To Play covered my travel and expenses to spend the day in New York for the Time To Play Holiday Showcase.

I Need Help in the Hillshire Farms Most Wanted Sandwich Vote Apple Champ!

 

There are 15 different sandwich recipes all competing for the Hillshire Farms Most Wanted Sandwich. The winner will receive 5,000 to keep and another 5,000 to donate to charity. We had to choose our charity up front, and I chose to give mine to The Eastside Domestic Violence Program. So your voting is going to make a huge difference, no matter who wins, a very worthy charity is going to win too! Each of us competing against each other brought our game day faces as we went head to head making our local fresh variety sandwiches. I created the Apple Champ:

 

_0003_The Apple Champ

Apple Champ

Potato Bread

Honeycrisp Apple (grated with a cheese grader) If you can’t find a honeycrisp let’s use a granny smith apple
Hillshire Farm Signature Honey Ham
Sharp Cheddar Cheese Slice
Honey Mustard dressing

Directions:

1. Use an cheese grater to grate up the apple, by grating the apple you can add as much or as little apple as you like. Spritz with some lemon juice if you want the apple to keep it’s fresh look and color

Hillshire_Kessler_05902. Place the Ham on the sandwich

3. Place one slice of cheddar on the ham

4. Place the grated up apple on the sandwich

5. Drizzle some honey mustard over the top of the apple

Voting started yesterday so I’m a little bit behind, ok, I’m actually really far behind, but I know we can catch up.

All I need you to do is to go to GoMeat.com and vote for the Apple Champ, you might have to scroll over to vote for me. Remember, Apple Champ, Louise Bishop, http://momstart.com Mom Start.  Once you vote you will receive the opportunity to download a coupon to save on your next purchase of Hillshire Farms Fresh Deli Lunch Meat. It’s our family favorite and has been for 7 or 8 years.

Go Meat!

I Need Help What To Wear? Boots or Heels?

I’m attending the red carpet premier of Gnomeo and Juliet with Elton John and 14 other bloggers on behalf of Disney and I want to dress appropriately. We have three days of events and the dress code is

Friday, 1/21 – Casual attire.

Saturday, 1/22 – “Nice” casual attire.

Sunday, 1/23 – “Nice” attire (the actual red carpet event which is an afternoon premier so we were told to leave the ball gowns at home, but since I never get to dress up I’m tempted to wear one anyways)

So I’m going to be looking at my friends and their closets for help. But I did go out shopping with the kids the other day and I bought a dress, but I went really safe so if it’s not red carpet approved by you guys then I’ll wear it on the day before. I just need to know what category the dress falls into and if you like the boots or the heels better?

This Dress is from Karen Millen

The Boots are from Camper: (300.00 shoes I purchased for 20.00)

Karen Miller Dress with Boots

 

Again the Dress is Karen Millen

The Heels are  from ClarksKaren Miller Dress with Heels

Help me please?

Should I look for anther dress?

Should I wear the boots or the heels?

I’m taking the dress with me on the trip no matter what, the question is do I wear this dress on Day to as Nice Casual or day three, nice!???

I feel Inspired…Great Wolf Lodge Eco Moms Event

I can’t believe it’s almost been a full week since Kristin (Our Ordinay Life) organized and put on The Great Wolf Lodge Eco Moms Event. I’ve been working on a small local event and I’m not even the point person like Kristin was for the Eco Mom event and I can’t imagine how she stayed organized and on top of things. Yes, first I have to tell you how amazing Kristin is.

Kristin is a mother to two adorable girls, a wife to a husband that cares about her very much, a college student almost ready to graduate with a business degree, and a full time blogger making a business out of what she does. But on top of all of that she is Passionate, very passionate about everything organic and teaching others how to share in her passion. She took her passion and made a Mommy Blogger Event out of it, that just amazes me, She amazes me.

The first night there we went out to eat at a local restaurant and everything they served was organic. OMG, the chocolate dessert was to die for. I shared it with my son, and my husband shared his with our daughter and it was gone in seconds!

Great Wolf Lodge Eco Moms 2010

Day 2 we were mostly on our own. Great Wolf Lodge provided each of us with a Magic Quest adventure, I finished one quest. Yeah, it’s tough taking a two year old and a 3 your old up and down the stairs, but it was so much fun anyways. They got wands at the Howl O Ween event that we attend the month before and the great thing about Magic Quest is that once you have the wand you can just have them re-activated whenever you return. Little kids use demo mode and everything still interacts with the wands.

That night, Kristin had an organic wine tasting party. That was lots of fun too and she handed out door prizes and tons of organic swag. As I said before, I can’t imagine the hours she spent organizing this event.

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It isn’t often that you can attend an event where the whole family can attend. It makes sense though, that organic companies and Great Wolf Lodge (a family resort) would be invested in families and I’m very grateful for the opportunity and relationship I gained at this event.

On Day 3 we had the actual conference. I wasn’t able to stay for very much of it. It started off with learning from Great Wolf Lodge about all of their efforts to go 100 percent green.  It’s taking a lot of time because it is a lot easier to be 100 percent green when you start with building the building that way, but I’m still very impressed with everything they are doing to get there. The water park can not be green certified because there are no green certifications for water parks. Check out Project Green Wolf to learn more about Great Wolf Lodge and it’s efforts to be green.

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There is no waste in their water park and all water in the resort, even the water in the hotel rooms is heated in the same location. The only water loss is splash out by guests and they are using as many LED lights as they can making it very cost efficient to have rides that light up!

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Then came all of the fun stuff that I’m sad to say, I missed out on like making butter, eating Nature’s Path Samples.

Nature's Path Samples

Gardening 101gardening supplies

Making Home made soapimage

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Special Thanks to : Great Wolf Lodge, Nature’s Path, and Organic Valley. There were many other organizations that helped with the Great Wolf Lodge Eco Event, they are all listed on Kristin’s site.

I feel inspired to start being green around my house. I’m going to be taking baby steps but I invite you to take them with me. I have a friend that is going to be sharing a green tip with us once a day for the month of December.

Be red and Green this Holiday Season!

eBay Green Team Introduces The eBay Box

Last week I spent some time in San Jose with eBay learning about different things going on around eBay. They have a great advertising campaign with Samantha Bee called the “Unwrap Attack” and it make me laugh until I cried it was so cute, real, and funny. Of course I’ll have more on that later this week, but I was so excited by The Box that I just had to share it today.

 

showing off the eBay box

 

The eBay Box is made of 100 % recycled material, and printed with an earth friendly water based ink. The eBay box is quite an exciting opportunity eBay is using as a community builder within eBay. Sellers receive the boxes and register the eBay box at thebox.ebay.com. Just by registering the box you will receive one eBay buck. How exciting is that, earn money and save the environment at the same time. Who does that? eBay does that!. Then after you sell something on-line at eBay or recycle some type of electronic product with ebay’s electronic recycling program, they will buy it back from you and then re-sell it through one of their seller’s stores, so trade in your used electronics.  I was amazed at how eBay supports their users and already has a community among the company, buyers and sellers and this eBay Box project is just going to make it an even bigger community. Then ship your box. The Ebay Box

A view inside the ebay boxOn the side of the eBay box it says,

“If this box is reused 5 times, here’s what you contribute to the planet:

13.8 lbs of wood preserved for the future,

27.3 gallons of wastewater flow saved,

3.1 lbs of solid waste not generated,

849,767 BTUs of energy not consumed,

15.2 lbs of greenhouse gasses not generated.”

I’m not generally a green blogger, but with all of the packages I receive every week, I’ve been noticing which companies or PR agencies are trying to use environmentally friendly packaging and who is not and most are not. I have so much waste every week and that’s why I’m impressed with eBay and the fact that they are aware of how much waste goes into shipping. Even recycling uses natural resources, so reusing is even better than recycling, but for those of us that are just starting to recycle, at least we’re doing something to be eco-friendly. I urge you to follow in eBay’s steps and go even greener this Holiday season and into next year.

side view of the ebay box

Disclosure: In accordance to the FTC Guidelines and WOMMA Code of Ethics, I am disclosing that my time, travel and accommodations have been compensated by eBay for my participation in the Love to Give campaign. Although I have a material connection to eBay, any publicly stated opinions of eBay remain my own.

Leaving On A Jet Plane…

This morning I find myself sitting in the airport waiting on an airplane to travel to Silicon Valley. At least that’s where my husband said I’m going, I’m traveling today to San Jose to meet with a brand. Yep, I’m being vague. I was given specific instructions to not mention anything about the trip until after the trip or I can tweet what I learn during the trip but it’s top secret until Friday.

cuddle2So, I have a lot of posts that I have been working on and last night I decided to spend my time with my family instead of getting caught up. I’m going to have all day after I land in a hotel room, so I figure I’ll write then. Last night I was singing a song that often gets stuck in my head from the movie Armageddon. I sing it so often that last night Miles started softly singing with me. He has the cutest most adorable voice.

So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you’ll wait for me
Hold me like you’ll never let me go
‘Cause I’m leaving on a jet plane
I don’t know when I’ll be back again
Oh, babe, I hate to go
Now the time has come to leave you
One more time, oh, let me kiss you
And close your eyes and I’ll be on my way

These blogging trips always sound so very exciting to me and when it finally comes down to the day of going, all I can think about is how much I’m going to miss my kids and that I already miss them. I miss them  the night before I leave while they are sleeping in their rooms. I always have fun and learn a lot and make great on-line friendships but my kids just are on my sleeve. Of course I miss my husband too and worry about him being left alone with the kids. He’s a lot stronger and more patient than I am when it comes to the kids. I’ll miss my neighbors now too. We have the best neighbors anyone could ever ask for. We seem them almost every day and chat outside while our children are all playing together. I almost feel like my day is incomplete without seeing all of them. So I’ll see everyone when I get back, and I’ll share my experience. I miss you already kids!

I am excited to go even though I’m going to miss everyone. I’ve never been to San Jose before.

I’m leaving on a Jet Plane….