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Thursday, October 24, 2013

Recommended For You:

    Hello ladies and gentlemen,
    I have recently been thinking about some websites and programs that I am aware of and  would like to recommend to you. If you already know about and take advantage of these, bravo! If not, your missing out. :)

    First, I will be sure to tell you that I am not being paid or reimbursed in any way for recommending these sites and cannot be held responsible if anything unfortunate happens when you use them. They are simply sites that I've had good success with, and I'd like to share my reviews with you, my friends!

    The first site I'll tell you about is:
    Restaurant.com sells gift certificates to local restaurants for very discounted prices! The participating restaurants are never chain businesses like DQ or Pizza Hut, but are usually personally owned establishments in your area. Some areas have lots more participating restaurants that others, so I hope you can find some near you. The prices you pay for certificates on restaurant.com are usually less than half of what the certificate is worth. But, when you have a code like the one I'm about to give you, you can do even better! Today and tomorrow, use the code CARVE when checking out and you can get a $15 certificate for $3 or a $25 certificate for $5! The great thing is, these certificates don't expire, unless of course the restaurant were to go out of business, which I've never had happen. So, I'm telling you, go check it out! These deals make date night feel even better! :)

     Secondly, there's:
   This is my favorite site for digital photo books so far. I love Mixbook because there are some many options for customizing your book. That means you can pile lots of pictures on one page if you like, add text anywhere, change text color, add stickers, etc. They also have great codes every now and then, so you can wait to print your project until a deal comes along. Check out the website, or sign up for their emails to get the codes!

    I love unique fonts, and to fill that need in my life, I use:
     Dafont provides hundreds of free fonts for personal use. There have been times in my life when I used this site more than I do now, back when I was designing our family newsletter, or making graduation or other event invitations for our family. In another life, I think I would maybe go to school for graphic design, because I love that kind of thing, but in this life, I'm a mom-to-be and very happy! :) I still find opportunities to mess around with it...home decor, invitations, Christmas cards and the like.
   
    And speaking of graphic design, there's one more program I'd like to share:
    This one is new to me...I just discovered paint.net this week. If you're into layering text, photos, ect., but don't want to pay for expensive software, this program might work for you! Now, I'm so not a pro on this kind of thing, so I may not be the best person to recommend this software. However, it works well for what I need it for, and it's free, so you won't lose much if you want to give it a try! :)

    And that's all for now! I hope that one or more of these sites can make your day a little better.
                   Happy Thursday to you!


Tuesday, October 22, 2013

An October Afternoon

     What I'm listening to:
     The O'Neill Brothers album Autumn. Piano seems like the perfect music for the mood when you're having a cozy day indoors. It also makes me miss my girlhood friends and wish for a chat over coffee and dessert.

     What I'm smelling:
     A batch of granola baking, all full of almonds, craisins, and coconut. I can't wait to try it. I'm still looking for that perfect recipe!

    What I've accomplished today:
    Not a lot.☺ Gave the blog a face-lift, made a trip to the bank, mixed up the granola, mended my husband's Sunday pants. It's a nice day for doing little projects and taking lots of breaks...☺

    What I'm feeling:
    Baby kicking...well, it feels more like twitching, but I guess that's about all the punch the wee one can pack so far. I love the feeling, and this baby's dad grins big when he can feel it too!


     We've had snow already...real white stuff that actually stayed on the ground. It covered all those leaves on our lawn too, but we still knew they were there, so now that the snow is gone, we plan to tackle the raking this evening until it gets dark.
    The icky weather changed our plans to take the youth out deer shining on Sunday night, but we still had a nice time with a chili supper and games, hot drinks and sweet stuff to eat.
   I'm not sure if it's officially too late to do fall cleaning or not, but I hope to tackle the upstairs in the next couple of weeks. Maybe it will be winter cleaning...anyway, it needs to happen before December. Tom's parents are coming home then for their first furlough, and his sister's family will also be joining us for the week, so I want to get things company ready! Plus it will give me a good head start on that nesting that is supposed to happen before the baby arrives!☺
    One last picture:           
     (not a real obvious picture of the baby bump...I don't seem to have any good ones on hand. Maybe later!)